The Seattle Jamat has been hard at work preparing for the Diamond Jubilee through a host of ginan and qasida recitations, and a key individual in this initiative is Taufiq Karmali. As I prepared to interview him in an REC classroom, a girl walked in, looking distraught. “Taufiq sir, I’m sorry to interrupt can you please just listen for a moment?” He looked at me apologetically, his head tilted to the side, and shrugged his shoulders in the universal gesture of ‘sorry please wait,’ but there was no hesitation. In that moment, as always, the students come first.
He turned to her, as she took a deep breath and began reciting a lovely ginan, occasionally looking up to see what he thought. Her eyes were downcast for the most part, as he moved his finger almost unconsciously up, down, up, down, a staccato in 4:4 time.
She arrived at the the ginan's high notes that seemed to be giving her difficulties. A river of calm, eyes closed, a smile across his face, Taufiq listened intently as she exhaled, hit the notes and ended the ginan triumphantly. “So, it was ok?” she asked. “Lovely! Just focus on the rhythm and your breath, you’ll make it through,” he reassured her.
This was a quintessential moment for me to be present at, as he has been doing this with many others in the Jamat, not just the past few weeks in preparation for the Diamond Jubilee, but for decades.
Lately, Taufiq focused on preparing a troupe of individuals who were going to be reciting ginans on July 11, 2017 and who have been leading the Jamat in ventis and qasidas every week for the past month. He is also preparing his students to lead the Jamat in the Shaam-e-Intezaari.
As the student left, I mentioned that we were so lucky to have him in Seattle to be able to learn at our leisure, and he looked shocked. “But this gives me immense pleasure, immense pleasure,” he said, and “I tell my students all the time please take as much as you can from me because there are still so many ginans left to learn!” The sincerity was obvious and, as with all others involved in the Diamond Jubilee preparations, it was clear that to him this was a “joy and privilege.”
Voluntary service has been a huge part of Taufiq’s life from a very young age. When asked who instilled this love of service in him, he says “It was my dad, he was constantly serving, and in my youth I didn’t realize it was service! I just enjoyed the music and the ginans themselves - their meanings really spoke to me.” He said it was at the age of 25 that he understood it was service, and felt great “love and appreciation from the Jamat, and was really encouraged” as a young man.
Taufiq has spent the last year creating a collection of ginans and geets called "Ilm-e-Nur Phase II". The first album was released for the Golden Jubilee and this second phase was to be released by the Council for Canada online on July 10, 2017 and played in the Canadian celebrations on July 11. The collection will be available online for worldwide download on July 10, 2017.
