I am writing this for myself but if someone wants to read it as well, you are welcome. My father passed away on 29th January, 2024 and I wrote this small eulogy for him at that time. I am extending it and posting it here as well.
The relationship between a father and a son can be complicated, especially when the son grows up. My relationship with my father was also complicated. I had some complaints from him and I am sure that he had some complaints from me too. However, it doesn’t change the fact that I have seen him struggle for the education of his children and there are some instances of this struggle that occasionally come in my mind, and after his passing, those instances are making me cry.
I would like to write about some of those instances and some other things below. Since I witnessed this struggle of him for his children, I would say that despite the (sometimes very serious) complaints that I had from him, he was a good father and he has a pivotal part to play in helping me and my siblings reach where they are today.
My father wanted me to become an engineer. This shouldn’t come off as a surprise because many South asian parents want their kids to be engineers or doctors. However, his wish for at least one of his sons to be an engineer probably came from the fact that he himself wanted to be an engineer and tried to be one but due to some circumstances, he had to leave it at the very start.
When I told him in 2014 that I am interested in theoretical physics and not engineering, he was very understanding towards my interests. He asked me to give the ECAT exam anyway and apply for mechanical engineering in UET, Lahore but he said that I don’t have to do an engineering degree even if I am selected in UET, Lahore. When I was selected in UET, Lahore for mechanical engineering, he told me that he won’t put any pressure on me to join UET and he helped me to get an admission in BS Physics at University of the Punjab, Lahore.
I am mentioning this because I didn’t realize hoe rare it is to have a father who doesn’t impose his dreams on you. At that time, almost all of my extended family members were asking me to join engineering but my father used to tell me the responses that I should give in order to deal with the suggestions of the extended family members. I am very grateful to him to help me go in the field that I wanted to study. Later, my father’s dream to have an engineer son was acheived by my brother, who completed his degree in electrical engineering in 2019.
I just can’t forget the night of 21st November 2016 when I was returning from a trip to Islamabad. I was in the university bus and it turned out that they were going to take everyone to the hostel and people would stay there and go back home the next day. I didn’t want to stay in the hostel and when the bus was about to reach a gas station in Allama Iqbal town, I called my father (at 2AM in the morning) and told him that I don’t want to stay in the hotel and asked him if he could come to pick me up from the gas station. That night was really cold (about 2 degree celsius) and my father used to ride a motorbike.
When he came to pick me up after a long journey, I noticed that he wasn’t wearing any gloves. He took me back and I knew how cold the hands can become while driving a bike in such a cold temperature. However, he never gave any indication of the fact that his hands were freezing. I can never forget that night. He came to pick me up at 2 AM in the night although he could ask me to stay in the hostel (and now I think that my demand to pick me up at 2AM was totally unreasonable). That night showed me how much he cares for his children.
I didn’t know about O levels and A levels. My father was the one who said that he wants his children to do O levels and A levels. Due to some financial problems, this dream was hard to acheive. I started to do O levels and later, my siblings also started to do O levels but later (due to some circumstances), they continued with metric and FSc (although they turned out to be really smart. Both of my siblings know way more about software, coding and computers than I would ever be able to know). I continued with my O levels and completed it eventually. However, I knew that for my father, arranging the exam fee for O levels was getting hard. He arranged it somehow and it did put some pressure on me to perform good in exams as it was difficult for my father to arrange the money. In addition, I very well knew the way he used to pay for the books that needed to study, O levels books are quite expensive. The way he used to arrange for money for my books was a clear example of the struggle that he was doing, just so I could do O levels.
A similar story repeated in A levels. It was hard for him to pay for the books that I needed for A levels (although later I found some roundabout ways to study some topics without requiring books). I still remember his Nokia C2-01. He used to have an internet package and he used to give me his cellphone for use. I read a lot of things from the internet using that Nokia C2-01. He did what he could to facilitate our studies. Later, he had to take a loan to give my exam fee for A levels. At that time, I was a bit resentful to him because I expected him to arrange for the money without problems but now I understand that he was ready to sacrifice everything he had for his childrens’ education and he was ready to make it happen, even if it required muck more than his pay check.
For some time, my father used to work for a company that made pesticides for farmers. His role was to lead some product awareness campaigns among farmers in Sindh. He used to go to places like Sukkur and Shikarpur to name a few. In 2010, I went with him to Sukkur for 10 days. In that trip, I used to stay in the hotel and he used to go to his campaign in Shikarpur. One day I went with him to Shikarpur. It was October and thus, it wasn’t a day of summer.
As a person from Lahore, I thought that I have seen hot temperatures but when I went to Shikarpur (in October and not in summer) I realized that its heat was unbearable for me. I never went out of the van that we came in because I just couldn’t bear the scorching sun. And then there was my father, who was constantly in that sun for most part of the day. This was part of the campaign. He had to go to shop and shop (where his stalls were installed) and check if everything is going smoothly. Seeing him working tirelessly in that hot sun again made me realize that how much he was willing to work to ensure the betterment of his family.
He was very passionate to talk about politics (I mean, that isn’t surprising as most dads in Pakistan are very passionate to talk about politics). I am not gonna go in details (you can probably guess the details anyway) but for a long time, I used to support a party that was opposite to the party that he supported. This is again a place where I would love to appreciate his stance. He never forced me to vote for the party that he liked. He always said that it is fine if we won’t agree but I won’t pressurize you for voting a certain party. He was right, he never pressurized me. He took me to the polling both himself, knowing that I am going to vote for the party that is against the party that he is going to vote for (I miss him so much while I am writing this). So much so, when the party that I supported won the elections, I bought dinner for my whole family and he didn’t say that he isn’t gonna eat it because he doesn’t support that party. He did celebrate with me because I was happy after all (to be clear, I don’t support that party now… you may already know this if you follow me).
I wasn’t interested in talking about politics with him but when I came to the US, I used to talk back home and many a times, when I talked to my father, our conversation went for hours because we started talking about different topics including politics, business and many other things (gosh I would give anything right now to have those conversations with him again). He was so passionate about such conversations and very happy to talk to me about such topics.
I wasn’t a history enthusiast (specially Pakistan’s history). As an example, in O levels’ History of pakistan, the last section is about Pakistan’s history after independence. I never liked that part as it was uninteresting for me. My interest in this topic started to develop by seeing my father’s interest in history. He lived through a lot of it and remembered a lot of events by heart. My father’s interest for history had such an impact upon me that even after 13 years of passing my O levels’ history exam (after which I could have stopped reading history), I continued to read Pakistan’s history and many a times, I used to find some lesser known facts about Pakistan’s history and I always looked forward to sharing it with my father and listen to his reaction. This interest in reading Pakistan’s history also made me interested in reading world history later on. So in a large part, I owe this interest to my father.
There are some aspects of his struggle that in my opinion aren’t appropriate to make public. However, those aspects also heart wrenching for me to this day. I will always miss him and I also have some guilt due to the thoughts that probably I didn’t treat him as well as he deserved to be treated. There is a possibility that this guilt may also remain with me for the rest of my life. Right now, I really want to say sorry to him for any instances when I hurt him.
In the end, I would mention again that despite our differences, I loved him so much and his death has left a hole in my life that is impossible to fill.
Hassaan Saleem 