The Great Leveller

We all have memories from school days. The strongest memories about school are either the sweetest ones, or the bitterest ones. I remember a teacher in school who was the worst there ever could be. Very harsh and bitter by nature, she almost hated children. She used to rap our knuckles with all her might, and derived sadistic pleasure when we writhed in pain. I don’t remember if I dreaded her more or hated her more, but I’m sure she had a strong dislike for me. I never really forgot her, and like a recurrent nightmare she was often in my thoughts even decades after I left that school. Then one fine day as I sat in my hospital office waiting for the next patient to come in, I saw a frail old lady walk inside with a smile on her face. She kept on looking at me as if prompting me to recognize her. I did in an instant, and froze. Here she was, in front of me again. Clutching a polythene bag in emaciated hands, she was dressed very differently now in a full-body hijab, as her sparse, grey hair peeped out of the head-piece. Sunken and dull eyes, high and prominent cheek bones under paper-thin facial skin made for a sorry picture. She continued to smile as I looked at her dumbstruck. Despite her appearance I felt as if I were the same puny child in front of the monster of a teacher.

‘May I sit down?’ she asked.

Inadvertently, I stood up and blurted out, ‘G- -Good morning miss, please have a seat.’ (Irrespective of the marital status, we addressed all our lady teachers as ‘miss.’)

‘How are you Ishtyaque,’ she said, ‘you have become a doctor; I thought you’d not recognize me.’ How cold I ever forget you, miss. And perhaps this was the first time I heard her address me by my first name, else, I were either a ‘hey, you!’ or at best, ‘hey, Ansari!’

I did not know how to respond. So I didn’t. I just stood there.

Then slowly and fastidiously, she went on to narrate the plight of her family and how poverty gripped them over years, resulting from a succession of misfortunes. I listened in rapt attention and watched her eyes well-up when she talked about her brother’s hip fracture.

‘He slipped and fell in the bathroom, doctor,’ she said pulling out a couple of x-ray films from the polythene bag. From ‘hey you!’ to ‘doctor’ was a big transformation, and I could not believe my ears. The fracture was bad, and needed a major surgery.

‘How much would the surgery cost, doctor? My brother does not have an insurance and..’ she trailed off and I knew.

Two weeks later when her brother was about to be discharged from the hospital, recovering from a successful surgery, my teacher said some words to me that I cannot write here in order to preserve an elderly person’s self-respect. But she pressed into my hands a ‘taveez’ which she said would protect me from fearing anyone in my life ever. I wondered if she could have given it to me in class 5.