Irtaqaaii • ارتقائی • Evolution

The Nebula

Yesterday I was clever so I wanted to change the world. Today I am wiser so I am changing myself- Rumi.

This one quote from Rumi had been a joke for her for as long as she could remember. Her father Mir Farooqi was adamant on the fact that this quote is the essence of life. 

But Dua begged to differ. It was the world that needed to be changed, it was this backward world, with its misogynist, chauvinistic ideas. This world with its violence. The dreamers, the idealist, the poets, they are the ones that needed to change. 

Why should she change herself? She was already wise, right? She knew right from wrong, she knew that hoping for clean and wholesome freedom for this foreign rule was a fool's idea. 

She knew that this country will burn when the time came. 

She also knew that no matter how many parts the country is divided into, Men will rule, Women will be sidelined as was the norm of the society. She knew that the great women fighting today will not be remembered as much as the men will be. 

A day to the women's name, the country to the men's name. 

That was what this society did to women, it took and it took and women gave without expecting anything in return. So again Dua thought it was the world that needed to change not her. 

But her father was adamant and she was stubborn so, they were at an impasse when it came to this one quote. 

" I won't change myself Abba, why should I? You have given me the wings, why should I not fly high?" She asked her father, as her younger brother, Abdullah, and Omar watched on. 

The Mir brothers were quite used to watching this tennis match of words between their sister and their father. The debate was years old, and it was now a part of their Sunday rituals. 

The debate could be carried out only during Sunday's when their mother was out at her friends for a quick gossip session. Allah forbid, she would hear Dua talk like this, she would have had her way with Dua and a chappal. 

Mir Farooqi was a different story though, " Dua Jaan, there is a difference is flying high, and flying so high that the sun burns you. Soar as high as you want, you abba will stand by you but do not forget even the mightiest of the birds do not fly above the atmosphere, they stay at a place from where the rain doesn't touch them up in the clouds but not so up that they leave the world behind, and fall due to lack of perspective." 

Mir had always been ahead of his time, allowing his daughter to study in the best institutes, in a time when most fathers didn't even let their daughters out of the house. 

He heard her voice, and let her speak her mind. He valued what Dua said. She knew she was blessed by Allah. She was utterly grateful for it. 

But she was still not agreeing with her father, who as open-minded as he was, still wanted to keep within the society. He still thought that some rules were right. He was one of the Idealists she thought needed to change. 

She was about to retort with a counterpoint but their mother's voice filtered through the open windows and they had to put an end to the debate early that day.

"This isn't over," Dua said to her father gathering Rumi up and putting back on the shelf, lest Aisha Begum saw it and figured out that they were debating again.

"I will hold you to it," Mir laughed at his daughter's expression saying that she was not defeated. 

Aisha Begum entered the house and the house was up with activity again, the servants and workers all up and about following orders that they had previously neglected to follow.