A Small Sacrifice

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A Small Sacrifice

Synopsis:

The story describes the experience of a child who has been sent to work as a domestic for a family that lives in the city. It is told from the child's point of view, and was inspired by a brief news clipping I read a few years ago about a 12-year-old girl called Rupali, whose employer mistreated her.

Book Excerpt:

The full text of the story can be read at the following URL: http://www.thedailystar.net/magazine/2005/07/05/food.htm

An excerpt is given below:

A Small Sacrifice*Farah GhuznaviWhen I woke up that morning, it seemed like any other day. If I had known, perhaps I would have done things a little differently. Perhaps I would have spent less effort on trying to scrub the blackened grease off the cooking pots, and snatched a few more moments looking out of the jali (wire-mesh) in the veranda, hoping to catch a glimpse of the parrots that sometimes played in the mango trees at the back of the compound. But I didn’t. So when the begumshaheb, the mistress of the house, nudged me awake with her foot, I scrambled to get up quickly. I had been dreaming of my mother— it was Eid, and she had made shemai for Shawon, Shyamal, Shiraj and me. We didn’t have shemai very often, but we were all convinced that Ma’s cooking was the best in our para. Sometimes the women from other houses asked her for advice on how to cook something, because Ma’s father had been a well‑known baburchi in Dhaka. We had never met our Nana, and the glory days of his time in Dhaka were long past by the time I was born. By then, Ma was just a pretty girl from a family which had seen better days, chosen by my Dada as a bride for his second son. Even so, the early years of my childhood were happy ones. I was the first child—and the first grandchild—in the family, so it didn’t matter so much that I was a girl. Indeed, my name, Shahazadi (Princess), was given to me by my Dada; though everyone called me by my daknam, which was Onu. I had other names too, pet‑names given by my father: shonamoni, janer tukra. When my father came home at the end of the day, he would call out, “Where is Onu? Amar shonamoni koi re?” My father and my grandparents loved me so much, that my mother often told me that I was spoilt. But I knew she didn’t mean it. She was happy in those days, too. Besides, I knew that my situation was unusual. My friend Rekha’s family was very poor. She had eight brothers and sisters, and when the ninth child was born, they named her “China.” The foreigners who came to visit one of the local NGO offices were very impressed. They thought that she had been named after the country China, which we call “Cheen.” Actually, her name means “unwanted.” By the time my third brother, Shiraj, was born, things had changed a lot for our family. My grandparents were both dead, their sons had fallen out with each other, and two of my father’s brothers, Shahed and Jabbar, had successfully cheated him and his other brother out of any claims to my grandfather’s property. My father was a proud man; he said he had his manshonman (his honour), so he refused to go on fighting them, or to beg for his share. He had asked the village matbars, the community leaders, to intervene in the matter. But my uncle Shahed was married to Selim Matbar’s daughter, so they all sided with him. Our family moved out of the compound into a small shack on another relative’s land, but my parents found it increasingly difficult to feed their growing family. When my Dada was alive, he had ruled the family with an iron hand, and my mother often lamented to our female neighbours that he had not allowed any of his daughters-in‑law to use jonmoniyontron (contraception). At the time of my grandfather’s death, my third brother was already on the way, and none of us could have imagined how our financial circumstances would change. Within three years, my father could no longer afford to send us to school, and my brother Shawon and I, as the eldest children, were expected to help our parents in any way we could. My brother started to work at the village tea stand, serving the locals as well as the truck drivers who regularly passed through. I helped my mother with the household work, and looking after our cow and chickens. But things just kept getting worse. My father worked as a day labourer for one of the landowners nearby, but we could not manage on what he earned, and the humiliation he felt at doing this work changed him. My mother said it had made him bitter—“Bhalo manushtarey noshto koira disey. It has ruined a good man.” It was mostly she who suffered the brunt of his anger, although he never hit any of us, the children. Sometimes I felt as though he just looked for reasons to become angry with my mother, and despite the regular beatings, my mother seemed to accept this as her fate. In all the hours I spent bathing her bruises with cold water, she never said a word against my father. I remained my father’s favourite, however, his janer tukra. So it was a shock to me, when one day one of my khalas suggested that my parents send me to work for a family in Dhaka. My aunt actually raised the issue with my mother, pointing out that it would mean one less mouth to feed at home, and that whatever payment my parents received for my work could help meet the family’s expenses. “I know it will be hard for you to manage without her, but think about the benefits. It is just a small sacrifice! And you will have her back for the Eid festivals, anyway. It will mean that you can look after your boys better – they are the ones who will take care of you in your old age.” My mother did not respond to what my khala said, but her comment about the boys being more important made me feel bad, even though I knew it was true.

*Previously published in Star Weekend Magazine, 2005.

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