PREFACE

These lengthy autobiographical letters from Pakistan to my parents in America, the originals of which are now part of the manuscript collection of The New York Public Library, include the most decisive and important period of my life (1962-4). During this time, after an unnaturally prolonged adolescence, I matured into full adulthood, grew completely independent from my parents, developed my literary career, married and finally became a mother.

My migration was a Hijra, the sole and only motivation being to find a place hopefully where Islam could be practiced much more fully than in my native land. I came to Pakistan from America, newly converted to Islam, and sought nothing except complete integration and acceptance into a traditional, orthodox Islamic society. This is what I wanted -and found- in Pattoki where I lived for almost a year.

The impression I had formed of Maulana Maudoodi during my correspondence with him in America between 1960-1962, which resulted in my migration to Pakistan, was very different from the reality I found after arrival. He, too, was equally surprised and dismayed when he found me to be absolutely unlike the girl he had anticipated. That the actual ideals and goals of the Maulana’s re-interpretation of Islam were very far from the traditional orthodoxy in which I sought to live and immerse myself, I did not fully discover until long afterwards.

10 The following letters describe in great detail all my experiences, adventures (and mishaps) in the initial period after my arrival in Pakistan. All the persons described are real as I reacted to them at first hand as a newcomer to their country when everything was fresh, new and exciting.

Most astonishing to the reader is why a modern American girl, born and raised in the metropolis of New York, should seek her happiness and fulfillment at any cost in a poverty-stricken, so-called “backward”, “Third-World” country? The contents of these letters all provide ample response to that question.

Maryam Jameelah

Lahore Ramadan 1, 1408 (April 18, 1988)

11 “The Hellenic Torch” The Hellenic Lines Ltd. Alexandria, Egypt

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

June 3, 1962

Dear Mother and Daddy,

When we reached Alexandria this morning, I was so pleasantly surprised to find three letters from you waiting for me. It was certainly wonderful to hear from you and I particularly appreciated that lovely letter from cousin Judy and that she thought enough of me to take the time to write it. I wished I had received your letter of May 22nd on my 28th birthday. It certainly would have brightened up an otherwise most unhappy day.

I hope you have already received my letter of May 25th and that it did not depress you too much because today when our ship reached Alexandria, a long dark night emerged into day. The unhappy circumstances which I described in my last letter were inevitable and really could not have been different. It was a long, gloomy night because it is terrible to have to live among the nonbelievers. When I talk to them, even if we both speak English, it is impossible to communicate. Our minds are so far apart, it is as if we lived on different planets.

Nearly a week ago, we reached Naples, Italy. The ship did not stop at the port but remained a little distance from it while a tanker refilled our supply of fuel-oil. Next, a motor boat came and picked up the English girl, her two children and her two servants. I was glad to see the English girl go because her snobbishness was most unpleasant. Two days later, we reached Crete about sunset and did not leave until nearly sunrise. Thelma, Sherman, the old Greek man and the three Greek deportees all got off there and I could hardly wait to see them go. That day I decided it didn’t matter what 2 they thought of me so I decided to have my meals with them again instead of alone as usual in my room. When I came in for breakfast, our places were all set close together at one end of the long table. As soon as Thelma saw me, she did not hesitate to move her place to the opposite end and when Sherman, her husband, came in, he did the same. However, the old Greek man was still friendly although he didn’t like my long Muslim clothes and wondered why an American girl would not want to wear modern Western dress? I tried to explain to him, but he didn’t understand. However, he still remained on talking terms with me. Lunch was just like breakfast, but at supper, Sherman opened up and pretended to be friendly as if nothing had happened. Thelma followed suit and she even gave me some spare soap flakes she could not pack as well as other odds and ends. Just as if nothing had happened, Thelma invited me to her room while she and her husband packed. She was so tipsy with drink, she could hardly think clearly and I helped her as best I could. It is so strange but Sherman and Thelma kept telling me how much they hated the Arabs and the Muslims because they “lived in filth and squalor,” yet when the ship stopped at Crete, and by the time they were ready to leave, no place could have been filthier than the way they left their room. There was garbage and waste-paper strewn all over the furniture and the floor along with dozens of cigarette butts and ashes. I must have found more dozens of liquor bottles under their beds, broken and empty. The floor was stained with spilt liquor and soft-drinks. The bathroom had never been cleaned and the tiled floor was littered with sodden rolls of unused toilet-paper. Without a word, while I was talking to them, I started to clean up the mess as best I could but Thelma noticed immediately what I was doing and told me that this is what the steward was paid to do. I didn’t answer them but thought this was such a disgrace, I didn’t even want the steward to have to do it. Anyhow, I did clean up the worst of the mess without a word of criticism of how I felt about it. Thelma seemed very bitter and told me she was going to write the shipping company an angry letter complaining about the abominable food. By the time they were finally ready to get off, Sherman and Thelma acted just as friendly to me as they did at first and were wishing me a pleasant trip. I told them that I wished them the same and then turned to Thelma and 3 said; “I hope yours will be a happy trip. Please try to be happy.” Thelma then asked for my address in Pakistan and promised to send me a postcard. I am glad that everything turned out all right in the end but I do feel very sorry for both of them. Thelma is six years older than her husband (who is 30) and I cannot help but wonder what ever attracted him to marry an alcoholic? They seemed quite fond of each other but the old Greek man said he suspected they were just pretending. I don’t really know but I am quite sure there was a great deal which was never evident on the surface.

Anyhow, they are all gone now. The Indian student, another young blonde Greek who is going to Calcutta to work three years for this shipping company and myself are the only passengers left. Nearly all the crew also got off at Crete and we have a completely new crew including a new steward and a new Captain. Aside from the Captain, they neither speak nor understand more than a few words of English. Yesterday was another uneventful day at sea. The Indian student is so completely westernized in outlook that he insists I call him “Jack”. I said that I knew his real name was Jehangir Govind but he does not like me to call him by his Indian name because he says I cannot pronounce it properly. When he read the last chapter of my novel, “Ahmad Khalil”, he told me that what India needs is more young men like the son, “Ismail”, to raise the miserable standard of living. The young Greek man then joined our conversation and told me how much better he liked Beirut than Damascus “because Beirut is just like a European, western city”. He told me that he also hated the Arabs and the Muslims because they are so “backward, ignorant, filthy and religious fanatics”. When the Captain joined us at dinner, he continued in the same vein. The first thing he did was to criticize my Hijab. He said he just couldn’t understand why an otherwise attractive young American girl would want to dress like the backward people of the Middle East? I told him that I was a Muslim and wanted to LOOK like a Muslim and that this was the dress which made me most comfortable and happy. He made no further comment but went on and on about his visit to Turkey three months ago. He said that he hated the Turks because they were such “religious fanatics.” When I asked him what he meant by “fanatical”, he said that they refused 4 to eat pork and do anything contrary to the Quran for fear of going to Hell. They also avoided contact whenever they could with non- Muslim Europeans and Americans for fear of having their religion and culture destroyed which he said, he hoped would happen because Western civilization was far superior in every way. He said that unfortunately the Kemalist government was not successful and efficient in carrying out its persecution of Islam. Except for Istanbul, Ankara and Izmir, which are westernized and where many Europeans live, the rest of Turkey is as backward, reactionary and fanatical as ever. When the Captain finished his description of Turkey, I really wanted to go there. He convinced me that perhaps Turkey is still much more of an Islamic country than I had thought. The young Indian student, then said, if I wanted to say my five prayers a day, it was all right with him, but he couldn’t see any sense to it. “All religions are man-made. All religions are alike. It doesn’t make any difference which one you choose. They only differ in trivial rituals. When you are children, your parents tell you that God is everywhere and to pray in order that you learn to do good, but once you are strong enough, you can dispense with God and prayer because you will do good anyway. I am strong enough so I don’t need to pray,” Jack continued. “I just do whatever my conscience tells me is right and let it go at that. I have no use for any organized religion.” The Captain agreed and added that the Quran is completely “out-of-date” and unsuited to modern life. The young Greek then looked at me and said; “You will see what I mean when you arrive in the Muslim world and see all their filth, ignorance, poverty and backwardness for yourself. Why don’t you go back to America and on the way, stop and visit Israel?”

We arrived in Alexandria about six-thirty this morning. I was awake at dawn and when I finished my Fajr prayer, rushed up to the Captain’s deck to get my first glimpse of the Muslim world. I was not at all excited. I just felt wonderfully calm and serene. Just as the sun rose, I saw it - at first a mere shadowy reflection on the water and, as the ship drew closer and closer, I saw many little fishing sailing boats on the water with dark men dressed in flowing white gowns, turbans and skull caps. When they saw me, they immediately knew from my Hijab that I was Muslim and they 5 smiled and waved. “Assalaam alaikum!” (peace be with you) they called out to me and I answered back; “Wa Alaikum Salaam!” I felt such a glow of happiness, you cannot imagine. The long, dark night on the sea was over.

After breakfast at seven o’clock, a dragoman offered to show me the sights of Alexandria. At first I was suspicious and afraid I might be taken unfairly advantage of but the dragoman showed me his papers authorized by the Egyptian government and the Captain said it was all-right. At first, he was quite cold, stiff and overly formal, telling me the itinerary but after I told him I was a converted Muslim who was going to live in Lahore, and wanted only to attend a prayer service in the mosque, his whole manner changed at once. We took a taxi to the heart of the Old City and then got out and walked. It was exactly as I imagined it would be. In fact, I felt as if I had been there a thousand times before. Yet, the buildings were so dilapidated, they looked as if they were ready to collapse at any minute and most of the people, particularly the children, were dressed in little better than rags. To my pleasant surprise, there were many - men, women and children alike - who still clung to their native Arab dress. Most of the children looked extremely disheveled and some of the men were, as the young Greek had said, unbelievably dirty. The streets, though quite wide, were in a sad state of neglect and disrepair. There were few trucks and cars but many horse-drawn two-wheeled wagons. Once in a while a young man clad in a brilliant striped gown, rode past on a bicycle with a huge tray of bread on his head. Some of the black-gowned women carried crates of live chickens on their heads as well. Yes, here was all the “poverty” and “backwardness” so contemptuously described to me in every book about Egypt that I read and every westerner who had been there, I met.

Yet I saw things that they never could see. Despite the poverty, there was nothing depressing. The children played happily in the streets with no toys save what their ingenuity and resourcefulness could contrive. Hawkers chanted the virtues of their wares in rhythmic song. Two small girls walked by arm in arm. A young father carried his baby daughter astride his shoulders. No, this was not a sad place. These were happy people! At least I could not help but get that impression. They seemed gentle, kindly and 6 courteous. As we walked along, I felt that I was truly among friends. What is more, I felt as if I were one of them.

After we had walked about a mile, the dragoman told me he would like me to meet his wife and children. We climbed a flight of rickety steps when the dragoman knocked on the door and called out. His wife opened it and I was invited inside. The wife was cooking the midday meal in a dark, dingy kitchen where chickens—both hens and roosters—strolled all over the floor. However, the two bedrooms were very clean and neat. The dragoman and I sat down on the sofa while his son and daughter squatted on the matted floor. They offered me a bottle of Coca-Cola and after I finished, he introduced his children to me. His daughter, Amina, was a dark, alert, bright-eyed child, bare-footed in a ragged dress. She held her baby sister in her arms trying to fondle and comfort it gently as it cried and whimpered continuously. Although the wife was quite plump, the baby was pitifully thin and looked very malnourished. The son was attractive and neatly dressed and his father asked him to read some verses from the Quran. He chanted the Quran for about fifteen minutes and read some of the commentary by Ibn Kathir, in the back also. I was very impressed how a child that age could read so fluently (I was certain he could not be more than nine or ten years old). I asked him how old he was and he said he was fourteen.

The dragoman and his son then took me on a tour of the mosques in the neighbourhood. Each one contained the tomb of some Saint whom I did not yet know with the exception of Ghazi Abd al Qadir, the great Sufi mujahid who fought the French against overwhelming odds for the freedom of Algeria and passed the last years of his life in Damascus, writing mystical commentaries about the 12th-century Sufi Master, Ibn al Arabi who also passed away in Damascus. We peeked in the windows where groups of children were studying the Quran. I asked the dragoman to take me inside one of those Kuttabs or Quranic schools and meet the class. When the boys heard I was an American, they could hardly believe it! They had never heard of an American girl who chose to be a Muslim and live in a Muslim country.

Finally we went to the main mosque in the Old City to say our 7 Luhr or early afternoon prayer. Although this was only an ordinary week-day prayer, we had a congregation of at least fifty men. I was the only woman present. It was so wonderfully peaceful and serene. There were no rugs but instead we knelt to pray on reed mats. On the rafters, thousands of sparrows had made their nests and fluttered in and out unmolested. It is such a wonderful thing, that it doesn’t matter which mosque you go to anywhere in the world, the service is exactly the same and you feel so utterly at home and at peace.

After the prayers were over, naturally I was quite an object of curiosity and they all came over to meet me while the dragoman told them who I was. Dark, turbaned men in the flowing gallabiya—the young as well as the old—asked me how as an American, I chose to be Muslim? Were an American (especially a Jewish person) to ask me that, they would look for complicated psychological explanations and seek for a clue of some mental abnormality, but here all I had to say was, “Allah guides whom He pleases,” and they all understood perfectly. Then I noticed three or four ragged men and boys sound asleep, curled up on one of the mats in the corner of the mosque. I didn’t have to ask why they were there. You know, Khadijah Faisal, of the Islamic Mission in Brooklyn told me that when she goes to make her early morning prayer, she often finds a half dozen black men curled up on the rug in the mosque fast asleep. They have been evicted from their homes because of inability to pay rent or are travellers who have nowhere else to stay. This is one of the ways the mosque is a refuge for the poor and serves the people in the community. The Imam led both of us to the shabby back-room which serves as his “office.” I sat cross-legged on an old sofa and the dragoman sat on the floor and the Imam on a rickety chair by a rickety table. He asked me if there was anything about Islam I wished him to explain to me. I said I could not think of any particular point at the moment but asked him if he knew Dr. Mahmud Hoballah, the Imam of the Islamic Center in Washington D.C.? He replied vigorously in the affirmative. “He was a personal friend of mine,” he added. When I told him that Maulana Sayyid Abul Ala Maudoodi had invited me to live as a member of his family, he said, “Maulana Maudoodi is one of the best Muslims in Pakistan. I am going to write him a short 8 letter just now and convey my best wishes to him. Please give it to him when you meet him.” I promised that I would.

It is strange, yet perhaps not so strange to anyone who knows me well, but I do not feel as if I had gone away. As I walked the streets of the old city of Alexandria today, I felt as if these people were truly my own people. On the ship, I have been constantly asked why as an American, I dress as I do. Nobody I met in Alexandria asked me that. Every man, woman and child knew. No, I don’t feel as if I have gone away. Rather, I feel as if I have come home.

All my love,

Maryam 9 “The Hellenic Torch” The Hellenic Lines Ltd.

Port Sudan, Sudan

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

June 10, 1962

Dear Mother and Daddy,

The day after our ship left Alexandria, Egypt, we arrived in Port Said. Port Said proved to be a terrible disappointment in every way. In fact, with the exception of Beirut, it must be one of the most westernized cities in the entire Middle East. All the buildings in the city which I saw were of modern Western architecture; even most of the signs on the shops were in English. The people were equally disappointing. Nobody greeted me with “Assalaam alaikum.” I doubt if they even know what “Assalaam alaikum” means! In contrast with the warm friendliness of the people I met in Alexandria, those of Port Said are cold, hard and utterly mercenary. They are not interested in you unless they think they can cheat you. Our ship was flooded with hawkers displaying the most worthless, hideous junk you ever saw. In the Old City of Alexandria, they would gladly give you the shirt off their backs; in Port Said, they would not hesitate to steal everything you own if they could get away with it. I did not see a single Egyptian in Port Said in native Arab dress. All wore modern Western clothes. The men and boys all wore Western hats with brims. Nearly all of them could speak at least some English or French. In the harbour were many other ships; next to ours, was a giant freighter from Soviet Russia and nearby several from other Communist countries in Eastern Europe. I hated Port Said and everybody in it the instant I saw it and couldn’t wait to leave this horrible place. Not for nothing did Maulana Maudoodi in one of his letters to me, describe Port Said along with Beirut as “the latrine of the West.”

10 Fortunately, we only stayed there one day.

It took nearly two more days to go through the Suez Canal; there is nothing for me to say about this for the scenery along the way could not have been more dull and uninteresting. We traveled through most of the Suez Canal during the night so it was impossible to see much anyway. An Egyptian pilot came aboard to steer the ship until we reached the Red Sea. He had been educated in England and so naturally had the complete Western outlook. He asked me why I dressed as I did when there were so many young modern Egyptian girls with short hair, short tight skirts and high heels? When I told him I became a Muslim a year ago, he asked me whether or not I said my prayers? Of course, I answered him politely in the affirmative but inside I was just fuming with anger. I couldn’t think of a more foolish question. Why would I ever embrace a religion if I did not intend to follow it? How stupid can people get? What can you do with them?

The day before yesterday just before sunset, we finally reached Port Sudan. I could hardly wait to arrive and prayed that it would not be another Port Said. Just after the ship anchored, two customs officials came aboard. They were dressed in British uniforms but were black with tribal scars across their faces. Without really intending to be rude, I found myself staring at them. In a flash one of them whirled about and asked me in cold fury: “Haven’t you ever seen a black man before?” I was so stunned, I didn’t know what to say. I felt as if he had stabbed me with a knife. He didn’t care if I were Muslim: perhaps because in staring, I had not behaved like one. All that mattered to him was that I had a white face and he had a black face. I could imagine how much humiliation he had suffered at the hands of the racist British. Now that Sudan was independent, he would take out his revenge upon me.

Yesterday was Friday and I was determined to go ashore and attend the Juma Salat in one of the near-by mosques. Fortunately, because Port Sudan is little more than a small town, I had no trouble finding one. I made my ablutions, took off my shoes and walked barefooted inside. Although I had come nearly three hours too early, there were plenty of men lying on the matted floor of the mosque fast asleep or reciting the Quran. I walked up to the 21 balcony, thinking this was the women’s section and sat down. Just before the service was about to begin, a dignified looking man (no doubt one of the caretakers of the mosque) walked up and indicated that I was not supposed to be there. He led me outside where reed mats were spread on the ground and all over the pavement on the surrounding streets. Although this mosque was quite a good-sized one, the congregation was so large, less than half could fit inside the mosque; the rest of them spilled out all over the streets outside. There must have been at least two thousand men in this one mosque alone. Port Sudan is only a little town but it has fifteen mosques! In contrast to Port Said, nearly everybody wears the long white gown and turban. Western dress is rare and the westernized Sudanese in Western dress, you generally don’t find interested enough to attend the mosque. They wear nothing but white which is a beautiful contrast with their black skins. I prayed next to an old shriveled toothless lady in rags who looked at least ninety years old. Out of the hundreds present, she and I were the only women there.

After the congregational prayer was over, I decided to try and meet the Imam. I knew I would have to find him myself as nobody spoke English. I went inside the mosque as the men were leaving. However, quite a large number remained to listen to one of the most impassioned speeches I have ever heard. Of course I couldn’t understand any of it but the speaker shrieked in hysterical excitement for almost a half hour. Finally I found one little Abyssinian lady who spoke a few words of English. When I asked to see the Imam, she took my hand and led me across a sandy courtyard until we arrived at what looked like a kind of rough wooden shack, except that inside there were at least four or five spacious rooms. He led me to the courtyard where two rather elderly ladies, a middle-aged woman and several young girls were seated on low string beds. Immediately I knew this must be his home - not the Imam’s. They all greeted me with friendly “Assalaam alaikum’s” but because of the language barrier, I found it difficult to say much more. I did, however, convey to them that I was a traveler who had come on a ship and had stopped here on my way to Pakistan. I also managed to tell them that I was a Muslim from America. One of the ladies rose, went inside and after a few minutes, came out with a pitcher of a cold, sweet drink.

12 At first, I hesitated when they offered it to me because I was afraid the water wasn’t safe to drink, but the pitcher and the glasses looked sparkling clean and I was so thirsty, I gratefully drank it all. The half dozen women sat staring at me with bright, mischievous eyes. They must have been wondering just who I was but it was impossible for me to tell them in their native tongue. As they studied me, I studied them. They all had black skins but the fine handsome delicate features of the Abyssinian people. The older women’s faces were deeply marked with tribal scars. Their dress was somewhat reminiscent of the saris of India. Unable to carry on any sort of conversation with them, they began to chatter among themselves. Their faces were round and cheerful and they laughed a good deal. None of them lacked a sense of humor. Then children of all ages began to troop in; there must have been almost a dozen of them, including two sets of identical twins. The children all attended the local school and were eager to show me their textbooks and primers.

Suddenly, I found myself in a most embarrassing predicament. I had to go so badly and just didn’t know how to ask where the toilet was? I tried to convey in pantomime my terrible plight; I don’t know if they knew or not but the young girls thought it was hysterically funny. I started to search about the house but had no luck. Finally in desperation, I saw a door in the courtyard and opened it. Inside there was a slab of concrete with a hole in the center. You’re supposed to squat down; even the men do and there is quite an art in doing it right.

After the hilarity of the incident died down, the ladies became very friendly and indicated it was time to eat. A thin elderly gentleman in a long white gown and turban entered and one of the elderly women served him food and drink while the others conversed with him quietly and affectionately although they ate nothing. I surmised that both the women were his two wives. Others were busy in the kitchen which although far from immaculate, was reasonably neat and clean. At last two of them came out with a giant tray of food, big cakes of Arab unleavened bread, lamb, rice and vegetables. One of the young girls brought a rug into the courtyard and spread it down on the ground.

13 One of the ladies put the tray down and we all squatted around it. Everything was eaten with the fingers out of the common dish. I enjoyed it very much. It is much more friendly and sociable than the Western way of eating. I hope it will be like that in Maulana Maudoodi’s home in Pakistan. The food was good and so was the company. After that, the little boy came in and took my hand and led me through the rooms of the house. Although they were very sparsely furnished with only cots and an occasional old table or chest of drawers, everything was exceptionally clean and neat. We stopped when we reached the back room. Three men in white robes and turbans were lying on their cots conversing with each other. One was very young about twenty but the other two were old and wrinkled. I noticed one of the older man’s eyes had been destroyed by trachoma. They all immediately looked up when the little boy brought me in and introduced me to them. The young man spoke English very well and so I was able to tell him everything while he translated for the two older men. We were in the midst of a very lively conversation when abruptly the Adhan or call to prayer rang out from the near-by mosque. I was filled with joy to hear it. The men and boys of the household all went out to the mosque and invited me to come for the mid-afternoon prayer. We must have had a congregation of at least a hundred men and boys. As usual, I was the only woman present. After the prayer was over, we met again and when I told them I had better get back to my ship before sunset, the young man said I would be welcomed in their home at any time and that if I wished, he would introduce me to other Muslim families and their wives all over Port Sudan so that I could enjoy their hospitality.

On my way back to the ship, I saw men praying everywhere, at their shops, in the streets, at the petrol stations and all over the pier. It filled me with indescribable happiness to see this: something only possible in a Muslim country.

The Sudanese workers unloading this ship work unbelievably hard. At four-thirty in the morning, they are already here. At six A.M. they start to work. We have to unload over 800,000 tons of flour and since this will take time, we are going to remain here for at least another week. When I left New York, the shipping company told me that it would take only three weeks from New 14 York to Karachi. It’s been more than three weeks now and I am told I might be on the ship for another month. Maulana Maudoodi intends to leave for a tour of Africa in July and it looks as if I won’t see him when I get to Pakistan unless he changes his plans. As I said before, you can’t imagine how hard these men work. The Greek crew just idles away the hours and days sitting comfortably in the shade while the Sudanese labourers toil hour after hour in the burning sun. Each bag of flour weighs one hundred pounds and these men lift one of them after another for twelve hours. For this back-breaking toil, they receive the equivalent of $1.00 per day. I cannot help but marvel at their incredible energy. After twelve hours of lifting one hundred pound bags, they still have enough pep to sing and dance. Besides the Sudanese Muslims, there are quite a few pagan tribesmen from the South. They are strong, vigorous, handsome men with the most magnificent physiques you have ever seen. Unlike the Muslims who cover themselves from head to foot, the pagan tribesmen wear only a loin cloth and their black bodies are smeared all over with white flour. They are so strong and healthy, they never seem to tire and accompany their work with a rhythmic chant. We also have quite a lot of fuzzy-wuzzies. The fuzzy-wuzzies are tall and very lean and can always be identified by their long, wild, wooly hair. After supper last night I went to the top deck and looked down to watch the men working. Just after the sun set, they all stopped to pray. Some of the men were working among the tractors which prevented them from forming a congregation. What do you think they did? On top of each tractor was a flat space just large enough for one man. I saw a most amazing sight. On each tractor, a man took off his sandals or shoes (if he had any), spread out a piece of old newspaper, burlap or anything clean at hand and said his prayers. You can’t imagine what a wonderful sight this was. On the deck, and on the pier, all the Sudanese were praying.

The Indian student is Indian in appearance only. He is so thoroughly westernized that I cannot help but think that he must feel much more at home in America than in his native Bombay. Anyhow, he is much more at ease speaking English than his native Marathi. He told me that in order to succeed in life in India, it is essential to know English. He tells me that even his ancestors 15 before the Mutiny in 1857 received an English education. Although he is very much opposed to the political attitude of the United States towards India, he loves the American way of life so much that if I dare criticize it in the slightest, he becomes furious.

I am the only one on this entire ship who is happy about being here in Port Sudan. The members of the crew continually complain about the heat and how dirty the Sudanese are. To the crew and the Indian student, the native Sudanese are beneath their contempt. In fact, I wonder if they consider them human at all. As much as I liked Alexandria, I like Port Sudan even better. The main reason is the refreshing lack of the rabid nationalism which pervades the entire country of Egypt. Everywhere I went in Alexandria, people would ask me what I thought of President Gamal Abdel Nasser? They asked me in such a way that left no doubt I had better like him - or else! The Egyptian jails are full of political prisoners. There is nothing like that here. There is also much more personal freedom here in the Sudan than I found in Egypt. When we were in Alexandria, I had to have my passport to get off the ship; everywhere fierce soldiers with guns stopped me on the way to the city to look at my papers. Here in Port Sudan I can get off the ship anytime I want with no papers at all and walk about with perfect freedom wherever I wish to go. Yes, I am thoroughly enjoying myself here at Port Sudan, so much that were it not for Maulana Maudoodi, I would just as soon the ship leave without me.

All my love,

Maryam 16 “The Hellenic Torch” The Hellenic Lines Ltd.

Jeddah, Saudi Arabia

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

June 20, 1962

Dear Mother and Daddy,

No doubt you were worried to death when you received the copy of the letter I wrote to the Commandant of the Police in Port Sudan, but although you begged me never to worry you unnecessarily, perhaps you can take comfort in the fact that this gave me the additional protection I so desperately needed. I am now convinced that I did the right thing in going to the police in Port Sudan for protection because since then, neither the Chief Officer nor the Captain have given me any more trouble. At least they keep out of my way and I keep out of theirs: I stay in my room nearly all the time and the cook brings me my meals there.

The Captain and Chief Officer were conversing some nights back with the Hindu student and during the course of the conversation, the Greek Captain told him that he would not hesitate to lie, steal or even kill for the sake of expediency if he could get away with it. They all have nothing but contempt for Islam and the Muslims and never stopped ridiculing my Hijab. When he told me to take off my clothes “because I like naked women”, I was so terrified, being the only woman on the ship traveling alone, that I had to go to the police. I could easily be raped and thrown overboard in the midst of the high seas. Now I realize why Islam forbids a woman to travel alone without a male escort of close relatives. Although circumstances made it impossible for me to obey that law, my unsavoury experiences on this ship have made me fully appreciate the wisdom of the Shar’iah on this matter.

17 When I was at the police-station, I saw the Port Sudan jail. All the convicts were uncouth Greek youths arrested for theft, drunkeness or disorderly behaviour. None of the convicts in the jail were native Sudanese. On the way back to the ship, in Port Sudan, I was amazed at the virtual absence of women on the streets. I only saw a few small girls and very old women, veiled from head to foot. The rest of the Sudanese women stay at home in strict Purdah.

We remained in Port Sudan for eight days and I thoroughly enjoyed every minute of my stay. The people there were just wonderful to me and showered me with every kindness. On Tuesday, I went once more to visit the family who lived near the town’s largest mosque. They actually were the family of the Imam. I even met the Imam that day but was unable to speak with him because he didn’t know any English. During my stay in Port Sudan, I acquired a vocabulary of about a dozen or so Arabic words which combined with appropriate pantomime and pidgin English, enabled me to communicate after a fashion. I am quite sure that if I could have stayed on here for several months, I would really be able to speak Arabic. It is such a frustrating experience not to be able to communicate because of language difficulties. The Imam’s children, like the mischievous little monkeys they were, thought it terrifically funny. If I said anything in English, they would repeat it flawlessly right after me without understanding a word, laughing hysterically at the peculiar sounds. The meal the Imam’s wife served me on Friday, proved deceptive. I had believed they ate that well all the time; but later learned they can afford meat or fish only once a week; their meals consisted mostly of bread dipped in olive oil with chopped greens added and simply plain water. Although I ate everything they served and drank the water, I never suffered the slightest ill-effects.

Aboard ship, I never wearied of watching the work that continued unabated from six o’clock in the morning until ten o’clock at night. The majority of the Sudanese workers were fuzzy-wuzzies from the mountains and deserts of the interior. They were very lean and their clothing so ragged, it looked as if it was about to fall off their bodies. Their most outstanding characteristic was their great mops of wild wooly hair in which lived numerous little inhabitants. Each fuzzy-wuzzy carried a long pointed wooden 18 stick to scratch his head when the little inhabitants became too bothersome. The Greek crew of this ship had nothing but contempt for them. One evening about eight o’clock one of them came to the Chief Officer and in pantomime explained that he had been hurt. He then showed him his wounded foot which was bleeding. The Chief Officer merely swabbed the wound with raw alcohol and then gruffly ordered him to get back to work. He refused to bandage the wound although he has in his possession a fully equipped first-aid kit and the man, without any shoes to protect his feet from the dirt and grime and unable to walk, merely sat down. The Chief Officer became very angry and wondering what to do, I went into the kitchen where I finally found a clean white rag. I ripped it into strips and gave it to the man who expertly wrapped it around his wounded foot before he limped away out of sight. Another member of the Greek crew walked up to me and said; “You shouldn’t feel sorry for him. He doesn’t deserve any sympathy. He wasn’t really hurt at all. He was only pretending so that he would not have to work. They’re all like that - so lazy … “ I said nothing because I didn’t want to provoke another futile argument, but now I tell you, you don’t know what work really is until you have seen those men slave away in the 120 F. sun, lifting a hundred pound bags each for a mere 6 shillings a day, lightening their toil with rhythmic chants. One day I asked one of the overseers what they were saying. He told me they were chanting over and over; “We are pleased … Allah is strong … “ I looked at their lean sweat-soaked bodies in rags, not a word of complaint out of any of them, always cheerful, kind and pathetically polite, and I prayed to Allah that there will be the best place in Paradise for every one of them.

By the end of the eight days, almost every one of the fuzzy-wuzzies knew me by name. The police were wonderful, listened to my plight with the most sympathetic attention and tried their best to do all they could. When my ship left the pier at four o’clock, five days ago, there were at least two dozen fuzzy-wuzzies, a half dozen policemen and three or four of the Sudanese overseers as well, all lined up to see me off. They smiled and waved to me until the ship sailed out of sight.

19 Although we arrived in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, the following day, the harbour was so crowded with pilgrim ships to take the pilgrims home from Mecca, that we had to wait anchored outside the harbor for almost two more days until there was room for our ship. The weather has been stifling hot ever since we hit the Red Sea, but at least it was dry and for me, at least, not unbearable. Since Arabia is such an arid country, I expected no change in the climate but to my utter dismay, the heat here is extremely damp and humid. The sky is generally overcast and hazy though it never rains. During the daytime the temperature rises well over 100 F. while the humidity is nearly 100% also. It is not the heat in itself which bothers me so much as the copious perspiration which never evaporates and irritates the skin.

We have been unloading freight here at Jeddah for two days and expect to leave for Djibouti, Somaliland, early this afternoon. Although I have been trying to obtain permission to go ashore to see something of Jeddah, I have not been able to leave the ship even though Maulana Maudoodi happens to be a personal friend of the King. However, fortunately, one of the agents doing business with this shipping concern is a Muslim from India who has lived here in Saudi Arabia for thirteen years and obtained Saudi citizenship. He has been most kind to me, speaks fluent English and has been a pleasure to know. He told me that he is extremely happy in Saudi Arabia and has been trying unsuccessfully to get the rest of his family out of India and bring them here. He told me that the Muslims are having a hard time in India and are subjected to all kinds of maltreatment by the Hindu majority and that Nehru’s government refuses to take any steps to improve the situation. When he visited his parents in India last year, he told me he found them terrified even of their physical safety. But now it is too late to do anything because two years ago, the Saudi Arabian government passed a law forbidding any more Muslim immigrants to remain permanently in the country. He said that unless Muslims have visas specifically stating that they will return home within a specified date, they are forbidden to go ashore lest they like it too much in Arabia, decide not to return home and stay on. The Muslim Indian shipping agent told me that during the past decade, so many pilgrims from all parts of the Muslim world decided not to go home 20 but to remain in Mecca and Madina for the rest of their lives that the Holy Cities had become packed with Indians, Pakistanis, Indonesians, Malaysians and Africans. There are so many, there simply is room for no more.

Although I have not been able to see Jeddah itself, I try to observe as keenly as possible as much as I can from the deck of the ship. Policemen and customs officials in their white kaffiyehs diligently guard the gangplank and keep watch everywhere but that has not prevented me from having the most pleasant, friendly relations with them all. Very few of the manual labourers on our ship are Saudi Arabs. Nearly all are black Sudanese and Indians. We also have many little brown Yemenites wearing curious turbans, white polo shirts and plaid loin cloths. At four-thirty in the morning, the dock is already full of life. At six o’clock, work begins and ends at five o’clock in the afternoon. Unlike the fuzzy-wuzzies, who really were dirty-looking, the Indian and Sudanese labourers report for work immaculately clean. By the end of the day, however, they look as if they had not bathed for a year! At the British ship opposite ours, they are unloading hundreds of tons of dry powdered gray cement. The bags all leak and within a few hours, the workers’ bodies are so covered with gray powder, they too, look like mere lumps of cement.

The visitor to Saudi Arabia is never for a single instant allowed to forget that he or she is in a Muslim country. The Christian Gregorian calendar is used only in business dealings with foreigners. The Muslim calendar is official. If you ask a Saudi Arab what is the date, he will reply, “Muharram 17th.” Here, the official year is NOT 1962 but 1382. Saudi Arabia is also unique in that it runs on a time all its own. The time is calculated from Mecca - not Greenwich. The day officially ends and another begins at sundown - not midnight. The clocks are all set exactly the opposite to those of the Western world. Midnight and noon are not at 12 o’clock but instead, 6 o’clock. The Captain says he can’t wait to leave Saudi Arabian territory so he can have a drink. Liquor is totally forbidden in Saudi Arabia and unlike Prohibition in America, the law is enforced and universally obeyed. The police are eternally vigilant and anyone caught drinking liquor is dragged to the public square and administered eighty lashes with 21 the whip. Another thing, you never have to worry about any of your belongings being stolen. In Saudi Arabia, they don’t stand for any nonsense; 1the thief has his right hand chopped off and the stump dipped in boiling oil.

Although the Greek sailors, unlike the passengers, are able to go ashore, they constantly complain that in Jeddah there is nothing at all for them to do - no girls, no night-clubs, no cinema, no cabarets, no bars, no television and nothing but recitations from the Holy Quran over the Saudi radio. For entertainment the sailors spend their time listening by the hour to American pop songs over The Voice of Israel. The Israeli radio must have very powerful transmitters for The Voice of Israel comes in here in Saudi Arabia, loud and crystal clear. When the work ends at 5 o’clock, scores of the most shiny American cadillacs drive to the pier and out of these most luxurious of American cars (some costing up to $10,000 each) step the wealthy merchants of Jeddah in immaculate white robes and headdresses. While they confer the day’s business together, their wives, swathed from head to foot in black, huddle in the back seat while their children run and play about. The boys in their white gowns, skull caps and kaffiyehs are their fathers in miniature but the little girls are always dressed completely in Western clothes. The Arab fathers treat their little girls most affectionately, hugging and kissing them and carrying them astride their shoulders. However, at the first sign of approaching physical maturity at nine or ten, off come the Western dresses and they are swathed from then on from head to foot in black exactly like their mothers. There are many modern buses here in Jeddah which continually roll past our ship. However, at the appointed hours of prayer, all the buses stop, the white-robbed passengers get out and after the bus driver spreads reed matting on the pavement, they all line up in orderly rows and recite their prayers. Whenever I can, I go up to the deck, spread out my rug, take off my shoes and try to follow them. It always gives me such intense happiness to see these men unashamed to say their prayers anywhere they happen to be. All they have to do is spread out a mat on the pavement - and there is a mosque! It is as if the entire place were holy ground.

All my love, Maryam 32 0. H. Abbasi (Advocate) Bank of India Building Bunder Road Karachi.

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York.

U.S.A.

June 30, 1962

Dear Mother and Daddy,

Our ship arrived in Djibouti, Somaliland, just before sunset several days after we left Jeddah. It was so small a town, it could hardly be called more than a village. Built almost entirely by the French, it resembled a typical colonial settlement. There was hardly a trace of any Oriental or African atmosphere. Indeed, Djibouti could almost have been mistaken for one of the small towns of the deep American South. With the exception of a handful of little brown Yemenite workers in their loin cloths and turbans, everybody was entirely dressed in modern western clothing. I was told that although Djibouti contained a mosque, it was not a Muslim town but rather predominantly Christian. Like Christians everywhere, they seemed most indifferent about religion. Worst of all, the Muslims were no better. In Alexandria, Port Sudan or Jeddah, at the very mention of the word “Islam,” faces and eyes would immediately light up. I found this same love of Islam even among the most “primitive” of the fuzzy-wuzzies. If I told them I was a Muslim, from America, their white teeth would gleam in the warmest of smiles. If I showed them my beads, they would at once pull out theirs and we would dangle them at each other full of joy. But a “Muslim” of Djibouti would only react with an indifferent shrug of the shoulders as if he meant to say, “So what?” He could not care less.

We were on the sea five days until we finally arrived at Karachi. The worst part of it was when we finally did reach Karachi, there 23 was no room in the harbour for our ship and we had to wait more than twelve full hours. The sea was so rough and the ship rocked so violently, you could hardly stand up. Because of the rough sea, the ship could not anchor and thus it “toured” round and round in an endless circle of ten miles radius hour after hour. I had no idea how long this delay would last. I was tormented by the prospect of this going on for days and days when suddenly at six o’clock that evening, an empty space became available at last and an hour later, we entered the Karachi harbour. Three of Maulana Maudoodi’s friends were waiting on the pier for me and they listened most sympathetically while I poured out my miserable experiences aboard ship in great relief. Although by this time, it was quite late in the evening, I could not wait to get off the ship with them. To my disappointment, I was told that I would have to wait until the following day.

At 10 o’clock the next morning, Khurshid Ahmad and two other of Maulana Maudoodi’s friends arrived to take me off the ship and I could not describe adequately in words, my intense relief to find myself in such capable hands. I had no trouble at all with the customs officials. The customs officer approved of all my belongings in less than three minutes and did not confiscate anything. He did not even go through the motions of any kind of search at all but merely opened my suitcases, glanced at their contents for a second before closing them untouched back up again. I had not expected to stay in Karachi but to take the airplane at the airport at once to Lahore but my friends had different plans. They all disputed with each other which should entertain me in their homes and finally Mr. Abbasi, a lawyer, took me to meet his wife and baby daughter.

I have been enjoying the wonderful hospitality of Maulana Maudoodi’s friends here in Karachi for the last several days and I am not exaggerating when I say I feel as if I have emerged from Hell on “The Hellenic Torch” into Paradise here. Mr. Abbasi’s wife is an English-German convert named “Laura” of twenty-three who is so content with life here, she never intends to live anywhere else. She is an utterly charming and delightful person and I have enjoyed many happy hours in her company. Their chief servant is a fifteen-year-old boy from Kashmir whom I 24 believe was orphaned as a child and now lives with them. Although the servant boy, Ashraf, is completely illiterate and never went to school, he is gentle, kind and always behaves in the most refined, courteous manner, just the opposite of what Americans expect of an adolescent boy his age. He spends his time cleaning the house, waiting on table and helping her in the kitchen. The remainder of the time, he watches over the baby daughter and is most tender and loving with her.

During this time, I have been kept so busy, that I have scarcely a moment to myself because Mr. Abbasi says that so many people are eager to meet me and entertain me in their homes. They have all somehow heard about me, even though I do not know any of them. The day before yesterday, the editor of The Voice of Islam where many of my articles have appeared, invited me to his home where his friends were gathered, among them, important officials of the government. Khurshid Ahmad’s house was quite poor and primitive by American standards but contained a vast library of over three thousand books in English, Urdu and Arabic. Whatever he earns, he says, goes to pay for buying new books and students all over Karachi come to his home to use his library. If I were in his place, I am certain I would do the same thing.

The next day, I had lunch in Ahmad Bawany’s home who is one of the wealthiest men in Pakistan and whose fortune runs into the millions. Ahmad Bawany is the patron of Muslimnews International and it was he who telephoned me from London last April, begging me to be its Editor-in-Chief. Mr. Bawany’s home is the epitome of magnificent elegance. Like all Oriental homes, it is built around a courtyard and the garden is a brilliant blaze of colourful plants and flowers. Ahmad Bawany has two charming wives and fourteen children - eight girls and six boys. Contrary to what the critics of polygamy will tell you, both wives are most friendly with each other and get along fine. I had lunch with the wives and daughters who are all adolescents and found them thoroughly delightful company. Our meal could not accurately be called merely “lunch.” It was truly a banquet and the food was the most delicious I have ever tasted. The wives, who knew I was coming, with their thoughtful consideration refrained from adding any of the hot spices which all Indians love, but to which, of 25 course, I am not yet accustomed. Although each place was set with the most elegant sterling silver knives, forks and spoons, their purpose was merely decorative because everybody ate with their fingers. After this sumptuous banquet, we all went into the nursery to say our noon-day prayers. Two of the infant children were fast asleep in their cribs with the old servant lady lying down beside them, on the Persian rug on the floor. Although Ahmad Bawany is a multi-millionaire, he does make a great effort to use his wealth in a constructive, responsible way. He contributes enormous amounts to numerous charitable causes but his greatest pride is the secondary school he is financing and directing. Because he is very much opposed to co-education, there will actually be two separate buildings of this school - one for the girls and other for the boys. To make sure they have no contact with each other, the two buildings will be separated by a tall stone wall. Bawany’s school is extremely well-designed from an architectural point of view, harmoniously blending the traditional Islamic with the modern. Mr. Bawany took me on a tour of the building, up to the office where he introduced me to the Principal, a dignified elderly gentleman in a long black Pakistani coat and a white beard. He told me that the purpose of this school was to give students a well-rounded general education, harmoniously blending modern knowledge with Islamic studies and that such schools as these were so desperately needed because no system of public education exists in Pakistan as yet and almost 90% of the people are illiterate. The Principal told me that he is finding it exceedingly difficult to recruit teachers because nearly all of them believe in the Western methods of education and have little, if any appreciation for Islamic values. I was interested to see the library which contained more books in English than in Urdu. When I asked if these books were bought or donated, the Principal replied; “We buy and order all our books. Recently, the American Embassy here in Karachi offered to supply us with hundreds but we firmly declined the offer. We will not tolerate any foreign interference or influence whatsoever. Mr. Bawany, the Principal of his school, Mr. Abbasi and nearly all the other Pakistanis I have met thus far are extremely bitter about American “technical assistance” programmes or such things as President Kennedy’s Peace Corps. “They only want to spread 26 the Western way of life and turn our youth against Islam”, they told me. “Unless our Government bans this flood of foreign “aid”, cheap Hollywood films and lewd books, they warned, “our entire way of life will be destroyed.”

