Wings Across A City Wall

To everyone she was just Shimu, though she had a formal name as well.

Shimu and Tushar had grown up together on an alley in the Mirpur area of Dhaka city. Their neighbouring houses were separated only by a brick wall, about two meters high. The branches of a tree growing beside Tushar's house overhung the wall, its foliage shading a part of Shimu's courtyard.

Since childhood they had always played together in the dusty streets of the neighborhood, and had attended Mirpur Cantonment Public School & College.

Shimu lived with her family: her rickshaw pulling father, Fakhrul, with his black beard that tapered to an ocher tip like teeth decayed and stained by chewing betel leaves, who spent his leisure hours at the 'Jame Masjid' mosque of the Mirpur Ceramic Factory near his home; her mother, Ishrat, worked in one of the many textile industries in the area; and her two brothers, of whom, Shariful, the older, worked in one of the garments factories of Mirpur.

He would often say with pride: "It is we who dress all those people in Europe!"

***

Shimu was a dreamer. Since childhood. For Tushar, his moments with her were the best of his childhood. Whenever they had the opportunity, they would take a rickshaw or a CNG and go to Dhanmondi, not so much for the high-rise shopping malls and restaurants, but because Shimu loved seeing Dhaka from above. She envied her classmates who lived on the upper floors of their neighborhood's dingy gray buildings.

Tushar knew this and tried to take her to coffee shops or public places on the higher floors of the towers around Dhanmondi's busy streets. Up there, with her forehead and nose pressed against the glass panes of the large windows, Shimu would look down, her eyes shining.

The year 2009 was unforgettable for Shimu. The film by Ghiasuddin Selim, "Monpura," had just been released in cinemas. They were still in school, and had slipped away to watch it together.

Shumi was enchanted. On their way back they stopped to sit down on a pile of bricks a few streets from home. Shumi was still humming the song from the film:

Jao pakhi bolo taar-e/ she jeno bhole na mor-e

 'Go, bird, fly to him and tell him not to forget me.' 

 

When, on the screen the song was playing, with actress Farhana Mili as a lovestruck fisherman's daughter dreaming of being with her sweetheart in a boat on the river, and the camera rose over the two, like a dragonfly, Shimu almost had tears in her eyes.

"Wouldn't it be lovely to fly like a bird, leaving all the misery and ugliness behind?" She said now with a far away look in her eyes.

"Why? What's so bad about the earth?" Tushar replied, stroking the dust at his feet.

 "Oh! I'm tired of all this… the ground streaked red from betel juice spit, the traffic, the crowds of people going nowhere, yet everywhere, like stagnant rainwater. One day, I would like to leave all this behind, and travel. Fly far away." She continued to hum:

Megher opor akash orre/ nodir opar pakhir basha…

'The sky floats over the clouds./ Across the river is the bird's nest.'

Then turning around to Tushar she said with fervour: "I wish I could be like in the film, flying above the blue and green water?"                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                 

Tushar, suddenly, jumped up and began to wave his arms like wings imitating the actor in the film running around the girl.

"Enough! Silly!" Shumi shouted, smiling, turning her head to follow him. Tushar stopped in front of her, his hands on his thighs, panting.

"Well, since that's what you want to do, just flap around all day like a bird, I'll call you Pakhi. Thik ache?"

And from that day Shimu became Pakhi, for Tushar.

***

Years went by. Until it was the last year of school.

Every evening, Tushar climbed up the wall like a lizard, to sit on top with his legs dangling over the edge, to watch Shimu handwash her shalwar kamiz in the copper tub.

"Pakhi!" He called her in a shrill voice.

She looked up at him, then shaking her head went back to rubbing the bar of soap on the wet fabric, with her smile hidden by her long black hair.

It couldn't be said that she was a beautiful girl. She was skinny, but her face was oval and amber in color, her eyes seemed to take half her face and the lips were soft and thick as papaya pulp. Her knuckles were a darker brown than the color of the skin but her nails looked almost pink.

There were those who looked at her with interest at school, but she was rather shy, and talked mostly with her  girl friends, or with Tushar, whom she would meet on the street, in front of the school's iron gate, to have a quick bite at one of the snack stalls, surrounded by voices and laughter.

