The monsoons have passed. Moti has grown so healthy, so strong and so big that no other cocks even dare to be near him.
You land in London with £210 in your pocket. It is the year 2009. You are able to pay the first month’s rent for the room, but not the deposit. You have to share it with an acquaintance from Dhaka. He arrived a week prior.
A young white officer asks her in heavily accented Bangla, “What’s the purpose of your visit?”
One year, a week before Eid-ul-Adha, my grandma, Dadi, came to Dhaka from the village and broke into tears. “What happened?” we asked.
The Baishakhi fairgrounds is just a stone’s throw away from the Doyagonj Bridge, where grandpa always takes Rony for afternoon walks.
I’ve seen many hues of yellow. Colorful, gray, unadorned. The pristine bokul podium, the vibrant spring awash with the fragrance of yellowy brilliance, the mournful memory of my adolescent day—the wedding ceremony of “Aaj Amenar Gaye Holud,”
And we two—a lovey-dovey couple, get married one day. Always be true to the truth, be honest to each other—we harmonized on that point. Years later, it is our fifth marriage anniversary evening. She dresses up gorgeously, stands before me and asks, “How do I look?”
The monsoons have passed. Moti has grown so healthy, so strong and so big that no other cocks even dare to be near him.
You Are a Rickshawallah
You land in London with £210 in your pocket. It is the year 2009. You are able to pay the first month’s rent for the room, but not the deposit. You have to share it with an acquaintance from Dhaka. He arrived a week prior.
A young white officer asks her in heavily accented Bangla, “What’s the purpose of your visit?”
One year, a week before Eid-ul-Adha, my grandma, Dadi, came to Dhaka from the village and broke into tears. “What happened?” we asked.
The Baishakhi fairgrounds is just a stone’s throw away from the Doyagonj Bridge, where grandpa always takes Rony for afternoon walks.
I’ve seen many hues of yellow. Colorful, gray, unadorned. The pristine bokul podium, the vibrant spring awash with the fragrance of yellowy brilliance, the mournful memory of my adolescent day—the wedding ceremony of “Aaj Amenar Gaye Holud,”
And we two—a lovey-dovey couple, get married one day. Always be true to the truth, be honest to each other—we harmonized on that point. Years later, it is our fifth marriage anniversary evening. She dresses up gorgeously, stands before me and asks, “How do I look?”
Kusoom twiddles her thumbs again, her nineteen-or-twenty-year-old face pale and gloomy. She is small, short and near neckless in a kameez with denim pants.
Nineteen ninety-nine. Dhaka, Bangladesh. My college is over and I am having the pre-kingly hours of my life—waiting for results before applying to a university.
