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Great Expectations
- Untold Agonies
It’s tea time!
October 13th, 2010A decade is ten years. It sounds a long time but time fly! It seems just yesterday the world saw with horror and surprise the destruction of the Twin Towers in New York. Yet it’s been ten years! That one incident changed many definitions, has drawn new lines of friends and foes. But most importantly changed the demography of Western politics. West started to look at her backyard with a different view. The melting pot wasn’t melting anymore. The gardens were not appreciated with so many colors in it. The fall of the two buildings gave the rise of a new form of right wing politics in the West.
In most countries the definition of right wing might be the same but the message they had for people were different. Never the conservatives had a unified message. Conservatives are skeptical of big government here in the US, they want minimal involvement of federal system, want free market to dictate the course of business and believes people knows the best how to run his life and his surrounding. The more the government gets involved the more the civil liberties of individuals are hampered. Well that’s what on paper they believe and oppose. In last ten years we have seen a new breed. The right wing conservatives have run a unified bandwagon all over the West. That was on immigration and anti-Islamic view. Europe especially has seen history written in many countries. Hardcore right wing parties have became governing force for the first time in some but in most countries won electoral seats. European parliament has rightists from Great Britain, Netherlands, Denmark flocking in with a common agenda- have strict immigration policy and stop sympathizing with Islamic countries who harbor terrorism. On the other side of the Atlantic the same ideas are coming forward but with a twist. Here the first victim of extremist conservative are the conservatives themselves.
Tea Party Movement has stormed the picture of American politics like a wildfire fanned by a tornado. They are the newest edition of a long list of political entities in United States. They are suppose to be the most conservative section of the country, the far right. They took the name from the Boston Tea Party incident of the American Liberation movement. They don’t want Government in anything, and they think the Republicans are not conservative enough to take them to the ‘good old days’. The love for their American Values seemed to be threatened only when an African American with an unconventional name took office. This movement was never seen when George Bush was president. Wire tapping to Americans phones, given unprecedented power to gage in wars and spend billions of dollars in tax payers money and giving out billions of bail out money to financial institutions no question asked didn’t seem like big government activities to them. All of a sudden in 2009 people started to come out on the street; energized to take back the country. From whom, might be a logical question and here comes the new right.
If you look at any of the tea party gatherings you won’t find anyone criticizing a policy of the Obama administration. It’s far more complex then that. The banners and placards will say, “Move the Nazi”, “Take back America from Osama”. I saw thousands of footage of these tea party activists and one lady’s comment was the most open and honest. She said, “I don’t think Obama is a bad man, but I can’t see my country turn into a Muslim Taliban state”. One out of five in America believe the President Obama is Muslim and again as I have said before the country is in such Islamophobia that the president can’t repeat what Collin Powell said on behalf of him, “Even if he is, what’s wrong with that”. One of the reason the press secretary had to come out and said the president is a practicing Christian is the Tea Party bandwagon. Majority of these tea party movers emerged right before the presidential election of 2008 and many Republican strategists were surprised to see the size of this fraction. To keep these rightist votes McCain had to change many of his centrist or ‘liberal’ stands and was almost forced to make the biggest mistake of his life-pick Sarah Palin as a running mate.
If you are still not sure what the Tea Party is, just remember Sarah. She’s the beacon of this movement. Within last couple of years, she has turned an ignorant movement to the most crucial vote count sect of 2010 mid term elections and I’m sure for the 2012 presidential election. Their almost militant aggression has effected the Republicans the most. In many states strong candidates with long history were kicked out in primaries by “Outside” Tea Party backed candidates. One victim: Congressman Mike Castle, who lost the Delaware Senate primary largely because he was seen as too moderate. He had been a figure in Delaware politics for more than four decades and was seen as having a good chance in the November election. Sarah Palin backed Tea Party candidate Sarah O’Donnell, has made the race pretty easy for Democrats. She’s already in controversies for giving false information of going to Oxford and Ivy League schools but later said she never attended those schools. John McCain barely made it in Arizona, which was unimaginable even two years ago. Utah senator Bob Bennett was one of the most respected Republicans and is ousted in the primaries by Tea Party candidates. He served 18 years in Senate. In Nevada Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid was expected to have a tough race but Tea Party movers took the strongest candidate out of the race. In Florida the incumbent Governor is running as independent by not going into confrontation with Republican Tea Party activists.
