A paver (paving stone) in Fawzia's memory

 

A paver was installed at the National Shrine Grotto of Our Lady of Lourdes on the campus of Mount St. Mary’s University, Maryland, in Fawzia's memory.

Fawzia Braine Memorial Award

Mr. Chan Ka Long, Roy, a PhD candidate in the Department of English at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, will receive the Fawzia Braine Memorial Award for his paper "Being a 'purist' in trilingual Hong Kong: Code-switching among Cantonese, English and Putonghua" (published in Linguistic Research, March 2018). 

Dr. Ricky Lam, President of HAAL, presenting the award on May 30, 2019

Fawzia - Seventh Anniversary. 28 January

In Memory of Fawzia Braine

Spirit on Earth

           like a flame

burning

           your eyes

           with gentle light

you came to see the world

            its soil and flowers

you came to know

            the God who wandered

            among us

            who loved

us with open heart.

Fawzia, you believed

              our God made flesh

              You soared

              above calamity.

How could you foresee

               the Great Sleep?

Swept from the mountaintop

                 by mighty wings.

Joanna Radwanska-Williams

2012, Hong Kong 

Donations to Sri Lanka Malay charities in Fawzia's Memory

Donations were made in memory of Fawzia to two Sri Lanka Malay charitable organisations. The Rupee Fund was given Rs. 600,000 and the Women’s Association of Sri Lanka Malays (WASLAM) Rs. 400,000. The Rupee Fund of the Sri Lanka Malay Associations was started in 1953. One objective is "to grant scholarships to deserving students ... to enable them to prosecute their studies". A previous donation of Rs. 200,000 will be added to create the Nghei Fawzia Braine Scholarship Fund.  The Women's Association of Sri Lanka Malays (WASLAM) was formed in 2010. One objective is to help "all Sri Lankan Malay women to develop their education and inherent skills at grassroot level ... to become self-reliant and contribute tangibly to family and community". Mrs. Eileen Dane, the President of WASLAM, an old friend of the family, and Sandra Sourjah, another friend, were present at the donation.

Fawzia Braine Memorial Award for 2018 - Seventh Year

The winner was Peter Wingrove, a doctoral student at the University of Hong, for his article "How suitable are TED talks for academic listening?", published in the Journal of English for Academic Purposes.

The award was presented by Prof. Christoph Hafner, President of the Hong Kong Association for Applied Linguistics (HAAL), at an academic conference held in Macau.

Addo uncle

Addo uncle was Fawzia's mother's youngest brother. During the last years of his life, he lived with his daughter in Kalutara. Whenever she visited Sri Lanka, Fawzia would do a round visiting all her elderly aunts and Addo uncle. I recently discovered two photos taken during these visits.

June 2008.  Fawzia, Shirley, along with Addo uncle's wife, daughters, and son-in-law Rashid. I took the photo.

June 2011

The Hillary Clinton relationship

One of the stories mama (amongst many) fondly told anyone that would listen, was her chance conversation with Hillary Clinton in the summer of 1996 prior to his re-election and during Bill’s re-election campaign.  

It was summer time in Arkansas and the Clintons were scheduled to appear at an event in downtown Little Rock.  Mama grabbed a couple of her friends and was excited to be at the event not knowing how close she would be to the Clintons.  She went early with her friends and found a way to be at the entrance where Hillary and Bill would walk past after there speech.  She loved the Clintons.  To her they were similar to the Kennedy Family.  After the event, as planned the Clintons went past where her group was standing.  When Hillary was walking past and shaking hands, mama “forced” her way to the front and yelled “Hillary you went to Sri Lanka and I am from Sri Lanka”.  When Hillary heard this she came to mom and shook her hand.  Hillary had just returned from her trip to South Asia including a visit to Sri Lanka in 1995.  She told mom how much she respects our country, especially how progressive women were in Sri Lanka.  Her admiration that our tiny island elected a woman as the president when women’s rights were still in the initial stages in the U.S and hoped one day the American president would be a woman was something that stayed with mama forever.

When mama retold this story, what came out was the admiration of Hillary’s commitment for the advancement of women and childrens’ rights. During the election year Nelum became an Committed follower of Hillary. I was amazed that Nelum at such a young age understood what Hillary meant to the gender equality debate. What I saw in Nelum was the same passion I saw in mama many years before. Even though mama was not part of most of Nelum's life, she had successfully past the baton to the next generation. And her granddaughter will continue that fight until true equality is achieved by her young generation.

Sent by Roy