Shimu had asked him, as a favor, not to call her Pakhi in front of the others, at school or in the family. She was afraid that someone might tease her or ask too many questions.

The days passed in an unvaried pattern, spent at school, or at home with the family. Every night, her brother Shariful had arguments with his father. The girl and her mother listened from the kitchen. It seemed like he was becoming a trade unionist. Ishrat was worried about this.

"We have no rights anymore! They squeeze the life blood from us and when they have no use for us they chuck us out!" He ranted at his father. "How many textile factories are there in Mirpur, abba? At least a dozen on each street. Yet, there are more factories than schools! So, it's better to send our children to operate the sewing machines than to try to better their future, right?"

Her mother feared for the husband's heart. She put her head through the hall door, her face worried. "Son, calm down..."

Shimu was behind her listening. Shoriful continued to shout at his father. "Look at ammu!" He pointed to his mother. "They have taken half of her life. For whom? Not for us! For Westerners who make themselves beautiful, pose with designer clothes..." Shariful said, walking with his chest out and his hands holding his shirt as if it were the edge of a jacket, "... ignoring the label saying 'Made in Bangladesh!' 'Made in Mirpur!' Does anyone care? And what if ammu had been one of the thousand victims of the collapsed Rana Plaza garment factory? Huh? Then you'd agree with me, wouldn't you?"

Shimu watched her mother march to the chair where her husband was sitting. "Enough! Don't talk to your father like that! What's his fault?" She said with controlled fury.

Shariful rolled his eyes. "Oh! It's useless! Forget it! Better I step out for a bit, so tomorrow I'll be calm and ready for the grind!" He went out, slamming the door.

These were the moments when Shimu wanted to sprout wings and fly away. She went out into the courtyard, and in a low voice called to her friend on the other side of the brick wall.

Within a few minutes Tushar's smiling face emerged over the top.

"Take me away..." she whispered.

When they took a CNG through the streets of Dhaka, the sun was already setting. But these busy roads seemed unrelated to time or the planetary movements of the sun or the moon, and the only relevant thing was the continuous motion of people and vehicles moving in every direction.

Shimu looked at them from between the green grates of their auto-rickshaw stuck in traffic, with the green-gold orna of her dress covering her nose and mouth from the smog.

"So what do you think ants say when they collide against each other as they move along their line?" Shimu asked Tushar who sat next to her, pressed into the narrow space.

He looked at her with the expression of someone falling from the clouds. "Eh ...?"

She burst into laughter: "Nothing, nothing..."

They stopped in front of Batighor and entered the building.

Inside the ascending elevator she asked where he was taking her.

"To the library", Tushar replied excitedly.

"You? In a library?" The girl exclaimed incredulously.

As soon as they entered the premises, he took her by the hand and dragged her through the shelves full of books.

"Pakhi, Pakhi... You never trust me."

They went out onto a small balcony. A girl was reading a book while sipping a drink, sitting at a small round iron table. Tushar led her to the parapet of the balcony and made her look below to the busy street.

Shimu was seized with a deep happiness as she put her elbows on the railing and with her chin resting on both hands, she observed the random movement of black dots on the surface of the gray pavements. On the roof of a lower building to the left of the balcony, men were dining at the tables of an eatery.

When Shimu looked down she forgot about everything. She could spend hours like that – it relaxed her. Tushar, beside her, looked down and at the girl's face, trying to understand what she found so special about those little human ants below. He hummed:

Nodir opar pakhir basha/mone bondhu boro aasha

'Across the river dwells the bird/ And in my heart, o friend, abide my hopes.'

                                                                        ---

The last hurrah of their adolescence, before school was over, was the Phalgun festival, celebrating spring, on February 14th. That morning, like most youngsters, they also poured into the streets and parks of Dhaka like everyone else, wearing yellow and orange clothes: women in saris with floral wreaths and garlands in their hair, men in kurta, and almost everyone  with their cheeks painted with designs.

Tushar and Shimu went to the park of Dhaka University, together with their schoolmates. But first, they stopped at the flower market near Shabagh, to buy flowers for the girls to put in their hair.

