{Persian Empire in The British Museum till the end of the year}
This morning, before noon, I witnessed some thing in one of our neighbor’s guest-room that affected me so deeply and strongly that I cannot resist sharing it with my few friends in this business, the web log business. And today I'm Mr. “Polite nice guy” too by the way. But before telling you what I saw and heard today, I must explain a fact of life for some of you who may have not any experience in the field I'm going to talk about. This fact of life is that the absolute departure, leaving the world for good and going to heaven, (I'm so polite today that I cannot say even the word hell! I said it though, sorry.) In short, dying, I mean the natural death, is not always a simple easy short procedure it's not! Believe me. I have seen nice loving fathers and mothers who in their death bed innocently and against their own wish and will, annoyed and made their beloved ones mad so bad that the danger of them (the beloved ones) interfere in the course of nature and take the heavenly law in their own hands was dancing in the air and around the poor guy's head, that nice guy who was lying in his/her death bed awaiting the angel of mercy, angel Azrael, and begging him/her to hurry and end his/her pain and the horrible bore due to lying in(after a while) disgusting bed with nothing do except suffering from everything. This process in some cases can take weeks and even months. In fact fast sweet enviable deaths like the departure of my father is very rare. My mother called me and said: “I think your father doesn't feel good, he breathes a bit heavily I think." I went there and after a few minutes my wife came and then my brother came. The father didn't bother anybody didn't give us the least trouble of any sort. When I arrived he just let me know, he didn't speak those last minutes seemed a bit confused to me, he just let me know that he wanted to go to the bathroom, we went there I helped him to urinate, but it was false alarm, no pee. So we went back to the bed, a big king size bed that had room for all of us. My father lied in the middle and we all sat around him. For almost a minute or may be more he looked at us intentionally as he was trying to bear the picture in his mind as clear as possible. And then he left, no fuss, in peace and tranquility he smoothly crept to that eternal sleep. It was the way of dying that I guess every body wishes for, when the time comes of course, not now. But the strange thing was that, I, not a crying type, cried so heavily and with my whole body and no control, that even my mother and my wife who loved my father as much as the rest of us, halted their crying and tried to calm me down, I myself was trying too, but it was useless for a few a moments. The next day I thought about it, tried to understand why I had cried like that (it was the third time in my life) when every thing was so beautiful and was not very unexpected too. May be it was because he couldn't speak at those last minutes, may be I had thought: what if he wanted to say something? But then again nothing didn't matter any more anyway; the whole world vanishes with every death I guess. Anyway, I was saying that it's not always so easy, no sir! Some times especially when the whole family do not live in the same place, when every son and daughter with his wife and husband live in a separate continent, this hide and seek with Azrael can be really painful and annoying too, trust me!
They get a call that says: “It's TIME”. They leave their work, buy at least two return tickets, if they don't bring the grand children to say goodbye. They come to mourn for a few days and get back to their lives. But Azrael refuses to answer the prayers. They stay for a week, then two weeks, and then they loose hope and go back to their continents. A week later they get the call again they hear: “this is it, this time is serious." They whisper to themselves:" I hope so." and the poor things repeat the whole course of action again. May be this time they're lucky may be not, no one knows!
Now about this morning:
A friend of mine came and said he was going to visit "the poor old Mr..." father and father-in-law of two of our friends, and said that I better go with him, said: “It makes Mary and Joseph really happy if you come along too."
First I said no, because I had gone there last week and everybody knows that I'm not one of those nice guys who when ever hear that some poor bastard (sorry about that) some one is ill, they pay a visit every day and say nice things to her/him. I said no, I can't come. "Why not?!" he objected: “It’s less than a five minutes walk for God's sake."
"I know and that's why I went there last Tuesday evening; and brought a bottle of vodka too..."
"To cure the poor old man I'm sure!"
"No, to drink it with his daughter and his son-in-law."
"Ok, why not repeat that this morning without the drink."
"I told you I was there four days ago, I have a reputation you know, I can't just act nice guy on request of the first man who comes in from the door!"
At last he took me there saying that the poor man is really dying; I whispered: “don’t be so sure!" and we went out of the door.
To make a short story even shorter, we find the old man sleeping in his bed like before and the daughter started crying as we went in, as it's customary to cry for every new guest; but she was crying more seriously this time and seemed to me that she didn't want to let go, I thought, I must ask God's forgiveness before saying this: but I thought may be the poor exhausted woman had decided to cry very hard like the father was actually dead in the hope that the great God takes pity on her and send the angel. It was just a thought of course, a pretty stupid one too, at first at least! But then suddenly she made me proud, proud of myself that is!
(Sorry I forgot to explain it before what “legal doc” means: The "legal doc" is the doctor who signs death certificates; when some one dies in a house he must go there and examine the body and decide the cause of death and sign the death certificate; after that they can carry on with the rest of the procedure.)
Mary, the daughter, sobbing, told her young brother: “did you call the legal doc and all that?" The young brother picked up the phone and was going to ask what number (under Mary's husband, Joseph and my amazed stare,) that Joseph whispered: “Are you really going to dial?! Put the phone down, I can't believe it! The poor man is alive for god's sake he is not dead yet Mary! What’s the matter with you?!"
