Meetings and Agendas...

While we were busy with the condolences meeting, which followed the death of my dear grandmother, the whole of the crazy unUnited Kingdom (aka Wonderland) was preoccupied with the London meeting being hosted by Lord Avebury tomorrow.

I leave the scene for a few days and come back to mayhem, back stabbing and name calling, in a society which knows not even the basics of an age-old game called politics.

What is this mad mad world coming to? I don't know.. but frankly speaking I am fed up of it all and would rather be more self-centered over the next few days to share with you the daily antics a silly girl is up to from sun up to sun down.

I cried and sorry to say it laughed so much at the condolences meet. People who know me will tell you, that I am never around girls and women. I mean, I do hang out with girls but the only women I hang out with are my five sisters and a few select pre-screened similarly silly, opinionated, arrogant friends. The rest are guys, guys, guys and a few gays, who pretend they are macho guys too.

I went to the meet, covered up from head to toe in black..Yes, I could have done like some of the other classier girls and wear a thin scarf .. but that's not me. Either do it properly, or don't. Besides, I wasn't there for socialising because I would have rather locked myself up at home and shut the world out during the days which followed.

My grannie's 74-year-old daughter from Saudi was there, and boy she hated my mum and my mum's other cousin and made no secret of it. I was appauled by her behaviour and couldn't help but make her life miserable too. I planted my self next to her and when the place was quiet, usually after lunch, I would cross-examine her, reminding her that she too would soon be gone and the family will miss out a lot of its history, which we the young people never paid attention to before if she didn't open up the old files to me - and ONLY me ;)

She has an excellent memory and remembers dates and incidents as if they had happened yesterday. I hadn't seen her for a few years and the minute my eyes fell on her on the first day of condolences (four all together), I let out a cry. She looked like grannie did many many years ago - albeit much taller and not as beautiful. But she had the same fair full face and wore her hijab the way my grand mother did. But her eyes weren't the same and she was far from the familiar smiley face I can see everytime I close my eyes.

The only pictures we have of grandmother are those etched in our memories for she had NEVER ever exposed her face to an 'alien' man. I don't think even my dad has ever seen her. As such, we don't have many photographs of her. We have one, which she had to take for her passport... and a few we managed to click while she wasn't looking - much to her anger...Now, I really wish we had made her more angry and taken more pictures..because whether we were to make her angry, or life would turn evil on her, she would ultimately die one day...

And I was too ashamed to ask for any of her possessions. I don't mean money and jewellery here, because she didn't have much of that and the last time I saw her and she recognised me, she took off a necklace she was wearing and made me wear it and asked me to promise her that I would keep it. I wanted some of the things we had sewn together.. some of the pieces we embroidered... but was too afraid to ask.

There was a lot of jealousy in the air already and didn't want to electrify the atmosphere more. We (me and my sisters and brother) were the ones who sapped her energy when she was younger and they (her real grandchildren) were the ones who were burdened with caring for her in her old age..although...

"She really loved you," one of her 'real' grand daughters told me.. while I was choking with tears and suffocating with guilt and she was turning green with envy.
"And she loved your mum more than anyone else," she added..with a tone I really was in no mood to put up with there and then.

Every person goes to meetings carrying a different face and a different agenda...I wasn't there to show them how much my grandmother meant to me.. because I know and she knows and this is all that matters...I was there to hold my mum's hand, give her support and ensure that she wasn't an easy prey. That's what daughters are for.