MISSING OUT – Leila Aboulela
This is a story about love, culture and alienation. Majdy and Samra have different experiences when they leave Sudan for London.
Majdy goes to London for studies in college. In his first term, he is distressed about being away from home. He calls his mum and his throat tightens when he hears her voice. He cries and tells her the work is difficult and he has failed his qualifying exam. His mother dismisses this as nonsense and asks him to resit the exam.
Majdy is a brilliant young man and he passed his secondary school certificate exams with flying colours.
His life in London is tough at first since he experiences homesickness. Later, he loves life in London and talks of getting a work permit once his student visa expired since he does not plan to return to Sudan.
For Samra, his young wife, the opposite happens. After Majdy complained about his homesickness, his mother raised an alarm that he needed a wife. When he came home in June, he returned to London in the summer with his new bride Samra. Unlike him at first, Samra is enthusiastic like a tourist. She enjoys the easy life in London, puts on weight and writes happy letters home.
However, this fervour and zest is short-lived. Soon the days become monotonous and
she grows weary and jaded of the surrounding and the routine.
“She was like the holidaymaker who was getting a little bit tired of her exotic surrounding.”
Life in London is worlds apart from that in Sudan, quite
literally. When Majdy had the highest marks in his secondary school certificate,
his father slaughtered a sheep and they had a big celebration. They even
performed rituals with burning incense ostensibly to ward off envy and malice.
Meanwhile, the government in Sudan is despotic. Despite the university students’
insurrection, the opposition party leader Mahmoud Muhammad Taha is executed
after being accused of apostasy. This is just one of the many ills the
government has committed against its people.
Women in Sudan dress conservatively in traditional attire such as tope. In London, some Sudanese women have embraced change and comfortably strut around in tight trousers, while smoking cigarettes.
Although Samra is excited when she first arrives in London, she remains averse to change, choosing instead to hold on to traditional values, much to Majdy's dismay and disapproval. She quarrels him for missing prayers, lacking a prayer mat and being ignorant on the direction of the Ka'ba. She suggests that he should skip Friday classes to pray on Fridays. Majdy calls her stupid.
He makes up for his insolence by taking her to a mosque, buying her a prayer mat and a prayer booklet. She attempts to influence him to be more prayerful. She considers prayers crucial for protection, grace and guidance.
On the other hand, Majdy deems it a distraction, an interruption and
an inconvenience. Samra expresses her disapproval of Majdy's indifference
towards prayers, while she herself remains “keen
to preserve this practice even though she was away from home.”
Majdy considers life in London civilized. There is certainty
that one can build their future unlike Sudan where progress and success in life
are hindered by many speed bumps such as coups, new laws and lack of essentials
such as petrol.
Samra's uncompromising predisposition and her preoccupying
thoughts of home and attachment to Sudan obscure her from reality and she pictures
a perfect future with Majdy in Sudan. In her fantasy, Majdy is a well paid
lecturer and they live together in their own house. They discipline their
children and lead a carefree life enjoying an occasional cup of tea and
gossiping with neighbours, about political fiasco among other things.
The reality in Sudan according to Majdy is quite different
from Samra’s fanciful thinking. Lecturers are underpaid; there is corruption,
lack of basic commodities, unreliable electricity, idleness and unproductivity.
People waste time arguing about politics.
“Every lecturer is defined by his political beliefs, every promotion depending on one’s political inclination and not the amount of research he’s done or the papers he’s published.”
Majdy has a contemptuous attitude towards Sudan and he
considers it a large, crazy country wallowing in backwardness. Samra on the other
hand approves of the people’s values such as kindness and respect. She cites
the incident where Majdy's mother hiked a lift from one benevolent young man
who obliges, takes a detour and refers to her respectfully as Aunt.
In London, life never stops and this continuity is alien to
Samra. When it rains, people get out their umbrellas and go on their way. In
Sudan, the July rain makes silver puddles. This means there would be no work and
no school and cars would be stranded in flooded streets. Majdy reminds her
about the poor drainage system, potholes, stinking stagnant water and
prevalence of diseases caused by mosquitoes.
