Friday, 14 January 1994
‘Well this is a great surprise,’ said the old man, his hands stuffed into the deep pockets of the beige cardigan he had only just pulled over his turtleneck sweater, barely insulating him from the frigid January breeze. ‘I thought you’d forgotten me,’ he said, waving her into his long, narrow hall, all painted white.
‘Never,’ said Satya, beaming at him, her eyes delighting in his fond countenance. ‘I’d never forget you.’
‘I’ve missed your daily visits after school,’ he told her, directing her straight on into the kitchen. ‘I wait for you at five past four every day, but you never arrive.’
‘I regret that too, dadaji,’ she said wistfully, recalling her old pilgrimage each evening, a five-minute walk from the school gates to his front door. ‘I wish I was still there,’ she muttered ruefully, ‘Now you’re a bus journey away. But at least I’m here now.’
‘Indeed,’ he said, ‘Better late than never.’
From home to the crossroads, there had been an eight-minute walk. She knew that, theoretically, there would be a number three bus there every half an hour, which if she were lucky would convey her to her grandfather’s house in twenty-five minutes flat, but she knew too that it did not pay to be overly optimistic about anything printed by the council. ‘Amazing,’ she had thought, as she boarded the blue and white double-decker, right on time. That had never happened before; perhaps it was a sign. Climbing the stairs to the top deck, she had rejoiced as the bus trundled off along its zigzag route, south then north-west then east-south again, sipping the headache-inducing carbon monoxide, a gaggle of stoned townies behind her grunting at one another. Disembarking on the road parallel to his, she had dashed across four lanes of traffic, hurried down a litter-filled alleyway, and turned right, the last few paces pure felicity. ‘Genius,’ she had commended herself as she arrived at his front gate in the dark.
She had found herself supremely grateful to be back there. The weathered yellow brickwork and white-painted masonry had seemed to smile at her. The carpet of lobelia edging the garden path was gone for the winter, but Satya had nevertheless imagined its gentle fragrance soothing her mind, easing her inner disquiet. Another positive sign, she had thought to herself as she rang his doorbell, standing beneath that tall porch presumably designed for Victorian giants. Seeing him standing there before her with his short grey hair slicked back tidily, his friendly smile peeping through his neatly clipped white beard, her heart had skipped with joy. She wondered why she had not made this journey earlier.
‘So, to what do I owe this pleasure?’ asked her grandfather now, watching as she settled down at his tiny kitchen table.
‘I missed you,’ she replied.
‘I’m honoured.’
‘And I have the blues,’ she added gloomily.
For a widower living alone, his kitchen was remarkably tidy, only a damp tea towel divulging the secrets of the draining board, though the delectable scent of fresh laundry that hung in the air nearly unveiled them.
‘Oh dear,’ he said, glancing back at her from a cupboard with two cups in hand, ‘that’s no good.’ He set them on the table in front of her. ‘Masala cha or PG Tips?’ he asked her.
‘I’ll be fine with a glass of water,’ she replied, looking on as he took to searching his drawers for an opened packet of biscuits to set before her.
‘You must have the blues,’ he chuckled, his voice as soft as ever. ‘I’ve never known you to turn your nose up at Masala cha.’
‘I don’t want to trouble you,’ she told him, ‘I just need your ear, that’s all. Won’t you sit down? I don’t need a biscuit either.’
‘My goodness, Satya, you must be unwell,’ he smiled.
‘No, just preoccupied,’ she said. ‘I need someone to talk to so desperately. Do you mind?’
‘That’s what I’m here for,’ he said. ‘I appear to be the sounding board of your family.’
‘My brother’s been?’
‘They all have. They visit with surprising frequency given that I can only ever offer them a cup of tea and a custard cream.’
Satya slumped in her seat. ‘So you know what they’re saying then?’
Their eyes met as he abandoned his search for the treats he thought he had opened for her brother a week or two ago. He watched how her eyes changed, how her fond gaze grew distant, the corners of her mouth turning downwards. ‘Oh Satya, Sat-ya,’ he said, ‘I’ve walked on this earth long enough to know not to judge others on one side of the story. It’s true I hear stories about you, but I always take them with a healthy pinch of salt, for sibling rivalries are infamous.’
‘At least that’s something,’ she murmured.
‘To tell you the truth, Satya, I’ve missed our conversations a great deal. I’ve missed you too. So, naturally, I always try to think the best of you, desperate that you’ll remember me and drop in like you used to. Even so…’
‘I knew there would be an even so. I’ve disappointed you?’
‘Why do you say that?’
‘I have that feeling.’
‘Is your conscience keeping you awake at night?’
