365 Writing Posts: Might as well jump

What’s the biggest risk you’d like to take–but haven’t been able to? What would have to happen to make you comfortable taking it?

In my mind the biggest risk I took was when I enrolled in college. It was a  risk for me, I was young I had no idea who will pay my tuition fees. My father passed away, my mother had no income. She was a housewife, my eldest  brother spent all of Dad’s money in a business he had no clue about.

Where I come from,there is no such thing as a  student loan. If I wanted to study my mother would have to pay for my books and tuition fees.It was not possible for her, the money dad left was wasted by my eldest brother.

Fortunately I had two older brothers who encouraged me to register in the local college and they agreed to take care of my educational expenses, both  were working and getting a decent salary. They also took care of the household expenses which included fees for my younger siblings.

I’m not keen on taking any other kind of risks.

………………………………………:)

Daily Prompt: To Sleep, Perchance to Dream

Sleep is one-third of our lives. Write a post about it. Do you love naps? Have trouble falling asleep? Wish you could remember your dreams? Remember something especially vivid? Snuggle under a blanket, or throw the windows wide open? Meditate on sleep.

I have a definite pattern of sleep. I sleep regularly after ten pm, if I don’t I have difficulty sleeping. When I was very young I used to argue with my eldest brother about our traveling times. He always booked our train journeys at night. This meant I’d lose my sleep.

His reason was if we traveled at night we’d reach our destination in the day time. “But I’d lose my sleep I’d complain.”

As long as all the family members were okay with his decision, he didn’t care what I thought.

I don’t dream much when I sleep, occasionally I dream my purse has disappeared, or I lost something else. When I wake up in the morning I check if everything is in its place.

……………………………………….. 🙂

 

DP Daily Prompt: Cut Off

When was the last time you felt really, truly lonely?

It was a while ago, my mother went to the village to see her sister-in-law, although my eldest brother and his wife were there, I felt uncomfortable and lonely. My brother had just married, and he was one of those men who was always ready to scold us whenever his new bride complained against us.

During this time my aunt(Mom’s youngest sister) came for a visit with her children and uncle also came. Mom left us a servant who she thought would help us. I hate to say it he was dumber than dumb. All he would do whenever I asked him to do something he’d  find a room and fall asleep. My aunt I’m not sure if she ever did any house work, she was a housewife lacking the skills of being one.

It was just me fourteen years old taking care of cooking, even gave a bath to her infant daughter, aunt would sit around and gab. those were the times I missed my mom and dad, I felt lonely I worked day in and day out but never heard a single “Thank You”. My mom was visiting her brother and his wife and dad died when I was twelve. I never had a soul to talk to. my younger siblings were scared of big brother so they kept out of sight.

Those were the kind of days I wished no one should face!

https://sabethville.wordpress.com/2015/02/24/dp-daily-prompt-cut-off/

365 Writing Prompts: Sad but true

Tell us about the harshest ,most difficult to hear— but accurate criticism you’ve ever gotten. Does it still apply?

When I was fourteen my newly married eldest brother, told me I was never going to be anything,because I did not put in the time to study, he was going to marry me off to a farmer, according to him ,it was the best punishment for me.

His new wife complained I was watching too many movies and wasting my time, I had only watched one movie with my aunt who wanted company, and asked me if I’d go with her to watch a movie.

My sister-in- law was peeved because she was not invited, she complained I was not studying.

The criticism was not accurate, I wasn’t a poor student, he knew that, he had to please his wife.

It certainly didn’t apply then and not now either.

Since that time I have successfully completed all the courses of studies I registered for. In the ensuing years he never repeated those terrible words, I did not give him any reason to.

One thing I’m sure about is my father, if he was alive then and heard my brother say those words to me, he’d tell him to pack his bags and leave.

k: https://sabethville.wordpress.com/2014/10/22/365-writing-pr…s-sad-but-true/

365 Writing Prompts: Toy Story

What was your favorite plaything as a child? Do you see any connection between your life now , and your favorite childhood toy.

I grew up in a large family, I didn’t have a plaything which solely belonged to me. We played with a variety of things, one of these was we’d stack up seven  flat stones one on top of the other   and with a tennis ball we tried to hit the stack and scatter the pieces of stones, we continued to play until all the stones were scattered if we missed a shot it would be the turn  of the next sibling.

Our best plaything was the board games,  Monopoly, Scrabble and one other  which I cannot remember.

We had a lot of fun playing , in the game of Monopoly, my eldest brother was always the banker, when he needed money to  keep playing, he’d take some when he thought we were not looking, but I caught him each time. We were very noisy  my mom said I was the loudest, I had to stop playing and help her with some chores.