Although the women, unlike the men, speak little or no English, they have overwhelmed me with affection and kindness. The wives of Maulana Maudoodi’s friends here in Karachi have organized their own club where they meet once a week to discuss religious matters and recite from Quran and Hadith. They took me to the home of their leader where I met everybody. They had a complete Pakistani outfit all prepared especially for me and insisted I wear it. Here in Pakistan, the religious Muslim women do not wear the Hindu sari. Rather, we wear full white trousers gathered at the waist with a draw-string, a colourful shirt reaching the knees over this with long slits up the side for ease in walking and a long white head-scarf. This is indoor dress at home. However when we go out, we put on a long black cover-all coat and black veil which completely hides the face, including the eyes. However, the material is such that the lady can easily see everything but nobody can see her. Wearing the burqa or veil is rather like seeing with dark sun-glasses. These shall be the clothes I shall wear from now on. I wish you could see me now! I wonder if you would recognize me as the same old “Peggy”?

The ladies then insisted that they take me to the Quranic school which they run for the poor peasant children and their mothers. We all rode in an old dilapidated taxi over bumpy, almost impassable roads some ten miles distant until we finally reached a small white-washed flat-roofed hut into which were jammed over a hundred children and their mothers suckling their infants, crowded and squatting on the bare floor. The only chair I found was reserved for me and while the leader introduced me to them in Urdu, they served me a glass of cold lemonade. Finally I was asked to rise and address them: My speech was very short because none of them spoke English. I said: “I have not come here from America as a tourist but to live here and share your life, for you are a part of me as I have become a part of you…” What more I said, I can’t remember and as it was translated, the expression on those hundreds of faces would convince you that to them, I was someone 27 almost holy. The principal of the school then called up several little children and some of the older girls as well to recite and chant the Holy Quran in my honour. One of the older girls chanted the Quran with particular beauty; she was an Arab born in Mecca. It took me almost a half hour to reach the door. I shook the hands of everybody present. The faces of the women and girls were so beautiful, despite the poverty. They possessed the kind of beauty that radiates from within.

5-A Zaildar Park Ichhra, Lahore

July 1, 1962

I did not have time to complete my letter from Karachi because I had to leave at once to be on time for the departure of the airplane at the airport. The airport at Karachi is among the largest and most famous in the world and the airport terminal itself is a beautiful and impressive building. Although the distance from Karachi to Lahore is more than seven hundred miles, the plane ride took only two hours. I sat next to an elderly American lady who was a secretary connected to the American Embassy here and when I found she did not like me to talk about Islam, we just carried on an innocuous conversation of small-talk and got along fine after that. Besides the discomfort of pressure in my ears and an occasional stabbing pain because of the high altitude, my plane trip was so easy and comfortable that before I knew it, it was over. Nothing could be a greater contrast between the freighter ship, “The Hellenic Torch,” which travelled only a few miles an hour subject to hours and days of delay, and this plane which was a marvel of efficiency and comfort not even surpassed in America itself.

Most of the airplane passengers were Pakistanis of the most westernized variety combined with quite a number of Americans on business. I was indeed the only woman on the plane dressed in a burqa with veiled face. After the plane landed in Lahore, at once, I was led by the airlines hostess to the lobby of the terminal in Lahore where Maulana Maudoodi’s book publisher, Mian Tufail Mohammad was awaiting me, accompanied by a score of his little 28 children. He was so dignified-looking with his grey beard, lamb-skin cap and spotless white clothes, I was dumbfounded to see him because I thought he was still in prison.

A year before, he was arbitrarily imprisoned without trial for publishing a pamphlet against the anti-Islamic Pakistan Family Laws Ordinance and when I heard he had been released only three days earlier, I burst out: “Did they treat you very badly?”

He only shook his head gravely and replied; “It is good to suffer in the cause of Allah.”

As we drove in the car to Maulana Maudoodi’s house, I was struck by the contrast between Karachi and Lahore. Karachi is in the midst of the desert and is so arid, little more than cactus will grow there. But Lahore is fertile with its wide tree-lined streets and many beautiful parks and gardens. Unlike Karachi, where nearly all the buildings are of recent construction, Lahore is filled with monuments of historical interest, including the largest mosque in the world.

In his letters, Maulana Maudoodi had told me of his two daughters but never even hinted that he has seven other children - including six-year-old Ayesha and ten-year-old Khalid - mischievous little monkeys who reminded me of the Imam’s children in Port Sudan. Unfortunately, Maulana Maudoodi has been so preoccupied with his work and meeting a constant stream of visitors as well as lectures on Quran and Hadith in the local mosque, he has little time to spend with me. Maulana’s two older daughters, Humaira and Asma, are charming and delightful companions. I am sharing a room with one of them. They both share their father’s deep love for Islam although not his knowledge. The neighbour women have streamed in to catch a glimpse of me and I feel so frustrated because I know no Urdu and they speak no English and thus it is impossible for me to communicate with them. I insisted that the two older girls force me to speak and do everything to teach me Urdu for the language barrier is at present my greatest difficulty. Although the men all speak English, hardly any of the women do.

Maulana Maudoodi’s home would appear old and dingy by American standards, but it is a warm and homey place which is always full of women’s chatter and babies and little children happy 29 at their play. It is a home in the truest sense of the word - a house designed not for decoration but to be lived in. We materialistic Americans are said to judge a country by its bathrooms but here in Pakistan, I have seen every variety of bathrooms. From the most luxurious plumbing in Ahmad Bawany’s palace, to the slab of cement with the hole in the middle of the floor in Khurshid Ahmad’s home (he spends his earnings on his vast library of books - not toilets). Here in Maulana Maudoodi’s home, there is no plumbing at all. You merely answer the call of nature on a glorified chamber-pot and cover it with a wooden plank when you are finished. Twice a day the sweeper comes to empty it. We sleep on the low beds peculiar to India made of woven string without any mattresses but, despite this, I find them quite comfortable and sleep very well. My lack of skill with knife and fork, which made my table-manners in America the constant object of criticism, simply don’t matter here. The only silverware are large spoons used for cooking. Maulana Maudoodi does not like to eat with knife and fork. He says it spoils the enjoyment of eating and the taste of the food. Even more important, our Prophet Muhammad (upon whom be peace) ate with his fingers and so do we. Food is no problem. I thoroughly enjoy all the Pakistani foods so long as the hot pepper and chillis are omitted. I particularly like the Pakistani bread which is called chapatis. It has a delicious whole-wheat nut-like flavour and tastes much like a buckwheat pancake. They are so nutritious and filling that one, or at the most two, completely satisfies my appetite. Best of all, you will be happy to know that although from Alexandria, Port Sudan, Karachi to Lahore, I have freely drunk all the unsafe water and eaten my fill of everything served to me without the slightest ill-effects, I was fully prepared to suffer bouts of dysentery, loose motions and vomiting but as yet so far, I have enjoyed perfect health. The climate is no hotter than many summer days in New York and indeed one suffers less from the heat here than in America because the homes are constructed so they always feel cool, airy and breezy which makes expensive air-conditioning wholly unnecessary.

I was so happy to receive your letters. Please write to me as often as you can. I want to know everything happening at home. Even if you think you have little to say, your letters mean so much.

30 My books, which I sent ahead of me by surface book-post before I left New York, have been delivered by the postman here. In fact, they reached here only a few days before I arrived. I am so glad they all arrived safely intact and not one was lost.

In my next letter I will write you more about Maulana Maudoodi and the many members of his large family who all live here or nearby. On the ship, I hardly ever thought of you but now I remember you often. Hoping that you received my telegram and will write to me again very soon.

All my love,

Maryam 31 Maryam Jameelah c/o Maulana Sayyid Abul Ala Maudoodi

5-A Zaildar Park Ichhra, Lahore

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York

July 5, 1962

Dearest Mother and Daddy,

Now I am becoming settled here in Maulana Maudoodi’s house, I’d like to tell you the whole story in detail how I came to live in Pakistan.

When I embraced Islam just over a year ago, because there were so few Muslims in New York and so isolated from a Muslim community, it was like being on a tiny island surrounded by a hostile sea, I rapidly became convinced that there was no future for me in America. Being compelled to live in a kind of society which I hated with all my soul, I could not but remain the most hopeless misfit, unable to find any livelihood to support myself nor because I rejected the “dates”, parties and dances which is usually the way in western life, men and women meet, my chances for marriage, much less a happy and successful marriage, were virtually nil. If I stayed in America, all I could look forward to was unhappiness, frustration and loneliness and when you were no longer able (or willing) to support me, the humiliation of living on the pittance of public welfare and probably ending up as a lifetime inmate of a state institution. The only way out of such a dreadful predicament was to leave America and make my permanent home in some Muslim country.

In his very first letter to me of January 21, 1961, Maulana Maudoodi was wise enough to realize the magnitude of my personal difficulties. He wrote:

“But now I cannot help expressing my pleasant surprise at one thing. I want to know precisely how and 32 where a young American girl born to Jewish parents could attain such a clear and true conception of Islam. I will feel very much pleased and grateful if you can find some time to write a brief story of your mental evolution and send it to me. I quite understand your awful feeling of loneliness for want of an Islamic society. No doubt this is the greatest agony for a Muslim. But it might give you some consolation to know that in the present world, every true Muslim is sharing these pangs of agony with you, though it may be in a lesser degree or in a somewhat different way. If you come over to Pakistan, it will be my pleasure to meet you and welcome you as my guest. How delightful it would be for me and my family if you manage to come and keep with us the fast of Ramadan, falling this year from February 17th to the 18th of March! I will be in Lahore till the end of March. Then I intend to go on a tour of Africa where I wish to organize Islamic missionary work, inshallah. I will be in Lahore during the remainder of the year and whenever you come, you will find me at my home … “

Although I very much wanted to accept Maulana Maudoodi’s offer, at the time, I didn’t have the courage to break all ties with my homeland and venture out into the unknown. I didn’t reject his invitation but I kept putting it off although I continued my correspondence with Maulana Maudoodi and wrote him about the story of my life. A month later, he replied:

“I studied your life-sketch with great care and interest. As I read it, I came to realize how an open and unbiased mind can find an access to the Right Path provided it makes a sincere and steady effort. The story of your sufferings, tribulations and mental anguish contained nothing unexpected for me. If a person is passing through a constant and implacable conflict with his social surroundings and is at a loss to find even a trace of sympathy or appreciation in his mental or moral environment, it would be an unusual thing if his or her nerves do not undergo a final collapse. The conditions that led you to the psychiatrist and the mental 33 institutions were not the result of any abnormality in you.

They were the natural outcome of the incompatibility between you and your society. Your temperament and taste, your ideas and ideals, your habits and conduct all are fundamentally different from those peculiar to the society you live in. This constant friction could have done you much more damage than what it really did. You seem to be just like an equatorial sapling implanted into the Arctic zone and you had to face the inevitable. Every person can best grow and shine in a favourable atmosphere. In a hostile climate one is apt to lose or dubbed to have lost one’s mental poise and all one’s capabilities are likely to wither away. Similar are the reasons for your being still at twenty-six unmarried. The society around you cannot like the type of girl you are. All your merits are to be considered as faults there. You cannot possibly find a true life-companion in your present set-up and if artificially you are tied to a person, I do not hope it to be a desirable or successful matrimonial arrangement. If you come over to Pakistan, you will find yourself amidst many like-minded people, barring the language difference. God willing, you will have here all moral as well as material support and encouragement. Moreover, there is every likelihood here that you may find a virtuous, young Muslim to be your life-companion. When you are in Pakistan, I can offer every possible help to you but I am sorry to say that I am unable to assist you in your passage from America to Pakistan because there are very stringent restrictions over foreign exchange here. I do hope that your parents as your well-wishers will not stand in the way of your choice. They should not fail to keep in view the fact that if their daughter is forced to live in inclement weather, not only will she be doomed to lead a life of despair but there is every danger of renewed attacks of her mental affliction from which she has just recovered after five years. On the other hand, if she is fortunate enough to find a friendly and suitable social 34 atmosphere, she will regain her balance and will find an enviable place in life. I think if once they are able to grasp this point fully, no resistance will be encountered on their part. Rather, it is not improbable that they will welcome the change …”

However, it took another year and a half before I could summon the courage, borne out of the desperation of my impossible situation living in New York, and despite my skill at typing, because of extreme maladjustment, unable to find any means of self-support, to accept Maulana Maudoodi’s invitation and make the final decision. Thus on March 31st of this year, he wrote:

“I have received your letter of March 22nd just now after I had penned a reply to your former letters. I had already realized your problems and difficulties fully. I was not very much hopeful about your future in America. I had thought that if you came to Pakistan, I would be glad to put you up as a member of my family in my home. In due course, you would have had contact and introduction through me to some virtuous young Muslims. If any one of them proved to be a match for you, both might have been united in wedlock and may prove to be good workers for the Islamic movement here. But when it appeared that you thought it feasible to remain in America, I dropped the idea. But now again when I ponder over your problems, I am driven again to renew my offer to you. On account of foreign-exchange restrictions here, it is not possible for me to give you any monetary help while you are in America. But I think you had better leave your country and reach here before your financial position worsens. Once you are here, you will have inshallah no cause to worry about your future. I wish to make the whole position quite clear to your parents. You should tell them frankly how difficult it would be to continue living in America after their retirement and that your welfare demands that they should willingly allow you to settle in Pakistan. You should also tell them that the man who is advising you and inviting you to take this crucial step is perhaps next 35 to them (your parents) your best well-wisher. He will not be content to extend mere advice but would rather shoulder all the consequent responsibilities when this advice is accepted. If you and your parents trust him, God willing, their trust will not be betrayed …”

Immediately I wrote back:

“May I convey to you my deepest gratitude for the help you are offering me. It is because of the mercy of Allah that I am not left to struggle alone. May Allah bless you …”

Maulana Maudoodi replied:

“I received your letter of April 7th yesterday. I am glad to know that you have accepted my counsel and are prepared to come to Pakistan. I pray Allah that He may guide you to what is right and best in your interest. I also think that you should travel by sea because it will cost less and you will be able to bring with you more of your luggage. You will embark at Karachi whence you will have to leave for Lahore by train. Lahore is at a distance of about 600 miles from Karachi. At Lahore station either I will personally receive you or my secretary, Malik Ghulam Ali will be present and escort you to my house. It would be better if you reach here not later than the third week of June next. I intend to go to Africa in the middle of July. You should take note of the fact that when you propose to reach Lahore, this part of our country will be in the severest grip of hot weather. In June, July and August the heat reaches its height with the maximum day temperature rising to nearly 120F. We do not have any air-conditioning but we do have electric fans. I think later on you will become quite acclimated to our seasons but you should be prepared to bear the very first onslaught of this extreme climate. You should bring along with you all your necessary 36 belongings which you easily can manage to bring. Due to heavy customs-duties, all foreign goods are so highly priced here as you cannot imagine in America. Therefore you should leave behind nothing which you may need here, thinking it could easily be purchased in Pakistan. As you can well imagine, our ways of living and social conditions are greatly different from the American way of life and social environment there. We lack here many facilities to which you Americans take for granted. Difference in language will also be a troublesome obstacle in your way to some extent. Unless you will make up your mind resolutely to mould your life according to our pattern and to live and die among your Muslim brethren here, you might find it very difficult to reconcile yourself to the unavoidable inconveniences obtaining in the initial stage. I am sending a separate letter to your parents. But I think you also had better introduce me to them and get them to hear or read the gist of our correspondence so that they may be able to grasp fully the background of my present letter to them…

How relieved and overjoyed I was when you came back from your winter vacation in Trinidad and Tobago in the West Indies and did not object nor put any obstacles in my way and you yourself showed me your reply to the Maulana’s offer:

“I am grateful for your kind letter of April 18th, extending to my daughter an invitation to live in your home. My wife and I are deeply moved by your gracious offer of hospitality. Since embracing Islam, particularly as an ardent convert, it seems that living in our society presents practical difficulties. Margaret is anxious to accept your invitation and as her parents, we are amenable although it means going to a distant land. Particularly in view of the enthusiasm she has evinced, we are hopeful it would give her an opportunity for a happy and meaningful life. She goes to your country with our full consent and especially as a person of fine character, we shall maintain a continuous interest in her 37 welfare. Therefore, please feel at liberty to write to me at any time. Mrs. Marcus joins me in conveying to you, your wife and children our heartfelt gratitude … “ The way out an apparently hopeless predicament and the door to a better future wide open, during the six weeks of preparation for the journey which followed, I was intoxicated with a happiness borne of the conviction that this was indeed the turning point and the most decisive time of my whole life. From the time I was twelve until now I was approaching my 28th birthday, I had been sunk in the no-man’s land of an unnaturally prolonged adolescence; in fact, it seemed that during these long years, I had not really been living at all in the true sense but just a kind of marking time, neither here nor there, alone in my room with my books and few social contacts beyond my immediate family or close relatives. But now Maulana Maudoodi had opened a door through which I could escape and I surely would flee as quickly as I could from the terrible destiny which awaited me had I remained in America. Approaching my thirtieth year, I had the feeling that I was escaping just in time when the period of my youth had almost come to an end.

The weeks which followed were those of a feverish preparation for the long journey ahead. The first man I consulted was my friend, Mr. Chaudhry at Pakistan House for my visa which fortunately I obtained without any difficulty. Mr. Chaudhry also promised to arrange passage for me on a freighter boat (which I wanted because it was the cheapest possible means of transportation) on The Hellenic Lines, a Greek-owned company. Being completely naive and inexperienced in travel, I did not think to doubt the wisdom of this choice and promptly took all the money I had out of the bank and sent the required $475.00 for my passage reservation. Simultaneously I went to apply for my passport and then I made arrangements with the doctor connected with Martha Washington Hotel for a series of appointments to be vaccinated against typhoid, typhus, small-pox, tetanus and yellow fever, without which I would not be permitted to travel. Even though sometimes I felt quite sick from the injections (the typhoid one was particularly nasty with a painfully inflamed arm and fever) I kept as busy as ever doing all the shopping I needed.

38 In the bargain basement of Gimbels department store, I bought some stout cotton cloth with pleasing designs and with this I stitched by hand (for I didn’t have nor know how to use a sewing machine) five full ankle-length skirts and the same number of blouses with high neck-lines and long sleeves to the wrists. Then I bought some big scarfs to cover my head. This would be my Hijab because in Islam a woman is obliged to cover every part of herself except for her face, hands and feet so this is what I would wear until worn out and Pakistani dress from then on. Since modern fashions do not conform to Islamic standards of feminine modesty, I decided to get rid of all my American frocks and gave them away. For shoes, I went to the finest men’s shoe store on Fifth Avenue in New York and for $10.00 bought a pair of loafers with thick soles and the most durable leather, a pair of English sandals with broad low heels and round toes and another pair of stout moccasins. Again, then, I went to Gimbels bargain basement and bought myself a couple of bulky black knit sweaters on sale for only $2.00 each and four pairs of heavy knee length cotton stockings which were selling for only 4 pairs for $1.00. Because Mr. Chaudhry at Pakistan House had told me that during the winter in Lahore it can get quite cold and the houses have no heating, to prepare for that eventuality, I was just in time for the big sale on winter coats so I purchased a very well-made, warm woolen coat for only $15.00. Then I went to Woolworth’s Five and Ten Cent Store for an ample supply of all colours of stout cotton and nylon thread, fine English needles, scissors, tape-measure, thimble, and everything else I would need to make a good sewing box to mend and repair my clothes. Finally at Gimbels, I bought two huge but very light plastic suitcases which were really meant for air travel, to store all my clothes and in addition, a smaller brown canvas travelling bag to store my hair brush, comb, sewing box, some small books and other miscellaneous necessities.

I still had my typewriter to take care of and this presented a problem because I found that my heavy office model could only be shipped to Pakistan with the greatest complications and expense. There was no choice but to exchange my office machine for a portable. Right next store to Martha Washington Hotel where I lived, was a tiny typewriter and office machine store. Since it was 39 so near and convenient, and I was in a hurry, I consulted the proprietor, a middle-aged Jew whose business was so small, he had almost no employees under him. Never in my life had I encountered such a wonderful and honest businessman. Instead of trying to sell me his most expensive machine, he persuaded me to take a second-hand Smith-Corona for just $50.00 which he assured me was better-made and would last for a life-time with a minimum of breakdowns and repairs needed. So I took his advice and bought the second-hand portable for $25.00 since he allowed me another $25.00 on my old office machine. And up to now, this typewriter he sold me has proved completely satisfactory and even works better than my old machine.

During the next two weeks before my departure, I had many telephone calls from friends and well-wishers. Mr. Ahmad Bawany from Muslimnews International telegrammed me from London, begging me to fly to London at once to work on the editorial staff of his magazine but I turned down the offer as politely as I could since I much preferred Maulana Maudoodi’s invitation. However, I promised to contribute articles and essays independently to Muslimnews each month - a promise which I faithfully kept. Then all the way from Montreal, Canada, I received a long-distance phone call from Zafar Ishaq Ansari, formerly the editor of “The Voice of Islam”, Karachi, now studying at the Islamic Institute of McGill University, who wished me the best of future happiness in Pakistan but warned me that I would have difficulty in adjusting to Pakistani life until I knew Pakistani manners and etiquette. How true his warning proved! Then from Harvard University, my friend, who used to belong to Shaikh Hasan al Banna’s Ikhwan al Muslimun, Muhammad Ahmad Sakr, telephoned me to say farewell and convey his “salaams” to Maulana Maudoodi. A few days later I received an envelope without any return address and with a note simply signed “Your Muslim brothers”, a cheque for $100.00. Overwhelmed, I wrote a grateful letter of thanks, knowing that only a Muslim would do a thing like this. The last week in America I spent with my friend, Khadijah Faisal at the Islamic Mission of America, trying to help as best I could with her preparations for the Eid al-Adha where she was going to cook a big Arabian-style dinner for all who came to 40 worship after the service. I spent the Eid al-Adha with my good friend Balquis and ate a huge dinner with her and her children and friends at her house. After a thoroughly enjoyable day, on the way back to the hotel from Brooklyn, I began to suffer from a severe headache. Feeling very ill, all of a sudden, I could scarcely make my way back to my hotel room. I fell into a restless sleep for a few hours but then about 2 o’clock in the morning, awoke with violent pains in the stomach, loose motions and vomiting. When it did not subside but rather kept getting worse, in agony, I grabbed the telephone receiver and gasped that I must have a doctor come immediately. When the doctor arrived, he gave me some pills and injections and told me that because of extreme dehydration, if the gastro-enteritis did not subside by morning, I would have to be rushed to Bellvue Hospital for intravenous feeding lest my life be endangered. I told the doctor I couldn’t go to Bellvue Hospital because I had a passage reservation on a freighter-ship bound for Pakistan in only two days. The doctor said he had called an ambulance to take me to Bellvue because I was in serious condition. However, by morning, the doctor said I wouldn’t have to go to the hospital since I had improved sufficiently and gave me more pills and injections. I spent the remainder of the day in bed with high fever and so delirious, I didn’t notice the stream of neighbours in the hotel who visited me with anxious concern. The coloured lady, who was my neighbour at the hotel, took her day’s leave from sewing dresses at the factory to stay with me and bring me my meals. Being a fervent Roman Catholic, she begged me to let her call the priest for Baptism and Extreme Unction lest I die, but I told her I was a Muslim. Towards evening I called in the hotel janitors to clean the mess I had made with vomiting the night before and had to pay them an extra $5.00 to do it. In the morning, I felt so weak, I could hardly sit up but I forced myself to get out of bed and walk about even though I don’t know how I did it. Now the fever was gone, I had only to convalesce but I had to do it quickly because “The Hellenic Torch” was due to leave New York the very next day. I had to pay the doctor more than $50.00 for attending me in the middle of the night and this is where my Muslim brother’s cheque helped me. Mother and Daddy, you didn’t know a thing about this illness because I was afraid to tell you at the time lest you 41 worry and not let me go on the boat the following day. The miracle was that for such a serious illness which nearly cost me my life, I was abed for only two days and by the evening of the third day, except for looking a bit pale, I felt completely well. I think this is one of the few miracles I have ever experienced, especially because during the entire six-week trip to Pakistan, I enjoyed absolutely perfect health except for sea-sickness. This was indeed fortunate and a mercy from Allah because on the freighter, there was no doctor nor any medical aid available.

I do not think ever in my life I experienced deeper emotion than when at 9 P.M. on May 18th, The Hellenic Torch pulled out of New York harbour and I stood on the deck, watching the lights of New York City become dimmer and dimmer, knowing that I would never see these shores again….

I think in my last letter, I told you about the wonderful hospitality I received during my two and a half day stay in Karachi at the home of the advocate, Mr. Abbasi and his German wife, Laura. I had thought that Laura had become a real friend of mine when I wrote her some of the problems I was facing here. She gave me a terrible shock when she replied, severely criticizing my behaviour and my dress. After that, my warm feeling towards Laura evaporated and we never wrote each other again. Maulana Maudoodi’s daughters, Humaira and Asma keep telling me how amazed they were when I came dressed in the Pakistani clothes, including burqa, the Karachi ladies Jama’at-e-Islami had made for me. They, and all the other women-folk at the house, expected to see a real mem-sahib (that is what Pakistanis call a white European or American lady) who looked and dressed as all Western ladies do with short blonde hair, blue eyes, very white skin, short tight skirt, bare arms, high-heels and lipstick instead of a stocky, dark-haired, dark-eyed, olive-complexioned girl of Semitic, quite Jewish appearance in burqa that sorely disappointed their curiosity because I wasn’t at all their conception of a mem-sahib.

Despite all the problems and difficulties I am faced with here in my personal adjustment to my new adopted family, my conviction remains unshaken that no matter what happens here, I am still 42 infinitely better off than had I remained in New York.

All my love,

Maryam 53 Maryam Jameelah c/o Maulana Sayyid Abul Ala Maudoodi

5-A Zaildar Park

Ichhra, Lahore.

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont New York, U.S.A.

July 12, 1962

Dear Mother and Daddy,

For nearly a week after I arrived at Maulana Maudoodi’s home, there was no word from you so you can well imagine how happy I was to receive your letter of July 2nd. I was so interested to hear the news about the birth of cousin Jim and Celia’s baby-son, Ernest, and wrote them immediately to congratulate them.

After a few difficult days, I am now rapidly adjusting to my life here and feel happy and at home. Although I am still wearing for the most part, the home-made clothing I brought from America, Begum Maudoodi and her elder daughters, Humaira and Asma are now making real Pakistani clothes for me. Although I am not so fond of Pakistani food as Arabian, I like it well enough and by now am accustoming myself to the hot chillis and peppers and can easily eat everything the rest of the family eats. For breakfast, we generally eat one or two eggs fried in oil, chapatis — a kind of whole-wheat pancake which takes the place of bread, fried potatoes liberally seasoned with pepper and strong hot tea with milk. For lunch, we have more chapatis, goat-meat stew which mostly consists of gravy with only very little bits of meat, a thick kind of bean-soup which we call dhal and highly spiced egg-plant. Dinner is just like lunch except that rice is added. The only kind of meat I have eaten since I came to Pakistan is goat-meat which is never eaten in America. Meat is extremely expensive and beyond the reach of most people and we feel very fortunate to be able to afford it at all. One single pound is stretched to feed all 44 thirteen of us. Milk is equally scarce and costly so that it is diluted with much water and sugar added to stretch it. Milk, of course, is not pasteurized as in America so that all of it must be thoroughly boiled to make it safe to drink. As a special treat, sometimes there are mangoes for desert. Since mangoes are a tropical fruit and are extremely perishable, I had never tasted them before I came to Pakistan but a good mango is really delicious. Sweets are eaten only at weddings or religious feasts. Even the children hardly ever taste candy, cookies, cake, pies and of course, never ice-cream. No doubt, this is one reason why Pakistanis have such beautiful teeth. A perfect set of teeth is the rule, not the exception, not only among the young, but even many of the middle-aged in their late forties and fifties. Only the very old are toothless. All of Maulana Maudoodi’s children have perfect teeth even though not one has ever been to the dentist. Since dental care is very rare here, I try to clean my teeth carefully after each meal, knowing that if I neglect them, I will lose them. We eat breakfast between six-thirty and seven in the morning, lunch at noon but we don’t have dinner until after eight thirty and sometime as late as ten o’clock. As I told you in my last letter, we eat mostly with our fingers, although occasionally with a spoon. There are no knives and as for forks, nobody even knows what they are! Our dining room adjoins the kitchen and is furnished with a regular rough wooden table covered with old red oil-cloth and straight-backed wooden chairs. Although we eat with our fingers, each of us has our own separate dish and we generally do not eat from the common dish as the Arabs do. Maulana Maudoodi and his wife allow themselves one very costly luxury - betel-nut. One pound of betel-nut costs twenty rupees or the equivalent of $5.00. Although Begum Maudoodi chews betel only after meals, Maulana Maudoodi likes to chew it continually throughout the day. Preparing betel-nut for chewing is quite an elaborate, painstaking procedure and all the equipment is stored in a beautifully carved silver box. First Begum Maudoodi takes out a very ordinary-looking green leaf, cuts it into small pieces and upon each piece, spreads tobacco and a kind of thick red paste (which is the sap from the tree). Then the piece of leaf is folded into two and is ready for chewing. One leaf will last for about three hours. The mouth and lips are turned bright red 45 from the red pasty sap and for the purpose of spitting, Maulana Maudoodi has a beautiful silver vessel.

Our house is a good-sized one, built sturdily of stone and cement. To an American accustomed to the luxury of American kitchens, ours would seem primitive indeed. The stove is more like an open fire-place and one cooks squatting on the floor. Of course, there are no prepared foods such as you buy in America, nothing canned or frozen; all food must be prepared from scratch and each meal takes several hours to complete. When salt is bought, it looks like ordinary rocks and must be pounded by hand between stones before it is fit to eat. However, we do have a beautiful modern American Westinghouse fridge in the dining room. We have two bathrooms, one upstairs and the other downstairs. The toilets are chamber-pots emptied twice a day by the sweepers and at the opposite side of the room is a shower fixture which seldom works and a tap for running water. Although there is no hot water, the water for bathing in summer is delightfully tepid. The only trouble is that the pumping system does not work properly and consequently, the running water is shut off much of the day. I will be taking a bath and in the midst of it while I am covered with soap, without any warning, the water will be shut off! Water is scarce, especially during summer, and too precious to be wasted. There are three or four bedrooms, all very sparsely furnished. Indians and Pakistanis do not like cluttered rooms. Our beds consist of low wooden frames across which is woven a special kind of string and rope. On top of this is spread several layers of cloth upon which we sleep. There are no such thing as sheets as understood in Europe and America. Neither are there any mattresses although thin home-made pallets are used during the winter. But I find these Indian string-beds comfortable enough and sleep just as well as on my old bed at home. There are no clothes closets as you understand them but rather all clothing is stored in tin trunks. Although the temperature rises well over 100° F., the climate hardly bothers me at all since I stay out of the sun and every room is equipped with a big electric fan on the ceiling which keeps us cool and comfortable. At night everybody sleeps on the flat roof under the stars. It is the custom here in Pakistan to sleep through the hottest hours of the day - from about one o’clock in the afternoon to nearly five o’ 46 clock. I am very happy about this because I have always liked to nap in the afternoon. The entire family, with the exception of the Maulana himself, gathers in the one large room furnished with only a kind of Indian bedspreads on the floor and scattered pillows. Everyone lies down on the floor and goes to sleep. During the first week, I never knew what time it was, for my wrist-watch broke in Port Sudan and I had given it to the Maulana for repairs. Although our house has several old grandfather clocks on the wall, they are mostly out-of-order and each one tells a different time! We mark time not so much by mechanical clocks but by the Adhan or call to prayer.

Since Maulana Maudoodi thought I required more complete rest from my long journey, he has given me a room all to myself. It is no regular bed-room, however, because all were fully occupied with none to spare. Rather, my room is in Maulana Maudoodi’s library. It consists of a narrow corridor with a bare dusty cement floor and big ceiling electric fan and one naked electric light bulb for lighting. From floor to ceiling, the walls are completely lined with row upon row of shelves filled with the thousands of books which comprise Maulana Maudoodi’s vast library. Books upon books in English, Arabic, Persian and Urdu in addition to another shelf stacked with magazines from every part of the world. Maulana Maudoodi cleared one section of his bookshelves for me and there I have stored my own library plus the clothing I am now wearing. My heavy winter coats and sweaters have been stored in my suitcases which are kept beneath my Indian string bed. There is also a little wooden table for my typewriter and a straight-backed wooden chair. This is my “office” and I do all my writing and correspondence here. I love my room very much because I like to go to sleep amidst so many, many books, knowing that I have such easy access to them all.

Housekeeping is quite simplified in the absence of vacuum cleaners or carpet-sweepers. To chase the dust away, a rag is attached on the end of a long stick and with this stick, you merely go from place to place, flapping the rag vigorously about. To sweep the floor, you take a bundle of straw sticks, tie them together with a bit of string, and presto! A good broom! Naturally because it lacks any sort of handle, you cannot sweep the floor without 47 squatting down on your heels.

In front of our house is a good-sized garden of bushes and potted plants and a grassy lawn. The plant and animal life is totally different from New York. Instead of squirrels, we have a little furry mouse-like rodent with black and white stripes down its back. They are very playful little creatures and I often see three or four chasing each other up and down the trees. Then we have the sweetest little sparrows who fly into the kitchen to eat what crumbs they can. They are about the size of a wren and we call them “cheeriya”. The black crows are truly enormous with big hard beaks and the harshest cries. Often above us we can see great black vultures and kites circling round and round in the sky searching for dead animals to eat. Vultures and kites find plenty of food here in Lahore and are greatly prized because they eat garbage and are such efficient street cleaners. At night the frogs come out and hop all over the place. There is also an endless variety of insect life - huge black ants, flies, spiders, beetles, yellow bees and many other winged creatures that defy classification. The family next door has a whole flock of roosters and hens which strut freely in and out the house.

During the first few days here, I managed to pick up about twenty-five Urdu words but since then have made little further progress. They seem to expect me to pick up the language automatically while I feel I have little chance learning it unless somebody takes the time and patience to teach me. My first Urdu word I learned was “pani” which means “water”. My extremely limited Urdu vocabulary is almost exclusively confined to the names of different foods. All I can do in Urdu is eat! Everybody seems far more interested in practicing speaking English with me than teaching me Urdu. Nearly all but the youngest children can speak a little English, although none, not even Maulana Maudoodi himself, can speak it fluently. Because Maulana Maudoodi, his wife and elder daughters are accustomed to the British accent, they do not easily understand me. To my greatest surprise, I discovered that Maulana Maudoodi never wrote any of his letters to me himself. He merely dictated his ideas in Urdu to his secretary, Malik Ghulam Ali who translated them into good English and typed them.

48 The Muslim women here in Lahore do not wear the sari much because it is considered Hindu dress. We wear mostly full white trousers gathered at the waist with a draw-string (the shalwar) with a khameez or tunic with slits up the sides of colourful designs. Sandals on our feet and the dupatta or white scarf over the head completes the costume. Like all grown women in our family, I am in strict Purdah and must put on my black burqa which veils me from head to feet, concealing the entire face, whenever I go outside the house. I never go out beyond our house into the street alone as all my needs are completely provided for. Our faith requires strict segregation of men and women and the free social intermingling of the sexes is forbidden. Like Saudi Arabia, small girls most often dress Western-style until they begin to show signs of physical maturity. Maulana Maudoodi and his sons wear a kind of costume which resembles white pajamas. On their head, they wear the curly lambskin cap or “toppee”. Many of the poorer men, however, wear the Indian “dhoti” or loin cloth. All the clothing worn here are made by the women by hand or on the sewing machine at home.

Our household consists of Maulana Maudoodi, his wife, their nine children plus two servants who live with us. Although Maulana Maudoodi was born in 1903, he looks closer to eighty than sixty. His hair and full beard are totally white and he takes so many medicines, he has enough medications to open up a chemist shop!

His terms of imprisonment, and especially the death-sentence in 1953, severely impaired his health. Despite his indifferent health, his duties are now heavier than ever before. From dawn until past midnight, his time is taken up with interviewing a steady stream of visitors, correspondence and lectures on Quran, Hadith plus every other subject connected with Islam in the mosques of Lahore. Within about two weeks, he is leaving on a three-months tour of Africa. Just before I had arrived, he had recently returned from Saudi Arabia where he had long discussions with King Ibn Saud on the formation of a new Islamic University in the holy city of Madina. Maulana Maudoodi has visited Saudi Arabia four times in as many years and has become a very close friend of King Ibn Saud. Maulana Maudoodi is also one of the political figures of Pakistan as the head of the 49 banned “Jama’at-e-Islami Pakistan” which is seeking to make Pakistan a full fledged Islamic state with the Quran and Sunnah as the law of the land. I like Maulana Maudoodi’s wife very much. She is about forty years old but looks older. In addition to her strenuous household duties, she finds time to visit the homes of various women in the neighbourhood who all congregate to listen to her lectures on Quran and Hadith. She always takes me with her on these lecture tours. Women come from all over to listen to her; they squat on the floor and suckle their naked brown babies. Each lecture lasts for several hours with plenty of time for questions and discussion afterwards and I feel so sad and frustrated because I cannot understand a word! Right now there is great excitement in our house. A big package just arrived from Saudi Arabia by K.L.M. Airlines and when Maulana Maudoodi’s eldest son opened it, he found it contained a large piece of the black covering of the Holy Ka’aba in Mecca with verses of Quran embroidered in gold. To a Muslim, there is no greater prize than this! This was a personal present direct from King Ibn Saud to Maulana Maudoodi so you can understand how highly King Ibn Saud regards him. The treasure was ceremoniously spread out on the bed while all the children stood around gaping in awe.

Umar Farouq is the oldest son, next is Ahmad Farouq who is about twenty-five years old (ages are all approximate estimates as nobody celebrates or makes any effort to keep count of birthdays) and he is studying to be a doctor. His medical textbooks are strewn all over the house. Umar Farouq is completely absorbed in the study of Arabic. Neither Umar nor Ahmad Farouq have ever addressed a word to me since I came nor do they pay me the slightest attention. Rather, they completely ignore my presence and act as if I did not exist. When I asked Begum Maudoodi about this, she assured me that it had nothing to do with me personally but rather it was because Islam forbids men to talk to strange women. Indeed, Umar and Ahmad Farouq talk little even with their own sisters and converse freely only with their father and mother. Both Umar and Ahmad Farouq are regarded with the highest respect bordering on awe because they adhere to Islam so strictly and are so devout. Humaira is in her early twenties and specializing at college in English literature while nineteen-year-old 50 Asma is studying for her Master’s Degree in Economics. When I questioned Maulana Maudoodi as to why his daughters chose such westernized subjects, he replied that because of such enormous British and American influence in the country, no Pakistani is respected as educated unless he or she is thoroughly versed with Western knowledge. A person learned exclusively in Islamic studies and ignorant of English, he said, would carry no weight or respect among the people whatsoever. In striking contrast to American girls their age, Asma and Humaira are quiet and reserved with the most lovely, refined manners. They are meek and obedient to their parents. My two best friends among Maulana Maudoodi’s children who have shown me genuine warmth and kindliness even throughout these first few difficult days, are eighteen-year-old Muhammad Farouq and fifteen-year-old Haider Farouq. Muhammad is attending his last year of secondary school. He is also a champion cricket player and goes into town to practice nearly every day. Superficially we don’t have much in common but he is so gentle and kind. I spend even more time with Haider Farouq. He has the most delightful sense of humor and we have a gay time. We spend much time together playing badminton on the lawn. One of the rackets is broken but this did not discourage Haider. He merely found another broken racket and bound the two together with string and it works as well as mine. Like boys the world over, Haider loves birds and little animals. He found a baby pigeon abandoned by its mother which was too young to fly. For more than a week, he kept it in his room, feeding and caring for it until yesterday, it flew away. Once, Begum Maudoodi told me, he brought home a whole litter of puppies which infuriated his father because, according to our faith, dogs are unclean and we are forbidden to keep them inside the house. Haider is always giving me presents. When I first came, he presented with a ring with imitation diamonds surrounding a stone of blue glass. Two of the imitation diamonds have fallen out and disappeared within as many days but I think the ring is quite pretty nevertheless and wear it all the time. Then there is ten-year-old Khalid who always looks sleepy-eyed. His favourite playmates are the neighbouring children from the poorest families and he is always running off with them to go swimming in the creek. Maulana Maudoodi’s favourite 51 child is little six-year-old Ayesha, the “baby” of the family. She is a high-spirited, mischievous little monkey and sometimes really a naughty little girl. Ayesha thinks I am a big joke and like the Imam’s children in Port Sudan, takes the greatest delight in making fun of my English by mimicking me. She is just starting school and learning to read and write Urdu and Arabic and has an extremely bright little mind. The children own no toys whatsoever. Ayesha has never owned a doll; much less even seen one. I wonder if she knows what dolls are. Ayesha, however, has no need for dolls; not when she has her baby cousin, Hassan to play with. Ayesha just loves little babies and nearly smothers little Hassan with affection. She is always carrying Hassan about on her hip and since she is so small and slender and Hassan so big and fat, he is much too much a burden for her and looks as if she will drop him any moment. Hassan is so strong and healthy that at seven months, he is able to stand with support. But never in my life have I ever come across a baby who cries like little Hassan! Crying is little Hassan’s occupation. He cries all day and all night! Only occasionally will he coo and smile his toothless smile.

Hassan’s mother is everything that a Muslim woman should be. In addition to being an expert home-maker, she can read and write both Urdu and Arabic and can recite more than half of the Quran from memory. She keeps her Quran with her constantly and its words are constantly on her lips. She rises at four o’clock in the morning to recite Quran after the dawn prayer and then reads it again later on during the day. She spends hours and hours at her prayers and devotions, soothing little Hassan to sleep. She goes to sleep after praying and wakes up reciting Quran with little Hassan kicking at her side. As soon as little Hassan gives the sign that he has to go, his mother, slips off his little pants and carries him naked to the lawn. There to the accompaniment of a delightful little whistle, little Hassan is encouraged by his mother to do his duty. “From Heaven down unto earth!” commented Haider.

As I mentioned before, we have two servants who live with us. Our cook is an elderly lady, brown and wrinkled up like a dried prune. Her name is Karima Bibi and she is so quiet and impassive, she rarely speaks to anyone except Begum Maudoodi. Karima Bibi, however, is an excellent cook and so efficient and 52 conscientious she has been with us for more than ten years. Our other servant is a little twelve-year-old boy from a poverty-stricken village of the Punjab whom his parents were no doubt unable to feed and who, of course, has never been the inside of a school. His name is Hidris, and when he is not busy doing odd cleaning jobs around the house, he takes great delight playing with Ayesha and Khalid. He also loves little Hassan.

In addition to Hadris, the little children of Maulana Maudoodi’s secretary, Malik Ghulam Ali, and book publishers, Mian Tufail Mohammad, often come to play and are extremely friendly with Ayesha and Khalid. The servants are never humiliated nor treated in a condescending manner but they are almost like members of the family. The servants do not do all the housework but they merely help out and Begum Maudoodi and Hassan’s mother work along with them as do Humaira and Asma also.

Our next-door neighbours are a jolly family of Sufis whose swarm of children make more noise and racket than ten Ayeshas. Sometimes the house is used as a mosque. Sufi dervishes gather from all over Lahore, sit row on row packed tightly together on the bare floor and rock back and forth chanting their prayers. When I asked Begum Maudoodi about them, she made it clear that neither she nor the Maulana belong to their category because they do not consider them as proper Muslims as they do not obey Shar’iah strictly enough.

Adjoining my room is Maulana Maudoodi’s office. From five o’clock in the morning until nearly midnight, it is filled with grave, bearded brown men in white pajamas. Because the walls of our house are so thick and the doors sturdy, they never bother me at all. I can only hear faint sounds of their conversation. Urdu is a soft and gentle language—not harsh and gutteral like Arabic. These men are the members of Maulana Maudoodi’s political party and each afternoon in the back-yard, you can see about two dozen of them seated in a circle around the Maulana listening with rapt attention while he instructs them in Islam. “My father’s family!” commented Haider. When the hours for prayer arrive, they form their own congregation with the Maulana as Imam.

I enjoy a most active social life. All of Begum Maudoodi’s family and friends are eager to meet me; every afternoon promptly at five 53 o’clock, I am invited without fail to a tea-party. Every afternoon means another tea-party. I am literally full of tea-parties and saturated with cups of tea! Although Begum Maudoodi is a devout Muslim, unfortunately, her younger brothers and sisters are not. We are a typical middle-class Pakistani family but many of Begum Maudoodi’s younger brothers and sisters are quite wealthy, at least according to Pakistani standards. Frankly speaking, I rarely enjoy these tea-parties because of the incessant, inane chatter and because there is so little genuine Islamic atmosphere in these homes. So long as I know only English, I am limited to this highly westernized upper-crust. Only after I have learned Urdu, will I be able to pick and choose my own friends.

