Grandfather of the pictures

This photograph was one of many on a similar wall, and I had seen it all my life growing up. Albeit for some odd reason, what should have been so obvious in this photograph, was a blind spot to me; and it took a school friend to gasp and point out that, “that is a German Swastika!” in the background.

A photograph to send back home to India

My husband Fehmeed was born and brought up in Lucknow, and spent his early years darning cloth at his father’s shop in Hazratganj. He would often tell me about his struggles in Calcutta (now Kolkata), where he moved to in 1965, while in his mid-20s, to find better work. He also spoke about the gruesome violence he witnessed between Hindus and Muslims there, how it shook him, and prompted him to move to Karachi, where his paternal relatives lived at the time.