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Sometimes we need a gentle reminder that ours used to be a more secular state, a long time back. Mrs Merle Jeevanandham, now 72, remembers the years gone by when people shared each other’s joy and religion did not create barriers.
Merle Jeevanandham is a familiar face to students past and present at Kinnaird College, Lahore, where her teaching career spans decades. Though Lahore has been home to her she has also spent many years of her life living in Rawalpindi and in Karachi. And it wasn’t just the Lahore of yesteryear that was a different place; Jeevanandham says some of the best Christmases of her life were those spent in Pindi.
“I’m really an army wife, and hence have also lived in Rawalpindi for many years. Lahore is my hometown. I grew up here, I went to the Cathedral School, did my BA from Kinnaird in 1958, then Masters in English literature from FC College in 1960. I got married the same year, in 1960. I was away from 1964 to 1986, and when I returned to Lahore in 1986, I found that things had changed.”
Karachi was the city that was home during the swinging 60s. “The 1960s were years that my husband was posted in Karachi, and Karachi was beautiful then. We were young and we had a lovely group of friends. Together we put up a Christmas play which I directed — Christmas in the Marketplace. It was held at the YWCA, located on Bunder Road, which was a very happening place in those times. We organised dances and all sorts of fun things all the time.”
But Karachi is not the only city that she has fond memories of. “The best years were when we were in Pindi and started celebrating Christmas in our own house,” says Jeevanandham. “As soon as the children’s exams finished we had to start preparations for the Christmas cakes that were to be baked. It was fun to do everything from scratch, sitting round the table, cleaning the spices and getting everything together. Even in the initial years at Pindi when we used to come to Lahore for Christmas we used to put up a tree in the house and decorate it before leaving for Lahore. When we later moved back to Lahore we purchased an artificial tree from someone, but that wasn’t really as much fun as having the real one.”
Initially, though, she recalls, Pindi was difficult to adjust to after the wonderful years they had spent in Karachi. “Pindi was a real let-down because everything seemed dark and dismal after Karachi. Once we were in Pindi, initially it was always convenient to come down to Lahore for Christmas. My sister-in-law and her children were also in Lahore so it was always good to prepare for Christmas together, such as going to Anarkali and Shahalmi for buying presents. I was always doing things at the last minute, such as stitching the children’s clothes myself, getting their jerseys and so on.”
The best times were had at Christmas, says Jeevanandham, when they “decided to spend Christmas in Pindi every year.” The large house that they had was a spacious venue. “This was in the 70s to early 80s. We used to look forward to the Christmas holidays in those days since the girls had gone away to Lahore to study at Kinnaird. I remember the nice, warm feeling we had whenever the girls came home for the holidays. We always used to plan surprises for them.
“We used to get a huge Christmas tree from Murree, though this was illegal, since you weren’t allowed to cut trees. But we got ours from the log area commander who was a friend. I remember the tree we got one year was so large that we had to cut the top off and even then it reached till the ceiling. We used to decorate the tree with tinsel and you didn’t get Christmas decorations back then, so we used to make our own — such as wrapping up matchboxes to look like miniature presents. Later on I used to get decorations when I went abroad. I think Christmas days were the happiest days of our life back then.”
Christmas joy was doubled when everyone joined in. “We had an open house every year in Pindi where all the neighbours, who were Muslim families, (there was just one Christian family) used to come over.”
In 1986 they moved back to Lahore and found that many things had changed. One of the smaller changes to the city was that the centre of the town was no longer Mall Road but Gulberg. “These were also things I discovered,” she says, “when I had to go and shop for ingredients for the Christmas cakes I used to bake every year which were always a big hit with everyone; I used to give them out to friends and family too. My daughters were living at home then, and we used to make more goodies, such as toffees, and give them out as well. Then somehow it all fizzled out and stopped, now there are also few friends around with whom one can share all this. Part of the reason was also that my husband died eight years ago. Now I celebrate Christmas with a very good Muslim friend who invites me over to her place for Christmas.”
This is not to say that Christmas has in any way lessened, the Christmas feeling still persists, says Jeevanandham. “In fact my daughters who both live in Canada now carry on the tradition of having an open house. Over there people who don’t celebrate Christmas also get Christmas trees and decorate their houses, just to participate.”
A lot has changed with the times. “Back then in the ’60s there wasn’t the ‘separateness’ that you have now, in religion. It doesn’t take away from being a Muslim or a Hindu if you join in others’ celebrations. Like we used to join our Muslim friends in their Eid festivities. I remember what we used to do on Shab-e-barat was to make halwa puri at home and take it over to our Christian friends’ house and share it with them. But now the narrow-mindedness that has seeped into society is a characteristic that Christians as well as Muslims are prey to.
“I remember, one time in Pindi a Christian family who happened to visit us on Shab-e-barat asked why we were making halwa puri in the Muslim tradition, and we said because that’s the spirit of how to enjoy with others. Now I feel that people think they’ll detract from their religion if they join others. In Kinnaird, for example, not only has Christmas always been celebrated, but also Eid and Basant. Now, however, some Muslim girls are hesitant to take part in the Christmas play, while others don’t mind helping out.”
Mrs Jeevanandham has been teaching English literature to the MA and MPhil classes at Kinnaird College since 1986. She completed her MPhil degree in 1995 and at present is writing a book on Hanif Kureishi.
