Familiar Strangers

By Nikhil Kurien

Familiar Strangers is a marvelous kaleidoscope of varied colours and exquisite patterns as the pages keep turning. The author has undoubtedly presented us a collection of exquisite literary gems. The varied plots, built with intense imagination, showcase the human whims and absurdities in stark reality and in surrealism.
Each story is different from the other in theme, background, and presentation.
No lover of literature can put down Familiar Strangers once they start reading it.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Partridge Publishing India
• Release date: Aug 18, 2021
• ISBN: 9781543707908

Book preview

Martha’s Syndrome

A belch from Martha was enough to jolt Suhara from her sleep. They both lay down in neighbouring beds in the otherwise empty hospital ward which had fifteen beds. Two of the in-patients who were there with them got discharged in the morning, and Martha was impatiently awaiting her turn to go home, for it has been a long time since she was admitted. Suhara was admitted three weeks back after a fall which fractured her hip bone, and she was slowly recovering from repeated infections after her surgery. Both the ladies had become close by now in between their infections and sorrows.

Suhara looked at Martha quite inquisitively as though asking what was that loud belching about. Martha understood the meaningful look, and she giggled and said, These medicines have converted my stomach into a gas factory.

Did you take the tablet for nine o’clock? Suhara asked with much concern to clarify if it was that big round orange-coloured tablet that was making her belch.

Tablet? Martha had a questioning tone. It’s tablets.

Don’t feel bad about it. They are for your own good. Suhara made a weak attempt to pacify Martha who was fed up of all the treatments she was having for quite some time, and she was no better than what she was when she was admitted a few months back.

You look pale than yesterday. Didn’t you have the iron tonic? Suhara asked with empathy. Don’t you feel better after the changes in medicine?

Better? I feel bitter. I don’t feel like taking anything, Suhara. All I require is somebody’s hand to scratch my ever-itching body, Martha answered as she pointed to the lesions that had grown a bit more in their circumference and had become red. Who knows with what I am diseased? Even the doctor excuses himself before I ask of my own state of affairs.

Martha slowly got up from her bed to drink some water from the jug kept nearby on the bedside table, and Suhara couldn’t help noticing how much hair of Martha had shed onto the bed sheet. The pillow is full of your hair.

Please don’t call my attention to that. I know the hair is raining out of my head. Maybe within another month, I will turn bald, unless the doctor helps me, said Martha as she rubbed her right palm gently over her head, reminding her of the thick cascade that was her pride some time back.

Martha was a retired professor who led a lonely life after her husband died early into their marriage. She didn’t have any children. At first, she ignored the small rashes that erupted and healed at intervals. She first visited the doctor when she had spikes of fever along with joint pains. The rashes were now taking more time to heal. It had now been more than a year since the symptoms became more severe and numerous tests had been carried out, but still, the doctors seemed to be clueless as to what kind of disease the symptoms were pointing to. Later on, she was admitted in the hospital for a careful observation, and in her condition, she was also finding it difficult to travel the distance between the hospital and her house. Her muscles too were failing, which made it difficult for her to stand even a short time. She had tried umpteen times to talk with the doctors who examine her each day, but all they did was pacify her with kind words that things would improve soon. Nobody seemed to have an answer. She had often heard in the Sunday sermons that God was there for the destitute. But for her, there was none, except her bedside mate Suhara until the time either one of them got discharged.

Oh, please don’t cry! Suhara tried to comfort Martha as she saw tears brimming up from her eyes. Isn’t this the day that the chief doctor said he will come to have a talk with you?

Until today, the doctors examining her have kindly evaded all her queries, and finally, yesterday the nurse came and informed Martha that the chief doctor will be here soon to talk to her in detail about her condition. Martha was tired of this prospective visit of doctors. Every time she expectantly would wait for a favourable reply about her disease, the doctors seemed to talk to her about everything in this world but her medical condition. So she was least bothered by the doctor’s visit and instead wanted her attention to something else than diseases. She said to Suhara. Now forget all these things about diseases. Go through the newspaper and tell me the important news of the day.

Suhara picked up the well-folded daily paper, which was provided to them every morning, and checked randomly the printed news. Nothing important is there in the headlines. Only the routine scams and controversies. A pause was there; during which time, Suhara dug into the news items and finally took a piece that was worth telling Martha. Yeah! Here is one. This year’s Nobel prize for literature goes to an unheard name. I can barely spell his name even. God has blessed him.

Martha didn’t believe in any blessings because she now felt she was the most unblessed of all the human beings. I don’t believe in any blessings. It is his imagination and power of writing that has fetched him the award.

Of course! Imagination which God had bestowed upon him, said Suhara, an unequivocal supporter of the Almighty.

Yet another man has made a reputation for himself. From now on, people will respect and have high regard for him. His words will be quoted, and his views will be discussed and debated. Yet he was a little-known personality until yesterday. Martha felt proud for that Nobel awardee.

Strange are his ways! Suhara exclaimed, looking up to the Almighty, and at the same time, Martha gave another belch as she shifted in the bed and said, I wish I were him.

To Suhara, it sounded as a comedy when a lady with undiscovered illness wishes that she was a winner of that prestigious award.