‘Yes.’ She looked at him sadly, nodding. ‘Yes, it is.’
‘What’s it saying to you?’
‘It’s saying I’ve lost my way. It’s saying I’ve taken all the sweet parts of everything you ever taught me, but I’ve set aside anything unpalatable. I’ve taken out whatever doesn’t suit me.’
‘And is it telling the truth?’
Satya shrugged her shoulders. ‘Maybe,’ she said. ‘I can’t sleep these days. This voice in my head keeps challenging me, over and over. It says, “What happened to your humility, Satya?” It says, “What happened to that quiet piety you used to have?” And the trouble is, the voice is yours. I hear your voice.’
‘It’s not mine, Satya. It’s your heart.’
‘You say to me: “I wonder what happened to that great quality you once exuded.” I ask you which quality you mean. You say: “You used to look inward, you used to hold yourself to account, you used to judge only yourself and withhold judgement from others.” This is what you say to me.’
‘That’s your heart speaking to you, Satya.’
‘I’m worried you’re reading my soul. It’s how I feel. I’m worried you see all that I hold inside. I hear you rebuking me.’
‘As if I don’t have enough sins of my own to worry about,’ he laughed.
‘You used to say I reminded you of your beloved.’
‘Oh, how I miss her!’ he exclaimed.
‘I wish I was still the seeker you believe I am. But I feel like I’m losing my way. The voice inside my head rebukes me: “What has become of your journey? Have you abandoned it for the world?” Is that how you feel? Are you angry with me?’
Satya looked back at the old man but found him silent. She felt sick saying these words, shivers pushing through her skin from within. She wondered if he was no longer the character she loved so much, but had instead grown serious, his ever-friendly face overshadowed by some kind of grief, like the character she saw night after night.
‘Oh Satya,’ he said, ‘what right do I have to be angry with you? I’ve always been in awe of you. If truth be told, I wish I’d been like you in my youth: eager to seek truth and faith. The conversations we have, my dear girl, are such a blessing. You come here asking as if I have all the answers, but in truth, I’ve always been learning from you.’
‘Then it must be my heart,’ she sighed, ‘My conscience. Which is even worse. I have no excuses then.’
‘It could just be the winter blues,’ he suggested affectionately, ‘or a bout of melancholy. Are you getting enough vitamin D?’
‘No, it is my soul. It stands witness against me. It sees me as I am.’
‘Perhaps you’re too hard on yourself, Satya. But then you always were. Do you think Sukhbir comes here to read my books? Do you think Jaspreet comes to ask questions, to bounce ideas around?’
‘You always said everyone has their level. You said that if they wanted to talk about the weather, you’d be here to listen.’
‘That I did. But if you want to talk about your ideas and thoughts… Or about physics, chemistry and biology. Or about the history of the world and everything in between. Yes, I’m here to listen to you too.’ He glanced at her kindly. ‘I make no secret of which I prefer. There’s only so much Sudoku an old man can take to keep his grey cells ticking over.’
‘But you know what I did, don’t you? They’ve told you, haven’t they?’
There was a pause then, too long for comfort. Satya wondered what it meant, seeking his old friendly eyes behind his black-rimmed glasses. It looked like he could not decide whether to speak his mind or not.
‘As long as you’ve made amends and have put it behind you,’ he offered in the end, ‘who am I to pass judgement?’
‘You’re the only one who says that.’
‘Perhaps I’m the only one with blisters on my soles and sores on my palms, borne of my six-decade adventure on this earth. I’m no wise sage, Satya. Just an old man who’s reconciled himself to his life of mistakes. You’re still young. You have your whole life ahead of you. Don’t let one silly mistake, however daft, let you lose sight of all you’ve achieved.’
‘If only it was just one mistake, Dadaji,’ she sighed. ‘I hate what’s happened to me. I hate what I’ve become.’ Her gaze dropped onto the tabletop, embarrassed. ‘I want to tell you something, Dadaji, but I don’t think you’ll like it. And I don’t think you’ll like me very much either once you’ve heard it.’ She glanced at him surreptitiously. ‘Do you remember those exchanges we used to have? You used to ask, “What’s your varna status?” And I would reply, “I don’t have one.” And you’d say, “What’s your jati group?” And I’d reply, “We don’t care for these things.” And it would go on like that.’
She recalled how he would sit with his little red notebook open in front of him, from which he would pick out quotations, questions and his own contemplations. Paperclips fixed to the edges would mark important pages and he would slide his finger under them every now and then and turn to that page, spending moments scanning it, searching his handwritten notes for a particular nugget of wisdom. They used to do that regularly, she recalled. Now she regretted neglecting him.
