Shelina Janmohamed is an author and a culture columnist for The National
January 12, 2024
Last month I lost my father. As in the case of so many fathers like him who don’t capture the headlines, it is unlikely that you will find his name in history books. And yet they are the men who have built societies and made us. In many ways, and especially for me, he embodied the history of the last tumultuous century.
After losing my mum just 15 months ago, I am now, in technical terms, an orphan. At a personal level this is life changing and the grief that comes with it is not to be underestimated. Particularly as it is interwoven with the grief of the end of the journey of more than a decade of being a carer for them both. But I am also mindful that in these dark painful days of my own bereavement, I am still fortunate to have had them with me till their old age; especially when there are children who are being orphaned from not just their parents but entire family networks. It is sobering, for example, to think of the heartrending acronym WCNSF being used in Gaza for "wounded child no surviving family."
A boy points to a picture of his father who was killed in an Israeli army operation at the Jenin refugee camp, on December 31, 2023, in Jenin, West Bank. Getty Images)
I am not the first and I will not be the last to lose my father. And yet while my loss expands to fill up my universe, it also speaks to a much larger human experience: the impact of fatherhood.
In the days following my father's passing, I’ve been writing and publishing his story. And that feels important: not just for me, but as a service to all fathers and to fatherhood. Theirs are often untold unknown stories – even for their own families whom they have nurtured and elevated.
It can seem like our world is being increasingly poisoned by ideas of toxic masculinity that are harmful to both women and men. Algorithms and disinformation can make such stories flood our social conversations faster than the rarely told stories experienced by so many of us who are or have been lucky enough to have had fathers as their biggest champions.
When it comes to changing the narratives and archetypes of fatherhood in the public domain, we need to start sharing stories of role models, the humanity, the quiet successes that so many of us are blessed to come from. Which means we need to capture and reframe what it means to be a man and a father, by celebrating and documenting their lives.
For someone like me, this feels particularly acute because this is an era in which Muslim men are frequently vilified as violent and as suppressing women, where immigrants are often the "other". And yet it is my father, my Muslim Asian immigrant father, who has made me the woman I am, encouraged me to be independent, soft-hearted and to work hard to make the world better, while still finding joy in people and places.
He was the one who encouraged me to have a voice, take hold of my own power and stand on my own feet. We must reinvigorate the humanising of Muslim men by telling their stories that make our lives better and make us who we are.
My father was also the embodiment of the immigrant story: his father travelled from Kutch in India, and settled in Tanzania after having worked as a businessman in the British Empire port of Aden, in today’s Yemen. The small town called Mingoyo in Tanzania was on the tectonic plates of history as German rule was eclipsed by the British and the latter’s commerce grew trade as well as its occupation of the region, and whose withdrawal post independence led to my father following his British passport to the UK. He had looked around at post-independence states and assessed Britain to be the right option for him.
His immigrant story is nothing like the hateful caricatures used to demonise today’s migrants
Like many children of immigrants, my father’s decisions have shaped my life in ways that counterfactuals mean I could have grown up in so many different places and led a different life.
But even though I wasn’t born until many years later, having spent time sitting with him and hearing his stories, I know that he made those decisions with a view to not just that old cliche of giving his family the best lives possible, but also where he felt he could contribute.
He arrived in the UK with £75 and was part of a post-war generation that helped to re-build Britain. My parents through their work and talent contributed to society, to the economy and brought up a family which now works to do the same.
His immigrant story is nothing like the hateful caricatures used to demonise today’s migrants. Having published his story, many have reached out to me to say they wept and felt pride at seeing the story of a father like their own.
None of this is to deny the sad and painful reality that there are so many fathers who are absent, violent, abusive and harmful. But we need stories to showcase that there are other ways to live, because otherwise how can we ever know and apply models of successful fatherhood that are all around us and hiding in plain sight, to our own lives.
Our fathers don’t have to have been celebrities or prime ministers in order for us to tell their priceless stories. They are powerful because they built the lives of their families and contributed to upholding societies.
We need more stories of our fathers to shine a light on a kind of masculinity we hear little about. Each of their lives will have injected magic and strength into multiple lives. And sharing their stories means not just establishing a legacy for them, it means inspiring a whole new generation.
It’s the least that we owe our fathers.
End of free parking
- paid-for parking will be rolled across Abu Dhabi island on August 18
- drivers will have three working weeks leeway before fines are issued
- areas that are currently free to park - around Sheikh Zayed Bridge, Maqta Bridge, Mussaffah Bridge and the Corniche - will now require a ticket
- villa residents will need a permit to park outside their home. One vehicle is Dh800 and a second is Dh1,200.
- The penalty for failing to pay for a ticket after 10 minutes will be Dh200
- Parking on a patch of sand will incur a fine of Dh300
AUSTRALIA SQUAD
Tim Paine (captain), Sean Abbott, Pat Cummins, Cameron Green, Marcus Harris, Josh Hazlewood, Travis Head, Moises Henriques, Marnus Labuschagne, Nathan Lyon, Michael Neser, James Pattinson, Will Pucovski, Steve Smith, Mitchell Starc, Mitchell Swepson, Matthew Wade, David Warner
WHAT IS A BLACK HOLE?
1. Black holes are objects whose gravity is so strong not even light can escape their pull
2. They can be created when massive stars collapse under their own weight
3. Large black holes can also be formed when smaller ones collide and merge
4. The biggest black holes lurk at the centre of many galaxies, including our own
5. Astronomers believe that when the universe was very young, black holes affected how galaxies formed
Olympic-size swimming pool with a split bulkhead for multi-use configurations, including water polo and 50m/25m training lanes
Premier League-standard football pitch
400m Olympic running track
NBA-spec basketball court with auditorium
600-seat auditorium
Spaces for historical and cultural exploration
An elevated football field that doubles as a helipad
Specialist robotics and science laboratories
AR and VR-enabled learning centres
Disruption Lab and Research Centre for developing entrepreneurial skills
The Cairo Statement
1: Commit to countering all types of terrorism and extremism in all their manifestations
2: Denounce violence and the rhetoric of hatred
3: Adhere to the full compliance with the Riyadh accord of 2014 and the subsequent meeting and executive procedures approved in 2014 by the GCC
4: Comply with all recommendations of the Summit between the US and Muslim countries held in May 2017 in Saudi Arabia.
5: Refrain from interfering in the internal affairs of countries and of supporting rogue entities.
6: Carry out the responsibility of all the countries with the international community to counter all manifestations of extremism and terrorism that threaten international peace and security