All in all, the surprising aspect is many of these Tea Party candidates will go to the election with a strong base even if they are not the most qualified candidates. The horrifying truth will be when many of them win seats in House and Senate. In Nevada Reid’s opponent Ms. Sharron Angle recently made a comment that Muslims are taking over the country city by city and many cities are run by Sharia Law. She indicated that Dearborn, a Detroit suburb with a significant Muslim population of whom there’s a significant number of Bangladeshis, are running the city under Sharia Law. Half of the Tea Party movers think United States is not tough enough on Muslim militancy because the president is Muslim. Recently Republicans have urged to reform a constitutional amendment (Amendment 14) which gives birth right citizenship to anyone regardless of their parents immigration status. Even to many “not so conservative” Republicans that was a line crossed no one imagined can happen. But the extreme ideas are flowing in American right wing strongly. Even some conservative Democrats are distancing themselves from the president to save their seat, as they are afraid the Tea Party allegations will change their voters minds. A slow economic growth has also been against the Democrats and Obama, also incident like the Time Square Bomb plot and the New York Islamic Center controversy helped the movement to get the right kind of ammunition. Almost 10% unemployment and unpopular but necessary initiatives like the health care reform gave the movement the intensity it needed. The failure of the left was to leave the argument tables in media and let the conservatives bash everything the administration brought on the table. Like in Europe this didn’t help to keep the independents or general population focused on the positives.
It’s obvious this would be seen as a great victory for the Tea Party movement, but the trend of kicking incumbent president’s party in midterm election is common. It happen in Regan’s time, Clinton’s first term, Bush’s era in 2006. Many in the US like to see check and balance in power. So having a president from one side and legislation from the other is seen as a preferable balance. But this time the Tea Party seems to take it to the extreme far. If Republicans do get as many seats as expected then they’ll block everything the president will put on the table. Measures like environmental conservation or negotiation in Middle East, can be seriously threatened by an uncooperative Senate.
It’ll be interesting to see how far the ignorant movement is going to keep their stronghold. But for now, it’s tea time all the way to November 
The placard says it all...
Their pain, our pride….
October 8th, 2010I’m very ordinary man. My ability to protest or point out something that I think is wrong is probably confined within this blog. But still, now technology has given me the opportunity to share my thoughts with the world, and I like to take that advantage. So here I go again! I was reading about Bandar Abdulaziz, a 32 year old man, who was beaten and strangled in a London hotel. Nothing unusual right? Well this man had another identity, the identity that took his life. He was the servant of a Saudi prince- Saud Abdulaziz bin Nasser al Saud. His highness in his great wisdom used to beat his servant for pleasure and prosecutors also found evidence of other pleasure the royal courtier had to provide. One night his highness got so drunk that he beat Mr. Abdulaziz to death. There were CCTV footage of his random assaults on hotel lifts which prosecutors found. I don’t want to go on the Saud prince’s action. If he and his ancestry were so civil then they wouldn’t need so many prophets to save them. My thoughts are with Mr. Abdulaziz and millions like him in the Middle East, domestic servants. Domestic servants and the abuse they face in Middle East is becoming folklores. Some of them are so brutal that sometimes I become skeptic of its truth. The next story was one of them. Until I saw the X-ray images online, I couldn’t believe. A Sri Lankan maid servant was nailed by her employers 42 times in different parts of her body. She had to work with nails in her skull. When she almost died, they terminated her “Akama” or work permit and kicked her out. And some of us believe these butchers will directly go to heaven because….
I looked at the X-ray footage and thought, she’s the Jesus of our time. She endured all these so that her family didn’t have to go through anything like this. The country will shed tears and send millions of saints like her so they can earn a little bit of foreign currency. According to UNHCR there are almost three million domestic workers working in the Middle East at any given moment. Kuwait has the highest population to domestic worker ratio. For 1.3 million citizens there are almost 660,000 migrant workers! But interestingly, none of the countries recognize domestic workers as foreign labors. For that, these workers, of whom majority are women, are not protected by any labor law. I think when they asked what domestic worker means someone gave them a literal translation. It means you can have a domesticated human. Majority of these women are from Sri Lanka, Philippines, Ethiopia, Nepal and increasing number from countries like Bangladesh. Saudi Arabia has almost 1.2 million domestic workers, the highest number in Middle East. Surprisingly even Lebanon has almost two hundred thousand migrant workers. Most of them don’t get paid regularly, no vacation days, can’t go out without employer supervision. It almost seems like a modern day slavery to me. Countries like the Philippines has opened shelters for fleeing workers in many of its embassies. That’s the best they can do, said one human rights activist in a report on Human Rights Watch. It’s a good earning source for semi skilled or unskilled workers. Many of them are young mothers and need to support a family. So they think they can go and work for 2-3 years and make a living for them. Most of them are unaware what kind of abuse awaits. Also recruiters and government officials claim the stories to be over exaggerated to keep the supply chain stable, the report added.
