Munir Muztaba Ali
Good Music Tells a Good Story
I
On a fine morning in early spring not too long ago I woke up with a jovial feeling, the reason being that
I was going to see Niru Bhai and Nishi Bhabi that evening. I had seen them only three weeks earlier,
at my home, but that didn’t diminish my yearning and excitement to see them again, this time at their home.
The house, the food, the music, the conversation had their own appeals, no doubt, but the very company of
Niru Bhai was the main attraction for me.
Dr. Nirupam Majumdar, alias Niru Bhai, and I worked at the same hospital, but we weren’t colleagues; he was a neurosurgeon while I was a mere technical assistant in the cardiology department. My low position at the hospital and my lack of high academic as well as professional pedigree didn’t bother him enough to create a distance between us. In other words, he didn’t have a prejudiced bone in his being; at least that’s what I gleaned from his kind treatment of me. I still remember the day I met him in his office when I first arrived at this mid-sized hospital at a small town called Roseville in the American South. A middle-aged, tall, clean shaven, finely dressed man with a chummy personality welcomed me with a broad smile. I immediately felt drawn to his graciousness, and ever since, I’ve been close to him, close enough to feel as if I’ve been taken in under his wing.
I met Nishita Majumdar, alias Nishi Bhabi, on the same evening. Niru Bhai wouldn’t take no for an
answer when he informally invited me for dinner that night. “You’ve got to see your Bhabi,” he insisted,
and I couldn’t afford to say no to his importunity. Bhabi looked the same as I had seen her in pictures,
tacked all over the walls in Niru Bhai’s office. A tall, slender, fair skinned, middle-aged lady with
a sweet tongue who well complemented her husband. With an infectious smile spread all over her face,
she was as affable as Niru Bhai. And the house they lived in, all alone, their two children grown up and
gone, was as beautiful as its lovely occupants. It had a beautiful name as well—Madhuban.
The house was elegantly decorated with furniture, pictures and portraits that had the mark of good taste,
but the one thing that drew my attention most was a sonic device set, the home theater system as they call it,
in every important place of the house.
As soon as I set my foot into their house, I sensed that Niru Bhai and Nishi Bhabi loved music. Sure enough,
upon inquiry I came to learn that Nishi Bhabi herself was a musician in her youth. As long as I was in their
house, soft spiritual and mystical music composed by some of the greatest minds of the bygone
generations gently came through the sonic device set inside the living room ceiling. When I
expressed my own admiration for music, Niru Bhai and Nishi Bhabi were visibly hyped up with
emotion, and started theorizing the nature of music in a way that I had never thought or heard before,
and eventually they made good sense to me. “Music is no stranger to science,” Niru Bhai proclaimed,
“because, like science, music is exact and specific, demanding exact acoustics.”
“Music is science?" I was struck by wonder, and the question just slipped out of my mouth.
“Yes, my dear,” Niru Bhai continued. “See, a music conductor’s full score is a chart, a graph which indicates frequencies, intensities, volume changes, melody, and harmony all at once and with the most exact control of time.”
“Music is mathematical,” Bhabi chimed in, “because it’s rhythmically based on the subdivisions of time into fractions which must be done instantaneously, not worked out on paper, but unlike mathematics, music is fun to learn.”
“You’re absolutely right, darlin’,” he concurred, “and that makes it easier for me to assert that
music, above everything else, is an art. It allows a human being to take all these dry and boring
techniques and use them to create emotion, and that’s one thing science can’t duplicate: humanism,
feeling, emotion, call it what you will.” After that one unintended question, seeing me sitting there like a
mannequin, spellbound by his magic words, Niru Bhai brought a subtle smile upon his lips, and I
could read a tinge of delight in that smile.
“Music is a vital part of our living,” he continued. “Music is inherent in the very nature of man. As you often see, the tiny infant responds to a rhythmic sound and begins to hum even before he or she begins to speak.”
“Rhythm and music abound in nature all around us;” Bhabi added, tuning her sentiment on the same string with Niru Bhai, “you can find music in the rhythmic drumming of the surf, the rustling sounds of the tree-tops, the measured meter of the rain, the winds, the water falls, and the melodic tunes of song birds.”
