Dear Bernhard :
Its really been long time since I have written you. One of the reasons, behind not writing you is; may be its because we are seeing each others, at least couple of time a year. Of course, there used to be time when we used to see each other for long gap almost 9 years gap, so this is not the case now a days.
What makes me write you this letter is, my visit to Chitwan, last October. I make it every year During Dashain I visit my brother. I had a conversation with a guy, in the micro-bus. I was on my way to Chitwan with my Bhauju ( my youngest brother’s wife ). There in the micro-bus was our neighbour from chitwan, who had stayed in Kathmandu for quite long time and he too was on his way to home for Dashain. During our small chat on the bus before I went sick inside the bus; he did help me to understand one thing which I knew for quite some time, but had not got it quite clearly though. He being born and raised in the Terai area and having stayed in Kathmandu for his work proved quite handy for me to understand the difference between the land division in the Kathmandu and Terai area.
My youngest brother along with other four had inherited some land which he got as part of his share. In Nepal fathers had to transfer, their property in equal shares to his son(s). If he does not, the sons will make him, to divide it in equal shares, No favoritism.
There are about 27 Kattas of land on his name - not all of it he got at a inheritance. There is some percentage of land - my guess is - about 15% of the total land he must have got from his other brothers, as a clearance of the money they had borrowed from him. My point is, I did not knew how much is that much land ? 27 kattas was just a figure for me before I had taht small chat with that guy on the bus. How big it is or how small that 27 katta means. 27 kattas make 18 ropanis of land as per Kathmandu calculation term, which is big enough for me. That much is substantial land to own, to any one.
Okay, I still don’t know how many hector or acer that much land makes, so that I can make you understand. But they say there is a thousand way to skin a cat. One third of that much land in the breakfast belt of our country is not only enough to feed a family of four for a whole year but they can send them in decent school too.
Of course they really have to work hard for this, but who do not have to work hard to earn decent meal !
My other brother, the middle one is living on less than one third of that much land. What i find it so Interesting is the 18 ropanis of land has been barren since 1995. This is also the year my brothers lost their father. Its so that he could not sell it and his oldest brother is the main reason he is having hard time selling it. He can not sell the land without his help and he will not let him sell without he getting bigger pie of the share. If there are questions in your mind about why so, same here with me also.
I hope, you do remember, last time in March 2010 when you were here in Nepal; I told you, I came to know about the death of my biological father in the year 2000 only; about six years after his demise. It was the year i had visited my brothers after 12 plus years. He died a year after I graduated from college and surprisingly, I had never seen him before nor heard his voice. I also do not remember his desire to see me or know me. There were people to float his news.
During my first visit to my brother in 2000, When I asked my brother ( I stay only with my youngest brother during my visit in Chitwan ) “do you have a picture of him ?” They handed me one. on which a frail sick man who seem to be wearing his skin as a cloth looks much lean and lanky was lying on the bed already dead.
“ who keeps a dead man’s picture ?” I asked.
They said, “this is the only picture of him.”
I also remember telling you in front of so many children that when all I wanted to do is to go to college after school and be independent, none of my brothers came forward to pick up my college bill. Not a single brother came out with a solution, suggesting with the idea to pick just one months bill by one person and or the combined for a month or book bill for whole year.
The truth and the hard fact is that my college going was the one topic never been spelled by my brothers nor by their father.
Let me clear out the air here about, one more truth here, I did not knew that I had a father. There was always a confusion about his being, like how many brothers I have five or seven. Some times the news came, I have and some times the news came; I don’t have. Some times news came he is still alive but mentally disturbed, News came from the bigger brothers, not smaller one.
My youngest Bhauju, who took care of him at the time of his sickness when he was on his deathbed; tells me he was a very much normal person when he died.
As a child, growing up in an orphanage; it did not matter to me much or let me be honest, at all that I have a father or not. I was not just one orphaned child, as you know, there are hundreds of them like me in that big Rana Era Palace. We were blissfully innocent enough to understand the value of parents around us. Luckily and the by the grace of God, we were in very good conditions without them being around us.