I have seen either on Bangladeshi news channels or sometimes on newspapers about workers send back from Middle East, without pay and sometimes badly beaten. I always wonder what the Government could do. With the highest amount of labor force working in the Middle East and remittance as the second largest source of foreign currency, I guess not much. One of my friend informed me, for all the workers in UAE, there’s only two embassy officers. I think it’s our oasis to these workers to comfort them. I can’t remember but I also read a news on Prothom Alo once that the number of migrant workers returning dead without any autopsy or explanation has also increased (if someone can point to the news, I would be grateful).
This is a civic duty to find alternative markets for our migrant workers. A recent news said Singapore will take 45,000 domestic workers from Bangladesh. They’ll pay higher wages then their Middle Eastern counterparts, and I’m not going to bet my life but I’m pretty sure they are not going to come home with nails in their skull. We should also look for alternative markets in Europe and USA. With an increasing older generation in the west there’s a huge need for care givers in these countries and if we can invest some money in institutions with the assistance of certified institution in government or private sector, then this can be a great source of remittance income for Bangladesh. At least they’ll be protected by law and we won’t leave them in the hand of savages. I know most of our workers are illiterate but I’m sure if we try in private sectors we can find alternative labor markets with better condition or where these workers will be protected by labor laws. But the untapped market in the west can be a great opportunity for many of our semi skilled professionals.
I know even in Bangladesh we have the culture of domestic workers and there are stories of abuse to inhuman level. But think about it, at least most of the domestic workers in your neighborhood has the hope of running away and they know there’s someone out there who will help them. But thousands of miles away, these women go to earn a little more then what they have spent. Hopeless, knowing no one’s out there to help them. The only hope they have is God has given them enough power to take all these and go home alive. A dead body would be just another burden to the family. So next time when our policy makers think of finding job market, can someone please tell them not to count them as dollar signs and look at them as human. And also help these people by giving alternatives in the private sector. I’m sure if we make a coordinated effort in public and private sector, our labor market can become more efficient and spread in new markets. And for those of us who live out of the country, if someone sees one of these saints on the street, at least spare a smile. Who knows, may be that’s the first one they saw for ages.
His Highness in all his might at London
Gulliver’s Travel
September 30th, 2010
Musa on the top
I hardly watch local news. Who got shot in Los Angeles or which county is having the best “Fair of the Summer” is hardly my thing. But the other day I was surfing channels and saw the news that a 13-year-old boy, Jordan Romero from LA, had become the youngest person to reach the top of Mount Everest. It was mid May and coincidently I also found that someone named Musa had become the first Bangladeshi to reach the Mount Everest peak. Huh! Did they go there together? That was the first thing that came to my mind, and honestly I was kind of surprised. My reason was a bit different. I honestly thought someone from Bangladesh must have done it before! I mean Mr Brojen Dash crossed the English Channel in the ‘50s, so I thought someone would be adventurous enough to try to go on top of the world! May be some people tried and failed or maybe Musa is the first in that category too. What ever it is, Kudos!
It shows our youth is not rusting their brain but also trying to find challenges for themselves. Good to see there are so many young eager minds doing mountain biking in the Hill Tracks and now adventuring with a group of Nepali mountain climbers to reach the peak that would be named Bangladesh-Nepal Friendship Summit. Oh, so sweet, I feel so good! My friends like hiking here in California but I’m too lazy to enjoy the nature in such laborious manner, but good to see Bangladeshis working together to win such challenges. Gives a sense of purpose and hope, doesn’t it? If we want we can do anything. Wait, did I say ‘working together’? Sorry about that, there’s nothing we can do as a unit. Even to say “hats off to you my friend” takes a lot of effort for us and we have shown our true colors-again.
Right after Musa’s news came out, he became every ones hero. Being an optimists I started thinking of accolades that I would write for this young achiever. Before I could be a little more romantic, my blogosphier friends shot the balloon down. All of a sudden I saw people writing articles, giving expert evidence and sharing the write-ups on the likes of leaked paper on the murder of Kennedy to prove that Musa’s Everest quest was a hoax. There’s media conspiracy, and then there’s fraud. Musa’s achievement was a project worth Five Hundred Thousand Taka, OMG!! We could’ve solved so many problems with that amount of money. Poor Mr Musa, I don’t know him personally but it’s not hard to imagine he was happy, he was on top of the world, so he must have been thinking of all the hard work he has done, all the support he got from others. What he didn’t realize was, when you are at the highest point of the world, it would be all downhill from then on. And didn’t we make it a snowball ride!