I cannot see any connection with our game of Monopoly and my life now. I have the board games, I don’t play at all, I miss playing with my brothers. I’m not the noisy one even if we play once in a while. So there is no connection between life then and now.

: https://sabethville.wordpress.com/2014/09/12/365-writing-prompts-toy-story

DP Daily Prompts: Not Lemonade

When life gives you lemons— make something else. Tell us about a time you used an object or resolved a tricky situation in an unorthodox way.

I think it’s a good idea, if life gives you lemons do something else. At one time in my life all I used to get was lemons, no matter how hard I tried, I was never appreciated. The only recourse left for me was to erase the word nice from my vocabulary.

At first I wasn’t comfortable changing my personality.

My eldest brother’s wife always complained to my brother about me, my brother of course took her side and never wanted to hear my side of the story. This happened too frequently for my liking, I decided never to visit him, to relieve me from the stress.

One evening he came for a visit and invited me to go to his house, he said his wife had cooked large prawns he’d like me to go for dinner, I refused and told him, he should  eat his prawns himself I wasn’t interested. Normally I would never say that, but I thought I was doing the right thing because he stopped being nice to me.

https://sabethville.wordpress.com/2014/08/09/dp-daily-prompts-not-lemonade/

 

365 Writing Prompt: We can be taught

Tell us a moment or an incident that you treasure — not necessarily because it brought you happiness, because it taught you something about yourself.

In my childhood I was known for my curiosity, I was never satisfied with a simple answer to my question ,my family had to deal with my why questions,my eldest brother used to be tired of my continuous why questions so much he’d warn me about the famous phrase, “Curiosity killed a cat.”

This never changed my habit of asking the why questions. In 2010 I accidentally heard two verses of Poet and Philosopher Allama Iqbal’s poem, “Masjid toh bana di shab bhar mein” meaning you built the mosque in one night. It aroused my curiosity so much I had to find out why he wrote it ,to me there had to be a reason.I got the help of the internet and got my answer. I realized then how much I adored the writing of this man, I wondered how I could learn more about him.

I thought of my eldest brother who showed me a book where the words, “seek and you shall find” was on the cover of the book, I was eight years old, my brother asked if I understood what the words meant.I looked at him and said, “it means if you look for it you’ll find it.” I did not pay too much attention to it. Those words reverberated in my mind, ‘seek and you shall find.’ when I thought more of how to know more about this awesome Poet and Philosopher Allama Iqbal.

I was amazed how easily I found out what I wanted to know. I was introduced to another great personality via internet he helped me  register in the online course, which was all about Iqbal, I started taking the course since 2011 and am still doing it and learning more and more about my favorite poet.

It seemed to be an ordinary incident which started with my curiosity and ended up helping to know myself better than I ever knew. It has brought me the kind of happiness I never thought possible,one more time I’d conclude by saying,”Seek  And You Shall Find.”

https://sabethville.wordpress.com/2014/06/28/365-writing-pr…-can-be-taught/

DP Daily Prompt: Showdown At Big Sky

How do you handle conflict? Boldly and Directly? Or, do you prefer a more subtle approach?

 

I handled conflict very differently from any of the ones listed,I’d loved to write how I handled conflict, once upon a time.

This is all about my sister-in-law , she joined our family without invitation and was always ready to give us trouble and prove to my eldest brother we were evil.

One day my sis.-in-law prepared lunch as usual, she told the maid she was going to her neighbor’s and would be back before my other brother came home for lunch.She told the maid not to serve lunch until she came back.

 

My brother arrived home for lunch and  asked the maid to quickly bring lunch for him she said she couldn’t because she was told to wait  until Mrs.  was back.The clock was ticking my brother got very impatient I watched him pacing back and forth, and getting angrier every second. He had five minutes left to go back to work and the lady  of the house i.e our sis.-in-law did not come back.

My brother could not keep his temper in check anymore,he went into the kitchen, and started picking up the food pots and tossed them outside one after another until he was done. Then he left. I was horrified I did not know what to do,I thought my eldest brother would come home and get angry with me or even hit me.You might wonder why was I afraid because if anything bad happened my elders used to take it out on me. 

I got dressed up quietly,called a rickshaw and went to our Grandpa’s house. I was safe, Grandpa looked at me and smiled,” what did your sister-in-law do this time?” I didn’t stop shaking, he felt bad for me, he said,”next time come to my house don’t go to your brother’s place”.

This is how I handled that conflict.

 

ttp://sabethville.wordpress.com/2014/04/22/dp-daily-promp…own-at-big-sky/

 

DP Weekly writing Challenge: A synopsis of my memoir

I spent eleven years of my life as a happy go lucky child with very little to complain. Suddenly at age twelve  things were different, I wasn’t carefree anymore. My most important person my Dad passed away.

