Interpreter of Winds

by Fairoz Ahmad

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  orbit #004

  Interpreter of Winds

  Copyright © Fairoz Ahmad, 2019

  ISBN 978-981-11-9444-3 (paperback)

  ISBN 978-981-14-7162-9 (ebook)

  Published under the imprint Ethos Books

  by Pagesetters Services Pte Ltd

  #06-131 Midview City

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  This is a work of fiction. Resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, events or localities is coincidental.

  Cover design by Elizabeth Lim

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  Cataloguing-in-Publication information for this title is available from the National Library Board Singapore.

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  Contents

  Interpreter of Winds

  The Smell of Jasmine after the Rain

  The Day the Music Died

  The Night of a Thousand Months

  Glossary

  Notes

  Acknowledgments

  About The Author

  Interpreter of Winds

  1

  That afternoon, under the light, a spider that had just hatched scurried up the table. It stood on tiptoe and waited. Moments later, it stretched its abdomen, producing fine threads of silk. The spider allowed the column of rising air to warm its threads, caressing and delicately undressing them. I watched all of this silently, but did nothing. The spiderling then flew from the table, its threads propelled by the soft updraft. The wind brought it places. Sometimes to the top of the world. In 1924, a British expedition team discovered a spider on the crown of the Himalayas. That was what he liked to tell me.

  “The histories of our world,” he once told me, “are shaped by winds. The history of Egypt was altered by it. Let me tell you the history. It begins with a king who lived in a Palace of Glass.”

  It was a story told many, many days ago, before he entered his deep sleep, hence carrying with him the fragmented histories of the world into his dreams. Sometimes, I wish he would tell me less of his histories but more of the role that faith plays in them.

  Since then, I had roamed the edges of the marketplace every morning, finding items to bring back to moisten his lips, so that even in dreams, he would remain nourished to complete his histories. But ever since he had remained still while time moved on, my memories of him had begun to diminish. As his beard began to overrun the uneven landscape of his face, I started to forget how he looked like, save for those pink lips which I moistened every morning, and whose slight quiver at the wetness of my touch told me he still lived.

  There is a history, they say, which is recited only upon the impending loss of a loved one. They say it is a story of love decorated with the trappings of a scholar obsessed with his scholarship. Some say it is a story of scholarship. An obsession with scholarship decorated with the trappings of a love story. Listen.

  2

  The History of Amir Hamzah

  This is a history they used to tell in the Malay lands, when there were still kingdoms and when there were still kings. There once lived a scribe in the Kingdom of Darul Ta’zim who was considered to be the greatest penman the Malay world had ever seen. His name was Amir Hamzah and he was the royal scribe for the King of the Abode of Dignity.

  It was not long after his appointment as royal scribe that the kingdom declined and became a British colony. It declined not because of trade, for its trade with both the Old and New Worlds was flourishing. It declined not for want of military might, for no war broke out and no blood was shed. It declined because it had allowed itself to be mapped by the British.

  One day, the new Lord of the Kingdom summoned Amir Hamzah and said, “Her Majesty has sent an expedition team to the Malay World to collect curiosities from the colonised lands. In the ship from which the expedition sailed in, I have seen the orang utan from Borneo, a man running amok from Pahang and the Singapore Stone. I, however, would like to give Her Majesty something less vulgar, something that would suit her more refined tastes.”

  “And what do you envision this gift to be, Lord Campbell?” Amir Hamzah asked.

  “In the Abode of Dignity, there exists the greatest Malay manuscript ever written. It is said to be four hundred years old. Each page is gold-plated and each character etched on that page is made from ink ground from the bones of the nightingale. I, however, have made a promise to your former King that I will protect this manuscript. As such, I would like you to replicate the Hikayat Muhammad Hanafiah. This copy will be first presented to Her Majesty the Queen, and then displayed at the British Museum.”

  Thus, Amir Hamzah took on the arduous task of replicating the Hikayat Muhammad Hanafiah. Many weeks later, his good friend, Abu Bakar, saw Amir Hamzah sitting listlessly by his desk. “O Amir Hamzah, why do you look sullen? Why are you not completing the task given to you by Lord Campbell?” his friend enquired.

  “My dear friend, I have fallen in love. I have fallen in love with the princess. While she is no longer the royalty she once was, she still demands of royal things from me. She demands that my expression of love be known and yet not known outside this Kingdom, and that once known, it will have to live forever.”

  “My beloved friend, she has set upon you a most perplexing and impossible of tasks. It is wiser that you focus instead on the task at hand, upon which you will be rewarded handsomely. Once you are rich, you will no longer have to trouble yourself with such things.”

  Amir Hamzah took one long look at the manuscript and said, “You are right, friend. From today, I will work day and night to finish this manuscript. It will consume me, just as how the poetry of Majnun consumed Leila.”

