My World: Tell me a story...

[fahim mohammed]

“All I have seen teaches me to trust the creator for all I have not seen.”*Rumi


London.

Ayesha and I lived in a one room apartment. We would ration the amount of coins ( shillings! ) we had to put in the electric meter. We had a small room downstairs which served as a communal kitchen. One could barely fit in it.

I would leave home early to go to Victoria station to catch the train to Kent; where I had a new job.The train fare, even during that time, represented a significant portion of our income.

One day, while I was in the office...a Bobby ( Policeman ) came in and I saw him talking to my colleagues
in the corridor. They looked at me and pointed at me.

Sir, we had to take your wife to the hospital; ' you are the proud father of a beautiful and healthy daughter. Both are doing well. Please come with us; we shall take you to the hospital '. ( One of the numerous reasons I still have the deepest respect and appreciation for Britain and its people. )

We could not afford a cot, a pram. We made do with a second hand settee we purchased at a sale, and
Ayesha and I would take turns sleeping on it.

I remember those times of hardship with fondness..because my family and I made it together.

This my daughter then; sleeping on the spare bed.

Now she heads committees in Medical Research.Chair of Scientific Committees. Senior Consultant. Member of the Saudi and Canadian Society of Pathologists.And a leading authority on soft tissue lymphomas.

I happened across the above photo, taken on a cheap film camera. Ayesha and I looked at the photo.
We were thankful to the Lord. And to those that helped us make it through while in England.

“All I have seen teaches me to trust the creator for all I have not seen.”*Rumi

 

[Asher Kelman]

Your daughter was adorable but it was the care and sensibilities that she absorbed from you both that enabled her brain to subsequently absorb what her teachers offered that others let slip by. My own belief is that all of us are blessed with such a lot of capability that is simply crushed and imprisoned in childhood, in most children, but more especially girls. Worse, in single parent families, unmentionable abuse in 67% of cases, puts young girls at a self-worth handicap they never usually overcome completely.

So the love and security of an intact home enabled your daughter to safely go, like her mother, up mountains where a lot of men are unfit to climb.

I am so thrilled that this long devotion and sacrifice paid off so handsomly. It's unfortunately insufficient for us to be given wonderful minds if there is no nurturing or seeding of values to grow.

Imagine that most children do not have the whole families and attention we have to ours. We are blessed that we both have been fortunate to have the life partners who allowed us to be in a position to enjoy the fine adults in our respective children.

I met some young Saudi women who had seen Ayesha on TV and were inspired. That is a force multiplier for our future!

Kudos to our wives for looking after us. I know my own wife is due a medal for putting up with me, as I am impossible!

Asher

 

[Charlotte Thompson]

Fahim

Such a tender story. I do like Rumi. We slowly become as we trust.

Best Always

Charlotte-

 

[Andy brown]

Hi Fahim, lovely story. Amazing the things that can happen in a lifetime.

 

[Doug Kerr]

In February of 1994 my granddaughter (my only grandchild) was born to my eldest daughter. I was in my daughter's room, with many relatives and friends, when a nurse brought Julia Grace into the room from the nursery.

One of the visitors (likely a teacher, as were many of my daughter's friends) said, "Just think of all the things she will learn."

I said, "I think she knows all that already."

The task, then, was to let her realize what she knew, and that went very well.

Today, she is, with her partner, the proprietor of a restaurant and a meal delivery service.

Did she know in February of 1994 how to do that?

Perhaps.

Best regards,

Doug

 

[fahim mohammed]

Asher, Charlotte, Andy, Doug...

Thank you all so very much. Thought I would share it with you.

Doug, I Know, just as you did.