1.

It is a beautiful summer day at Islambaz, a beautiful village in Bangladesh where a bright sun is shining and a light breeze cooling the tired-some farmers. It is green; everything is green and dancing slightly to keep up with the rhythm of the gentle wind. It is peaceful and the most soothing weather that one can imagine. In this quite peaceful nature, all of a sudden you can hear a child crying from far away but dancing wind carries that sound to the farmers. No one seems to worry about that loud crying child. It is probably part of the nature and seems very integral part of it. It is very hard to distinguish between a bird chirping and a child crying in poor but extremely gorgeous village like this.

If you try real hard, you should be able to hear the wind; you should be able to hear as if it’s trying to tell you something. May be a story. A story so familiar to the nature and it is so indistinguishable part of the green that you have to try real hard in order to extract the story out of this fabulous nature. Yes, sometimes story does express itself as if it is the old grandfather of the village who has lived through years to see life, living of life and ending of life as well. This village is so remote that still most of them do not have electricity even in this technologically advanced twenty first century. The kids of all ages still get together in moonlight nights and sit around a fire and find a grandfather to tell them stories. These stories live for years after years and become epic ballad of the people who have seen the both gorgeous ‘Nobanner Utshab’, festive time of the year as well as the most devastating twists of lives but yet to see a light bulb in their own huts.

We tell stories everyday. It is something that we like to hear and sometimes we like to narrate as well. As we grow old, we like telling more than hearing as if receiving capability is decreasing and transmitting capability is increasing of our mind. Well, is that good or bad? Not so sure about either one. Only thing that I am sure about is that we do get touched by stories and the amazing aspect of them is that both fact and fiction are deeply integrated.

I am trying to write an introduction of something, probably introduction to a story. If I cut short may be I can go to the zest of the story and instead of boring myself of trying to make an introduction of something that may or may not require any introduction.

Well, I want to tell you the story of a village and it’s people. May be it is a story of life or a story of just simply staying alive. May be I have to tell a story about not being able to staying alive at any means as well.

While you are wondering about the story, I am wondering about the definition of the term ‘story’. Is it a tale of struggle of inner self? Or is it an absolute depiction of facts or depiction of fiction?

The name of the village is ‘Islamabad’ but everyone in this village who are mostly illiterate, call it to be ‘Islambaz’ very passionately; in papers officially the name is still ‘Islamabad’. The name ‘Islamabad’ should be familiar to anyone who is interested in world politics or geography. Yes, indeed, ‘Islamabad’ is the capital of Pakistan but the ‘Islamabad’ that I am referring is a small remote village in Bangladesh.

This is such an ironic name that one may easily wonder why this name has not been changed. Off course, before someone wonders about this, he has to know the history of this village and history of the bloodbath that happened in 1971 in entire country of Bangladesh and went almost unnoticed to the rest of the world.

Julhas, the poor ‘borga chashi’, a farmer so poor that he does not even have a piece of land to farm and borrows other’s land to do farming and gives away half of his harvest, looks up at the sun and wipes sweat from his forehead. His skin, with a very dark complexion, covered with sweat, shines in the bright sun. His body is just like a very thick rope – skinny, firm and strong; you can see the twists of muscles which indicate his hard working livelihood.

Julhas stands up and try to look for his sister Basanti. She supposed to bring him some food and water before it’s time for Jahar, the prayer of midday. Julhas heard the Aajan, the call for prayer, a while ago but still Basanti is not here with food yet. Julhas feels really angry at Basanti.

Basanti is about four years younger than Julhas, in her late thirties. Usually it is not okay for a woman of her age to go outside and roam around with out ‘Ghomta’, covering part of the head only. It’s not exactly like the hijab but the same concept. Only difference is that it is not driven from Islam. It is driven from traditional Bengali culture. I need to mention that there are about fifteen percent Hindus live in Bangladesh and they also use ‘Ghomta’ which thus definitely not due to Islamic behavior, rather it is part of Bengali tradition.

It is somewhat okay for Basanti to walk around without ‘Ghomta’ as every one think she is ‘pagli’, mentally imbalanced. I have seen her many times in my life when I was little kid and I always thought like everyone else that she was definitely a mad woman but I never had seen her doing any like a mad woman. As I am thinking of her now, I think she might have a slight case of schizophrenia which is not so uncommon in western world. Without any medication, in a poor village she is a ‘mad woman’.

Somehow every time I see her, she makes me think that she is sixteen or seventeen years of very shy girl with a big smile on and with very adorable eyes. She has a very loud voice though to startle a stranger who does not know her. She is very aware of her loud voice as well and that is why she just becomes really shy in front of a stranger and somehow try to carry a conversation just with her eyes. As if she can make the entire conversation with her eyes and does not need to use her voice at all.

Basanti needs to listen to everyone in the family, the eldest brother Julhas, younger brothers Hasim, Azmal, even her kid sister Fatima. Basanti does not have problem doing things and listen to her brothers all the time but sometimes she gets upset that she has to listen to even her kid sister who is about eight years younger than her. She understands the fact everyone tell her that she is ‘pagli’, mentally imbalanced, so she just listens to everyone that she can stand. It’s really hard for to stand Fatima as she is just perfect. Fatima got married when she was fifteen and her brothers did not have to spend any money to get her married as she is extremely beautiful. Fatima already has four kids and a husband who works for Border Petrol. Basanti adores Fatima’s kids even though she is not so fond of Fatima that much. If she ever has to wish anything from Allah, she would wish a little cute daughter just like the little one that Fatima has. Her name is Rupali and to Basanti, Rupali is the cutest thing alive in the world. Basanti won’t mind playing with her all day instead of just doing things for her brothers. For example, she has to take ‘vaat’, rice to her elder brother Julhas now for lunch at the field where he is working.

Jushas sees from far away Basanti walking through the isle, a very narrow path between two fields, in her usual dancing style walking as if she does not have any urgency to bring the food to the field. Julhas feels furious just looking at her as his stomach started growling loudly and he almost feels that he is about to digest his own intestines. Some warm rice with some spicy onion and hot green pepper would be fabulous right about now. For a second he thinks, it would be nice if Allah would create us without hunger and without the need to eat food. Life would be so much easier, if people did not have stomach to fill with food all the time. Allah almighty must be a rich guy; did not think it is going to be so hard for Julhas to get food his own and his family of six children, his wife and a sister. So many mouths to fill everyday at least once or sometimes even twice a day. All of a sudden, anger takes over Julhas, the muscles in his face and neck get firmer.

(This is a work to be done. It is a translation from a small part of my diary and my memory after I have visited this village. Instead of translating my diary, I may be rewriting some of it in English in a different format.)