‘You once asked me, Dadaji: if I have an enemy, but someone’s doing them wrong, should I fight for their right or do I leave them because I hate them. Of course, I used to say I’d fight for their rights, but the truth is… the truth is, I’ve realised I’d just leave them.’
‘Be just, Satya, and God will be just to you.’
Before him, Satya let out a very weary groan. ‘Yes, and I know this. But reality…’
‘Go on.’
‘I had a chance to do the right thing. At school. But… but I failed. Completely.’
‘We all fail, repeatedly, in so many ways. Perhaps next time you’ll get it right. Don’t give up.’
‘It’s funny, but it was the other way around. There’s someone at school. This boy. He defended me. He stood up for me.’
‘Perhaps he was trying to impress you,’ suggested her grandfather, encouraging her with his beaming eyes.
‘No. No, he’s not. He doesn’t even like me,’ she moaned. ‘He thinks I’m… He thinks I’m horrible. And, really, he’s right. I have been horrible. It’s what I’ve become. I treated him so badly. I was awful towards him. The truth is, I bullied him. At first, I just joined in with my friends, but then it just overtook me. I bullied him every day. I was so nasty to him. I made fun of his looks. Made fun of his weight. Made fun of his clothes. The way he speaks. I got carried away. I’d insult him every single day. I’d wish him the worst. Yes, for three months solid. But even after all that, he stood up for me. Yes, he did what you said I should do, and now I feel so ashamed.’
‘Well that’s a start,’ said the old man. ‘Don’t you think?’
‘Is it?’ she asked despondently. ‘I’m embarrassed. I treated him like dirt, but he still stood up for me. I can’t get my head around it.’
‘Perhaps he has other intentions.’
‘Perhaps he’s just a better person than me,’ she grumbled. ‘A few months ago, everything we talked about seemed so easy. I had such an easy life, so everything was abstract, just theory. I didn’t have any enemies then. I was so happy at my old school. I had great friends. My whole future seemed so bright. I had everything planned out. So it was easy to answer your questions back then. Of course, Dadaji, you were right. Be just. Stand up for justice, even if it’s your worst enemy. Yes, that’s what I should do, but, I don’t know how to. Things aren’t as I thought they were. Now life is so, so complicated.’
Shaking her head, Satya stared at her grandfather, wondering if he could understand what she was saying. ‘The fact is,’ she muttered dejectedly, ‘these days I find myself thinking that I just don’t want to think about these things anymore. I just want to live my life. I don’t want to be thinking about race and justice and equality all my life. You’ve always told me to reject prejudice, so I do, but the more you go on about it, the more I’m thinking, he’s just a colour, he’s black, she’s white, he’s this nationality, that nationality. I don’t want to talk about it anymore.’
‘How quickly you’ve become jaded, Satya,’ he told her.
‘Well what do you expect, Dadaji? These past months have been impossible. I’ve tried to live by my ideals, but everyone just throws them back in my face. And so, yes, I gave up too. I abandoned everything we ever talked about.’ Satya stared at her grandfather even more intently. ‘And so to that old question of yours: if my enemy is being wronged, I’d just leave them. Because what’s the point at the end of the day? It doesn’t benefit me at all. I’ll leave them.’
As she said this, right before her eyes, her grandfather’s face lost its friendly smile and grew serious. ‘Then leave me too,’ he told her firmly, his gaze set upon hers. ‘I’ve spent my whole life fighting for equality, Satya. Campaigning for justice, fighting racism. None of it was easily won. Perhaps I wanted an easy life too, but that was a choice I didn’t have. What you’re demanding is a luxury.’
‘I knew you wouldn’t like what I had to say, but I’m just being honest with you.’
‘You’re in shock, Satya, that’s all. It’s been a shock to your system. Your father wanted to protect you from the reality of the world. That’s why he sent you there. He wanted to pretend you could transcend the inequalities the rest of us faced. You’ve had a hard landing. It’s always hard when you come crashing back to earth. He should’ve handled it better. Given you a parachute. He should’ve spoken to you about it. But it wasn’t his fault, really. He spent the whole summer worrying about it, pushing and pushing for your scholarship. He was embarrassed he couldn’t come through with the goods. He was ashamed.’
‘I don’t understand why the school just dropped me like that,’ whined Satya. ‘I was their star pupil. Wasn’t I? Why did they build me up, if they were just going to pull the rug out from under my feet?’
‘Money talks, Satya. And resentment festers. The truth is your father always had a battle with that school. He never told you of the racism he faced. He just bit his tongue, swallowed his pride. They always said you’d amount to nothing; you both proved them wrong. But, in the end, it was all about money. He’s struggled for a couple of years. He borrowed from all over to get you through. He was just biding his time until they said no more.’
