An Open Letter From a Dead Child To His Mother On His Death Anniversary

A mother crying on the death of her child- Peshawar School Attack 16 December 2014, Pakistan.

Ma!

It’s 16 December. The day you saw my blood stained dead body. The day you died along with me. It’s our first death anniversary Ma.

I can see your red swollen eyes today, you didn’t sleep Ma, I know it. I can see your hands tremble while you make tea for Baba. I can hear that painful unspoken conversation between you and Baba. When you look at each other and say nothing, your silence tells me all. The wails of your heart and the cries of Baba’s eyes, they pierce my heart. It’s been a whole year since that happened, but you still live in the moment I died. The days after that, they didn’t pass for you.

I know you can see the wound of bullet on my head bleeding again today. The very place where you used to kiss me before sending me off to school. My white shirt which you used to wash with such pure love, It’s blood stained forever in your heart. You clean my books, my toys, my chair where I’d sit to eat and my plate everyday, with your scarf. Today when you clean, I know you can hear these weep with you.

Remember Ma, the day when they entered our school with big guns and started shooting at the children. There were cries everywhere. I was scared. I called your name. You were not there. You were running in the street towards my school without shoes.

My friends with whom I’d play everyday, they were crying and falling down while bullets hit them. I saw a pile of small bodies on the ground beside me Ma. I was standing in a pool of blood when a bullet hit my arm Ma, It was so painful. I fell on the ground. Your little kid Ma, your baby. I remember how you wept when I once had my arm broken while playing. I had a bullet in it now, I knew you’d come to save me.

They fired up my teacher who tried to save us, she burned to death alive and we saw it. It was all so scary. I wanted to hug you and hide in your shawl. I called you Ma. I tried getting up and run to you but I couldn’t. One of them saw me. He came towards me and put his gun on my forehead. It hurt so much Ma, so much. I looked him in the eyes. I wasn’t afraid of him, he was a coward. I did called you and baba for the last time before he fired the bullet.

I saw you from up there, when between blood stained books and misplaced shoes you searched for me. When in the hospital Baba showed you my little cold body. When you touched my face, brushed my hair and fell down. Hysterical, crying, unconscious. The eyes that you saw shining in the morning, they were dark. The tongue you heard speaking, singing poems while having breakfast, it was silent forever. I felt your pain Ma. I felt the pain of 132 Mothers that day.

Please don’t cry Ma. Do you know, with every tear that sheds from your eyes, a beautiful flower blossoms here in our garden. Oh did I forget to tell you? We are here Ma in this magical garden with green grass and so many beautiful flowers. They smell of you Ma. We play here and laugh. We have Allah here with us, who love us like you do. He takes care of us and He tells us that you and Baba will be here one day and then we’ll live together in peace. No bad people can enter here with their guns.

I want you to be strong Ma. We’ll meet one day. You can kiss me on the forehead then and wrap me up inside you.

Till then, With Love.

Your Brave Son.

 

From this….

To this…

 

 

 

 

Education Means Enlightened hearts, Not Straight A’s !

Cute little kids with shining eyes and huge heavy school bags on their shoulders…. This is what comes to my mind when I think about schools.

Life is a race. The one who stops, fails. You have to run fast to achieve your goals and this running fast for a school kid means he has to study hard to get good grades. He has to pass four exams and many tests in one year with excellent marks. He has to be brilliant in studies and has to answer his teacher’s questions during lectures. He must shine in studies no matter how shining he is or not in his real life. 

On the other hand teachers have to cover a huge syllabus in one year. They have to check home works of hundreds of students everyday and papers four times a year. They have a fixed time for their lecture and they sometimes have to deliver consecutive lectures without any break. They don’t know the names of students in their class. They sometimes do remember the names of some top students and some bottom ones. All they worry about is how excellent is the result of their class at the end of year.

This is our school system.This is our education system about. A number of big school buildings with high fees and charges for admission have been constructed in a past few years. They don’t care about the quality of education, quantity is the only thing that matters. An innocent kid enters school and a cramming youngster passes out after 10 years. No one keeps a record of what he has learnt that would help him in his life? What are the improvements in his personality and attitude ? How strong is his character and how confident are his aims? All that matters is a result card with stars and excellent grades and straight A’s.

The real question isn’t about the problems. It is about the solutions. In my opinion, If people stop using education system as a means of earning money and start thinking honestly about the future of our youngsters, these problems can be solved. And if teachers think more about character building and less about the syllabus and students think more about correcting themselves and less about getting good grades. Obviously this is possible only if there is no pressure on their heads.

Our grand-Ma’s and Grand-Pa’s are more intelligent and have more wisdom then our parents and us. They didn’t even go to schools. Then from where did they learn all this ? We don’t learn wisdom from schools. We learn wisdom by experiencing life and this is possible only if we keep our eyes open. Problems these children have to face in real life can’t be solved by Maths formulas or equations. Nor is their depression lessened by arithmetic and geometry. It requires wisdom and courage which comes only if you have an open mind and enlightened heart.

Napoleon once said, “Give me educated Mothers and I will give you an educated Nation“. He surely don’t meant Mothers with brilliant grades but he meant Mother’s with wisdom and open hearts. That is what education is all about. You may have read about Bill gates story, how he was not a good student and his friend was a brilliant one; and now He is the owner of Microsoft and his friend is his employee. Albert Einstein couldn’t even speak when he was four and his teachers were of the opinion that he wouldn’t make anything of himself. Benjamin Franklin was dropped out of school at age ten. History is full of examples like that.

No doubt studying is important to earn a good living . But more important than that is keeping mind and heart open, pondering upon the nature, experiencing life to enlighten our hearts and most importantly trying, trying again no matter how many times we fail ! We will be educated then, in true means.

A post written in response to Daily Prompt: The New School.