Obituaries

Shortly before Muhammad Mashiur Rahman was born on August 18, 1975 to his mother, Arjumand Banu, and his father, Mohammad Matiur Rahman, his mother was nervous about having another child. Then one night, her anxiety ended when she had a dream of a light so beautiful and calming that she knew her third child would a great blessing that brought joy and goodness into this world. This is why his family chose to call him Jyoti, a name that means flame or light. And Jyoti was the perfect name for a man that brought so much fun, vibrancy, generosity of self and spirit, patience, and kindness into this world.

Jyoti spent his childhood in Dhaka, Bangladesh, breaking his parents’ glassware to trade to scrappers for candy or to tie to the tail of his fighting kites, hiding pieces of meat under his rice so his mother would give him something extra, excitedly eating the giant fish his father would bring home from the market wrapped in paper, building tiny boats out of leaves and floating them down rivers after school, jumping from the roof of one six-floor building to the next, dancing with his sister, laughing with his brother, learning to play the tabla, befriending animals that included doves (“They were not pigeons!” he would say.), a chicken he found in a drain, and even a monkey, sneakily rearranging mirrors so he could watch tv while doing his homework, reading Sherlock Holmes novels and English literature with his uncle, and being greatly loved and cherished by anyone and everyone around him.

In 1994, Jyoti took the TOEFL, not expecting to pass. However, he did! Then, again not expecting it to happen, he was granted a visa to study in the USA. He moved to New York where he had been accepted into university. There, he lived in a small apartment in NYC with some of his lifelong friends and worked under-the-table delivering ice cream for Hagen Dazs. He soon realized how much it would cost to attend university in New York and set out to make a new plan. Jyoti was considering moving to Russia (to attend a university he had been accepted into) or going to Alaska to work on a fishing boat when his cousin, Nasreen Ali and Muhammad Ali, generously invited him to come live with them and attend school in Missouri. He went and shared his life with them and their children, living in their home and the town they raised their children in. While there, he also spent time studying computer science, hanging out with some of his best friends eating frozen burritos at the InterVarsity Center, attending parties at a local party house affectionately named The White House, and frequenting his favorite bar, Jeremiah’s. Then, he finished school, began interning at the university he had graduated from, met his future wife, and went off to begin his career working in New Jersey and San Francisco during the dot-com boom.

In mid-2001, Jyoti moved back to Missouri to settle down, and in 2002, he married Rachel Daggs. They built a life together, one where he became a US citizen, loved his family and friends with his entire heart, spent more than 15 years in a job he greatly enjoyed at Washington University St. Louis, drove around on beautiful days with the top down on his Mustang convertible, and enjoyed spending time cooking, walking, making positive change with Rotary International, playing Minecraft with his niece, and watching Cardinals baseball.

Whether someone knew him as Jyoti, Punkle, Romeo, Rahman, Muhammad, Mashiur, Joe (his restaurant name), or Uncle Joe, anyone who met him could immediately see that light his mother dreamed of — a light that he made sure to shine on everyone around him. However, much like a flame, that beautiful light didn’t last forever. After one of the best days imaginable, a day he spent in the sun with people he loved, laughing, dancing, riding roller coasters, and befriending random strangers, he passed away due to a heart attack on November 3, 2023 at the age of 48. To say that he will be greatly missed by all who knew him doesn’t even begin to express all that we and the entire world have lost in his passing.

Muhammad Mashiur Rahman was preceded in death by his mother, Arjumand Banu. He is survived by too many friends to count, his wife, Rachel Daggs, his father, Mohammad Matiur Rahman, his elder brother, Mohammad Mostafizur Rahman (sister-in-law Shamima Nargiss), his elder sister, Shahnaz Rahman Bani (brother-in-law Md. Jahangir Alam Bhuiyan), his sister-in-law, Sarah Hubmeier (brother-in-law Christopher Hubmeier), his brother-in-law, Zachary Daggs (sister-in-law Ashley Daggs), his sister-in-law, Martha Daggs (brother-in-law Toby Cason), his nieces and nephews, Ahmed Saki, Nazneen Ali, Rezwan Ali, Shormie Ali, Adiba Jahin Orpa, Zahra Rahman, Evelyn Hubmeier, Ethan Hubmeier, Arisha Jahin Oboni, Genesis Cruz, and Nevena Daggs-Cason, his god-daughter, Ifunaya Egbuchiri, and his cousins Nasreen Ali, Gulshan Ara, Gulfam Ifat Ara, Jinia Sultana, Kondokar Emran Hossain, Mohammad Hossain, Nasima Akhtar, Kazi Johirul Hoque, and Farukh Milok.

A funeral service will be held at 2pm in Bellefontaine Cemetery and Arboretum on Tuesday, November 21, 2023. A memorial gathering will be held immediately after at one of his favorite local spots, Civil Life Brewery, in St. Louis, MO.