‘Why did he never tell me?’
‘Because that was his struggle. That was his battle. He wanted the best for you.’ He glanced at her more benevolently now. ‘And now it’s your turn,’ he said gently. ‘Now that struggle is yours.’
‘But I don’t know how,’ murmured Satya.
‘By not giving up. That would be a start. Don’t turn your back on your journey. Nobody said climbing a mountain would be easy. Your father just wanted to carry you across the foothills. Now you must set out on your journey proper.’ He smiled at her again. ‘Come,’ he said, ‘let’s go through.’
Following his lead, Satya meandered down the hall and on into his living room, elated to have been invited back into his inner sanctum, bathed in the incandescent reddish glow leant by the standard lamp in the corner.
‘Let’s have a little more light,’ said her grandfather, flicking the switch by the door, the white ceiling deflecting the bright illumination onto them. ‘That’s better,’ he said, shuffling over to his chair, ‘now I can see you properly.’
Smiling at him fondly, Satya gazed all around. ‘I’ve missed your library,’ she said, fingering a pile of books on his reading table.
‘I’ve missed sharing it with you,’ he replied, looking on as she traipsed away to inspect his bookshelves, showing him only her back and her long black ponytail.
This was a room of books, shelves affixed to every wall from floor to ceiling. Books overflowed onto a coffee table, the top of the electric fire, the mantelpiece and the windowsill. Piles of books sat on the floor beside his armchair, and on the television cabinet, the television abandoned in the corner of the room, itself the foundation for another column of books mushrooming skyward. The sofa in the rectangular bay window was not for sitting on; it was for keeping track of books borrowed from the library and loaned by friends. No, this was a house of books, for upstairs was the same, one room painted turquoise set aside for more books and an Amstrad PCW.
‘What are you reading these days, Dadaji?’ asked Satya, turning back to him at last, clasping in her hands a book by Piara Singh Sambhi.
‘I started Iain Bank’s latest, but we didn’t get on,’ he told her, ‘Just finished Karen Armstrong’s book on Muhammad. Bill Bryson’s travels in Europe: utterly hilarious. You must read it. Andrew Morton on Diana: forget it. Stephen Hawkins on black holes: fascinating. Ah, and I’m still working through A Suitable Boy, slowly but surely. It’s a remarkable book, but the print is tiny and gives me a headache. I must find my magnifying glass.’
‘So just a little then.’
‘Just a little, Satya,’ he said with a smile. ‘And what about you?’
‘I expect I should be reading lots of things,’ she lamented, glancing down at the back cover of the edition she had set upon. ‘Always looking for recommendations,’ she said, ‘Something to touch my soul.’
‘Books like that are few and far between, I’m afraid,’ said her grandfather, watching as she perched on an empty corner of the sofa to leaf through its pages. ‘If ever I find one, you’ll be the first to know.’
‘May I borrow this one?’ she asked, flicking its cover towards him.
‘Of course, Satya,’ he beamed back at her, only to watch once more as the expression on her face morphed into a serious frown. ‘You look troubled,’ he told her.
‘No, it’s just…’ She shrugged her shoulders. ‘It’s just these days I can’t help thinking…’
‘Go on.’
She paused for a moment, seeking words to express a feeling. ‘Why we’re not religious at all,’ she tried. ‘How come we don’t know anything about our religion?’ She looked perturbed. ‘Why are we so… indifferent?’
Gazing back at her, her grandfather nodded his head. ‘I don’t think religious is the right word,’ he replied pensively, ‘But I know what you mean, and you can blame me for that, Satya.’
‘What do you mean?’
‘Being religious invokes the idea of following rules, wearing certain clothes, conforming to the expectations of others. But what we follow is a way: to value truth above all things, and to dedicate your life to that.’
‘No, I meant, what do you mean…’
‘When I say you can blame me for that?’ He gazed at her warmly. ‘This may surprise you,’ he said with a chuckle, ‘but in my youth, I was just like your brother: I didn’t want to hear about simran and seva at all. I wanted maya, the world. I suppose that by the time I started thinking about it, it was too late. Your father and his brother were already teenagers, nearly twenty. Too late to reach. I’d spent all my energy making sure they’d have an easier life than I did. There was nothing I could do then. They had minds of their own.’
Recalling his arguments with his children back then, as they looked on at his new-found piety with bitter contempt, he could only shake his head, cursing himself for neglecting their souls. By then, they dismissed his concern as parental misguidance, imagined only to undermine the pursuit of love.
