Old Age effects

There are many changes with old age like return of childhood reflexes.

Senility and Senile Dementia are known to physicians how they manifest these conditions. When man gets very old there is return to the 'fetal' position also.

Surah Yaseen Ayah 68.

(Note, this is my first attempt at upkoading a picture on my blog, so gorgive me for it being less clear)

"Common-sense nerve fibers are seldom medullated before forty--They arenever see with a microscope before twenty" "William Osler MD"

Ramazdan night prayers

From the blog of I.A. Bhopal Saheb and comments on this subject I got somewhat mixed up So I reconsulted the fiqh books. Following is the way I understand and if my impressions are incorrect , the reader is requested to point out. (and oblige me)
"Qiyam-ul-Lail" is a general (?generic) word for supernumery night prayers.
"Tahajjud" is a specific night prayer offered AFTER Isha (Obligatory) prayer and can also be offered after sleeping some, actually prefered at late night before Fajr.
"Taraweeh" is another type of 'Qiyam' specifically offered in Ramadhan. There is no doubt Minimum offered by the prophet PBUH were 8+3. both at home and in the Masjid. He, through his behavior demonstrated restraint and 'suggested' to sahaba to offer at home (also) instead of masjid. ( I am not describing hadithes for keeping it short)
He did finish reciting Quran during his last Ramadhan (in ?taraweeh) twice (Jibreel AS listening)
Umar RA instituted (out of necessity, to create some order) during his Khilafat, the way we are doing it now. The number of raka't from 8 to 20 (plus Witr which itself can be one or three raka't). ( Maliki takes up to 36 Raka's of taraweeh)
Generally Witr is considered the last prayer of the night (Hanafi) BEFORE sleeping but can be offered late night AFTER sleeping. By this I understand that 'taraweeh' is NOT offered AFTER Witr. Tahajjud is offered (in other months) even after Witr. (Thus distinguishing taraweeh from tahajjud, though they are 'alike' in being "qiyam-ul-lail)
(OR, is there is no harm in altering the 'sequence' of all these night prayers, as long as they are sandwitched between Isha and Fajr?)
To me these differences and the prophet's attitude gives a lot of options and anybody can do whatever he can do or likes to do within these limits. AND one can skip the masjid any time (for the taraweeh only Isha) and as many times as he wishes to but offering the taraweeh at home instead. Maybe Allah wanted us to ENJOY these options so He made His rasool SAWS do that.
At present In the Haramain Shareefain Ramadhan Qiyamul-lail during the last Ashrah is offered as under:
20 Taraweeh after Isha (Regular Quran recitation for finishing Qur'an usually on Jumu'at-ul-wid'a), followed by witr.
Four Rak'a further Qiyam (with longer Rukoo' and Sujood) +one Witr, later in the night finishing about an hour before Fajr (for Sahoor or Sahri). Qur'an recitation longer surahs but not for second finish of Qur'an.
We have multiple mazdahib Muslims in our Islamic center and we have done the same as above with the following difference
8 taraweeh after Isha
2+1 (Non-Hanafi) or 3 together (Hanafi recommendation) Witr (Non-hanafi method), the Qunoot being mostly after Rukoo' and much longer dua.
(I am calling it Hanafi and Nonhanafi for lack of better expression. Hanafi recommendation for Qunoot being BEFORE rukoo'a and Offered 'quietly' and Non-Hanafi recommendation being AFTER rukoo'a and Imam utters dua Qunoot with voice)
After that the Huffazd take up the 12 more raka'ats with continuation of Quran (Apportioned for that night). This is followed by Witr for those who have not done before--- And Yes another Imam comes for the rest of the Qiyam of 4 + one Raka'ts, with longer rukoo' and sujood ( and Qur'an recitation other than the apportioned schedule). Those who did not do witr before do it now. (Understand that Witr is NOT repeated for obvious reasons, by individuals.)
Despite all these, I find this 'Optionality' most pleasing. The prophet had his own reasons for reducing hardship on Ummah. Ummah however not only indulges in more 'hardship' but even ENJOYS it (more than the "prescribed" or Fard prayers). This phenomena is amazing and year after year I watch the Masjid filling up and overflowing from just before Ramadhan and back to 'usual' thinning of crowds just after Ramadhan. As Umar (RA) says it is "Bid'ah Hasanah". (I, like many of you now even look forward to Ramadhan season)
Those of you who have had the experience of spending last Asharah in Haramain Shareefain know what I am talking about. It is just awsome. Hamaray nabi per lakhon aur karorron darood aur Allah SWT Nabi SAWS per apni salamtain aur rahmatain nazil karay-AAmeen