In the afternoon, Shimu and her companions cheered on the boys who challenged each other in a long cricket match in the park of Suhrawardy Udyan, next to the campus. The enthusiasm was as palpable as the dust that rose like smoke from the earth as the boys ran.

It was the last Phalgun they celebrated as teenagers.

***

Shimu wanted to continue with university but the money was not enough. She knew that both her father and mother were squeezing the last drops of their energy to keep thier household afloat.

It was not even her mother who asked her, rather she herself who told her that she would look for a job. This angered her brother, who had by now joined the workers' union. The girl reassured her mother and her brother that this was what she wanted, so they didn't have to be sad for her.

For Tushar there was no drama, nor the slightest doubt.

He knew well that he would work, and that most likely his father would be able to get him into the company that was building the metro rail: the elevated train that was everyone's hope to solve the terrible traffic problem, even if everyone knew in their hearts that little would change.

Shimu, for her part, was also sure of one thing, that she wouldn't follow her mother and her brother to one of the dozen textile factories. She wanted to, at least, go up and not underground, or her light would be extinguished forever.

Finally, Shimu managed to find a job as a maid with a family living in Nikunja-2, near the international airport.

The evening before her first day on the job, after hanging to dry her best red and green shalwar kamiz on a line in the yard, she walked over to the brick wall under the tree canopy. She looked up at the stars and whispered: "Tushar ...? Tushar ...?"

From the other side of the wall, after a while, his voice penetrated like wind through the bricks.

Jao pakhi jaa re urrey/ Tarey koiyo amar hoye

chokh jole jaye dekhbo taare/ mon chole jaye odoor durey.

'Go, bird, fly to my beloved/ and tell him on my behalf

My eyes burn to see him/ my heart goes seeking far away.'

Shimu gave a half-hearted laugh. "Stupid..."

"So, Pakhi, tell me everything..." He said.

The girl pressed her left cheek to the rough surface of the bricks, and with the evening breeze making her black hair drift over her face hiding the tears streaking her skin, she whispered.

"Where are you taking me tonight...?"

***

Every morning she woke up before dawn, prayed, quickly ate some left over rice and dal-curry with eggs, waved goodbye to her mother and took a CNG to go to work. It took her about two hours to get there.

The family whom she served lived on the fourth floor of a building of retired military and civilian officials. It was a quiet place, unlike the chaotic area where she had grown up. Shimu spent her time mostly with the lady of the house. She washed clothes, cleaned the floor, ironed and did the chores in the kitchen.

She did not feel tired, and the family was kind, and often made her leave before the scheduled time, knowing that it would take her about two hours to get home in rush hour traffic. Her favorite time was when she had to go and hang clothes on the terrace, even if she had to walk up two flights of stairs with the heavy tub of wet clothes. At night, in bed, her right hip, on which she rested the laundry tub for leverage, ached. But she had enjoyed the view from above for a moment without anyone noticing.

Meanwhile, Tushar, had joined the construction company where his father worked. After three months, he managed to get assigned to the Kilkhet construction site, not far from where Shimu worked.

Whenever he could, he borrowed the bright red tank Honda Hero Splendor motor bike from his older brother and drove Shimu to work. They would ride along the Shagufta New Road, then plunge into the colorful ocean of people, and smog of the streets of Dhaka. Before taking her to Nikunja-2, Tushar proudly showed her the huge gray pylons that stood like big T's planted on the ground, on which one day the metropolitan train would whiz by.

"You know, I work up there. It's not very high but I think from there you'd enjoy seeing people going to the market or walking along the highway." He told her this with almost the same enthusiasm that he knew she would have sitting on one of those pylons.

Shimu nodded, even though time had begun to erode the naivety and candor of her childhood. The daily routine and the impossibility of imagining a different future was like oil in water, which made the feathers of her wings viscous and heavy. Tushar felt it, so as soon as he could he tried to shake her wings, to free them from that oil.

He often hung around the area if he finished work early on the construction site. They would arrange to meet near one of the iron piers that led from the opposite side of the Dhaka-Mymensingh Highway, and crossed the open construction sites, observing the imposing pillars as if they were mysterious megalithic dolmens or a shower of who knows what extraterrestrial constellation.

They reached Lake Kilkhet and sat on the shore to watch the planes take off or land at the airport.

