3 minute read
Ami with an i...
By Ami Yeasmin, Bisbrooke Artisans. Photo by Paul Robinson, PWR media. Head piece is designed and made by Amanda Robertson @amandacarolinecouture
Childhood memories as I embark on my cancer journey...
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Since writing her first article for the QueenBee Summer Glow issue, Ami discovered that she has a cancerous tumour in her breast and is currently undergoing treatment. Here she bravely talks about the tough journey ahead and her cherished childhood memories of Bangladesh.
I sit in the car with the letter in my hand, struggling to absorb the information from the NHS breast clinic after a routine mammogram. I decide to put it back in the envelope. As I pull away from the kerb to drive towards London to see my parents, I try to put it out of my mind and listen to a Paul Simon CD. As the songs fill the empty spaces in my head, the tears start rolling down my face.
The letter says that four out of a hundred people are called back and the realisation that I happen to be one of the four seems to get stuck in my throat.
Sobbing my way to London, I finally arrive at my parents, where a family BBQ awaits, and it’s a relief to hug everyone. I am aware that I am home, and I can be their daughter again and this feels good.
Feeling safe, I relax and am reminded about a childhood memory in Bangladesh, where times were like honey, mellifluous and rewarding, dulcet and harmonious. I would wake up in the early morning to the sound of the cockerels in the yard outside and the sun beating down on my forehead. My feet would touch the cold hard mud floor and, in my vest and pants I’d run outside across the yard to the tin roof kitchen. Here I’d see my grandma crouched on the floor by the fire rolling out some rice cakes. I would ask what she was making and jumping onto her back, I’d rock back and forth with my arms around her neck.
Chewing her beetle nut and ‘paan’ leaves which left her mouth red, she would say that she was baking some rice cakes and that they’d soon be ready, but there was time for me to go down to the village pond and have a dip with the boys next door.
Her white hair, shiny with coconut oil, and tied in a small bun; the wrinkled skin on her hands that reassured me that she had lived centuries and was timeless. Strange how wrinkles on my grandma were comforting as a child, yet as an adult my instinct was to reject them. I would stroke the lines around her face and take in the smell of her white cotton sari, always freshly hand washed with soap and dried in the wind.
With me cradling her from the back she would roll the dough, stoke the fire and check her sari as I kept pulling at it. I would giggle and wriggle as I rocked. Then the boys from next door run, thundering into the kitchen to see if I was ready to go to the pond. The boys looked longingly at the rice cakes and before I even asked, she nodded and said yes there would be some for them too. I jumped off her back and kissed her neck. Grabbing a muslin towel from the basket on floor, I raced out of there screaming 'well come on, I’ll race you!'
Fast forward to present day, where I have since found out that I do indeed have a cancerous tumour in my breast and suddenly a harmonious life as an adult seems more complicated. As I contemplate that I did not choose cancer, but it chose me, I know that the journey ahead will be tough. And because it is not something I can control, like all things that are into the unknown, I get the feeling that I am going to learn something special about my life and myself and meet the most amazing people along the way. It will be one of those experiences whereby, being extreme, I will find again my balance, my harmony and my dulcet tones
Follow Ami's journey on instagram @bisbrooke_artisans
