Oborodhs and my holiday burnt to ashes

THE pressure was getting to me. Tomorrow was the last day of my exams, and if I did well I'd have a good feeling during the entire vacation. 

As I stepped out of the examination hall I felt very excited. I couldn't stop making plans in my mind. We would be going to Singapore and Bangkok for the winter and my father had already booked the tickets, but as soon as I went home my dad told me that my aunt had called from America saying that they would be coming to Bangladesh after a few days. This news was better than the idea of Bangkok and Singapore altogether, since spending time with my closest cousins was way more exciting than going anywhere abroad. So, my dad cancelled the tickets for Singapore and Bangkok and I started making plans for when my cousins came. I was thinking about taking them to Nazimgarh in Sylhet, Chittagong, Cox's Bazaar, and of course our home town, Comilla; maybe even a few other places if we got the time. 

Then suddenly I heard that there would be hartal the day before my aunt came, and I became anxious about whether or not there would be a hartal the next day. My dad told me to calm down saying that there, hopefully, wouldn't be a hartal that day. But just in case there was and for the safety of my cousins, I told my dad to hire an ambulance. But unfortunately, my fears came true. I still didn't worry because we had already hired an ambulance. But right at that moment my aunt called. On hearing about the hartal, she decided to postpone her departure for two days. I was okay with that because, just like everyone else, I was quite sure that everything would be back to normal within a short time. 

I don't want to repeat the same thing so many times, so I'm just going to say that two weeks of hartals had gone by in a flash, and my aunt had already postponed her trip four times. But I was still hopeful that that the hartals would end soon, and my cousins would come. But all that hope went away in an instant, when my aunt called, saying in a desolate tone that they had cancelled the entire trip. I was speechless. But I did kind of understand their decision, since I knew that if there were continuous hartals for the next two weeks there was a huge possibility that it could continue for another month or so. And if that happened, we'd be stuck at home like prisoners. But just as sad as I was, I knew my cousins were equally disappointed. They loved Bangladesh, they loved their home town and they loved spending time with their family. My aunt was always too busy to come to Bangladesh during the summer, and so winter was the only opportunity for them to come and spend time with us. But now, even that wasn't possible. We had cancelled our trip to go abroad, and had made so many plans of having fun with them that now we were left hapless. So, with nothing left to do, I just decided to stay at home, lie down on my bed, and stare at the ceiling for the rest of the day, day-dreaming about all the fun I would've had if it wasn't for all the hartals. 

Because of the hartals, my cousins cancelled their plans of coming to Bangladesh around December 30. Today, it's February 10, and the hartals and oborodhs still haven't ended. In fact, it's a hartal today, and the BNP and Jamaat, or whoever it is, has just declared a hartal for the next two days.

The writer is a student of Class 6, Sunbeams School.