I with the rest of my family had to move to a place which never felt like home. My mom had difficulty making ends meet. We were scared not knowing what the future holds for us.

Suddenly instead of Dad my eldest brother took over the  family affairs. He was inexperienced, young and lacked patience which was crucial for the head of a large family.We moved from our Granpa’s village to Comilla .  We were hardly settled in our new home, when our eldest brother decided to get married. No one in the family was prepared.

To make matters worse my older brother tried his hand in business, which was completely out of his league. Within a year he lost all the money Dad left for us.

I was barely fourteen but understood what a difficult road lay before us. My second eldest brother was an accountant,he came to our rescue. Whatever he contributed wasn’t enough to meet the family’s needs. My fourth brother agreed to help out.

We were doing fine but we lost all our enthusiasm  in life, we spoke softly, we tried to focus on our studies. We believed education will bail us out of our misery.

Slowly but surely we were moving along hoping the coming days  will be brighter.

I completed my high school exam successfully. I studied four years in two different colleges. After completion I went on to do my masters degree followed by an education degree. For me the years were passing ever so slowly, I needed to work to support myself to avoid being a burden to the rest of the family members.

After completing my education I took the first job offered to me. I taught for eleven months. I then moved to the bigger city to try my luck. I got the job I wanted but was unaware there were some strings attached, the position included looking after seventy-five kids ranging in ages from five to twelve.

I found myself waking up at 5 a.m and going to bed at midnight. This took a toll on my health. I could not complain , I decided to bide my time and leave this place at the first available opportunity. It came when I received a scholarship to study in England. The administration put a number of road blocks on my way to freedom. I was able to break those barriers by my firm resolve.

I went to London for a year and, completed the diploma of ,’Teaching English as a Foreign language.”

When I came back there were jobs I could get but there was a catch none of the places had living quarters for teachers. I stayed six months at home, I was waiting to get a place to live in the city where I intended to teach. Luckily I got one but it didn’t last long because it was a girl’s college hostel and some of the students didn’t like us(other women and I)to live in the hostel, because we were not students.

There were five of us we managed to rent an apartment on the fifth floor. There was no elevator in the building, once we came back after work we never went out it was difficult to climb those stairs more than once.

After a few months I was married to a physician who lived in Montreal. I stayed with my husband’s parents in a remote village which was accessible only by boat. Seven months after my marriage I came to Montreal to join my husband.

My husband was not allowed to practice in Montreal because he was not a Canadian citizen. To be eligible to practice he’d have to wait for two more years, this was the condition only In Quebec.

Our destiny moved us to Gander, Newfoundland , fortunately my husband was able to practice there because he was an immigrant. We made Gander our home hoping to move back to Montreal after two years. A year later my husband’s boss who had promised to hand over his practice to my husband died in a highway accident. A year and a half later my husband had a myocardial infarction. After this incident we gave up the idea of moving out of Gander.

I taught In Gander for a while. My husband had health issues particularly with his heart, we decided to move to the capital because the facilities were much better.

My life after age twelve until I completed my education was the worst years of my life. It was better after I finished my education and started working.

Young people face more challenges today than me, ours was different we were not bombarded with technological advance.

http://sabethvillewordpress.com /2014/03/11/march-11-weekly writing challenge-a synopsis of my memoir/

https://sabethville.wordpress.com/2014/03/11/dp-weekly-writ…s-of-my-memo

DP Daily Prompt: Sweet Sixteen https://sabethville.wordpress.com

I hear about ‘Sweet Sixteen often. I didn’t get the pleasure of celebrating it. It came and went like any other day in the calendar. When I think hard,I remember I was in college. Mom received a letter from one of my brothers, my second eldest brother was critically ill. Mom had the letter in her hand crying a river. I’d have to go to Chittagong ASAP to look after him. Was there anyone else with him,I know you’d think? My eldest brother, his cranky wife and did I forget, my sister who considered herself a princess would probably had no time to look after the brother.

Who would be shipped there but little old me?  I should feel good at the thought, Mom didn’t trust them . Here’s the problem I was acting as a nurse for my brother,I’d assume this was the reason for me to be there. Then the cranky one would bellow as if I was taking away her freedom.

After a few days of helping my brother, I suddenly overheard the princess telling the other siblings, I was there because I wanted to skip school. I get it they do not require my services any longer. Is this the way to show gratitude? Well I don’t know how anyone else would react,I packed my bag in a jiffy and was out the door, the princess was inwardly pleased but stopped me and said, “Ranu where are you going? My reply was I’ve heard your voice which is enough for me to leave.

This was my “Sweet Sixteen story, I bet you’re surprised !

http://dailypost.wordpress.com/2014/01/20/daily-prompt-sixteen/ https://sabethville.wordpress.com/