Siraj Bibi

I read about 119 year old Siraj Bibi( in Dawn) and thought we have our lives so complicated. She loves to work and tries to keep others happy. These two simple rules of life have kept her happy for all these years. And we strive for our own comfort and happiness. Can we get back to those simple times again. We can only dream of being 119 years old (Mashallah) and that too with an active life style. I wish and pray for Siraj Bibi’s life and health.

SIALKOT: Hard work and iron will are the secrets of the ‘successful life’ of Siraj Bibi, a 119-year-old resident of border-area Kingra village, who still loves to do her chores with her own hands.

‘The will to work instills energy in my body and I remain active even at this age,’ she told this correspondent. ‘I get up early in the morning, sweep the courtyard of my house, cut fodder for cattle and do many more things.’

All these chores, she said, had become an integral part of her life. ‘The idea of sitting idle even at this age seems like waiting for death,’ said Siraj Bibi who also serves meals to her family.

‘The secret of my happiness is that I have always tried to make others happy. After saying ‘Fajr’ prayers, I visit the only market in the village and kiss the foreheads of the shopkeepers as if they all are my sons — my dear ones.’

She has memories of the British Raj days which, according to her, were good in terms of safety. ‘Life and property of every one was safe in those days,’ she said.

Siraj Bibi was born in 1890 at the house of Laldin in the neighbouring Occupied Jammu & Kashmir’s Chimneywali village. She recalled the painful memories of her five brothers and their wives being killed by the Sikhs at the time of partition.

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I think we have become closer to the people who live in far away lands, like I could not have thought of ever meeting or watching my school friends in life again. Facebook and likes have made it possible. I can search the name of my University friends and can find all the outsanding work they are doing anywhere in the world. But the question remains, are we closer to each other than the people of 80′s maybe. People living in the same house at times talk to each other only on the mobile phone let alone sharing some peaceful moments together.

I am comparing today with the time when one household or one neighbourhood used to gather around one tv set for 8 o’clock PTV drama and khabarnama.  Can we extract so much pleasure from watching a simple drama alone in our seperate bed rooms. Ours  houses have TVs in all the rooms plus computers. I think we are missing the happiness they got from each others company.

With our mobile phones ringing all the time, we are not present with the people physically sitting in front of us. Lets try to spend some time with our  family and friends  in a far off village with no mobile phone and electricity. I bet, we will be able to know each other more in 24  hours as compared to  spending a lifetime together. (with all these distractions!)

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