Tushar saw that this made Shimu melancholy. Although she was happy to sit there and she loved watching the planes, there was a bitter edge, like a thorn under the skin that does not bleed but is felt.

"Maybe one day you too will climb into those metal birds, after all you're a Pakhi too, aren't you?" The boy said smiling as he threw small pebbles on the water to make them bounce.

"Maybe if I had continued my education, yes. Maybe I would have traveled to London, or Dubai or Bangkok, who knows..." Shimu answered looking at the pebbles skip over the water leaving concentric circles. "The truth is that we are more like birds locked in CNG cages than Monpura's bird," Shimu said following the white line of another airplane. "We beat our wings in this daily struggle, and get nowhere. Look at my brother, fomenting strikes, fighting for an extra $10, while my mother has been breaking her back since she was a child. For what? For me to wash the underwear of a woman I don't know, which I will do until someone marries me and I start washing his underpants. And my brother wants to have the factory shut down, while she continues to sew underpants for some student in Paris or London, who doesn't know that we exist or where Mirpur is on the world map."

She flung a pebble into the lake: "We are like the circles on the water or the trail of white smoke in the sky. Yes, the stone and the airplane exist for a bit, and then vanish, as do we... poof!" She said closing and opening her fingers like something exploding. "We dissolve without a trace..."

"Ya Allah! How pessimistic you are! I won't bring you to see the airplanes anymore!" Tushar snapped angrily. Shimu turned to look at him and smiled.

"I'm sorry! At least, I have my crazy pakhi- pagol!"

The boy was immediately happy, jumped to his feet, singing and imitating wings circling her.

Jao pakhi bolo taar-e/ she jeno bhole na mor-e

Shukhe theko bhalo theko/ mone rekho eyi amar-e...."

"Go, bird, fly to him and tell him not to forget me,/ 

 to stay well and happy, and to always remember me."

Shimu ended up laughing as usual.

***

At home the atmosphere was increasingly tense.

Her brother Shariful was agitated even when he ate, had red eyes and constantly talked on the phone in a low voice, or suddenly screamed and railed.

Her father preferred to stay away for long periods in the mosque.

The younger brother was by now under the influence of Shariful and this grieved Ishrat, who prayed every day for the fate of her children, but in her heart knew that things would not turn out well.

One evening Shariful was in his room with three friends from the union organization, smoking and discussing an impending strike. His mother prepared the cha and placed the cups on a tray. Shimu told her mother that she would carry it in, but Ishrat didn't like those boys looking at her daughter.

As they stood at the door they heard Shariful speaking excitedly.

"We must hit our factory! We can't take it anymore! Have you seen the government and industrialists' response to the United Garments Workers Federation's request to raise our wages from $ 38 a month to $ 100? They agreed to only a 7 dollars and 60 cents increase! Are we beggars being given alms, when it's thanks to our blood and sweat that textiles represent 80% of the national exports! And if we go on strike or take to the street, what do they do? They arrest us! Shoot us!"

Shariful yelled as he banged his fist on the table as his friends cheered him on.

His mother entered, placing the tray of cha on the low table, while his brother's friends said "Slamalaikum, khala-amma."

"Thank you, ammu," her son said in a hoarse voice, as he smoothed his tousled hair. His mother adjusted the orna to cover her hair, looked at the young boys and said gently:

"But if you close the factory, baba, how will the mothers and fathers who work there feed their children? As I have done with you for over twenty years..."

Shariful turned with fiery eyes to scream at her. Shimu rushed in, dragged away her mother, while glaring at her brother: "Don't you dare talk back to our mother." Shimu said, shutting the door behind them.

In the kitchen she gave her mother a glass of water.

"Leave him alone, ammu. He'll destroy you if the factory hasn't done so in all these years."

The next morning Tushar dropped her on his motorcycle. She handed him the helmet and went to work. Occasionally she paid attention to the news on television of the strikes taking place.

She went home locked in the CNG cage because Tushar would finish late.

She was in the yard washing her dress when she heard a commotion coming from inside the house. Turbulent voices, crying. She dropped everything and ran inside with foreboding about her brother, while in her pounding heart she prayed that her younger brother wasn't involved.