  Upon its presentation in London, the Queen rejoiced at the beauty of the manuscript although no one in her court understood its language. After the Queen lost interest, it was given away to the British Museum. Visitors gaped at how the gold-edged pages glittered under the ray of the morning sun, the use of the traditional naskhi script to depict specific Arabic verses, with the distinctive roundels that marked the end of each verse protruding into the margins and how the ink echoed the texture of the paper. But the public, too, soon lost interest in the manuscript.

  Many years passed by. One day, a returning British official from the Malay land, who had immersed himself in the most archaic languages of the Malay world, noticed something peculiar in the text during a visit to the museum. The introduction to the text bears the following words:

  “I, Amir Hamzah, have been tasked by Lord Campbell on 17 March 1824 to replicate the manuscript known as the Hikayat Muhammad Hanafiah. I have understood that this exercise is merely to satisfy the curiosity and whims of the Queen of the land of the English, whom I have not, and will never meet. It has also occurr
ed to me that if this manuscript is to be displayed in the museum as a curiosity, then it does not matter what is written in it. I have therefore decided to pen an ode to my love, for she posed to me the most challenging of tasks: ‘To make my love to her both known and yet not known beyond the shores of the Malay world, and that once known, my love will have to live forever.’ One day, dear readers, and many years from now, you will learn our language and acquire the ability to interpret our texts, just as you have learnt to map us. One day, when that happens, you will read my ode and pry the secrets of my heart. And the secrets, once out, shall live forever, protected and encased in the everlasting memoriam of knowledge you call the museum.”

  3

  Seventy-seven days after he fell asleep, I met a camel at the market place who told me, “All of us have ruminated long and hard about the fate of your master. The cat from the northern quarter since came to the conclusion that it must be because of the wind that swooped past us that October. If you remember, he fell asleep soon after. This has to be the reason, for do you not remember that a French philosopher had once studied many philosophers and many cats, and concluded that the wisdom of cats is infinitely superior?”

  The camel also shared that the cat wanted the last point to be conveyed twice. I knew this cat. He took his texts literally and his French sparingly. Nevertheless, a wind did swoop past us that October and never returned. And my master had slept ever since.

  “Was it the khamsin wind that blows from Egypt or the bad-i-sad-o-bist-roz from Iran?” I asked.

  “It is neither. It did not blow for fifty days, like the khamsin, nor did it live for a hundred and twenty days, like the Iranian. It came directly from the desert,” the camel answered.

  I shuffled my paws against the dust and told him, “I hope you are right. I had feared it was because of my ambition that my master paid the price. The day he first slept was also the day the thought first came to my mind that perhaps I should be a Muslim, just like him. I am worried that my improper thoughts caused him to be punished.”

  The camel gave a camelish sort of laugh and said in a matter-of-fact tone, “Most animals, like us, will go to heaven. Thus, your worries are irrational and hopes, redundant. However, we must accept that some animals, like the pig, are less equal than others and that they will need to go to hell.”

  “But does religion not articulate a vision of heaven? Heaven to me has no meaning without faith.”

  “I have not heard of this vision being articulated for us.”

  “And why is that so? For I believe in one God, his Prophet and the Quran.”

  “True. But could you perform the duties that are required? Could you perform, for instance, the prayers or circle the Kaaba seven times? You have dangerous thoughts. Even the cat, the most loved of creatures in Islam, does not answer such questions, even when there is precedence of love.”

  I asked him to explain further.

  “The cat was the pet of the Prophet. Our cat from the northern quarter hinted at close historical ties with this cat. We ignored him. But to return to my point, once, the Prophet’s cat fell asleep on his sleeve when he was about to leave for prayers. Rather than disturb the cat, the Prophet cut his sleeve and let it sleep. I have, however, heard that your kind has a rather unsavory past. That some would consider you… impure.”

  “That’s false, camel!” I countered, getting jumpy. “There was a night, many nights ago, when I heard someone reading from the Quran its Surah Al Kahf—The Cave of the Seven Sleepers. Six men ran away from a pagan king and hid in a cave, where they fell asleep for a hundred years. The seventh sleeper was their dog, who stayed with them to the end.”

  “The Surah is to be interpreted not for the loyalty of the dog to its masters but for the loyalty of Man to god. The presence of the dog is probably incidental to the story. You interpret what they consider to be loyalty as faith.”

  “They are, to me, dimensions of the same problem.”

  “Perhaps. But your master is still sleeping while we debate this. Do you want to help your master?”

  “Yes… yes. Of course. I have no other alternative. It is worth trying. But who will guide me in the desert?” I queried.

  “Obviously, you are not that perceptive. I have volunteered, since I know the desert best. If you wish, we can get the parrot to help care for your master while you are away. He is resourceful, which means that he is a more skillful thief than you and can borrow many items from the market place to nourish your master.”