Honest to God, I really don’t care if he reached the top of Mount Everest or not. I don’t know his socio-economic background. May be he has the leverage to be a bit adventurous or may be he dreamed of doing something and he made it possible. Bengalis are not from a mountainous location and please Chittagong Hill Tracks really don’t count as mountainous region. Yet someone dreamed of climbing mountains, took the training, did all the hard work and went for his goal. He knew what his dream was, he did everything that was needed to achieve his goal, found all the required resources and went for it. Did he go all the way to the top? 8,000 meters or 7,000 meters is all the same to me. He walked his talk. And I say, “Hats off to you my friend.”
When I saw the news of Jordan Romero on television or next day on Yahoo, I didn’t see anyone asking the question if it’s possible for a 13-year-old to endure that kind of physical challenge. No one asked how much his sponsors paid for this little adventure in a time of recession. Everyone said, look at this kid; he is not legally allowed to drink, drive, vote or fight for his country but he reached the top of the world. Hats off to your efforts. I’m sure that those pointing fingers at Musa are just a few who haven’t done anything worth noting in life, but even if the number is four or five, isn’t it sad? We are wasting all this time trashing someone, and tying to find some sense of achievement out of it.
Musa is just one example. I can give you another one. After Shakib Al Hasan started playing county cricket, someone wrote the entire history of Worcestershire in friend’s status; not to highlight the team Shakib was playing for but to prove that the team was from Second Division and therefore really didn’t count as an achievement. Huh, second division cricket in England!! Sure they just got promoted to first division and the entire British media said Shakib was one of the catalysts! I mean anyone could’ve done that right!! I don’t blame that poor fellow. You can’t condemn someone for an illness, can you?
Another one for you: boy, am I on a hypocritical bus ride or what! A while ago we had something that actually presented a positive picture of Bangladesh. That’s Dr. Yunus. I don’t want to look at what the interest rates of his microcredit loans are or how many of those loans were defaulted. I’m happy to see him on Simpsons on October 3rd! And I’m damn proud of it. He gave a new idea to the world that everyone else embraced and we are busy publishing books on the loan sharks that Grameen Bank has created. Before you point at his wrong doings, why don’t you start a project, where you will monitor the ones who might default their loan and help them to overcome it. Or let’s say, monitor cases where the interest rate is unfair and help the poor negotiate their loan payments. Oh no, we won’t do that! Who has the time to get up and do all that, it’s so much easy to just make a comment and feel satisfied.
Unfortunately, we like to take the later option too often. I don’t know if we just became super pessimist for a reason or is it a cultural or genetic issue. Why do we have to be so negative about everything? People say ‘oh we are so corrupt, we are always looking out for our self interest.’ I don’t think we do all that because we are greedy. I believe greed, in it’s purest form, is actually a good thing. It drives people and a society to become aggressive and achievement oriented. Western capitalism has really cute words for it: ”Optimism” and “confidence”.
I think we like to add our two cents to everything, because as soon as we see someone else’s success we become jealous. This jealousy comes from a subconscious section of our mind. I’m sure I’m also a victim of it, but I do believe this is becoming a disease. The guy who’s making a fortune on the black market is making me jealous, so I start doing the same. The guy next door just bought a car, I have to assume he hasn’t earned it with his hard work, “Hell No!”. I believe that, because as soon as I saw the car, the shine of that windshield just burned my inner skin like a vampire under the sun. We have become pessimist out of our jealousy, and I have started to believe it. Those who are pessimist out of frustration are the victim of not having any success to show for. “Nothing will happen” “Bhallageyna” type words are used at one age just as a fashion statement but soon it becomes a part of their core believe when they see all this negativity. Even when you open a newspaper, success stories are a Friday Feature, how sad and sarcastic can that be.
Why don’t we start talking about our successes a little more. Why don’t we do something in our classrooms so that our next generation would learn to give credit to people who deserve it. Instead of looking at each other as competitors to score a little bit higher in a math test, we’ll teach them how to work together, or something like that. I’m sure there are enough bright minds out there to find ways of changing this attitude. For starters, stop putting question marks on others achievements.
Musa (?), Shakib (?), Dr. Yunus (?), should I dare add Bangabandhu to this list. Show me one person whose success has been embraced by everyone; without putting a question mark beside it. We don’t have much, but whatever little we do have, we must show them as role models or examples of success to our next generation? Forget about them, they might be drowning in 50 years anyways, what about us? Who’s our source of inspiration? Why won’t an entire generation feel disoriented and frustrated if they have no one to look at? Why won’t they just leave the stage for dogs and savages, when that’s the only unanimous story of success in front of them? When someone climbing to the top of a mountain becomes such an opinionated question mark, what else did you think the result would be?
Tale of two cities: Gotham and Dhaka
September 15th, 2010
Insanity shines...
