A Tribute To A Unique Gentleman - Aamir Siddiqi
As you no doubt know by now, the world suffered a tragic loss on Sunday 11th April.
I am speaking of the death of a son, the death of a brother, the death of a gentleman dedicated to being the friendliest, kindest and most loving person I know, and the death of my friend Aamir Siddiqi.
We were not that close, which is a shame for me, but I could call him a friend and even if I didn’t know of his purest of hearts personally I could see it with the amount of people who are affected by his death.
So here is my tribute to a friend who never failed to make me laugh whenever I saw him, whether it was his eccentric knowledge of the most random facts or his bizarre commentary comparisons where he’d compare us to random League Two players who no one knew except him.
He must have been reading encyclopaedias at the same time I was talking for him to be able to absorb the amount of knowledge he continually surprised us with. I can remember Aamir reading the Financial Times when he was in year 9 and that must have spurred him onto secure his rightful place at Cardiff University to study law.
This didn’t stop his love of sports and I would always be amused when I played football with him, when I heard my name being strung along with a bunch of superlatives in a fascinating commentary from behind me. Even when we were losing 29-1 by half time we have improved now Aamir would always be a bright light of optimism, saying something along the lines, “Accrington Stanley Juniors were once down by 30 goals at half time, but they pulled it back.”
The tribute football match, which was covered by all major news channels, was held last Thursday and was a resounding success. It was amazing to see that even after Aamir was unfairly taken from this world he still found a way to bring everyone together and put a smile on our faces. I remember how the organised game slowly deteriorated into just a big scramble that had everyone laughing and smiling, which Aamir would have loved.
Even a policeman standing on the sidelines came into to join as the 11-a-side game turned into a 50-a-side game. There must have been hundreds gathered on when we last played football with Aamir to give their respects to a true gentleman through and through. Aamir’s last Facebook status was “Thanks guys for an awesome day.” After we had played football with him.
So Aamir all I’d like to say is thank you. Thank you for making me laugh dozens of times. Thank you for allowing me to be your friend and brightening my life whenever I saw you. I will hopefully see you again so until that point I would like to thank you again and say goodbye. I will always remember when I last saw you and you admitted to me that you actually read encyclopaedias.
See you soon, my friend.
1 Comment – Post a comment
Sprout Editor
Commented 73 months ago - 27th April 2010 - 12:32pm
Due to this case being in court, we will be unable to publish comments until after the trial. Thanks to all of you that have left your kind words.