What nags me, is that I was just a child and did not know about the existence of him. My mother ( the most uncomfortable word for me to pronounce ) died when I was only three, and that was the time we landed in an orphanage. Me and my youngest brother were put in Naxal. My other two brothers were placed in Shiphal, you know the place because that is where Dhana was placed for some time, its only for boys; and the forth one who was a little more bit big to keep in an orphanage, was kept in the royal palace for some time. I am not quite sure for how long he stayed in the place. And the biggest one has no option but to remain with his father.
My biggest brother has a hump on his back, for which he blames his father. He told me about it, when I was still a teenager; during his visit to me, he got it because he did not do his chores, so the hump is there.
None of my brothers have seen the face of college, you know, they never visited me there. I am the only one from my family to go to college and graduated. You know what, I am the only girl and the youngest one in my family to make it. I would not have gone to colleges and find myself independent today if my biological father would have been in a position to decide my future. Education was not on his priority list .
Thank God you were there for me and not him !
How thankful I am that, that was the time you came in my life. Your entrance in my life is like god sent angel, which in fact changed my whole life including my perception in bigger sense.
Some times, my brothers talk about the unclaimed land in the Shaktikhor area, big land; some 7 bighas in their fathers’ name. The problem is nobody can go and claim it, because none of the brothers have the document to claim it. They just have the knowledge about the land being in their fathers name. Did I ever told you, we are the flood victims. The flood that not only swept our house and the land but it also dispersed the siblings from their remaining single parent, so the documents must have been lost then.
I am not much close with my brothers, never felt comfortable sharing my problems with them; and neither asking ‘help me I am in trouble which you get lost from me !’ Just the light talk, nothing serious. The four broters are also not much close with each others, four of them turn the four different directions.
But there is this line in my head for so long and I cant remember how this line is so engraved in my mind for this long and I have no idea how and when it got there. “ we were dispersed as a family not because the flood swept the whole village including ours but because he was devastated by the death of his wife.”
What I find so nagging here, about my biological father is; he choose to pull himself from me through out his life after the death of his wife, was he locked up emotionally (?), Did not think it necessary to visit me, not even once in his life, not in the orphanage and not after that. He did not do anything, that I remember him or know him well, long after he is gone. I mean even long after his death.
His excuse to the devastation or may I say, his reaction was (?), he was an adult at the time of tragedy happened in his life which shocked him for longer than that should have lasted and I was blissfully unaware to the fact because I was so young to understand the gravity of the situation that happened in my life also became my excuse for not remembering whole scene that went around me.
How thankful I am, that that was the time you came in my life. Your entrance in my life: when I was only a teenager and just out from school and about to go to college, and when five men - one of my brother is retard who got lost more than a decade ago in India when he went to India for medical treatment with his biggest bother - in my life was reluctant to pick up my bills, not just college bills but any bills.
The time is what makes me to think: you have been a God sent angel in my life. A right person at the right time.
That phase of my life, in fact kind of changed my whole perception about having it all and not having it at all. I think you came in my life, because God felt really bad, sad and sorry for me. I mean really bad for my condition and not being able to grasp the bad time might have awaited for me. Today I think that if you are in my life, its only because God wanted to say sorry to me. I did not exactly prayed for some one to reduce my trouble. Did not get it early in my life when you were there to ease out my hard life. I was taking everything for granted then.
You have played a very important role in my life. Had I have my parents around me, I never would have known you and knowing you and having you in my life is much more important to me than trying to understand, very vague behaviour of my bio-logical father.
Now, it does not matter why he never wanted to see me or know me. Why did, he not did; anything that I would remember him very fondly or at least have some respect for him in my heart long after he is gone.
What makes me think and think hard about the whole situation today, is death of a woman which devastate him happened to be my mother too !
Lovingly yours,
Sunita
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