I really feel kind of weird calling up my family back home, especially my parents. When I phone them I know they also feel the same weirdness. My mother told me a couple of days ago: “What else can I talk about son. I’m tired of complaining about the same things over and over again. Why don’t you tell me how you are doing over there?” I have no answer to this question. Seriously, I don’t. What do I tell her? That I do have one solution, close your eyes and do what I did, leave the country and become a great patriot blogger!!
Then I ask myself, how is Dhaka now? Let’s start with the population. Some say it’s over 10 million. 10 million!!! That means by population size we should be the 80th largest country in the world. Hmmm let’s see what we can do with that. Well, we can all board on a ship and literally march into any of the countries like Singapore, UAE, Qatar and Oman. Think about it!! How many bullets do you think they have? They have to have enough hands to pull the trigger. With the size of our population we can walk into Vatican and turn it into a Madrassa!! Easily!!
I don’t understand how we can have shortage of power. Just give everyone a battery that they can carry on their back and let them walk on the streets. Just from the pushing and shoving, hustling and bustling we’ll make enough static electricity to run at least a light and a fan for most parts of the town. Unless you have to give some of the power to ‘enlighten’ the palaces of the Maharajas and Pother Rajas, that should take care of the electricity problem.
Then Eid came and I got depressed, and forgot about Dhaka, until mother earth shook us to remind what we are doing to her. Right after the two earthquakes, I started asking the same questions again and found a fascinating answer. You know what; Dhaka is the mirror image of Gotham city!!
Dhaka is not much different than Gotham these days. We didn’t need breakout fugitives from Arkham Asylum. We have our own home grown breed that’s spreading like clockwork. Did anyone think moms would turn into baby killers for ‘blind love’, but it’s happening! How many of you thought you could see celebrities uncensored all over internet and yet spread the footage and talk about it as if you just saw the highlights of Mohammadan beat Manchester United, but it happened before and now it’s spreading at lightning speed!! The way Dhaka is going, with all the Chinese restaurants that turned into coaching centers and the coaching centers that turned into diagnostic center, that day is not far when half of them will HAVE to be turned into mental hospitals or depression clinics. All the traders of certificates will change the billboards from “MBA in 1 year” to “Masters in Psychology in 1 year”.
The only difference between the two cities is that our Batman and Joker change costumes every five years. At least that’s been the trend for the last two decades. Sometimes like “Gotham’s finest”, our men in uniform try to take the situation in their own hands but soon silently they let the “red phone” rescue them from all problems. In Gotham, there’s only one Red Phone — in the commissioner’s office. I believe in Dhaka there are several “Red Phones”, like the invincible phone at the invincible “Bhaban”. In Gotham city, Gotham Times decides when to demonize Batman and when to make him a hero. I think a couple of our leading dailies fit that description pretty well!!
Our Bruce Waynes don’t wear a black cape to change the city. They either wear a black coat or a black suit, even if it’s 100 degree outside. Our villains also have many names. Instead of Joker, Penguin and Riddler we have our very own Tokai Mizan, Kala Jahangir, Pichchi Hannan and Jamai Mizan. I really have to give these people credit for their creativity.
Yet, unlike Gotham I am more worried about the others from Dhaka Asylum. The ones who are becoming Jokers and Riddlers by being confined to the city cell 24/7. I am worried about who’s there to hear them out, listen to what’s going in their minds and how it’s getting twisted every second from the compression of this “Junk Jungle”. What is the solution of this problem? In a society where a psychologist’s office is “Pagol er doctor”, is there any way to make sure they get professional help if needed? Besides coffee shops and shopping centers, where are they going to let their minds free? Television is a noise box, seriously, I don’t see anything but people talking in it, and most of it is noise. How do they let sanity prevail over the frustration of uncertainty?
Cutting people into pieces, killing children for affairs, eve-teasing and sexting are things I don’t want to incorporate in the same sentence with the city I grew up. On the other side of the spectrum there are so many who are becoming religious extremists. I don’t remember my friends who used to pray five times being so aggressive. It’s not the theological devotion I’m worried about, it’s the aggression. You can’t have an argument or discussion with them before they explode. Why so much anger, what’s the source and what’s the solution? These are all signs of a changing time. I can guarantee you that time is not of advancement. It’s of a time when unlike Gotham, Dhaka is slowly losing her sanity. The nerve gas of over population, lack of recreation, lack of policy in youth development and an ailing school system is making sure the town will become a “Mad Factory” of Joker.
We are all worried about the destruction that’s upon us if an earthquake shakes us. Who’s going to shake us awake and smell this coffee?
