Ujala
Entry 1
Word count: 1572
1990
Ujala Siddiqui sat in a widow seat of the plane, looking down at the expanse of turquoise ocean, receding swiftly and embracing land. Her heart thudded loudly in her chest as she fingered a gold pendent hanging on a thin chain around her neck. The pendent spelled “Siddiqui” in a beautiful, cursive script. It was her married name and a present from her husband who was dozing quietly in the seat next to her.
Ujala’s other hand was tucked under her banarasi dopatta. She had intricate henna patters on both of her hands, flowers, vines, stars scattered all over her soft palms and long fingers. She tried to keep a safe distance from Ammar Siddiqui, her husband, because the very first thing that he had said to her when he had walked into their hotel room after the wedding was “I have a strong aversion to the smell of henna. I can’t stand being close to you until that sick brown color washes out of your hands.” Then he had tossed a small velvet-lined box on the bed where she was sitting and staring him in disbelief. “Here, wear it. My mother said I am to give this to you, although, for what I do not know, and do not care to find out,” he said gruffly before walking into the adjoining bathroom and running the bath.
She looked at him now, snoring softly, a thin line of drool dripping from the corner of his mouth. She did not feel love for him, not even the slightest adoration. But she remembered a time only a few weeks ago when she had agreed to marry this man with the intention of trying to love him. She had told her sister “Love comes with time, Sahar. I do not love this man. But, I am ready to love him.”
She had agreed to marry him, not because he was an American citizen, not even because he had his own construction business in San Francisco, California, and not because she wanted to leave Pakistan. She had married him because it had been her father’s will. She had been taught since she was a little girl that one day she is to marry and have a home. She is to tend for her husband and her children and be a good wife and a good mother. And then such a day had arrived. All too soon opportunity had knocked on her door although it was neither welcome nor expected.
She remembered that day. She had come home from her summer teaching job at the Lahore Tutoring Center for Pre-Medical Students to find the drawing room occupied by guests. She assumed that her father being a retired professor was entertaining old acquaintances, students perhaps. She took the back door to the kitchen where she saw her mother cooking fresh pakoras and tandoori drumsticks.
“Why so much fanfare for a few guests?” asked Ujala munching on a potato pakora.
“You remember Uncle Tariq whose son went to America eight years ago? Your father’s friend from the University,” her mother inquired. “Well, he is back. All of thirty years and already has his own business in a place called California. Perhaps it is a city? Or a big town?”
She had known from the slight tilt of her mother’s head, the way she put the spatula down and slowly turned to look at her. She had known what the purpose of the visit was. She wanted to protest that it seemed like she was not adequately prepared for the responsibility of being a wife, and that too of a man who was all but a foreigner and ten years her senior.
“I expect you want me to get dressed,” she commented instead of voicing all that was going on in her mind and walked upstairs to her room. She remembered clearly what she had done that afternoon. She had worn a simple, starched yellow cotton Shalwar Qameez, and tied her long brown hair in a lose chignon at the base of her neck. She had taken a long time to decide how to wear her dopatta. At the end she had decided to spread it across her upper body rather than covering her head.
She walked into the room with a tea-trolley that her mother had set up for her in the kitchen and greeted no one in particular and everyone all together in a strong, steady voice, with her eyes lowered to the ground. Her father invited her to sit by his side and she obliged. They talked about many things that evening. Ammar Siddiqui and Mr. Siddiqui had told tales of America and its glory and the opportunities in that country that were beyond the comprehension of white-collar teaching staff in Pakistan.
“Why don’t you move there too, Mr. Siddiqui,” Ujala’s father, Mr. Mir had asked.
“No, Mr. Mir. I have spent my whole life here. Who would want an old, retired Literature professor in America? I have my students here, and my friends. My daughters are settled here. As you know, one is in Karachi and has two sons. The other one is in Bahawalpur. It is time for Ammar to settle down now and start his life. I have lived mine contently.”
They had moved on to talk about Ujala’s education. She told them she had a B.Sc. in Biology and a B.A. in English Literature.
“MashAllah, that is wonderful,” Mrs. Siddiqui said, beaming at her.
And then Ammar talked directly to her. It was the first time that he had addressed her that evening.
“Why didn’t you get a Masters, Miss,” he asked.
She cleared her throat nervously. She did not know whether it would be inappropriate for her to answer her suitor’s question directly in the presence of her parents. After a moment’s hesitation, she decided to answer it.
“Because I wanted to teach,” she said simply. It was the truth.
