“The worst harm you can inflict upon a child is sending him to a school where he is relatively poor,” an excerpt from one of George Orwell’s books I read goes. I found this adage adduced by the following episode that I am going to relate to you.
A lady in my neighborhood was called to report to a community police station without fail for her recalcitrant son was about to be detained. Only God knows how with a pajama-like dress, drenched with diluted-dough, she arrived at the station running or flying avoiding a knock down by a vehicle.
Her ex-husband Surafel with cracked-open chin, from which blood was oozing, was sat on a long chair by the door of a sergeant’s office. Surafel’s sUIT was soil besmirched on one side.
“What happened? Are you knocked down by a bicycle?” circling him she continued touching him.
“Leave me alone Joy! Your crazy son Abraham knocked me down punching my chin out of the blue.”
“What? How dare he do that to his own father? Vexed, he must have done that unintentionally,” she projected a disbelief stamped face.
“Whatever the case he has palpably demonstrated his ingratitude. A government employee, it was deducting from my modest income I sent him to a school with exorbitant fee for quality education. I wanted his future to be rosy. As I was brought up by poor parents, I knew the disadvantage of education lacking quality especially in English language. While competing in college with my classmates, most of which were from better off families, I was fighting with one hand tied behind my back. Out of a good will gesture it was bending over backwards I was giving Abraham pocket money, while he was a college student.”
“Where is he?” disbelief ceded way to anxiety on Joy’s face.
“A sergeant is talking to him. The insufferable brat must get himself behind bars to know firsthand what hunger and thirst mean. ”
“Is it not better I broker peace between you two,” Joy saw Surafel with beseeching eyes.
“No, I can’t find it in my heart to forgive him,” he waved a pointed finger left and right.
“Diving into the leg of Surafel she beseeched him not to take to heart the childish folly of their grown-up kid whom both pampered unintentionally.”
“I know the sacrifices you paid in our effort to bring up the child. Even after we got separated you never failed to extend all necessary support to him not forgetting me for the mental health of the child,” she tried to evoke his pity expressing gratitude he deserves.
“I did that but in vain. I often bought to him the best books and clothes in town. I hired tutors for him,” he expressed his resentments with forked fingers of both hands.
“He came with flying colors in high schools and universities. I know very well all these accolades are attributable to your fatherly role.”
“He couldn’t realize that,” tears broke away from his eyes provoking twice as much of hers. He brought her up from where she knelt grabbing his feet.
At that point, the sergeant opened the door and said
“Get in a hard talk awaits you.”
Taking a minute to return to normalcy they got in. On extreme ends of the table chairs were laid facing each other. Joy sat by the side of her son who was shivering with a diffused feeling of shame and regret as his anger had ceded place to fear of being detained and relegated to a disgraceful child. Surafel chose to sit facing the unruly son.
On the wall, a poster was hanged that run “Taking the public aboard we shall fight crime!”
The question “What if neighbors, relatives and friends hear about my follies,” was recurring in Abraham’s mind.
Surafel turned his face to the door in an effort to hide his tears once more rebelling to break away from his eyes.
“How could I get my son out of this mess?” Covering her face with her palms Joy kept on sobbing.
Looking Joy the sergeant said, “Well I presume you are the mother.” He added “all of you need composure. As I have figured out from my discussion with Abraham, he was sent to a school where most parents are willing to lavishly spend money on their children. They spoil them without considering the negative impacts the situation creates on fellow students that hail from families in the relatively lower income bracket.”
Joy nodded by way of saying “I buy your point!”
Surafel continued hearing with bewildered face.
The sergeant went on his explanation observing them turn by turn “There are some parents that buy a car to their underage children as a gift for 15th birthday and the like. They buy airplane thickets and send their underage children to the Middle East and Europe to spend vacations. Still others live in a palace -like villa. You can imagine how it detrimentally affects a child sent to first-class private schools while hailing from relatively not filthy rich families.”
“You are right sergeant from what Abraham confides to me while we are alone, I can decipher it is the harrowing mental torture he has been undergoing through schools and campus that amorphously shaped his mindset,” Joy nodded you have probed into the psychological matter.
“What is the advantage of education? Is it not to weight things to create a balance? Abraham should have seen the sacrifice I made to let him get a better education. Unlike collogues I was frugal to salt away money to rise up to the exorbitant school fees ever soaring up. Renting a hell hall for lodging, it was to mediocre restaurants I was going to save money. I almost cut my expenses to bare necessities. I only had two pair of suits for over a decade and half. Many were the times I skimped lunch and got famished thinking Abraham’s mind may not better work if he is not well nourished.” Surafel touched his stomach.
Scanning the faces of the three Surafel continued “I am an honest civil servant trying to live by the sweat of my brow. I’m averse to corruption. I could have done to my son the pampering he wanted had I engaged in rent seeking like most of the parents of his classmates!”
On his turn, Abraham busted into tears. To that point he was thinking what his father, unlike other fathers of his classmates, didn’t do to him. He failed to see things from a diametrically opposite perspective that, relatively speaking, it was his father who was investing the better portion of his income for his son’s sake. It dawned on him he had made an unforgivable mistake.
Abraham tumbled down crying. “I’m Judas the culprit please father forgive me,” he sobbed on his father’s leg. His mother followed suit. They sobbed for five minutes on end before the sergeant urged them to stop. Curtains of mist were visible on Surafel’s eyes.
“For at least a week Abraham must not see his father. Surafel and Abraham must go partying ways. It is better Surafel go to a clinic for a checkup. You see he fainted while he was punched on the chin. There could also be a loose tooth.” The mother thanked the inspector bending from her shoulder and run out of the police station grabbing her son’s hand.
On their way home “What happened?” Joy asked Abraham putting her palm on his chest.
“Early in the morning Surafel gave me a call to come to a nearby hotel to hand me money for purchasing a suit that I wear on my graduation ceremony fortnight ago,”
“After taking breakfast when we began to discuss about futurity, he told me he has no plan of supporting me after graduation as he is due to marry another woman and start a family life anew. As I was not prepared for this, I knocked him on the chin following a knee-jerk reaction. May God forgive me! I was expecting more help from his side. I’m subject to dependency syndrome. I wish I had gone to a school where I’m materially better off than my classmates. I was tortured by inferiority complex,” he put his palm on his head.
“I think that is why schools order students to put on uniforms. Parents must also be advised no to treat their children in a showy way. They must not outlay money than is due, for otherwise their children apart from going off the track will take others down the precipice.”
“You are right mother.”
“Do you think Surafel will forgive me?”
“Do not worry I will talk to him?”
Their hands locked mother and child went home.
A sunny Sunday was mood uplifting. At the closing ceremony of a luncheon Joy organized for relatives and neighbors and parents Surafel arrived carrying a photo album and a necktie as a gift. Overjoyed both Abraham and Joy embraced him getting up from their chair simultaneously. He spared them a bashed hope. Abraham putting on his gown, Joy took the photo of father and son. Both were short and stout except Abraham had developed a pot belly.
Of all things the inspector said one thing loitered in Abraham’s mind “before you stopped demanding from your parents, now on the wrong side of 18, as custom bids your time of supporting them has come!”
BY ALEM HAILU G/KRISTOS
THE ETHIOPIAN HERALD SATURDAY 30 DECEMBER 2023
