A faithful moment

I had an interesting experience recently. I decided to do up our bedroom while Gurtaj was away on a business trip, as a surprise. So I hired a contractor to coordinate the 5-day effort. In India, workers and contractors are normally bad news. They never deliver on time, they ask for huge advances, and they trick you into also doing this and that around the house, so as to get more money.

However, Akram bhai was the most pleasant surprise! This thin, bearded gentleman with a steely face appeared on my doorstep to inspect the room shortly after I had called him. He scanned the walls and ceiling with expert eyes, and before he could say anything, I told him, in my most earnest broken Hindi, that this was all a surprise for my husband. He looked at me, quiet and confused how to react, and I knew I had won. He said he would call me in half an hour to confirm. "Yea, yea," I thought, "Let's hope he will call me tomorrow". But in half an hour shap my mobile rang and Akram bhai formally committed to start work at 9 am the next day.

The workers turned up on time, worked efficiently and orderly. Akram bhai used to come every morning to discuss the tasks of the day, and every evening to check out the result. I was truly amazed by the porfessionalism. By listening to their conversations, I soon found out that he was simultaneously supervising projects at 5-6 other houses, some as far as Thane. Work never ceased even on Sundays.

This made me look at him and his workers with deep empathy and respect for their hard work. So I would make sure that every day they got unlimited tea and sandwiches. And I made sure I greeted them with a smile and small talk every time they came. Soon enough, I was calling the eldest painter "mama" (uncle) which thouroughly amused them all.

One day, I don't really remember how, I started with Akram bhai one of these endless doorstep conversations, just as he was leaving for another site. Our conversation drifted off in the porcelaine-like fragile area of religion. By now, those of you who know India well, would have realised from his name that he was a Muslim. And here, like everywhere in the world, there is a lot of prejudice and preconception. To me, passing thorugh predominantly Muslim areas, means casting my eyes down, and making sure not too much skin is showing, and also averting my eyes from the slaughter houses along the road. I remember Muslim boys on JJ Flyover breaking cat's eyes. And huge Muslim gatherings on the ground next to Bombay Gym Khana, with propaganda blasting from huge speakers, and crowds of men clad in white gawking at us taking our evening walk in our privileged cocoon.

Two of the most charismatic Muslims I had met were the deadly funny fimls head of my ex-employer, ad agency Leo Burnett, Firoz, who used to make us roll on the floor with laughter, and treated us (200 of us!) to biryani et the end of each Ramzan; and Mumtaz, a Singapore-based Indian woman of 43, GM of Club Med for Asia Pacific, a deeply religious and spiritual woman living in a joint family, who could dance the night away and put us all to shame with her energy to party.

But I am deviating here...

Akram bhai asked me, "you have traveled around the world, which do you think is the best community?" I said something which is quite a cliche, but in which I firmly believed till this conversation. I answered that while in writing religions may seem different, at the base they are all represent the same values - love and the victory of good over evil. And that unfortunately a handful of people use religion to pervert it to suit their own interests.

I though that the conversation was over, but the simple Akram bhai surprised me with some deep thoughts. First, he said he disagreed that all religions were the same. And he explained how, according to him, Allah was in the beginning of all other religions. He also surprised me with an explanation of why Allah was different from Jesus (something about the status of a fallen angel and Jesus being born by humans). He also recommended the works of a particular Muslim scholar who could make me understand Islam better.

He predicted, that in about 30 years, there will be harmony between religions, but that in the meanwhile there will be many wars. Which made my skin crawl. I did not dare to ask him if he thought that these wars were justified, and in vain I scanned his face to see if he supported them. But all I could see was acceptance of something he saw as inevitable, for whatever reason.

He also showed me on his mobile phone a call for a Muslim peace conference and invited me. "We will take care of you there," he said (I did not go as I am highly uncomfortable in big crowds). And promised to get the Quran for me.

And well enough, after the work was over and the house got empty, I looked at the dining table and saw a neat parcel containing two volumes of the Quran, along with a dictionary of terms... Left there without any fuss.

I have kept it carefully on my book shelf, wondering if it is a sin to read it even before I have read the holy book of my own religion - the Bible. I guess this will prompt me to read both (watch this space). But what I appreciate most about this conversation, was the fact that once again it helped me see a face amongst the crowd, and hear a voice that made me think. And despite what Akram bhai said, I am still convinced that in our core, we are all the same, and we want the same things out of life.

I am wondering how would he react if I gift him a Bible for Christmas :-)