Geetanjali Krishna: Not quite like home, but close

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The atmosphere in Sardarji's household was so tense, you could have sliced right through it. "I'm eighty years old and haven't set foot outside Delhi for the past 10 years," said Beeji, "now I want to travel "" can't my only son fulfil what might be his mother's last wish?" Sardarji pleaded with his mother: "Beeji, you're not quite a spring chicken "" what if you fall ill there? We can't let you go off like this!"

The old lady said implacably: "I have already made all the arrangements through the Gurudwara, and am leaving next week." Since the old lady was the only one in the household with a passport, the family could do nothing but wave goodbye as she set off for Pakistan. Before she left, Beeji looked at her family's troubled faces and said, "don't worry, I'm not going to some strange unfriendly country. I'm returning to my birthplace, and that of Guru Nanak, a place we've all visited so often in our prayers, it's as familiar as our own home is." But nobody else in the household remembered the Partition and heartbreak of being separated from some of her community's best loved shrines. So she smiled, "and I can't wait to go shopping in Lahore's markets...they've always been the best!"

Her group left by train from Delhi to Amritsar, and by coach thereon. "All their staying arrangements were in Gurudwaras," said Sardarji, "so I knew she was in safe hands." But he worried about the gruelling trip, that too in soaring summer temperatures. "If the group insists on sightseeing and shopping the entire day, Beeji may not be able to keep up with them," he worried.

For the next 10 days, Beeji and her group travelled to some of the most famous Gurudwaras in Pakistan, starting with Nankana Sahib in Sheikhupura district, where Guru Nanak, the founder of Sikh faith, was born in 1469. This shrine had to be abandoned at the time of the Partition, a fact that has rankled devout Sikhs ever since.

Which explains why their traditional prayer after 1947 has always included an impassioned entreaty that they serve and pray at Nankana Sahib at least once in their lives. Beeji had a hazy recollection of having visited this Gurudwara when she was a child, and spending many a happy hours exploring the many shrines there, all associated with Nanak's childhood. When Sardarji called her to find out how she was, she said happily, "I feel as if I've come home." But after the euphoria of the first few days, Beeji's sense of homecoming palled a little.

The group was not permitted to go anywhere but to the Gurudwaras on their itinerary. "The Pakistani government gave them permission to visit only their Gurudwaras, nowhere else," said Sardarji. So Beeji had little opportunity to spend the $200 she'd optimistically carried to shop with. Except for two occasions when the group was shepherded to for shopping, they spent the rest of their time enjoying the peace of the Gurudwaras.

Sardarji's entire family went to receive Beeji at the railway station when she returned. "How was it?" they asked. "Oh, very nice indeed...I can picture it so vividly even now," said she, reflectively. "What?" the family asked. "This beautiful pair of jutti I almost bought in the bazaar in Lahore," said she regretfully. Everyone piled into the taxi specially hired to celebrate Beeji's homecoming, and she sighed: "It's good to be back. Pakistan was almost unbearably familiar even after so long, but it wasn't quite home!"