Has it ever occurred to you how much more lucky is this guy Nobel than the guy who actually won this award? Martha asked pensively.

Alfred Nobel was dead, buried, and gone, but Martha considered him to be the luckiest of all, more than the awardees who won the recognition in his name. He was remembered even after death, talked about with respect long after death has eclipsed him, and his name echoes year after year. His name has been etched in history by an award and is secure for the rest of the future. He is now more famous than when he was alive.

Isn’t he the fellow who is remembered for inventing the dynamite? Suhara enquired.

True! But the fame and recognition his name now carries is simply not proportional to the name he had when he was alive. Were there not greater and more wonderful discoverers, inventors, and explorers? It was Alfred Nobel’s father, Emmanuel Nobel, who invented plywood. Do we know anything about him? Though we know and remember many of the great people, it’s Mr Nobel’s name that regularly comes to our minds more than the others, and we speak that name with reverence. Death has frozen him in time, and the award has etched his name in our memory.

Suhara couldn’t quite grasp the emotional content of Martha’s words, and she went back to the newspaper and changed the page. There on the next page, she found one that interested her, a scandal about the supply of unpasteurised milk in the town, and she read out the news to Martha.

Now here is another man who has secured a place in every man’s mind and tongue! Martha exclaimed, to which Suahara wondered who this other man was.

Louis Pasteur has secured a place for his name in this world forever by the term pasteurisation. It’s another term we use knowingly or unknowingly almost daily. Hasn’t Mr Pasteur done many other greater works, and of them, how many can we enlist now?

Suhara tried in vain for a moment to enlist his achievements but finally admitted, I can tell only about his pasteurisation technique.

True, Martha said. So is it with me. But I can recollect some if I travel down the memory lane of my schooldays. If I am right, it was he who developed vaccine against anthrax and rabies. He is considered as the father of microbiology. He showered light on fermentation process and introduced various techniques for sterilisation. If the pasteurisation technique was known by any other scientific term, Mr Pasteur might have gone into oblivion like many greats who have found things of great value but are not remembered. Not that we are ungrateful to these great people, but simply because they couldn’t ensure their name against the face of time. Their names could have been preserved by simply naming whatever they were concerned with.

Suhara really felt that Mr Pasteur was indeed lucky to lend his name to that technique, thereby carving his name on the wall of common people’s minds.

The monologue of Martha was not over. It’s the only reason why we still remember great men like Albert Einstein for Einstein’s theory of relativity, which we learn in awe, though it’s for another work of his that he actually won a Nobel prize.

As Issac Newton is remembered for Newton’s law of gravity, Suhara finally had something to contribute from her side.

Exactly. Put it simply as law of gravity and the next generation will not associate Newton to his great work. Edison made a thousand inventions, but comparatively, his name sprouts less on our tongue. The number of times Edison’s name sprouts on our tongue is inversely proportional to the number of inventions he had made. His name is seldom used. But imagine if the name Edison itself was used as a term for any of his great inventions, his name would have remained viridescent. Very much like the name of James Watt, whose name appears on every electric bulb.

But isn’t the electric bulb really called the Edison’s bulb? Suhara wondered.

Then he is unlucky in having his name lost in the battle of sovereignty to the term bulb. Very much like the case where Roentgen’s own term roentgenogram loses the space to the term x-ray. It will not be much long before their names are pushed off people’s tongue, only to be read in textbooks for examinations or in general knowledge books, Martha added, and now Suhara was beginning to get the vibe of Martha’s debate. The point was it is lucky to have your name left behind, and it is all the more lucky if people would use it as an everyday term or language, reminding one another of the particular man, though unintentionally. You lend the name to the product and you are ensuring that you have labelled your name in this world. Your name should be ensured as an award like Mr Nobel’s, or it should be synonymous with an act like Hitlerian or Chaplinesque, or the thing itself should be the name like diesel of Rudolf Diesel or bell of Alexander Graham Bell, Martha equated.

In life, many people might be respected and praised for their worthiness, work, and standing in society, but who cares for them after their death? How many from these billions on earth get to be remembered? Lucky is the man who gets remembered occasionally, like Socrates or Edmund Hillary; great if it is systematically, like Mr Nobel’s; fantastic if it is uttered often by our tongue as part of everyday language, like Mr Pasteur’s or Bell’s. The fact is only one handful get to be remembered knowingly or unknowingly.

Suhara was all praise for the Creator as she thought about the great names that changed the world. God determines whose all names should be left behind to be studied, revered, followed, and used.

I too wish that I had an opportunity to leave behind my name in this world. Who wants to be one in a million? It should be one out of a million. Martha expressed a desire that was in her heart for a very long time, but alas, she had nothing in her to make her famous. The utmost recognition she got was that of the best teacher award before her retirement.

God can do it. Suhara gave the indications that she was an optimist and anything was possible with her ever-trustworthy God, and she continued her newspaper reading.

That is quite impossible now in this age and situation, Martha declared. She just said what a practical mind would say, and she was not a pessimist. For that, you need to do or find something, or else, you should be tremendously lucky.

