When someone said she was going to be in the tristate area over the weekend, I courteously asked what time was her flight. After a confused moment, she clarified, visibly irritated by my ignorance, "I meant, around Banani."

That was the first time I heard the term "tristate" being used to refer to a location in Bangladesh, and not an American place denoting a cluster of three individual states -- New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut for example.

God bless America, but the hip, trendy, posh tristate of the 21st century is to be found in Bangladesh. It's Gulshan-Banani-Baridhara!

Apparently, it is a utopian place where the wealthy people live, where money flies about in the air, where the refined upper-class resides in.

I am here to tell you that I myself am a resident of this so-called tristate -- not a humble brag -- I am none of the aforementioned adjectives. I only dream and pray that the assumptions people make about my finances were true!

But who can argue with people's perceptions? They are as unreasonable as some of the prices and rent in the tristate area (I personally call it tristate-tax).

The other day, I overheard a "ghotok" (matchmaker) enquiring about a potential bridegroom and what he does for a living: "Apnar bhatija ki korey?"

To which the other side replied, "Bhabi, chhele Gulshan e thakey."

Apparently living in Gulshan is a job, a highly lucrative one in the marriage market.

I even know someone who lives in Badda but says that his house is in "Gulshan-3"!

"It's sort of an extension of Gulshan, right? There's Gulshan-1 and 2, and so Badda is Gulshan-3," he said.

"Well, next time you take a CNG-run auto-rickshaw, let me see you tell the driver that you want to go to Gulshan-3," another friend of mine retorted back at him.

Meanwhile, some Baridhara residents need to understand that just because there are many embassies in their neighbourhood doesn't magically make them ambassadors.

I rather side with those people who are not impressed by the whole tristate fiasco. We all know of exorbitantly rich and influential people who hail from all parts of Dhaka, and no amount of money will make them move from their beloved communities.

Please, stop chasing this "tristate dream". It is not the American dream if there ever was one.

Every nook and cranny of Dhaka have stories waiting to be told. "My Dhaka" gives interested writers the platform to share experiences of city life. Only selected stories will make it to our print edition and digital platform. Send your Dhaka story (within 450 words) to raffat@thedailystar.net