A Long Jihad. Muhammad Abdul Bari
from London, so Mostafa and I decided to spend a couple of days visiting some nearby seaside towns and a few more days in London. We took a taxi to Sleaford with our luggage and were on our way to London once again. After few busy days of shopping and meeting friends, we were on a Bangladesh Biman plane once again, returning to Dhaka, which when we got there was soaked with summer monsoon rain. After a couple of weeks break with family and friends, the two of us arrived at Jessore Air Base, in western Bangladesh, for our main physical training.
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We were kept busy with over six months of gruelling physical training, but we were not using any of the skills that we had learned at our valuable course in Cranwell. It was frustrating and our knowledge was getting rusty; we should have attended the course after basic military training, we thought. In any case, life continued: Mostafa got married and my father was also reminding me to do the same. I could find no reason to disagree with him and began inquiring about potential spouses. Our training finished towards the middle of 1980 and both of us were posted to Dhaka Air Base.
It was in the officers mess in Dhaka that I became somewhat settled, with time again to think and reflect about my life and do some forward planning. But life as a junior officer was regimented, with unexciting office work in the morning, lunch at the mess, a games session in the afternoon and then occasional formal events in the evening. It was a stable but boring experience, there were few contemporary books or journals, so I tried to build connections with some of my army and navy friends by visiting them occasionally.
As I was not far away from my village, I tried to visit home more frequently to see my elderly father. My older brother was now deeply entrenched in various community projects; he was running a secondary school that he had helped establish, plus a religious school (madrasah) for children to memorize the Qur'an, and a bazaar was also springing up nearby. He was the main man behind all this! His wife and my father lamented one day that he was doing all this at the cost of his own health and his children's education. I was younger than him by ten years, but I chatted with him one night and implored with him not to ignore his health and family. He was loud and boisterous, and with an infectious smile he laughed off my suggestion as if it was coming from a little boy. After quietening down he asked me in a combative mood: 'Who's going to do all this then? Find me someone.' I thought it was beyond my ability to convince him, and I just ended by saying: 'Please, do not ignore your children at least'. He loved his work, and used to spend hour after hour every day helping others, particularly poor lower-caste Hindus. He continued this for another two decades when he was diagnosed with a killer disease, late-stage bowel cancer. When I went to see him he was the undisputed leader of the region, both Muslims and the Hindu minority, and it was painful to see him suffering. He urged me to support his children when he would not be there. Sadly, he passed away within a month of my return to London.
Apart from the initial charm of living in the officers' mess in a posh area of Dhaka, the capital city of Bangladesh, there was little opportunity to learn and develop oneself further. Some of my friends had already got married, some had left for America and one or two had left their Air Force jobs and were making money in industry or by setting up their own businesses. Without informing the Air Force Board, I began exploring a future in the academic world. Gaining admission to any western university for a PhD in, say, physics was not that difficult, but securing funding was the main obstacle. I asked a few of my friends in Britain to see whether they could help me, and Aziz Bhai worked hard to put me in touch with the physics departments of some London universities. In the meantime, early in 1981 Mostafa and I were promoted to Flying Officers.
During this uncertainty, one afternoon my maternal uncle (Nuru mama) came to see me in the officers' mess. He had a thick envelope in his hand and I remembered I had used his home as my postal address before joining the Air Force. I opened it and saw it was from the King Faisal Foundation (KFF) in Saudi Arabia. I quickly read it, then paused and read it again. Nuru mama observed my facial expression and asked: 'What's in it, dear Bhagne (nephew)?'
I abruptly stood up and hugged him. He was perplexed. 'What's the matter, my nephew?' he asked again.
With excitement and a loud voice, I said: 'Mamma (uncle), I've been awarded a scholarship from the King Faisal Foundation to do a PhD!' He sat silent for a few seconds, then stood up and hugged me tightly. A worrying thought arose and I said: 'But, I'm in the Air Force now and have just been trained in the UK. Will I be allowed to take up this opportunity?'
He advised me to work it out and left me with a positive comment: 'Don't worry, there'll be a way out, inshallah (God willing).'
My mind was buzzing, how could I avail this opportunity? But first I realized that I needed a PhD enrolment from a British university, and so I informed Aziz Bhai of the news and requested his continued help. I also consulted Mostafa and a few close friends on what to do next. We were all junior officers, and we came up with a plan that I ought to talk with the head of the Armament Branch. As I was setting this plan in motion, another surprise was waiting for me: I received an official memo from Air HQ that I was selected to attend a six-week British Army course at Chattenden in Kent, England, which would start in a few weeks. I agreed to attend the course in England and asked the KFF if they could place a hold on my scholarship offer.
Soon, I was back in London again.
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My six-week stay in Kent was memorable not only for its tough training and long fasts, since Ramadan fell that July, but also for finding my life partner, Sayeda. Fasting was a challenge for two reasons: sleep deprivation, given I had to wake up and eat before dawn (suhur); and day-long physical training during the summer months. As my stay there was longer than fifteen days, I could not call myself a traveller (musafir), which allowed observant Muslims to excuse themselves from fasting. However, with intention and determination, and with God's mercy, I survived. It was a once-in-a-lifetime experience.
I met Sayeda's older brother by accident, but it was a meeting that was to change my life forever. As the journey to London was just over an hour by train, I would visit Whitechapel for a couple of weekends to relax and meet the friends I had made last time. One weekend, I bumped into a well-dressed gentleman in the East London Mosque, which was then still just a hut. I recognized his face as someone I had met in Dhaka, at a mutual friend's house. Firdaws was a few years older than me, but was very sociable and we had a good chat. I discovered that he had come to London two years earlier to do a course leading to chartered accountancy. When he learned that I was living near Rochester, he offered to visit me at the officers' mess, as he often came to Rochester to help his brother-in-law in running a restaurant.
He arrived the following weekend. He told me he hailed from Bangladesh's southern district of Faridpur, but had settled further south in Barisal. We talked on many issues, including our future plans in life, and in that relaxed conversation the issue of marriage naturally came up. He was married with a little daughter and by that time I had also been thinking of getting married myself, and had always been fairly straightforward. So without much thought, I said: 'Firdaws bhai (respected brother), you've now learned something about me. If you come across a suitable girl for me, please let me know.' It was normal at that time to seek assistance about marriage from friends. He thought for a while: 'Yes, I may know someone who you might like!' he warmly replied. 'This girl I'm talking about,' he said, 'has been brilliant since her primary years; she recently sat her final economics exam from Dhaka University and is waiting for the result. Her father is a senior education officer, and her brothers and sisters are all settled in their life after higher education. Most importantly, she's been brought up in an honest family with good religious practice.'
He gave me some more information, before adding: 'If you feel positive and want to know more about this girl, I can inform her family but they will want to know about your background as well.' I gave him some brief details about me and my family. Before parting, he said: 'If you are really serious about the girl please let me know before you return to Bangladesh and I can inform her family.'
'I'll definitely let you know, inshallah', I said.
A few days later I got a call from Firdaws: 'Bari bhai, I thought I would visit you again, but cannot due to my work pressure. I didn't disclose on that day that the girl I mentioned is my younger sister, Sayeda.