Image crisis: What do we see
August 30th, 2010
I was going through an album of a friend. That friend recently went to Bangladesh and took pictures of Daily Life in Dhaka. When I started going through the album I started feeling a bit uncomfortable. The album had pictures of trash pilling up as if a bottle of champaign is pooping with all it’s aristocracy, a guy picking his nose-as if his birth right of a clean nose and the obstacles is in clash, traffic, pollution etc etc. At one point, my uneasiness became annoyance and I was getting in to my typical mode of writing a comment about it. Just when I was ready to crack the knuckles of my fingers and start writing I clicked ‘next,’ and my annoyance turned into joy. I saw a picture of a hero, a hero who reminded me that Bangladesh is all about these heroes. Unheard of, brushed off by society, yet their heroism is what makes Bangladesh. A boy, probably 10 years old, selling newspaper on the street. A boy, who is cheated by the system, with no future as we “bhodro loks” know, is the messenger of knowledge. He could’ve been anything-from a beggar to an intern thug, yet he chose to fight for his fate. Smoke, fume, dust, spit, swearing might have filled his ailing lungs into charcoal but the determination of his tiny fist, his screaming presence in the chaos of this ‘Jungle of Junks’, still gives me hope. As long as heroes like him are on the streets, cowards like me can effort to be a little romantic on a blog page!
I don’t blame my friend for taking the pictures of trash or nose picking or anything like that. Bangladesh is a country of serious image crisis. If the conscience of Bangladesh “Prothom-Alo” one of these days, asked it’s readers what they think of Bangladesh, I’m sure more than half of us would say something negative about it. This mass national negativity has made us skeptics, pessimists, polarized, opinionated. As a nation, we do have some shortcomings. But that shortcoming is not in the economic or political failure, it’s far more basic and crucial than that, it’s our attitude. We have opinion about anything and everything (which is shown by me here!) and because of our image crisis most of those are from a sense of rejection. Think about it. When you go out on the street everyday- how many thoughts of hope and positivity comes in your mind? If I ask what’s the situation of the country, I always hear a list of “No”s. No water, no gas, no this, no that. I feel sorry that we have so many problems, well what about the solutions? Interestingly most of us are willing to talk about problems waiting for someone else to provide the solution. And when someone does come up with an idea, the first comments will be to show the shortcomings of it. Traffic is a huge problem of Dhaka City. Now today, if I propose of a mass public transport system let’s see what do you all think.
My proposal is, Government should ask small bus owners to form a corporation with all their buses. So if five owners have ten buses each on the same route they’ll merge them all together. So instead of competing to go to the bus stop to pickup people on a tiny narrow road at the same time, buses will follow one after the other every fifteen minutes. Won’t matter which bus goes first, because it’s a corporation- the buses will earn from the cash pool. The result, you just freed the streets from four extra bus. I’m sure that’ll take a bit of pressure off the streets!
After reading this what are the thoughts that’s coming in your mind? How many of you are rejecting this simple idea right away? Now you know where the real problem lies. We are so negative in our national image that the first idea that comes is “i know this won’t work”. For that, if a government comes and gives a solution it seldom gets the light of success. The bureaucrats know, as soon the government will change the project will change. People see it the same way so they don’t care if it would have worked or not. The sense of rejection allows the system to play ping pong with our fates.
If you ask “see how far Bangladesh has come!” The first analogy is “how far we could’ve been”. This negativity must go!
We are a resilient nation. One thing that always make me wonder is the faces I saw on TV and newspaper after a few days of a natural disaster. I can guarantee you, very few country could turn around the way our people do with a smile after every flood and cyclone. That comes from our natural ability of resentment and determination. We must use this as an asset. Our workers work in such harsh conditions all round the world, without any government support, without any support from the so-called intellectual class for better work environment-yet they are the backbone of our currency reserve. When some tell me, “Oh! we don’t have heroes to look upto”. My answer is look around you. There are heroes all over. When columns of teenage girls walk under the cover of darkness at dawn, remember they silently created a revolution in the country. That revolution has challenged the status of women of a vulnerable class. A man with a tool and couple of cell phones and banner of “Mobile to mobile 2TK.” has silently shown the world the power of small investment. Small!! they have shown how to make a living out of nothing!! So next time when you complain about the “weird” smell inside the plane coming from middle east or have a good laugh on a mis spelled signboard of a phone fax center and spread all over facebook, just remember- you are laughing at your heroes.