“Music is the universal language of mankind,” Niru Bhai added, quoting Longfellow, and then he concluded in a Wordsworthian tone, “a good song is a soul food that nourishes our mental health, for it always tells a good story about us, the story of our greatness as well as our triviality.”
When the homily on music eventually ended, I said to myself,
“Wow! What an insightful discourse!” As I drove home that night after this
interlude with my newly acquainted Niru Bhai and Nishi Bhabi, the last few words of
Niru Bhai kept ringing in my ear, “A good song is a soul food that nourishes our mental health,
for it always tells a good story about us.” I fully understood now what Stephen Vincent Benet meant
when he had commented on Margaret Walker’s poems that they “keep on talking to you
after the book is shut,” because Niru Bhai’s words kept on talking to me. They had the effect
of the song of Wordsworth’s highland lass, the famous Solitary Reaper, on me:
“The music in my heart I bore
Long after it was heard no more.”
I thanked God, not only for the delicious dishes that I was entertained with, which seemed rather a lagniappe to the main soul food of the discourse, but also for His good grace in having me meet and spend a delectable evening with such wonderful and witty people.
II
But that was a few years ago. Lately, I hadn’t seen them too often. Niru Bhai fell ill more than
a year ago, and was quarantined much of the time. It was a baneful disease that required not
only extensive treatment, but also careful living. It had a name, but I wouldn’t say it because we
Bangalis don’t call certain diseases by their names; it’s kind of taboo in our culture. I often wondered
why such a good man should be afflicted with such an ailment that we shudder to pronounce. Though
I hadn’t seen him very often, I kept in touch with him and Bhabi over the phone, sometimes just
inquiring about his latest predicament. So often had I lifted my poor, iniquitous hands toward
Makka for his recovery, and with the good grace of God, he eventually reclaimed his health
back to normal. That’s what his doctor colleague gleefully whispered into his ear,
almost a week ago. Nishi Bhabi called me to give me the good news.
I wasted no time to call them up for a dinner at my home. One more week after he had gotten this
good news was way too long for Niru Bhai to stay away from the social life that he so ardently adored.
I had already called up some other people of the Rosevillean Banglalee community, so Niru Bhai could see
them too. Although single and not very fond of culinary habits, I liked to invite people to dinner, not so
much for a good meal but for a good conversation. Being single, I didn’t have to invite anyone, no one
would mind if I didn’t, but it wasn’t my style to go around making myself available to other peoples’
generosity and not invite them back. So I did invite them, sometimes. Although I didn’t know
much of anything regarding cooking other than simple things like plain rice, boiled, scrambled,
or fried eggs, dal, mashed this or mashed that, people in my expatriate community rarely passed up
my call for dinner. I suppose they turned up at my house not with much of an expectation for
delicious dishes, but rather to spend a delectable evening rattling on merrymaking gossips,
gossips that had no spiritual importance. Every time we got together, we reveled in light-hearted
gossips and worry-free laughter until the wee hours of the morning. Niru Bhai always led such a congregation.
When the telephone rang at Madhuban, Nishi Bhabi answered the phone. “’Slamalaikum Bhabi,
I’ve invited some people over for dinner on Sat’day. We’ll make a toast to Niru Bhai’s recovery.
You two must come, 7 o’clock , but if you can come earlier, that will be great, we can talk,
heart to heart, before anybody else shows up.” I said all this, rather briskly, in one breath.
Bhabi laughed at my excitement.
“It’s so nice of you, Kumar”, she said (though that’s not my real name, Bhabi endearingly calls me
by that name denoting my single status). “Your Niru Bhai’ll be so glad to see you, but you know,
I’ve to ask him first. He’s resting now, but I’ll call you back tonight if you don’t mind.”
“No, no”, I said. “You can take your time.” This is something I admire about Nishi Bhabi—her high regard for Niru Bhai. She knew what Niru Bhai would have said, yet she wouldn’t take it for granted. Every time I invited them, Bhabi said the same thing. “We’ll rejoice the get-together, but let me ask your Niru Bhai first.” This is her way of showing respect, not taking her husband’s love for granted. This is her way of fostering that love. As one writer once wrote in one of his novels, for love to endure and grow, it needs rearing. Bhabi must have read that line, or better yet, that writer must have borrowed the line from Bhabi.