She was asked by her mother to clear the dishes and she left the room shortly after that mundane exchange with the man who was sitting in her father’s drawing room pursuing her hand in marriage.
Later that week, her mother told her that the wedding would be in a month. And that was that.
She nudged him now, her finger carefully wrapped in her dopatta.
“Wake up. They announced we will be landing in a few minutes,” she whispered near his ear.
He opened his eyes, still groggy from his five hour nap. His eyes hovered over her face as if he didn’t recognize her. Then the last remnants of sleep left him and he jerked away from her hand.
“Don’t touch me. Your hands smell,” he said harshly.
She swallowed a large lump in her throat. Once. Twice. Three times. And turned away to look outside the window.
“For the love of God, change into something presentable. My friends will be here to pick us up. You look so…” he seemed to search for a word “red.”
A few minutes later the plane landed on San Francisco International Airport and Ujala Siddiqui walked behind her husband of ten days clutching a small carry-on bag and her passport.
“Thank you for traveling with us,” a pretty, blond flight attendant smiled brightly at both of them.
“You’re most welcome. It was a comfortable flight,” said Ammar, returning her smile and touching her lightly on her upper arm.
The flight attendant batted her lashes, and then looked from Ammar to Ujala and back.
“Have a lovely evening,” she continued smiling.
“And you too,” sang Ammar as he walked ahead of his wife.
Ujala saw this exchange and bit on her peppermint chewing gum a bit harshly. She gave a taut smile to the flight attendant and followed her husband.
“Didn’t you have anything normal in that carry-on bag? Do all of your clothes look like this?” he asked her, walking briskly toward the baggage claim.
“It’s a cotton Shalwar Qameez, Ammar,” she said quietly.
“Exactly my point. It’s a bloody Shalwar Qameez. And you have a degree in what? English is it?” He did not wait for an answer to this sarcasm.
She followed him quietly, blinking back tears. It seemed like that was all she had done these last ten days of her married life. Smiling for the benefit of her parents, her in-laws, her sister, smiling for everyone, and sobbing into the hotel’s feather pillows at night as Ammar invariably smoked cigarette after cigarette on the balcony, cooing into the cordless phone.
Ammar picked up their bags, put them on a cart and started wheeling it towards the sliding doors. Ujala followed half-heartedly. The two doors opening and closing as people walked through them frightened her. She was about to walk into a new life that she was completely unprepared for. She wanted to flee, to run, to scream. And then resolve formed inside her heart as it had so often for the last ten days. “I am a married woman,” she thought. “This is it, for better or for worse.”
Ujala Siddiqui walked out into the cold San Francisco wind, wearing a simple cotton Shalwar Qameez, with her henna-painted hands huddled behind her dopatta as her husband walked ahead of her, and so she breathed her first large gulp of air on American soil.
yes, *sob*. The first four chapters have grabbed my attention
I wanna know more!!
Fully agree with Sidra…I really want to know what happens to her now!
I love the flow ..Its a very sensitive issue for traditional girls!
uffffffffffffffff HURRY UPPP YAR… kab post karni hai agli kist.uff. mujay Ammar nazar aa gaya na Frisco mein, tou i will KILL him.
hahaha Saadi you are too cute!
i know i am
nice work yar. MashAllah. you are an amazing writer. so far bahot achi ja rahi hai story. cant wait to check out the next chapter InshAllah soon.
Wssalam
Benn reading this for over an hour–very enjoyable indeed–but you could make this all into a full-fledged novel if u fill it out a bit more in the beginning, and also if you try to give Ammar more of a chracter than the soddy, good-for-nothing husband that he is. All this could be made much more complex if the cliches were blurred somewhat.
Thanks, Aamna! Consider this an outline in its very early stages. All I am doing at this point is giving myself a parameter to work within, some standard boundaries, etc. This is not even the first draft, so the characters will be fleshed out a lot in the first and subsequent drafts. Thank you so much for your comments and for taking the time to read this. Please feel free to critique any aspect of the story and point out anything that it lacks at this point. : )
WGB!!!!!!!!! I love it. I need to read the rest of it pronto. And I also want to know how Ujala looks. DASTI!!!!!!!!!!
heyyy…surprise surprise =)..when is the next entry coming ..hurry up ..you are done with your exams now.
soon soon!! : )
hey this is the first time im reading ur stuff. i like it alot and n w8ing 4 the next to cum.