Take small steps to win the battle, George Washington said. We need to take a small step to change our mindset about our country too. May be then we can go forward. One step at a time
Ground Zero: Debate within ourselves
August 24th, 2010“Brothers, please don’t take part in Thanksgiving. What is thanksgiving to us? We must protect our children from practice of other religions. Only then can we save ourselves from hell fire!!” Everyone nodded their head around me. This happened in Fresno, the city that is very much a heaven for white conservatives in California. The person was the Imam of the mosque, that is right across the street from our university. And that was the last day I stepped in a mosque. I was never a religious person, but I did enjoy commonality of culture. I lived all by myself in an isolated community. To me, going somewhere once a week and sharing a “Hi, how are you” gesture with a smile was more holy than anything. When I saw many around me were educated professional and school going kids and none pointed out, “Excuse me Sir, I think you don’t know what Thanksgiving is”, I knew this is not the place for me. I later heard they changed their stand on it and had organized a small ‘get together’, but to me this was just to save their skin. Their thought of the mainstream American community was pretty evident to me. I shared this story with someone in a conversation; he smiled and said,” I wish I could tell you, that was an isolated incident. But you know, not everyone is like that.” I knew mine wasn’t an isolated incident and I also knew not everyone in the Islamic leadership in USA is like that. Unfortunately I haven’t met anyone with a liberal mind frame. Until now.
The whole controversy about the Ground Zero Mosque is pretty interesting to me. This story has many angles and I think people are just picking the side that suits them. Those who don’t know what’s going on here’s a summery- in lower Manhattan area just two blocks away from the location of the Twin Tower an Imam named Feisal Abdul Rauf, wanted to build a thirteen storied Islamic Cultural Center. Many saw it as a right to practice religion and many looked at it as an insult to injury. The poor Imam is clueless and I believe is really helpless at this point. The mayor of New York came out passionately in favor of the Islamic center, so did the idealist centrists and the left. But the right wing found it as a reason to ignite their base by saying, a 13 storied building so close to Ground Zero is a “triumph for the terrorists.” Even the president came in favor of the mosque as an idealist himself, but then did a bit of a topsi-terby juggling about the “judgement of the location”.
Well let’s look at the main character of this story. The Imam, Feisal Abdul Rauf is a Columbia graduate in physics, who’s father was a senior Egyptian cleric. This person is now the symbol of Islamic faith in US. He’s portrayed as a “radical” cleric by the right wing media. But just a few months back the scenario was the opposite. The Imam was known as an agent of America in his Middle East speech programs, some of the programs where funded by the State Department. The poor guy was blamed to be a Western sympathizer for constantly denouncing the extremist ideologies of Middle East, in plain word the terrorist activities. His second and current Persian wife Daisy Khan left Iran for the extreme views of the Islamic Government. He was the kind of Islamic leader the right wing fantasized all the time. A man who believes in co-existence of religions, who believe interfaith dialog is the key to gain permanent solution for all conflicts. He points out that, Shariah Law in principle is sometimes implemented by Westerners more frequently then in the Middle East. His visit to the far east Asian Muslim countries especially Malaysia, gave him understanding of ethnic harmony over religion. A Sufi by practice, he wasn’t very much welcomed by the Wahabi practitioners. I guess, he would’ve never thought the he’ll be the shield that same Muslims will use and the right wing will use him as a placard of extremism. Poor soul! What he forgot is religion is not all spiritual, it’s also good business. But that discussion for another day.
Why such a controversy over an Islamic Center? Did the so-called free Willy practitioners of Islam in US ever ask themselves? Now they are taking shelter behind the liberal left but, how many of these mosques actually work into incorporating the Muslim community to the mainstream culture? Time is a very crucial factor and we had been ignoring it in this debate. In a pre 9/11 world this wouldn’t have been an issue. In a booming economy with more than 5000 alive teenage soldiers, most would’ve been pointing out how lower Manhattan used to be known as Little Syria. But we live in a world where ideological lines are drawn in the name of religion once again. On the main street, in a recessionary time, people will take their frustration out on anything and everything. This is natural. To middle America, which is still the majority of the country- there’s no difference between a Shia, Sunni, Ahmedia, Sufi. They know one thing- these are all Muslims who attacked with planes on 9/11 almost ten years ago. Who tried to do the same again in Time Square few months back, who attacked on a military base inside the US, who keep their prayer halls away from everyone else. What happens in a mosque is known to most by movies and documentaries just like the rest of the world thinks US is what they see in Hollywood movies.
In a time when 1 out of 5 think the President is a Muslim and he has to come and defend that he’s a practicing Christian, instead of asking the question,” wait a minute,what is wrong in being a Muslims?”;the Muslim community also should trade their trade a bit carefully. Majority of Muslims in US would tell you that they don’t care what happens in Palestine or Iraq, they are working hard to have a better life for their families but it does effect our lives, doesn’t it? It’s also our duty to realize the circumstances and work accordingly. Obviously, there’s no problem in practicing religion. But you also have to make sure that the main stream understands what you are practicing. Instead of convincing yourself of others faults, it’s also time we look at our owns once in a while. A religious minority specially Muslim community is very tricky to identify in USA. We have African American Muslims here who have a history since the slavery. Muslims from Ottoman empire came here at the beginning of 1900s. Asian Muslims started to migrate for last 60-70 years. They all have only one part of their culture in common- their religious background. It’s very important mainstream Americans also understand the fact that 8 million Muslims in US are not all from one part of the world.