Mary slowed down to mild weeping, clearing her nose into a tissue and said, not whispering, she said:
"It's alright, call them, he'll be dead by then...till they get here." then whispered to herself: "in this traffic!"
This morning, before noon, I witnessed some thing in one of our neighbor’s guest-room that affected me so deeply and strongly that I cannot resist sharing it with my few friends in this business, the web log business. And today I'm Mr. “Polite nice guy” too by the way. But before telling you what I saw and heard today, I must explain a fact of life for some of you who may have not any experience in the field I'm going to talk about. This fact of life is that the absolute departure, leaving the world for good and going to heaven, (I'm so polite today that I cannot say even the word hell! I said it though, sorry.) In short, dying, I mean the natural death, is not always a simple easy short procedure it's not! Believe me. I have seen nice loving fathers and mothers who in their death bed innocently and against their own wish and will, annoyed and made their beloved ones mad so bad that the danger of them (the beloved ones) interfere in the course of nature and take the heavenly law in their own hands was dancing in the air and around the poor guy's head, that nice guy who was lying in his/her death bed awaiting the angel of mercy, angel Azrael, and begging him/her to hurry and end his/her pain and the horrible bore due to lying in(after a while) disgusting bed with nothing do except suffering from everything. This process in some cases can take weeks and even months. In fact fast sweet enviable deaths like the departure of my father is very rare. My mother called me and said: “I think your father doesn't feel good, he breathes a bit heavily I think." I went there and after a few minutes my wife came and then my brother came. The father didn't bother anybody didn't give us the least trouble of any sort. When I arrived he just let me know, he didn't speak those last minutes seemed a bit confused to me, he just let me know that he wanted to go to the bathroom, we went there I helped him to urinate, but it was false alarm, no pee. So we went back to the bed, a big king size bed that had room for all of us. My father lied in the middle and we all sat around him. For almost a minute or may be more he looked at us intentionally as he was trying to bear the picture in his mind as clear as possible. And then he left, no fuss, in peace and tranquility he smoothly crept to that eternal sleep. It was the way of dying that I guess every body wishes for, when the time comes of course, not now. But the strange thing was that, I, not a crying type, cried so heavily and with my whole body and no control, that even my mother and my wife who loved my father as much as the rest of us, halted their crying and tried to calm me down, I myself was trying too, but it was useless for a few a moments. The next day I thought about it, tried to understand why I had cried like that (it was the third time in my life) when every thing was so beautiful and was not very unexpected too. May be it was because he couldn't speak at those last minutes, may be I had thought: what if he wanted to say something? But then again nothing didn't matter any more anyway; the whole world vanishes with every death I guess. Anyway, I was saying that it's not always so easy, no sir! Some times especially when the whole family do not live in the same place, when every son and daughter with his wife and husband live in a separate continent, this hide and seek with Azrael can be really painful and annoying too, trust me!
They get a call that says: “It's TIME”. They leave their work, buy at least two return tickets, if they don't bring the grand children to say goodbye. They come to mourn for a few days and get back to their lives. But Azrael refuses to answer the prayers. They stay for a week, then two weeks, and then they loose hope and go back to their continents. A week later they get the call again they hear: “this is it, this time is serious." They whisper to themselves:" I hope so." and the poor things repeat the whole course of action again. May be this time they're lucky may be not, no one knows!
Now about this morning:
A friend of mine came and said he was going to visit "the poor old Mr..." father and father-in-law of two of our friends, and said that I better go with him, said: “It makes Mary and Joseph really happy if you come along too."
First I said no, because I had gone there last week and everybody knows that I'm not one of those nice guys who when ever hear that some poor bastard (sorry about that) some one is ill, they pay a visit every day and say nice things to her/him. I said no, I can't come. "Why not?!" he objected: “It’s less than a five minutes walk for God's sake."
"I know and that's why I went there last Tuesday evening; and brought a bottle of vodka too..."
"To cure the poor old man I'm sure!"
"No, to drink it with his daughter and his son-in-law."
"Ok, why not repeat that this morning without the drink."
"I told you I was there four days ago, I have a reputation you know, I can't just act nice guy on request of the first man who comes in from the door!"
At last he took me there saying that the poor man is really dying; I whispered: “don’t be so sure!" and we went out of the door.
To make a short story even shorter, we find the old man sleeping in his bed like before and the daughter started crying as we went in, as it's customary to cry for every new guest; but she was crying more seriously this time and seemed to me that she didn't want to let go, I thought, I must ask God's forgiveness before saying this: but I thought may be the poor exhausted woman had decided to cry very hard like the father was actually dead in the hope that the great God takes pity on her and send the angel. It was just a thought of course, a pretty stupid one too, at first at least! But then suddenly she made me proud, proud of myself that is!
