Chapter Three
5
Taha… Longing for Home
Some of our people have remained attached to home, holding fast to its embrace from the cradle to the grave—men and women who never considered emigrating to Egypt, living in the Gulf, or even working in Khartoum and our other cities. My mother, for example, died at an estimated age of about forty-five without ever seeing the weekly market of Karma to the south or the town of Wadi Halfa to the north. What pains me is that we do not possess a photograph to show her descendants her gentle features.
By contrast, my master and uncle Abdoun Mohamedin spent most of his life in Egypt, the mother of the world. He was known for his quick wit, attractive humour, and love of people. When his many admirers gathered around him—some of them permanent residents of home, present morning and evening—he would tease them in an Egyptian accent: ‘What have you people seen of the world? When one of you goes to Abu Sarah and asks, “Where am I?” they tell him, “You are abroad!”’ The group would laugh with a purity rising from souls that knew nothing but innocence and openness.
My uncle Taha Nouri was one of those contented, satisfied people who lived with the torya and sickle—a dignified, pleasant, and honourable life. He remained a reference for the Nubian calendar, or the Coptic calendar as people call it. In Nubian usage, the farmer’s calendar determines the agricultural seasons and includes these months: Tout, Baba, Hator, Kiahk, Toba, Amshir, Baramhat, Baramouda, Bashans, Baouna, Abib, and Mesra.
Taha was among the people I most longed to visit at home, to meet, sit with, draw comfort from, and learn from their generosity and virtues. My uncle Taha was everyone’s friend—children before adults—with his delicate, kind, pure spirit. During his last rare visit to Khartoum, compelled to seek treatment, he remained welcomed by everyone, surrounded by the care of his daughter, the generosity of her husband—his nephew—and the celebration of his devoted grandchildren and all the family.
I made a point of sitting with and keeping him company every day, because I knew that anyone who made the village his home and settled there for a lifetime felt suffocated in Khartoum and other cities, as if at the bottom of a deep well. When his treatment was nearly complete, he insisted on leaving like his peers, refusing our requests to rest and stay longer. His determination to travel grew more urgent every day.
One day I pleaded with him: ‘Home is there, and you will reach it. Stay with us a little.’ He replied, ‘You have not fallen short; I am comfortable here—nothing is missing.’ But all Khartoum could not equal sitting beside the high agricultural canal near his house, watching people come and go and, from a distance, following the stream of cars on the road. Taha returned yearning for the village that we all love.
They are our people, our elders, our teachers, and even our pride. How dearly we remember them; may their memory remain forever.