Life in Dhaka
Ever since the day I landed my feet at the soils of the scorching land called Dhaka, it has also been stepping on the soul of the scorching life of mine. Going out of the country might get people excited and thrilled to start a conversation with you and so they do, but all those thrills dry up pretty soon they they hear the name thats not Australia or US or UK or something fancy and sophisticated as such. I dont know on whom is the joke on, but sitting on a chair, doing nothing else but study,eat, study, sleep,study, watch game of thrones, HIMYM, onepiece, study, and be awesome is much more easier than study, search for jobs, do jobs, pay the rents, study, and be awesome. Well, the life doesn't actually suck back here anyways... I mean it's quite good. Although you do have to work with that blood boiling heat sometimes, but the life is a charm.
Life starts from the mosque here in Dhaka. With the music of the islamic prayers in the loud speakers the morning sun rises yawning up behind the tall apartments with a beautiful orange smile. The silent empty streets now slowly start filling with the rikshaws and tempos filled with students going to the schools and colleges,their moms dropping them and medical students going to their lectures. The latter category of students might be mistaken sometimes for drunkards with a bag and an apron because of their sleep deprived face and the irregular movements.
As the sun rises slightly more, and when the children are all already inside their classes, the street vendors come to the play. Tea, coffee, chocolate shake, cold coffee cold chocolate, samosa, singada, omelette, french fries, burger, chicken wings.. you name it.. everything can be found sold in the streets.. quality however you guessed it.. either its stale or it sucks. "And it is definitely unhealthy" says my tummy who has faced 4 upset stomach situations within a single month.
By this time, the officers will have come out of their beds as well.. the streets are full of people. Students teachers, workers, work providers everyone. The roads are pretty crowded and you can see mostly males doing the works in the streets... Educated women can be seen in the workplaces as well. The class bunkers are seen around the streets as well many times, taking the sips of coffee or tea maybe, along with a stick of cigeratte clamped in their other hand.
While we are in our lectures, studying about bones and the ways we can heal them, there is at least one guy in the dhaka slums being beaten by the shopkeepers for trying to fill his hungry stomach without any money and having the same bones broken and the ligaments torn. Little will we have to face the heat of the inferno called the midday sun of dhaka from the well air conditioned lecture halls of the college but the children out there have no other choice. The children who are selling chatpates and men who are riding their sweat off pulling the rikshaws under the blazing sun out there all around the dhaka for the little to none of the payment they get might be the real victims here. Heck! Some of them have to wait for the mosque to provide the free food at around 2 in the day everyday just to fill their empty bellies for the day.
By the time we finish our lectures and are walking back to hostels, the streets are filled with medical students. Mostly eating foods at streets and rushing back to libraries as soon as they can. I mean who has the time to eat healthy? We have tests tomorrow and 2 complete chapters to cover. Life of medical students is not all bed of roses neither. We don't realize how privileged lives we have been living until we ask ourselves," How long has It been since you had eaten a wholesome dinner? Or had a complete good night's sleep?" But its all good. Something for something better I guess.
And then comes the evening. When the streets are filled with jhal muri and puchka stalls. Along with stalls come the girls and along with the girls come their sponsors known as boyfriends. The traffic jams of at least 3 hours is so common that I had completely forgotten to mention them till now. And every streets have them couples, sitting on the sidewalks, too close to each other to have any room for breathing in a fresh oxygen. As the saying goes, 8 out of 10 times if you throw a pebble at Dhaka, it either hits a couple or a medical student. Couldn't be any more accurate.
By this time the city is also filled with the carts of cheap clothes. Sometimes with a great sale scheme as well. Buy one get one free in the t shirt of 50 taka? TAKE MY MONEY NOWW SIR!!!! ( and fight to return it back because the T wont last for more than 2 washes). It is a city that never sleeps. The shops open for more than 2 in the morning, businesses run for long enough to let the owls fall asleep as well and the ghosts are kinda afraid to visit a random house to scare people by this time. Who knows if you end up in a medical college hostel and find those monsters holding the bones and skulls at the midnight chanting up some fancy spells like foramena magmum, glutious maximums, plica semicircularis and such to summon the devil himself?
