Dear Editor,

IT is an extremely difficult situation one has to face when one loses a parent or any sibling. Grief for the loss of a mother is one of the hardest things we face in life. Moms’ thoughts and actions are in, for, and about their children. Few children return the favour. Some children don’t have much time with their mom. I have attended to the needs of not only my mother but I try to do for all elderly people in my encounters. A tribute to my mother, Gladys, is a tribute to all mothers of pre-independence period because they all experienced a similar life and they did their best to fight against adversities to provide a better life for their descendants. I salute all of the women pioneers of our nation who did so much to make a better country and who received so little credit.
I lost my mother less than a week ago. Anytime someone mentions or expresses condolences, I choke with tears. The pain of grief is overwhelming that anytime someone says something about my mother, it heightens my emotions. But at some point, she has to go. All of us have to go.

She was a heroine, perhaps typical of almost every mother of her generation — very hard working to eke out a living under difficult challenges for their children which few children reciprocate. Women of that era did multiple jobs — at home, on the farm, and even professional career like mine who was a seamstress. My mother and other women of the indentureship period and thru the 1960s continued a tradition that was brought from India by the Coolie Woman who had an indomitable spirit about them that is to be emulated and that is scarce today. There is so much to celebrate about them. My mother like the typical coolie woman prior to WWII represented strength, courage, and a determination to succeed against all odds and adversities. And she was a success story. Her 75 years of experience as a mother shaped generation.

No number of words can describe my mother, in fact most mothers. My mother had outstanding, rare qualities as an income earner. She was the sweetest mother to all as every mother is or ought to be. She had the nicest smile and was very generous Sharing whatever little she had. She offered great advice to her children and others even when we defied her and refused to follow her words. My mother, our Mai, was very special to us all and she never kept us out of her memory. My siblings are fortunate or blessed for spending invaluable time with our mother.
Ninety-three years is a long life. We can’t keep her forever. But no amount of time is enough to spend with mother.

My mother, Gladys, like the coolie women laborers and their first and second generation born in British Guiana were very strong, industrious, hard-working, creative, productive, caring, loving, kind, generous, compassionate. They were abused by their bosses in the fields and in the homes but they persevered against all odds, and they left a lasting legacy for their children.
Gladys, like her mother and her nanni and Aji who came from India, lived a dynamic and meaningful life. She was a guardian angel, teacher, best friend, guru, chef, chief, boss, business woman, seamstress, creator and innovator of clothing design. She did not depend on hand outs. She was an income earner for the home when women hardly got a salary. She lost her father very early. He died in an accident at the estate and was never compensated except for a job for his wife, my nanni as a weeder; that was the extent of the cruelty of indentureship and its immediate aftermath. So, my mother had to earn an income to help her siblings who were fatherless as well as provided for her own new home with her in laws.

Women worked without pay in that period and they even did more than the men in the fields and in the rice mills although not as equals in hard physical labor. Gladys, like women of the era, were also budget directors of the home, managing the finance for the week, month, year and beyond. She was independent minded for the longest while; only in the last few years when she became frail, she needed assistance. She did not depend on hand outs not even in death. She made preparations for her funeral and the rites. She purchased all the items for the rituals and she gave instructions on what must be done and how the prayers should be carried out.

Gladys’ best accomplishments are her products – her children and descendants. She gave birth to 12 and raised 11 (one died in infancy). She cradled and nursed them, first to wake up in the morning and last to go to bed in the night. She never begged, no matter how difficult the circumstances or tight the budget. She ran into deficits but quickly balanced the books running surplus to share. She worked very hard to see children succeed in life, sending all but one to secondary school. (But the one who didn’t go to secondary school became a success story in her own right in America that gave her an opportunity). Gladys was a blessing not only to the 11 children she raised. She was also a heroine to the people she came into contact with over the years, training them in sewing and in helping to find spouses for so many. Sewing skills was a prerequisite for marriage and it helped females to boost family income.

I like to think of myself and my siblings as proof of our mother’s achievements as well as her outstanding character. My mother built and left behind a very strong legacy in her children and in her achievements. Our mother and our father who died in 1994 had been such a blessing in our lives. And their parents and grandparents and indeed all the indentured who came from India and the slaves from Africa also left a long-lasting legacy. I am so grateful for the time I have had with Gladys. I can never forget her. Others too have not forgotten her. So many outside of the family reflected on what my mother did for them to become better persons. She had a rare heart willing to share with others. Those who had the privilege to know her expressed their admiration for my mother for helping them, for her generosity.

She wanted to trace the relatives of her nanna and nanni, and aja and aji in India. She spoke fondly of her grandparents. I took my mother to India and as we travelled in the villages, she said they reflect the descriptions given to her by her grandparents. I had some success in tracing some of them in countless trips to India and will attempt to complete the mission in coming trips.
I will continue to carry the experiences I had with mother and her memories of her grandparents from India in my heart.
May the lord grant her soul eternal peace as the Lord did for her ancestors and all the indentured. I pray for her and the fore parents as I perform final rites over the next 12 days as is the ancestral tradition and as she requested.

Yours truly,

Vishnu Bisram