The day before yesterday, however, I was invited to a tea-party at the home I have liked best of all the homes we have visited in Lahore thus far, because it was a real authentic, indigenous Pakistani home with no Western influence at all. It belongs to one of the whole-time workers for the Jama’at-e-Islami who has been closest to Maulana Maudoodi ever since he joined as a young man in 1951. His name is Mohammad Yusuf Khan. His house, although old and dilapidated, is very large and spacious and has a substantial, sturdy look, accomodating his entire joint-family of brothers and sisters and their families, including some cousins as well. It is located in the midst of what looked to me like a poor, shabby neighbourhood. Begum Maudoodi led me by the hand inside and when I took off my black burqa, I found the courtyard of the house alive with scores of women from pretty young girls to withered old grandmothers. I was deeply touched by the respect given those old ladies. When one of them entered, at once, all the younger women and girls would rise to their feet and offer them their seats. The older women were most beautifully dressed in handwoven silken tunics, satin trousers and white-lace scarfs around their heads with embroidered satin slippers with turned-up toes on their feet. Although the younger women also looked nice, their dress was far less elaborate. The older women were mostly very stout; the young girls slender and glowing with health and vitality but you never saw such pitiful looking children. The little babies were so sick and starved-looking with their pale, pinched, emaciated little faces and great sad hungry eyes. The children were 54 so thin, you could see every bone in their bodies. They looked just like the pictures I used to draw for my novel “Ahmad Khalil.” Mohammad Yusuf Khan liked the comfort of his entire enormous joint family in his presence so they all lived together in this one big house: his wife and four small children, his married and unmarried brothers, sisters, cousins, aunts and old mother, together with all the children of the family. There must have been close to thirty people altogether living here - six kindred families in twelve rooms. Each family had one or two rooms to itself. After Begum Maudoodi introduced me to them, the women’s faces brightened up with glowing smiles and each one came forward to shake my hand. I greeted them with “Assalaam alaikum” but since I knew no Urdu and they did not speak any English, that was the extent of our conversation. All I could do was smile and sit still while Begum Maudoodi chatted with them for more than an hour. Amidst all this exuberant female company, I happened to notice one man lying on a string bed in the corner of the courtyard. I looked closer. He appeared to be very young - no more than eighteen or twenty. He was obviously very ill indeed; he was so terribly emaciated, his body was no more than skin tightly stretched over the bones. He acted as if he were all alone and appeared not to notice anything going on. Begum Maudoodi whispered to me; “He is not normal.” When I asked what was wrong, she replied: “His mind is not right. He has been like that since he was a child.” Just then all the ladies stood up and motioned for me to come with them. “Tea is ready,” explained Begum Maudoodi. “Please come.” They led me into a large room in the centre of which was a long table spread with an immaculately clean white linen cloth. On the table were plates stacked with literally mountains of the most expensive, finest quality sweets, biscuits, iced cakes and rich pastries. There was an unlimited, overflowing abundance of the finest tea served in the finest bone English china cups and saucers. Although there was not enough to go round, the ladies insisted I eat until I could eat no more. Although the sweets tasted marvellous, I could not eat without the constant reminder that these must have cost this family a fortune and because of this, they might go hungry for days afterwards. But the ladies laughed and chatted cheerfully and insisted that I must eat everything because I was “a hundred times 55 welcome.” Finally Begum Maudoodi said: “It is time for the sunset prayer.” We all rose from the table and returned to the courtyard where rows and rows of reed mats were spread out on the stone pavement. After we had all completed our prayers, Begum Maudoodi said it was time for us to go. We put on our black burqas and just as I was about to go out the door, I saw that the sick man had risen from his bed and was conversing softly with one of his sisters.

At dinner that night when I told Maulana Maudoodi about the “tea-party,” he explained, “In India, Mohammad Yusuf Khan was a rich man and his family were very prosperous land-owners. In 1947 when they were forced to flee as refugees to Pakistan, they lost all they owned. Mohammad Yusuf Khan is a very honest, upright man. The honest people found nothing here while the crafty and the cunning grabbed everything.”

All my love,

Maryam 56 Maryam Jameelah c/o Maulana Sayyid Abul Ala Maudoodi

5-A Zaildar Park Ichhra, Lahore

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

July 22, 1962

Dearest Mother and Daddy,

What a relief and joy it was to receive your letter of July 18th and to know that at last my second letter reached you! I wrote my first letter while still in Karachi and completed it just after I arrived at Maulana Maudoodi’s home. It described in detail my arrival and stay in Karachi and my plane trip to Lahore. Mother and Daddy, please don’t think that I would ever neglect writing to you. If you do not receive my letters regularly, it does not mean I have forgotten to write. It only means that the mail has been delayed. You must know that all in-coming and out-going letters at Maulana Maudoodi’s address are subject to strict censorship and open and read. Sometimes even photostatic copies are made of them. This is why my letters are so slow in reaching you and sometimes will take as long as a month to arrive, even when sent by air-mail.

“Sayyid” is an honorific title meaning “one who is descended from the family of the Prophet.” “Maulana” is another honorific title meaning “scholar” and given to a learned man. As for the correct spelling, “Maudoodi”, “Maududi” or “Mawdudi” are all equally correct.

Yes, Shaikh Muhammad Ashraf did come to see me and interviewed me in Maulana Maudoodi’s office. He is a tall, thin, brown, elderly man with sharp features wearing a red fez and white pajamas. His manner was very reserved and courteous while I discussed with him a possible new, revised edition of my book, “Islam Versus the West.” I told him I was also working on two more books, “Islam and Modernism” and “Islam in Theory and 67 Practice. At the close of the interview, he gave me a cheque for Rs.150.00

Aside from the few dollars I spent aboard ship to mail my letters, I have spent nothing since. Maulana Maudoodi provides me with all my needs; all the books I want are already in his library so I need not buy anything. Pakistan has very strict currency regulations and no money can be sent out of the country. As for the Islamic periodicals you have received containing my articles, please send all of them to me without delay! I have not received any of these here and am very eager to see them. If there are duplicate copies, you are more then welcome to keep one for yourself if you want.

Right now I am devoting most of my time to writing articles, essays and letters and the remainder to learning Urdu. Although my Urdu vocabulary has reached about sixty-five words, I can as yet say only a few different kinds of sentences. Begum Maudoodi has engaged a very cultured lady who teaches Urdu at the local university to instruct me. Unfortunately, she has not been able to come regularly because she lives several miles distant and the heavy rains make the dirt roads impassable. We are in the midst of the monsoon now.

Mother, if you are squeamish about insects, you could never stand it here a single day! Although the monsoon has moderated the extremely hot weather, and made it a bit more bearable, it has also brought in its wake literally hordes of insects. During the night they come in droves, thousands upon thousands - millions of them. I never saw so many bugs in all my life. They come in every size and shape in an infinite variety. They particularly love my room and crawl all over the floor and cover my bed. I try to kill as many as I can but every one I kill, hundreds more arrive. I must have killed several hundred of these creatures last night, crawling over my bed. I can’t decide if it is better to sleep with the live bugs or the dead ones!

Although the language barrier prevented us from speaking to each other, I have missed Hassan’s mother very much ever since she returned to her home in Karachi. She was a true Muslim in every respect and I would have very much liked to make friends with her. Her visit here lasted for more than a month. We are 58 always having visitors, various members of this enormous family who stay on and on.

In my past letter, I mentioned that Maulana Maudoodi has nine children but I only described eight of them. The one I omitted was seventeen-year-old Hussain Farouq. At that time he was visiting one of his uncles in Karachi. His visit lasted more than two months. This uncle happens to be among the most highly westernized of Pakistanis who received his education in England and had recently returned from a trip to America. He neither fasts nor prays; in fact, he is a Muslim in name only. Naturally, Maulana Maudoodi did not want his son subject to such influences, but felt powerless to prevent him from going because this visit was deemed essential to preserve unity and good relations among the various branches of the family. So last Sunday morning Hussain Farouq returned, his suitcase crammed with the latest style Western clothes including skin-tight jeans and pointed shoes, cartons of American cigarettes and girlie magazines. Pakistani youth who try to ape Western ways are called “teddy” boys or “teddy” girls. This is a purely British idiom which I had never heard before I came here. It has a terrible connotation for Muslims here and they always use it with the utmost contempt. When I asked Maulana Maudoodi why Muhammad, Hussain and Haider are so vastly different from his two eldest sons, Umar and Ahmad, he explained that while Umar and Ahmad were raised under the full impact of his influence, during his three younger sons’ most critical years, he was a political prisoner behind bars. Therefore they lacked a father to give them the firm hand they so desperately needed. Now Maulana Maudoodi is doing his best to repair the havoc of his long absence.

Maulana Maudoodi’s two elder daughters, nineteen-year-old Asma and twenty-three-year-old Humaira are gradually becoming more friendly with me. They are really lovely girls who are truly Muslim in their behaviour and manners. Humaira is preparing for her final examination for a Master’s degree in English and although this crucial event is eight months away, Humaira studies almost continuously for fifteen hours every single day alone in her room. We must all be very quiet so she can concentrate. Mother, you and Humaira would have much in common because right now, Humaira is reading every single classic of English literature, both 59 antiquated and modern, and she is wildly enthusiastic about all of it. Right now she is studying Shakespeare’s “Richard III”. Believe it or not, she has read Chaucer in the original Old English! Margaret Mitchell’s “Gone with the Wind” made such a vivid impression upon her that she told me, the other night, she dreamt she was Scarlett O’Hara! When I told her how much I loved what Arabic poetry and literature I had been able to read in good translations, she told me she hated Arabic literature because it was so indecent and overly-sentimental. I asked Maulana Maudoodi about this and he assured me that Humaira’s attitude regarding English literature and her literary tastes would surely undergo a change as she matured. As for her contempt for Arabic literature, Maulana Maudoodi said that British influence on the college curriculum was entirely to blame. Arabic is deliberately taught so that the students will have a very low opinion of it; for this reason, Humaira was assigned only the worst examples of Arabic literature to read and purposely given the impression that this was representative of the whole. Humaira told me that as soon as she has sufficient knowledge of English, she wants to translate her father’s Urdu books.

There is one thing about me which Maulana Maudoodi dislikes very much - he says that I talk much too much. He also says that I take up too much of his very limited time and thus deprive his wife and nine children of their share. I feel very sorry about this; but there are so many problems which I can only discuss with him. Then too, is the problem that I really enjoy talking and discussing topics of mutual interest but nobody else in this family does. “We are all students”, says Humaira. “I sit in my room all day studying English literature; my sister is studying Economics; Umar sits in his room completely absorbed in his Arabic studies while Ahmad has only his medical text-books to keep him company. You see, Maryam, how little we talk to each other; we are content to communicate in just a sentence or two. I am not free with anybody; not even my own brothers. You are much too free with little Ayesha, Khalid, Haider, Hussain and Muhammad, and that is why they don’t respect you. Until you learn to be quiet and reserved as a well-bred Pakistani woman should be, you will not command respect from anyone….”

70 Last night during dinner, Maulana Maudoodi had to interrupt his meal to answer a telephone call. The telephone call concerned me. It seems that a friend of his offered me a regular full-time job teaching children English at an Islamic school called Madrassah tul Banat here in Lahore. When I insisted that I had neither the interest nor the qualifications for this work, Maulana Maudoodi was extremely disturbed. He wanted me so much to be an English teacher and I had disappointed him in my refusal. “My problem,” he said, “is your rehabilitation. You must think of what kind of work you would like to do so you can earn enough to live decently. I am old now and in poor health and I am very much worried about your future.” When I explained to him that this was exactly the same problem you yourself had been facing these last several years back home, he replied gravely, “Your parents’ worries concerning you are now mine. I am responsible for you and you are making things very difficult for me.” He went on to explain that because Pakistan is so poor with such a high rate of illiteracy, my writings will not bring me nearly enough to live on; my ability to type is of no help either; here in Pakistan, all the typists and secretaries are men. He paused and then said; “If you do not want to work, then the only remaining alternative is marriage. I am convinced that marriage is the best thing for you, no matter how much you insist that you do not want it. Believe me, Maryam, the woman in you is not absent. She is only sleeping….”

All my love,

Maryam 61 Maryam Jameelah to Maulana Sayyid Abul Ala Maudoodi

5-A Zaildar Park Ichhra, Lahore.

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

August 2, 1962

Dear Mother and Daddy,

I was very happy to receive your letter of July 21st and July 29th and was greatly relieved to know that all my letters have safely arrived. You must know that the reason why I cannot write to you as often as I wish is because I am literally overwhelmed with correspondence. Although “The Pakistan Times” never did print my autobiography, “The Daily Kohistan”, an Urdu daily, did. Since then, the letters have been pouring in. All of them must be politely acknowledged. Maulana Maudoodi tells me that since I arrived a month ago, I have received about fifty proposals for marriage. Most of these are directed to him as my guardian rather than to me. However, I did receive one the other day from a certain Ibrahim Idris Ibrahim. He addressed me as follows:

“I am a lonely tree parched in the wilderness of the desert! A fire for you is burning in the furnace of my chest!”

As a further inducement, he informed me that he has a savings account in the bank for Rs 8,000. When I read this letter aloud, Maulana Maudoodi’s children thought it most hysterically funny. They laughed till their stomachs ached. This afternoon I received another letter from a genuine crack-pot. He mentioned that he had fifteen infallible proofs of the truth of Islam which he planned to send to the Russian ambassador to Pakistan through Maulana Maudoodi to “challenge the Russian nonbelievers.” Among these “splendid proofs” were the following:

“When the Jewish king Abrah of Yemen sent an army to 62 try to destroy the Ka’aba in Mecca, Allah sent a flock of nightingales upon his army who threw stones down upon them from the air until they perished.

Let the non-Muslims bring a king cobra and keep it in the sunshine and making a circle around it saying that he has a circle of Hazrat Pir Dastigir and the snake will die there without coming out of the circle.

Let the non-Muslims bring a goat and a wolf and leave them together within the boundaries of the Ka’aba. The wolf will not fight with the goat. Then it is clear that Islam means peace and brotherhood …. “ Evidently all it takes is one article in a single newspaper “to light the fires in their chests.” In fact, Maulana Maudoodi tells me he is not exaggerating when he says that I am the most sought-after spinster in Pakistan!

It is true that I do not mail my own letters; I give all of them to Maulana Maudoodi. In fact, the same is true of his telephone. He makes all the necessary phone calls for me. For the same reason, I never go out on the streets alone, but only when accompanied by Maulana Maudoodi’s family and friends and veiled from head to foot in my black burqa. Certain areas of the house where Maulana Maudoodi’s friends call upon him, are also off-limits. The women and small children are only allowed to use the front lawn and the front portion of the house while the back part, where the activities of the Jama’at are carried on, are reserved for the men. To ensure our privacy, our house is surrounded by a high brick wall and the gate is locked at night. Begum Maudoodi, of course, never meets her husband’s friends. She doesn’t know them at all, not even their names. Vice-versa, Maulana Maudoodi never sees his wife’s friends and does not know them either. This is Purdah in practice. As Begum Maudoodi so eloquently explained it: “In Islam, mens mix with mens and women with womens. Mens and womens not mix up!”

Just this afternoon we heard the most wonderful news over the radio: Martial Law has finally been removed after three long years of it and political parties, including the Jama’at-e-Islami are allowed to function again. Now there is much activity in the back of the Maulana’s house.

63 Yesterday one of Maulana Maudoodi’s friends took me sightseeing in Lahore for the first time. The high-light was our visit to the Badshahi mosque of Lahore built more than three hundred years ago by the great Mughal emperor, Aurangzeb. This is the largest mosque in the world and also one of the most beautiful. It is entirely built of pink granite with white domes and four graceful minarets. When not in use, tourists are allowed to climb to the top where they can see the entire city of Lahore spread out beneath them. I saw quite a few American tourists; slim blonde women in sleeveless blouses, tight short skirts and spike-heel shoes and sunburned men in their casual sports open-necked shirts and shorts. I felt as remote from them as the moon. In my black burqa, it is impossible to identify me as an American. In fact, I looked exactly like a big black crow among hundreds of other “black crows.”

About a week ago there was an unfortunate incident at one of my numerous “tea-parties.” It took place in the home of one of Begum Maudoodi’s highly westernized younger sisters. It seems that her husband, Ashkali, expressed vigourously modernist views in favour of the total westernization of Pakistan. After I had frankly expressed the contrary, we both had a terrific argument. I became so angry with him that I stormed out of the room. When news of this reached Maulana Maudoodi, he was very much displeased.

“But,” I protested. “This man is one of the most despicable people I have ever met. He was an exact replica of “Ismail” (the westernized son of “Ahmad Khalil” in my novel) in the flesh.”

Maulana Maudoodi looked at me gravely and very critically; “That may be so, but so were your manners. You were a guest and you had no right to insult my wife’s brother-in-law in his home. If you are to be a true missionary for Islam, you must learn to tolerate all kinds of people. You must know that Ashkali used to come to me for advice. Now since that night, he refuses to see me because you are here. This kind of uncivilized, rude behaviour will only frighten people away, make them more hostile to Islam than ever and bring nothing but harm to our cause. Do you know, Maryam, that among my disciples are thousands who were just like Ashkali? By patience and kindness their lives were transformed and they 64 became true devoted servants of Islam. Some of these are among those who work here every day from dawn till midnight. Now I must go and take my evening meal. It is 10 o’clock now and I have not eaten since early morning. I have worked for eighteen hours continuously and I am very tired and hungry. Now please excuse me . . .”

This is one of the most frustrating aspects of my life here - the fact that Maulana Maudoodi has no spare time to spend with me. There are so many things I wish to know about Islam from him; so many questions to be answered and discussed which only he knows the answers; yet he has no time. I cannot expect him to give me the time which he cannot spare even for his own wife and children. The children, especially the older ones, don’t seem to mind too much; they are quite resourceful and self-sufficient - all that is, with the sole exception for little six-year-old Ayesha. As the child of Maulana Maudoodi’s old-age, Ayesha is his very favourite. At night she often sleeps with him in his bed. To all outward appearances, she is a completely happy, although overly mischievous little girl, high-spirited and full of playfulness - happy, except during mealtimes. Ayesha is unique in that she is the only child I have ever met in Pakistan who is a real feeding problem. The others eagerly eat anything in sight and literally lick their platters clean. But if Begum Maudoodi tries to insist that she eat, little Ayesha will only slide under the table and cry piteously. However, it is an entirely different story if Father is present. When Maulana Maudoodi feeds her by hand, then she will eat just like a hungry baby bird.

Ayesha’s best friend is the little daughter of Mian Tufail Muhammad’s (Maulana Maudoodi’s publisher who was just released from prison), Rashida, who is almost exactly her same age. Ayesha and Rashida will take an old crate, cover it with a tattered piece of burlap and happily play “house” together hour after hour. Rashida often takes her meals with us and Ayesha at Rashida’s house. Rashida eats even less than Ayesha. In fact, Haider said once that she must live on air. While Ayesha is lean, she is bright-eyed and healthy-looking but Rashida is so thin, you can see every bone in her body. Although Rashida is older than Ayesha, she looks several years younger. She is much quieter than 65 Ayesha and is a very sweet child with a sweet disposition but also one of the most homely little girls I have ever seen. All nine of Maulana Maudoodi’s children are strong and healthy but Rashida is pale and sickly looking.

In the last ten days, seventeen-year-old Hussain has quieted down considerably and is better behaved. Lacking a place of his own, he keeps his things in his mother’s room. His treasures are displayed in what is meant to be a glass book-case. Here he keeps colourful photos of Hindu dancers, of sexy Indian film-stars, pictures he has drawn himself and to my utter amazement, a painting of Jesus Christ, no doubt given to him by some over-optimistic Christian missionary. When I asked Maulana Maudoodi about this, he replied; “No Maryam, I don’t like these things any better than you do; they don’t belong in any Muslim home but the fact remains, I cannot insulate this house. I must tolerate them for the time being. I am doing my best to reform my sons gradually. If I bend the stick too quickly, it will break. If I reprimand them too often and am too harsh with them, they will only become hostile and more disrespectful than ever. It takes time, patience and kindness . . .” Last night at eleven-thirty on my way to the bathroom, I came upon Hussain Farouq who was absorbed in reciting his ‘Isha’ or nightly prayer. It was such a very long and fervent prayer, he didn’t even notice me. Yes, I hope that eventually he will turn out all right.

The latest addition to our ample household are two little kittens whom Haider has adopted as his own. Nobody knows what happened to the mother or the rest of the litter. When Haider found the kittens, they were so tiny and helpless, they could scarcely open their eyes. Now they run about all over the place, friskily playing with each other. But they are pitifully afraid of human beings and will cringe and meow pathetically if anybody comes near. Begum Maudoodi feeds them with goat-meat bones and left-over scraps but Haider makes sure that they have at least one bowl of milk a day plus scraps of meat fit for human consumption. Haider loves all animals; since the pigeon flew away, there was a great vacuum in his life until he found the kittens. His main concern is to keep Ayesha away because she is so rough with them; she has no idea how to treat them.

66 Our diet of goat-meat gravy, bean-soup, and chaupatis does become dreary after a while. In Pakistan, the government has imposes on all its citizens two meatless days a week on Tuesdays and Wednesdays. However, we neatly solve this problem by storing meat in the freezer compartment of the fridge for use on the “lean” days. Fortunately, Maulana Maudoodi has many prosperous friends all over the country who oblige by sending us crates of fruit - mangoes, Persian melons, pears, peaches and pineapples which greatly help to bring a welcome variety to an otherwise monotonous diet. Since I have been here (a month), we have received from Maulana Maudoodi’s generous friends, at least ten crates of fruit. Whenever one arrives, there is always great excitement and an almost festive occasion prevails. As for the milk, it is so expensive, we are lucky to be able to afford it at all; Begum Maudoodi carefully doles out our share. Our milk is from the buffalo - not the cow because the cows are too starved to give any. Tonight there was a very special treat - frozen fish imported from Kuwait in Arabia. This was the first time I had tasted fish since coming to Pakistan. Haider was careful to collect all left-over bones. He put the fish bones in a dish, set it on the lawn and immediately the two little kittens rushed to it. I don’t think those little kittens have ever enjoyed themselves so much.

The other night we had a party; a lady government official from East Pakistan came to see me; she wore a gorgeous jade blue silk sari and with her slanted eyes and high cheek-bones she looked much more Chinese than Pakistani. For this special occasion, Begum Maudoodi somehow managed to obtain some very rich and expensive Pakistani sweets and pastries, which she carefully arranged on the table. No sooner had she turned her back when a half dozen huge hungry black crows were sitting there, determined to enjoy our party even though uninvited!

Pakistanis are extremely scrupulous concerning their personal cleanliness. People are horrified to discover that I take only one bath a day; they take three or four! Clothing, however, is not changed so often. There are no such things as night-gowns or pajamas. Everybody sleeps fully clad in whatever he or she was wearing during the day. When we bathe, we always take showers. Muslim Pakistanis think Westerners are extremely dirty to think of 67 bathing in a tub filled with stagnant dirty water. Teeth are diligently and thoroughly cleaned after each meal. However, this cleanliness is not extended to the house or the streets. Although the sleeping and living rooms are kept clean and neat, the conditions in the kitchen and bathroom would horrify the American housewife. All cooking is done on the floor littered with the remains of the previous meals. There are no such things as incinerators, or any means of garbage disposal. After the meal is over, the servant merely flings egg shells, mango skins, goat-meat bones, etc. out the door into the yard. However, this is of no concern to anybody. The birds, cats, lizards, frogs and insects will soon take care of it. Table manners are delightfully easy-going. We either eat with spoons or our fingers, just as we please.

Our little servant boy, Hidris, was dreadfully sick for a few days with an attack of malaria. His fever was so high, he could scarcely stand and just staggered about. Most of the time he lay on his string bed, completely covered with an old spread to protect himself against the flies. When Indians and Pakistanis go to sleep, they pull the covers completely over their heads and faces like a corpse. It is a mystery how they breathe but they do and sleep soundly. Anyhow, Begum Maudoodi gave Hidris a stiff dose of quinine and he feels fine now.

From the upstairs bathroom, I can get a full view of our Sufi neighbours. Their courtyard is filled with chattering women of all ages, shapes and sizes making chaupatis. Indeed, they make chaupatis all day long from dawn until far into the night. They must in fact make thousands of them in a single day. It is truly a chaupati factory. Small children dart in and out in various stages of undress while hens and roosters strut about. But this morning about six o’clock, I witnessed a very touching scene. A little half-naked brown boy no more than six years old was sitting near his mother vigorously swaying to and fro while loudly reciting the Fatiha or the first chapter of the Quran. His mother was busy cooking chaupatis. When the little boy faltered in the middle, his mother looked up from her cooking for an instant and prompted him. Then she 68 slapped another chaupati on the fire as her little boy continued to chant on…

All my love,

Maryam 79 Maryam Jameelah c/o Hakim Rai Naimat Ali Khan (President) Tibbia Association Main Bazar Pattoki, District Kasur Pakistan

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

August 13, 1962

Dear Mother and Daddy,

I was very interested to know that Cousin Carol and Martin’s wedding took place yesterday. I lost no time writing them in care of Aunt Raynor to congratulate them.

I hope they will be very happy together and that a bright future is in store for both of them. Please send me cousin Carol and Martin’s new address in Brooklyn.

It seems that a dear friend of Maulana Maudoodi’s, Hakim Rai Naimat Ali Khan, invited me to spend a few days with him, his wife and his eighteen-year-old niece, Um Kalthum, a college girl from Karachi who is spending her summer vacation with them. The letter was written in such a kind and loving spirit that I could not help but accept the invitation with great gratitude. Hakim Sahib explained that his wife, Khurshid Bibi is childless and would welcome my company as a kind of substitute daughter. Hakim Sahib and his wife live in a very small town named Pattoki about 50 miles from Lahore. After I had been there for two days, Hakim Sahib asked if I would like to live with them permanently? My stay was so happy that I accepted, went back to Maulana Maudoodi’s home to collect my belongings and have now been here for almost a week.

I travelled from Lahore to Pattoki with Hakim Sahib’s brother-in-law, Muhammad Anwar (another uncle of Um Kalthum) by 70 third-class train where I sat in the women’s compartment with all their baggage and babies. Because Muhammad Anwar was a man, we could not travel together but he sat in the next car with the men. In Pakistan, separate facilities for men and women are provided on all public transportation to preserve purdah or the segregation of the sexes on all public buses, street cars and trains. We were all jammed together when one young girl asked me who I was? When I told her, every face in the car lit up.

“So you ARE Maryam Jameelah! We all know about you! We have read about you in the newspapers and we think Islam Versus the West is a very good book!”

For the next hour I carried on a gay conversation in my terribly broken Urdu with some young teen-age girls. Afterwards because it was quite late at night, everyone began to get very sleepy and started to prepare for the night. Some were hungry and brought out baskets of food, hungrily scooping up handfuls of rice, beans and stuffing chaupatis into their mouths. But most of the others spread out quilts on the hard seats and curled up to sleep. Others, who could find no room on the seats, spread out their quilts and mats on the floor under the seats and completely blocked the aisles.

Muhammad Anwar and I went the rest of the way by bus. The bus was filled with rural folk from remote villages; there were many children; the younger ones wore no clothes at all. In front of me sat four policemen guarding nine prisoners arrested for robbery, all chained together with heavy iron chains, on their way to be locked up in jail.

Hakim Sahib is a man in his middle thirties, with shaved head, sparse black beard who dresses in a dhoti and a tall red Egyptian fez. He and his brother-in-law, Muhammad Anwar, are partners in the drug business and their rickety shop “The Sharfia Medicine Company” is a combination drug store and dispensary for the sick. Khurshid Bibi, his wife, is a tall sturdy-looking statuesque woman in her early thirties who as I mentioned before, is childless. Her healthy appearance is deceptive however, because she suffers terribly from sciatica (nerve inflammation) of the right leg and also from frequent migraine headaches. Although childless, she loves children and her little nieces and nephews visit the house 71 frequently to eat their meals with us and spend the night. They are a most devout couple, completely devoted to Islam in the truest sense. You could not find better people anywhere.

Um Kalthum, the eighteen-year-old niece, is a very sweet, gentle, refined girl who from the beginning, has been most kind and attentive to me. She is studying a pre-medical course at a women’s college in Karachi. She has been invaluable as my interpreter because neither Hakim Sahib nor Khurshid Bibi speak any English.

When I first saw Muhammad Anwar, I thought he must be an English or American convert to Islam. He is much, much whiter and fairer than I am with curly reddish brown hair and freckled skin. He is a very attractive young man about my own age with his immaculate white pajamas and curly lambskin cap. He is one of the very few here in Pattoki who speak English perfectly and he has been so kind and helpful to me in providing me amply for my every need.

Muhammad Anwar’s favourite daughter is little four-year-old Ferhut. Like her father, she is unbelievably fair for a Pakistani with straight blonde hair and light grey eyes. Although I was told that her skin was white when she was born, the hot Pakistani sun has turned it as brown as the other children. She is a very sweet affectionate child and I am growing extremely fond of her. Compared to mischievous Ayesha, Maulana Maudoodi’s favourite - she is truly most beautifully behaved. Ferhut spends almost all her time with us; she eats almost all her meals with us and sleeps here practically every night. Indeed, she spends much more time with her uncle and aunt than with her own mother and father!

Muhammad Anwar has engaged little Ferhut’s tutor to be my teacher also. He comes here early every morning and spends an hour and a half teaching me to read and write Urdu. He is a tall lean brown, middle-aged man with a stubble-black beard. He has a kind, weather-beaten face and a fine sense of humour. He wears a white turban, a thread-bare dhoti and a loose shirt with shirt tails on the outside. He has a very large family; his children are Ferhut’s playmates and his wife, a good friend of Khurshid Bibi’s. She often comes here to chat with Khurshid Bibi and suckle her naked brown babies. He is evidently a poor man for his clothes are threadbare 72 and liberally patched and mended. Ferhut and I each have our own wooden slate on which we write our lessons in black home-made ink. The ink can then be washed off and the slate used over and over again. This saves much paper. I am using Ferhut’s primer and she and I are on the same lesson. Believe it or not, she is a better pupil than I am!

I forgot to mention another important member of our household - Miamitu. Miamitu is our pet parrot. Of course Miamitu speaks only Urdu and his vocabulary is strictly limited. All he can say is “I want some chaupatis!” However, he is equally fond of mangoes and all other kinds of fruit. When he is not begging for chaupatis, he can make the most dreadful-sounding, screeching noises, which are very difficult for poor Khurshid Bibi to bear because of her bad headaches.

Our house, like all the others in Pattoki, looks very old and has probably been standing for a century or more. It is sturdily built of brick and we live in two rooms set around an open courtyard which serve double-duty as bed-room and livingroom. One of the rooms has been reserved for my exclusive use where I can keep my typewriter, books, clothes and all my other things. The white-washed walls of both rooms are decorated with framed examples of Arabic calligraphy quoted from the Holy Quran and Hadiths. As a very special present, just before I came, they furnished my room with a dressing table, a stuffed sofa and two stuffed chairs. Although I use the dressing table for a desk when I type, the sofa and stuffed chairs are reserved for guests. In summer, however, nobody sleeps indoors. We all carry our charpoys or Indian string-beds up to the roof and sleep there where the air is cool and fresh. We have no special kitchen; all cooking is done outside in a corner of the courtyard on a low kerosene stove, squatting on the ground. Keeping house in America and here in Pakistan are two entirely different things. I literally have to start from scratch and learn to cook and clean all over again! Meals take three or four hours each to prepare and the cooking continues almost the whole day long. Flour must be ground by hand between stones; salt is bought in lumps of crystal rocks; it must be pounded and crushed in a bowl with a heavy wooden mortar; even laundry soap is manufactured by hand at home. We have to make our own 73 butter from buffalo milk. You keep shaking the milk in a bowl long enough and finally the butter-fat collects in a round white ball surrounded by watery liquid. Melted, we call it ghee - which is used in all cooking. A single dish includes a half dozen different spices; I am rapidly becoming accustomed to the hot spicy food. It no longer burns my mouth and I like it very much. Maulana Maudoodi tells me that within a year, I won’t like the taste of any other kind of food. There is no such thing as piped water here in Pattoki but we do have a pump. The water from the pump is used only for washing - never for drinking purposes because it has such a vile, bitter taste. Every day the water-seller comes to our house with a large goatskin on his back to supply us with fresh drinking water. Since it is scarce and expensive, water is precious and none is wasted. Because there is no refrigeration, all perishable foods must be consumed at once. Here in Pattoki, our homes are furnished with an ingenious sanitary arrangement. In our house there are two square holes on the floor surrounded with a slippery slab of cement. This serves double-duty as bathroom and garbage pail. All the filth and garbage is washed down the holes in the floor with buckets of water into the street below. If one is unfortunate enough to walk down the street at the wrong time, he risks grave danger of being drenched with a dirty shower! Everybody bathes and washes very frequently, particularly during the hottest weather. If we want to take a bath, we draw a bucket of cold water from the pump, stand on the slippery cement, soap ourselves well and then pour the bucket of water over us. There are no telephones here in Pattoki; nobody possesses a car; indeed, there is practically no mechanized traffic to be seen at all. The streets are filled with buffaloes, donkeys and horse-driven carts. The cobble-stone streets are very narrow and in a sad state of disrepair.

In big cities such as Karachi and Lahore, the government forbids people to keep large animals because they fear their filth will breed epidemic diseases. For this reason, food in the large cities is extremely scarce and expensive because it must be transported over such long distances. Here in Pattoki, where we are almost self-sufficient, we can afford to eat much, much better. Almost every family keeps one or more buffaloes. Another of Khurshid Bibi’s relatives who lives next door, has a buffalo with a month-old 74 calf. Whenever the mother is milked, the little calf grows hysterically angry. When it is finally allowed to nurse, instead of going for its mother’s teats, it rushes frantically to the bucket of milk and if not forcibly restrained, would kick it over. The expression in its eyes seems to say: “How dare you take my mother’s milk! That’s mine!” Plenty of buffaloes mean plenty of milk; I can drink as much milk as I want; three or four times a day! An abundance of chickens means an abundance of eggs and plenty of goats mean plenty of fresh meat. There are very, very few cows, however, and these few look almost starved to death. Pakistani Muslims have a strong prejudice against cows because they are so disgusted with the way cows are worshipped as sacred by the Hindus in India.

Indeed, whenever India is mentioned, people here shudder in horror. The memories of the horrors of Partition days in 1947 are still painfully vivid in people’s minds, even after fifteen years. One of Khurshid Bibi’s best friends invited me for dinner the day before yesterday. Although she is several years younger than I am, she already has a large family. She would be very pretty were it not for the horrible scars on her face and all over her body. After I left, I asked Um Kalthum about it. “She was nine or ten at the time of Partition. She was fleeing with her family from India to Pakistan when a gang of Hindus armed with knives and swords fell upon them. They seized the child, knocked out her front teeth and almost ripped her to pieces. She was lucky to escape with her life; the rest of her family were not so fortunate. She still bears the marks of the sword all over her body; the scars, visible and invisible, will never leave her.”

Although Pattoki is only a small provincial town, hardly more than a village, we have four mosques. They are never empty. The Adhan or call to prayer rings out loud and clear five times every day. We Muslims are early risers. Promptly at 4 A.M. the four muezzins climb the four minarets and beseech all Pattoki to worship Allah in the loudest possible voices, crying out; “Prayer is better than sleep!” If one muezzin fails to awaken everyone, it is guaranteed that the other three will! The roosters, crows, sparrows, wild dogs, donkeys, goats and buffaloes join the muezzin in chorus. Children happily scamper from the roof of one house to 85 another; the houses in Pattoki are all joined together so you can travel from one end of the town to the other by means of the adjoining roofs without ever touching the street. It always fills me with an intense happiness to hear the Adhan, particularly early in the morning. Can you think of any better way to start the day?

All my love,

Maryam 76 Maryam Jameelah c/o Hakim Rai Naimat Ali Khan (President)

Tibbia Association

Main Bazar Pattoki, District Kasur

Pakistan

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

August 27, 1962

Dearest Mother and Daddy,

I received your letter of August 13th almost a week ago and hope by now my first letter from Pattoki has reached you safely. I only hope that the news of moving from Lahore to Pattoki did not shock you or give you mental anxieties. As good as Maulana Maudoodi and Begum Maudoodi were to me in their home, I am much, much happier here. Since the end of Martial law, Maulana Maudoodi has been permitted to revive the activities of his Jama ‘at-e-Islami after having been banned for more than three years. Consequently, he is burdened with work and nearly overwhelmed with responsibilities and therefore has absolutely no time to devote any attention to me, much less his own wife and children. This created an atmosphere of tension about the house which had its effect on everybody.

I was very interested in your short, but vivid description of cousin Carol’s wedding. Their prospects for future happiness appear very bright indeed. I do hope they received my note of congratulations so that at least they know that I did not forget them.

As for the mosque I visited in Lahore, it is known as the Badshahi Mosque and is distinguished by being one of the largest and most beautiful mosques in the world, built by the great Mughul emperor, Aurangzeb, nearly three hundred years ago. It is also 77 famous because our modern poet and sage, Allama Iqbal (1876-1938) is buried there. Then I went to the spiritual centre of Lahore, the Data Sahib Mazar. There I found an atmosphere of such intense holiness with so many women reciting Quran and Tasbih or their beads at once, but the Maulana forbade me to go back again because of the numerous malpractices there diametrically opposed to everything he says Islam stands for. The Mazar is centered on the tomb of Ali bin Uthman al-Hajwiri, known to all Lahorites as Data Ganj Bakhsh, the Patron-Saint of Lahore, he was a great holy man who lived and died here more than 900 years ago and converted many Hindus to Islam. As much as the Maulana and his followers oppose the Mazar, they do not lack reverence for Data Sahib. In fact, Mian Tufail Mohammad has prepared an Urdu translation of his book, Kashfal Mahjoub on the science of the mystic path which I hope to study some day. The historic Lahore Fort, built by the Mughul kings, which is also well worth seeing, shows a sound view of both worlds.

As for the weather, although we are supposed to be in the midst of the monsoon, actually we have not had more than two or three full days of rain plus several brief showers. West Pakistan is generally arid and receives very little rain. When there is too much rain during the monsoons, there are severe floods. Happily we have been spared floods this year. As for the temperature, I would rather not speak about it. In Lahore and Pattoki, the thermometer seldom ever drops below 95 F. during the day and it generally averages a good deal higher. To make things worse, this stifling temperature is too often combined with an equally high humidity. The “heat-wave” lasts every year for at least six months from the middle of April to mid-October with only very brief respites like a dust-storm or a rain-storm for relief. This is the reason why nearly every Pakistani home, with the exception of the very poorest, indulges in the luxury of at least one electric fan. With a good powerful electric fan, one can bear it. Unfortunately, however, although our house here in Pattoki does have electricity, the current is weak and utterly unpredictable and frequently fails.

For the next several months I will be spending nearly all my waking hours trying to learn Urdu as quickly as possible. Indeed, I have time for little else. The teacher comes promptly at 8 A.M.

78 every morning and the lesson lasts for about two hours. The homework he gives me takes up the better part of the afternoon and in the evening, Baijan (the title of respect I call Hakim Sahib) hears me recite my lesson. It is quite strenuous and indeed I feel just like I am going to school all over again. However, they all seem quite pleased with the rapid progress I am making. In less than a month, I have almost completed a primer which would take the average school-child here at least a year. Out of sheer necessity in less than a month here in Pattoki, I have probably quadrupled the vocabulary I had in Lahore. By this time, I think I have accumulated a vocabulary of several hundred Urdu words. For that, I give the credit to Um Kalthum who was a wonderful help to me. Before she had to return to Karachi about a week ago, I had her dictate to me all the Urdu words and phrases which would cover my most important needs. By learning all that Um Kalthum taught me, I am now able to make most of my elementary wants understood. Conversely, I can now understand simple directions, and do whatever Baijan and Appa expect of me. When I first arrived, Baijan and Appa used to discuss me right in my presence, confident of privacy. Now that I am beginning to catch many phrases and thus the gist of the conversation, they are much more careful.

As Um Kalthum was dictating to me the most important Urdu sentences which I recorded in Latin letters in order to learn them right away, at the same time, she instructed Baijan, her uncle, in the most important English expressions which he carefully recorded in a notebook for study. Since Baijan cannot read the Latin alphabet, he recorded all the English he wanted to learn in Arabic script. Believe it or not, English can be written perfectly well in Arabic script!

Just before Um Kalthum returned to Karachi, all Pattoki celebrated the Holy Prophet’s birthday. The streets were decorated for the occasion and we had a special parade through the main bazar. Since we ladies are all in strict Purdah, Um Kalthum and I could not stand in the street but fortunately a friendly neighbouring family was kind enough to let us, bundled up in our black burqas, peek through a hole in the roof. I don’t think you will ever see a parade like this! It was led by some uniformed men 79 bedecked lavishly in ribbons, playing loudly on the bugle. Next came the floats mounted on two-wheeled wooden carts pulled by great black male buffaloes, each garlanded with flowers. Each float was crowded with turbaned Shi’ahs who shouted through loud-speakers, “Ya Ali, Ya Allah! Ya Ali, Ya Ali!, Ya Hassan and Hussain!” The procession was climaxed by little Pakistani boys mounted on camels dressed up like Arabs. It ended with a disorderly crowd of Sufis singing and dancing. The Sufis really had a splendid time. The celebration was indeed theirs. At three o’clock in the morning, the Sufis gathered in the mosque and began to chant over the loud-speaker in the loudest possible voices, poems and eulogies in praise of our Holy Prophet (Peace be upon him). They kept this up without stopping, making sure that nobody in Pattoki would fail to listen or get any sleep. Baijan and Muhammad Anwar said they were much disgusted with the way the Prophet’s birthday was celebrated here. They told me they thought the Muslims were behaving like Hindus. “We should not have all this fanfare,” commented Muhammad Anwar. “We should rather study the Quran and devote more time to our prayers . . . .”

Unlike Maulana Maudoodi, Baijan does not condemn all Sufis. Although he admits there have been many abuses and most of the Pirs today are fakes, some indeed are genuine holy men devoted to God. He has at least one very good friend who happens to be a Sufi. On the eve of the Prophet’s Birthday, Baijan invited him to our house to give us a recitation of the Holy Quran. Appa, Um Kalthum and I sat veiled behind a white curtain. The Sufi was a husky brown man with a full black beard and a white turban. He did not even carry his Quran with him but recited it entirely from memory with such beauty and intense feeling, it deeply moved us all.

One thing I love about Pakistan is the presence of other living things about. The very sight of so many animals and birds makes me very happy. And I am most fond of little Miamitu, our pet parrot. He keeps me cheerful company while I am typing or working on my Urdu lessons. Like the true Pakistani he is, Miamitu is as fond of peppers and chillis as the rest of the family. Most parrots are mean birds, but not my Miamitu, who never gets 90 angry nor tries to bite my hand when I feed him or clean his cage. Our neighbours next door (who are also our blood relatives) had for their prize possession the most beautiful rooster. This morning the daughter, Selima, came over and informed us that today they would perform “Zabbah.” Selima asked me if I would like to see “Zabbah” so she promptly took me to her house. One of the little boys overturned a huge cone-shaped basket and out walked the most magnificent rooster. I held it in my arms and brought it to Selima’s father who was waiting with a sharp butcher knife. Selima’s father took the rooster, held it firmly on the brick floor, murmured “Allah Akbar! Allahu Akbar! Bismillah … “ (God is greatest! In the name of God … “) and slit the rooster’s throat. After all the blood had run out, Selima’s father and mother, squatting on the floor, busied themselves expertly pulling out all its feathers with their fingers. “Zabbah!” exclaimed Selima. “Now we shall have a very fine dinner!”

The only time the weather is bearable is at night when we sleep on our charpoys up on the roof. On the roof, you can hear what all Pattoki is doing. The babies of the neighbouring houses cry; the wild dogs yowl, yelp and fight each other the whole night long. Promptly at 4 A.M. the four Adhans arouse all Pattoki to worship Allah. The wild dogs, cats, the roosters, the crows, sparrows, the goats and buffaloes join in the prayers. Indeed 4 A.M. is the nicest part of the whole day. A light goes on in Selima’s house and I can look right down into her courtyard where her gray-bearded father is swaying back and forth, reciting the Holy Quran. He does this every morning at dawn. Although the required early morning prayer is very short, Baijan’s last much longer. I awaken to find him on his prayer rug, utterly absorbed in his prayers and telling his beads over and over again.