‘I used to regret that profoundly,’ he muttered mournfully. ‘But in recent years, I’ve come to see it as a great blessing.’
‘How?’ asked his granddaughter, squinting.
‘It means you and I have a freedom the devout do not,’ he said. ‘We have the freedom to seek and explore. To choose our path. To discover a truer way.’
‘In what way?’
‘Perhaps if we had a prescriptive faith, we’d find it impossible to truly believe. We’d be all caught up in dogmatism, or cultural identities, or in living up to other people’s expectations, whether they’re right or wrong, good or bad. We’d end up deferring to a guru or a sheikh or a priest in everything we do. Perhaps we’d never be able to pursue the truth, let alone discover it.’
For a moment, he offered her a half-smile, part reassuring, part serious. But his mind had already left her, drifting back in time to his distant youth, as a guest at a Gurdwara in Zirakpur. All of a sudden, he was humming a hymn to an old Punjabi melody he remembered from that strange summer long ago. Lending her ear, Satya immediately recognised his words. ‘Ek pita ekas ke ham barak,’ she offered semi-fluently, recalling a raag he had once taught her. Her grandfather smiled when he heard her, but continued to sing without pause, as if those soothing words could cure some pain within.
There is one God. We are all his children. He is my guide. Listen, friends: my soul is a sacrifice, a sacrifice to God. Do not be proud; seek his sanctuary, and accept as good all that he does. Listen, friends: dedicate your soul, body and your whole being to him. Thus shall you be blessed with his vision.[1]
‘You know I’m no sage, don’t you Satya?’ he asked abruptly. ‘I’ve always taken pride in navigating my own path. In being my own man. In following what sat right with me. In following my heart.’ He glanced at her thoughtfully. ‘Most of my faith I took from my beloved. Of course, I have nothing against the pious folk at the Gurdwara, it’s just that your grandmother was always my spiritual guide. She was so special to me. I’ve never met a person with such profound faith as her. Oh, how I miss my beloved. I dreamed we’d grow old together, but alas, it was not to be.’
‘We miss her too, Dadaji.’
‘Yes indeed, how can we not?’ he agreed, attempting hopelessly to wipe away the tears that should have settled behind his lenses. He grieved now as much for his absent tears, which with old age no longer seemed to intimate his sorrow, as for friends long lost along the way.
‘Yes, I’ve been thinking about the journey of faith a lot of late,’ he told her, ‘Perhaps it’s something I read. Of prophets and saints, mystics and gurus. To me, they were all the antithesis of religion as we understand it today. They were nonconformists. They were dissatisfied with the answers the people around them gave to the questions they asked. Jesus wandered in the wilderness. Muhammad climbed a mountain to meditate. Baba Nanak journeyed all over Asia. So I wonder… I wonder why we don’t follow them. Why do we pursue dogmatism, when all our guides opposed it?’
Satya’s grandfather watched her intently, nodding his head ever so slightly, wondering if she was ready for thoughts like these. Perhaps he would never have released them had she not waited three months to visit him. He dared not tell her of the loneliness that had been driving him towards insanity at half past four every weekday afternoon since September.
‘Satya, my father wasn’t a pious man, nor was his father. Oh yes, your grandmother had faith, although it wasn’t in the khalsa. Her faith was quiet and private. Her faith was working with people who had nothing. Her father was a good man, but he hated religion of show. He was a simple man, a potter, but his skin was too dark for him to have any status amongst the wise turbaned ones. They used to say caste is a forgotten tradition, but actions speak louder than words.’
‘But he was Sikh, wasn’t he?’
‘Do you never wonder about your name, Satya?’
‘What do you mean?’
There was another of those strange pauses, so unfamiliar, so out of place. She had grown so used to the recitation of ancient wisdom in the face of every predicament that this uncertainty alarmed her. She awaited the words of a guru or of a mystical saint of the distant past, but today there were none.
‘In life, you can be whatever you want to be sometimes,’ he said instead, ‘and sometimes you just have to survive.’ His eyes were back with her. ‘Your grandmother’s father believed in God. He used to say faith is just three things: to be truthful in speech, to give back whatever you’re given in trust, and to leave alone whatever does not concern you. Such simplicity, but such wisdom.’ He nodded his head at that, and then he laughed for a second too. ‘My father also believed, but he only mentioned God during illness and the floods, and once when he got his foot trapped in a snake hole. But when Partition occurred, it wasn’t enough to say you just believed in God. You had to be a Hindu or a Muslim or a Sikh, or a Christian, though nobody would admit to that when we’d just thrown the Christian army out. But the Christians weren’t alone. Look, all those years, that simple potter’s customers were Hindu, Sikh and Muslim. There were disputes of course, but Hindus and Muslims worked side-by-side, ate side-by-side, raised their children side-by-side. But then came the bloodshed. And so what became of the potter, with his simple faith in God?’
