Truly
a life-changing experience.
Experiences are
so often described as "life changing" that the adjective
seems clichéd, almost value less. But Timeri N. Murari's
book My Temporary
Son is about a true life-changing experience - the story of a child bringing magic into two lives
and teaching lessons of resilience and love.
It is a warm story of a little boy, an orphan
with a fairly serious health problem, who takes over
the lives of an elderly, childless couple who believe
they have seen, done and experienced pretty much everything.
Tim and Maureen Murari are well settled into
their respective routines; he a writer of fixed, rather
reclusive habits, and she working with various charitable
institutions and voluntary organisations. On a trip
to an orphanage, Maureen chances upon one-year-old
Bhima, a baby with impossibly large, expressive eyes,
lying in an iron cot banging his head against the
bars to distract himself from the pain in the raw,
red mass of flesh on his lower body. And she decides,
as she has with other destitute children before, to
raise the funds for his operation and help place him
with adoptive parents abroad.
For the first few months, Tim is just an observer
of sorts, listening and providing emotional support
to Maureen as she gets into endless rounds of consultations
and tests with doctors and raises funds to correct
Bhima's vesical exstrophy, a condition in which the
bladder is outside the body.
Maureen brings Bhima home "for a few days"
after surgery; to recuperate till he is strong enough
to resist the infections he could catch in the orphanage. The few days turn into 11 months as the Murari's
wait for Bhima's adoptive parents from Europe to plough
through the paperwork demanded by the Indian adoption
system.
And during that time, Bhima transforms Tim's
life, drawing him out, teaching him to be a father.
Tim and Maureen do as much for Bhima - sitting through
the night to comfort him when he experiences night
terrors, being attuned to his every mood, being there
for him - as he does for them.
Though his early development was delayed because
of his medical condition, Bhima proves to be an exceptionally
intelligent and resilient child, capturing Tim's and
Maureen's heart with his simple faith, intense curiosity,
mischievous ways and tin but tremendous spirit for
survival.
Tim also uses the book to provide insights
into Indian society; he brings up ideas of karma and
destiny, and the traditions, superstitions and beliefs
that are so much part of Indian life.
Child labour, exploitation and discrimination,
bureaucracy, the education system, the almost-hopelessly
convoluted adoption process.simple statements, made
almost in passing, reveal social attitudes to all
these and more.
Finally, the mammoth Indian bureaucracy begins
to move and Tim and Maureen find themselves facing
the idea of life without Bhima. There is heartbreak
but they have to confront the reality of their age,
Bhima's future and what is best for him.
A story like this - with so much of the writer
in it - could easily slip into the mawkish and the
maudlin but Tim maintains dignity in his prose while
infusing it with a certain enchantment that comes
from his clear and beautiful language.
It is also without explicitly being so, a story
of many in India and around the world who find it
in themselves to open up their lives and hearts to
abandoned children and are willing to move systems
across continents in their willingness to love. THE
HINDU.
Timeri Murari tells
a sensitive, moving story in prose that is spare and
devoid of gimmick- and that is the book's triumph.
The emotion is powerful for being understated,
the confusion of a 60-year-old faced with feelings
he never thought he had is touching for being genuine.
Lesser writers might have made a hash of this experience,
the temptation to overwrite is strong. Murari's style
is at once concise and poignant.
The story is simple enough. An abandoned child, later named Bhima, is taken from an orphanage
for a rare surgery for which Murari's wife Maureen
raises the funds. The surgery is successful, but rather
than send the boy back to the orphanage. The Murari's
decide to let him recoup Hl their Chennai home. Bhima
is not the first 'house guest' (as Murari refers to
him initially). But he is special for some reason,
and the manner in which the little one shines a torch
on Timeri's soul and light up emotions hiding there
is the essence of the book. "He is your temporary
son," says one of their friends and it is then'
hat Timeri's unspoken wish is first articulated.
Even for Maureen who
is in touch with deep emotions within herself the
change brought about by Bhima is startling. 'Parenthood'
for the year that Bhima is with them brings with it
all the doubts and certainties that first-time parents
less than half their age live with. The Muraris cannot
adopt Bhima because of the age difference (the law
states that the parents cannot be more than 45 years
older than the child).
The story is as much Bhima's as it is the author's.
Both while showering the child with
love as well as when holding back in the cause of a greater love, the Muraris
show themselves to be a rare mix of the romantic and
the practical. They know that Bhima will soon have
to leave, and that his adoptive parents from Europe
are only waiting for the paper work to be cleared.
So right from the start, Bhima is trained to call
the Muraris 'aunty' and 'uncle' so there is no confusion
with the 'papa' and 'mamma' to come. Love is as much
about giving as about holding back. Closure is important,
but it is not easy.