Although Pattoki is a thoroughly Muslim town, we do have a few Christians who also live here. One of the many visitors who came to see me was a young Christian lady who was a nurse and mid-wife. She was quite attractive in her starched white uniform which made a pleasing contrast against her very dark brown skin. She was very sweet and gentle and invited me to her house that afternoon but although I accepted, Baijan did not approve. She belongs to the High Church of England and Baijan said that her house is also used as a Church.

81 Islamic influence is so strong here that the Christians call their churches “mosques” and their ministers or priests “Imams.” On our street there is a Christian lady whose duty is to clean more than thirty latrines twice every day. In dress and physical appearance, she is indistinguishable from any other Pakistani, except for one thing - the dreadful odor. Twice each day I see her carry the filth in a jar on her head. This profession is wide-open for the Christians who get no competition - for no Muslim, however poor or humble he or she may be, will do it.

Indeed, there is no faith which so stresses the necessity of cleanliness than Islam. Islam requires of us strict hygienic practices which no other religion does. Without proper cleanliness with ablutions or “Wudhu” performed in the most precise manner, our obligatory prayers or “Namaz” is not valid. I can’t understand why westerners always refer to Muslim peoples as “the great unwashed.” If they could only come to this house, they would never, even at home, see so much washing and so much tooth-brushing. In fact, it is Muslims who look down upon the westerner as dirty. Here is what Maulana Maudoodi had to say in a recent issue of his journal, “Tarjumanul Quran”: “Muslims are commanded to perform ablution before their prayers because Allah, the Almighty wants to distinguish between who is worthy and who is unworthy to present himself. Thus whenever a person intends to offer prayers, he should check his body and clothing to examine whether or not he is fit to present himself before Allah. Attending to this ablution with diligence and care will impress upon his heart the extraordinary importance of his prayers ….. Because westerners do not do this, is the reason why the mouths of European gentlemen breathe bad odour and why their bodies generally give off a nasty smell, and as for their feet, they stink very badly, so much so that even their shoes and stockings putrify …. “

Because my Urdu studies require so much time and energy, for the time being, I will be compelled to write shorter letters to you at much longer intervals. Therefore please do not worry if my 82 letters arrive late. It only means I am busy at my Urdu.

All my love from your ever-affectionate daughter,

Maryam.

83 Maryam Jameelah c/o Hakim Rai Naimat Ali Khan (President), Tibbia Association, Main Bazar Pattoki, District Kasur, Pakistan

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

September 7, 1962

Dear Mother and Daddy,

I received your last letter of August 30th only about three days ago which was so brief, it was hardly more than a very hastily scrawled note. However, I do realize how tired you are at the end of the day and how difficult it is for you to write. Nevertheless I want you to know that I am always so very eager to hear from you.

Daddy, Baijan showed me the letter you wrote the following day in answer to his and it was truly beautiful both in literary expression and in its loving spirit. As for my present relations with Maulana Maudoodi, he made it very clear to me before I left for Pattoki, that he did not intend to relinquish his responsibility towards me, that he would continue to help me, encourage me and support me to the best of his capacity and that I should always feel free to seek his advice and counsel. At present I am corresponding with him in much the same manner as I did in America. Fortunately for me, in Pakistan, my lack of ability to support myself financially is not looked upon with any disgrace. Here women are supposed to stay at home, sheltered and protected by their menfolk. Women who observe Purdah are not expected to go out and earn their own living.

As rich and full as my life here in Pattoki is, I often remember the Muslim friends I left behind in New York. I think of each with the most profound affection. How can I ever forget the gentle piety 84 of Ameer Rashid and the beautiful love between him and his aged father, the heroism of Balquis who is single-handedly raising her children as good Muslims in the worst possible neighbourhood, the sweetness of Muhammad Ahmad Sakr and his unstinted generosity, of the selfless sacrifice of another Palestinian refugee whose name I cannot remember who while fighting Israel, lost his entire family and afterwards spent more than two years in prison in Jordan for his sympathies with Shaikh Hasan al Banna and al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun and of the wisdom and impeccable character and integrity of Dr. Mahmud Hoballah, the Director of The Islamic Center in Washington D.C. I must not forget to mention Gulen and Ali Tangoren who were both able to stand the most rigorous persecution from the Kemalist government in Turkey and come to New York to practice medicine with their piety still intact. Their busy lives still leave them time to rise in the middle of the night for long prayers. I will never forget when they brought me their six-weeks old baby for me to see and that little baby as young as it was somehow looked very old and very wise. “Please pray for my little son,” pleaded Gulen the last time she saw me before I left for Pakistan. “I am so afraid for his future.” Then there is Abd al-Qadir Sharif, born into a family of share-croppers in South Carolina who spent the best part of his youth in prisons and state mental institutions. While still in prison, he joined Elijah Mohammad’s rabid, racist Black Muslims as a most enthusiastic supporter. But somehow he gradually came to sense that Elijah Mohammad was wrong and developed an insatiable thirst for the true and genuine Islam. Since he never went beyond the fourth grade in school, he was almost illiterate but spent all the time he could spare in the Oriental Division of the New York Public Library and the Library of Congress in Washington D.C. and taught himself to read the most difficult translations of Islamic books. Convinced of the truth of Islam, he broke completely with Elijah Mohammad’s Black Muslims and became a true convert. Although Abd al-Qadir Sharif has a brilliant intellect and his speech is as beautiful and eloquent as the most highly educated man, he cannot write even the simplest letter but must have his friends do it for him. He can barely sign his own name. Just before I left for Pakistan, Sharif and I talked for many hours together at 85 the mosque. “I want more than anything else to earn a scholarship to study Islamic law at the University of Madina in Saudi Arabia. Do you know of anybody who could help me?” Then too, I cannot forget Khadijah Faisal of the Islamic Mission in Brooklyn who spent her days scrubbing floors and peeling potatoes in that dilapidated run-down place so that the Muslims in Brooklyn who could not go to the mosque in New York, might have some place to meet and say their prayers. I can still remember her face, heavy with weariness, as she cried out to me; “If no women come to help me, then I don’t think I will live to see the next Ramadan!” Yes, now that I think back, I even look upon her husband, Shaikh Daoud Ahmad Faisal with the same affection. Yes, he did have grave defects—his arrogance combined with ignorance until at times I questioned his mental balance, but his piety was at least sincere and he practiced his faith as best he knew how, with the simple trust of a child. There were many who condemned him as greedy and selfish but he would not hesitate to rise in the middle of the night and attend to the funeral preparations of a seaman stabbed to death by an unknown attacker, so he could at least have a proper Muslim burial. Yes, even if he was naive, his faith was strong and unshakeable. It was he before whom I pronounced the Shahadah, formally embraced Islam and he gave me my Islamic Certificate of Adoption. I remember one morning when the Shaikh and I were walking along the streets in Brooklyn, so utterly at home in the long white robes King Ibn Saud had given him as a present and which he was very proud to wear, he pointed with his gnarled wrinkled black hand to the crowds thronging the sidewalks. “Look, Maryam!” he exclaimed. “Look at all those people—hundreds, thousands of them and not one of them knows a thing about God!” He paused for a moment and then continued. “If only I had stayed in Saudi Arabia after my last Haj but I could not because my work and my responsibility are here. But this place is so evil, it will kill me soon! . . .”

But more than anyone, my memories remain most vivid of Dr. Shoreibah, the Imam of the mosque in New York. During the year I lived alone at The Martha Washington Hotel in New York, I don’t know what I would have done without him. I will never forget that one night in the middle of last Ramadan when I went to 86 the mosque for the late Tarawih prayers. It was bitterly cold that night; the temperature must have been close to zero with a wind so strong, it was almost a gale. Because of the heavy traffic, the bus ride took nearly an hour. In the middle of the ride, a frail old blind lady got on. She was about to get off, exactly where I did, when I tried my best to help her. Although my awkwardness frightened her, I finally got her safely up to her flat.

When I told her where I was going, she exclaimed in a worried querulous voice; “But you’ll be late! I made you late!”

I answered gently, “Never mind! This is more important!” When I finally arrived at the mosque, sure enough, Ameer Rashid and his father were there, standing outside in the freezing cold. It was 9 P.M. before we began the Tarawih. Ameer Rashid, his father, an Indian Muslim student, three ragged coloured men and one old coloured woman and myself composed the congregation. Tarawih prayers are long and strenuous; they last for nearly two hours each and consist of twenty rakats which means you get up and down twenty times. I have never heard the Holy Quran recited so beautifully as Dr. Shoreibah did that night. As he recited the Quran slowly with such deep feeling, I suddenly felt the whole room filled with the radiance of this love for Islam. Indeed, whenever I saw Dr. Shoreibah so tender and gentle with the little children of the members of the congregation or any visitors who came to meet him, I was always reminded of what Christ is reported to have said in the Gospels: “Suffer the little children to come unto me for such is the kingdom of heaven . . . .”

Just before I left for Pakistan, I received the following note among the letters I collected at the lobby of The Martha Washington Hotel: “This is a letter of appreciation on behalf of a few of the so-called “reactionaries” of the al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun who share your convictions and views, so eloquently expressed by you in your writings. From the knowledge you display about the history of Islam, the modern issues and social conditions in Muslim countries, bringing out so well the grave threat of the destruction of Islam from within and attempts being made by “reformers” to modernize and westernize Islam—it is apparent that you 87 would be spending a good deal on books for the purposes of research. May we hope that you will accept from some of your Muslim brothers, this small amount of money to take a· little pressure off your limited hudget …. “

This letter was signed anonymously but because of the postmark, I was quite certain who sent it -

Muhammad Ahmad Sakr, a Palestinian refugee, now studying physics for his PhD at Harvard University. He is not only brilliant but also one of the sweetest, most gentle people I have ever kriown. Maulana Maudoodi told me that he once met him personally when he was last in Arabia and said.to me; “Muslims just don’t come better than him.” The “smaJl amount of money” happened to be a cheque for one hundred dollars!

Perhaps you think me oversentimental in describing to you my Muslim friends I left behind in America but these memories will always be so very precious. As Balquis told me when she saw me off on the ship; “Distance alone can never separate believers.”

If you saw me now, I wonder if you would recognize me. I am thinner now than I have ever been in my whole life and my hair is growing very long. The standards of beauty are radically different here in Pattoki than they are in New York. When Appa saw my finger nails, she was horrified and promptly cut them all down to the quick. “Long nails are ugly and dirty,” she commented, “and besides against the Sunnah or practice of the Holy Prophet (peace be upon him). Although at that time, I hesitated to agree, I never said so but humbly replied: “Appa, what pleases you, pleases me!” I have by now accumulated a fortune of twelve jangling bracelets on one arm and six on the other. If I let them, the ladies here would like my nose pierced for nose-rings and my ears pierced for earrings like their own.

Pattoki is full of beggars. In fact, begging is a flourishing business here. There are old-men beggars, young female beggars, as well as little children whom their parents take considerable care to train early and thoroughly in the profession. During the day, the beggars beg for money all day long in the bazar, but every evening after sunset, they never fail to make the rounds of each home begging for chaupatis. During the daytime, they beg for money and 88 in the evening for food so they don’t have to spend anything. It’s quite a racket. People here teIJ me that the beggars are quite prosperous. Many look even better fed and better dressed than the hard-working citizens of Pattoki, as they are firmly convinced that all Pattoki owes them a free living. The same beggars make the rounds of this street every single night at the same time without fail. They are reaIJy characters. Some of them have no doubt been coming around here every night for the last twenty or thirty years. But one morning I was startled by some very wierd singing. Hastily veiling ourselves, Appa and I ran to the window and peered out from behind the curtains. There, directly below, us, we saw three Sufi beggars - one who was draped in a long white robe, his hair shaved except for a tuft of hair hanging down his back from the middle of his head, was dancing, whirling round and round. The second beggar was singing while the third beat a drum. Every fifteen minutes or so, they would stop and hold out their hands for some free chaupatis.

Although Appa and Baijan have no children of their own, the house is always filJed with children from morning to night. Knowing how much Appa loves children, Muhammad Anwar has permitted her to take full charge of the upbringing of his little daughter, Ferhut who lives and sleeps with us. Muhammad Anwar figures that since he has five children, he can spare one for his sister who has none. Ferhut is an unusualJy sweet and bright little girl and I love her very much. On the first of September, all the schools in Pattoki opened for the year. However, Ferhut and her classmates attend school only three times a week for a half-day each. But gaijan and Appa insist that she be diligent in her homework. My Urdu teacher says Ferhut is the brightest pupil in his class. One of Ferhut’s favourite playmates is a little six-year-old boy who lives next door to us named Haroun (Aaron). Although Haroun is very thin and small for his age, he is truly a beautiful child with his smooth brown skin, large brilliant black eyes and delicate features. He has the sweetest, most angelic little face although he can be as mischievous as a little monkey. Several nights ago while we were eating dinner, Haroun gave us some entertainment with a perfect rendition of a Hindu temple dance complete with the proper hand and foot movements and alJ. I was amazed by his delicacy and 89 grace. When he danced, he sang the appropriate songs with a most beautiful voice for a child so young. When I asked little Haroun where he learned this, he told me from the Hindu dancers who visit Pattoki to perform on their festival days. When news reached his father what little Haroun did, he was furiously angry. He gave his son a thorough scolding, saying that Muslim boys must not copy Hindu women and threatening him with severe punishment should he ever dare to do such a thing again!

As in Maulana Maudoodi’s home in Lahore, the children here in Pattoki are content with simple toys. Right now Ferhut’s favourite plaything is a cheap plastic toy helicopter which squeaks along the floor when wound up. The little boys are most fond of flying their kites on the roofs of their houses. But little Haroun is getting to be quite an excellent chef. At six, he can already make excellent miniature toy chaupatis. Ferhut has a battered old box in which she keeps scraps of left-over material which keeps her fascinated for hours. One afternoon I saw a little boy on the street playing at being a muezzin. He made all the motions of climbing the minaret and then chanted the Adhan or call to prayer with perfect accuracy.

I forgot to tell you about our family heirloom which is kept in my room. It is a magnificent silver sword beautifully engraved with verses from Quran in Arabic all over it encircled by intricate arabesques. When Baijan, Appa, and Muhammad Anwar came here from India, they relied upon this sword for their protection against the blood-thirsty mobs. When I asked Muhammad Anwar if they ever were forced to put it to practical use, he replied that by the grace of Allah, they reached the border of Pakistan safely without undue trouble. However, people here still get quite nervous when they think about India. The border is less than twenty-five miles away…

The only newspaper I ever get to read is an occasional issue of the Lahore English daily, “The Pakistan Times”. Because most of the news it reports is local, I have little idea of what is going on the outside world. The only foreign news we all do know is that Marilyn Monroe committed suicide some weeks back by swallowing a whole bottle of sleeping pills. I remember that just before I departed from America for Pakistan, Marilyn Monroe had 90 suffered a nervous breakdown after her divorce from Arthur Miller and had been committed to New York Hospital - the very same place I had been - as a psychiatric patient. I wonder if she had been where I was - on Nichols Cottage, the disturbed ward? Perhaps she had even slept in my very same bed - who knows?

In all Pakistani newspapers, both English and Urdu, prominent place is given to the cinema advertisements. Some American films playing right now in Lahore are: “The Happy Thieves,” “The Bachelor of Hearts,” “Naked Paradise” and “Suddenly Last Summer” with Elizabeth Taylor. The advertisement for “Naked Paradise” showed a voluptuous female in a skimpy bathing suit, floating in the air while her muscular lover was in the process of ripping it off with a giant hook. Unfortunately, Pakistan gets the worst American pictures and to make matters worse, the Pakistani films are nothing more than a shoddy imitation of Hollywood. Although thank Allah, Pattoki is free from this filth, some of it filters in through the radio whose programmes are largely devoted to lewd, obscene songs from the films, both domestic and foreign. Although some of our neighbours do own radios which are played at ear-splitting volume, thank Allah, Baijan and Appa feel as I do and we do not!

I was very interested in what you had to say about Aunt Raynor and Uncle Walter as well as your description of cousin Carol’s wedding and how happy Carol and Martin appear to be. I am so glad that family relations have so greatly improved. May this continue! Tell your sister, Auntie Roslyn, that I have not forgotten her and will try to write her a detailed letter as soon as I have the time.

All my love

Maryam 101 Maryam Jameelah c/o Hakim Rai Naimat Ali Khan (President) Tibbia Association Main Bazar Pattoki, District Kasur Pakistan

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

September 25, 1962

Dear Mother and Daddy,

I was very happy to receive both your letters of September 13th and 20th and to get a glimpse of all that you are doing. Mother, I just loved that story in “The New York Times” about the gorilla in the Bronx Zoo. When I was living with Maulana Maudoodi in Lahore, I asked fifteen-year-old Haider if there were any apes in the zoo in Lahore and he said there certainly were! Haider promised to take me to see the zoo in Lahore but before he could get around to that, I had moved to Pattoki.

Here in Pattoki I often feel as if I were living on a farm because there are always so many animals about. Of course I love our pet parrot, Miamitu very much; he has grown so friendly, that he will eat right out of my hand! Appa’s brother, Muhammad Anwar is still waiting for his pregnant buffalo to give birth. He has waited for more than ten months and now the buffalo by this time is quite long overdue! I can hardly wait. I only hope the little calf will be a female. In any case, it will be my very own as soon as it is weaned. Of all the animals here in Pattoki, the buffalo is the most valuable of all. Muhammad Anwar owns three of them - all magnificent beasts together worth more than Rs.2,000. To guard against theft, Muhammad Anwar hires a special watchman to stand outside their stable all night long. To chase away thieves, the policemen and watchmen here in Pattoki have a very ingenious method. All night 102 they rend the sky with the most weird, piercing cries. They begin to cry about nine o’clock at night and keep it up without stopping until the Adhan or call to prayer at five in the morning. The weird, ear-splitting cries of the watchmen are designed to strike terror in the hearts of the thieves and frighten them away. Not all, however, because three nights ago, four donkeys were stolen and in the nearest village, two buffalo. The thieves are highly specialized in their nefarious profession. Some steal only donkeys, others goats, others chickens and the most daring of all, the buffalo.

Last night, Baijan decided to give the whole family a wonderful treat. When he came home from his drug shop, he had a beautiful live rooster in his arms. He gave it to me and said; “This is for you!”

Appa said; “Tomorrow we shall have the most delicious meal! Tomorrow morning, Zabbah!”

I carried the struggling rooster in my arms right outside my room and put a big basket over it so that it could not get away. He slept peacefully right outside my door all night long, totally unaware that this would be his last night on earth. Promptly at eight-thirty this morning, Appa sharpened her butcher knife and then gave it to Baijan.

Baijan handed it to me saying, “I want you to learn how to do Zabbah. This Zabbah is for you!”

Little Ferhut brought the crackling rooster to me while Baijan held it down firmly on the floor of our courtyard. “Now Maryam, say; ‘Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar! Allahu Akbar! Bismillah ….’” I repeated this and then Baijan guided my hand to slit its throat. After it was dead, Baijan, Appa, Ferhut and I squatted round it and pulled out all its feathers with our fingers. Right now the rooster is cut up and sizzling in the pot. Our feast will be ready within an hour.

“That rooster was not at all a foolish bird,” commented Appa. “He did not struggle or even make a sound. Indeed, he was the bravest rooster I have ever seen!”

Right now Appa is beginning to teach me how to cook, Pakistani style, of course. Perhaps you might be interested in a typical menu for our day. When it is time for breakfast, Appa squats down and lights her kerosene stove, and while the servant is busy cutting up onions, she heats some ghee (liquid clarified butter) over the fire.

93 When the ghee is sizzling hot, she puts the onions in. When the onions are toasty brown, she adds an egg or two and scrambles it up. Next she pours peppers and chillis into the mixture. In five minutes it is all done. This is eaten with many chaupatis. Chaupatis are made with wholewheat flour and water with no leavening and cooked much like a pancake on a hot grill. For all West Pakistanis, chaupatis are our staple food which takes the place of bread. Now while Appa has been busy making chaupatis, the servant has been preoccupied vigorously stirring a pot full of rich buffalo milk until the ghee (butter-fat) all collects in a round white ball in the middle. Appa takes the ghee out, puts it into another pot. The watery white liquid which remains is the lassi. We drink this lassi every morning instead of coffee to wash down the rest of the meal. Round about ten o’clock in the morning, Appa sends her servant (and sometimes Ferhut) to the bazar to do the morning marketing. A half hour later she returns with a quarter of a kilo of succulent goat-meat wrapped up in newspaper plus a kilo or so of vegetables which I never knew existed before I came to Pakistan. Aside from the potatoes and onions, hardly any of the vegetables we eat here exist in America and vice-versa. Now what we do is to cut up the vegetables and goat-meat nice and fine and when the pot of ghee is sizzling hot on the stove, we pour them in. Of course much peppers and chillis are added and the stew will now simmer in its own juice on the fire for another two hours. We call this stew “salen” and when it is done, it will be mostly gravy which tastes like a kind of very rich soup. Now what you do, is take a piece of chaupati and scoop up the gravy, meat and vegetables with it. This salen along with two chaupatis is our main meal of the day. The left-over salen will be covered and carefully saved for the night meal. Now round about five or six o’clock in the evening, Appa goes to Muhammad Anwar’s house just at the time his buffalo are being milked. Soon she (or her servant) returns with a pail full of warm, rich buffalo milk which is then boiled over the stove. Afterwards, Appa and her servant busy themselves making the night’s supply of chaupatis and boiling rice. By eight o’clock all is ready and as soon as Baijan comes home from work, he sits cross-legged on the bed while Ferhut squats on a mat on the floor; Appa and I sit on low wicker stools called pirees and thus we eat whatever salen is left over with

94 two chaupatis each, boiled rice, and wash this all down with buffalo milk. For Pakistanis, our family eats exceedingly well. The poor people cannot afford milk, eggs, ghee or meat and must subsist precariously on plain chaupatis and dhal, a kind of thick bean soup. Promptly at sunset and just after, the beggars of Pattoki begin their rounds from house to house. Although most of the hardworking citizens of Pattoki are very poor, the beggars always manage somehow to make an excellent living. Indeed, we have so many beggars here, I am convinced that there must be more men in the beggar business than any other trade! Although as a rule, the beggars beg for money in the bazar during the daytime and only beg for food at the homes during the evening, yesterday was an outstanding exception. I was sitting with my Urdu teacher in the midst of my Urdu lesson yesterday afternoon when all of a sudden, I heard a great commotion in the street below. I bundled up in my black burqa and rushed to the window to see what had happened. Directly below, a great crowd of women and children had gathered to watch a dancing beggar. The dancing beggar indeed looked just like a very beautiful girl with long flowing black hair partially covered with a lace silk scarf, dressed in a white silk dress and pantaloons covered with red roses with at least a half dozen bracelets on the arms and many silver bells around both ankles, dancing a dance very typical among the Hindus. Three men sat cross-legged on the ground, accompanying the dancer - the first beat a drum, the second a tambourine and the third playing another Indian instrument which somewhat resembles a combination organ and accordion, like a harmonium. When I heard the dancer sing, I never had such a shock in my life - the voice was a man’s voice! The dancer was a man dressed up just like a lady! Every five minutes or so he would pause in his gyrations while a child handed him a coconut shell of flour or a female onlooker handed him a coin or two.

My Urdu teacher refused to look. “Kufr!” he commented bitterly. “Allah is very angry this afternoon!” His face had a look of the most excruciating pain before a moment later, he rose without a word and left. I tried to call him back but he just rushed down the stairs. That night I asked Baijan why my Urdu teacher was so extremely upset.

95 “Was he angry with me?” I asked.

“No,” replied Baijan. “He is not angry at you, but he is very disturbed about his youngest brother…”

I asked naively, “What has his brother done?”

Baijan explained, “Your teacher is a very pious and religious Muslim, so he cannot bear to see what has become of his youngest brother…”

I repeated, “But what did his youngest brother do?”

Baijan looked into my eyes very gravely for a long moment before he replied, “Didn’t you know? The dancing beggar is his brother!”

A few days ago when one of Appa’s friends came to visit, I was surprised to see her covered with charms and amulets. She had a kind of white gauze tied round her forehead with a knot in the middle. Her khameez also was knotted in one corner and round her neck she wore a little metal box on a black string. I asked her what was in the metal box and the knots and she replied, verses from the Quran on tiny pieces of paper. Although this girl was very poor, she was also really beautiful and a week ago when she began to feel ill for some unaccountable reason, she and her husband visited an old Haji who lived in a little farming village some five miles away. The husband, so the girl said, brought along an extra khameez.

After the old white-bearded Haji smelled it, he replied, “No doctor and no medicine can cure you.”

The husband asked, “Then what is wrong with my wife? Why does she feel so ill?”

The old turbaned Haji looked him straight in the eyes and replied, “Your wife has been possessed by the Djinn! Your wife is very beautiful, you know, and some of the mischievous Djinn, who are very jealous, take a special liking for beautiful young girls and tease them. This is what has happened to your wife and why she feels ill. Now here is what you do to chase the Djinn away. Take this knotted bandage and tie it around her forehead; then have your wife wear this box with the verse from the Holy Quran inside and tie it around her neck and always wear this strong perfume I am giving you. The Djinn do not like the smell of it. If you do all I tell 96 you, you should feel perfectly well by tomorrow … “

After the beautiful young lady had finished her story, I asked her, “How do you feel now?”

She shook her head sadly. “Just the same,” she replied. Although Baijan and Muhammad Anwar compound and dispense drugs, both ancient and modern, and know about modern medicine, they too have much faith in spiritual healing. When little Ferhut did not feel well, every morning, Baijan would write some verses from Quran in Arabic on a scrap of paper and wash off the ink with water and collect it in a bowl. Then he would have little Ferhut drink the ink and water. Sure enough in several days, little Ferhut felt perfectly well. Although Baijan and Muhammad Anwar both dispense numerous kinds of drugs for sick people, they consider this the best cure of all!

School is now the centre of little Ferhut’s life. As it begins at 7.30 A.M., Appa must get her ready very early. First she must have a bath and Appa bathes her under the pump. Of course, there is no hot water or piped water and the pump water is ice-cold. More than anything else, little Ferhut just hates her baths. She struggles and screams, poor little thing, as if she were being tortured to death, but Appa holds her firmly and refuses to relent until she is washed clean to her satisfaction. After she is dressed in a clean frock and white pantaloons, Ferhut must go through the terrible ordeal of having her hair oiled and combed. She cries and cries until Appa at last finished tying a big pink ribbon on her blonde hair and declares her ready to go. When she runs to me and kisses my hand, to say goodbye, she looks so sweet and adorable and scrubbed to an inch of her life! Appa gives her the wooden slate, ink-pot, wooden pen and primer in a home-made cloth bag and off she goes! Ferhut is a very good pupil, as I said before; according to her teacher, the brightest in her class; most of the time, she loves school so much, she is in tears when there is a holiday and she can’t go. But last Thursday, Ferhut got into bad trouble. She looked outside the classroom door into the street filled with all the colour of the orient and she just couldn’t resist it. So little Ferhut decided to play hookey for that day. When the teacher informed Appa and Baijan of what Ferhut had done, Appa furiously flung Ferhut down on the stone floor, tied up her hands and feet with rope and slapped 97 her hard on first one cheek and then the other with a big wooden stick. Ferhut cried so piteously I could hardly bear it; Appa is a very gentle and kind woman and never had I seen her beat little Ferhut before. After a half hour of slapping and scolding, Appa untied Ferhut’s hands and feet and Ferhut, whimpering piteously, crawled under her bed and fell asleep on the bare stone floor. Baijan then lifted her on her charpoy where Ferhut slept off her misery for several hours. She was very miserable for quite a long while and it took her some time to regain her normal cheerful self. But one thing is certain: Ferhut will never dare play hookey again!

No, I am sorry to admit that I am as yet far from fluent in speaking Urdu, and although I am making good progress in understanding it and making myself understood, my speech is extremely queer due to my utter lack of knowledge about Urdu grammar. I can now talk on the level of a three or four year-old child and write about as well as Maulana Maudoodi’s six year-old Ayesha. Last week at last I finished my primer and am now reading real stories meant for six or seven year-olds. My little book of stories presents examples from the great figures in Islamic history about, for example, how much respect Haroun ar-Rashid had for his teacher when he was a little boy and how little boys should respect their parents, teachers and all their elders. I am now reading a little story about how Rukanna who was the strongest and greatest wrestler in all Arabia, wanted to wrestle with the Holy Prophet Muhammad upon whom be peace. Our Holy Prophet was a very brave man indeed and accepted the offer. After the Holy Prophet knocked down the wrestler for the third time, he decided that he would become a good Muslim and devote his life for the cause of Islam … My Urdu has not reached the point where I can say it has broadened my world. Not when my reading is on the level of “the cat ran after the mouse!” When and if I grow advanced enough to exchange “The cat ran after the mouse” for the poetry of Allama Iqbal in the original, or the theology of Shah Waliullah, which does not exist in English translation, then I will feel very differently and begin to take an interest in the language. Maulana Maudoodi takes great interest in my progress of learning Urdu and wants me to learn the high literary style which was purest in Delhi in pre-Partition days as well as the ordinary spoken language, only 1 am sorry to admit, I am a long way off from that now!

Despite all the time I must devote to studying my Urdu lessons, I still manage to find lots of time to do my writing in English. Since my arrival in Pakistan nearly three months ago, I have written four brand-new articles and essays, all condemning the western impact on the Muslim world and attempts by the reformers to modernize Islam. In fact, I am now hard at work on three books simultaneously - Islam and Modernism, Islam in Theory and Practice and my big anthology in two volumes, Western Civilization Condemned by Itself. When I came to Pakistan, I also brought with me, the revised manuscript of my novel Ahmad Khalil: The Story of a Palestinian Refugee and his Family, and I still hope this can be published in Lahore in the near future. The Message, from Kerala, India, The Voice of Islam, the Karachi monthly, and the Lahore Urdu Weekly Shihab now publish everything I submit to them. Kemal Kuscu writes me from Istanbul that the collection of my essays in Islam Versus the West which I sent him and which he has just finished translating into Turkish, is also in press and says that inshallah, my book will be ordered for sale in the Turkish bookshops within a few weeks. The Lahore Daily Kohistan published the Urdu translation of my essay: “Western Civilization versus Islamic Civilization: Facts and Fallacies.” And the daily An-Nadwah from Saudi Arabia which is printed in the holy city of Mecca, published in full the Arabic translation of my strong condemnation of President Nasser for nationalizing, secularizing and modernizing Al-Azhar University, thus destroying the sacred character of this most important international centre of Islamic higher learning.

Thank Allah, after six months when the daytime temperature NEVER fell below 90 F. and usually well over 100 F., at last the weather is beginning to turn cooler, especially at night. Now it is clear and sunny with the thermometer a delightful 85 F. All Pakistan has now breathed a sigh of great relief!

Yes, I do continue to correspond with all my Muslim friends in America. Muhammad Ahmad Sakr gives me the good news that the situation of the Muslims in New York has considerably improved within recent months; native American converts to Islam are becoming much more common, and that the Muslim 99 community in America is becoming better organized.

I was very sorry to hear about Mr. Vessey, the minister of your Unitarian Church still being in the mental institution after all these months. Is he an inmate in New York Hospital, White Plains, where I had been five years ago? I would be interested in more details, if you care to tell me.

Awaiting further news in detail about what you are doing now. Appa and Baijan hold you both in very high esteem and ask me about you often.

Your loving daughter

Maryam.

100 Maryam Jameelah c/o Hakim Rai Naimat Ali Khan (President) Tibbia Association Main Bazar Pattoki, District Kasur Pakistan.

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

October 12, 1962

Dear Mother and Daddy,

I received your last letter of September 29th almost a week ago, begging me to write to you as you had not obviously received any word from me in quite a long while. This means that the two letters I wrote you - one on September 20th and the other on September 27th have not yet reached you. I surmise that my letter of the 20th might have been detained by the authorities because I wrote more about Maulana Maudoodi. As for my letter of the 27th, I have nothing to worry about as it contains nothing even remotely connected with politics!

Because Baijan and Appa are so dissatisfied with their house the way it is, they are having it completely rebuilt and remodeled. The work began five days ago and will continue for another month or two before it is completed. So I can have the peace and quiet I need for my study and writing, Muhammad Anwar offered to let me stay at his home for the time being. Although Baijan objected at first, Muhammad Anwar finally persuaded him to give in. Therefore for a month or two, I have moved in with books and baggage. Because Muhammad Anwar has quite a large family, his house is also plenty big enough to accommodate everybody. At night I sleep downstairs with the others on my charpoy but during the day, I work alone upstairs in a cool, spacious room on the roof. Here I keep my books and my portable typewriter as well as my manuscripts. At night, 111 the room is locked securely.

Now I will try to give you my typical programme for the day. The Adhan or call to prayer awakens everybody (including the buffalo) promptly at 4.30 A.M. We get up, make our wudhu or ablutions and say our prayers. Then Muhammad Anwar hastens to the neighbouring mosque (only three or four doors down the street) to say his early morning prayer in congregation. As soon as the prayers are over, the three buffalo let everybody know in no uncertain terms that they are very hungry. Therefore the servant hastens to the bazar, returning within twenty minutes with their breakfast. An adult buffalo consumes on the average of 150 Kilos of hay each day.

When they have eaten their fill, Muhammad Anwar’s wife washes a big pail and milks them. By this time her four small children have awakened and are also clambering for their breakfast. The womenfolk go up to the roof and collect several of the many cakes of buffalo dung which have dried in the previous day’s sun and put it into the fireplace as fuel. Meanwhile Muhammad Anwar’s wife is busy making the morning’s supply of chaupatis and boiling buffalo milk to sterilize it. As soon as breakfast is finished, huge black crows flock in droves to snatch the last remaining crumbs. If our food was left unguarded, believe me, the flocks of crows, vultures, kites and the multitudes of alley-cats and wild starving dogs would steal every bit! After breakfast, the little children are bathed and dressed. Here in Pattoki, little tots up to the age of six or seven wear little or nothing - usually only a little shirt or short gown and never any pants. Mothers have no diaper washing problems because there are no nappies to wash - all the little babies have bare bottoms. They are quite permissive about toilet-training which is gone about in a very easy-going manner. When the tiny tots do begin to wear pants, they have a convenient slit both in front and behind so as to minimize trouble both for mother and child. After the children have had their baths, I take mine. It is really a very simple affair. You just fill a bucket of cold water from the pump and take a piece of soap and towel with clean clothes into the washroom and after you are soaped well, just pour the cold water over you with a little pitcher from the bucket. As the weather cools and if the water is too ice-cold, it can always be warmed over the fireplace first.

102 Almost as soon as breakfast is finished, preparations for lunch are made which take up most of the morning. Very unfortunate are those who must buy their flour, dhal (beans) and milk from the store. Dealers have become so unscrupulous that it is almost impossible to buy prepared food in its pure state. Nearly all the prepared flour, beans, milk and all other food-stuffs are adulterated, sometimes with chemicals positively harmful to health. Even if the adulterations are not harmful in themselves, (like adding water to dilute milk), the nutritional value of the food is seriously impaired. Here is what we do to get around this difficulty: thank Allah for our buffalo which make sure our own milk is pure, Muhammad Anwar’s wife can make her own ghee. Ghee bought from the store is always adulterated. To make certain the flour we eat is pure, Muhammad Anwar and Baijan have a contract with a local farmer where we purchase great quantities of wheat in its raw state. The womenfolk and the servants sit for hours on the roof, cleaning the wheat of all its impurities by hand, grain by grain at the same time, the little children are posted to chase away the big black hungry crows. As soon as the wheat is cleaned, we have it ground by hand or at the local mill. Five rupees will buy a fine live rooster which will make a fine dinner. The best way to ensure good pure meat is to buy the goats, roosters, etc. live and slaughter and prepare the meat one’s self. This is exactly what we do. Only the roosters are killed for their meat because the hens are kept for their eggs. About ten o’clock in the morning, the three prize buffalo are ceremoniously led out by the servant into the street for some fresh air. When they saw me for the first time, they were panic-stricken and charged head-long in the other direction down the street until the servant was finally able to catch them and calm them down. I think it hysterically funny and comical that such huge, herculean beasts with great powerful horns weighing at least a ton a piece could be so terrified by such an insignificant looking creature as myself! “They don’t know you,” explained Muhammad Anwar. “They are terribly afraid of you … “

Meanwhile the large courtyard is filling up with neighbour women who have come to visit and chat. The place is crawling with their screaming and crying tiny tots. While the neighbour women are busy catching up on the latest gossip, they suckle their babies 103 at the breast. All the women I know nurse their babies at the breast; the child is often not completely weaned until the age of two or three. The only lady I have seen thus far who bottle-fed her infant was little Hassan’s mother visiting Maulana Maudoodi’s when I first arrived. However, this was not Hassan’s mother’s choice. She was too thin, sick and undernourished and had no milk to give.

You mentioned what a heart-warmer little Ernest — cousin Jim and Celia’s baby is. Well, here in Muhammad Anwar’s house we have no lack of our own “heart-warmers.” Although all tiny children are cute, there are two here which, besides Ferhut, are special favourites of mine — Ferhut’s youngest six-month-old brother, Asman and his three-year-old cousin (Selima’s little brother) Nairn Ashraf. All you have to do is take one look at Asman and then you know why he is just irresistible. He is as round, plump and cuddly as a little butter-ball with smooth rich brown skin, fat little cheeks and the most adorable toothless smile. Most irresistible of all are Asman’s huge brilliant black eyes, as they gaze intently at you so wistfully. Babies just don’t come any more adorable than Asman. Then there is little Nairn Ashraf with his little bare brown bottom and bright cute little face dominated by great bright black eyes. If I ever did get married and had any children, I would only want exact duplicates of Ferhut, Asman or Nairn Ashraf.

Promptly at three o’clock in the afternoon my Urdu teacher arrives and my lesson lasts from 3.30 to 5.00 o’clock. When my teacher is through with me, he tutors little Ferhut. Ferhut and I are no longer on the same lesson. In the past month, I have shot two years ahead of her and can now read about as well as the average eight-year-old although as yet I understand little of what I read. Because I don’t know any grammar, my Urdu speech is so peculiar, that few except Baijan and Appa can understand me. When Appa’s friends come to visit, she must “translate” my bad Urdu into correct Urdu so they can understand me!

Although we do have electricity in our house, the power is so weak and the lights are too dim to read or indeed do anything but go to bed. Everybody in Muhammad Anwar’s house retires promptly after the last prayer of the day which is now about quarter 104 to eight. There is always an extra charpoy on hand to accomodate any extra guests who wish to spend the night.

Good Muslim ladies here in Pattoki never wear nail-polish or lipstick but we have other ways of beautifying ourselves. They are most fond of jewelry and as I have said before, wear nose-rings, ear-rings and many jangling bracelets. Since the six bangles I brought from Lahore were so fragile, they are now all broken, I am waiting for suitable replacements. However, the six metal bracelets Selima bought for me here are still good; she bought all six of them for only one rupee (25 cents)! As newer cosmetics, hair-oil, mendi and surma are an indispensable part of every lady’s toilette. Appa is always putting more and more oil on my hair because the hot sun dries it out. As for the eyes, she applies black surma which makes them look large and lustrous. Even men and little boys wear it. Mendi or Henna is derived from the leaves of a special kind of tree. These leaves are chopped up fine and when mixed with water, it looks just like mud. Now here’s how you apply the mendi: You put a big chunk of it in the palm of one hand, then make a fist; to keep the mendi in place, you tie a bandage large enough to cover the entire hand and leave this on all night. In the morning, you take off the bandage and after the surplus mendi is washed off, the entire palm of your hand is indelibly stained with bright orange. The next night you do the same thing to the other hand. You can also apply it to the soles of the feet if you want to. The orange stain of the mendi is indelible and cannot be washed off. It only begins to fade as new skin grows and then applied again. I now have both palms of my hands stained bright orange with mendi as does Appa, Ferhut, Selima and all our friends and female relatives. When you start to get along in years and your hair begins to turn white, then is the time to apply mendi to your hair and beard and make it bright orange. The Arabs like mendi (henna) and surma (kuhl) as much as Pakistanis do; in fact these beautifying agents are Sunnat which means that it was the practice of the Holy Prophet (peace be upon him) to wear them as did his wives, Khadijah and Ayesha and his beloved daughter, Fatima (may Allah be pleased with them all).

Unlike Baijan and Appa who will not tolerate a radio in their house, Muhammad Anwar has a very expensive English-made 105 short-wave set. In the evening when he comes home from work, he is in the habit of listening to the B.B.C. and The Voice of America. Last night on The Voice of America, the announcer was interviewing Sammy Davis Jr. and discussing films and night-clubs. Afterwards rock ‘n roll, “twist” and jazz were played. Just at that moment the Adhan sounded loud and crystal clear from the neighbouring mosque. I walked out into the courtyard, looked up at the star-lit sky and listened. After that silly radio programme, the Adhan never sounded more beautiful to me than it did then.

It seems that I am surrounded by doctors and medical people. Not only does Baijan and Muhammad Anwar practice medicine but Baijan’s younger brother does also. Our nearest neighbour, little Haroun’s father, is also a doctor. These families have a long tradition in the profession. The word “Hakim” means doctor in Arabic; the Arabic literal meaning is “wise man.” The Sharfia Medicine Company which is a combination drug-store and dispensary, specializes in Unani drugs. Baijan is a firm adherent of the Unani school of medicine which is derived directly from the ancient Greeks and the Arab-Muslim doctors of the Middle Ages. “Unani” is very prevalent here as it is all over India as well.

I have recently made two very fine additional friends. Among the many visitors who flock to see me were two Brazilian ladies — the older one was a very handsome white-haired woman of fifty who has been married to a Pakistani and lived in Sahiwal near Lahore for more than twenty-five years. She has three sons and one daughter; her husband is a very good friend of Maulana Maudoodi’s. The younger one was a single woman in her early thirties who has been the older one’s bosom friend since early childhood. Since the younger one — Marlena Garcia — has lived in her friend’s home for several months, she wants only to renounce her Roman Catholicism and abandon her former life (she made her career as a professional nightclub entertainer and singer) and tar a pious Muslim. Both these ladies are exceptionally intelligent and speak perfect English. Their visit, unlike the usual visits of the neighbouring women who just come and stare which makes it a real ordeal to endure, their visit was so utterly delightful and really exhilarating. For obvious reasons, I have little in common with most of the ladies who come to see me who are very child-like 106 and so much with Marlena and her older friend where for once, we can really have an intelligent conversation. Both these ladies have visited me twice and Baijan has invited Marlena to come and stay with me until he and Muhammad Anwar can find her a suitable husband. I have written to Maulana Maudoodi about Marlena and he also promises to do what he can for her. I am looking forward with great anticipation to Marlena’s next visit. She is such a charming and delightful person. Her older friend has also invited me to visit her at her own home in Sahiwal for a week or so but unfortunately, it is not easy for me to travel. Purdah makes it difficult for me to get about — even in Pattoki.

The older Brazilian lady has found much happiness with her husband and children here in Pakistan but even she has not been able to escape from tragedy. She told me that her only daughter who is now twenty-one had a severe breakdown two years ago during which time she gradually deteriorated until she just lies motionless in her bed all day and all night refusing to get up, eat, drink or even go to the bathroom. She has become more and more confused and deranged. Because of her refusal to eat, the doctors told the mother that she was at the point of death from starvation and if she was not hospitalized, within a week, she would surely die. Now the young daughter, Farida, is an inmate in the Government Mental Hospital in Lahore where she is undergoing tube-feeding and electric shocks.

Although it is already the middle of October, the temperature here in Pattoki is still well above eighty degrees F. although thank Allah, the worst of the heat is over.

All my love,

Maryam 107 Maryam Jameelah c/o Hakim Rai Naimat Ali Khan (President)

Tibbia Association

Main Bazar Pattoki, District Kasur

Pakistan

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

November 1, 1962

Dearest Mother and Daddy,

I was so glad to receive your latest letter of October 23rd and be assured that everybody in the family is so well and happy.

Our house here won’t be finished for repairs and renovation before the middle of next month; it is practically being rebuilt but my stay here at Muhammad Anwar’s home is only temporary for this duration. After the house is completed, I will surely move back with Baijan and Appa.