Satya shook her head forcefully, her eyes slanting. ‘I don’t understand what you mean,’ she said.
‘These things are very complex, Satya. It’s all philosophy. Can you say what he was before and what he was afterwards? You could say he was a wise man before and a very frightened wise man afterwards.’
‘But frightened of who? Of the Sikhs? Of the Muslims?’
‘It is all philosophy, my dear, and most of us no longer care for the whys and the hows. Only the extremists care about that. My brother used say that our village had been Sikh since 1823. That may well be true. We may have always been Sikh in a collective sense. But you, my dear Satya, have taught me much. Does God care for our tribe? Have you ever been content with, “I’m just Sikh,” when you come to me with your questions? Is such a faith enough for you? I know it’s not. This quest of yours was always about your relationship with God. Isn’t it true?’
‘Yes, Dadaji, but the khalsa is part of that. Are you saying it’s wrong?’
‘Not wrong, not necessarily,’ he said, his arm wrapped around a cushion, ‘But are you seeking an identity, Satya, or the truth? If it’s the former, then choose your tribe, Satya. Be whatever you want. God knows I’ve lived here long enough to call myself an Englishman. Why the skinheads protest when they’re happy to call me a Paki, I have no idea. If the true test of an Englishman is his love of cricket, then all of India is surely more English than most of this town’s hooligans.’
‘But is it wrong to have an identity? I don’t see why I can’t embrace our heritage and still have faith,’ she said. ‘Are they mutually exclusive? Surely, to be Sikh is to have faith.’
‘Let me tell you something which happened this afternoon, Satya. On my way back from the library, I stopped off at the newsagents to settle a debt. I was twenty pence short the other day, and had promised I’d pay them back without delay. This time I was served by a fellow I’d not seen before. I confess that when I saw his impressive beard and neatly wrapped turban, I said to myself, “Here’s a real Sikh.” I felt so tiny beside him.
‘So I handed him my two coins and asked him to make a note of it, but as he was doing this, a young woman entered the shop and he seemed to become distracted by her. Whether she was his sister, his wife, or a stranger, I don’t know. It looked to me that she had learning difficulties or a disability of some kind. In any case, he forgot he was serving me and immediately began shouting at her at the top of his voice. I had the misfortune to understand exactly what he was saying as he demanded that she get out of his shop. Just then, I thought to myself, “No, this man does not know the way at all.”
‘Unfortunately, I left his shop with his appalling swearing still ringing in my ears. And just then I thought to myself: this man has missed the point of the way altogether. His actions were all, “I am,” kam and krodh consuming him completely. I nearly went back to tell him to recall nimrata, but I feared that was my ego, so I left him be. But still, it disappointed me terribly.
‘A Sikh is a person who values the truth above everything else. That’s the whole point of the path: to dedicate your life in commitment to the truth. You start with, “I surrender.” You start with, “I give.” You leave, “I am.” That’s because the ego cannot coexist with God. If you seek God, then you must let go of your ego. They cannot dwell together. “I am” is the rival of naam simran. If you are to find Waheguru, you must get rid of “I am” in its entirety.’
‘So are you saying that my understanding of what it means to be Sikh is wrong?’ his granddaughter asked him pleadingly.
‘I’m saying that it’s a way of being. It’s not a costume that you put on. That’s something else entirely.’ Gazing directly into her eyes, he nodded. ‘If this is what you mean by being Sikh, that you pursue truth above all else, then I’m with you. I commend you and support you.’
‘And if not?’
‘Then that’s not the way. It’s just dressing up.’
‘I’m still not quite sure I understand,’ murmured the girl.
‘Oh Satya,’ he whispered knowingly, ‘I’m sorry I have only the eloquence of a retired fish-packer. If I could convey what occurs to me, I surely would.’ In that moment, he appeared frustrated by a tongue that would not submit to him or by the degeneration of his once brilliant mind.
‘Now look,’ he tried again, ‘did Baba Nanak bring anything new, except a renewal of the eternal way? Did he call us to declare to the world, “I’m a Sikh,” all puffed up with pride? I am, I am, I am!’
‘I suppose not,’ she said, shrugging.
‘No, I’m certain that he never had in mind that we build an institution. That flies in the face of everything he taught. No, he called to a way. A way of being. As did those before him. It’s the way we must pursue, not the great edifices we’ve constructed over it. Leave all that. Leave it.’