Certainly not after the kind of impact the child makes
on their lives. As Murari writes, "I hate being interrupted
while I am
working. I try never to answer the phone and I ignore
the doorbell. At one time I would have
snapped and snarled at anybody who disturbed me. Now
Bhima was teaching me things that work, no matter
how important cannot take precedence over a child's
demands and needs. I was acquiring a new skill - that
of being a. father. I was not used to it, to constant
repetition and to just as constantly admiring him
as he practiced new skills time and again and again.
But I realized that every moment I spent with Bhima
is what Americans called 'quality time' his confidence
grew as he pushed at the boundaries of love surrounding
him."
We
speak often about the loss of innocence that comes
with age. Children help us reconnect with our lost
selves. But here was a successful writer regaining
innocence. The thought that such a thing is possible
is charming in itself; the idea that age is no bar
There
are too lovely vignettes of Chennai, of the memories
that Timeri has carried with him of his own childhood:
of the work done by Maureen and others like her who
do good by stealth. But it is the sheer intensity
of ultimately hopeless unconditional love that keeps
a simple story from flagging or moving into areas
that are of no relevance
Murari
has long talks with his temporary son, explaining
everything around him,
It
does not matter that the child does not understand;
the exercise is new to the temporary father, and he
begins to understand himself and his childhood better
is doubly comforting.
"In
this long belated 'fatherhood'," writes Murari,
"I wanted Bhima to experience
everything
I had as a child growing up in Madras, in this house.
I wanted to recreate
my
childhood through him, as all fathers do, I assumed.
It was important for him to remember something more
about India, than the four walls of the orphanage
that had contained him for so long."
The
irony is that while the 'father' was doing everything
in his power to erase from the child's mind the bad
memories and replace them with good ones and thus
prepare him for a life beyond the orphanage and Chennai,
he himself was finding it increasingly difficult to
distance himself from the 'son' although he knew that
would be necessary. In the end all ironies and contradictions
dissolve in the ocean of love. Timeri Murari has written
about a dozen - works of fiction including the recently
reissued Taj, about half a dozen plays and a couple
of films. His writings have been marked by a detachment
and attention to detail that only the finest practitioners
of the craft can bring to their work. In taking the
road from a professional detachment to an increasingly
inevitable attachment he brings to the surface in
this book an aspect of autobiographical writing that
is both personal and universal
At
the end of it, the author who has lived most of his
life abroad is told that this is India and that with
some sensible bribery could have adopted Bhima 'legally'.
The reader is left to wonder what might have been.SAHARA TIME.
Anyone
with a child in their life, anyone who has ever longed
for a child and anyone, but anyone, who has ever been
at the receiving end of a child's love will find something
in this book. For even the most cynical will not be
moved by Timeri Murari's true account of caring for
an orphaned and disabled child. Murari's life took on a new meaning when baby Bhima entered his
life. At first
it was a nameless pair of deeply troubled eyes, a
two-dimensional image from a photograph that was taken
in the orphanage to which his parents, also nameless,
had surrendered the child.
A child who left a profound impression in the
precious 11 months during which Murari became his
father
My Temporary Son is a thoroughly honest, self-scrutinizing and, in places, brutal narrative. It documents young Bhima’s entrance into a hard world, and the inordinate medical procedures he undergoes, all the while following the author’s growing emotional attachment to his ‘son’.
Murari's great skill lies in the way he encapsulates
his love for baby Bhima, not by wild, gut-wrenching
emotive adjectives, but by a pensive and almost introspective
examination of his emotions, creating g an altogether
different but equally painful type of tragedy.
The author does not paint himself or his country
as perfect. Indeed, it illustrates the wretched bureaucracy
that that forms the basis of the adoptive process
in India as both a curse and a blessing.
The circumstances which led Bhima into the
arms of Murari and his wife were far from easy and
the author provided no palliative in his portrayal
of events.
The book delights and saddens in turn. Murari
and his wife provide a firm presence as the baby Bhima
suffers and triumphs; there is pain in his surgery,
his recovery, his first smile. His joy in discovering
rain. This is a tremendously powerful book, and tragic,
too, in its way. INDIAN EXPRESS
Believe
me, I don’t feel ashamed to accept that I cried when
I was reading the last paragraphs of the chapter ‘The
Final Goodbye’ in Timeri N Murari’s non fiction ‘My
Temporary Son’. The fact is that it is long since
I was absolutely moved by a book; the books have been
interesting, irresistible and engaging. But this was
one book, which does not belong to any of the above
category but still made me read.
