Cultivating your own garden

During my recent visit to Sicily, a chance meeting with a pavement vendor selling hats and belts left me in a reflective mood. Since the man appeared to be Bengali (Italy has a large number of Bangladeshi immigrants), I stopped to ask him for directions and soon we got talking. After he confirmed my origin, he stated that he had worked as a server in the Jahangirnagar University canteen before making his way to Italy. The encounter made me effusive, since I had been a teacher in the same university at one time. I handed him a €20 bill to show my solidarity, but he was unwilling to accept charity and handed me two belts. His pride and rectitude confirmed what our guide in Palermo had told us: "In Italy Bangladeshis are universally liked for their integrity and diligence."

That the Bangladeshi vendor demonstrated an exceptional dignity filled me with a sense of pride about a compatriot. But the positive feeling was overtaken by regret. Why is it that during my tenure as a teacher in the university I had been so snobbish that I had never thought of passing the time of day with someone on the other side of the rusty metal counter? Let me confess that as a raw teacher, I had donned the garb of someone above the hoi polloi…as if the academia bestowed this right on its teaching staff!

But why focus on the academia? Snobbery and discrimination are an integral part of our social norm. Each time I go back to Bangladesh, I am offered unsolicited advice on how to manage the domestic help. The conversation usually starts with a caveat: "Since you are not used to full time help in the  United States you tend to overindulge them – distance yourself from them and maintain an occupational relationship or they will walk all over you."  I have to acknowledge that the years of living away from my country of birth have substantively changed my attitude toward the so-called "lower social strata". Despite all the well-meaning counselling, I end up investing a sufficient amount of time talking to the help about their personal situation – something that I never did in my younger days. I find myself having these casual conversations while sharing mundane household tasks with them. The richness and depth of their personal stories have taught me a great deal about the trials and tribulations of the common folk. The married women abandoned by their husbands who toil to feed and educate their children, the single women whose fathers are unable to provide for them because they are disabled, or have too many mouths to feed - all have their own tragic tales to narrate. These heart wrenching stories not only stir my conscience, but also make me count my numerous blessings.

I seem to have digressed from my original narrative about the Bangladeshi I met in Italy. My short interchange with this exuberant immigrant made me aware that in my young teaching years, I never made an effort to get to know the people who helped keep the university grounds clean or served tea in the lounge. They mostly operated as invisible beings. I was too preoccupied with my career and high ideals. But today, having taken many twists and turns in life, I was struck by this man's aspiration to change his life from a tea boy to something that would give him a greater identity and a better life!

The brief interaction also triggered a natural question in my mind. How do Bangladeshis, who are generally considered "lazy" and "untrustworthy" in their country, transform into hardworking and honest individuals in Italy? Is it the environment, is it motivation, or is it something more organic in the nature of man?

I began to reflect on Voltaire's Candide in search of a possible explanation. In this satirical novel, Voltaire challenges the prevalent idea propagated by the philosophers of the time: "Everything is for the best in this best of all possible worlds", and people perceive imperfections only because they do not understand God's grand plan. The protagonist, Candide, after a long journey of suffering and witnessing a wide range of horrors and injustices, discovers a farmer who claims that simple work keeps him from the three great evils: "Boredom, vice and poverty". Candide is deeply moved by these words, and decides that his prime duty in this world is to "cultivate the garden", since this will give him purpose, peace and a productive life, leaving no time for philosophical speculation.

Is it possible that these Bangladeshi immigrants in Italy have discovered their "patch of garden", and are hoping to reap the fruits of their labour with dignity? No longer weighed down by the adverse circumstances of their birth, they may have found their emancipation through hard work that offers rewards and satisfaction. In their own modest way they have gained a degree of control over their destinies!

The writer is a renowned Rabindra Sangeet exponent and a former employee of the World Bank.

E-mail:shiftingimages@gmail.com.