By Hitoishi Chakma
Illustration by E. R. Ronny
Loving where you live doesn't really require your city to be as awesome as Las Vegas or Venice! Neither does your home have to be a large bungalow with three or more butlers at service all the time. You will just have to live there long enough to love it. I have relatives coming in from different parts of Bangladesh and abroad and hear them huff at the sight of living here without much green and blue. They ask, "How do you people live in this kind of hassle?" But I don't reply. I just smile meekly and don't bother to answer that question.
Dhaka is not like “those cities” in the developed world! It doesn't have nice parks all over, the alleys are narrower and dirtier than those in Venice but it's still quite nice to live here. Of course, many would not admit. Because right now, 'I hate to live in this country' is in vogue. And this brings a swell idea to my thick brain. I should make a 'I hate Bangladesh ' wrist band and sell them for two hundred bucks apiece. And what am I going to do with all the money that I will collect? (because they are going to sell!) At first I am going to treat my friends for sure (because I owe them 11 treats for my last eleven birthdays) and then go bananas while shopping. So listen up, 'Amra Bangladesh' teens - I am smarter than you!
You have nice parks and schools all over the UK to mull on whatever things you want. But this one piece pure Bangladeshi thick fat sleepy skull brings the smartest idea to... oops sorry 'out' of his skull I guess (yeah, I probably got a couple of screws up in my head loose; now tell me where I took that from?). So the moral? Love your own country and the city you live in.
To me Dhaka is cool because I have been living here since the third grade. I know about most of the common characteristics of this city. I know where I should be able to find the audio CD's or the clothes I am looking for. I know about most of its good places where I will love to hang out with my friends or take my GF (girlfriend of-course though non-existent) out on a date. And I love to be stuck in a traffic jam. Because whenever I am stuck in a jam, I just peek over to the other car and see people watching 'Bruce Almighty' in an 8 inch television screen. Who needs a Cineplex anyway? Though it happened to me only. It is true, Dhaka is not so much an eye candy and teens out there in New York or LA might be getting more entertainment and educational facilities than us but still we cannot really tell it from our hearts that we hate it here. Hey!
Everything has its bad side! Above all, it is the place where most of our friends exist, our loving family exists and the cool addakhanas exist where we can drift away with our friends while having a wonderful time.
So all in all it's good out here and you might not like it, if all of a sudden you are taken to LA to spend the rest of your life there.