(Sorry I forgot to explain it before what “legal doc” means: The "legal doc" is the doctor who signs death certificates; when some one dies in a house he must go there and examine the body and decide the cause of death and sign the death certificate; after that they can carry on with the rest of the procedure.)
Mary, the daughter, sobbing, told her young brother: “did you call the legal doc and all that?" The young brother picked up the phone and was going to ask what number (under Mary's husband, Joseph and my amazed stare,) that Joseph whispered: “Are you really going to dial?! Put the phone down, I can't believe it! The poor man is alive for god's sake he is not dead yet Mary! What’s the matter with you?!"
Mary slowed down to mild weeping, clearing her nose into a tissue and said, not whispering, she said:
"It's alright, call them, he'll be dead by then...till they get here." then whispered to herself: "in this traffic!"
posted by GazanKhan at
9:51 AM
5 Comments:
On Thursday 16:30 I woke up to go to my night shift. After 12 and a half hour of work and no sleep, I went to the Belgian Embassy as they had sent me letter saying that they can issue me a visa, I either can snd my passport in post or to go there in peron Only on Friday between 9:00-11:00. So I drank a lot of coffee, and went to the embassy. I waited there for a long time before I was seen to. I kept hearing this guy behind the counter trying to keep his calm when talking to some of the people who were there also to get a visa. Some of the questions were so stupid that even I felt like going to the customers banging their head to the counter and saying "are you deaf, you can't have a multiple six months schengen visa". But the Belgian guy was so calm - slightly patronising at times- but very calm and polite. I has assumued that the process was like the other Schengen authorities. That they call me to say my paperwork has been approved, I'll give them my passport and wait either for half an hour, or to go back in the afternoon to collect the passport with my visa in it! But when it was my turn, the guy said you can either give us a slef addressed envelop and we'll post it, or come in at 11:00 from Monday any day to collect it. Then we agreed that I'd go to post office get a special delivary envelop and have them post it to me. I was angree and very tired by this time, but really didn't want to argue with the nice man.
I've been waiting for some money to come through from a housing assosiation (who help the key wrokers, i.e. nurses, teachers, social workers, ...)with equity loans, to stay and work in the capital and not leave their jobs. Since April they have had me run for this damn money. One day they say I earn too much,the next they they say I earn too little. First I thought they are stupid slightly, but yesterday I realised that they are just evil. While I was it the que in the Embassy, my finacial advicer called and said , that for the hundredth time they want a proof of some thing, and that she was going to write them a letter, and that would be the end of that, and I would get the money!
After I left the embassy, instead of going home to sleep, I went to a big clothes shop to find an outfit for an "Aghd" I'm going to on Thursday. I was there for THREE hours. I wore EVERTHING they had, and came out with nothing at 14:30. By this time I was both exhausted, and hyper for lack of sleep. I came home and thought it was too early to sleep, so made a huge pot of coffee and drank it all! I was in the state of numbness, dazed and still hyper. Left my phone in my room, had dinner watched TV, when finally my friend/financial adviser, found me on some other phone. It was 19:30 and her, my solicitor, and the woman from housing assosiation had been trying to call me from 15:30 (axactly when I abandonded it on my bed in my room). She told me that the housing peopleafter promissing that every thing was ok that morning, managed to find yet another problem, and that they needed to talk to me and no one could find me. For those who know me, I get very angry normally and loose my temper, and finally cry. But this time nothing. My friend kept talking on the phonme, and I nodded with complete carelessness, and told her that they'd all gone home at 18:30 in the afternoon, and that there is nothing I could do then. I said sorry that I didn't have my phone with me on time, but first of all they knowing them, they probably would have wanted me to wait until Monday, and secong of all I hadn't closed my eyes for about 30 hours, and I really couldn't care less.
Gazankhan; I told you all this story, so you would know how nothing could make me uspet yeterday, and this morning your post had me in tears!
It was both beautiful and funny, but again reminded me of how guilty and helpless I felt on that Christmas eve, when I couldn't be with my Grandfather whom I loved, and my family.
By
Anonymous, at Sat Sep 24, 02:29:00 PM
This was absolutely beautiful Gazankhan. Everything about it was wonderful. You made me laugh, you made me cry and it all happened while I was having a cup of tea, just like in a proper funeral, right?
I also enjoyed reading Shdi’s comment. Girl that was good. You should get a blog of your own. Fancy it?
By
Shirin, at Sat Sep 24, 07:51:00 PM
People, I just read what I had written, sorry for the spelling. I had just woken up, and never read it before sending it. My bad!
By
Anonymous, at Sat Sep 24, 11:17:00 PM
I was really tired and not in the mood to read anything but I clicked on your Blog just by habit and I just couldn’t stop reading. It was brilliant. I also must say that I feel sorry for Mary. She couldn’t feel more desperate. It reminded me of Anjelica Huston in Prizzi’s Honor for some reason.
By
Anonymous, at Sat Sep 24, 11:26:00 PM
Thank you for your kindness my dears. Shady, my dear the spelling is not important. You just need to calm down a little my dearest.
By
GazanKhan, at Sun Sep 25, 11:19:00 AM
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