Believe it or not, here it is November and the thermometer during the daytime is still close to 90° F.! However, the nights and early mornings are beginning to grow cooler — about 50 to 60° F. The children are beginning to put on their hand-knitted sweaters, the women, their woolen shawls and the men wrap themselves in heavy white blankets. There is an awful lot of sickness about, particularly colds, influenza, sore throats and endless coughing. During the daytime, the flies swarm in the millions and billions and at night the mosquitoes take over. Here in Pattoki, the most widespread illnesses are malaria, typhoid, dysentery and tuberculosis. There is also small-pox. Just the other day, Baijan told me of one of his patients (an infant) who died of it. Nearly all of Muhammad Anwar’s children are sick with the flu. Poor little Ferhut has so much fever with the flu she feels like she’s burning up. Neither Baijan or Muhammad Anwar ever prescribe aspirin for fever or headache. They say aspirin is bad for the stomach and 108 the heart. They have so low an opinion of aspirin that they think even a high fever does less damage to the body than prescribing it. However, thank Allah, I am perfectly well and so is Muhammad Anwar, Baijan, Appa and Muhammad Anwar’s wife. Illness chiefly afflicts the very young and the very old.

I forgot to tell you that the most important event that has happened since I came here which certainly deserves publicity: Muhammad Anwar’s prize buffalo has just become a mother! Actually, this was her second calf. Ever since I came to Pattoki, I have waited for this; the buffalo has to be no less patient; from the time of conception to birth takes more than ten months! When I came to live at Muhammad Anwar’s, she was just miserable with her pregnancy. She had become so heavy, that all four of her legs were too weak to support her ponderous body and she stumbled, fell and injured her hoof. Muhammad Anwar had to give her medicine to combat infection and bandage it up before it finally healed. Four nights ago, she attracted attention, growing particularly restless. Immediately Muhammad Anwar recognized the tell-tale signs and summoned a neighbour to come at once.

The old turbaned brown man with a long white beard came; both men stripped to the waist to stay with the beast in case it needed any help. Muhammad Anwar also had his bicycle ready for instant use in case the buffalo had any trouble and a veterinarian was necessary.

Meanwhile his wife filled the stable with sweet-smelling hay to make the beast as comfortable as possible; the old turbaned brown man was busy massaging her flanks while Muhammad Anwar looked on anxiously. After only a half hour of labor pains, all of a sudden, I saw the cutest little head poke itself out from the hole in the mother’s behind with its two little front paws. Its bright eyes were wide open as it gazed about curiously. A minute later the birth was complete and the little calf lay beside its mother, all wet, black and shining. Immediately the mother began to lick it clean, all the time while the little creature gazed about with its bright, alert expression. A half hour later it was already trying to get up on its little feet. It would make the feeblest attempts to rise, only to stumble and fall down again. However, barely two hours after its birth, the little creature could already stand on its weak, wobbly little legs to nurse from its mother’s 109 teats. Although it looks very small in comparison to the mother, it must weigh about 75 pounds and is the size of a very large dog. Muhammad Anwar’s wife then got out her hand stone mill and ground lots of flour, cooking it into cereal for the beast which was then mixed with raw unrefined sugar to give it extra energy. Muhammad Anwar did not go to sleep until after 1 o’clock in the morning because he had to wait for the afterbirth. The little calf is just the cutest thing. It is so furry, soft and cuddly and in perfect health. In another month it will be little more than skin and bones because we drink the milk that nature intended for him. The little buffalo calves live in a state of semi-starvation until they are completely weaned and can digest adult food. Actually, we are all very disappointed about the birth. The calf was a male and thus worth nothing to us from a practical point of view. A healthy female buffalo will fetch over one thousand rupees while the male is not worth more than three or four hundred. A male buffalo is useful to pull carts with heavy loads and for work on the farm; but the real purpose of the male is to mate with the female and give birth to more females. It is the milk that we want. Now we have four buffalo; two little males and two adult females. They are no longer afraid of me; they all know me and recognize me and will even lick my hand.

One of the daughters of our neighbours has just been married. Since their home is very small, the wedding was held at ours. For three nights, some of the relatives, who had come from Karachi and Lahore, slept at our house. All during the day preceding the wedding, the relatives flocked here from long distances. The women were dressed in their very best - brilliantly coloured khameez, shalwars, and dupattas with gold and silver hand-wrought bracelets, necklaces, ear-rings, nose-rings and anklets. In contrast, the little children were half-naked or completely naked while the older children dressed like their parents. A long reed mat was laid out and upon it deposited all the presents brought by the guests to the bride and groom. Early next morning, three goats were slaughtered, their chopped-off heads in full view. In the side street outside our house, men were setting up gigantic earthenware pots to cook the wedding meal. They improvised fireplaces on the street, put the pots on the fire and 110 stirred the rice for hours. So that all Pattoki should know, the bride’s parents had engaged a band of musicians who stood outside in their striped tunics, white coats and plaid loin cloths playing loudly on fife, horn and drum. The fifteen-year-old bride sat on the mat, her back against the stone wall of the house, her eyes downcast. She sat there for seven hours, hardly moving, so that all the women could admire her. She was dressed in red silk brocades, bordered with gold with gorgeous gold jewelry to match. The palms of her hands and the soles of her feet were stained with mendi and her eyes outlined with black surma. Finally late that afternoon, I managed to catch a glimpse of the groom. He was dressed in Western clothing, his straight black hair slicked back, clean-shaven in spotlessly clean white shirt, blue immaculately pressed trousers and black and white oxford shoes.

Although I never saw the wedding ceremony itself because it was held in strict privacy, the celebration afterwards was public. There was plenty of rice and goat-meat for everybody, including hundreds of crows, sparrows, dogs and cats, who although not invited, managed to invite themselves.

Yesterday afternoon, that same dancing beggar, who dressed like a lady whom I told you about earlier, appeared right in front of our door to put on another display of his antics. As always, he drew a tremendous crowd of children but this time, he didn’t get very far because right in the middle of his performance, Baijan’s uncle was very angry - indeed, angry enough to call him a Kaffir (unbeliever)! He won out because the dancing beggar and his troupe were compelled to halt their performance and walk away.

Since I have come to Pakistan, I have slept so soundly that I haven’t had a dream vivid enough to remember until last night. Although I had this dream in the early part of the night and woke up from it at 1:30 A.M., even though I went back to sleep again, I can still remember everything. The dream seemed very long as if it lasted for many hours. I dreamt for some reason I was compelled to leave Pakistan at once but on no account, would I consent to return to America. During the first part of the dream, I was taking long airplane rides all over the world, not knowing where to go? Then suddenly I received an invitation from Kemal Kuscu, the translator of all my essays into Turkish, to come to Istanbul and 111 live with his family. I accepted. Although this solution was far from satisfactory to me, it was nevertheless better than returning to America. I was surprised that the exterior of Kemal Kuscu’s house was identical to Muhammad Anwar’s. But the inside was exactly like a Western home; the floors were immaculately clean polished wood covered with exquisite oriental rugs and the furniture all elegant waxed mahogany. It looked very fine and luxurious. I never saw Kemal Kuscu’s wife nor his daughters; only his two grown sons seated in comfortable upholstered arm-chairs reading. They were, of course dressed entirely in western clothing and were very fair and European-looking. When I asked to see their father, Kemal Kuscu came slowly and gravely down the stairs. He was a very handsome, dignified, elderly man with a shock of silver white hair. But his eyes were dark, deep-set and very, very sad. I asked him where was his library of Islamic books? He answered that he had hidden them away for fear of the police. He set his sad grave eyes on me for a moment before he said: “You cannot go out on the street as you are. In Turkey you must wear western dress! If you go out as you are, you will be lynched!” I was still wearing my long black burqa and underneath, my Pakistani shalwar, khameez and dupatta. I did not answer but looked out the window into the streets of Istanbul. I saw numerous magnificent old mosques and minarets but I also saw that they were all in the process of being demolished. All round, ultra-modern high-rise monstrosities were being erected in their place. When I looked at my Turkish friend, I saw that his face was haunted by a great fear and I felt very frightened too…. Just at that critical moment, the call of nature woke me up; for a few moments I still thought I was in Istanbul; before I realized that I was safe and nothing had happened. When I heard our little pet parrot, Miami tu stirring about under my bed 1 (Miami tu is my roommate and he sleeps in his cage under my bed), I was completely reassured. “Thank Allah! I am still here!” I exclaimed gratefully. “O Allah!” I prayed. “I just want to stay here and never live anywhere else!”

All my love,

Maryam 112 Maryam Jameelah c/o Hakim Rai Naimat Ali Khan (President) Tibbia Association Main Bazar Pattoki, District Kasur Pakistan

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont New York, U.S.A.

November 14, 1962

Dear Mother and Daddy,

I received both your letters of October 28th and November 2nd and I was very glad you answered all my questions. Thank you so much for the addresses you typed for me of everybody in the family. I shall keep them carefully so they are at hand whenever I need them. I also received a copy of “The New York Times Book Review” which I found very interesting. Please continue to send it to me each week if you can.

My Urdu lessons have been suspended for the time being. Although my old teacher, Abdul Ghani was excellent, unfortunately, he did not know any English. Although he taught me to read and write simple Urdu quite fluently, I scarcely understood a thing and failed to increase my vocabulary. Because Muhammad Anwar is so terribly busy and Baijan completely preoccupied with the reconstruction of the house, my formal study of Urdu will not resume until it is completed. Although I am still unable to speak Urdu either fluently or grammatically, I still manage to get along fine with Appa and her friends who do not know English. By this time, I can say in Urdu almost anything I want except, of course, complicated philosophical ideas. I think by now I must have an Urdu vocabulary of more than five hundred words.

Last week Muhammad Anwar’s younger sister, Mushtaq Begum came to visit us. She is still here and will remain with us for four or five months. Mushtaq Begum is exactly my own 113 age—twenty-eight—and although she has been happily married for nine years, she, like her elder sister, Appa, is childless. She looks much younger than her age—tall, slender and really beautiful. Her features and fair colouring are identical with that of a northern European. Her luxuriant deep red hair reaches below her waist. Mushtaq Begum might look the twin of an English girl but she does not know English—only Urdu and Punjabi. She is a very lovely girl and we have become good friends.

As I said before in my previous letters, we are here in Pattoki amazingly self-sufficient. We prepare all our food from its raw state. We make all our own clothes. From the roof of our house, I can look right down into the courtyard of our neighbours. I often see the ladies in the neighbouring courtyard squatting on low stools, busily occupied spinning thread at their spinning wheels. They spin on their cherkas or spinning wheels, identical to that which Mahatma Gandhi used, and gossip all day long while the children play about.

One of our neighbours has just given birth. Her screams woke me up in the middle of the night and Muhammad Anwar rushed to her to help her out. There is great happiness now because it was a fine healthy baby boy. The tiny mite is all red-brown and wrinkled up, crying all day and all night. The mother looks quite haggard and worn out. She really does. When the baby is seven days old, its little head will be shaved, he will receive his name from the Holy Quran and two goats will be sacrificed in honour of the occasion. Whatever meat is left over is given away to the poor and a date will be mashed up and put in its little mouth. He won’t be circumcised, however, until he is about seven or eight years old. This ceremony is called Aqeeqa and takes place whenever a Muslim baby is born.

Our little buffalo calf lived only two weeks. I have never in all my life seen such a beautiful little creature as he was. In fact, it looked just like a big stuffed toy, only it moved. He had the most exquisitely shaped little body, luxuriant soft, silky black fur with a little white spot on the top of its head and pure white hind feet and a little pink nose exactly like his mother. Muhammad Anwar said that he had never in his life seen such a beautiful little buffalo calf as this. It was also the sweetest, gentlest spirit that ever was. The little calf was born and apparently remained in perfect health for 114 eleven days when it suddenly contracted an acute stomach trouble which made it impossible to eat, drink or eliminate. I never saw any living creature suffer more. The little calf lay too weak to move on its side on the ground, covered with burlap to keep him warm. Although it never made a sound, its eyes were glazed in agony. Every few minutes it would be seized by a convulsion. Everything possible was done that could be done. Muhammad Anwar stayed up most of the night watching over it and gave it an injection of 2,000,000 units of penicillin. All Pattoki’s best veterinarians were called in for consultation. Miraculously the little creature managed to survive the night and all the next morning, two old turbaned bearded brown men worked over the little thing, forcibly opening its mouth which was paralyzed, forcing bottles of medicines down its throat and massaging its flanks to stimulate it to go. Everything was tried and everything failed. The mother buffalo licked it over and over again lovingly until its gentle spirit passed away.

The mother buffalo has been beside herself with grief ever since. She feels her loss as much as any human mother would. For two whole days she refused to give any milk. The great ponderous beast paces up and down restlessly, rending the air with her piercing cries. Indeed, she has wept so much that the tears flow out of her eyes. When she is tied to her post out in the street for fresh air with the other buffaloes, all the passers-by from the youngest child to the most wrinkled old man know what is wrong with her. One by one they stop to comfort the bereaved mother and gently pat her great head between her horns.

We are also sad because had the little creature lived it would have grown into a magnificent animal of great value. To this day we don’t know what the mysterious illness was that killed it. I think it died because it was too sweet and too beautiful for this world.

All my love,

Maryam 115 Maryam Jameelah c/o Hakim Rai Naimat Ali Khan (President)

Tibbia Association

Main Bazar Pattoki, District Kasur

Pakistan

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

December 27, 1962

Dearest Mother and Daddy,

I was very happy to receive your letter of December 18th which was newsy and lively despite your insistence that your lives are so uneventful. I am glad that you received Maulana Maudoodi’s book, “Towards Understanding Islam”. I sent you this book and other Islamic literature, not to impose my beliefs upon you unwillingly but so that you can gain greater understanding about the kind of life your own daughter has chosen and why?

The most heartwarming letter I have received in a long time was one from Debbie which I now quote:

DECEMBER 21, 1962 DEAR AUNT PEGGY, THANK YOU VERY MUCH FOR THE BOOK, “THE PROPHET MUHAMMAD” THAT YOU SENT ME. I HOPE YOU ARE FEELING WELL. I AM. I SAW YOUR PICTURE AND WAS INTERESTED IN THE CLOTHING YOU WEAR. I SUPPOSE YOU ARE GETTING USED TO THE NEW WAYS OF LIVING. OUT HERE IN NEW JERSEY WE HAVE HAD SNOW. HOW DO YOU CELEBRATE CHRISTMAS IN PAKISTAN?

LOTS OF LOVE,

DEBBIE 126 Well, the only way we could tell it was Christmas was that the Christian children exploded many fire-crackers and that because the Christian sweeper-ladies, who not long ago were Hindu untouchables, took a three-day holiday and caused us hardship because they refused to clean our toilets during that time. When they returned yesterday, the ladies of the household were very angry with the sweepers and there was a loud, lively argument. Christians in Pakistan are much more religious than in America or Europe. There is not the cheap, materialistic commercialism here as in America and all the Pakistani Christians go to church on Christmas Eve and Christmas morning. However, here in Pattoki and all over Pakistan, all schools, banks and bazars are closed down, not because of Christmas but because December 25th happens to be the birthday of Quaid-e-Azam, the founder of our country.

Christmas was a very sad day indeed for my former teacher, Abdul Ghani for on that day, his youngest brother died after a violent attack of dysentery. He was sick with agonizing pain for two days. Baijan and Muhammad Anwar did what they could but even a combination of modern antibiotics and Unani medicine failed to save him. He was only my own age — about twenty-eight — but he had been afflicted mentally for nearly nine years. Despite his affliction, he steadfastly continued to say all his prayers five times daily and was a very gentle and pious man, respected by all the community. Nobody had anything but good to say about him. The ladies of the household were busy from dawn until late afternoon cooking a big meal of goat-meat, potato stew and stacks of chapatis for all the members of Abdul Ghani’s family and many 1

old ladies of his family came and went. There are no funeral homes nor professional undertakers among us Muslims for a Muslim funeral is a very simple affair and costs next to nothing — no coffin, no embalming, no flowers and no music of any kind. Promptly after death occurs, the members of the family wash the body with soap and water, shroud it in white sheets while the members of the family, relatives and friends carry the bier to its resting place. The body is always buried immediately, no later than the same day as the death occured. Although the women all gather in the house to mourn, they are barred from the funeral procession or the 117 graveyard. Both in Lahore and Pattoki, I have seen quite a number of these funeral processions passing through the streets on foot. As for Abdul Ghani’s youngest brother, may his soul rest in the peace he rarely enjoyed during his brief life, only Allah knows why Abdul Ghani must suffer tragedy after tragedy. In many more ways than one, he cannot but remind me of the chief character in my novel, “Ahmad Khalil.”

Although my Urdu lessons cannot resume until the house is complete and I return, I am doing as much as I can on my own. I am reading over all my old lessons Abdul Ghani had given me so that when my new teacher is hired, he can take up with me where Abdul Ghani left off. Thanks to the cooperation of Muhammad Anwar and Mushtaq Begum’s husband, Aslam, my Urdu vocabulary has increased to nearly eight hundred words and now I cannot only make my bare needs understood but am rapidly gaining in fluency and am able to chatter quite freely with the other ladies.

As for the climate, the average temperature at night falls to just above freezing and at mid-day to an average of 60-65 F. We have no system of heating the house at all. This house is constructed for very hot weather so that all one’s essential activities must be done out-of-doors. At night we ward off the cold by a heavy cotton quilt apiece and during the daytime, if the cold gets too much, you can always warm yourself at the fireplace where the food is cooking. I don’t know what I would do without my heavy winter coat; I wear it day and night, even to sleep in, and never take it off except to make wudhu. The others make their wudhu with the ice-cold water from the pump, but Muhammad Anwar’s wife is so kind to me, she even heats water especially for my wudhu over her fireplace.

Baijan’s house is still in the midst of reconstruction. The noise of ten men constantly hammering for nearly ten hours every day is absolutely unbearable. This is why Appa and little Ferhut spend as many hours here as they can to escape from the terrific noise. It is even worse for Appa because of her migraine headaches. The ten men all hammering at once do her no good. I only hope it will not be much longer before the renovation is complete.

128 Now to return to my favourite subject - Islam - nobody but the most dedicated person can ever follow the teachings of Islam as they should be practiced. Islam is rigorous and demanding to a degree inconceivable to irreligious westerners. A true Muslim does not do anything in his life unrelated to his beliefs. Indeed, it is hardly an exaggeration to claim that the really observant Muslim spends as much, if not even more, of his life involved in his faith than even the priest, monk or nun! Only he does not retire from the world. The man will spend his time earning an honest livelihood for his family while the women raise the children and do other essential domestic and household duties. I have learned from my first-hand experience that the observant Muslim does nothing merely for the sake of pleasure. He goes to no places of amusement or entertainment and never takes a holiday. The daily obligatory prayers we know as the Namaz and in Arabic are the Salat - consist of four rakats at dawn before the sun rises, twelve rakats just after mid-day, eight rakats in mid-afternoon, seven rakats just after sunset and seventeen rakats at night before going to bed together with the rigorous requirements for cleanliness as a prerequisite, continue day after day without ceasing till one’s last breath. This means that the observant Muslim spends several hours daily at prayers. The truly religious Muslim will not forget to wake himself up after midnight for the optional Tahajjud prayer, the most difficult of them all. Our spiritual guides tell us that the believer will never really draw close to Allah unless he regularly recites that prayer. Then there is the entire month of obligatory fasting during Ramadan, not to mention the optional fasts which occur at other times of the year and are widely observed by the pious ones. Although to observe Islam properly requires endless hardship, austerities, self-denial and self-sacrifice, you will never find any other people more cheerful, tranquil and serene.

All My Love,

Maryam 119 Maryam Jameelah c/o Hakim Rai Naimat Ali Khan (President)

Tibbia Association

Main Bazar Pattoki, District Kasur

Pakistan

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

January 21, 1963

Dearest Mother and Daddy,

I was very happy to receive your letters of January 5th and 12th as well as the copies of the recent New York Times Book Review which made very interesting reading.

After three and a half months of working on its renovation, at last the house is finished. It really is a tremendous improvement. Best of all, our entire roof is paved with bricks instead of only beaten earth like the other houses in the neighbourhood which makes everything much nicer and cleaner. My room is so nice and cozy with a lovely red, white and blue cement floor, plenty of built-in shelves for my books and the walls decorated with framed inscriptions from Quran and Hadith in beautiful Arabic calligraphy. Miamitu is my roommate. Our neighbour’s seven children gave me such a warm and loving welcome home and so did little Ferhut. Little Miamitu is just squawking all day with joy. Baijan’s young cousins, twenty-two-year-old Shemima, and nineteen-year-old Selima brought over their little kid just one week old. I did not know that newly-born kids are so beautiful; this one was as exquisitely lovely as the little buffalo calf which did not live. It was pitch-black with the most thick glossy fur; it was so quiet and sweet, it looked just like a stuffed toy. It could hardly stand up on its weak wobbly little legs. I held the little creature in my arms and loved it so. But then Salima said it was hungry and in walked its mother to suckle the baby. The sacrificial goats and sheep run all 120 over the house and play with the children all day long. When I asked if they didn’t mind all their jumpings to dirty the house, she said the sacrificial beasts before the Eid-ul-Adha must be given the very best of everything. During the time I was at Muhammad Anwar’s, Shemin and Selima’s father has increased in prosperity for now they have a magnificent rooster, a hen and twelve newly-hatched little chicks. The tiny chicks are the most adorable things you ever saw; each is not bigger than three inches and looks like soft balls of yellow fluff, so perfectly and exquisitely made with its little eyes, tiny little claws and such weak, useless little wings. I held one of them in my hand and could feel in the midst of the warmth of its body, its little heart beating and the vibrations of its squeaky, tiny little voice. However, Shemin’s pet parrot met with a sad end. The cat killed it and ate it up and relished the most delicious meal in its life-time. That is why I am always so careful about Miamitu and never leave him alone outside even for an instant.

I am very glad that you have an increasing desire to understand and know more about my faith and have on your own read some books about Islam without any pressure on my part. That pleases me very much. Long ago my old friend, Zenita once wrote me a letter in which she declared that any Arab or Muslim leader who receives favourable publicity in the American or European press, one can have good reason to doubt his being a good Muslim. I am convinced that she was absolutely correct!

Yes, believe it or not, we in Pakistan have our winter, even though the cold weather lasts only two months — December and January — a very short winter indeed! In some places, particularly in the mountains, there is snow. Here in Pattoki we never have snow, (neither does Lahore,) but you feel the cold keenly in unheated rooms when the thermometer drops to the 40’s and 50’s F. The leaves are just beginning to drop off the trees. In Pakistan, the leaves on the trees in winter do not turn brilliant colours as in America. They just dry up, wither and drop off.

By American standards, our diet is skimpy and spartan. In the winter season while the days are short, consumption of food is reduced to the bare minimum and we eat just two meals a day; breakfast is about nine or ten o’clock and dinner shortly after 121 sunset. Breakfast generally consists of a few chaupatis, a bowl of buttermilk and some kind of vegetable. Vegetables are cheap and quite abundant in Pattoki, much more so than in Lahore; the winter favourites are cauliflower and kale. Sometimes the kale greens are cooked with chunks of goat-meat liver - a very healthy, nutritious dish indeed. Dinner consists of the same with perhaps a bowl of hot buffalo milk with sugar just before going to bed. Sometimes we have oranges which are now in season and both cheap and plentiful, even the poor can enjoy them. Miamitu is my constant companion. He stays with me all day and I take complete charge of him. Miamitu eats the same things we do. He is a very patriotic Pakistani indeed for he just loves peppers, chillis, chaupatis and dhal. I always save part of my meal for him.

Yes, Pattoki with its 20,000 odd inhabitants is a good-sized town but it still retains its provincial, even rural, atmosphere. Right across the street, our neighbours have a big fine stone house but no electricity at all and as soon as the sun sets, it is totally dark and after saying their nightly prayers, they are all asleep. Although Appa has a small kerosene stove, Muhammad Anwar’s wife must make do with a clay fireplace out-of-doors with dried buffalo dung cakes for fuel. Right now I can see on the neighbouring roof, a young lady busy at the spinning wheel. From the roof I can look right down on the main bazar although I rarely do because of Purdah. If there are any paved streets in Pattoki, I have never seen them. Nobody in Pattoki owns an automobile; I don’t think there are any telephones either; practically all the traffic on the streets are men (and very few women) on foot. We ladies are all heavily veiled whenever we go out which is rarely. Occasionally you see a man on a bicycle. Yesterday I happened to see a herd of camels sitting right in the midst of the busy street, placidly chewing their meal of greens. Their turbaned and bearded heavily-armed master was obviously a tribesman from the hills here to conduct business in the main bazar. We have some tongas or carts driven by horses or male buffalo but the donkey is still the chief beast of burden.

I think I told you in my previous letter that Baijan and Muhammad Anwar are both practitioners of the Unani school of medicine. That is why Baijan is called “Hakim” which literally means in Arabic “wise man.” This profession is carefully nurtured 122 and passed down from father to son. Although The Sharfia Medicine Company stocks modern Western drugs, including the antibiotics, their real specialty is the native drugs, made mostly from herbs and medicinal plants locally grown or found wild in and around the vicinity of Pattoki. Genuine Hakims like Baijan base their study of medicine on the practice of the great Muslim doctors of the Middle-Ages such as Al-Razi (865-925) and Ibn-Sina (980-1037). Unani medicine is under very fierce attack in the Pakistan press which argues that Unani medicine should not be allowed to be practiced in this “advanced” twentieth century, and daily condemned as being antiquated and having long outlived its usefulness. Although I am the least one who could claim any authority to speak on this subject, the strongest argument for Unani medicine exists right here in this house! I have never told you about Appa’s mother who is an old lady of more than seventy and who of course lives with us. We all call her “Umma” or “mother” including myself. When I arrived in Pattoki, Umma was a very sick woman, indeed, too weak and in too much pain to do anything but lie on her charpoy and moan and groan. Muhammad Anwar, who has more faith in the modern medicine, took her with him to Karachi and Lahore to consult the biggest doctors there, but to no avail for Umma continued to grow worse and worse and weaker, and weaker. She had some undiagnosed stomach trouble which could not be detected by any examination, test or X-ray. She constantly complained of a terrible burning sensation in her throat. Worst of all, the medicines the modern doctors prescribed for her only aggravated her condition. Shortly after I arrived at Muhammad Anwar’s, Umma’s illness became critical. I remember how friends and relatives rushed from miles around to her bedside, chanting the death-Surah, “Ya-Sin” from the Quran and counting their beads, fully expecting her to expire at any moment. Muhammad Anwar had given up all hope for her when Baijan persuaded him to switch her treatment from the modern drugs to Unani. The result was nothing short of a miracle! Umma’s health has continually improved ever since. Now she is up out of bed and active, helping the younger ladies around the house. Although Umma never went to school and can neither read nor write, she is a very wise and intelligent lady. We all love her very much.

123 I don’t think you will dispute me when I say that America is a very sad place indeed for an ageing person. This is not so in Pakistan where family ties remain strong and unshakeable. Pakistani families include the entire extended clan - not only parents and children but grandparents, uncles, aunts, cousins and all in-laws as well. Aged parents do not consider it any disgrace to live with their married children; this is in fact, the universally accepted thing. Old people are always respected and never regarded as a burden to be shipped off to old folks homes, nursing homes or the senile wards of the public mental institution. Thank Allah there is no need for them here! Allah forbid, may I never live to see the day when there are! I am so sorry to hear what has become of our old neighbour in Larchmont Acres - Mrs. Stark. I have such fond memories of her. During my long affliction, she always took such good care of me when you went on vacations abroad. She had been a truly wonderful neighbour of ours in Larchmont Acres for so many years. If she were Pakistani, she would be lovingly and tenderly cared for by her grown and married children to the end of her days. Never would she be sent to any old-folks home! What you said about Mrs. Stark pained me so much, I can hardly bear to think about it. I was equally saddened when you told me about our other neighbour in Larchmont Acres,

Mrs. Guest being so critically ill in the hospital with a stroke. Please convey my special prayers for her speedy recovery. As much as you liked the substitute minister of your Unitarian Church, it is good to know that Reverend Vessey has sufficiently recovered from his breakdown to leave the institution and return to his work.

All my love, Maryam 134 Maryam Jameelage c/o Hakim Rai Naimat Ali Khan (President)

Tibbia Association

Main Bazar Pattoki, District Kasur

Pakistan

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

February 8, 1963

Dearest Mother and Daddy,

I received your very full and interesting letter of January 26th and I hope by now you have received my long letter of January 21st which I had sent registered air-mail. It seems that even by air-mail, my letters take up to two weeks to reach you and sometimes even longer.

This letter will be short because we are all in the midst of the fast of Ramadan which began on January 26th with the appearance of the new crescent moon. We had all thought it would not begin until the 27th of January because this was the date set on all our calendars. However, at one o’clock in the morning, we were all awakened by Muhammad Anwar’s servant who rushed here to tell Baijan that he had just heard over the radio that the new moon had been sighted. We are now in the 12th day of the fast. Promptly at three o’clock in the morning, four lean turbaned brown men equipped with huge drums and kerosene cans and very loud voices, make the rounds of all the streets in Pattoki, stopping at each house to beat the drums, call down the blessings of Allah to every member of the household, and cry out that everybody had better wake up for their pre-dawn meal and recite their prayers. Our servant then arrives shortly after that and makes a great stack of chapatis and heats up the salen or stew left over from the night before. So at four o’clock in the morning, Appa, Baijan and I eat a substantial breakfast of goat-meat lungs and liver stew, buffalo 125 milk and several chapatis apiece. Little Ferhut is still sound asleep; she won’t observe the fast until she is between seven and ten years old. We do not eat or drink anything until the sun sets now about six o’clock when we have our main meal of the day. Appa tells me that I should spend much more time reading and reciting Quran and at prayer and Dhikr — that is, counting the beads. O yes, we have our beads, just as the Roman Catholics do, only we call them the “tasbih” instead of the “rosary.” Ninety-nine beads are strung on a string, divided into thirty-three with a marker, and when you say your beads, you recite in Arabic, “Glory be unto God 33 times”, “praise be unto God” 33 times and “God is Greatest” 34 times or “There is no god but God” 100 times or if you want, you can recite the 99 Divine Attributes in Arabic. Although we ladies recite our prayers at home, the mosques are all open round the clock and the menfolk spend so much time in the mosques during Ramadan, they almost live there.

During Ramadan, Pattoki children adore the wandering story-tellers and the way-side entertainers from the surrounding villages with their trained yellow and black bears, monkeys and parrots. I always love to hear the wandering minstrels in their long black shirts, Sindhi caps and many necklaces, bracelets and multiple rings on each hand of different kinds of stones. Too poor to afford shoes, they are almost always barefooted, and although they accept charity, they are not greedy like the other professional beggars. For a few chapatis or a mere handful of flour, they earn their precarious livelihood by singing the mystical poetry of the Sufi saints. I read in “The Pakistan Times” about the most famous of them all — Saeen Marna, who died in great poverty and misery only a year before I migrated to Pakistan. Born in an Indian village of the East Punjab in 1910, when he grew up, he fell in love with a woman who rejected him. After that personal tragedy, he disposed of all his worldly possessions and singing mystical songs of his own composition, he wandered from village to village, from town to town and from city to city, performing to rapt audiences at the mazars of the Sufi saints.

I feel sorry for you now because of the severe winter you have had to endure. I wish you could all be here now because in Pattoki we are experiencing truly heavenly weather; the sky is clear and the 126 sun always shines and the temperature ranges from 60 to 70 F. Now that our brief winter is over, I have stored my heavy coat away, we are having our spring and what a glorious spring it is! I only wish the weather could stay like this all year round! The trouble is that it won’t. In less than two months, our long torrid summer begins with temperatures averaging well over 100 F. and little relief for more than six months. So we enjoy this heavenly weather while it lasts.

As for my Urdu, it is rapidly gaining in fluency; my vocabulary now has reached almost a thousand words which enables me to say almost everything I want to say. However, because I don’t know any grammar, my Urdu must sound awfully funny to them. Only those in the family who are with me constantly like Appa, can readily understand me. The illiterate in this part of Pakistan generally speak only Punjabi which I don’t understand at all. Punjabi is a kind of dialect which is not a written language and has no written literature. However, there is a rich store of folklore and oral literature in Punjabi in the villages still relatively isolated from modern life. A good Pakistani Muslim is not considered really educated unless he also knows the Persian language well. Pakistanis educated in Persian all strive to study “The Mathnawi” by the great Persian sage and mystic, Jalal-ud-din Rumi (1207-1273), an esoteric commentary on the Holy Quran and one of the classic masterpieces of world literature. Those who do not know Persian well enough to study the original, can read “The Mathnawi” in many Urdu translations and commentaries. Maulana Maudoodi is also well-versed in Persian as well as Urdu and Arabic.

The news you wrote to me about cousin Lois is wonderful—the best possible thing which could happen to her! I am certain Aunt Helen must be as happy about her marriage as she is! And that letter in which her new husband called her “his little lotus blossom”—yes, love is wonderful, isn’t it?

All my love,

Maryam 127 Maryam Jameelah c/o Hakim Rai Naimat Ali Khan (President)

Tibbia Association

Main Bazar Pattoki, District Kasur

Pakistan

February 28, 1963

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus

Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C

Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

Dearest Mother and Daddy,

I was so touched by your desire to send Baijan and Appa a gift for the Eid and your affectionate regard for them at the close of everyone of your letters. Although we have all experienced the joy of the holy month of Ramadan and the Eid, Appa is suffering very badly from chronic migraine headaches and Muhammad Anwar’s wife, Fatima has been feverish for the last sixteen days with malaria. We are also very sad to hear that Maulana Maudoodi’s health has rapidly deteriorated in recent months. He is suffering very acute discomfort from kidney and bladder stones and his joints, particularly in the knees, are stiff with arthritic aches and pains. Although he is taking so much medicine, including the most modern drugs, nothing seems to give him any relief.

Our holy month of Ramadan ended three days ago and with Allah’s help, we all fasted the entire month. With this letter, I am enclosing an article clipped from “The Pakistan Times” and quoted from “Newsweek”. It is mainly because of such publicity as this that we Muslims distrust westerners and their literature. The Communists could do no better! Now I quote from the offending article as follows:

FASTING

LEADS

TO

LESS

WORK

& INEFFICIENCY — U.S. Magazine

“Fasting leads to decreased working hours and 128 inefficiency,”

according to

American magazine, “Newsweek,”

In an article on Ramadan, captioned, “Fasting and Feasting,” published in the religious column of its latest issue, “Newsweek” said:

‘The rules of Ramadan, the holiest month in the Mohammedan year, were laid down almost fourteen centuries ago and are no help to Muslim governments trying to pull their populations into the twentieth century.’

It added:

‘All day fast, followed by feast at sundown and then several hours of celebration, make for irritability on the job the next day. And the tendency of Mohammedans to consider the entire month as lost to normal tasks leads to decreased working hours and inefficiency.’

The Magazine, after quoting Cairo textile manufacturers in support of its “findings,” said:

“Jute exporters in Pakistan and Syrian cement producers have also been hit.”

Mentioning the Awakeners, “Newsweek” said:

“From Casablanca to Karachi they stride at Sehri, the paved streets of the cities and the sandy roads of the villages, beating drums, summoning the faithful to their religious duties — and to an accelerating conflict with the ways of the modern world …”

Every morning, Muhammad Anwar awakens at the Call to prayer and then hastens to the mosque for the congregational prayer before sunrise. Before 9 A.M. Baijan and Muhammad Anwar are hard at work caring for the sick who flock to their dispensary, stopping work only long enough to say the early and late afternoon prayers; they continue working without stopping until the Adhan for the evening prayers; just after sunset at 6 P.M. We ladies meanwhile continue our domestic tasks at home just the same during the fast of Ramadan as always. Our fast is not followed by any feast — just a frugal meal of several chapatis, spiced vegetables and perhaps one or two small bite-sized pieces of goat-meat, washed down with buffalo milk or just plain water. The “several hours of celebration” referred to in “Newsweek” consist 129 of the following: After we have finished our meal, which is all over within ten minutes, Appa lies down on the bed to rest while Baijan says his beads until the Adhan for the night prayer at 7:30 P.M. when he again hastens to the mosque for the lengthy two-hour Tarawih prayers after which he comes home and goes to bed. Promptly at 3 A.M., four lean brown turbaned men equipped with drums and kerosene tins and very loud voices arouse everyone for our Sehri or pre-dawn meal which consists of two or three chaupatis, buffalo buttermilk and whatever salen or stew is left over from the night before. After saying our dawn prayer at about 5:15 A.M., we all go back to sleep for a few hours.

This, rather than what Newsweek wrote, is the daily routine typical, not only of this household during Ramadan, but all good Muslims throughout the world. Despite his serious illness, Maulana Maudoodi steadfastly observed the fasts of Ramadan the entire month, in addition to attending to all his usual duties and responsibilities from before dawn until far into the night.

Thus you can understand what we Muslims feel whenever we read such nasty stuff as that!

Three days ago Ramadan came to an end and when the new moon was first sighted in the clear black star-lit sky, there was great rejoicing throughout Pattoki, the small children like Ferhut dancing up and down, shouting for joy.

Our Eid was very pleasant indeed, beginning with a glorious warm and sunny spring day. Baijan got up early to join the great Eid congregational prayers which, because of their size, are always held out-of-doors. Appa had told me I could join the ladies but nature had her own way that morning which prevented this. Nevertheless, Appa and I took a complete bath and we put on our very best new clothes. For the Eid, Appa, her sister, Mushtaq and Umma had made for me the most beautiful lace-trimmed pure silk blue shalwar and khameez. Dressed in our very best, Appa, Ferhut and I all proceeded to Muhammad Anwar’s house where we had a most pleasant time with the family. The Eid here in Pattoki is primarily a family day and I could not help but be reminded of Thanksgiving holidays with you, Betty, Walter, Debbie, Sue and Aunt Helen. And when you think of it, the Eid is a Thanksgiving in a very real and literal sense.

140 A little over a week ago, a very strange thing happened, so strange that I still wonder if it really happened and was not a dream. It seems that Muhammad Anwar’s aged mother, his wife and his two sisters and I were all sitting inside Umma’s room talking and getting sleepy enough to go to bed after the night prayer when all of a sudden, one of our servants knocks at the door and informs me that two English girls were waiting outside in the car, wanting to come in and see me. I gasped; “English girls in Pattoki? What would they be doing here?” As if in a daze, I told the servant in Urdu, all right to go ahead and bring them in if they really wanted to see me. Scarcely more than a minute later, in troops the two girls with florid complexions, their frizzy light brown hair cut very short, both wearing tight red sweaters and skin-tight jeans, heavy black hiking shoes and thick white woolen socks. Although both girls had very slim figures, their outfit was so tight they popped out both in front and behind! For a moment, nobody spoke. They just gaped disbelieving at me and I at them. Finally I broke the uneasy silence and asked them what had brought them to Pakistan — to visit friends, to study or any other kind of business? They shook their heads and explained that four months ago they left their homes in London and set out to “see the world.” They have hitch-hiked overland through central Europe to Turkey and through the Middle East. The only body of water they said they crossed was the Bosphorus Sea in Turkey. The furthest point they reached was Madras, India. Now they were on their way home, they told me, because they want to be with their families in time for the next Christmas. I looked again at them closely. They looked very young indeed; two girls no older than 21 or 22, traveled this distance “just to see the world” — two young girls willing to accept hitch-hike rides from any man who would pick them up — two young girls all alone!

You certainly have a brave and adventurous spirit, I complimented. “How do you like Pakistan?”

They gave me a peculiar look. “The people here STARE at us all the time, just as if we were a pair of monkeys!”

I took one look at their outfit and then dared inquire: “I do realize that what you are wearing is regarded in the West as appropriate dress for hiking, but tell me frankly, do you go out on 131 the streets of Lahore and Karachi in this costume?

Immediately they responded with a look to indicate that they were highly insulted. “They would stare at us anyway. What’s the difference?” Then they looked at me, swathed from head to foot in my long ankle-length skirts and my head covered with a long veil and asked me puzzlingly. “What are you doing here? We heard that you are an American and have decided to become a Muslim. “When are you going back?”

I stared at them uneasily. “ I am not going back,” I answered. “ I never want to see America or any other Western country again. This is my home. and I regard these people like my own family. I intend to say here always ….

They gazed at me disbelieving. “But how could you do a thing like that? How does your family feel about it?”

“The life in America did not suit me,” I explained. “There are no hard feelings between my family and me: they are glad that I have found happiness here.”

“Are you in Purdah?” they asked me. “Do you have to wear those weird black burqas everytime you go out and never allowed to meet men outside the family?”

“ Yes,” I replied. “ I am in strict Purdah. I rarely ever go out. In fact, I have not been outside the confines of this house for nearly two months ….

“What a horrid life!” they gasped. “How on earth do you spend your time?”

I replied, “I do quite a lot of writing.”

“What do you write about?”

“I write articles for magazines, newspapers and books about Islam,” I answered.

“But how can you stand this life? Muslim women are treated like slaves! How can you stand this Purdah?”

I replied, “Looking at Islamic life from the outside is a very different thing than actually being part of it and seeing it from within …”

The two young girls stared round them uneasily and then announced “We have to go, really we do. We are very hungry and the car is outside waiting for us. Nice meeting you. Cheerio!”

132 I said blithely, “Get a good night’s sleep and have fun”. “Goodbye …”

As soon as the two English girls were out of sight, Muhammad Anwar’s mother, wife and sisters who could scarcely stifle their giggles out of politeness, we all burst out laughing at once. And then we pictured these girls walking down the streets of Pattoki in that outfit, we burst into another fit of laughter so hard we could hardly stop.

“Don’t laugh at them,” I finally told the ladies. “They are not really bad girls. They just don’t know any better.”

The following morning the servant went up to me and confided in a low voice: “Those girls don’t like Islam,” he said. “They didn’t like meeting you. They didn’t like it at all …”

I had not heard a word from Marlena, the Brazilian former showgirl entertainer until about a month ago, I suddenly received a letter from her, telling me how she had been knocked off a bicycle by a hooligan and thrown to the ground and broken her foot in three places. She was taken to a Christian missionary hospital near Lahore by some Muslim passersby who took pity on her on a stretcher where she remained for ten days.

Hospital accomodations provided only a hard string bed (charpoy) and no sheets, blankets, soap, towels, and not even any food. For these, she had to depend upon her Muslim friends. Since even these Spartan accomodations cost Rs 5.00 ($1.00) Marlena could not afford it nor could her Muslim friends, so she went back to Mrs. Iqbal Shaikh’s where she had been staying for the last four months. This letter shocked me and I answered right away, trying to offer what comfort I could. A week later, another letter arrived which was so depressing, I burst into tears. Marlena told me that she had been betrayed so terribly at where she was staying that she thought if Islam was responsible for making people like this, her desire to embrace it had been badly shaken. She said that more than anything else, she wanted to come to Pattoki from Sahiwal to visit me even with her broken foot in a plaster cast. She said she would come to Pattoki; since circumstances where she was staying made it impossible for me to visit her. So we set the date for December 1st. Promptly at noon, Marlena hobbles into the house, our servant helping her and carrying her purse. Since the ladies of 143 the house knew she was coming and that we wanted to be alone, we spent the entire afternoon in Muhammad Anwar’s room where we could talk privately. When I saw how upset Marlena was, I tried to calm her down and asked her to begin right at the beginning. So she started telling me the story of her life. She is thirty-six years old and was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. When she was three, the whole family left the country which she has not seen since. She thus forgot all her native Portuguese and speaks English as her native language. She spent most of her growing-up years in Burma where her father was a brilliant doctor. Her family, like all Brazilians, were staunch Roman Catholics. She admired her father to the point of worship and he made plans for her to become a doctor like himself because he had no sons. Her mother, she said, was no good and drank heavily. She said her father married her mother because as a young woman, he could not resist her physical beauty. Her father’s sudden death in a cholera epidemic when she was thirteen years old, destroyed all the plans he had made for her medical career. Indeed, Marlena said that because the family moved from place to place so frequently, she had very little formal schooling. Marlena had other talents, however; from earliest childhood, she had shown a flair for acting and now wanted to find self-expression in that art. When she was sixteen, a movie company touring Burma to make a film on location suddenly discovered she was just what they wanted.

