A promise to keep

Wisran Hadi

Suri first realized there was something terribly wrong with his eyesight at the communal prayer held at the beginning of the fasting month of Ramadhan.

It was a tradition for his mother to arrange the prayer in the family's home, thanking God for all their blessings before the holy month began.

As the prayer began, Suri leaned over to Manda to ask why his mother, who always took a spot in the corner, was not there.

"That's your mother sitting over there," Manda replied. Suri nodded his head and smiled to hide his embarrassment.

"Good Lord, my sight has really changed," he said to himself.

After the prayer was over and all the guests had left, Suri, his mom, his wife, Hajar, and his elder sister, Ayang, gathered in the spacious front room, the site of their most intimate family discussions.

As he sat with his family, Suri pondered the change in his eyesight. It must have occurred when he was sprayed with tear gas during the protest rallies at the House. Before the incident, he could see the color of the safari suits worn by the legislators; today, everything had blurred, his vision reduced to moving shadows climbing up and down a dark passage.

Suri was not an activist; he only wanted to know why everybody had become part of the movement. He cared little that every day the rallies became more and more like a dangdut music concert.

When the movement succeeded, and there was change in the government, Suri returned to his real profession as a pediatrician.

* * *

To his mother, Suri was everything.

Of course, there was Ayang, but she would marry, have her husband and children to take care of, like all young women did these days. For Suri's mother, a son had a particular position in her life, to defend and unite the family. She pinned all her hopes on her son, who gave her an identity in life, who everybody loved very much and would always care for her even when he married.

Now it was a husbandless house, with her, her mother in law and Ayang. They waited for the sound of Suri's footsteps, his smiling face coming through the large front door adorned with beautiful calligraphy.

Suri's mother would be overcome by great pride at the sight of her son relaxing in the sitting room.

"Women need men, not as their husbands or sons, but as protectors and as people who make their lives meaningful," she snapped when Ayang told her not to go to so much trouble by cooking Suri his favorite food.

"Women are meaningless without men. In the absence of men, we felt as if we are sexless people. We know we are female because of the presence of males. Men distinguish between them and us. Differences are necessary for life."

* * *

Almost every night, Suri's mother wept at her son's loss of eyesight. She blamed herself for pushing him to get an education, for it must have been poring over textbooks late into the night that had caused the problem.

She was worried, too, because she knew that in today's world many women would forsake their husbands for the simplest of reasons. Women were too materialistic, afraid of having to bear any hardship; they wanted a rich, healthy husband to give them a decent life.

Suri's mother had been proud to have the pretty and lively Hajar as her daughter-in-law, but it was this same feeling of pride that now made her worry that Hajar would move on to another husband.

They called on a parade of psychics to try to identify what had caused the problem.

One said that it was his grandmother, who had damaged Suri's eyesight so her son would inherit the title of datuk (chief) of their clan.

Another said it was because Suri's mother had a sacred object that should be given offerings and bathed in water sprinkled with flowers, but that she had failed to comply with the duty, causing the problem.

Yet another said their home was built on an accursed piece of land.

Most troubling of all was the advice of a psychic who had once been a member of the legislature. He said Suri had read too much, spent too much time watching TV and also immersed himself in deep thought. Too much thinking, he said, was bad for eyesight and health.

Suri's mother decided she would not listen to any of them. She resolved that there must be a cure for the illness.

*

Suri's mother, Ayang and Hajar spent exactly three weeks discussing the cause of the damage to Suri's eyesight.

Ayang preferred modern medicine. There are many doctors for a variety of illnesses, she argued, and there is such sophisticated technology today. Suri can seek help in the United States, Russia, Japan, Korea, France or anywhere else under the sun, she argued.

Hajar, meanwhile, had lost trust in drugs. She said that for nearly every medical condition, the pharmacist and the doctors were merely engaged in speculation. She also understood that when one kind of medicine was given to different patients suffering from the same complaint, the rates of recovery would differ.

The efficacy of a particular drug would largely depend on a patient's condition, belief, religion, habit and emotional stress.

"Now I have more trust in the supernatural power behind the drugs," she said.

"My conclusion is that Suri can be cured through a traditional healing method. Medically, he isn't ill. What changes is only his eyesight, not his eyes," she said with great conviction.

Although Hajar and Ayang stuck to their approaches and their own arguments, Suri's mom was sure that Suri, the only man to bring warmth to her life, was headed to complete blindness.

"I'm afraid he will go blind. But it worries me more if he has a blind conscience and turns a blind eye to his past, his present and his future. Suri will be meaningless to me if he cannot lead me down a along journey. A journey to a great expanse. A journey to peacefulness," she said, sobbing quietly.

They decided they would visit many places in many parts of the world, meeting all the psychics and experts in supernatural healing to find the cure.

Suri's mother would never give up until she had exhausted all the means to help her beloved son. Ayang, meanwhile, did not care about meeting the psychics; all she wanted was to protect her mother.

Hajar had her own plan during the journey. She would see as many psychics as possible. She believed once the causes were identified, it would be easy to find the cure. Hajar had to join this journey. As a wife, it would be her obligation to go even to the end of the world for the cure for her husband's damaged eyesight.

Suri was left alone with Putri, his 10-year-old daughter. She was special to the family, born after seven years of marriage after he and Hajar had tried every fertility treatment method.

Yet there was something that the rest of the family did not know. One day, from the frustration of not having a child, he had vowed out lout to bear any hardship as long as Hajar could fall pregnant.

Not long after, the desired news finally came, and Putri was born. Soon after, Suri had started to lose his sight.

He was overwhelmed by fear, now only able to see to the length of his arms.

"Let me be unable to see nature around me as long as I can see the future. Before me now is a blurred future," he said to himself, rocked by his own hesitation.

Only Suri knew of his vow. He could not tell the others; his mother would accuse him of not believing in the power of God. But he found another, more acceptable reason for his loss of eyesight -- the tear gas.

Still, it was not enough to give him peace of mind. He remained restless, watching Putri, his only child, growing, a flickering image in the encroaching darkness.

* dangdut: A popular musical form, a hybrid of Indian, Malay and Arab influences

Translated by Lie Hua