In Khartoum power outages are a part of everyday life and
the citizens are accustomed to misery of life. In London, a power outage would
be in the headlines and on TV as it is unheard of. Life is conveniently
controlled by reliable supply of power, electricity, traffic, lights and trains.
Samra remains intransigent. She is not excited about the
opportunities in London, the people’s efficiency and decency, reliable services
of ambulances and fire engines, convenience in accessing cash, and decent treatment
of animals and birds such as ducks and pigeons in the parks.
Majdy is bored by her illogical refusal to change her views.
Her intransigence blocks her progress, blinds her to the benefits she could gain,
choices and doors to limitless opportunities.
“She was stuck in the past, adoring Sudan and missing out on the present.”
Majdy is happy about life in London but Samra is aloof and
she seats at home with a frozen heart. She is immobile, hungry and thirsty. He
enrols her for a word-processing course thinking the homesickness was
compounded by idleness. She, however, flanks out when her tutor suggests that
she must be relieved living in London away from war and famine in Sudan.
Finally, Majdy compromises and allows her to return to Sudan
much to her delight.
“She left, easily, so easily as if she had never truly arrived, never laid down roots that needed pulling out.”
Preoccupation with the past and refusal to change one’s views may lead to missing out on opportunities presented by the present. Such a person risks being stuck in the past. On the other hand, immigrants may also suffer cultural and psychological alienation in Western countries. An alien cultural and social environment fills them with nostalgia for their homeland.
Leila Aboulela tries to paint a positive picture of her country and her religion, the main components of her values. She does this through Samra, an uncompromising young Muslim woman who finds power and refuge in prayer and religion rather than escaping it.
Samra is strong and self made and does not allow Majdy to alter her beliefs.
Aboulela seems to suggest that alienated Africans may also miss out on their own identity and cultural values.
SAMPLE KCSE ESSAY QUESTION ON MEMORIES WE LOST - MISSING OUT
Referring to Leila Abouleila’s Missing Out, write an
essay to show some of the problems facing developing African countries.
Difficulty in accessing services
- Majdy's mother makes several trips to the Central Post Office, sits for hours on the wooden benches and sits for hours in the stifling heat (Pg 108)
- Majdy has to beg Professor Singh, a lecturer of topology, for a reference letter, while on a frantic chase for a grant to do a postgraduate research (Pg 109)
Lack of petrol
- Majdy's mother waits for hours for a taxi/bus but none comes – petrol shortage. She is forced to hike a lift from a young man. (Pg 115)
- People in Sudan sit in petrol station queues all day (Pg 113).
- No petrol to get to the Souk of Umdurman. (Pg 114)
Poverty
- Barefooted children sell chewing gum, hairpins and matches. (Pg 108)
- Presence of beggars at the mosque in Khartoum (Pg 108)
Injustice/Poor governance
- Students demonstrate against proposed execution of opposition leader. (Pg 109)
- The students are stopped from reaching the market centre to avert an eruption of a riot protesting many grievances owing to older pains caused by poor leadership. (Pg 109)
- Sudan is bedeviled by coups and new laws (Pg 113).
- Job promotion depends on ones political inclination and not the amount of research done or papers published (Pg 114)
Poor wages/salary
- Doctors strike (Pg 113) an indication of poor pay
- University lecturers are paid poorly – cannot afford to pay for an apartment. This leads to corruption
- One has to steal or accept bribes in order to afford some necessities. (corruption) (Pg 114).
Poor infrastructure (roads) (Pg 115)
- Roads have poor drainage systems and potholes
- When it rains there are silver puddles, vehicles are stranded islands in the flooded streets
- Days later, stagnant water still stinks
- The water is a breeding ground for mosquitoes that spread diseases.
Unreliable electricity
- No electricity for the fan
- Electricity cut at Samra’s uncle’s home (Pg 115)
- Electricity cut is an everyday event in Sudan – soggy food rots in defrosted fridges. Majdy resignedly concludes that it is part of the misery of life in Sudan (Pg 116).
War and Famine
- Samra's teacher talks about war and famine in Sudan (Pg 118).
Don't miss out. Join the conversation.
Between Majdy and Samra, who is missing out?
NEXT: No Need to Lie-Rolf Schmid
See analyses of all stories in Memories we Lost here.