The man from Kassala

Abdulaziz Ali Omer

Graham Greene once wrote :” One can’t love humanity, one can only love people” . Kamal Ahmed Mussa was and is still one of people I love. For more than twenty years, I had never heard him utter an obscene word. More than once, on my way to Gedaref market, he intercepted me and invited for a breakfast that contained beans mixed with an olive oil and to the vegetable stew, he added some water to reduce the heavy taste of salt and spices for health reasons. Originally, Kamal came from Kassala to as his family moved to Gedaref when his father had been transferred to Gedaref Teaching Hospital as a health superintendent. Kamal and I were friends since 1997 when I was a secondary school student while he worked as an educational supervisor. In 2003, it had been pre-ordained for us to meet in the third semester after he earned a scholarship from the ministry of education for elevating his Diploma to the Bachelor degree. So, we could become the members of one batch and department at the faculty of education where we graduated together in 2006, and as I left the college, he remained as a lecturer. He also taught English at the Academy of Health Sciences. Recently, I was following the news of the Presidential Guards coup in Nigere when Samy Mahjoub knocked at the door of my house. He looked sad. My first thought was that Samy was unhappy because of war in Sudan. ” Bad news, I’m afraid” Samy said. ‘ Austaz Kamal is dead of brain surgery complications. My deepest sympathies” He added. Samy shook my hand and left. I stared into the bleak horizon thinking about my colleague He had been self-effacing, exuberant and vivacious. Mohamed Kamal, the oldest son described ny his father as ” rational” on a condolence visit admitted to us some of the inherited values of his father: honesty, probity, humility and an altruism. In his last visit to my home in February, 2020, Ustaz Kamal inclined to tell me one of his happiest memories. He recounted how once, his wife threatened with a divorce because he had no house of his own and was living with his in-laws. One morning, as he seemed puzzled over what he could do to dissuade his wife from an idea of a separation, he came across a famous trader haggling over the cost of a house which he ultimately bought. ” This is your house” , the merchant said to Kamal who exhaled a sigh of relief. What a beautiful surprise! Why did the merchant do this? I asked Kamal. ” The house is a reward for the success of his sons whom I taught English.” Kamal replied happily. An almond tree and some flowers decorated the interior of his home that echoed the sound of an organ in a rehearsal or an audition performed by his son Ahmed for an imminent concert in the evening. Kamal kept re-iterated “the moment of an exhilaration has come” But, it was one of the ironies of fate that one evening collapsed on the floor after he laid the final touches to his Ph.D thesis about the treatment of errors in secondary school students written texts. He finished typing the manuscript of his doctorate dissertation; however, an abrupt death precluded him from discussing it at the university. Even after his parting, I still look back at House Street anticipating to see him getting a lift on the pillion seat of a motor-bike or walking on foot to help him with his things, I also stop near the shop where he entered to buy something as if I were expecting him to return a few minutes later. I do these in vain for I realize that he has reached the inevitable end of every mortal creature which he depicted as an ” immutable fact of life’ on the eve of his departure. His son told me that his father ” Abdulaziz!” he said in an hour of delirium in the hospital where he added ” Your life will be better”! “Don’t worry, my son!”.