Останься, дочь / Stay, Daughter

Many years ago, my father reported, when our country, the island of Ceylon, was still a British colony, an Englishman – perhaps the Governor himself – had invited a Muslim statesman to dinner. “Bring your wife too,” the important official said. “I have never met her.”

“Aaah,” came the reply. “That is not possible. She is in purdah and cannot be seen by men outside the family. But,” the Muslim man continued, as he pulled out a rose from a nearby vase, “look at this. It would be just like looking at her.

”

My father beamed and nodded as he ended his story. I looked back and said nothing.

If we felt the stirring of wishes unknown to our mothers and grandmothers, we didn’t tell them. They would have been shocked, like Wappah, who had only known women like flowers.

Chapter I

Men are the protectors and maintainers of women.

В В В В The Quran, 4:34

Not three years after she had become a bride, Wappumma, my father’s mother, became a widow.

“She went into shock when they brought the news to her,” Aunt Asiyatha said. “Rolled on the floor and wailed. What was she going to do? Your grandfather had died in Bombay on the ship bringing him back from Mecca. �Who will guard us now, who will guard us?’ your Wappumma kept asking. She was six months pregnant too. Lost the baby.”

Aunt Asiyatha was my father’s cousin – the adopted daughter of his mother’s only brother. When, as a girl, I accompanied Wappah to his childhood home in the village of Shollai where his sister still lived, she was often there.

Patting down a straw mat spread on the floor, my aunt would say, “Come sit here; I have some things to tell you.” I would sidle right up. As far back as I can recall, I latched on to anyone who would tell me a story.

Aunt Asiyatha spat out a stream of dark red betel juice and continued. “What was your Wappumma going to do? Your father was a toddler, and his sister only a little older than that.

Who was going to look after them?”

“Didn’t Grandfather have money?” I asked.

“Yes, but he had all those children from his first marriage. He couldn’t leave everything to your grandmother. Soon, the money was used up, then the jewelry was sold, and all the plates and most of the furniture, and in a few years, there was nothing left.”

“Didn’t they own land?”

“All that came to nothing.