Found about Dr Suresh Tikoo’s death on face book today. May he rest in peace! Mulah Tahir Ghani Kashmiri said: Az damay besh naseebash na bownd Ghar che hubab sar zad az aab-e-hayat. (The life of a bubble is a few seconds, even if that bubble exists on the surface of aab-e-hayat. (The elixir of life)) If it was not for Facebook, I would have never found out about this sad event. On my last visit to Kashmir, I was surprised to see the number of obituary announcements in the newspaper. When I was growing up, the only time you saw a death announcement was when it was a news item about a politician’s death. Now there are pages full of obituary announcement. They still don’t have an organized obit section as we see in the west. Many small town newspapers in America survive because of their obit sections. People subscribe to these newspapers just for their obituary announcements. Weddings and funerals are the only times when relatives (especially the extended family) and friends of the deceased get together. For weddings you have invitation cards but for funerals you have the obit sections of the newspaper. I sometimes wonder, for immigrants like us, who are just putting their roots in this country, if anyone will pay attention to our obituary announcement. It reminds me of a beautiful couplet written on Noor Jehan’s tomb in Lahore. She is buried in a small decrepit building that sits across a gigantic royal mausoleum where her husband Jahangir is buried. Bar mazaray ma ghareeban nai chiragay nai ghulay Nai paray parwane sozay, nai sada-e-bulbulay (No one is going to light a candle or plant a flower on the graves of us immigrants There will be no melancholic flutter of a moth’s wings and no ballad of a bulbul’s song.)
Posted on: Fri, 20 Sep 2013 21:12:19 +0000
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