Ankhon dekha hal

Ankhon dekha hal (narration of eye-witnessed events) "Sarai' or "bungla" turned out to be the reason for bringing into prominence my village Kotla. Originally built as an encampment on the way to Kashmir by the Mughals, later used by British for similar purposes or even just for a 'sarkari afser' staying overnight on his way to some place. It was otherwise an empty place. As the Kashmir struggle started catching up momentum one day I found villagers getting together there for plans to attack Bhimber (A small town of Kashmir nine miles Northwest of Kotla). My sister and brother-in-law who lived there (A Vet. Surgeon) had already moved out along with children and were with us in Kotla. Rajah's 'dogra fauj' had a fortress in Bhimber. 'Fighting forces' developed with some army personel on vacation or the retired ones with guns, others just in there for 'booty' etc. but ready to go equipped with 'dang' (Staff) or 'berchha'(spear or lance) or 'koharri'(axe) with "mundassa" (Head-wear of cloth) and of course 'Allah-o-akber" The villagers were instructed NOT to shout takbir until they have reached on 'top' of the enemy. What I heard the next day, they could not contain themselves giving the Dogras enough time to get ready for defence--result was they came back in the evening woth lot of losses and no gain. Kotla had a small dispensary and a (LSMF) doctor also that got to work. Sort of mini MASH you may say. Planning restarted soon and eventually one day they were succesful. Soon after that "Sarhadi Mujahideen" started coming in large groups by the time these expeditions advanced to Mirpur. After that advance was going on to Srinagar when "jang-bandi' orders were 'issued'. On the other front Mujahideen were close to Jammu (northeast to Kotla) and would have taken along with Srinagar if fighting had not been stopped for another week (my guess). As stated above, the fighting forces consisted of several types of people, the Kashmiris, the 'Punjabis' (many of them retired faujis) of various villages around there, sarhadi pathans and some Pakistani faujis on vacation (from their services) I remember one Pathan brought the body of his son(shaheed) from Mirpur proudly presenting 36 bullets in his chest, as he had played a significant role in getting the 'faseel' of Mirpur Qila. After India had taken 'possession' of Kashmir frequent bombing had started in Kashmiri areas near the Pakistani borders which were crossed several times by the Indian airforce jets. A couple of miles from our village, there was a grove of trees where "mujahideen' were taking cover from these bullets and bombs when a pathan's rifle hit some vulnerable part of one of the jets and it was downed (Yes, that was INside Pakistani territory, actually not too far from the village of "Aachh-Gochhia Lohar" as we called him whom you know now as "Alam Lohar"the famed 'Jugni' singer). The Pilot jumped out of the downed aircraft totting his pistol, (not hurt bad). The Mujahid asked him to throw away his pistol or face death. He was caught alive and brought to our village from where he was to be taken over by the Pakistan Government/Army for exchange of 'prisoners'. I saw him, a well-built youngman of not very dark color but appeared to be south Indian. Because of these Indian AF jet incursions Pakistani Army came in. They occupied the 'bungla' and soon established anti-aircraft guns all around our village (and other villages near the Kashmir borders) Then the bombing stopped at least in Pakistani territory. This was the first time I saw the 'caterpillars' arriving in advance to make roads etc. We, the children were so excited to see the initial works of the army Mechanical Engineers. In those days we played less and snooped around more, for 'news' everywhere. Soon the army 'things' became common in our village, and as the 'faujis' proved to be good customers, the shops of all kinds started multiplying. Although the army eventually left the border area, Kotla never looked back, with the result that today, it is a big business center and a couple of banks (branches) to support. Last time I visited Bhimber was when some great leader (?president) of Azad Kashmir was vising there (Sardar, ? the name has slipped from my mind about '49-50) I went with another friend of mine on the bicycle and the roads were unmetalled. It started raining while we were going down a hill and I slipped. The front wheel got twisted. We waited until a truck passed and gave us lift to Bhimber (we were close). There, a cycle repair man helped me out with very little money. So we had fun, listened to the 'Taqrir" and came back home at night safe and sound. The Bungla was the place where a large 'jalsa' was arranged when Mian Mumtaz Daultana came for 'taqrir' and a Malik Saheb (was my teacher) read out the "sipasnama" in which he pointed out rather meaningfully: "Naumeed na ho insay ay rahber-e-farzana--- kamkosh to hain laikin bezauq nahin rahi".