You are an excellent writer in the sense that u portray ur protagonist like all great writers do; so that the reader feels at one with her, feels her pain and dreams her dreams. As soon as I caight sight of the ‘updated’ beside ur name, I went and grabbed a couple of cocomo packets and sat down to read…so uv got a loyal reader here.
I really don’t know what to say at this point; I just hate the way some men try to dominate women in every way, but as good as the story is, it’s still too typical for me…maybe I’ve read too many Agatha Christies, but the word ‘twist’ comes to mind. The plans a woman makes, the way the man destroys it, the adjusting to circumstances…we’ve all read books like that haven’t we? It’s an interesting concept, but I NEED something new
Thank you for your comments and loyalty. It is very encouraging. I have not accomplished enough in my writing to have a following. There is more to come in this story. All I will say at this point is that this story does not revolve around a man destroying a woman’s plans. There is more to it than that, and you will see later on that there will definitely not be any ‘adjusting to circumstances.’ I hate adjustment and I detest catering to someone else’s needs and desires, therefore you will find that my protagonist will reflect this frustration. I have not yet mastered my writing enough to detach and alienate myself from my characters. They have my weaknesses and my strengths. Hopefully, you will find something different here. Your comments and suggestions are welcome and highly appreciated.
Hi! I’ve just come across this site… and ive got hooked to ur beautiful story… i cud actually feel the emotions going through Ujala… I just cant wait 4 u to update really wanna knw wht happens next… ur writing is excellent mashaAllah… keep up the good work!
i read all the eight entries in one go
and it gripped me like anything!!
very nice effort i must say!!
Ainee…I want to read the next bit. Hurry up. And yes, how does ujala look?
I just read till you 12th entry and I’m totally completely in love with ur dialogue use in that entry! Awesome work, seriously!
I’m glad you liked it, Sidra. I reread it and caught some typos. Did you catch them too? Anyway, this is the first draft. Hopefully I can improve it by leaps and bounds when and if I get to the second draft. : )
lovely story! really enjoyed it. im gonna make sure i have something yummy to eat when i read the rest of it. Best of luck!
brilliant story! i truly enjoyed reading it. and im gonna make sure i have something yummy to eat when i read the rest of it. Besta luck!
whoops. it didnt seem like it was working the first time. challo you deserve two different posts of praise..write the rest soon plz!
i thought u would take it further,, i kept coming to the website and kept anticipating that you would add something else into it as well…but u didnt, and after reading the recent comments it seems that you brought the novel to its end…
i would say its good one, you really done well and i liked reading it and i read the whole of it in one go. but i was thinking of some ending you know ending after which we say “and they live happily ever after”, in this case it seems she has still alot left over like she would file her divorce and then telling her parents ‘the truth’ would also prove a real drama considering the mind set of our society…
sooo, it seems she is not gonna live happily ever after…
but then taking it from the other angle real life is not about living happily ever after, life is combination of good things and bad things and i think that life is constant struggle if you really want to live to its fullest, …so ujala is gonna live life to its fullest with her refreshed zeal to live and move on and keep struggling for better.
good luck to her!!
hey, rsh, thanku for coming back to read. Actually the novel hasn’t come to an end yet. There are a total of 13 entries up. There is some glitch in the website so it’s only showing 7 of them right now. Noor has added alot to it, those entries will soon be up again Insha’Allah. Ujala has alot in store for us and so does Noor
Please do visit back to read more. I will let you know when the remaining entries are up on the site.
Thank you all so much for your interest. I really appreciate that you all took the time to read and comment on the story. RIL has been a companion in writing, and I value this companionship. InshAllah I will keep posting entries, and hopefully when I get to the second draft, we can publish that here too. : )
thanks for the clarification dear administrator:)
It is a story heard before sadly,a story of many sheltered,unsuspecting eastern women who unflinchingly place blind faith in their parents for securing them a future of stability..knowing little what lies ahead. but the true test is the strength of character that i see abundantly in ujala..either you can wallow in self-pity or you can walk away from it with nothing else but dignity.Weakness is a notorious immorality and yet it is human nature to succumb to it as it seemingly is the easier way out.
I love the journey of self exploration of ujala and cant wait to read what she makes of her life..and hopefully that hick of a husband should come crawling back to her..it would’nt hurt.
thankyou ms Noor for giving me a good read,although there is room for improvement but i can easily say that i actually felt every emotion warring inside of her.
My compliments.
hey, i visited after a couple of weeks..the novel has not been updated…
wake up administrators, wake up!!!