But she was shocked to see Tushar's mother crying in her mother's arms, while Tushar's elder brother stood gravely next to them, his helmet still in his hand.

"Ammu...? What...?" Shimu asked in a faint voice, her blood running cold.

"Tushar... He's in the hospital." Her mother said as she struggled to contain her friend's howling.

Shimu's heart shattered.

The brother walked over to her: "He was climbing one of the pylons when he slipped and fell down four meters, hitting his head. Luckily he was wearing a safety helmet, but he suffered fractures and now he is...." His voice choked as he tried to hold back the tears.

"Where is he? Which hospital?" Shimu asked, her eyes brimming with tears.

"At Kurmitola General Hospital."

The girl saw the helmet and told him without hesitation. "Take me to him. Please."

They sped on the motorbike, darting through the cars in stalled traffic. The carhorns, and the street noises came to Shimu like hushed whispers muffled by the helmet and her preoccupation.

She felt her heart pounding against Tushar's brother's back.

Arriving in the intensive care room the nurse stopped them at the door, saying they could not enter.

She opened the pink curtain a little from inside and Shimu pressed her face and hands to the glass, looking at the bed on which her friend lay, full of tubes and surrounded by machinery.

The glass fogged up immediately. The brother was next to her. "He's in a coma..." he said.

Every day Shimu went to the hospital. She couldn't focus on her work She confided in her mistress, who often allowed her to leave an hour early to visit him. The nurse would let her in.

Tahera, the nurse, had given her a white plastic chair to sit beside the bed.

"Sometimes the voice of someone you love helps to come out of a coma." She said smiling.

Shimu didn't have time to object, troubled by the word "love." She wanted to tell her that he was her best friend. But Tahera had already left the room.

Only the BEEP... BEEP... of the machine to which Tushar was connected.

"I'm Pakhi..." she could only say this as she stared at his closed eyes.

When Shimu came home she was totally exhausted. Her mother forced her to eat something. Her brother also seemed to have calmed down and came to ask her every night how Tushar was.

She went into the courtyard, and sat leaning against the bucket with the shalwar kamiz soaking in the soapy water. Suddenly she heard a ticking. She looked up at the brick wall and saw a small brown bird hopping on the edge of the wall near the branches of the tree. Shimu finished washing her dress, spread it on the line, and after the evening prayer, collapsed in a very tired sleep

The next day, at the hospital, she asked Tahera if he had woken up, but the nurse shook her head. Shimu went to sit in the white chair, beside the bed.

"You told me I would have liked to sit on those pylons, but now I have no intention of approaching them anymore. "She spoke aloud as she looked at Tushar's right hand sticking out of the blue sheet, the oximeter on his index finger. She patted and held his hand as she chattered away.

 "They started the strike in the factory, you know? One day my brother will end up in prison..."

After half an hour, she rose to leave, saying, "I have to go now," but as she started to move away she felt herself being pulled back. Startled she turned around. It was just the edge of her orna caught on the oximeter around his finger.

Shimu took courage with each visit. A month had already passed.

She came everyday and sat telling him everything that was going on.

"You are lying here comfortably, while I continue to wash underwear."

She said with a forced laugh, stroking his forehead.

In the evening as soon as Shimu would go out into the courtyard with her dress rolled up in her hand, she would look at the bird that did not leave the tree. She whistled, and the bird jerked its head, scuttling from the branch to the edge of the wall.

The next day, sitting in the bedside chair, the girl took out a paper bag. "Today I passed the sweets stall outside our alley, and they were making hot jilapi, the batter swirling in the wat of boiling syrup. I know how much you like them, so I bought some. You can watch me eat!" She laughed, pulling the sticky orange, web-like circles out of the paper, pretending to bite on one.

Tahera entered the control room. Their voices were interspersed with the machine's BEEP.

Shimu offered the jilapi to the nurse.

"How is he?" She asked her.

Tahera adjusted the IV and smiled: "I think he's better. Mmm…Just smelling this perfume, I'd open my eyes in a heartbeat!"

Shimu nodded vigorously, smiling and chewing on the crunchy pastry.

When the nurse left closing the door, she brought her face close to Tushar's.

She whispered. "I miss my pakhi-pagol so much." Then began humming softly in his ear.