The School I graduated TWICE from, II

As the year 1946 started to close, tensions and disappointments opened up amongst the people of India leading to communal riots in the new year(1947). We were all together in our class of nineth, Hindus, Sikhs and Muslims (Staff as well as students) We used to stand together in the 'prayer' before the classes in the school compound "Tabay hay tairay maula sari khudai tairee" was one and sometimes Allama Iqbal's well-known ones. I remember Herbans Lal passing out as he came late one day, sweating in the humid warm day, to stand in the lines of prayer. Everybody was concerned (had an epileptic attack, poor fellow and that was my first experience witnessing an ep. attack).
News reached late in the villages but a sense of fear had started to appear everywhere. There was uncertainty and difficulties for the school and we had not yet had full quota of teachers for the high classes We were being taught Math by an able teacher, our regular teacher (MA in Math first class) eventually arrived (more detail later, see below) and new Head Master (a BA,BT) arrived and a science teacher. We had opted to learn science in English. (One could do that in Urdu but it was not popular at that time)

From here I will get into anecdotal narrations.
About RT. He was a kind mild-mannered man and a brilliant mathematician (he was 'second master' or asstt. head master also) but was known to have "declared that he was the Imam Mahdy, expected". Unfortunately sometimes it resulted in 'practical' jokes about him, that I would not like to relate to you (He was actually a Schizohrenic) but they were hillarious at that time. Consider this now,for example, when I was in my fourth year of Med. College I read a news one day about him that he had applied for a passport to go to England 'to get married to Princess Margret' and the reason given was as follows, " I have written 340 letters to her and she has not replied to a single one. So she is quiet and "al-khamoshi neem-raza" indicates she is half willing", so all I have to do is to get there and......." When I was in Peshawar (as a senior lecturer in Physiology in Khyber medical College) I found out he was in the hospital with the diagnosis of Schizophrenia (a thought disorder). So I dont like to make fun him any more. Inspite of that he was a good and respectable teacher.
The Partition Experience
The riots themselves did not create much disturbance in the school and the non-Muslims gradually disappeared from the classes by the end of 1947 (no incidence of violence in school). but as the Kashmir fighting broke out the school suffered a lot. Initially I remember the sounds of Indian airforce jets pounding bombs, and straffing and such on my way home from the school. Then the Pakistan Army started posting near the border (Kashmir border is only 3 miles from my village) because Indian jets frequently used machine gun fire INSIDE the Pakistan Territory. (I have personal experience of 'dive-bomber' sounds that i learnt later in my neurology teachings) I saw 'anti-aircraft' Guns being fixed around my village and other villages along the border. Then I saw the jets running away as our guns fired, shooting up high and running away, stopping gunfire altogether. Will write other experiences separately.
Coming back to school's misfortunes. After the Kashmir struggle started, groups of 'sarhadi mujahideen' started coming through our villages on their way to Kashmir and one day we found they had occupied our school rooms. We had to hold classes in the fields (winter, I remember). We were using our own 'boris' to sit on anyway. Mujahideen had 'fun' in the rooms, and to keep themselves warm even took liberty at the use of our windows and doors. Unfortunately for my classroom's widows that were locked because they contained the ONLY few items of science Lab such as flasks, test-tubes, other tubings, chemicals, prisms etc. When they vacated after some weeks or months, I saw flasks having been used for Hukka (flask and a keef and tubings, wow) smoking, was funny. But we were left with nothing for science experiments.
Many boys (who carried their 'basta' in the army bags) lost heir bags, for Mujahideen needed them (for ammunition) more than the boys needs. They were fond of 'practicing' use of rifles they carried (saw the cowboy type scenes in person) but some of them were educated pathans also (see more about them in my separate blog, especially their 'heroic' achievements).
No further addition to our high school teachers and the time for our final Matriculation exam neared while we had performed no practicals at all in science. Believe it or not, we went to Gujrat in a school lived there three days performing ALL the science experiments of high school. This was arranged by our science teacher. Wow, that was quite an experience, a concentrated dose of experiments of science. English was taught by our Head master, a well-built older and kind teacher who introduced us to paragraph writing, essay writing and 'stuff like that' though many village boys still needed a lot more instruction in Grammer. Can you imagine the perplexing and confusing alterations that the verb in English undergoes for becoming interrogative or prohibitory tense and so on? Just think about it for a moment a Punjabi villager 'jat' boy learning that who was going to go back to ploughing in the fields anyway.
Extra-curricular activities of school