Niru Bhai and Nishi Bhabi had never missed a party that I had thrown, yet I spent the
entire day in wild speculation. What if he didn’t feel up to it? What if he didn’t decide to come in
close proximity to other people yet? What if the silly stigma of the disease was still bothering him? If he used any of these reasons to pass it up, I would be very sorry for myself. He was the mainspring for me to plan this party, but I did so without confirming his coming first. I felt sort of annoyed with myself for planning things helter–skelter, not following any logical order. Then the much expected call came at night as Bhabi said she would call me.
“Who else have you invited, Kumar?” she asked. This is a routine question that Bhabi always asks.
I never minded such an inquiry, because I always thought her curiosity was about
figuring out whether the party would be high-spirited or dull.
“The regulars, Bhabi,” I said in a matter of fact way. “The Haiders, the Uddins, the Sarkars, the Bashirs, the Rahmans, Sanchita Bhabi, and Raquib, you probably have met Raquib, the new young man from MIT. Haven’t you met Raquib, Bhabi? A very high spirited congenial young man!” Though true, I probably added that last clause as an inducement.
“A very high spirited young man indeed,” Bhabi echoed. Then, after a little pause, she said, rather cheerlessly, “Don’t mind, Kumar. We would rather take a rain check this time.”
“Why?” I asked. “What’s it that seems to get in your hair, Bhabi?”
“Well, it’s not important,” she said, “We would rather come another time.”
I sensed someone among the invitees might have piqued her for some reason, so I pressed on to find out who or what it was.
“But I would like to know, Bhabi,” I demanded, “I would like to see if I could dispel any discomfort that may be bothering you.”
“Well, Kumar,” Bhabi answered, “I wouldn’t mind sitting with Raquib in the same room, but I don’t think your Niru Bhai would love to sit with him.”
“I appreciate your candor, but why would Niru Bhai hate to sit with Raquib?” I inquired.
“What happened between them, Bhabi?”
“When your Niru Bhai was ill with that awful disease, everybody in the community checked to see how
he was doing, but not Raquib, not even once. He’s close to our son’s age, and we expected that
he would pay us respect by giving us a call, but he never did,” she complained.
“But Bhabi, I don’t think he meant to disrespect Niru Bhai,” I argued defensively, “This guy’s so busy I don’t think he even calls his wife.”
Now this young man, Mohammed Raquib, had just joined the faculty of a flagship university of our
state no more than six months ago. He appeared to be a congenial man with a frisky personality,
kind of a happy-go-lucky fella, but he was very serious about his career, always writing proposals
for research funds. I suspected that the time constraints that he experienced because of his always
scheming and writing research proposals had thrown him into oblivion that he ought to call an ailing man
and wish him get-well, but Nishi Bhabi appeared to be too hard-hitting to be persuaded with this line
of reasoning. And she was probably right when she argued that it was never a crime to be serious about
one’s career, but he also ought to be able to perform his social duties, however voluntary they might be,
to an acceptable stretch.
I raised no further argument with Nishi Bhabi, but rather reckoned she should have been full
of pique at Raquib’s insolence, and said that Raquib was not a close friend anyway and would be
uninvited for that day and re-invited for another day. That’s how I wheedled and sweet talked Bhabi
and Niru Bhai into coming to my house on Saturday, and on Sunday, I put Raquib with another group
of guests that I didn’t intend to invite at that time.
III
The weekend came and went, but I wouldn’t say it was an experience worth pursuing,
except for the fact that I was happy to see Niru Bhai come back to life, all jocund and lively again.
The bitter end of my experience was, of course, in the kitchen. For a non-cook like me,
venturing into entertaining quite a number of people on two consecutive days was not only idiotically heroic,
but also morbidly dangerous. When one’s raw culinary skills, or non-skills, are teamed up with
nervousness, the outcomes are likely to be a disaster. That’s exactly what happened to me.