Suhara was hearing Martha, but at the same time, she was going through the newspaper. They say there has been a record sale of greeting cards for this year’s Valentine’s Day compared to what has been for the Christmas or New Year celebrations.

Yeah! That’s it. Lucky like Saint Valentine. Martha found the right example to deliver her new point. He didn’t do anything much to be ascribed about, except for the reason that he advocated love, and now he has become synonymous with love. Great, isn’t it?

He indeed is blessed to be a saint of such a wonderful, loveable day, Suhara said passionately. Saint of love.

Weren’t there better advocates of love and intense lovers? But who gets to be talked about on the day kept as a respect for love? A priest. He is lucky to have his name secured in this world, though by chance. Martha finished her description on that matter.

Martha’s wish to leave a name behind her for the world to talk about, discuss, or study was growing in her, though she knew it was a vain dream. She thought of the people pronouncing her name, at least occasionally, when greeting or when describing things, and she gave a belch again.

Seems your system is rejecting your excess dreams, Suhara joked as she realised that Martha was lost in her dreams for a moment. Martha knew that her dreams were in excess, but then commoners like her, who have been sent into this world merely to fill in the voids between the great people, have every right to dream, however far-fetched it maybe, and can derive their own pleasure. The freedom to dream was there since the stars were right above them.

Be calm. God is great. One can’t determine one’s own fate. Tomorrow you may become famous. Martha was stupefied at Suhara’s consolation, and she laughed it out. I haven’t heard of a more ridiculous consolation. You don’t even deserve a consolation prize for consoling.

But Suhara stood by what she stated. I mean it. Strange are his ways.

It’s your words that are strange. I thought you were a prudent lady, but now I realise that you are a hyper-optimist. Well, I won’t blame you for that because it’s a good medicine for someone who lie down dejectedly on a hospital bed. Martha knew Suhara was not trying hurt or tease her but was just complementing her wish to leave behind a name to be talked or used upon. I am over sixty years, and I haven’t got the least literary sense or voice to sing. Surely you don’t expect me to earn fame in the sporting arena, nor do I have the brain to invent or the eye to discover a thing. I can’t do humour roles to be remembered like Charlie Chaplin, nor can I get out of this bed to do services like Mother Teresa. If it is luck you wish me like Father Valentine had, well, know that I wouldn’t have been in this condition if a fraction of his luck had passed on to me.

You can’t be sure of anything, Martha. If God decides to keep your name back on earth, he will. It now seemed as if Suhara had taken up Martha’s case with God.

Considering all the explanations I have offered to you just now, can you still tell me or offer God a way by which he can make me famous and retain my name for others to quote and remember? Martha just completed what she wanted to ask Suhara, and just then, the nurse entered the room with some of the results of the blood tests done a few days back, and she announced that the chief doctor had started his morning rounds of inspecting the patients and would be here to meet Martha soon. The chief doctor had promised Martha that he would definitely speak to her about her condition in detail after getting a few more laboratory results. Now the moment had come. Considering the number of investigations by countless names they have done on her during the past year and the number of specialist doctors who have visited her, it certainly had created inquisitiveness and anxiety in Martha to know what truly was going on inside her. She knew that they were treating her to their best of abilities without success, and now she had a hunch that they might be trying to do something new. Martha didn’t care what they did to her as long as it helped her get out of the bed.

The morning looked pleasant out of the window, and the conversation in the morning had put a lively face on both the female patients, and they were ready to face the day and their diseases. The chief doctor came in with his usual comforting smile, and behind him rallied a few assistants of his with stethoscopes and notes. He wished Martha and Suhara a warm good morning, and both the ladies too wished him back. Before the doctor could evade from her with some pleasant enquiries, Martha immediately asked, Did you get my results?

Yes, but did you sleep well yesterday? the doctor asked with much concern, to which Martha replied, Not quite. Did you get my results?

The doctor stood quiet for a moment, as though rehearsing how to deliver what he had to say, and then he began in a very soft tone, Well, let me first tell you how famous and important you are going to be from now on. Get ready by noon. A group of researchers are coming over here to talk to you and perhaps take some of your pictures and ask you some questions. You are going to be well known from now on.

Martha couldn’t quite grasp what the doctor was talking about and sat there on her bed plaintively. Suhara felt as though some heavenly intervention had happened after the discussion they had some time ago. The doctor noted the expressionless face of his patient and said to her, I am talking about you, Martha. From now on, your name will be discussed, debated, and studied upon.

What is all this about? Even Suhara was getting miffed over such confused statements. Are you saying that she is going to be famous?

Yes, in a way, said the doctor without much happiness, although Suhara’s face erupted with a smile that showed her joy deep inside.

It is just as you wished, Martha, and just as I said. Didn’t I tell you God is great and answers all our wishes?

This is all unbelievable. Why me? How do you think it can happen? I think you have got it all wrong, Martha objected to the suggestion that she was on her way to fame.

It’s because through you, a great contribution has been made to the field of medicine. You have shed light on an important aspect that, from now on, will benefit thousands of people. Practitioners and researchers of medicine will remember you, and your name will be found on all medical texts and journals besides dailies and weeklies.

Just as you wanted, Martha!