We did develop a 'mehfil-e-adab' (maybe some other name, I dont remember exactly) and I started my first Urdu presentations there. No. I did not become an Urdu debator. Some 'bait-bazi' did take place but did not become very popular at that time. The only 'sports' we had was Volly-ball (a net and a ball is all the school could afford) and kabaddi/wrestling. The last I remember we had not yet developed a 'team' of our own in anything though we did play vollyball with other schools (?Daulat-nagar probably) While we were holding classes in the fields we had some 'racing athletics' experience. I thought I was a good runner of short distance but he bigger stouter teenage boys beat me completely. O! I was declared the best 'scout' in the school though I was phyically very poor that was because I was the only one who could 'read' hand signalling. Scout master was PT master, sports teacher, vollyball coach everything. We had, (before the Mujahideen came) written Urdu and English sentences and mottos etc. on the walls and the face of the school building. I remember making English letter templates myself and the insignia of school (I dont remember that now what was it and what were the words). Students had to write something on the 'blackboard' outside our senior classroom. We made lot of fun as somebody wrote one day "Dost aan bashad keh geerad dast-e-dost, der pareshani o hali o dermandgi" (instead of Pareshan-hali-o-dermandgi). A liberary was soon formed consisting of a few books (Of no great consequence) The high school was still in the making when I graduated.
We were 16 boys and 12 of us passed the matric exam, pretty good, hunh? That was the first graduating class of Kakrali high school in 1948, my second graduation from the same school. I wish we could have re-union next year. We did'nt in 1998 (Golden Jubilee) I dont know how many are still around and where. I know of one 'Khudadad' who became BA,BT, head master (died of brain tumor some years ago) and another one probably Mohammad Siddique who took MA in some subject.
Many boys had droppd out from high school (teenagers) when they heard about Pakistan Navy (One day a naval Petty officer came in white uniform (attractive youngman) to tell us, "Join the Navy and see the world") and army was already a popular reason for most 'drop-outs'.
My own 'general knowledge' was so poor, I did not know the difference between medical science and non-medical science at that time (Biology and specially Zoology was to become my favorite later.) However I caught up rapidly in the colleges in Lahore, but never won any academic medals or honors worth mentioning.
I must mention I appeared in interview before two remarkable personalities for admission into college, "Pitrus" in Govt. College (he was the principal at that time) and MD Taseer (Principal) in Islamia college (where I was admitted eventually) Railway road Lahore.

"Correctness of opinion goes along with changes of the times; it comes with them and it goes with them." LIVING ANDDYING WITH GRACE (Counsels of Hadzrat Ali)