‘My Temporary
Son’ is a real life narration of an aged couple Tim
and Maureen whose life suddenly takes a change with
the temporary entry of an abnormally sick, fragile
orphan kid who had to undergo series of serious surgeries
for surviving. Anachronously, the boy is named Bhima.
The baby boy was born with his bladder outside the
abdomen and abandoned by its natural parents in an
orphanage.
Tim’s
wife Maureen is a social worker who helps foreigners
in adoption and its systems. So it was not uncommon
for the couple to provide transit accommodation for
the kids in their ancestral palatial home at Chennai.
Bhima’s entry is no different but a little longer
because of these medical interferences. Tim who is
generally indifferent to such short diversions was
totally drawn into the vortex of love and affection
towards Bhima by a chain of incidents. The childless
ageing couple suddenly realizes that their love for
this boy was overwhelming because of this baby’s pranks
and quiet resilience to live notwithstanding the oddities
of fate during his stay in their home for the period
of eleven months. When the time comes for them to
part with Bhima, there was a cauldron of emotions.
How Tim and Maureen overcome because of their intense
love for the kid forms the end of this non fiction.
‘My Temporary
Son’ is in one way a linear narrative with tangential
paths. The book is not something, which one could
complete just in one sitting. Murari’s writing is
just reliving of his whole period of life from the
birth of Bhima, the discard, entry, enjoyment of his
growth and exit. He takes us with him in his journey
with episodes strewn in between both relevant and
irrelevant. They include Murari’s childhood, growing,
preferences, love affairs, likes and dislikes, opinions,
his family members, feuds, friendship, happiness,
frustrations and what not.
The book
also describes the most convoluted procedure of adoption
and the exasperating rules and regulations prevailing
in India. It projects the shocking state of the orphaned
children in our country, apathy of the officials,
indifference of the public, concern on the ever enlarging
population, above all the deplorable conditions of
living in India irrespective of one’s financial background.
The book may be a useful guide for those who want
to adopt a kid from India (will anyone after reading
this book?) with the model legal documents and procedures
as Appendices.
Timeri
Murari’s language alternates between simple and complex.
This is probably because of its spontaneity. The emotions
are brutally honest and painfully straightforward.
The characters Tim, Maureen, Bhima, Sarala, Shaila,
the lovable adopting couple Bettina and Karl and their
family communicate and interact with the reader in
flesh and blood through the pages of the book. One
cannot but empathize them very honestly.
Tim writes
‘… that love had more substance and sustenance than
food and drink; it was the buoy that had kept them
afloat in the freezing waters of old age’.
I am
sure after reading the book one will agree that this
statement holds good at any age of a true human.
BOLOJI.COM
Author,
journalist, playwright and filmmaker Timeri N. Murari
has played a lot of roles in life. But perhaps one
that he did not bargain for was the cause of a lot
of heartache. In a cathartic way, resulting in his
latest book, My Temporary Son, as much about
adoption as about learning to be a father.
Chennai-based
Murari and his wife Maureen have assisted in a number
of adoptions over the years from the city, while remaining
childless themselves. And before going to their adoptive
homes, many of these kids have also stayed in their
home for a while. So when Bhima came along, Murari
had no idea that things would be different this time.
Bhima,
born to a rural family in Pondicherry, had vesical
exstrophy, or was born with his bladder outside the
body. Abandoned by his parents, he was in an orphanage
when Maureen spotted him and began the process to
get him operated to relive him of his constant misery.
And after the operation, she brought him home to recuperate
before he went to his adoptive home.
And it
was while he was staying there that Bhima made such
a place in Murari’s heart that he was tempted to adopt
Bhima himself. Except for that he was 60 years older
than Bhima, and adoption would create many complications,
both for him and for Bhima in future. But that is
what the head said.
The heart
was on a different track. “I had to confront myself,”
says Murari. “A child changes your life, I learnt
about being a father, it was almost slammed into me.
Bhima, had ‘special’ needs in one respect, but was
extremely intelligent,” he reminisces, eyes looking
somewhere into the past. “Bhima brought home the meaning
of the word, ‘the child is the father of the man’.
For at one level I was learning to be a father. I
was literally learning.”
And there
were many aspects that became clearer to the author,
the father, the individual. Children are low priority
in an adult controlled world. Adoption in India is
an extremely strenuous process, and despite people
wanting to adopt from India, many do not do as bureaucratic
hurdles are too long.
Bhima
was adopted by a couple from a European country, by
which time he was already two years old. When they
adopted their second child, they did so from South
Africa, and despite having to furnish similar documents
and guarantees, they completed the process in three
months. “There is an urgent need to speed up the process
of adoption in India,” says Murari. By the time the
formalities are completed, the child has already undergone
much pain and neglect, and has become institutionalised.