At the sight of Satya’s bewildered face, he stumbled again and searched inside for better words to express his contemplations. ‘All I’m saying, my dear Satya,’ he offered when the clarification he sought failed to surface, ‘is that if you’re seeking an identity, you can be whatever you want, but if you’re seeking God, only truth will satisfy you. You may find truth in the Sikh way, you may find it on the potter’s wheel. It is not for me to tell you where to find it or not to find it. It is your journey, Satya, not mine.’
‘But now I’m confused, Dadaji.’
‘Confusion,’ said her grandfather, leaning in closer to her, ‘is the door to enlightenment.’
‘Did Guru Nanak say that?’ she asked.
‘Oh no Satya,’ he said, chuckling, ‘that’s just a saying of a foolish old man. The meandering of my soul. But I believe it’s true. How will you set out on the road of discovery if everything you know is true? Whatever will you learn? Isn’t it better to be confused and seek answers than to know it all and seek nothing?’
Finally, with that fondness she was used to, not these strange meanderings of the mind, he extended his right arm towards her face and stroked her cheek with his fingers. ‘Thank God you have your youth on your side, Satya,’ he told her with softened words, ‘for soon I’ll be dust, forgotten. Were I twenty years younger, I would’ve joined you on your journey. But soon I’ll be just dust.’
‘Don’t say that,’ whispered Satya.
‘That’s no bitter lament. It’s simply the reality for us all.’ He smiled at her encouragingly. ‘All I mean to say is please don’t abandon your journey. Don’t let life get in the way.’ He grinned at her this time. ‘If you must take me as your guide,’ he said, ‘let it be in learning from my humongous mountain of mistakes.’
‘In what way?’
‘Well consider this,’ he said: ‘I thought I’d arrived the day I set foot on these shores, but now that seems like pure delusion. After all the years of hardship, the racism in the seventies, the strikes in the eighties, the long days at the docks, the death of my beloved, and of my only brother back home, you reach a point where all you can do is wonder what you achieved. When I look back at my life, this is what I find myself asking myself. And then there’s death. Soon I’ll just be dust in the ground, forgotten.’
‘Oh Dadaji, you won’t be forgotten. And you’re still young. Aren’t you going to come to my graduation? Imagine it, Dadaji: a beautiful summer’s day in 1998, mortarboards spinning into the sky.’
As he tried to picture Satya’s vision, his face lit up. ‘I hope I’ll be there, Satya, it’s true. But whether death comes tomorrow, in five years or two decades from now, it’s all the same. What have I achieved?’
‘You have sons, you have grandchildren, you have friends, your garden.’
‘This is all maya, Satya. This is all “I am.” I mean what have I achieved for God?’
For a few moments he remained silent, as if he hoped she would answer, but she hoped for the same of him. Gone was the wise teacher she was so used to; now a frail old man sat before her, fidgeting awkwardly with his fingers. He had suddenly grown old, his face far more wrinkled than she had ever remembered it. There was a sort of weariness in his eyes that she had not seen before.
‘I’ve learned much during my life, Satya. I share what I can with your father and uncle, but sadly they take little I say seriously. Perhaps you, Satya, are my last witness. My last hope. Will you indulge me?’
‘Of course,’ she replied, ‘Absolutely.’
He smiled when she said that, for he had been saving up these thoughts for months on end, cataloguing them in his mind, praying that she would finally remember him and return.
‘Here’s a thought,’ he chuckled: ‘For the price of a packet of cigarettes, you can buy a book. For thirty years, every time my friends fed their nicotine addiction, I bought myself a paperback. The result of that is all around you. Unfortunately, I’ve just buried the last of my friends from our days at the docks.’
‘I’m sorry,’ she whispered.
‘This is life, Satya. We live, we die. But smoke like a chimney, as my friends did, and it’ll be a horrible death. Don’t take up smoking like it seems your brother has, Satya. It’s a horrible habit and one you’ll regret when you’re old. Your body is your temple: look after it. Don’t fill it with poisons. Fill it with ideas. Read widely. That will keep you grounded. Humble. The more you learn, the more you’ll realise how little you know. Never be content with ignorance.’
As he said this, he took hold of his glasses and began cleaning them with a handkerchief in his lap, glancing back at her with now tiny eyes. ‘Promise me something, Satya,’ he said, ‘promise that you’ll keep in mind what I’ve said to you this evening. Don’t just dismiss it as just the rambling of a foolish old man.’
‘I’d never say such a thing,’ she whispered.
‘But you are surprised?’
