The story of the crooked rice pudding

In memory of Iftikhar Husain
June 14, 1912 - June 8, 2004


My grandfather, Iftikhar Husain, died three years ago today.

I think I will always mourn him.

But today, in his memory, I will tell a joke he shared with me a couple of years before he died. He and my grandmother were over at our house for a visit. Barai Abaji or "Big Father," as we grandchildren called him, was in good spirits.

We settled into the living room sofa.

"Have you heard the story of the crooked rice pudding?" he asked, his lined face anticipating a good story.

Barai Abaji's delight was infectious and we both laughed uproariously at his punchline.

I snuck upstairs some time later to write the joke down. I had begun to feel the tenuousness of the time we had left together, like the delicate threads binding us were fading and pulling with age and readying to snap.

Here is his joke. Some of the spirit of the original Urdu may not transfer into English, but perhaps that is exactly the story's point -- that while some things can get lost in translation, new things can also be found.

"There was once a blind man," Barai Abaji began. "He had a visitor, who told him he had just returned from a dinner party.

"The blind man asked his guest what he had been served at the dinner. The guest listed the items on the menu, and said, for dessert, he had kheer, or rice pudding.

"'Rice pudding?' asked the blind man, who had never heard of such a thing. 'What's that?'

"His guest hesitated, wondering how to explain. 'Well, it's made of rice and milk and sugar. It's white.'

"The blind man asked again, 'What's white?'

"'White is like - well, it's like a stork.'

"'What's a stork?' asked the blind man.

"His guest crooked his arm at the elbow, and then at the wrist, to form a little Egyptian pose. 'That's a stork.'

"'Ah, I see,' said the blind man, feeling his crooked arm. 'Rice pudding is a bent thing.'"