  And thus, seventy-seven days after my master slept, I embarked on the journey with my annoying acquaintance.

  4

  There was a sense of emptiness to the beauty of the desert. The contours of the mustard sand swaying its hips over the hills; the aching of the breeze as it drags past hidden floors, dizzy with the heat. Here, time slips past one’s palm and falls through the valley of fingers, cluttering the desert. Here, one sees the darkened golden tresses of the sun, which bleeds eyes blind if you stare for too long. Here, winds have terrible desires. Eating up old cities. Breaking down vast armies.

  Here, the education of the scholar begins with the interpretation of winds. Iqra! Read! For there is a wind they called the Harmattan that blows for three months. Some say the name comes from the Arabic ‘haram’—forbidden. In the desert, winds can feel. They can do things to you. They have their moods. Certain dispositions. They acquire an outlook. They possess character. They do all this while deforming the desert, blunting its edges. Here, during the war, sandstorms blind soldiers, distort magnetic fields. They wander aimlessly with broken compasses. Lost. Hearing names, they turn, only to see ghosts of dead cities under blankets of sand, having conversations with the past.

  And once you master the epistemology of the desert, you extend it to the seas. Because in the desert, land covets water. The Persian geographers of old, navigating their ships with the secret dreams of their forefathers, referred to regions by winds. Their Middle East was the land that lies above the winds. Islam therefore spreads where the wind blows. The camel tells me all of these that day.

  “And what do they do when there is no wind to propel their ships?” I asked.

  “They throw saffron. They throw it in the air to form golden clouds. And winds arrive,” he said as he licked the moisture from a piece of rock.

  “Faith arrives through the winds, then?”

  “Yes. And sometimes they are one and the same. It is there, for it is anything we want it to be. It is only when the air becomes completely still that we feel we have lost something that we once took for granted.”

  “How do you know all this, camel?” I asked.

  “I soaked in conversations, just as the cloth soaks in the heat of day. This was when I had a master, and when my master had friends,” he said, his back hunched. He does this each time he eats or drinks.

  “It may not be wise to always believe what you hear,” I interrupted.

  “But by your logic, your argument will suggest that we should not believe in the Quran. Truly, you recall that the Quran was never meant to be read. It is meant to be recited. To be heard. That is how hearts are broken,” the camel responded.

  “Unless we agree that some texts are more equal than others, and the parts of some are greater and superior than the whole,” I argued back.

  “And upon which you should also agree that some animals have to be more equal than other,” the camel cut in, looking triumphant.

  “But we are speaking of two different categories altogether… Camel, let us rest. I am tired,” I said in the end, deflecting the subject. “It is tiring to debate with you.”

  “One should only rest when the sun is highest, for that is when our shadows disappear and navigation impossible. Let us walk a bit further, dog, before we rest.”

  So, I trudged through the rough skin of the desert. The heat amplified my annoyance with the camel, leaving me in a sour mood. Soon, the sensuous contours of the desert which I had earlier admired devolved in their m
eanings. They were just empty mounds of sands, repeated a hundred times over.

  On the seventh day of our journey, we rested by a crown of rocks near a sloping valley. In the desert, valleys acquire names from their watering points. The rest remained nameless, identifiable only through the shape of the rocks. Like water, names in the desert are scarce, and given only if it matters. “The desert Arabs called this valley Eghalgawen. It is named by its pool—the pool of Eghalgawen, which is the depression just beyond here,” the camel said, as he jerked his neck to point to a vague direction. “One should never rest there although it provides plenty of shade. The pool fills up quickly during rain. Many years ago, during the war, several French soldiers fell asleep there. They were submerged underneath the rocks when it rained overnight.”

  The camel spoke of many things that day. He spoke of the sounds of drums at night, which was one of the many trickeries the spirits devised to lure men into the darkness. He spoke of a flower named yesuf that blooms only one day each year and stains the air blue when it dies. He spoke of an angel that once disintegrated into seven colours when it passed through the glassy stares of a mirage. Since then, no angels ever passed by that area, leaving it populated with demons. And he spoke of a Muslim desert community they called the Tuareg, whose women are never veiled, only the men. But he never spoke of himself. Thus, that day, I asked him, “Camel, I have wanted to ask you this. Where is your master? Why is he not with you?”

  The camel slowed down. He heaved once. And heaved again. He hunched his humps close together and gave a sigh, as if trying to offload a burden. “There was a night, about seven moons ago. We were chasing an errant word deep in the desert. We…”

  “Wait, what do you mean you were chasing an errant word?” I interrupted, getting confused.

  “An errant word is a word that had escaped. As I was explaining…”

  “But I have never seen such a thing,” I exclaimed.