‘Yes,’ she confessed, stuttering, ‘but that’s okay, I think. I came here in search of wisdom. It wasn’t the wisdom I was expecting, but it’s food for thought.’
‘I’ve never had any interest in the Panj Kakar, Satya, but there are five virtues you must take to heart. Without them, there can be no faith at all. The first is truth, sat. The second is contentment. The third is nimrata: benevolence, humility, modesty. The fourth is compassion, daya. The last is love. You must carry these with you always.’
As he said these words, he watched as his granddaughter’s face seemed to fall, her eyes cast down. ‘What’s wrong, Satya?’ has asked, concerned.
‘Well I’ve failed already, completely,’ she said, grieving.
‘How so?’ he asked, reinstating his glasses back on his face.
‘To be truthful? I’ve become a liar. Contentment? I’m constantly agitated. Nimrata? Look at me! I became a horrible bully. Daya? The same. And love: I don’t even know what love is.’ She managed to look back at her grandfather briefly. ‘Have I been doing it all wrong?’ she asked him.
‘You’re not alone, Satya. Take nimrata. It took me years to achieve something even close to that. My beloved used to take me to task whenever she found me all puffed up with pride. “Be humble,” she used to say, whenever I came home in a rage from work, because some foreman had decided to show me my place. It’s hard, you know. So very hard. But my beloved was right.’
‘Don’t I know it?’ muttered Satya.
‘Don’t we all?’ he replied. ‘Yes, pride is the hardest test of all,’ he said. ‘You’ll be tested with it at school, you’ll be tested with it at home. At work too. And on every day of your life.’
‘So I’m not alone then, Dadaji?’
‘Not at all, my dear girl. All of mankind is tested with lust and anger, ego and greed. If you let them, they’ll snatch away your common sense. Alas, I’ve learnt that the hard way.’
‘And me too, I suppose.’
‘Yes, but you’re still young, Satya. You have your whole life ahead of you.’
‘But as I say, I’ve lost my way. I feel the world calling me. Calling me away.’
‘And that’s the fifth thief, Satya: attachment to maya. But what does our wise one say? “As long as there’s desire, there’ll be anxiety.” Can we speak of God, when we’re preoccupied with our desires? Of course not.’
‘So what can I do, Dadaji? How can I find my way again?’
‘First, be kind to those around you,’ he told her. ‘Speak the truth, even if it causes you pain. Forgive whoever wrongs you. Learn to give freely. Rush to serve others, practice kar seva. Lift up the oppressed. Elevate the needy. Do whatever it takes to tame your ego. Remove “I am” from your whole being. Obliterate it. And be sincere, living your life caring about nothing but the truth.’
‘Even if that leads to conflict?’ Satya asked him.
‘Recall the words of the great poet: “There is nothing higher than truth. Everything is upheld by truth, and everything rests upon truth.” If you’re truthful, you have nothing to fear.’
‘I wish I was truthful then,’ muttered Satya, ‘Instead I’m just full of regrets.’
Before her, her grandfather shifted a little and took to fiddling with his glasses again. ‘My dear Satya,’ he told her candidly, ‘you’re not alone in that. I’ve certainly made more than my fair share of mistakes over the years. So many, many. But take my advice, Satya: make amends, yes, but don’t dwell on them. When you make a mistake, learn from it and let it be an opportunity to change, to reform.’
‘But what about others?’ asked Satya, ‘They’re the ones who won’t let you forget the mistakes you made.’
‘Just do your best, Satya. Live a good life, whatever people may say. Be kind, whether or not others are kind. Don’t measure yourself against others, good or bad, but against that measure within. Follow your heart, Satya. Follow your heart.’
‘My heart rebukes me these days,’ she complained.
‘Then listen to it,’ he told her. ‘Be true to yourself, Satya,’ he insisted. ‘Believe in yourself,’ he urged. ‘Yes, and place your trust in the One.’
Freeing these words came as such profound relief, he mused, contemplating all the weeks he had waited for her to descend on him again. Had she come in September, days after a week playing truant and an evening on the run, his words would have been incomparable. He would have rebuked her then, it was true. Back then he would have demanded to know what had become of her journey. If she had arrived then, he would have chastised her, censoring her for her hypocrisy. Yes, he had certainly entertained thoughts like that. It was better she did not know about that, he thought now. This evening’s unplanned ramble had been better for them both, he conceded, taking in his granddaughter’s fond gaze, sitting there amidst his piles of books.
‘Tomorrow’s a new day,’ he told her finally. ‘Start over. Start again. Let tomorrow be a bright new dawn.’
[1] Sikh hymn, Ek pita ekas ke ham barak, from Guru Granth Sahib.