So she went with the film company when it returned to Europe and made this and two more films. Ever since then, she had made the show-business her profession, singing and entertaining in nightclubs and cabarets all over Europe and Australia as well. She has never been to America. When she was nineteen, she fell deeply in love with a very brilliant, kind older man in Germany and they were engaged but before they could get married, he was killed in an automobile accident. During World War II, she did a great deal of entertaining at the U.S.O. for American and British soldiers fighting in Europe. As the years passed, although she had made a success in her profession, she began to despise her life and all the depraved men and women connected with it. When her mother died when she was twenty-three, she was left all alone in the world with the sole exception of her older sister, Blanche, fifteen years 144 older than she. Throughout her career, Marlena never forgot the tender love her sister had given her as a child. When Blanche matured, she fell in love with an Indian Muslim living in Burma and married him. They returned to India and over the years had five children. During the hardships of the terrible Partition days, Blanche lost two of her children through epidemics of cholera and typhoid; one of them, a little three-year-old girl named Peaches, was her very favourite. Blanche kept writing her sister letters about this child so remarkable that at three years of age, she was saying her prayers five times a day along with her mother. She looked exactly as Marlena did when a child that age. Blanche loved her little Peaches so much, that she never recovered from her death. Over the years, Blanche and Marlena continued to correspond, writing each other the most affectionate letters. Blanche kept urging Marlena to come to Pakistan and become a Muslim and marry a good Pakistani Muslim. Marlena refused, saying that she was Roman Catholic and there should be at least one in the family faithful to the heritage of her forefathers. Finally Marlena grew so disgusted with her life and so tired of the depraved people she met in show-business that the love of her sister seemed to be the only thing which made her life worth living. Finally last July, she accepted her sister’s invitation to come and visit her en route to another contract in Australia. So last July Marlena came. At first Marlena and her sister were overjoyed to see each other after sixteen years and the first months were so happy, Marlena could not bring herself to leave. The contract in Australia was forgotten. Her older sister, now a handsome white-haired lady of 51 and her 26 year old son, Iqbal, now began arranging her marriage. Together they found whom they thought was just the right man for Marlena - a dignified, brilliant and intellectual gray-haired Pakistani of 52 years who wanted, above all, a very brilliant and intellectual wife. When his wife died in the Partition massacres, he turned down every other offer of marriage because no woman was intelligent enough for him. When he heard about Marlena, he wrote Iqbal immediately that he was so sure she was just right for him that he was flying from Karachi to Lahore at once to marry her. But the strangest thing happened. Just as Marlena, her sister and her nephew were at the airport to meet him, at the same time, 135 his forty-five year old first-cousin whom he had presumed dead at the hands of the Hindus for fifteen years, was suddenly traced by the family and found alive. They were at the airport at the same time, and when this man saw his beloved cousin, Marlena was completely forgotten. The two lost no time and married several days later. At the beginning of November, Marlena had that terrible accident and while her Muslim friends provided her with every comfort they could afford, her own sister came only once to see her. Marlena was shocked and heartbroken that her sister’s manner was so cold and unkind. When she returned home ten days later, she came into her room to find nearly all her possessions stolen, including her travellers cheques and 200 rupees. She then found that her twenty-three-year-old nephew, Farouq was a most accomplished thief and robbing his own aunt. When Marlena demanded that Farouq return all he had stolen, neither her sister nor her brother-in-law was willing to be firm with the boy. From that time on, Marlena and her sister quarreled continually and the house became a nightmare. Marlena threatened to go to the police, and Farouq finally handed her over the traveller’s cheques but refused to return anything else. When the family quarrel was at its height, 26-year-old Iqbal, although unemployed with no money of his own, takes a plane to Cairo at his mother’s expense to marry. Although Farouq goes to carpentry school to learn a useful trade, his teacher threatens to expel him because he is worthless and refuses to learn anything, stealing whatever he can from Marlena. The twenty-one-year-old daughter, Farida has been in the mental hospital in Lahore since October. Although she was at the point of death from starvation two months ago, she is getting very fat now as a result of forced feeding. She is beginning to talk a little now, but just prefers to sit motionless in a chair and stare at nothing. She is a human vegetable, a living-death. The youngest child is fourteen-year-old Ahmad, “the most normal of the lot,” says Marlena. The family is all intent on getting young Ahmad admitted into one of the most exclusive private schools for boys in the country, but Ahmad is not a good student, so they are trying to forge the necessary papers to get him admitted. Marlena could not understand the sense of this.

“Suppose he does get admitted. He is sure to fail his subjects 136 afterwards and can’t possibly stay! But 23 year-old Farouq is the problem-child. The whole family is so afraid of him that each member of the family has a big strong double-lock and every time they leave their rooms for a minute, they double-lock their doors. The husband is a building contractor but so ill with diabetes he is almost completely incapacitated. Now for her room and board for four months (at her own sister’s home where she came on invitation), her brother-in-law is demanding a thousand rupees and Farouq is demanding 150 rupees for going out on Marlena’s errands in addition to his thefts. “So you see, Maryam, I am all alone in the world now. I don’t have a sister anymore. Next week I am leaving for Bombay to take care of my luggage stored at Thomas Cook’s Travel Agency. Then I am returning to Australia to conclude what business must be finished there. But after what I have been through, I cannot return to my former life. I have discovered how much more there is to life than mere self-expression in the theatre. I hate modern Western life and Western civilization just as much as you do, Maryam. The door to my former life is shut tight now; I cannot do otherwise than become a Muslim. Yes, I love Islam; every time I hear the Adhan or call to prayer, the tears flow right down my cheeks. Yes, when I think back over my life, I know I have always been a Muslim at heart although I never knew it until now. Yes, I want to be Muslim even despite this terrible shock with my sister. Now I know that her life has not been blessed because her faith is not true. I came to Pakistan depending upon the love and mercy of my sister; but God has taught me that you cannot depend upon any human being. Now I know that God brought me here to Pakistan so that I would turn from my sister to Him alone.”

Well, Marlena has gone now, back to Australia. I probably will never see her nor hear from her again. May Allah bless her, help her and have mercy upon her!

My former Urdu teacher continues to come, not to teach me but tutor little Ferhut. I was and still am so sorry circumstances forced him to discontinue teaching me. He is so kind, so honest, so sincere, so gentle and patient, all that a teacher should be. Sometimes I see him squatting on the cold stone floor of the courtyard of our house, pounding edible oil out of dried up old ears 137 of corn with a heavy wooden mortar, barefooted and practically in rags with the temperature near the freezing point. In the early morning about six o’clock, two of his little daughters come to us and we give them a pail of buttermilk. They look even poorer than any of the children who come to our house to beg; the little one has trachoma and their clothes are so ragged, they look as if they are about to fall off their pitiful little bodies. No, Abdul Ghani is not like his brother who dresses up in lady’s clothes and dances Hindu dances for a living. Abdul Ghani is a proud man; determined to care for his large family with his own earnings, however meagre. Never a word of complaint out of any of them. They never ask for anything.

Yes, this is a real Muslim home and we feed and take care of many poor people. Among them is a kind old lady, wrinkled and toothless, who is a very good friend of Muhammad Anwar’s aged mother. She often eats and sleeps here with Umma for a night or two. Her husband died many years ago and although she had ten children, only one survives. He is a good son, though, who cares for her as best he can. He has four children. Then there is the deaf-mute girl, a special friend of Appa’s, who comes to cook and clean when Appa isn’t feeling well. She is fifteen and cannot talk at all; only grimaces and makes animal-like noises. But she sits on Appa’s bed, massaging her bad leg hour after hour. She has six brothers and sisters, all but one of whom is exactly like her. Her mother and father, strangely enough, are both entirely normal. Then we have another unfortunate man, about forty, with the intelligence of a child of eight. He is too feebleminded to work even at the most menial tasks, but not too stupid to perform his prayers steadfastly five times every day. The poor man is also afflicted with a club foot and can hardly walk. But he hobbles in here everyday because he knows he will not fail to get a good hot meal of chaupatis and dhal.

Then the wives of our water-man often come to pay us a social call. Everyday about eleven o’clock in the morning, our water-man arrives with a huge, inflated goatskin of water upon his back and fills up our giant pottery jars with the day’s supply of fresh drinking water. As soon as he comes in, we ladies all shrink to the back of the house and hide our faces in accordance with Purdah, but still I have glimpsed him—an emaciated man in rags who earns so little, 118 he and his family must derive their nourishment from air; it is a mystery how they manage to survive at all. The wives of the waterman sit with the rest of our friends, their infants in arms, the older children whimpering plaintively; they are all feverish with malaria. Like my former teacher, they never complain about their poverty but accept it with patient resignation and would never think of begging anything from anyone.

Now Muhammad Anwar’s best friend is a very jolly man with two very jolly wives. They have a nice big house and a beautiful huge double bed; the jolly man sleeps in the middle of this bed and his two jolly wives on either side. I asked him if his wives were jealous of each other. “Oh no!” he replied. “This is a very happy home and all are happy. They all keep each other snug and warm on these cold nights!”

Muhammad Anwar’s brother-in-law, Asslam, who is Mushtaq Begum’s husband, has rejoined her here. It seems that Asslam is in the Pakistan navy and has travelled on ships all over the world. He has been to England twice although never to America. Now he is having his three-months yearly leave and thus he and his wife will stay here all this period to visit their brother, Muhammad Anwar and his aged mother. Because Asslam has seen the world and speaks English perfectly, he is much more cosmopolitan than anyone else in the family. He likes to speak to me in English on intellectual or philosophical questions and yesterday, Muhammad Anwar and he were sitting with the ladies and we were discussing why Westerners look upon polygamy as such a horrible moral evil? What I wanted to know was, why the very idea of polygamy is so horrifying to the western mind? And as we talked on, the answer suddenly revealed itself to me. The answer is because of the individualism which in the West is carried to such an extreme, it amounts to egotism utterly foreign to Islamic or any other traditional, orthodox civilization. The modern Western concept of marriage is that the wife stands on a plane of complete equality with her husband; she is a self-assertive person in her own right, refusing to surrender one iota of her individualism. The purpose of her life is individual happiness and pleasure even at the expense of the social order! In fact, the whole civilization of the West from the days of the ancient Greeks onwards is dominated by the concept 139 that the individual is a complete entity in himself or herself and the individual’s creative, original self-expression is held up as the highest ideal. A Westerner will naturally regard his civilization as superior to all others on account of the achievements of certain outstanding individuals in the arts and sciences. “Where are your Leonardo da Vincis, Michaelangelos, Shakespeares, Beethovens, Rembrandts or Verdis?” Although we too have had our geniuses in the arts and sciences, like Amir Khusru, (1253-1324) and Mian Tansen (1506-1585) who were musical geniuses without peer anywhere and Sinan, the Turk, (1489-1578) was the greatest architect who ever lived, much of the greatest and most beautiful Islamic art was produced anonymously, not as the creative expression of an original individual but the spiritual legacy of an entire civilization, to which each was happy to contribute his or her share anonymously.

In a Muslim society, no individual exists for himself or herself alone, rather, his service, obedience and self-sacrifice to the eternal Law as laid down in Quran and Sunnah, is his supreme goal in life. Although the individual is highly valued, his special talents and abilities are for this end. But the life for which he lives and dies is something much greater and beyond his self. To be sure, the individual is greatly valued for his own sake; in Islam every human soul is of infinite worth. Yet no individual is regarded as self-contained. Now to come back to marriage, in Islam, the husband is the economic provider and undisputed master of the home. This does not make him a tyrant; it does not deny the wife or wives their say and their importance and value; it only means that he has the ultimate authority. The wife in Islam is expected to complement the husband, not to be an isolated entity in herself. She lives for the welfare of her husband and children and therein derives her emotional satisfactions. This is why Muslims can see nothing wrong about a woman sharing a peaceful home with three 1otherwives. The idea of a woman sharing a man’s love with others, is horrifying in the extreme to the Western mind because of the individualistic ideals of Western culture.

Yesterday morning I was suddenly startled out of a sound slumber when little Miamitu began to shriek in terror. When I opened my eyes, I saw a big fat rat scurrying about among my 140 library. The rat climbed up on my four choice volumes of Hadith when I screamed for Baijan. Baijan came running with a big stick in hand and chased the frightened rodent about the room till it scurried out the door and out of sight. I only hope it won’t decide to visit me again!

Whenever bedding is infested with bedbugs, the charpoys are all carried up to the roof and vigorously beaten with sticks while the bedding is set out in the hot sun for several days until the unwelcome visitors depart.

Inspite of the fact that we bathe almost daily and change our clothes frequently, we ladies must wage an incessant battle against the lice which infests the heads of rich and poor alike. Ordinary washing does no good. The children, packed together at school in overcrowded classrooms, are worst affected. We ladies sit together in the sun and fine-comb each other’s hair with stout wooden fine-combs. The more modernized ladies prefer plastic fine-combs which are a great disadvantage because the plastic teeth break off so easily. Appa washes Ferhut’s hair with strong laundry soap and then fine-combs it with plenty of kerosene, afterwards instructing her to stay away from the stove or the fireplace. Our servants tell me that Mendi or Henna is a most effective remedy.

It was so strange hearing what you wrote to me about Patty Allen who used to be our nearest neighbour in Larchmont Acres. I remember her when we used to play together so many years ago; she was two and I was five and we used to raid your first-aid kit and cover ourselves with bandages. And then I will never forget how Mrs. Allen did not want little five-year-old Patty to go all alone to school; so every morning, I used to go across the hall and ring the Allen’s bell. I never forget little Patty scolded by her mother because she always used to dawdle so long over her breakfast that I was late for school and Teacher would scold me. I never blamed little Patty but faithfully waited while she dawdled for a half-hour over her cereal and soft-boiled egg and took her by the hand all the half-mile to school every morning that whole year. O how things have changed since she grew up! Would Patty Allen ever recognize me today?

All my love

Maryam 151 Maryam Jameelah c/o Hakim Rai Naimat Ali Khan (President)

Tibbia Association

Main Bazar Pattoki, District Lahore

Pakistan.

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus

Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C

Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

March 12, 1963

Dearest Mother and Daddy,

Although all your letters reach me without difficulty though somewhat late for air-mail, if you do not receive mine promptly, I will have to send them to you by registered post from now on, until the postal services become more efficient.

The latest news from Muhammad Anwar’s is bad news. Umma was suddenly taken seriously ill again and suffering very much; the eldest brother, Muhammad Sarwar thus insisted that she come at once to Karachi for consultation and treatment by the best Unani Hakims in the city. As a coincidence, Asslam and Ashraf, who have been staying here with her for their yearly three month’s leave from the Pakistan Royal Navy, were recalled to duty just then so very shortly after the Eid, Umma, Asslam, his wife, Mushtaq Begum, Ashraf and his wife Anwar Bibi all left together from Pattoki by train. They travelled third-class (we call it “inter-class”) and after they left and Appa and I returned home, Appa was very sad and worried indeed. Although we are a very well-to-do family, nobody ever thinks of traveling by any other way than third-class because first-class is generally regarded for foreigners only. That is fine for the young and strong like Ashraf and Asslam but I was really concerned about Umma - a critically ill lady in her seventies travelling one whole day and night in such discomfort. But Appa told me not to worry about that, since the Eid holiday rush is over, 142 there would be very, very few people on the trains now so none of the discomfort because of the crowd. Muhammad Sarwar wants Umma to stay under treatment in Karachi until June when he and his sons and daughters, including Umm Kalthum, will return to Pattoki for a big happy family reunion. But looking at Appa’s sad, down-cast eyes made me worry and when she looked at me, we knew we were both thinking the same thing without asking.

“Suppose we do not see Umma again?” I ventured timidly.

“Suppose she dies in Karachi?”

Appa only answered calmly; “Nobody dies except in accordance with the will of Allah. Inshallah, Umma shall return in three months.

In your last letters, you asked me to what interesting Hindus and Muslims could we introduce you to when and if you come to Pakistan (inshallah) to add zest to your visit here? Well, I am sorry I will have to disappoint you concerning the Hindus because in the first place, I don’t know any and in the second place, because of what has taken place in India since the Partition, we Muslims could not regard the Hindus with any friendly feelings.

The first and most logical people for me to introduce you to is our large and close-knit family. We shall take Appa’s family first. There is our beloved Umma who is more than seventy and widowed several years ago. Her real name is Barkat Bibi. The eldest son is Muhammad Sarwar in his early forties and has made the Haj or pilgrimage to Mecca. He is a very well-paid mechanic whose job it is to look after the engines of the airplanes of the Pakistan Air-Force when grounded at the airport. Although he has several children, the eldest daughter, Umm Kalthum is the only one I know. He and his family have their home in Karachi. Appa (her real name is Khurshid Bibi) is the next eldest; she must be in her middle thirties and although barren, she raised Umm Kalthum as a child and now little Ferhut. Muhammad Anwar who is about 33 comes next. Muhammad Anwar’s wife is named Fatima and although Fatima is younger than I am, they have been married for ten years and have six children. Zafar, who is nine, is the eldest. I have never seen him as he is staying at a boarding school in Karachi; Next comes 143 Kumar, a very pale, thin mousy-looking child of seven but although he looks sickly, is almost never sick except with occasional bouts of malaria. Kumar ul-Islam (his full name) has the same features and fair colouring as European children, the only difference is that under the guidance of the local Imam of the mosque, he has just completed reading the entire Holy Quran in Arabic. As mousy-looking and non-descript as he appears, Kumar is a bright boy, very quiet and well-behaved for a child his age and smart in school.

Next in line is five-year-old Ferhut whose blonde hair and gray eyes make her colouring just like Kumar’s although she is very pretty and when she grows up, I think she will really be beautiful. Appa now takes full charge of her upbringing and she always sleeps and eats with us. Plump, bright-eyed little three-and-a-half year-old “baby” Nushut comes next with her fat rosy brown cheeks, mischievous black eyes and straight light-brown hair. Then comes two year-old Farouq who is also fair and European-looking and in the hot weather, just runs about the house barefoot in a little shirt and no pants.

Last, but certainly not least, is ten-months old Asman who looks like his mother and not at all like his father- a typical little Pakistani and a more beautiful and adorable baby you could not imagine - great big beautiful luminous and wistful coal-black eyes, smooth rich warm brown skin and the cutest little face you ever saw. His little personality is just as appealing as his looks. He has cut four teeth but not weaned yet as Fatima still nurses him at her breast. He is plump and glowing with health and should be walking soon as he can already stand alone. I once told Fatima that if I was ever going to have a baby, I would pray to Allah to give me an exact duplicate of Asman!

Anwar Bibi is next and looks the same age as I am. She is married to Ashraf who is about 31. Ashraf is an engine tender on the ships of the Royal Pakistan Navy. He is very stout and robust and always cheerful. During the two-months of his vacation here, he has been a wonderful help to me in improving my Urdu. Now that he has gone to sea again, I miss him very much. Anwar Bibi must miss him much more because he is gone from home nine months of the year; they have only one child, a two-year-old son, Naeem Ashraf who is as cute, bright, mischievous and noisy as a little monkey. And like all little monkeys, Naeem Ashraf hates to 144 wear clothes and likes nothing better than to run about with nothing on, particularly when it is hot.

Mushtaq Begum who is about twenty-five, is the youngest and with her glorious long red hair, beautiful white skin, black eyes, regular features and statuesque carriage, is the beauty in the family. She is the only one who wears the sari. Appa will wear only shalwar and khameez and strongly disapproves of the sari as Hindu. Yes, she is beautiful indeed but unfortunately, like Appa, barren. It must run in that family. Were Mushtaq in America, nobody would ever believe she was Pakistani, in appearance she looks much more western than I do; but appearances are deceiving. When I was staying at Muhammad Anwar’s and eating my evening meal with her, squatting on the very low string stools (Piree) (we eat on the floor with no table), I asked her for a spoon. She gave me a chaupati instead and told me to scoop up the dhal (beans) with that. She looked at me very intently and asked: “Don’t you want to eat like a Muslim?” I nodded. She replied; “The spoon is not Sunnat. Don’t you know our Holy Prophet always ate with his fingers?”

Mushtaq’s husband, is Asslam who says he is about 32 years old. He added that he doesn’t know for sure how old he is exactly; only his mother knew the exact date when he was born and she is dead now. Asslam told me that Pakistanists don’t celebrate their birthdays which are considered of no importance - We only celebrate two birthdays here in Pakistan-

Quaid-e-Azam’s (1876-1948) which falls on Christmas and that of our national poet and sage, Allama Iqbal (1876-1938).

The Holy Prophet’s birthday is not a major Muslim holiday and not Sunnat- the Holy Prophet never told Muslims to celebrate his birthday! Elaborate celebrations of Milad an-Nabi only occured during our periods of decadence.

Asslam is very dark but quite handsome and although rather small in stature, he is very strong. In contrast to his wife, nobody could think he was anything but Pakistani. Like Ashraf, he is also a member of the Pakistan Royal Navy and spends most of the year at sea. In this way, Ashraf and Asslam have traveled to nearly every country in the world. But while Ashraf is cheerful and jovial, Asslam is very serious-minded and seldom laughs unless playing with his little nieces and nephews. After his wife, Mushtaq, his 145 little nephew, Asman is his first-love. He never tired playing with Asman and carrying him around astride his shoulders the whole three months he was here. With his harassed and overworked mother, Asman must cry at least fifty times in a single day but with his uncle, Asslam - never! They are always happy together. Just before Asslam left, I warned Fatima; “You better watch out or Uncle Asslam will steal your little Asman away!”

When I was staying at Muhammad Anwar’s in a more serious mood, I commented once to Asslam, “You and Mushtaq love children so much, you should have borne a dozen of them!” Asslam answered simply; “It is only the will of Allah. It is not for us to question the wisdom of His will!”

Asslam’s father, Ibrahim (Arabic, for Abraham), fully lives up to his name. His is Umma’s eldest brother and must be close to eighty years old, but unlike Umma, retains his health despite his great age. He is among the elders of Pattoki and the Patriarch of our family. His appearance and bearing make him fit the part to perfection. He is rather short, very thin with a long white beard, white turban, white robes and cane. He is the epitome of dignity and repose and nothing is more touching than to see him leading a tiny child so gently by the hand. Umma’s younger brother who must be about sixty, Abdur-Rahim (the slave of the all-merciful God) is equally devout although of a very different personality. He is tall but slight with a long thin silver gray beard. He always wears a dhoti and a big turban. He is quite jovial, almost to the point of boisterousness at times and since I’ve been here, he has never once been ill. Despite his jovial mood, Abd ur-Rahim is the disciplinarian of our family. The children mind - or else! Disobedience is promptly punished with a severe whipping - this is considered here in Pattoki as the proper thing for a father to do - not only to disobedient sons but nephews as well. Asslam told me that when he was little, he learned in his earliest years never to tell a lie, never to steal, never to neglect prayers and never be disobedient or disrespectful to elders or else a whipping and a scolding from Uncle Abdur-Rahim! When I asked Asslam more about this, he said that his uncle was right and only did this for his ultimate good. Abd ur-Rahim’s wife, Chara Bibi, looks to be in her late fifties and put her in a black dress instead of shalwar and 146 khameez, she could be a typical middle-aged Yiddish housewife, the only difference is she never neglects chanting the Holy Quran every morning before sunrise and she does chant it most beautifully. Ashraf is the eldest and next comes Safa ul-Haq who is just about my age and married to Asslam’s sister (Asslam Bibi). Safa ul-Haq and Asslam Bibi have three small children - Parvez Anjam, age 4, Muhammad Tariq, age 2 and little six-months old Rabeena. Little Muhammad Tariq had trachoma last summer - the flies were clustered all over his sore eyes but Baijan and Muhammad Anwar acted quickly and after prompt medical attention, he is fine now. Rabeena is the baby of our family. She was born shortly after I arrived in Pattoki last August. Her mother and father suffered great disappointment because she was not a boy and oh, so dark, even darker skinned than their two other sons. “My poor little black baby!” mourned Asslam Bibi. But now at six months, I think Rabeena will be very pretty with her beautiful black eyes and lovely delicate features as she gets older and her hair grows. Fazlur ul-Haq who is about nineteen with his curly light brown hair, hazel eyes, aquiline nose, heavy lips and very fair skin could not resemble his older brothers less - if you saw him in New York, you would be certain he was a Brooklyn Jew. He is the only one in the family who regularly patronizes Pattoki’s lone cinema house to Baijan’s very strong disapproval. I never even suspected that there was a cinema house in Pattoki until Fazlur ul-Haq told me about it. Then there is Shemin Akhtar who although more than twenty, still remains unmarried (something very rare here in Pattoki where early marriage is the rule.) Shemin is a school teacher in one of Pattoki’s primary schools and has helped me a lot with my Urdu. When her work is over, she comes home in her burqa to help her mother with the housework. Shemin spends several hours daily spinning cotton thread on the family charkha or spinning wheel - just as Mahatma Gandhi and the disciples of his Ashram used to do - but not for any particular religious reason - only because hand-spun thread is so much stronger and cheaper than store-bought factory-made thread. With her straight black hair, high prominent cheek-bones and copper skin, I cannot help but wonder sometimes if Shemin might really be an American Indian! Selima who is in her late teens comes 147 next, and her keen sense of humour makes her very entertaining company indeed. Then comes fourteen-year-old Zia ul-Haq who does not look any older than twelve. Zia ul-Haq has the most beautiful voice you ever heard in your life - in the West he might well have been destined to be a great opera singer - but Islam forbids professional singing and frowns upon musicians. He could grow up to be a muezzin though and already he can chant the Ouran more exquisitely than most of the imams of the mosque!

The youngest is Shams ul-Haq who is eleven and as fair and European-looking as his brother, Zia ul-Haq is dark and oriental in appearance. With his straight crew-cut straw blonde hair, bright hazel-grey eyes and freckles across his nose, were he in America, nobody would think him anything but a typical American boy; that is until he opened his mouth - only Urdu! He is a very sweet child for a boy that age and we have become good friends.

In Ashraf’s house are also twelve chickens - mother and father and ten children! Ashraf had the hen and rooster specially imported from England because he thinks that English chickens lay better eggs than Pakistani desei chickens. Now that the little chicks are growing up - five males and five females - they are mean and noisy and uglier every day - ten little English children who speak not one word of English! Since Selima’s parrot met its sad fate in the jaws of the cat, Ashraf found that same cat in the street the next day - a pure white pigeon in its mouth. He caught the bad cat and literally took the pigeon right out unharmed from the jaws of death and brought it home. The following day he went to the bazar and bought a male pigeon for its mate. Pakistani pigeons are not at all like the ones you see in New York City; they are the epitome of sweetness, gentleness and innocence - all white just like the doves that symbolize “peace.” The baby goat ran away the other day and Abd-ur-Rahim had to chase it all over Pattoki before he found it and brought it back. The baby goat is still beautiful but blind in one eye; it must have been born like that. Abd-ur-Rahim will sacrifice the mother goat for this year’s Eid al-Adha; the baby goat is for next year. Ashraf also has his own buffalo with a little female calf just two months old.

Baijan’s family is not nearly so huge as Appa’s. Both his natural parents are dead; but his step-mother, Zainab who must be close to 148 seventy, a hefty, boisterous lady always full of laughter and fun - is still living. Baijan’s only full sister is Naimat Bibi, in her mid-thirties who is married and lives in Multan. He has many half-sisters and brothers by his step-mother, but of all of them I know only Issa Muhammad who is a brilliant medical student at the university in Multan. He must be in his mid-twenties. “Issa” means Jesus in Arabic and his younger sister, Gulzar Begum who although nearly twenty, looks more like a strikingly beautiful little girl of thirteen or fourteen. Her slim figure would be the envy of any American girl and she dresses beautifully. Her husband, Muhammad Afzal, is an accountant and they have only been married a year. It was Muhammad Afzal who brought us mithai.

So this is my adopted family - Muhammad Anwar, Asslam, Ashraf, Issa Muhammad, Muhammad Sarwar, Muhammad Afzal, Fazl ul-Haq and Umm Kalthum speak English quite fluently; the others do not know a word.

Then, of course, you must meet our servants -

Sharif and Riamulsul who serve Baijan and Muhammad Anwar at the dispensary. They are both in their late adolescence and Sharif, particularly, behaves just as the average teen-age boy in America is expected to act. Riamulsul is quieter. Yes, they were the same boys who tried to steal ten vials of streptomycin last December. Muhammad Anwar beat them both nearly to death and Baijan was about to report them to the police when they both begged for mercy and for Allah to forgive them. Since Baijan and Muhammad Anwar could not find other servants to replace them, they are still with us as if nothing ever happened and I have heard no more complaints about either of them since. Our house servant’s name is Fatima and she looks to be in her late forties. Appa never calls her anything but “Myee” or “elder” which is another Urdu title of respect. Every day Myee arrives at about 6:30 A.M. and works until noon. Then she goes home and returns about 3:30 P.M. and works here until the sunset prayer. We all like Myee very much. She is very faithful at her work - but her one great defect in Appa’s eyes, is that she never says her five daily prayers except during Ramadan. As much as Appa disapproves of this, however, she never mentions it. Myee has two daughters -

twenty-year-old Hanifa and 13-year-old Balquis. Hanifa also 149 works for us and even though she has never been to school and is totally illiterate, she is very clean, intelligent and of lovely appearance. Appa holds Hanifa in high esteem because of her trustworthiness, honesty and unlike her mother, she never neglects her prayers. Myee wants Hanifa to be married very soon. Although Myee’s wages only amount to Rs. 15.00 (about $3.00) monthly, Appa provides her and her family with all their meals - they eat whatever we eat and if their clothing is hardly better than rags, they are at least as well-fed as we are.

Finally, we must not forget our Christian servant girl - indeed the only Christian we Muslim ladies in Purdah ever see - that is, Dara. Dara comes promptly twice daily to clean the toilets with the exception of Christmas and Easter which we Muslims must “celebrate” with dirty toilets. Dara cleans thirty toilets every single day. I always thought that Dara must be a converted Hindu untouchable since this is the kind of work “untouchables” or Harijans are generally associated with. But when I asked her, she emphatically denied this, insisting that she was born a Christian, that her parents, grandparents, brothers, sisters and cousins are all Christians and no Hindus in her family. In dress and physical appearance, the Christians here in Pattoki are indistinguishable from the Muslims except that their women do not observe Purdah and are infinitely dirtier. Dara would really be a pretty girl who always looks pretty in her typical brightly-coloured Pakistani clothes, that is, if she were not so incredibly dirty. But in view of her occupation, I don’t suppose that can be helped.

Our next-door neighbours are also among our very best friends. Their house adjoins ours and since the roofs of our homes are connected, it is as easy for us to visit each other as to walk from room to room. In our courtyard, there is a hole through the wall between our house and theirs and whenever Appa wants the wife or children to come, she can call them through the “speaking hole” and need not expose herself to the gaze of men on the roof. This is our “telephone.”

Like Baijan, our neighbour Irshad Sahib is also a Unani Hakim and has his own dispensary where he works very long hours: Here in Pattoki, there is no such thing as a “week-end”. We Muslims do not believe in any kind of Sabbath as Jews and Christians do - so 150 work continues seven days a week - interrupted only by the compulsory ritual prayers - prayers which are the same every day round the clock. As can be expected, Baijan and Irshad Sahib like very much to talk shop. Irshad Sahib is a very small, very slight and thin brown man with a graying beard. In winter, when swathed in white blankets, making his way with a cane, he looks so frail and much older than his fifty years. He is very gentle and kind and speaks English surprisingly well. This is one reason why if there is any problem concerning me, he is always consulted. Unlike Baijan who was entirely schooled in the art of medicine by his father and grandfather, Irshad Sahib is a graduate of the Tibbiya College in Lahore - class 1936. The Tibbiya College is a major center in Pakistan of Unani medicine. The chief textbook there is Ibn Sina’s (known in the West as Avicenna) voluminous masterpiece - the “Qanun”. The “Qanun” in its Latin translation from the original Arabic was also the standard textbook in all the major medical schools in Europe until the 17th century. Al-Razi’s medical works compiled in the 9th century, are next highly esteemed. Irshad Sahib’s wife, Sughera, is an intelligent-looking lady of forty, very dark-complexioned; her eye-glasses make her look even more intellectual. They have eight children all living in three small rooms. Adeeba who is about 17 years old, is the eldest. She speaks a little bit of English she learned in school but her formal education is complete now and she waits for her father to find her a good husband. Naseem is the next eldest. Twelve-year-old Naseem is attending a Madrassah or religious academy in Multan and returns home only for a few days at the end of Ramadan. Irshad Sahib sends him Rs. 50.00 (about $10.00) every month to cover all his expenses and Rs. 50.00 for people like us is a lot of money. Naseem is very quiet and serious-minded and studies his Arabic for long hours very hard. Then there is 10-year-old Saida whom Appa and I see most often. Every afternoon Saida comes promptly at four with her Arabic Quran and sits on the low stool beside Appa while she makes chapatis and Appa corrects her whenever her Arabic pronunciation is wrong. Although Saida is only a little girl of ten, she already knows everything her mother knows about housekeeping, sewing, cooking and baby-tending. She has a thin, serious face - not too serious though to join her two younger 151 sisters, Suheiba, 8, and Najeem, 7, in a game of jump-rope or jackstones.

Once they begged me to join their game of jump-rope but I protested that I am now an old lady of nearly thirty who has not jumped for the last twenty years! Saida could indeed beat any American child her age at jackstones, only here in Pattoki, the “jacks” are real stones which Saida happened to find on the ground herself. Then, of course, there is little 6-year-old Harun, a beautiful child by any standards, his great black eyes shining with intelligence, but like his father, such frail little bones! Young as he is, Harun (Aaron) has a beautiful voice and exquisite grace - were he a Hindu, he might well be destined for a career in temple dancing and singing, but Irshad Sahib, like all other devout Muslim parents, does not look kindly upon such talents which are ruthlessly suppressed.

Then there is Naheed, a delicate, solemn-faced little girl of two.

The youngest is little three-months-old Muhammad Ameen, born while I was staying at Muhammad Anwar’s. He is a very weak, sickly baby because Sughera lacks sufficient milk for him. But he is the sweetest little thing and whenever he sees me, he smiles the warmest, toothless smile. For a three-month-old baby, he cries very seldom. Irshad Sahib’s and Sughera’s aged parents also live with them in dark, cave-like rooms beneath where the family buffalo is also kept. The buffalo is very old, weak and bony - a sad contrast to Muhammad Anwar’s magnificent specimens - but she will be kept so long as she continues to give a little milk for the children and then, - Zabbah! and into the pot! Sughera’s youngest sister Surraya, a girl of twenty, also lives with them. Surraya has been a victim of insanity all her life - Sughera says her sister was born like that - Surraya is absolutely and totally mad and you know it the instant you see her. She is incredibly dirty and unkempt and her abusive language - usually so with a cruel glint in her crazed eyes. “She called me the daughter of a donkey-thief!” confessed Irshad Sahib. Unlike Abdul Ghani’s younger mentally-afflicted brother - the one who died on Christmas day and was so gentle and pious and never neglected his prayers - Surraya is too far-gone even to know what Namaz is, much less perform it. Although relatives have tried to persuade Surraya’s parents to send her to the Government Mental 152 Hospital in Lahore, they steadfastly refuse to do so.

Well these are the sum total of all the people in my life and when you come to Pattoki, inshallah you shall meet them all. Everybody is asking me when you are coming? In the matter of introducing you to people, Begum Maudoodi can offer you much more practical help. She is the eldest of ten brothers and sisters, all but one living in Lahore. None of her younger sisters observe Purdah and all speak fluent English. Visiting their wealthy and cultivated homes for “tea-parties” would amply fill in your social life. Of course, there won’t be any cocktails. If you know Urdu, Begum Maudoodi would be delighted to introduce you to her lady-friends as devout as she who work for the ladies Jama’at-e-Islami. Baijan also enjoys the acquaintance of many venerable Maulanas in Lahore and a score of Sufi friends here in Pattoki; his best Sufi friend is the Imam of one of the local Pattoki mosques but unfortunately, they are inaccessible to you because none of them speak English.

Like the Arab world, Pakistani hospitality is generous; your hosts will neither expect nor want “tit for tat.” Just bring along your pleasant good manners and avoid religious or political controversy and you’ll get along fine.

If you travel from Karachi to Lahore by Pakistan International Airlines (P.I.A.) you will certainly go in comfort and a marvel of efficiency unsurpassed even in America and your companions will include many other Americans in addition to the ultra-modernized Pakistanis of the upper-crust elite. But if you really want to feel part of the country, then third class (inter-class) train is the thing to do, crowded and uncomfortable as it is, but very, very cheap (700 miles from Karachi to Lahore inter-class costs only about $6.00) and from Lahore to Pattoki (50 miles) only about 50 cents!) So it is for you to decide what you want.

Cities like Lahore and Karachi will scarcely take any notice of you because like great metropolises the world over, the inhabitants are accustomed to seeing all different kinds of people from every country. But here in little provincial Pattoki, it will be an entirely different story. The moment you step off the train or bus, all eyes will be agog. The women and children especially, will stare at you until their eyes literally pop out of their heads. Please 153 understand that they do not intend to be unfriendly or even unpolite; they are merely simple, uneducated people who have never seen an American or European before - so your coming will be an important event for them.

When I first arrived, before I had accustomed myself fully to Pakistani food, whenever I was hungry, technicolour visions would torment me of thick, juicy steaks, hamburgers, chops, succulent pot-roast, meat-loaf, baked potato with butter or Sara Lee’s cheese cake. Sometimes, I must confess, your letters, minutely describing birthday-dinners or menus at Westchester’s choice restaurants were well-nigh unbearable for me. Maulana Maudoodi used to tell me that the same thing would happen to him on his visits to Saudi Arabia where, as among the honoured guests of the King, he would be confronted with an entire roast camel, its head split open, and be presented with its eyes and testicles as the choicest delicacies or maybe, the juicy camel’s hump as succulent appetizer! Because a Pakistani can tolerate only Pakistani food, once one grows accustomed to the peppers and chillis, food is tasteless without them. Now the visions of steak, chops and hamburgers are no more. Now when I am hungry, I can only dream of stacks of piping hot chaupatis, peppery dhal, saag or kale with a big lump of ghee or maybe some goat’s lung and liver stew or best of all, my very favourite dish of goat’s brains with eggs which Appa prepares especially well. Please tell Betty that if she loves cauliflower, she can eat her fill here because this is one of our favourite (and cheapest) vegetables.

Now I regularly attend “The Chaupati Institute for Higher Learning” with Appa in charge. Ferhut is my classmate and Appa is teaching us both how to make chaupatis. Appa assures me that if I am diligent in my lessons, I shall be an expert within a week or two.

Baijan has grown much quieter and more withdrawn these last several weeks. More and more of his spare time - at least two or three hours each morning before sunrise and late at night is spent alone on the roof, pacing back and forth, alone with his Tasbih, repeating the Dhikr on his beads over and over again. From the neighbouring house Roshan Ara Begum’s classical singing or what we call Pukka Raag can be heard over Lahore Radio. Now-a-days 154 only a few old people can appreciate Pukka Raag or our classical music: the young people will only listen to the film or pop songs. But the sad, minor but lovely strains of our classical music are always a great treat for me to hear. So while Baijan paces back and forth on the roof with his beads, I listen to the sad and beautiful songs of Roshan Ara Begum until the last notes die away. By 9:30 P.M. all radios and lights in every house are off, no such thing as night-life in Pattoki, that is, except for the wailing of dozens of street cats (it is sometimes difficult to distinguish between the cry of a cat and that of a human child). The wild dogs are also carrying on a lively conversation of barks and grunts which can be heard all over the town. The electric and kerosene lights are off now, but the sky is bright with stars and an equally bright half-moon. But Baijan paces back and forth alone with his beads - alone with God. Appa says she thinks he has become a Sufi!

All my love, Maryam 155 Maryam Jameelah Government Mental Hospital Jail Road, Lahore Pakistan

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus Larchmont Acres, Apt. 223-C Larchmont, New York, U.S.A.

August 3, 1963

Dearest Mother and Daddy,

Since I was finally released from this place yesterday, today I want to give you the whole story how and why I was committed here, what the place is like, how I was treated and now, my release. To go back to the beginning, as soon as Maulana Maudoodi saw me after I had arrived at his home at the end of June last year, he was bitterly disappointed. He confidently expected me to be somebody quite different from what I am. After seeing me, he told me he could hardly believe I was the same person who had written these “brilliant” letters to him. He said there was not one but two Maryam Jameelahs - the one in her writings and the actual one in person. Deciding as my guardian to assume a strict, paternal role, the Maulana constantly scolded me and criticized me for my behaviour and when he could not scold me in person, then he would send me notes, informing me of my latest misdeeds. I was so miserable that I used to try to win sympathy by unburdening myself to visitors to the house and Maulana called me to his office, severely scolding me for saying derogatory things about him in the presence of strangers. In addition, he told me that my Urdu teacher whom he had engaged to tutor me, continually complained to him that I refused to concentrate on my Urdu lessons as I should have done but just wasted her time discussing personal problems. He told me how just about everybody I met was complaining about me 10, and that people who came to me with love, would go away with hate. I must admit at that time, I was not a good missionary for Islam because I lacked the social skills how to act and get along well 156 with all different kinds of people. Socially, I was extremely immature and inexperienced. I simply did not know how to be nice to people I disliked and who made me so upset.

The worst thing that happened while I was staying at Maulana Maudoodi’s house, was the time that I was invited by Begum Maudoodi to a tea party at her younger brother’s house. I had looked forward to the occasion because Begum Maudoodi told me that her brother had invited a young Canadian convert to Islam especially to meet me who introduced himself as Dr. Abd ar-Rahman Barker, a typical modernizer who said that Islam must be “modernized” to “move with the times”. He appalled me when he proceeded to tell me all the hardships and disappointments of his haj to Mecca the year before; how difficult it was for him to get the permission because the Saudi authorities were so suspicious of white European converts and these “hordes of filthy, primitive people,” and going on and on how bad the Muslims were and how disappointed he was in all Muslim lands and even branding the Maulana himself as a “reactionary fanatic.” His wife, a Canadian-born Pakistani girl—very petite, slim and beautiful—was even more thoroughly modern-minded. She behaved like a “teddy girl,” more like an American teen-ager than a mature wife. Suddenly in the heat of the conversation, in despair, I burst into tears and walked out of the room, cutting short the “tea party” and begged to be taken “home.” Maulana Maudoodi was furious and in the worst verbal beating I had ever received thus far, accused me of disrupting his family relations in his nephew’s own home, and that the Canadian convert, Dr. Abd ar-Rahman Barker, happened to be a distinguished Professor of Islamics at The Islamic Institute of McGill University, Montreal, Canada and that now he refused to meet him as he had previously done and discuss Islamic topics with him so long as I remained at his home. The word he used when describing people I disliked was “respectable.” Everyone was “respectable”—that is, except me. Only I was not!

A few days later, I found some lurid lewd cinema magazines from India which belonged to one of his adolescent sons—and took them to the Maulana’s office explaining that “this is the kind of thing his sons like to read.” They were all enraged with me and accused me of spying on them to their father.

157 Maulana Maudoodi told me that I was disgracing his family. Miraculously he did not send me back to you in America—but instead to Pattoki, hopefully to be “rehabilitated” there.

But instead of being “rehabilitated,” I suffered a severe breakdown soon after I arrived in Pattoki. I did not tell you anything about this before, because I didn’t want you to worry about me. The breakdown was as bad as the one I had suffered in America from 1953 to 1958, and kept growing worse and worse. As my condition deteriorated, the Maulana’s letters grew harsher and harsher, the final one on March 12th recounting all the stories of my misdeeds in Pattoki on his visits to the Maulana in Lahore. This was a most dreadful shock. How could Baijan, who had always shown me such kindness and sympathy, do such a thing? I felt as if I could not trust anybody. The remainder of the letter was intended to refresh my memory in a most detailed account of everything wrong I had done since my arrival in Pakistan. “At first,” he concluded, “I thought your condition was due to the frustrations of your unmarried state but suppose I took the responsibility for your marriage and still you do not improve, what then? The poor man’s entire life would be ruined!”

You can well imagine what that letter did to me. The weeks that followed were of unspeakable mental agony and in my torment, I took refuge in the home of our neighbour, Irshad Sahib. So convinced was I that the Maulana was out to do me harm that I wrote to one of my correspondents, a Karachi journalist named Shaheer Niazi, and told him that because of what had happened, I did not wish to remain under Maulana Maudoodi’s guardianship any longer and would he come to Pattoki so that we could discuss how I could live in this country independently? Shaheer Niazi replied that he would come at once.

But before he had the chance to reach here, one morning several days later, in walks Mian Tufail Muhammad, the Secretary-General of the Jama’at-e-Islami, some non-descript man from the American Consulate in Lahore and an attractive, slim, blonde American girl looking even younger than I was, who introduced herself as Janet Hananem a member of President Kennedy’s Peace-Corps. There was still one more man to be accounted for, a complete stranger to me—youngish, dark, heavy-set and rather 158 handsome in his way and when I asked Mian Tufail Muhammad who he was, he merely replied; “Dr. Rashid Chaudry, a personal friend of mine.” I later learned that he was the Director of the hospital and the most renowned psychiatrist in the whole of Pakistan! Then followed a “tea-party” in Baijan’s best room where we were served tea and sweets. The “tea-party” concluded, I was told to get packed and ready to go. Now that it was evident I was leaving, all of Appa’s and Baijan’s family and friends gathered at the house, many of them weeping to see me going, never to return. Baijan said, “Don’t forget us and if you ever need anything, I’ll always be glad to help you.” Appa embraced me and broke down completely, sobbing as if her heart would break.