Beside the rikshaw, never ending traffic jams, colored beards and covered faces, everything else is kinda like kathmandu back here as well. And yeah, the heat as well.Who can forget the Dhaka heat?. Everyone and everything has many faces I admit. But this is the face I have seen till date.The face of the place I live in. Lets see what else is in the store for us. Dhaka and I are gonna go a long way.
Life starts from the mosque here in Dhaka. With the music of the islamic prayers in the loud speakers the morning sun rises yawning up behind the tall apartments with a beautiful orange smile. The silent empty streets now slowly start filling with the rikshaws and tempos filled with students going to the schools and colleges,their moms dropping them and medical students going to their lectures. The latter category of students might be mistaken sometimes for drunkards with a bag and an apron because of their sleep deprived face and the irregular movements.
As the sun rises slightly more, and when the children are all already inside their classes, the street vendors come to the play. Tea, coffee, chocolate shake, cold coffee cold chocolate, samosa, singada, omelette, french fries, burger, chicken wings.. you name it.. everything can be found sold in the streets.. quality however you guessed it.. either its stale or it sucks. "And it is definitely unhealthy" says my tummy who has faced 4 upset stomach situations within a single month.
By this time, the officers will have come out of their beds as well.. the streets are full of people. Students teachers, workers, work providers everyone. The roads are pretty crowded and you can see mostly males doing the works in the streets... Educated women can be seen in the workplaces as well. The class bunkers are seen around the streets as well many times, taking the sips of coffee or tea maybe, along with a stick of cigeratte clamped in their other hand.
While we are in our lectures, studying about bones and the ways we can heal them, there is at least one guy in the dhaka slums being beaten by the shopkeepers for trying to fill his hungry stomach without any money and having the same bones broken and the ligaments torn. Little will we have to face the heat of the inferno called the midday sun of dhaka from the well air conditioned lecture halls of the college but the children out there have no other choice. The children who are selling chatpates and men who are riding their sweat off pulling the rikshaws under the blazing sun out there all around the dhaka for the little to none of the payment they get might be the real victims here. Heck! Some of them have to wait for the mosque to provide the free food at around 2 in the day everyday just to fill their empty bellies for the day.
By the time we finish our lectures and are walking back to hostels, the streets are filled with medical students. Mostly eating foods at streets and rushing back to libraries as soon as they can. I mean who has the time to eat healthy? We have tests tomorrow and 2 complete chapters to cover. Life of medical students is not all bed of roses neither. We don't realize how privileged lives we have been living until we ask ourselves," How long has It been since you had eaten a wholesome dinner? Or had a complete good night's sleep?" But its all good. Something for something better I guess.
And then comes the evening. When the streets are filled with jhal muri and puchka stalls. Along with stalls come the girls and along with the girls come their sponsors known as boyfriends. The traffic jams of at least 3 hours is so common that I had completely forgotten to mention them till now. And every streets have them couples, sitting on the sidewalks, too close to each other to have any room for breathing in a fresh oxygen. As the saying goes, 8 out of 10 times if you throw a pebble at Dhaka, it either hits a couple or a medical student. Couldn't be any more accurate.
By this time the city is also filled with the carts of cheap clothes. Sometimes with a great sale scheme as well. Buy one get one free in the t shirt of 50 taka? TAKE MY MONEY NOWW SIR!!!! ( and fight to return it back because the T wont last for more than 2 washes). It is a city that never sleeps. The shops open for more than 2 in the morning, businesses run for long enough to let the owls fall asleep as well and the ghosts are kinda afraid to visit a random house to scare people by this time. Who knows if you end up in a medical college hostel and find those monsters holding the bones and skulls at the midnight chanting up some fancy spells like foramena magmum, glutious maximums, plica semicircularis and such to summon the devil himself?
Beside the rikshaw, never ending traffic jams, colored beards and covered faces, everything else is kinda like kathmandu back here as well. And yeah, the heat as well.Who can forget the Dhaka heat?. Everyone and everything has many faces I admit. But this is the face I have seen till date.The face of the place I live in. Lets see what else is in the store for us. Dhaka and I are gonna go a long way.
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