He has had no relationship, and this has a profound
impact. “About 150-200 children are adopted from India,
mostly children with special needs. Indians prefer
to adopt health children, as a special-needs child
comes along with additional medical burdens. However,
many prefer adopting from countries like Korea, or
those in Latin America as the process is much faster,”
he laments.
Bhima
has found a home, and has the luxury of having adoptive
parents who love him, and people like Murari who desperately
wanted to make him a permanent part of their lives.
Most
orphans have to contend with the opposite conditions,
something Murari has poignantly, transparently captured
in My Temporary Son, which you will find difficult
to read without a lump developing in your throat.
BUSINESS TIMES
If you
are the one to cry with an author as you read his
book, this one is definitely recommended. A heart
rendering tale of how the author became a father for
the first time at 60 when an orphan gate crashed into
his life and changed it forever.
A contented
elderly man, Tim's life transformed when a thin and
sickly child Bhima entered his home thanks to his
wife Maureen. Since his wife is involved in social
work, he dismisses this new entry as a temporary arrangement.
But the truth is far from it. Bhima demands attention
and the author learns to be a father and enjoys it.
As you start enjoying their relationship, the truth
jolts you as you come to know that the author and
his wife cannot adopt Bhima's as they are too old.
He is given up for adoption and meeting the adoptive
parents is anything but painful. The gradual handover
of Bhima and his adjustment to his new parents is
heartbreaking and you identify with the author's pain.
Not only is it an inspiring book that makes you believe
in selfless service, it is also a great way to understand
the complicated adoption process in India. The eyes
on the cover page of the book tell a tale of its own
and the author takes you along on his journey of suddenly
discovering fatherhood and losing it immediately too.
The author
uses simple yet effective words to convey the emotional
turmoil that he and his wife undergo in eleven months.
His faith and belief in Bhima and his feeling of incompetence
when he doesn't understand how to handle a child seems
to be true for every new father. The end of the book
is particularly heart wrenching. The impossibility
of the situation frustrates you and the author and
his wife's commitment to Bhima's welfare is baffling.
He ends the book saying 'Bhima was meant to have an
enchanted life and for us, it was a closure of sorts.
We knew there would never be total closure, not until
we die, or love does.' Words that speak beyond their
meaning. AFTERNOON, Bombay.
Not
everyone has it in him to adopt a child and treat
the child as one would one’s own. But people capable
of such love do exist and make up for a miniscule
fraction of the world. Timeri Murari’s personal experiences
bring these peripheral people in focus.
Up until
such time that Bhima, an abandoned baby with vesical
extrophy (a state when the bladder is outside the
body) came into Tim’s life, his world was systematic
with little room for deep emotions. Tim has been a
journalist with the Guardian and has written
novels, screenplays and stage plays. His film, The
Square Circle, made it to Time’s list
of 10 best films. With so much happening in his life,
Tim could not have been bothered by his wife’s efforts
to bring home Bhima for better care after a corrective
surgery.
Tim wasn’t
new to having babies in his huge ancestral Madras
home as his wife, associated with the Overseas Women’s
Club, would often get orphanage babies, signed up
for adoption, to their house before they would leave
for their respective homes abroad.
In Bhima’s
case, it turned out to be a bonding he wasn’t quite
ready for. Tim says: "I was a contented elderly
man, not looking to be immersed in any emotional cauldrons...and
then, unexpectedly, Bhima came along, skewing all
my calculations."
Used
to constant pain and alien to a tender touch, Bhima
gradually learns to love and trust Tim and Maureen.
His sparing but gentle kisses change Tim who, perhaps
for the first time in his life, regrets being at the
wrong side of 60. His longing to adopt Bhima leaves
him restless and in the 11 months that the little
boy is with them, Tim fears his home and life would
never be the same. Bhima’s impending adoption by a
European couple looms large and with it grows his
desperation to keep his “temporary son”.
Childless
himself, Tim bares his heart and one knows why he
chose to write this novel— to let his feelings flow
unhindered; they needed expression. Tim reaches the
pinnacle of pain on his parting with Bhima. How he
tries to adapt to the vacuum and his subsequent visit
to Bhima’s new home makes up for the latter part of
the book.
That
it is an exceptional and an emotional book goes without
saying, but what it does to you is worse. It leaves
you with a feeling of being an inferior human. There
are people, including foreigners, who eagerly adopt
babies with deformities or those with special needs
and give them utmost love and a comfortable home.
Our own insufficiencies show up sharper in contrast.
TRIBUNE.