So the five of us — Mian Tufail Muhammad, his “personal friend”, Dr. Rashid Chaudry, the Director of the American Consulate and myself with a great crowd of curious onlookers pressing to get a glimpse of the “Mem-Sahib” (that is what Pakistanis call white ladies of American or European origin), we got into the car and drove off. When we arrived at the institution, I was promptly conducted into the Admissions office where I discovered that Dr. Rashid was the Director-in-Charge. Having no alternative and no route of escape, now I was very docile and offered no resistance. Meekly, I myself signed all the papers which declared me as a “voluntary” patient although this, of course, was 1 the last place I would ever go of my own free will. Would that journalist, Shaheer Niazi — ever find me here and rescue me?

It turned out that my experience here in Lahore was actually not nearly so bad as I had anticipated. And in comparison with my two years (1957-1959) of confinement in private and public institutions in America — this place was paradise! Because I still retained my American citizenship, I could only be committed as a private inmate and I soon discovered that my American citizenship made me by far the most privileged inmate in the whole hospital! Unlike all the other inmates who had to share their rooms or sleep in dormitories, I was given a large, sun-lit room completely to myself with three Ayahs in exclusive attendance to me round the clock. Unlike the other inmates, I was not dispossessed but allowed to keep all my books and all my clothes. I was even allowed such things, unheard of in a mental institution, as razor-blades and matches, since unlike most of the other inmates, I had never attempted suicide. Every day, Dr. Rashid or the lady-doctor under him, Dr. Saida would see me and the nurses, social-workers and doctors were especially nice. Everybody treated me with the utmost kindness, consideration and even a degree of respect. What a contrast to my harrowing experiences in institutions in America where the staff could be particularly nasty to the inmates and the latter absolutely defenceless and helpless! In contrast to the institutions in New York, the inmates here were not regimented but allowed to spend their time as they pleased. I passed the time reading, sewing and typing new articles for Islamic periodicals which I submitted with the Maulana’s consent under his home address. Nearly every day, Janet would visit me and go to the bazar and buy anything I wanted. On the Eid-ul-Adha, Mian Tufail Muhammad brought me a very fine sacrificial sheep for which I only had to pay Rs. 70.00! I was the only inmate who was able to sacrifice my own animal and I distributed the meat myself among the Ayahs and some of the very poor inmates without families.

Of about 500 inmates in the women’s section, at least 475 of these were public paying if they could afford the Rs 50-60 monthly or if their families were too poor to pay, they were accomodated free. Living conditions for the public inmates were horrible and the sanitary conditions indescribable. The food for us private inmates was poor enough but the food the public inmates had to eat, consisting almost entirely of watery dhal and stale “roti,” was nauseating even to look at, I wondered how they could eat it but later I discovered that most of the inmates were used to such poor living at home and that conditions in the institution were not much worse. In contrast to American institutions, mothers here were allowed to keep their infants and small children with them, but although very humane from the point of view of the mother, what a terrible atmosphere for children! We had some bright-eyed mischievous small children who, appearing normal, happily played together and even went to school, but had to stay here until their mothers recovered because there was no other place for them to live. Some of the children, though, were inmates. Most, if not all, the child-patients were severely mentally retarded and becoming too much a nuisance to their mothers who wearied of looking after 159 matches, since unlike most of the other inmates, I had never attempted suicide. Every day, Dr. Rashid or the lady-doctor under him, Dr. Saida would see me and the nurses, social-workers and doctors were especially nice. Everybody treated me with the utmost kindness, consideration and even a degree of respect. What a contrast to my harrowing experienc~s in institutions in America where the staff could be particularly nasty to the inmates and the latter absolutely defenceless and helpless! In contrast to the institutions in New York, the inmates here were not regimented but allowed to spend their time as they pleased. I passed the time . reading, sewing and typing new articles for Islamic periodicals which I submitted with the Maulana’s consent under his homeaddress. Nearly every day, Janet would visit me and go to the bazar and buy anything I wanted. On the EidalAdha, Mian Tufail Muhammad brought me a very fine sacrificial sheep for which I onJy bad to pay Rs. 70.00! I was the only inmate who was able to sacrifice my own animal and I distributed the meat myself among the Ayahs and some of the very poor inmates without families.

Of about 500 inmates in the women’s section, at least 475 of these were public paying if they could afford the Rs 50-60 monthly or if their families were too poor to pay, they were accomodated free. Living conditions for the public - inmates were horrible and the sanitary conditions indescribable. The food for us private inmates was poor enough but the food the public inmates had to eat, consisting almost entirely of watery dhal and stale “roti, “was nauseating even to look at, I wondered how they could eat it but later I discovered that most of the inmates were used to such poor living at home and that conditions in the institution was not much worse. In contrast to American institutions, mothers here were allowed to keep their infants and smaH children with them, but although very humane from the point of view of the mother, what a .terrible atmosphere for children! We had some br~ght-eyed lllISchievous small children who, appearing normal, happily played together and even went to school, but had to stay here until their mothers recovered because there was no other place for them to live. Some of the children, though, were inmates. Most, if not all, the child-patients were severely mentally retarded and becoming too much a nuisance to their mothers who wearied of looking after 160 them were committed here. They were the most pathetic sight, running about naked, their emaciated bodies caked with filth, snatching any little piece of bread they could find and then flinging away like frightened, half-starved animals. And the poor little babies, were so emaciated, hardly more than little skeletons. Dr. Rashid told me they did their best to save them but still most of them died.

The public inmates were divided into two categories — one building was kept for those inmates who had a good prognosis and were expected to be released within several months or at least within the year. These inmates were allowed to wear their own clothes and since they had no secure place to keep their things, their meagre possessions had to be kept with the attendants who, like in the American institutions, frequently stole them. Even at the height of this torrid tropical summer, they could bathe only once or at most twice weekly! That must be a real hardship. Treatment consists of electric shock, tranquillizers or other sedatives; or for the lucky inmates, any medication necessary should they fall ill with malaria, dysentery, typhoid or T.B. which was very frequently the case. And having no electric fans in the summer and insufficient warm clothing and bedding in the winter, they must suffer terribly. Since most of them are the simplest, poorest illiterate peasant women and girls from the rural villages, they don’t complain. The other building is reserved exclusively for the chronic inmates, I mean, those who have been afflicted for many years and in all probability, will never leave the institution alive. Most of these chronic inmates have their separate individual cells which are indistinguishable from prison cells — the lowest depths of degradation.

Once a month what is called “the Visitor’s Committee” meets and in private conference with Dr. Rashid, decides which inmates are ready for release. Public inmates and those private inmates who have been committed can be discharged only through the unanimous consent of this group which meets on the 15th of every month. Voluntary private inmates can be discharged on Dr. Rashid’s recommendation alone any time. And on the first of each month, all the chronic inmates are taken out of their cells and brought to the admissions office for physical examination by 171 Dr. Rashid and Dr. Saida. What a depressing sight are these hordes of chronic insane, their heads shaven as precaution against lice and clothed only in ragged burlap, if not completely naked. One by one the attendant takes them inside the doctor’s office where they are examined, especially for evidence of T.B. which is notoriously common and malnutrition which is universal. One by one they step on the scale to be weighed and most don’t weigh more than ninety pounds, some only seventy pounds or even less. Those in the worst states of undernourishment are given milk and better meals.

Most of the public inmates do little more than lie around in bed, or sprawl on the ground or wander about in a daze but some of them who are recovering, go to occupational therapy where they create some lovely things. Occupational therapy is not compulsory; they go only when and if they want to. Some other convalescent inmates can seen on the grounds reading and reciting Holy Quran and saying their prayers.

In contrast to American institutions where visiting is severely restricted, here in Pakistan where family ties are strong, visitors to kin are allowed to come almost any time and stay as long as they wish. Most of the visitors come in the morning and the grounds are thronged with huge families in their colourful native dress, presenting a festive sight. Inmates who have family are often visited daily; the only patients who lack visitors are some of the long-term chronic insane and those whose family and friends live too far away.

We private inmates have our own quarters, but not being separated by any wall from the buildings where the public inmates are kept, the latter, feeling so deprived, often go and filch things from the private rooms and this is why the private inmates continually complain of thefts and that they can’t keep anything safe, even under lock and key. Being the super-privileged inmate with Ayahs in constant attendance, I’ve been quite fortunate in this respect, all my things being with me, but my best blue silk khameez and shalwar trimmed with hand-made lace which was specially made for me by Appa in Pattoki was stolen from me right under my nose and how badly I feel about that! And I think the thief must have been one of my Ayahs but since I have no way of knowing 162 which one or proving anything, I have no alternative but to make myself philosophically resigned for what I can do nothing about. Most of the private inmates are kept two and three in a room which, deprived of possessions, are bare as a monastic cell. But a few inmates have their own radios. I could buy a radio for myself but I do not want one. 0

As only the very rich can afford the Rs 250.00 monthly fee required to keep an inmate on the private ward, here in the mental institution, I associate with “High Society”, as my fellow inmates are the daughters of the big zamindars or landlords, the wealthiest merchants or businessmen - highly cultured and educated young women and girls. One very pretty young girl of seventeen tells me she had to come here “because I had many beautiful little bottles of poison but I just tasted them … “ Another girl about the same age, fat and unattractive, has the most horrible epileptic fits. Then there is Sa’adia, a mother of thirty-five with four growing children who has been afflicted for more than fifteen years. Although she has never gone to school, because her husband was educated in England, she speaks the most beautiful, cultured English - her English far better than mine! She tells me that she spent five years in mental institutions in London. Dr. Saida told me she has to be watched very carefully because she has tried to commit suicide many times. In fact, she is the only inmate I know who successfully scaled the high wall but during her jump to freedom, she broke her ankle and she has since been kept abed, spending most of the day listening to her transistor radio. The oldest private inmate is a sad-eyed, grey-haired lady from Dacca who used to be a brilliant university professor. But the sudden death of her beloved husband was too much for her so she broke down in deep depression. She has grown so awfully thin and won’t eat anything. She just sits listlessly on her bed, too depressed to speak, staring at the floor. She is the only lady who wears the sari. Since all her relatives and friends live so far away in East Pakistan, she seldom has any visitors. In the room next to mine is the daughter of one of the biggest landlords or zamindars in the Punjab. She is not at all insane but is here to be treated for drug-addiction. She told me she had a major operation and to relieve the pain, she was given Pethadine. It must be a horrible drug because at least a tenth of all 163 the inmates I know here are Pethadine addicts. Pethadine addiction is as bad as morphine addiction, if not worse, and yet it is standard treatment after operations in all Pakistani hospitals. And you should have seen this girl, barely twenty years old, all skin and bones, her legs and arms covered with festering sores. Another Pethadine addict, the daughter of a fabulous Nawab, with literally millions and billions of rupees at his disposal - more money than he knows what to do with! She told me that she was married when she was only twelve years old. With troops of servants at her disposal, she has a full-time Ayah to take care of her three children. As she described to me her life, it seemed to come straight from the potentates of “The Arabian Nights!” Being so fabulously rich, they own, so she says, ten thousand buffaloes and thousands of head of sheep and goats on their vast estates where they raise all the meat, milk and vegetables they need. “One of my uncles,” she boasted, “who was educated in America has thirty wives.”

I gasped; “THIRTY? But our Holy Quran says that no man can have more than four!”

She shrugged her delicate shoulders. “My uncle is a King!” she exclaimed. “Who can stop him?”

Another inmate is a buxom lady still very pretty with pink cheeks, glowing with health and short curly black hair although she tells me that she is nearly forty. In contrast to the lady from Dacca and most other inmates, who in their misery, neglect their personal appearance, she is always beautifully dressed and immaculately groomed. But she is quite mad and seldom talks sense. Dr. Saida tells me that she has been here five times before and after each recovery, suffering another relapse within the year. Prior to her affliction, she was known as a distinguished lady-doctor here in Lahore who had built up a fine practice. The status of mental-patient being too humiliating and shameful, she never fails to accompany Dr. Rashid on his daily rounds to the wards. “I am Dr. Rashid’s assistant!” she says.

The most colourful of all my neighbours here is my friend, Saifuddin Roberts. Saifuddin is a Pakistani Christian whose family belongs to the High Anglican Church. She is tall and slender, exquisitely graceful with long, flowing, glossy, black hair, smooth 164 blown skin and fine intelligent dark eyes. At thirty-two she is still a very beautiful woman - so beautiful, she has posed for the cover of Urdu women’s magazines and played minor roles in Pakistani films. She has also written some interesting articles published in the local Urdu newspapers interviewing celebrities which she showed to me. But with all her beauty, intelligence and talents, she is insane and probably incurably so. Ten years ago she married an Englishman but the marriage was not successful so they were separated only a few months afterwards. However, he left her pregnant and she bore a son. Shortly after the birth of her child, she broke down and had to be committed to a mental institution in London. After she had recovered sufficiently with electric shocks, her mother took her out and brought her home but since she could not assume the responsibility of rearing her child, her mother has taken charge of his upbringing.

Poor Saifuddin is obsessed all her waking and even dreaming hours with the delusion that she and her family are about to be “blackmailed.” So vividly does she describe to me “the black-mailer” that I can see him before me now! The blackmailer’s name is Ali Reza and Ali and his wicked clan live on one of the alleys of Hira-Mandi, the Red-Light district here in Lahore. Ali runs a brothel and is so low as to hire out to his “customers,” his own wife and daughter. His wife, so Saifuddin tells me, is half-English, half-Pakistani and always wears Western clothes. His twelve-year-old daughter is very fat and ugly, her face covered with pimples. So poor Saifuddin spends all her spare time cutting paper into smaller and smaller pieces and in her exquisite tiny handwriting, printing endless streams of notes to “the blackmailer”. Saifuddin says in order to stop the blackmailer, she must have the very best lawyer; and she has chosen for her lawyer, none less than Mr. A.K. Brohi, who is the most renowned lawyer in the whole of Pakistan! I have grave doubts if Mr. Brohi knows Saifuddin even exists, but Mr. Brohi is always in her thoughts and she continually writes him at least a dozen notes daily, begging him to save her, her mother and son from the blackmailer. I have discovered that her “letters” never arrive at their destinations - Dr. Rashid merely collects them and keeps them in her file for they are not fit to be sent out anywhere, being mere gibberish. But of 165 course, poor Saifuddin doesn’t know this and keeps on writing …. Once I asked Dr. Rashid if there were any truth in her stories and he said that the hospital, after a thorough investigation, had found none. Then I asked if there were any such family as Ali Reza’s, but he told me although the hospital investigation had found a family by that name, they were very ordinary people and not in the least as she described them.

Saifuddin has been my most constant companion since my arrival here because, despite her fantastic delusions, she is such an interesting person while the other inmates seem so dull. Once you can get her mind off her delusions, she can talk intelligently and sensibly on any other subject and you would never even suspect anything was wrong with her. She is very religious and keeps her rosary and pictures of Catholic saints with her always. She spends much time reading the Bible.

Dr. Rashid tells me within a few days, Saifuddin’s mother will take her out because after the electric shocks have failed to result in any lasting improvement, they say they can do nothing more for her. Saifuddin tells me that she is afraid that half her head is empty. “The electric shocks have destroyed my brain,” she says, “and half my brain has melted away …. I want to go to London and take my son with me. Although he attends the most exclusive convent school for boys in Lahore, he wants only to return to London because he doesn’t like to live in Pakistan. When I go to London, Maryam, I want to go to the finest doctor on Harley Street and have my head examined! …”

To return to my own story, from the middle of last April when I came here until the beginning of June, I was quite content and reconciled to my fate. Maulana Maudoodi and Begum Maudoodi went on Haj to Mecca and Madina several days after I was admitted. This made my heart twinge with sadness because before I left for Pattoki, Begum Maudoodi said they were planning to make the Haj and that she promised if they went, she would take me with her. And sitting forlornly on my bed, I would think if circumstances had been different, I could be performing Haj now! In the end of May, the Maulana returned from Saudi Arabia and visited me with Mian Tufail Muhammad and a stranger they introduced to me as Mohammad Yusuf Khan - tall, 166 long black beard and fair-complexioned with a heavy, extraordinarily handsome, I did not recognize him although he insisted we had met at the tea party in his house before I had left for Pattoki. But I did not remember him at all and regarded him as an utter stranger. The tall, handsome and bearded man began to see me every day, sometimes even twice daily and every time he came, he would bring me so many, many presents! Anything I asked for and he would bring it to me. And now I didn’t have to depend upon the poor hospital food as he brought me plenty to eat and since he daily deluged me with sweets and bottles of syrup which, when diluted with ice-water, made a delicious drink, I became very suspicious of him, convinced that I did not deserve such kindness from a strange man I didn’t know at all.

Then one morning, I had another visitor—Shaheer Niazi! Shaheer Niazi said he had finally discovered my whereabouts and came at once from Karachi. He said he and his wife went to Pattoki only to find I had already gone. He told me my life was in great danger, that the Maulana planned to have me taken to a remote village and have me tortured to death and so I must immediately renounce his guardianship. He told me he and his wife would put me up in his house in Karachi until I could live independently on my own. I was feverishly excited by this fantastic idea and as incredible as it was, believed every word of his story! Mr. Niazi told me I must hand him a note written in my hand, saying that I had renounced the Maulana’s guardianship and was going to live independently in Karachi. I promptly did just as he told me. Shaheer Niazi promised he would get me out of the hospital by the following day. In a fever of excitement, I began to write letters to everybody I knew, telling them why I had renounced the Maulana’s guardianship and was running off with Shaheer Niazi. Most of these letters which I gave to Dr. Rashid were, of course, censored and never sent but some of the others I had foolishly smuggled out by my Ayah to the American Consulate.

The next morning, Shaheer Niazi, a little wiry brown wrinkled man in white Indian pyjamas, instructed me to pack all my things and that he was getting me out of the hospital and that by nightfall, I would be on the train to Karachi. Impatiently I waited, but then something went wrong in the procedure and Shaheer Niazi failed 167 to get me released. I was even more downcast during the following days when Shaheer Niazi never came again.

A few weeks later, I received your letters when you wrote and told me that since I had renounced Maulana’s guardianship, the American Consulate would not permit me to continue to reside in Pakistan but instructed me that I should spend all the money I had to arrange for an airplane ticket to New York after which the authorities would immediately arrange for my transfer and re-commitment to Hudson River State mental institution in New York. You further told me that the American Consulate had informed you that Shaheer Niazi was a very dangerous man and, as a journalist, notoriously dishonest and this is why the hospital would never allow him to assume any responsibility for me. Mother and Dad, I was just about frantic when you wrote to me in your last letter; “If you don’t have any American clothes, ask Janet and I’m sure she will lend you some of her own dresses so soon, darling, very soon, in another two or three days we’ll meet you at the airport in New York…” Now I thought you as my own parents had also turned against me and I remember what furiously angry letters I wrote to you, telling you that to return to America and be re-committed, at the same state institution where I had previously been in 1958–1959, would spell absolute ruin for the rest of my life. I reminded you that I would have never accepted the Maulana’s offer to migrate to Pakistan if my situation in America had not been desperate. I also told you I would NEVER return to America unless forced against my will.

I then realized what Shaheer Niazi had been up to and that my only hope was if Maulana Maudoodi would only forgive me and accept responsibility for me once more. So I wrote him a letter telling him how I had realized the evil designs of Shaheer Niazi and that a return to America was nothing short of total disaster, would he please forgive all I had done and if he would, I promised to accept his guardianship again. Several days passed in anguish but one night I entered my room after a talk with one of the nurses to find on my table, two more bottles of syrup and a big box of sweets. Instantly my torment was relieved as I took this as a good sign. The following morning, Dr. Rashid handed me a letter from Maulana Maudoodi saying that if I would believe he had done the best he 168 could for me under the most difficult and trying circumstances, with his most humane intentions, if I would not disrupt his family any longer or try to interfere with his work and if I would again accept him as my well-wisher, he would resume his guardianship and forget the past and as soon as Dr. Rashid said I could be safely released, he would find a private house for me to live in and take me out. Gratefully, I accepted these terms.

Very shortly afterwards, the strange bearded man came to see me again and this time, he brought not only more presents for me, but his wife, sisters and four small children to introduce to me.

Soon he was taking me out for excursions in the beautiful Shalimar Gardens, Lawrence Gardens and the Lahore zoo and other places of historical interest. And when he took me to his house, at once I knew I had been here before. Dimly, very dimly, I recalled that just after I had arrived in Lahore, Begum Maudoodi had taken me here for a tea-party. And I also remembered how much I had liked this house more than any other I had been to in Lahore because this was a real Pakistani house where the hated western influences were absent and these were the only people who never complained about me to the Maulana. The strange bearded man’s aged mother, his sisters and young nieces all greeted me effusively by name even though I could not remember any of theirs. Every day, he began taking me to his house for dinner and to the homes of his sisters who lived nearby. Finally I screwed up enough courage to ask this strange man who he was and he said Maulana Maudoodi, being too overworked to tend to me personally himself, had delegated that responsibility to him.

Towards the end of July, every afternoon he began taking me on shopping excursions in the heart of the old oriental bazars in the Walled City buying for me everything I would need to set up housekeeping - a little kerosene stove, a kerosene lamp to use when the electric power was cut off at night, pots and pans and eating utensils of every description. I asked what all these things were for, and he gently answered that he was finding me some rooms in a private house near where he lived for me.

Then just a few days ago, he took me to see where I was going to live. He took me into what was going to be my room and there was my very own charpoy - a brand new one - a beautiful new 169 electric fan, tin trunks to store my clothes and everything I needed. Then he took me downstairs to meet the landlady who introduced herself to me as Mrs. Usmani, whom I at once liked because even though she spoke English well and was educated, she was an observant Muslim in strict Purdah. She told me that she worked in the mornings as a civil servant inspectress of the local high schools but in the afternoons, she returned home to take care of the house and her four small children. We soon became good friends. Today is Saturday, and as I just was released from the hospital yesterday at noon, Mohammad Yusuf Khan is taking good care of me as the Maulana instructed him to do. In his absence, if I need anything, Mrs. Usmani is so nice. If ever I feel lonely, I just put on my burqa and take a five-minute walk to Mohammad Yusuf Khan’s house where his sisters and nieces keep me good company. In another three days, on the 6th of this month, Begum Maudoodi has invited me to visit her and the children again. In my next letter, I will tell you all about that.

Please do not worry anymore about me: you need not worry. The long nightmare is over and I think, inshallah that I am going to be happy now.

Your loving daughter,

Maryam 170 Maryam Jameelah c/o Mohammad Yusuf Khan 15/49 Sant Nagar, Lahore-1

Pakistan

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus 49-Calle de la Cenia Palma de Mallorca, Majorca Spain

December 11, 1963

Dearest Mother and Daddy,

Now that you have left the U.S.A. and are living in retirement in Spain where the climate is mild and the cost of living low, on your pension, you must have been really surprised at the news of my marriage as I doubt you ever expected me to be married and to tell you the truth, I didn’t either. This is why I want to tell you in more detail how it happened.

At the close of my last letter, just after I was released from the institution, I told you that I had been invited to visit the Maudoodis again on August 6th. Just a half hour before we were leaving at three in the afternoon while Mohammad Yusuf Khan was helping me to get ready, all of a sudden he asked me very casually, “Would you marry me?” Instinctively I gasped in utter astonishment for this was the very first time in all my twenty-nine years that any responsible man had seriously proposed to me. He again looked at me very earnestly and asked, “Will you marry me?”

“But - but,” I stammered. “How can you do that when you are already married and have four children of your own? You love your wife, don’t you?”

“Yes,” replied Yusuf gravely, “I love her very much but you know in Islam, a man can have up to four wives and I want to marry you too…”

“You know that Maulana Maudoodi has told me to take care of you and since there is nobody else except me to provide for you 171 what will the neighbourhood think of us to see me every day entering your room alone? And from the moral point of view, this is neither good for you nor for me, but if you will marry me, I assure you that everything will be all right … “

“But what about your family—your wife’s family, certainly they will object to your taking a second wife … “

“Don’t you worry about that,” assured Yusuf firmly. “That is my responsibility. Now will you marry me?”

Still hesitating, I replied, “I will ask Maulana Maudoodi’s advice and if he says I should, then I certainly will!”

After a pleasant afternoon with Maudoodi Begum and the children, they asked me to stay for dinner. After dinner in private, I asked the Maulana’s advice and he declared emphatically: “You know, since you entered the mental institution, your value on the marriage market is absolutely gone. Here is a man of the very best character who is willing to carry your burden. This is an act of great mercy. Why then do you refuse him?”

When I told him of our conversation, Yusuf’s eyes lit up with a twinkle and he chuckled gently.

“I asked the Maulana if he thought I should marry you and he replied; ‘Why do you refuse him?’ so I do as he says and will marry you!”

Yusuf looked me straight in the eyes and responded in a very gentle voice; “The Maulana is tired, his health is bad and he is very much overworked. In the past year, he has been extremely worried about you … “

Early the next morning, Mohammad Yusuf Khan lost no time taking action. He instructed me to put on my black burqa and sit on my charpoy and wait patiently. Yusuf then went out and about an hour later returned with two or three bearded turbaned old men, one of them, the Imam of the neighbouring mosque and another, Mrs. Usmani’s eighty-year-old father who explained to me in very clear English that he was going to be one of my waqeel or witnesses. For several hours I sat quiet in my burqa on my charpoy while the three old men squatted on the floor, intent over various documents and rustling a big pile of Urdu and Arabic papers. Then without a word they left the room and Yusuf explained to me that we couldn’t be married officially that day because of the 172 complications caused by the new Pakistan Family Law Ordinance which severely restricts polygamy. According to this hated un-Islamic law his first wife’s consent must be obtained in her own handwriting and then the reasons for his marrying me as second wife would have to be approved as valid by the local court. Yusuf says he is so bitterly against these unjust laws that during Martial Law in 1961, he spent nine months of rigorous imprisonment as Government penalty for opposing them. But for the present, now that they had been declared against the wishes of the people and unanimous opposition of all the ulema or religious scholars as the law of the land, he had no choice but to submit.

Late in the afternoon the next day August 8, 1963, Yusuf came in my room with a tremendous basket full of Pakistani sweets. “Put on your burqa quick!” he ordered in a whisper. No sooner had I done as I was told than in walks the same three old men with the same big pile of Urdu and Arabic papers. As if in a tremendous rush, they squatted down on the floor and hurriedly filled out all the necessary forms. Usmani’s father signed, then the Imam and finally the third old man who offered his thumb-print since he was illiterate. Then the old Imam opened his tattered volume of Hadith or Traditions of the Holy Prophet and recited in Arabic the following:

“ALL WORSHIP, PRAYER AND WEALTH ARE DUE TO ALLAH. PEACE BE UPON YOU, O PROPHET AND THE MERCY OF ALLAH AND HIS BLESSINGS. PEACE BE UPON US AND THE RIGHTEOUS SLAVES OF ALLAH. I BEAR WITNESS THAT THERE IS NO GOD BUT ALLAH AND I BEAR WITNESS THAT MUHAMMAD IS HIS SLAVE AND HIS MESSENGER. ALL PRAISE IS FOR ALLAH AND WE SEEK HELP FROM HIM AND WE BEG FORGIVENESS WITH HIM AND WE SEEK REFUGE IN HIM FROM THE EVIL OF OUR PASSIONS: WHOSOEVER ALLAH GUIDES, THERE IS NONE TO MISGUIDE HIM AND I BEAR WITNESS THAT THERE IS NO GOD BUT ALLAH AND THAT MUHAMMAD IS HIS SLAVE AND MESSENGER. O YOU WHO BELIEVE.

173 FEAR GOD ALLAH TO WHOM YOU DEMAND ONE ANOTHER’S RIGHT AND ALSO RELATIONSHIP. SURELY ALLAH IS THE GREATEST WATCHER OVER YOU, O THOSE WHO BELIEVE! FEAR ALLAH AND SPEAK THE STRAIGHT WORD. THEN HE WILL MAKE YOUR ACTION GOOD FOR YOU AND FORGIVE YOU YOUR SINS AND WHOSO OBEYS ALLAH AND HIS PROPHET, HE HAS INDEED ACHIEVED A MIGHTY SUCCESS!”

I was then told to repeat this after him. This was the marriage sermon, essential for every Muslim marriage, only I didn’t know it then. Finally Mrs. Usmani’s old father handed me the marriage document called the Nikah-Nama and instructed me to sign my name at the bottom of the page. Since it was completely in Urdu, I signed my name in Urdu but they insisted on my English signature as well. The simple ceremony concluded, the three old men rose and without another word, left me and Yusuf alone.

He then made a careful wudhu or ablution and instructed me to pray two rakats with him. He prayed fervently for about fifteen minutes and then we started to play. He was immensely happy to find me as simple and naive as a child, knowing absolutely nothing at all about it. And he was even more happy when I bled and bled on the sheet to find that rare and unique phenomenon - an American virgin at the age of twenty-nine! So we kept popping sweets into each other’s mouths and laughing and playing as if we were children …

For many days afterwards, a steady stream of visitors from Yusuf’s huge clan called on me to see me as his new bride. Some, like his sisters and young nieces, were very warm and friendly but others, particularly the first wife’s mother, was icy-cold in my presence, and glared at me in silence as if to plead, “how could Yusuf do such a thing to my daughter?” Every day Yusuf would bring his first wife and four children to see me and to become accustomed to me and my presence. The first wife’s name was Shafiqa and although she and I were exactly the same age, her face was coarsened from hardships and her body swollen and misshapen from bearing five children and losing one of them in 174 infancy, she looked much older.

The five children Shafiqa had borne my husband were: Ayesha who died when she was only eight months old; Umar Farouq aged five, who had been very sick as an infant although thin, was bright-eyed and healthy now; plump sturdy little Ahmad Farouq aged 4, whom in my husband’s opinion, is the most intelligent of all his children; Muhammad Farouq aged 2 who was born while his father was in jail. He is my husband’s favourite and he often won’t go to sleep at night until my husband comes home even if near midnight, he crawls into his bed; little Humaira, aged one year. All the children look almost exactly alike; they would really be very beautiful children if Shafiqa could keep them cleaner and neater. All have large, beautiful dark eyes, straight light brown hair, fair complexions and perfect little features. They resemble Shafiqa much more than my husband; she must have looked like them when she was a child. My husband admires Maulana Maudoodi so much that he has deliberately named all his children after his and he hopes to have as many, if not more. My husband is against birth-control, despite our very precarious financial situation, and wants a large family. Shafiqa is most obliging - every year she presents him with another cockee or another cockah. Cockee means in Punjabi, very little girl and cockah means very little boy. My husband is very fond of little children and he is so gentle and affectionate with them that they all love him very much.

I became pregnant immediately. Scarcely two weeks after my marriage, I became nauseous. The nausea of pregnancy is commonly known as “morning sickness”. In my case, it was not confined to the morning, but rather I felt nausea continuously all day long and for nearly four months, I could scarcely stand even the sight of food. I felt awful and during the early months, I was almost completely confined to bed but my husband was very happy. He was even more happy when he discovered at the same time that Shafiqa was pregnant too. So you can see how my husband imparted strict justice and impartiality to both of us!

When I was feeling a little better I liked to go downstairs and chat with my landlady, Mrs. Usmani, partly because I could talk to her freely in English and not endure the nervous strain of trying to make myself understood in my poor Urdu. I asked Mrs. Usmani 175 what I should call my husband and she told me I should call him “Khan Sahib.” Since my husband seemed perfectly satisfied for me to call him this, I have addressed him as “Khan Sahib” over since.

Perhaps now, you are curious to know in greater detail more about my husband’s family background. My husband thinks he is about thirty-nine but like most Pakistanis, has no idea of the exact date of his birth. My husband’s family are all Pathans and extremely proud of this; so proud that they rarely ever marry into any other group. Our social horizens are limited mostly to our family but we don’t feel deprived in any way because our clan is so large, there is continual visiting back and forth and there always seems to be some blood-relative staying at our house as a guest.

Khan Sahib’s remote ancestors originally came from Afghanistan but before Partition, the whole huge clan lived in Jullunder, India. The Muslim Pathans lived in an entirely separate quarter from the Hindu and Sikh majority. My old mother-in-law has described this so vividly. Our Pathan broderi, (i.e. Urdu, family) all lived on one street in Jullunder called “Pathan Street” shut off from the rest of the community by a high wall. At night the heavy iron gates were locked and no outsider could enter “Pathan Street” without permission. My husband’s father, Muhammad Amin Khan was a big zamindar or landlord. The family was quite wealthy. They lived in a lovely home and enjoyed a comfortable and pleasant life. Although at that time, the British still ruled, Western cultural influence had not yet penetrated the precincts of “Pathan Street,” and my husband was born and raised in a thoroughly traditional Islamic atmosphere. My old mother-in-law loves nothing better than to reminisce with nostalgia about those “good old days” in Jullunder where the injunctions of Islam were universally observed by everybody. All performed their obligatory five daily prayers and all the women observed strictest Purdah. And what strict Purdah we younger people today can scarcely imagine! In those “good old days” in the “old country” a girl put on her burqa at the age of twelve and if she matured young, even earlier, so as soon as the young girl began to show the first signs of puberty, into Purdah she went! My old mother-in-law never went out-of-doors walking. Whenever a respectable Pathan lady wanted to go out on a rare excursion to visit a female relative or friend, she 176 not only put on her burqa but was carried on a “dholi” or litter surrounded with heavy curtains on all sides by her servants. Despite strict Purdah, none of the women in my husband’s family are illiterate for the father gave them all a fine education. Although they know no English, my husband’s sisters were thoroughly tutored at home in Arabic, Persian and Urdu. Even my aged mother-in-law who must be nearly eighty years old, and her surviving sister, two years younger, are quite literate in Urdu and every day they read Holy Quran after which the local Urdu newspaper is avidly scanned and discussed. So it was a happy life they led in Jullunder, the chief satisfactions derived from observance of Islamic teachings and in the emotional security provided by their close and warm family ties.

Abruptly Partition changed all of this for the worse as during the dreadful communal strife between the Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims, my husband’s family was forced to abandon all their belongings behind them and flee for their lives. So the solidarity of the family was shattered as they scattered — some to Lahore, others to Multan and still others to Faisalabad. Dispossessed and destitute, those were dark and terrible days filled with nothing but suffering and despair. Having fought in the British army against the Japanese during World War II, my husband was just over twenty at the time of Partition and after they walked more than two hundred miles, at last they arrived exhausted at a refugee camp on the outskirts of Lahore. In the refugee camp, my husband, previously so strong and healthy, fell ill and was wracked with malaria and dysentery for more than a year. Finally several years later, my husband found a place they could settle permanently — a big, old and dilapidated house after having been abandoned by the prosperous Hindu family who had lived here. But my husband, finding this house empty, came here to claim it and our family took over half of it. The other half became occupied by at least a dozen poor Punjabi families. Typical of the development of slums the world-over, where one family had lived comfortably, now was hacked up like tenements with a family in every room. About a year later, the Hindu family who had previously occupied the house returned in an attempt to get some compensation and my husband said when they saw what had become of their old house, 177 once so lovely, they broke down and wept. My husband tried to comfort them by giving them what little compensation he could afford, but sorrowfully they returned to India, not to be consoled.

Before Partition, Sant Nagar was an exclusively Hindu district but now all the Hindus have gone, their temples demolished and mosques and minarets sprung up everywhere. Conversely, there are no Muslims left in Jullunder and our beautiful old house is now occupied by the Sikhs.

In 1951 my husband became acquainted with Maulana Sayyid Abul Ala Maudoodi and was so impressed with his vigorous movement to achieve Islamic revival that he eagerly sought admission into the Jama’at-e-Islami and the Maulana was at once won over by his upright character and moral integrity. Soon afterwards, he was accepted as a whole-time worker. My husband also became the manager of the Urdu Weekly Shihab one of the local periodicals in sympathy with the Jama’at. Early in 1954, his marriage was arranged by his father to Shafiqa, a cousin of his and the children followed in rapid succession. Only a year after my husband and Shafiqa were married, in October 1955, because the monsoon rains were heavier than usual, the Ravi, (the river which runs past Lahore), overflowed its banks and our entire neighbourhood was flooded with nearly ten feet of water. Our old house, damaged enough during the communal rioting of the Partition days, was ravaged even more. Shafiqa has told me about the hardships they endured during the “Great Flood” — the hunger and the typhoid epidemic which claimed many lives; how many thousands of cows and buffaloes were drowned, and how Khan Sahib had to travel about by boat through the flooded streets in order to bring in food and provisions.

All political freedom to criticize the Government was suspended when our President Mohammad Ayub Khan declared Martial Law in 1958. But my husband, like Maulana Maudoodi and the other members of the Jama’at, were very brave and fearless. When the hated Family Laws Ordinance, which altered in certain very vital respects the personal laws of our sacred Shariah, was declared the law of the land, the Jama’at was not to be cowed and so published a pamphlet in which 80 prominent ulema (religious scholars) put their signature and officially announced their 178 opposition to this Ordinance as contrary to Islamic Law. And my husband as manager of the Weekly Shihab was bold enough to publish the full text of the ulema’s criticism of the Ordinance. No sooner had this issue been off the press than it was censored by the Government and confiscated. My husband was arrested with a sentence of nine months rigorous imprisonment. These must have been dark days for Shafiqa; with no other financial resources, she was compelled to exchange one by one her gold jewelry for food and many the day she went hungry. During this time Khan Sahib was in jail, little Muhammad Farouq was born.

Shortly before I arrived in Pakistan, my husband was released. During the period of Martial Law before he was arrested and the Jama’at, along with the other political parties, was banned, besides being the Manager of Weekly Shihab, my husband had built up his own business, selling and distributing Maulana Maudoodi’s books. And since Maulana Maudoodi’s books are popular Pakistani “best-sellers,” he soon enjoyed a thriving little business. But at his arrest, he was fined as well as imprisoned so everything he possessed was lost.

As soon as Martial Law was lifted in July 1962, despite the fact that its entire treasury had been confiscated, the organization of the Jama’at is so efficient and dedicated, that it revived with more vigour than ever. The Jama’at looks forward very eagerly to the Eid al-Adha — materially as well as spiritually — because the bulk of its income for running its charitable works is derived from gifts by its numerous sympathizers of the skins of the sacrificial animals. Although their leadership is entirely independent, the goals and ideals of the Jama’at-e-Islami and the banned Al-Ikhwan al-Muslimun (Muslim Brotherhood) in Egypt are virtually identical, as the aim of both is an Islamic state to enforce Islamic Law and the reformation of society on the basis of strict Islamic laws. This is why the Jama’at, exactly like its counterpart in Egypt, is so active in politics.

Right now Maulana Maudoodi is in Saudi Arabia as guest of King Ibn Saud; since Partition, he has been to Saudi Arabia fifteen times! Diplomatic relations between Saudi Arabia and Pakistan are extremely cordial. In Saudi Arabia, Maulana Maudoodi has the opportunity to meet many active members of the banned Ikhwan. 179 A few days ago, my husband and I received a card signed by five of these Arab Ikhwan, wishing us the best of happiness for our marriage! Maulana Maudoodi must have told them all about us.

Mother and Daddy, on the trip you plan to take around the world, why are you so intent on going to Israel? I know how sympathetic you are with Zionism and Israel but you know you can’t go to both the Arab countries and Israel. Because of the lack of diplomatic recognition, you must choose either the former or the latter. Why don’t you change your plans? Why not visit the Arab countries instead? Maulana Maudoodi knows many people there and they all know me. Next to Saudi Arabia, Maulana Maudoodi likes Syria best. He has told me that when he is in Damascus, he feels so much at home there, he could almost imagine himself in Lahore! Oh, if you’ll only quit the idea of going to Israel, Maulana Maudoodi knows many Ikhwan in Egypt and Syria and if you go there instead, they’ll all come out of hiding and shower you with the finest Arab hospitality!

I almost forgot to tell you about the huge all-Pakistan Jama’at annual conference held here in Lahore from October 25th to the 28th. In helping to organize it, my husband toiled from dawn until far into the night. Since a great crowd of tens of thousands was certain to attend, the Government tried to frustrate this by forbidding Maulana Maudoodi the use of a loud-speaker. But Maulana Maudoodi, never to be discouraged, devised a most ingenious system of having his workers stationed at intervals in the crowd to relay his speech to everyone present. And the Jama’at press was busy, printing thousands of copies of his speech. As soon as they rolled off the press, the Jama’at workers were distributing copies all over Lahore. I was looking forward to this conference for many weeks as there was a special place provided for the ladies and meeting Begum Maudoodi and all her friends. The morning the conference was to start, my husband left very early, promising to return to fetch Shafiqa and me about nine-thirty. Ten, eleven, twelve o’clock—Shafiqa and I waited but no sign of him. Finally in the middle of the afternoon, in walks Khan Sahib white-faced and immediately we knew something bad had happened.

No sooner had Maulana Maudoodi started his speech, when a big truck-load of goondas (that’s what we Pakistanis call gangsters)

180 sent by the Government started running all over the place, setting fire to the tents and throwing soda bottles indiscriminately at the crowd. The Jama’at workers, refusing to yield to panic, methodically tried to deal with the goondas as best they could and restore order. But all of a sudden while the Maulana was in the midst of his speech, one of these goondas jumps up and fires three shots directly at him with his pistol. Although Maulana Maudoodi was told to dive for cover, he calmly remained standing. “If I were to sit, who else would stand?” he insisted fearlessly. Thank Allah, the shots missed and Maulana Maudoodi escaped unharmed. He called upon the crowd not to leave; he would continue his speech as if nothing had happened, but this time, heavily-armed, fierce, turbaned and bearded Pathan tribesmen from Peshawar, took up guard on either side of him. Meanwhile other Jama’at workers, determined to catch the culprit, were chasing after him. The goonda, firing off his pistol again, killed one of the Jama’at workers but my husband continued running until he caught hold of him and handed him over to the police. Pathans are brave and my husband certainly lives up to that tradition! The story with his picture appeared in the local Urdu Daily Kohistan the following morning.

But while my husband is leading this kind of exciting life, let’s return to us ladies at home as I would like to tell you more about my adopted family.

First of all, there is my co-wife—Shafiqa. During the first months she was so unhappy about Khan Sahib taking a second wife, she just brooded about the house, listless and spiritless and would hardly eat anything, even though she never openly complained to anybody. My husband would tell me: “Shafiqa made a big sacrifice for you and you should appreciate that.” So I really did feel sorry for her even though at first we were scarcely on speaking terms. But because my husband is so good and kind to us both, now that she realizes she has not been abandoned, she is beginning to brighten a little. Shafiqa is completely absorbed in her home and children as indeed she has no other interests or diversions. To be sure, she is not totally illiterate, having attended primary school up to about the fourth or fifth grade. But she is too preoccupied with domestic cares to have any leisure for reading and I have never 191 seen her writing a letter to anybody, even a close member of the family. Shafiqa subscribes to two magazines - The Sayyara, the literary and cultural organ of the Jama’at and the monthly Batool which is the organ of the ladies branch of the Jama’at headed by Begum Maudoodi. Hameeda Begum, a very pious lady is its Editor even though she is old and ailing with heart-trouble and dropsy, she continues her work. The Batool is Shafiqa’s favourite reading matter; she devotes one whole afternoon each month to reading it aloud to anybody within ear-shot from cover to cover. The Batool consists of articles and other features to make good Muslim ladies. Sometimes it publishes my essays in Urdu translation. While I have a room all to myself, filled with my books and papers and attractively decorated with beautiful Arabic calligraphy covering the walls, poor Shafiqa’s room is small, narrow and since there are no windows, the sunlight never penetrates so the electric light must always be on. However, this dismal-looking room has one big compensation; in our torrid summer, it is by far the coolest in the entire house!

