Friends forever: A loss etched in memory
Amir Karim Tantray in Jammu
Sometimes, we exist solely because of memories. Sadly, this strikes us when someone close leaves, forever. Associations are very personal, but the sense of loss needs sharing, it is as if personal grief would vanish the more you talk about it. And then, you find a sudden emptiness that throbs all around, until the loss is subsumed. I talked to myself quietly when I heard Nusrat Shameem (35), my friend and cousin, was no more, about a week back. I felt a similar loss when my mother had died aged 51 in 2011.
From my home at Furqanabad Ghat (Doda), a village of about 1,500 residents, I trudged along to Nusrat’s house. Mourners were sitting on floor around Nusrat’s body. Her sudden death shook all, and people knowing the Sheikh family, where Nusrat was married, and the Tantrays, her parental family, were sobbing. She was a pious woman, whose life was full of struggle and hard work. She was helpful even when circumstances were adverse for her.
A childhood friend, a cousin, a wife, a mother and a ‘bahu’ — she was as good as it could get.
I was remembering my school days way back in 1986, and, the years since then. We both joined Islamia school, now Royal Academy high school, in Ghat in 1985. We were same age; both born in 1981. Our batch was the biggest and perhaps the strongest in the school, both in terms of number as well as school activities. Imran, Zahid, Sajid, Ashiq, Adil, Tahir, Shadab, Sadiq, Shanawaz, Wakas, Marjeena, Rameeda and I were Nusrat’s classmates. We’d sit near a stream for hours during school-sponsored picnics. Nusrat, like other girls, would leave her footwear afloat in the stream while splashing the flowing water with her feet. The boys were assigned to get the footwear back.
Then came college; adulthood took over our adolescence. Nusrat would always greet every classmate with a smile and shared laughter with everyone. Back to present: Her death brought us all boys together and we all stayed as one till 6 pm, when her ‘janazah’ was offered. “It was Allah’s wish,” whispered her husband, Sheikh Shameem Ahmed into my ears. Nusrat had a heart condition and despite a surgery, she could not recover. I was told her brother-in-law, himself a doctor, tried very hard to revive her as she collapsed. “It was our destiny,” he said.
Nusrat was buried just below my mother’s grave. Both women had held their respective families together and helped others in building their lives. Nusrat took care of her uncle and aunt like their own daughter as the couple was childless. With Nusrat’s passing, I miss my ‘ammi jaan’ a lot, who, as if, came back into my life when I was blessed with a daughter. My sisters, too, find traces of ‘ammi jaan’ in my small daughter.
Nusrat is survived by her husband and three daughters, the youngest, Izzat, is an infant. The other two are too young to understand what death means. Back from the last rites, I heard the sound of flowing water in a stream. Life moves on. I’ll miss you Nusrat. ‘Ammi,’ take care of her!
