Written by: Anwar Maqsood.
She wasn't just my sister, she was my everything. She brought us up like a big brother and a mother. When our father passed away she was 42 years old, she was the eldest among the 10 siblings so she took the responsibility of educating us. She educated us in so many things! How to talk to people, how to sit within a gathering, how to read and write. Bajiya did all this for us and when she was done, when we were able to live life on our own and went on our own ways, she started doing all this for others, these people not only were from Karachi, but they were from all over the country. If someone was facing a problem, they would come to her and always returned with a solution. That was her goodness, she wanted to help everyone in every way.
Our age difference was 11 years but she always talked as if she was a kid, maybe that is the reason everyone irrespective of age loved talking to her. If there was a wedding, if someone was having trouble at home, the first person you will see, the first person doing things here and there in a crowd would be her. She did not get much happiness in her life. Maybe God knew that she was born to make others happy. Such people would do anything to make others happy and that is the reason she gave happiness to everyone keeping her sorrows aside. Therefore, everyone including her friends and enemies have her name on their tongue these days. Yes, there were some people against her too, but they were the first ones who came to her for advice and she always advised them well.
She was well educated. How to write the script, how to say something in front of a crowd, these are the things I have learnt from her. She was my best friend. There are things which you hide from your family, parents, even your kids and wife but always tell your best friend and that was the case with me, I told her everything, she used to help me and that's how even the biggest problems were solved without any fuss.
Bajiya was fond of dolls in her childhood. Her doll house was so big that even she could have lived in that doll house. I remember whenever a doll got married there were more than 200 people invited at the wedding, all the wedding traditions were followed, food was served. Therefore in her dramas the wedding ceremonies were so colorful. Before that wedding ceremony scenes were not that common in Pakistani dramas, it was she who started this tradition on the television.
There are some other things that were impressive about her. When she was 12 she wrote her first novel named 'Muslim Samaaj' and our grandfather was so happy that he made sure the novel was published. She was a very good singer and her voice was beautiful.
We all knew that she would end up becoming a famous personality. Although all other of her siblings including me do something or the other like writing, acting, painting, cooking or even working for the BBC but she ended up becoming the most famous. In my opinion becoming famous is not that difficult, it is maintaining that fame which is the most difficult part. The respect and the love she got from people is so much that it might never end.
She has done a lot for the Japanese community too. When she was awarded the biggest civilian prize of Japan I was really amazed because she was the first Pakistani to get that award. She had this habit of calling everyone 'son' even if that person was 20 years elder, interestingly no one ever minded that.
She used to scold me a lot even when I was a kid and even when I was old. In our family it is considered inappropriate if you write something with a dual meaning. Because Pakistani people are not that literate therefore it was always a worry that people might end up taking the wrong meaning of something we have written. She used to say that whatever you write, write carefully and whatever is the meaning in your mind should be the one conveyed to the public. I used to show her all my stories but she insisted on reading the whole script because she was worried that I must have written something against someone and she was of the view that writing negative about someone did not make them better. Whenever she used to watch my drama she used to call instantly saying the drama was good, if you cut this (a specific) scene it would have been better because it wasn't deep enough and so on. She always helped.
Actually her personality and artistry is so great that maybe we need binoculars to see her worth. It is impossible to see from the naked eye that how great she was in every possible way and it is impossible to realize how much I will miss her.
No comments:
Post a Comment