The Fabric
I realised in a few of these blog posts I've focused on some pretty 'heavy' topics, and may be giving the wrong impression of how I experience Bangladesh. Of course, all the poverty, massive inequality, and entanglements with personal guilt and agency are always present, informing all the threads of life here. But these are inter-woven with another strand - that of wonderment and life-vitality. There is just so much vibrancy out on display here; a stranger-flaneur-interloper such as myself has the privilege of seeing and experiencing things that would otherwise be shut up indoors back home. Of course, the very real factors of poverty, over-crowdedness, and inequality contribute to this situation - however I do not wish to dwell on this here. Together these two threads weave a heady fabric for the naive visitor.
Unraveling a thread
Not long after I arrived I started collecting small, random experiences and sights that I came across during my walking around Dhaka. Here are some of them (in no particular order).
- Watching with awe as a predatory kite circled the sky effortlessly over the water, riding the air with the mastery of an animal angel
- Pouring much anticipated cereal into a bowl and adding milk only to find scores of tiny ants float to the surface - but bursting out laughing at the sheer tenacity and veracity of life over here, then feeling Bangladesh sliding ever so slowly under my skin
- A mangy street dog's eyes following me and the moment opening up as he began to wag his tail
- Coming to the rooftop and sharing the expansive twilight sky with a handful of other people lounging around on their rooftops, chatting, laughing, and watching the world go by
- Crossing the busy Kamal Attaturk road in the middle of the upmarket Banani area one morning on the way to work, and finding a group of large, docile cows crazing next to the police checkpoint; an old man caressed the flank on one as he milked he, standing on an ancient wooden stool
- Watching the storm roll through from my bedroom, the cooling air rushing through the stuffy room carrying in the wet scent of the city
- Walking past a women in a bright red-orange sari sitting on the ground slowly sculpting a new rounded cooking stove from rich brown clay
- The warm rains pimpling the dreamy green Banani lake
- Picking up a seemingly dead beetle on my spartan balcony which started to revive and as I tossing it down towards the garden to the south it spread blue-green wings and took off in a determined line through the air
- A small boy leading a blind man with a cane across the road near the lake. A spirited conversation between the two, the man's smile
I hope that some of the photographs below can give you a sense of this melody of life.