Shukhe theko bhalo theko/ mone rekho eyi amare.....

'Stay well, be happy/ And always remember me'

In the evening, while she was in the courtyard, she saw the bird fly across the wall and hop to the ground a meter away from her. Shimu smiled and went into the house, returning with a fistful of rice.

As soon as she threw the grains at her feet, the bird scuttled forward, pecking at the rice right up to the tip of her left foot. The girl wiped her soapy hand on her shalwar and placed it palm up on the ground next to her foot.The little bird leapt onto her palm. She could barely see the tiny eyes, and the feathers looked velvety.

"Hello, little one." Shimu said bringing her hand close to her chin.

The bird spread its wings and took off, beyond the crown of the tree.

The next day she worked longer to make up for the hours she had missed the weeks before.

The lady gave her a bag of fragrant mangoes. When she arrived at the hospital, later than usual, Tushar's family was there. Shimu watched them from behind a wall, waiting for them to leave.

She decided to give Tahera one of the plumpest of the mangoes, because by now she considered her a friend. They had been talking every day for months. As soon as Tushar's family left, and Shimu appeared, the nurse updated her on everything the doctors had said. Then she left the girl alone with him.

These days, Shimu was getting increasingly tired. Sometimes her eyes would close without her realizing it. Still she talked and talked, telling Tushar many things. Then she would rest her cheek on Tushar's hand, still telling the stories, and close her eyes hypnotized by the beeping of the machine. Often Tahera would wake her up to go home when it was late, or when the doctors were about to arrive.

Today, also she closed her eyes.

She was starting to hear the melodious sound of the harmonium.The plunge of the oar into the river. The sky blue like water dotted with the green of the lotus.

She saw the white trail of airplanes in the sky and the ants lined up on the red earth.

She heard the incessant ticking of sewing machines and the honking of cars in traffic.

From the blurred blue background emerged a figure with outstretched arms swinging like wings in flight. And a voice, was coming to her from who knows which corner of the sky and the river.

A sweet and feeble voice.

"Shonaro palonker ghor-e/ likhe rekhechilem daar-e"

'In the chamber of the golden bed/ I had written this on the door'

Shimu opened her eyes with difficulty. She felt a movement under her cheek. Suddenly she realized that the voice was not in her head. Tushar's finger was moving in jerks.

"Jao pakhi bolo taar-e.../she jeno bhole na mor-e..."

Tushar sang in an imperceptible voice.

Shimu jumped to her feet. She saw the boy's eyes open slightly.

His dry lips barely moved as he tried to smile. "Hi... Pakhi..."

Shimu couldn't hold back the tears. She bent over him. "Welcome back, my pagol!"

Then she ran out to find Tahera. They returned to the room accompanied by a swarm of doctors. Shimu took her things, and backed out of the door as the white coats surrounded the bed. Tahera nodded at her with a smile.

Back home she told her mother and brother about him. Tushar's family were already on their way to the hospital.

That evening she ate as if she hadn't touched food in months.

In the evening Shimu went out into the courtyard with the clothes to wash.

She looked toward the wall, where the branches of the tree crossed the brick's edge.

She waited and watched. She whistled. No whisper of wings, not a trace of the bird.

That night, she went to sleep with a smile on her face, as if she were looking from above at her reflection in a green and blue river.

 

 

Stefano Romano is a well loved Italian photo-journalist and writer among the migrant communities of Rome, especially the Bangladeshi. He has traveled widely in South East Asia and published books about Malaysia and Indonesia, among them, Sweet Light (Agamee Prakshani, 2020) was reprinted in English in Bangladesh and in 2012 My Bangladesh Tales. He has taught courses at La Sapienza, like Photography as Cultural Mediation, and one of his largest photographic exhibitions, titled "Shodesh-Bidesh" comprised  ten years of photographs of the Bangladeshi community in Torpignattara, Rome.

Neeman Sobhan, Italy based Bangladeshi writer, poet, columnist and translator. Till recently she taught Bengali and English at the University of Rome Publications: Anthology of columns, An Abiding City: Ruminations from Rome; fiction collection: Piazza Bangladesh; and poetry collection: Calligraphy of Wet Leaves. Armando Curcio is publishing her English stories in Italian as Cuore a Metà.