Except on festive occasions, we never have more than one kind of dish, almost always dhal (beans) or highly spiced vegetables eaten with chapatis. And here in the Punjab, we relish vegetables that are unknown in America. For instance, Shafiqa’s favourite dish is mitee. Mitee is none else than green clover! Another of Shafiqa’s very favourite dishes is saag. Saag is the equivalent of what Americans know as kale and is relished by all Punjabis, rich and poor alike, especially during the winter. The poor folk are literally sustained on this saag and mitee throughout the winter and it keeps them healthy because it contains so many vitamins. Children in America shun green vegetables but here in Pakistan they relish them and are always begging for more. Rice appears only at weddings or when one of the family is a guest from Faisalabad or Multan. We eat our fill of meat only once a year on the Eid-al-Adha when all the animals are sacrificed. Ghee has also become too expensive for us to afford so we make do with the vegetable oil called vanaspati which we buy in big ten pound tin cans. Near the Ravi, our family jointly owns some land where we hire servants to raise vegetables for our own use - carrots, turnips, egg-plant, potatoes, onions and the most magnificent heads of 182 cauliflower. We also raise radishes called in Urdu moulee and believe it or not, we eat the radishes cooked, not only the roots but the green tops as well. Should hunger pangs strike between meals during the winter, the favourite snack is raw sugar cane. We buy it in quantity, the poles as high as ten feet. Then my husband’s young nephews go to work and hack it into smaller pieces about twelve inches each. These are doled out to everybody present who chew vigorously on the stalks in order to suck the sweet juice. The children like this very much. White sugar is scarce and rationed but sugar-cane in the raw is a good substitute. When guests come, should it be winter, they are promptly offered a cup of tea. (We never drink coffee). But if in the summer, for hospitality, it is essential to serve each a bottle of Coca-Cola.

Shafiqa’s servant is a very wrinkled dried up little old lady but quite spry and energetic for her seventy-odd years whom we affectionately call “Myee.” Mira Myee was Shafiqa’s nurse in Jullundur and so she’s been with us ever since. Although she is much too old to do the cleaning, she does most of our cooking and washes up the pots and pans afterwards. She has been with us so long that we are very much attached to each other and she is considered a member of the family. Although Mira Myee must have borne about ten children, only one son survives so we try to take care of her grandchildren too. The eldest grandson, her favourite, is now very ill in the hospital with T.B. For doing little errands about the house, in return we give these children their meals and occasionally clothes because there is no provision for them at home.

In addition to Mira Myee, we employ a whole family of Christian Jamadars or sweepers to clean our latrines, sweep the floors and cart away the garbage. There is the mother, Mutaj Bibi, a care-worn woman aged far beyond her years, a barefooted father whom we employ to sweep the streets outside the house and do some of the heavy work, and two daughters - Majee, aged thirteen, and Cheema, aged eleven. Although bright and intelligent, neither Majee nor Cheema will ever go to school or even learn to read and write but must be raised to follow the same occupation as their parents. Originally Hindu untouchables, these Christian Jamadars are the darkest skinned of all and at the very 183 bottom of the economic ladder. To them, our house looks like a palace and our diet, which by American standards would do credit to Sparta, appears to them like a lavish banquet. It all depends on the way you look at it!

My mother-in-law’s younger sister, for example, who suffered a stroke about five years ago, can no longer walk without somebody supporting her, so in order to perform her vital functions she is obliged to sleep in the corridor within an arm’s reach of the commode near the front entrance of the house. Whenever she has to “go”, of course, the front door must be locked which causes us considerable inconvenience whenever we want to go in or out. Although my mother-in-law can still walk, she moves about only with difficulty because she suffers badly from arthritis and has grown so heavy with the years. She, too, has no room of her own but in the summer sleeps outside in the courtyard and in the winter on her charpoy in the dark narrow corridor leading from Shafiqa’s room. It must be a real hardship for her to be deprived of her own room, especially accustomed in Jullundur to so much better conditions, because she has no proper place to change her clothes, to keep her few possessions or any privacy.

My mother-in-law — Azeez Begum — bore ten children — two of them died — one of miscarriage when she was six months pregnant and another son who died in a typhoid fever epidemic when he was three. The eldest of her surviving sons is Ilyas (Arabic for Elias), now a middle-aged man of about forty-five. He is rather short but heavy-boned and stocky. He is very quiet and keeps almost entirely to himself. He has never married. He does some business in real-estate and drives about Lahore in his own motor-cycle. With Ilyas, family custom demands that I observe almost Purdah. In his presence, I don’t have to veil but we are not permitted to speak freely to each other. If he comes in while I am eating, sitting on the pirhi or the low wicker stool next to our little two-burner kerosene stove, I must without a word, at once rise, give him my place and sit elsewhere. As the eldest son, he must be treated with all reserve and respect. For instance, if I am reading the daily Pakistan Times to which he subscribes, and he comes in for breakfast, I must immediately hand it over for him to read first.

194 grown children — a nineteen-year-old daughter named Kauthar, and three sons in their early twenties — Zaheer and Shabeer, both students at Government College, Lahore and poor Javid who is wasting away to a skeleton from a terrible kidney disease. Javid does not look Pathan — he is as dark as a Punjabi but were he not emaciated, he must have been handsome before he became so ill. Since Javid was mentally retarded, he could never attend school with his normal brothers and sister, so remains entirely illiterate. Before he became ill three or four years ago, he spent his time doing housework, running errands for his mother and grandmother in the bazar and sitting and talking with the womenfolk. What they tell me Javid loved best was to listen to the music over the radio. He had a fine ear for music and loved to sing by the hour. My old mother-in-law says that he had a beautiful voice and she used to like him to sing her some Qawwali which are songs in praise of our Holy Prophet. But now he is so weak, he can hardly walk and is often in great pain. He doesn’t sing anymore.

Next is Mumtaz, also close to fifty, who lives with her ageing husband in Faisalabad but very frequently comes to Lahore to visit us. Mumtaz has no children of her own but her husband has two grown sons by his previous marriage. He had been a widower for some years when he married her. When she comes to visit, Mumtaz is always sewing clothes for me on her sewing machine and making other things for me. She is always doing things for others. Thoughtful, considerate, unselfish and very religious, she is considered the best of all Khan Sahib’s sisters.

Still another of my husband’s middle-aged sisters is Hamida. They live upstairs but even though she, her husband, Nishan and three daughters, Nadra, Asma and Afzal are all crowded in one little room, they keep it very neat and clean. Hamida had four sons who my mother-in-law says were the most beautiful children but all of them died in early childhood — two from cholera and the other two succumbed to typhoid fever. They died in Jullunder so perhaps life there was not so bright as I thought. Hamida’s most beautiful, intelligent and promising of all her daughters was her eldest, Nasira, but when she was eighteen, just before I came to Pakistan, she succumbed to tuberculosis and after having been sick for little

184 185 more than a year, she died.

The fourth of Khan Sahib’s sisters is Gauhar Zaman who is a widow. Her husband passed away about five years ago. Do you know, we have a Wali or saint in our family and Asadullah Khan could certainly qualify for that high rank? He was so religious, pious and strict in Islam, being a noted scholar in Arabic and Persian, that after becoming mentally afflicted, he promptly forgot his native Urdu and would converse only in Arabic! Being modern-minded, Gauhar Zaman said she did not want her children to grow up as Maulvis, so she divorced him by Khula and won the custody of all the children. After that terrible blow, Asadullah Khan became a homeless wanderer. He wandered from city to city, finding shelter in the mosques and everyone who saw him there was filled with awe and convinced he was a true Wali or saint, and people would bring him food and clothes. He died while making his prostration in the dawn prayer and he was laid to rest with great reverence. Gauhar Zaman’s eldest son, Laeeq Ahmad Khan, is a brilliant doctor who was interning at the Mayo Hospital in Lahore in the Pediatric section. Laeeq has just gone on a government scholarship to America where he is practicing at the Lakewood Hospital, Cleveland, Ohio for advanced study in children’s medicine. I don’t know what I will do without Laeeq now. He has pulled me through abscess infections on every part of the anatomy and four attacks of malaria — and with so much sickness always about, he was the most useful member of the family, his services in constant demand. Laeeq’s younger brother, Farouq Ahmad Khan, a young man in his early twenties, is a professional athlete specializing in track and hockey. Young Farouq Ahmad Khan has been to Germany, to England and to Indonesia and Mexico — all over the world to participate in athletic contests. He almost got to participate in the Olympic Games but at the last moment, didn’t quite make it. His room is filled with medals and trophies. Farouq Ahmad Khan has the greatest love and respect for his late father and has carefully preserved all the letters he wrote to him in Arabic during his wanderings from mosque to mosque. The third brother is twenty-year-old Khaliq who is an officer in the Pakistan army. Khaliq is very westernized and speaks perfect English. He is the only one in the house who 196 changes into pajamas to sleep at night when all the rest of us sleep in our clothes. The youngest niece, is seventeen-year-old Amina who is now a college student. Although Amina is quite a typical modern girl in every way, she shares her father’s love for the Arabic language because she tells me of all the courses she takes in college, Arabic is her favourite subject.

The youngest of my husband’s five sisters is Sarwar who, does not live in our house but in a very comfortable and pleasant flat nearby. Sarwar’s husband, Inayat Khan, is a great hulk of a man — tall, stout and jovial. He is a retired army officer. But since he receives an ample pension from the Government, they live very nicely. Sarwar’s three sons all attend English convent schools and speak perfect English. Much as I dislike the idea of sending Muslim children to convent schools, there is one thing to be said for them — the children educated there are very well-bred and have such nice manners, totally lacking in those children who attend the ordinary Government schools. Sarwar’s sons are no exception; they are such nice boys and when they come here, they are always clean and well-dressed. Jamshid, the eldest of the three, is a handsome boy of sixteen who could easily pass as an Englishman. Already he is a splendid athlete who specializes in swimming and has won many competitions. His name appears quite frequently on the sport’s page of Lahore’s Pakistan Times and the shelves of his bedroom are filled with gold medals and trophies. Jamshid has just graduated from high-school and is now ready to enter college. He is a very good student. What do you think he received for his graduation present? His father proudly gave him his own buffalo for him to raise and milk himself! My husband envies his young nephew for this because he has always wanted one.

My husband’s youngest brother is Kumar, a gentle, loveable man just about my own age who is a petty shopkeeper. Kumar has his tiny hole-in-the-wall shop in a dark, narrow street in the local bazar and to see him sitting crosslegged bargaining with his customers, he looks just like the typical oriental merchant. Kumar has a little daughter of six, bright-eyed Anjam. His wife, Surraya, is pregnant again. They both hope the child will be a boy.

And finally we come to Abrar, who being the son of my mother-in-law’s sister, is our first cousin. Abrar is a young man also about 187 my age who works in the local post-office. He certainly works in the right place because his hobby is stamp-collecting and since I receive letters from all over the world, I am a great help to him in adding to his collection. Every time I receive a foreign letter, I give the stamps to him. Abrar Khan is such a strict Muslim that he won’t accept postage stamps in his collection with pictures on them. He follows the Islamic prohibition against the pictures of people or animals as precaution against idolatry so strictly, he won’t allow himself to be photographed. Like Kumar and my husband, he wears a long full beard and I have never seen him wearing Western clothes. I thought my husband was devout until I became acquainted with Abrar. Abrar is by far the strictest in the whole family. Every time I go up to his room to give him my letters to post, I almost always find him saying his prayers. He takes a very long time at his prayers and not only says all his obligatory Namaz but the optional prayers as well. Although not a formal member of the Jama’at-e-Islami, he is sympathetic to Maulana Maudoodi and reads his books. “I will support any government who will enforce the Islamic Law,” he says. Abrar is married to Shafiqa’s sister, Rahat with whom I am very friendly. I often go up to her room to visit with her and her two small children, Muna, aged five and little Tahira, a toddler of a year and a half. Muna is Umar Farouq’s favourite playmate and the two cousins go to school and play happily together. Tahira is a sweet little baby who spends most of her time sitting on the charpoy while her adoring grandmother feeds her tidbits. In between Muna and Tahira, Rahat had another son, a sickly infant who died of whooping-cough when he was a year and a half, shortly after I left for Pattoki.

Despite all the dirt, the sickness and the physical hardships, I love this home and this neighbourhood and would not exchange it for any other. Most Americans in Lahore live in fashionable bungalows in Gulberg. Gulberg is the posh “Park Avenue” of Lahore but I am not the least interested in going there. So I sit by the window where I can see out but nobody can look in on the big chair in my room, each day growing bigger and bigger with child — and watch the life of the street pass by. I know everybody on the street now — every beggar — the same beggars come round each day — and I recognize each of the cries of the endless stream 198 of street vendors calling out their wares. Motor vehicles never penetrate the narrow earthen streets of this neighbourhood but only horse-driven tongas and caravans of loaded donkeys and buffalo from the villages surrounding Lahore. I love this street best during the days and nights of our holy month of Ramadan when at three in the morning, the men and boys come round with drums to awaken us for our pre-dawn meal and yes, the wandering minstrels, with their primitive flutes and one-string violin, such lovely mystical poetry of the Sufi saints, such sweet songs about our Holy Prophet with hordes of children following after them. And the very poor men often come round with their trained parrots, monkeys and dancing bears to amuse the children. In so many ways, Sant Nagar reminds me of Pattoki and that is why I look upon it with so much affection.

My husband, Khan Sahib — and his family send you all their best wishes and regards.

Your loving daughter,

Maryam 189 Maryam Jameelah c/o Mohammad Yusuf Khan 15/49 Sant Nagar, Lahore-1

Pakistan

Mr. & Mrs. Herbert S. Marcus 49 Calle Marques de la Cenia Palma de Mallorca, Majorca Spain

October 24, 1964

Dearest Mother and Daddy,

In my last letter I wrote you that my mission here is to strive to my utmost to combat all the vulgar modernism represented by the filthy film songs I hear all the time over my niece’s radio so that the Adhan will eventually emerge triumphant. Of course, with westernization and modernization day by day gaining the upper hand, to the non-Muslim it must seem as if I am afflicted by delusions of wishful thinking but the true Muslims never despair or lose hope. Last night in dreamland, I visited the holy city of Mecca. It was truly a terrifying nightmare. I told my husband the following morning: “I dreamt that in Mecca I stepped into the Haramash Sharif and what do you think I saw? Instead of being draped with the usual beautiful black brocade (Kiswa) covered with Quranic inscriptions embroidered in gold, the Ka’aba was plastered with the most vulgar cinema posters of nude women to advertise the latest romantic comedy, lurid bill-boards of men and women kissing and embracing each other and more billboards advertising such intimate products as deodorants, depilatories for shaving ladies’ legs, etc. Right next to the Ka’aba blocking the path so nobody could perform the Tawwaf (that is, the ritual encirclement of the Ka’aba seven times essential for Haj), was a great big piano and some man dressed in a tuxedo was playing spritely Western music so loud that you could never hear the Adhan from the mosque (if there was any Adhan). Feeling as sad as if the world had virtually come to an end, I walked alone into the great mosque to look for 200 some copies of Quran. I walked upstairs where the books of the library were kept, and on the shelves, not a single Quran in sight! The shelves were lined with nothing but popular American best-seller novels and other light reading matter in their bright jackets, dazzling as the sun streamed in through the window. Determined to find out where the Holy Quran and other sacred Arabic books were, finally on the floor in the darkest corner of the room, I discovered them thrown helter-skelter about in a state of disrepair, covered with dust. And I took them up in my arms and sat down on the floor and cried and wept. “I didn’t know Mecca was like THIS!” I wailed. “This is much, much worse than Pakistan!” and then I woke up.

“My husband told me gravely: “Your dream is the truth! These are very dangerous times…”

But now I want to tell you about still another dream I had some nights back. In my dream, our President Mohammad Ayub Khan had been exiled and dispossessed. Impoverished and homeless, he took refuge in our house. He said he was ill and required a penicillin injection and once the drug and the needle were provided, he would give himself the injection. So my young niece, Amina—who really does idolize President Mohammad Ayub Khan not only in my dream but in reality—rushed to the chemist shop and in less than a half hour returned with everything needed. Heavily President Ayub Khan sat down on one of the low wicker stools or pirees Amina provided for him, bent over the shabby one-burner kerosene stove to boil the water necessary to sterilize the needle. After the boiled water had cooled sufficiently, President Mohammad Ayub Khan himself prepared his injection.

“I am finished!” he announced, injected the needle and no sooner had he injected himself than he heaved a desperate gasp and then his portly body collapsed on the floor—dead!!

“Did you see his death?” my Khan Sahib asked me after I awoke.

I replied: “Yes, Khan Sahib, I did!”

Then he instructed me intensely: “Maryam, don’t you describe this dream to anybody! It could get us both into much trouble!”

Now that it is over, I can tell you the whole story about the 191 banning of the Jama’at-e-Islami. It was last January 6th when I awoke one bitterly cold and dreary morning with a loud knock on the door. Immediately startled, my husband jumps out of bed and at the door is one of his friends telling him that he must report to Jama’at headquarters at once. I knew that something was wrong but my husband said: “You are no longer any Yahudi (Jew) but are a Muslim lady now and you must not worry or be frightened,” and with this slight assurance, he and his friends depart. In a fog of fear, I sat on my charpoy and waited…. Finally about two o’clock that afternoon, my husband walks in breathless and pale. “The Jama’at-e-Islami is banned!” he announced—“all finished! When I arrived at Headquarters, Maulana Maudoodi had already been arrested and taken away to jail. The offices and Maulana Maudoodi’s library have been sealed and the police with rifles surround the house…”

The days and weeks following, how can I describe them; the C.I.D. or secret police following my husband about wherever he went and he was all prepared to be arrested and sent to jail any minute! How awful were those nights; every squeak of the floor outside and every footstep I heard and I’d jump with fright; any minute expecting the loud knock of the police on the door and my poor husband to be taken away! “You must not worry about me,” he would say over and over. “Since I have been to prison twice before, I am an experienced veteran. All my family is here to love you and take care of you…” But I could only think; I am nearly five months pregnant; and Shafiqa is six months along, when our babies are born, will Khan Sahib be here??

Thank Allah, my fears never came true as Khan Sahib was spared. Mrs. Usmani said she thought my American citizenship had something to do with this good fortune though I don’t know how much truth was in that. With the Jama’at banned and all his sources of income cut off, Khan Sahib was not in the least worried that two more babies were on the way. “Allah is the Provider,” he said, “and will take care of them.”

During the eight and a half months the Jama’at-e-Islami was banned, although out of work, my Khan Sahib was never idle for a moment. He utilized his time, every precious moment of it, making sure Maulana Maudoodi was made as comfortable as 192 possible; if he fell ill and required medicine, my Khan Sahib made sure he received any necessary medical attention; along with the police guard, he would escort him to the local optician to have him fitted for new eye-glasses; he managed to buy Maulana Maudoodi a radio and in the torrid heat of our tropical summer, brought him an electric fan. As a political prisoner, and such a venerable “celebrity,” the police did not dare mistreat him so he was imprisoned in Class-“A” which means by prison standards, he was accomodated in relative comfort in the jail. He was allowed to wear his own clothes and had his own cook to prepare his meals so he did not have to depend upon the unpalatable prison fare. And when his wife and children came to see him, they would bring him his favourite variety of betel-nut. So as I had been the superprivileged inmate of the mental hospital, the Maulana was the 1 super-privileged prisoner in Lahore jail-both the mental institution and the prison adjacent to each other on the same “Jail Road!”

When not tending to Maulana Maudoodi’s comfort in jail, my Khan Sahib tried his best to see to the welfare of other imprisoned Jama’at leaders as well. One time in February, he drove with a friend to Multan to see one of them whom he heard was stopping by train on the way to be transferred from one prison to another. Once when they were going to transfer Maulana Maudoodi from Lahore jail to a smaller prison in some remote province, my Khan Sahib managed to convince the police authorities to allow him to remain here within easy reach of his family and where he would, of course, receive far better treatment.

My Khan Sahib spent most of his time, though, with his Jama’at friends who, like himself, were fortunate enough to be spared from imprisonment. Mr. Akhlaq Hussain who publishes Maulana Maudoodi’s books and Kausar Niazi who had taken his position as manager of the Weekly Shihab, and others would spend endless hours at each other’s homes. During these months, my Khan Sahib had an amazing “social life” as each week on Friday afternoon following the Juma prayer in the mosque Mr. Akhlaq Hussain would give an “ice-cream party.” One night after returning from one of these “ice-cream parties”-all stag, of course-I asked my Khan Sahib if he had a good time. “The company,”

193 and that my time was drawing near and while I was growing more and more unwieldy with pregnancy, Kumar’s wife bore a son whom they named “Usama.” Kumar’s wife did not go to the hospital; she didn’t even have a doctor come to the house

“was very good but Pakistani ice-cream is not! - all ice and no cream!”

During the period Maulana Maudoodi was in jail, Khan Sahib often took Shafiqa and me on frequent visits to his home in Ichhra to visit Begum Maudoodi and the children. The children, of course, took their father’s imprisonment very, very hard; little eight-year-old Ayesha missing her father perhaps more than any of them, for she is his very favourite. I remember as I looked about me; it was the beginning of February and still as cold as winter, and although the house was very well-kept, clean and neat, where only a month before, had been so alive with activity, was now as quiet as an abandoned ghost-house. The children were very quiet too, abnormally quiet for children and the atmosphere mournful and depressing. Since the Tarjumanul Quran was banned, Umar Farouq was idle; so was Ahmad Farouq who although completing his studies at the Lahore Medical College, had been denied a scholarship by the Government to specialize in heart-surgery in Canada. Humaira, now twenty-five, was still unmarried since last year all her plans for her wedding were destroyed when her fiance, a flyer in the Pakistan Air Force, had been killed in a plane crash. Now that Humaira had attained her Master’s Degree in English Literature and Asma her Master’s degree in Economics, all plans for marriage were frustrated by their father’s imprisonment; they had nothing to do but mope listlessly around the house. Muhammad Farouq and Hussain Farouq have already graduated from high-school but there is not enough money to send them on to college, so they too, are idle and bored. Fifteen-year-old Haider, twelve-year-old Khalid and eight-year-old Ayesha don’t suffer so much because they are still leading the carefree life of school children. When I told Begum Maudoodi about the bitterness of the older children against their father’s fate, she replied; “My children may look grown-up to you; they may be brilliant honour students in school but in many ways, they are still children. They aren’t mature enough to understand what has happened and why…”

Meanwhile my “time” was drawing near and while I was growing more and more unwieldy with pregnancy, Kumar’s wife bore a son whom they named “Usama.” Kumar’s wife did not go to the hospital; she didn’t even have a doctor come to the house 194 because since her pains began after midnight, doctors were not available at that hour. So she just shooed Kumar and little Anjam out, closed and locked the door and had her birth alone without any medical aid. Fortunately, Surraya didn’t have too difficult a time as it was an “easy” birth but the baby was small and puny in contrast to Surraya who is so big and fat. As Surraya had no milk or else did not want to nurse the baby herself, it was promptly put on the bottle. I called Usama “the poor little baby” because it was so sickly. The “poor little baby” grew emaciated as a skeleton; I thought any moment it would die; I was convinced that “poor little baby” would never live to its first birthday! Almost daily, “poor little baby” was taken to the doctor but none of the medicine seemed to do any good. “Poor little baby” hung on tenaciously to the thin thread of life day after day, week after week, month after month. Kumar was so gentle and tender with his little son that even when a few months old, he definitely preferred his daddy to his mommy.

During the months the Jama’at-e-Islami was banned, the police became very much a part of our lives, at least for Khan Sahib. Just think, as if a criminal on probation, my husband had to report to the local police station each morning promptly at nine for an hour of questioning and interrogation. As if this were not enough, C.I.D. employees of the Central Investigation Department or secret police continually followed him about wherever he went. The first time I noticed so many men standing around the house, I asked my Khan Sahib who they were and he replied they were C.I.D., only I didn’t recognize them as such because they were so non-descript and ordinary and never wore any uniforms. And whenever I went to Ichhra to visit with Begum Maudoodi and the children, heavily-armed police and soldiers never failed to greet us at the gate. Humaira said that every time any of the relatives of the family came to visit in their cars or taxis, the police took down the license numbers. These police looked fierce and forbidding to me but Humaira assured me that as the months passed, they became warm and friendly. “They aren’t here because of their choice. They have to do their job … “ and then she continued how the police guards at the house became so friendly, they would even fondle the younger 195 children and join eight-year-old Ayesha and Khalid Farouq in their games in the back yard. And every time they came on duty, Muhammad Farouq told me the first thing they would ask is: “How is your father and when is he coming home?”

When Kumar’s “poor little baby” was three months old, late in the afternoon, on May 10th, Shafiqa’s pains began; at once her mother, who lives nearby, rushed to the house and, determined that Shafiqa should receive medical attention, and not, like Surraya, who had only an illiterate midwife, a horse-driven tonga was immediately summoned and Shafiqa’s mother took her to Lady Wellington Government Hospital. Of course, Shafiqa couldn’t afford a private room so had to be content with a bed on the general ward. Her mother was with her the whole time she was giving birth and fortunately she had a rapid and uncomplicated delivery. Khan Sahib also stayed with her at her bedside and didn’t return home until they brought Shafiqa back with the baby the following day. Although my husband wanted another son, he received a daughter instead. If he was disappointed, he never showed it. The baby was as fair and white as an English baby and my husband was delighted. After he whispered the Adhan or call to prayer in her ear as all Muslim parents do for their newly-born, he named her “Asma” after Maulana Maudoodi’s daughter. Shafiqa looked healthier and happier than I had ever seen her before and the expression on her face, usually so listless and dull, was now radiant and her dark eyes sparkled.

Since you insisted on my receiving prenatal care, in deference to you as my loving parents, my Khan Sahib consented to take me to The United Christian Hospital as had been recommended by the American Consulate. My Khan Sahib would have never continued taking us there were it not for the very good, kindly and competent elderly English lady-Doctor, Martin whom at once we all liked. But when Dr. Martin returned to her native England, Shafiqa and I, as Muslims, felt so self-conscious and acutely embarrassed going to seek care from the Christian missionaries. When Dr. Martin left, only a young, inexperienced Punjabi-Christian girl named Dr.

106 John was available. Shafiqa and I went in to her office for examination, completely covered in our black burqas. When we saw this modern girl towering over us in height, the gulf between our world and hers could never be bridged. Not suspecting we were both Khan Sahib’s wives, Dr. John asked me if Shafiqa were my elder sister? Bashfully, I just nodded, fearful that if she knew the truth, she would launch into a diatribe on the “evils” of polygamy. And because as a Christian missionary, Dr. John tried to do her share of proselytizing, we never returned.

As I approached my ninth month, I told Khan Sahib we had to think of making arrangements for my confinement. Although I insisted on competent medical attention and wouldn’t think of depending on any old illiterate midwife, as Surraya had done, I vehemently rejected the kind of modern hospital, Khan Sahib’s modern-minded niece had gone to. Despite my awareness that even the most “normal” and “easy” labour is excruciatingly painful, it may seem strange to you that I never anticipated it with dread at all. I was absolutely fearless and told my husband that I didn’t want to be made unconscious during the birth but that I thought I should be fully awake when the baby came. Here my wish was granted as I learned that Pakistani hospitals do not routinely give women anesthetics if the delivery is normal and uncomplicated. After I also rejected the kind of hospital Shafiqa’s mother had brought her because I needed a private room of my own to rest and recuperate, my Khan Sahib found just the perfect place, a maternity clinic run by a very gentle, kindly and devout lady named Dr. Tanwir. Dr. Tanwir is the niece of one of the most eminent Unani Hakims in Lahore, especially because the menfolk of her family are my husband’s personal friends. When I saw lady Dr. Tanwir and her clinic, I knew at once I had come to the right place. Dr. Tanwir greeted me as “my dear Muslim sister,” as warmly as if she had known me for years. Because of being so overworked, as she runs her clinic single-handed often officiating at two or three deliveries a day and up at all hours, she was extremely tired and weak-looking. But she says she loves her work so much delivering babies, she would not exchange it for any other. Although small and simple, the clinic was very clean and well-kept with ample facilities—indeed, far better accommodation than

1 text of the note

107 what I had seen at United Christian Hospital. When after the examination, she pronounced me in perfect health and predicted a normal and uncomplicated delivery, I told her: “Dr. Tanwir, I want my baby born right here…” But Dr. Tanwir, knowing about my American origin, could not be convinced that I would be satisfied with what her humble clinic offered and insisted that my Khan Sahib make arrangements for me to give birth at the American Hospital in Gulberg. Several days later he took me in the taxi and we drove to Gulberg. At first I was delighted seeing all the greenery and pleasant dwellings—white bungalows with gardens and the clean paved streets in such glaring contrast to the dilapidated old building and garbage-strewn alleys in Sant Nagar. But when I saw the hospital and was taken into what would be my room, so modern, but also cold, sterile and barren, I was so depressed at the sight, I began to weep. “Why are you weeping?” asked my husband gently. I cried out: “Because *I* don’t like this place and *I* don’t want my baby born here! I’d rather a doctor come to the house and bear my baby in my own room.” “Never mind, Maryam,” he said, “if you want, we’ll do that but suppose you need the doctor at two in the morning and she can’t come, what then?” I replied, wiping the tears away with the back of my hand, “Khan Sahib, I want Lady-Doctor Tanwir; she is a good doctor and I like her and I want to be hospitalized at her clinic.” My husband agreed: “All right, don’t you worry. We’ll arrange everything in time…” As the ninth month drew to its close, every day I began having pains of some sort and each time the pains started, I would be sure: “Now this must be IT!” but each time, the pains stopped—only another false alarm. But one night at the beginning of June, I was again awakened by the pains. “Only another false alarm,” I thought, sleepily but this time the pains didn’t stop and when they kept growing stronger and stronger, alarmed, I woke my Khan Sahib. “Khan Sahib, I think you’d better take me to the hospital now…” “All right, Maryam, you get all your things ready and I’ll call a 198 taxi.’” While Khan Sahib went out into the darkness to find a taxi, I hurriedly threw the things I would need into a small cardboard suitcase he had brought me the day before. I had just finished packing when my Khan Sahib rushed in and announced, “The taxi is in front of the gate;” so taking my suitcase and helping me downstairs, we climbed into the tiny three-wheeled rickshaw big enough only for us two and we drove off…. The brief, very bumpy ride over, the driver stopped our rickshaw in front of Dr. Tanwir’s clinic. Just then I winced with pain but my Khan Sahib put a gentle arm around me saying, “Be brave! Just up this one flight of stairs.” As if she had been waiting up for me, Lady-Doctor Tanwir was right there. “I think this is IT,” I gasped, and Tanwir took my hand and led me into the examination room. “Lie down on this table and let’s have a look…” A few minutes later, the examination over, she said, “Maryam, your labour has begun but as yet the pains are very mild and you are still at the earliest stages. I am very tired now so please excuse me if I go upstairs to my room and sleep but the nurse will be here all the time and as soon as you need me, I’ll come at once!” The nurse and I spent the whole night in that little room so I began to pace the floor while the nurse watched me. As the night passed, though, instead of the pains growing stronger, they kept getting weaker and weaker until by morning, they had stopped altogether. The nurse asked me what I wanted for breakfast and I told her so she brought it to me. Hungrily I devoured three hard-boiled eggs and two glasses of tea. When Dr. Tanwir came in to see me, I asked her why the pains had stopped and she replied that first labours often take a long time. Presently three of my husband’s elder sisters arrived — Mumtaz from Faisalabad, Hamida and Jamshid’s mother, Sarwar. As my labour was not progressing, Dr. Tanwir gave me a room downstairs where with fitful pains on and off, I spent a tiring and very miserable day. As evening approached, Khan Sahib came in to see me and asked me what I wanted to eat and as anesthesia would not be given, I could eat anything I liked. Khan Sahib brought in some more hard-boiled eggs, tea and very peppery spicy balls of ground meat we call 209 *kebab* and hungrily I devoured it all. Discouraged that my labour was getting nowhere, I lay down on my *charpoy* and was just beginning to doze off when suddenly the pains resumed again, this time, much sharper than before. Dr. Tanwir rushed in and I asked her, “Will the baby come soon?” “Yes,” she assured me. “Just be patient now and do as I say…” Two or three hours passed this way. Sarwar went home but Mumtaz and Hamida remained with me and fervently mumbled Muslim prayers while Dr. Tanwir sat at my feet, every few minutes, examining me. Although the pains seemed quite strong, it was still bearable and at midnight, Dr. Tanwir announced, “The birth is ready now. Come with me upstairs.” Fearful another pain would strike while on the way, I ran upstairs into the examination room as fast as I could and climbed up on the table. “Now lie down flat on your back perfectly straight,” Dr. Tanwir instructed me and as I did so, she took a big needle and injected it into my arm. At once the intensity of the pains doubled and Mumtaz and Hamida held me down while I screamed in agony. Dr. Tanwir’s kindly face grew stern. “I don’t like that! I attend to two or three births daily and never do my patients cry out!” Another pain and again I screamed. “You must not do that!” she reprimanded. “If you don’t work, your pains will be wasted and if the baby doesn’t come now, it might die!” That brought me to my senses and despite the agony, I managed to do as I was told. “It’s coming! It’s coming!” cried Hamida excitingly. I heard a loud baby’s cry and asked Dr. Tanwir, “Is THAT my baby?” “Yes,” Dr. Tanwir replied, her voice gentle now and furry with tenderness. “Your baby is born.” I raised my arm and looked at my watch — just one-thirty in the morning and fifteen minutes later it was all over. “May I see my baby now?” I pleaded. “You said you wanted a boy but here is the sweetest little girl!” Cleaned and wrapped in a blanket, she brought it to me. They always say new-born babies aren’t pretty but mine, so plump, pink and fresh with the cutest little screwed-up face was a perfect beauty! “I’m going to stay here with you here 1,” Dr. Tanwir assured me, “and watch you for another hour to make sure you’re all 200 right. All I remember is asking her, “Don’t you ever want to get married and have a baby of your own?” And she replied; “I’ll never get married, I don’t think I could ever bear a child. Look at how weak I am! How could I ever bear those horrible pains?” Mumtaz, Hamida and Sarwar stayed with me day and night the entire time I was at Tanwir’s Clinic. As a privileged patient, I was not forced to share a room with two, three or four other women, as all the others were, but was given a large, airy and clean private room all to myself. By the third day I was up walking about, talking in animated conversation with the other ladies as we all proudly showed off our babies to each other. All little babies are so sweet but I was convinced mine was the prettiest of all; forgive me, Mother, but I’m partial! Khan Sahib came to visit me every day and brought in our meals from home and from the bazar. After I had stayed there a week, Dr. Tanwir declared me ready to go home; first she examined me and then a thorough going over of my baby and my dear little Ayesha weighed eight and a half pounds. She pronounced us both in perfect health. Mumtaz and Hamida stayed with me to help take care of my Ayesha as this was my first baby, I was, of course, completely inexperienced. In came a steady stream of visitors, the distant relatives of my husband’s family in Lahore, all the Usmani family and their friends came to see me, each giving me little presents and small amounts of money. What would I have done without the $100.00 you sent to me? This was enough to take care of my hospitalization and the baby’s expenses. Khan Sahib bought for me a beautiful little polished wooden Pakistani cradle to rock the sweet little baby to sleep; and his sisters, nieces and myself prepared all her tiny summer frocks, sheets and nappies. Khan Sahib purchased from the market two fine goats - one for Shafiqa and the other for my Ayesha to sacrifice for the Aqeeqah and for several days we all enjoyed very fine meals. As his elder sister’s new house, just adjacent to his, had just been completed, I was brought there and I and little Ayesha given our own room on the roof. After we hung up all the framed Arabic inscriptions from Quran and Hadith in lovely Arabic calligraphy, 201 and fixed it up so nice, filling the shelves with all my books and papers, my new room here looked even better than the one I had at the Usmanis. Begum Maudoodi and her eldest daughter, Humaira came to see me and admire the baby, bringing more presents of little colourful frocks they themselves had made for her. Humaira said she thought little Ayesha looked exactly like me! Shortly after I arrived at my permanent home in my husband’s sister’s new house, I fell ill with high fever. A doctor was immediately summoned and he diagnosed my illness as another attack—my fifth since coming to Pakistan—of malaria. He said that the postpartum of pregnancy very often provokes a severe attack of malaria if it is already latent. I was ill with malaria for nearly a month and because I had grown so weak, Khan Sahib’s sisters did not want me to suckle the baby too much lest my own health suffer, so henceforth they gave Ayesha supplementary feedings and I nursed her only two or three times daily. Because in June my room became hot as a furnace during the day, we decided to let her spend the day in Shafiqa’s room where it was cooler. So Ayesha and Asma slept side by side… Although my little Ayesha received far better care than Asma, devotedly tended by my Khan Sahib’s young niece, Nadra while I was not well, on the second day of August, she fell ill. My Khan Sahib gave me the bad news that he had taken Ayesha to the hospital and that Hamida, Mumtaz and Nadra were staying with it day and night to nurse it. Of course I wanted to care for my little Ayesha myself but could not because I had a severe cold with fever. I never suspected that Ayesha was ill because she had seemed quite all-right when I had nursed her that morning. During the days that followed, I begged them to take me to the hospital to see her, but they kept putting me off and avoided directly answering my questions. Four days later, my husband told me she was out of danger after her critical illness with what they diagnosed in the hospital as gastro-enteritis. Khan Sahib assured me that although the baby had been dreadfully ill, she was all right now, laughing and playing in her little crib. “And now that Ayesha is well we’re bringing her home tomorrow.” So that Sunday afternoon, I drove with my Khan Sahib in the horse-driven *tonga* to the hospital and 202 I could hardly wait to see my little Ayesha, laughing and playing with her sweet little pink toes. When we entered the hospital, into the general children’s ward, never had I been to such a depressing place as this. The ward was not even in a proper room but consisted of only a narrow dark corridor with the children’s little beds lined up one right after the other, and I never saw such sick, miserable youngsters as these, so dreadfully sick and at each bedside, an anxious group of mothers, aunts, sisters and cousins. Because Pakistani Government hospitals are so short of nursing staff, the relatives of the patient are obliged to stay with him and nurse him themselves; while the doctor has time only to keep the charts and distribute the medicines. My Khan Sahib stopped suddenly before a tiny iron crib and I looked down at the baby, so deathly pale and thin, lying so still as if it were dead; its cheeks sunken in and its eyes just two black holes in its emaciated white face. “Where is Ayesha?” I asked frantically looking about. “Oh no!” I gasped in horror for I didn’t even recognize her. “She has been so very, very sick,” my Khan Sahib explained gently. At that I broke down completely, and sobbed on my husband’s shoulder. “Now, now,” my Khan Sahib tried to comfort me. “She is so much better now and the doctors are discharging her to go home tomorrow morning. Soon, soon, *inshallah* she will be well….” Hamida and Nadra brought Ayesha home the next day and as I was still ill with flu, my husband told me to permit Nadra to take over her complete care and take Ayesha into her room. I wanted to resume nursing Ayesha myself, but my husband said no - not until I was well again. And Nadra bestowed all the love and devoted care upon my poor little one as if she were the mother! Every time the baby woke and cried, Nadra was right there to prepare its bottle of warm milk; its nappies were changed almost hourly and in contrast to her little half-sister, Asma who was so incredibly dirty and neglected, Nadra kept Ayesha immaculately clean and sweet. To guard her against the swarms of flies, my Khan Sahib brought her a special canopy of pink nylon netting. Meanwhile dirty and physically neglected little Asma continued to thrive and Kumar’s “poor little baby” whom I had expected to perish any moment, day by day grew bigger and bigger and fatter 203 and fatter. But my poor little one, despite *all* devoted care day and night kept sinking, rapidly losing weight until she was no more than a little skeleton. I thought she would grow better if she would only suckle my milk again; I begged to be allowed to resume nursing her. But Ayesha would not drink my milk. She was much too weak to suckle at the breast. Whenever I picked her up to try and nurse her, she would cry furiously. She didn’t know me anymore! She thought Nadra was her mother! So Ayesha spent her days, too weak to do anything but sleep and awaken with a feeble cry for her bottle. Peacefully she slept under the canopy of pink nylon netting trimmed with lace, Nadra keeping her clean and sweet-smelling as ever. Whenever she cried after a feeding or became restless, Nadra would pick her up in her arms, rocking her and kissing her as she paced with the baby up and down the room. Everybody loved my little Ayesha and Shafiqa’s children were especially gentle and affectionate with their little half-sister. The last morning of her life, Nadra brought her downstairs to the courtyard and put her on the *charpoy.* Then little Muhammad Farouq came up and kissed her and Humaira wanted to play “mother” and when the *choosnee* or pacifier fell out of her mouth and Ayesha cried, two-year-old Humaira leaned maternally over her and put the choosnee back. Then my Khan Sahib came and smiled tenderly down at her and Ayesha looked up at her Daddy and gave him a big smile. One night I fell asleep earlier than usual when suddenly I was startled by Mumtaz shaking me; “Maryam! Maryam! Ayesha is calling you!” Sleepily I got up, drugged with drowsiness and followed Mumtaz to the house. At the door Kumar was standing, waiting… Kumar looked at me as if he were afraid to speak. Then he said; “Ayesha is dead!” My knees were trembling, so much I could hardly stand up but after I composed myself as best I could, I walked into the courtyard. My old mother-in-law, her sister, “Auntie,” Surraya, Hamida and all my Khan Sahib’s other sisters, cousins and nieces were crying and sobbing. Also gathered were some of our old Punjabi neighbours from the adjoining house - even the misshapen little dwarf. Shafiqa, clasping little five-month-old Asma tightly in her arms, was crying too. And my little Ayesha, 204 lying still and blue on the *charpoy,* covered with a shabby quilt, her ears stuffed with cotton and her jaw bound with a strip of cloth. A half hour later, Kumar and his elder brother, Ilyas returned with Khan Sahib who on hearing the news, showed no sign of emotion. He just stood, dignified, silent and grave while Nadra filled a big bucket of water from the pump and she and her mother, Hamida washed the body with soap and water. After the little thing was washed, Nadra ran up to get one of her new white bedsheets and this was wrapped around the baby as her shroud. All the womenfolk began to wail loudly when my Khan Sahib took the tiny body to where his friends from the *Jama’at* were waiting outside. To have the last glimpse of poor little Ayesha, we followed him to the door and watched behind the curtain before he and his friends disappeared from sight down the dark, narrow street… Only three days later, my husband’s nephew, twenty-year-old Javid, who had been so dreadfully ill with progressive kidney disease, also passed away with the entire household at his bedside and my Khan Sahib, chanting from the Quranic Surah - *”Ya-Sin”* - which is supposed to be recited over every dying Muslim. That night, Mahmuda’s *charpoy* was moved next to his so that Mother and son could spend the last hours together. As soon as Javid breathed his last agonized breath, the Islamic ritual for the dead took over. He was stripped and then covered with his bed-sheet. His ears were stuffed with cotton and his jaw bound up with a narrow strip of gauze. Using his *charpoy* as a bier, his two brothers carried it to the courtyard of the main house where all the women of our family and neighbours had gathered to mourn. The front door was bolted and then my Khan Sahib, Ilyas, Abrar, Shabir and Zahir holding Javid’s poor emaciated body over the sewage drain, gave him his last washing with soap and water; then they wound his white shroud around him, placed him back on the charpoy and the four men carried the bier out the door while we women watched the funeral procession disappear down the street… How strange can life be, for the very day Ayesha died - it was Friday, September 24th - the Pakistan Supreme Court arrived at the decision that the ban of the *Jama’at-e-Islami* was illegal so the Government lifted the ban and within twenty-four hours, the *Jama’at* had revived in its full vigour. And since the ban on the 205 *Jama’at-e-Islami* was decided by the Supreme court as unjustified, soon Maulana Maudoodi and all the other Jama’at leaders were released from prison, free to resume their duties once more. The summer is waning now and the chill of winter already in the air. This afternoon I am sitting with my beloved old mother-in-law, crosslegged on the *charpoy* in the courtyard of our old house. We are peeling potatoes and onions. And yes, my little parrot, Miamitu is still beside me as he has been through all these years of joy and sorrow. My mother-in-law is now conversing on her favourite subject - the good old days in Jullunder. As we peel our potatoes and onions, she is telling me how much more delicious vegetables were in Jullunder where they were irrigated with pure fresh water but here in Sant Nagar, the vegetables are inferior quality because they are only watered with sewage! Oh how good the potatoes and onions were in Jullunder! Everything was better in Jullunder! And little Muhammad Farouq runs up and my mother-in-law hugs and kisses him and then the three-year-old toddler’s great brown eyes become dim with memories, and drawing her little grandson closer, she asks him; “Where is Ayesha?” And the small boy looks up at her solemnly and replies, “She has gone to God’s house.” And I look up at the pink sky; the sun will set soon and the *Adhan* from the mosques will call the sun-set prayer and with a sudden sharp pang of poignancy, I realize that my youth has gone and I have entered into the full ripeness of mature womanhood. Your loving daughter Maryam