And my nervousness came into play when I gave up on simple dishes that I could cook and
decided to give a shot at cooking great dishes of style and taste. After all, Niru Bhai was a man of
style and taste. His penchant for delicacies was well known in the community. Who was what
kind of cook in the community was at his fingertips, and he would award culinary certificates
to the best ones. If you knew what would appeal to his taste buds, whether it was some kind
of Chinese chow-chow or a delectable deshi bharta, and cooked accordingly, you might
end up receiving his certificate vouching that you had just made a successful transition
from being an amateur cook to becoming a domestic chef.
So when I tried to cook polao, I emphasized so much on ghee that I poured too much of it.
Instead of calling it polao, you could call it ghee-dipped rice. When I cooked goat mutton,
I was so eager to put the lid on the pressure cooker to make the meat tender that I didn’t
decoct it well enough to dispel its goat smell. When I tried to cook curry fish, I simmered
it too long to have it actually turned into fish soup. The chicken tandoori turned out to be...I
don’t know what...but you could hardly recognize it as chicken tandoori. And the sweet curd?
That’s a long story, but to make it short, after quadruple trials, boiling the milk at
various lengths, putting more sugar, less sugar, and just-amount-sugar, pouring
various amounts of sour cream at various times, and eventually getting Nora Apa
on the phone in the middle of the night to instruct me one last time, I simply couldn’t
make the milk coagulate, so I gave up on it altogether. These are only a few examples
of my culinary mishaps, but I had many more. The ones that I eventually got right,
I had to cook them twice or more. I was, of course, physically drained, but my
physical exhaustion was dwarfed by my mental anguish. All these, it seemed, were because of
Raquib. Two days of huffing and puffing and sweating and sweltering I blamed entirely on Raquib,
no matter how unreasonable that might be. I even wished he had never been in our town.
IV
That was about three weeks ago. Niru Bhai and Nishi Bhabi surprised me by inviting me
to Madhuban rather quickly, within a month of his convalescence. Only over a month ago,
he was quarantined, and she was the only person he leaned on. And now, no sooner had
they become barely normal enough to smile again than they invited us. What a wonderful gesture!
Niru Bhai and Nishi Bhabi are what we ought to call an epitome of social congeniality.
They aren’t the ones to stay away from people for too long. The dreadful ailment
that had turned their lives topsy-turvy must also have created an indomitable craving for
social touch.
I could barely wait to arrive at Madhuban on that fine spring day.
It’s not that I didn’t crave the multi-course dinner that Nishi Bhabi always cooked, but I
craved the music more, the kind of music Niru Bhai called his soul food, the music that tells a story.
I arrived a little late having spent a good deal of time to pick up a good gift for Niru Bhai
and Nishi Bhabi. When I rang the calling bell, I heard a pair of swift feet thumping toward the door.
The chain rattled, the knob turned, and the door flew open with a laughter that seemed to
reverberate through the long hallway. No, it wasn’t Niru Bhai or Nishi Bhabi—it was Raquib,
the young man who didn’t call an ailing man to wish him get-well. The same buoyancy,
the same frisky happy-go-lucky personality was evident in his laughter and his handshake,
but somehow it didn’t perk up my own mood, which was so muddled by his presence at
Madhuban that, all of a sudden, I felt dizzy. The world, with all its weight, seemed to be leaning
toward me and orbiting round my head. I woefully wondered if my attraction to Madhuban was
turning to be an unwanted repulsion. I somehow dragged my feet into the living room and
sank in a couch. I heard a mystical poem by the great Persian poet Hafiz, set to
music by Ustad Elahi, coming from the Madhuban’s ceiling:
Why don’t you pass through the passage of love?
You have all the means, but you don’t do anything
You have the will power, but you don’t act
You have the chance, but you don’t try
You don’t spend the blood rippling in your heart
In painting His visage.
Although sitting motionless in a state of stupor, I sort of understood what this song
actually meant. Though it cried for my sorrow state, it certainly spoke my heart.
I wondered if Niru Bhai had finally heeded to the query of these mystic words to
patch up his rift with Raquib. “Niru Bhai is right, though,” I comforted myself. “Good
music always tells a good story about us, the story of our greatness as well as our triviality.”
Ustad Elahi indeed sang the story of my feelings.
©2008 by Munir Muztaba Ali
