Shackled to my Family by Younis Samina

Author:Younis, Samina [Younis, Samina]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Biography
Publisher: Oxford eBooks
Published: 2012-07-22T00:00:00+00:00

20

Meeting more relatives

AS WE WALKED to Aunty Gulab’s house with Fatima and Imran at the front leading the way I asked Aisha how she felt. Aisha said to me that she was glad that she was not getting married this time and that she hoped something would happen in the meantime or the next couple of years to break up the engagement.

The area that Aunty Gulab lived in was very dirty there was a landfill site at the end of her house this was where local villagers dropped their rubbish. There was a nearby lake next to it that was filled to the rim with dirt and rubbish and the smell was unbearable. We were now a short distance away from the house when we were greeted by some children. There seemed to be a herd of them, most of which looked very poor. Initially I thought the children were poor who came to us asking for food but Imran said they were not and that they all lived in the house that we were going to. The children were just surprised to see us, they could tell we were new to the village and they were very excited. I was amazed, I could not believe so many children were living in that small house that I could see in front of me.

The entrance to her house was guarded with a large metal gate that creaked when it was opened. We were greeted by a young man who Fatima said was one of Aunty Gulab’s sons but she was not sure which one as she had about five in total. This son was called Amjad, he was very happy to see us. He welcomed us in and said “We were all waiting and wondering when you would come and see us.”

As we entered the gate we were brought into the yard. The yard was not very large, not as large as uncle Faarooq’s or Aunty Noreen’s and it was mostly used up with manjis where people were sitting. As soon as we were seen, a rush of people made their way towards us. I had no idea who they all were. There were at least twenty of them if not more. Aisha and I could not believe that all these people were relatives. These relatives were never spoken of back in England, I did not know why but I was keen to find out.

One by one the women all hugged and kissed us and the men just touched our head with their hand to show embrace. Amongst the women there were four elder ones. One of whom I understood to be Aunty Gulab. All four of them began to cry as Fatima was being embraced by them all.

This was a regular thing that happened whenever we were met by people. They all seemed to do this with Fatima as they felt she knew what to do. They knew that Fatima was born in Pakistan and so she understood what the embrace was about.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.