I’m a firm believe that nationalism triumphs over anything. It’s true for Bangladesh, and it’s true for United States or France or England. When I think of a French, I don’t see someone in full Burkha, sorry to say. I know neither does a French. When I imagine schools in Bangladesh, I don’t think of classroom where I can identify someone by their religious attire. Same goes for most Americans. When they see someone from another part of the world, who speaks an alien language in their neighborhood, they also want to find the common grounds, to reason in their mind on why and how can they welcome this person. Remember we came to this country, so when in Rome, you must act a little bit like the Romans. How you take part in the mainstream community makes a huge difference.
I think this is where the Muslims in the West failed and the rise of extremist ideology didn’t help either. It’s easy to identify a practicing religious person, let it be a Christian, Jew or Muslim. It’s another thing to be isolated for that; and a totally different issue to be self-isolated. It’s important that ethnic minority communities don’t become a self isolated community in a multicultural country. But for many Americans, that’s how they perceive many minority community people. If all of a sudden they think the same for a religious minority i.e. Muslims, it’s also a question we need to ask ourselves, why and how can we change that.
The rise of right wing Christian ideologies in main stream politics, all over the West, needs to be analyzed with a different approach. I don’t believe all of them are anti-Islamics. If that was the case, then why did they tolerate Muslims in their countries for so long? We also need to see, where did we fail. Again, even though I don’t like to incorporate myself with a religious community, I still say we-because as I have said many times before, your name carries more power then a lifetime of work. Problem is, we are in a state of denial. We are ready to blame everyone else and keep a blind eye on our failure. Our main question shouldn’t be who’s against us, but are we against everyone else who doesn’t sound like me? In the book “Clash of Civilizations” Sam Huntington said religious identity would be the source of conflict in a post Cold War era. I think even he didn’t realize, the conflict would be also in an intra-religion basis. Shia-Sunnie, Kadiani, Ahmedia, Sufies, Wahabies.
Islamopho
Is this crowd for you? It's also your duty to find the answer.
bia is spreading in different forms in different countries. It’s real in one form in the West and in another form in Bangladesh, Algeria, Pakistan and Indonesia. The West needs to understand that by generalizing all Muslims they are isolating a huge number of liberals, who are more inclined to their ethnic identity then religious. If this quarantined trend continues some of them will naturally look for refuge in the extremist camp. But I think, the mainstream Western media and communities have been more accommodating then the other way round. It’s time also Muslims look at themselves and separate the extremist fractions out of their lives. I think then Mr. Rauf can have a world that looks a bit like Cordoba (Do your own research what the name means!)
Huzur Factor: Some Thoughts
August 13th, 2010So here we go again. I didn’t want to write on this topic, because I know, no matter what I say or how many people read this (I doubt if more than 5 people does!) nothing is going to change. I might be colored as a Neo-Islamic fundamentalist or to some just another typical “Bangali Muslim”. But I’m neither. Religion is not my cup of tea but like everyone else on this planet (including some animals!) I am also identified as a member of religious race. A name of a sect holds more power than a lifetimes work, and I’m realizing it everyday in an expatriates life. That discussion is for another day. Let’s talk about an issue that’s been bothering me for a while.
Ramadan started. My Facebook news feed was bombarded with Ramadan wishes. My wife told me people are asking for Surahs from Quran as ringtones in Bangladesh. Fast and feast is having their own hypocritical competition and festivity and fundamentalism is having a blast at this point, that I’m pretty much sure. All these are our so-called middle class “Bhodro loks” who are turning into part time spirituals. I said this to a friend and bluntly that friend told me, “It’s more of a cultural thing, you shouldn’t look at it in a bad way”. My point is exactly, this semi hypocritical religious fanaticism IS a cultural thing, and soon we will pay the price. Very soon, trust me.
Some days ago, I was reading a blog of a friend who wrote something about Madrasas. I gave it a little thought and tried to reason the arguments within myself. I didn’t go for statistics or opinions, only what I have seen and understood, so this is a personal opinion. I might have got the entire thing wrong. If I did, please correct my misconception.
In Bangladesh, I was stunned to find that there are around 64000 Madrassas in Bangladesh and that’s an estimate of 2002 as per Bangladesh Observer. Let’s say for the sake of argument in last 8 years there weren’t a single new Madrassa in Bangladesh. If there are around 50 students in these places that means 3,200,000 students in these places! Who are these students? These are not your or my cousins, nor our friends, nor children of our co-workers. They might be the children of our maid, relatives from village or our favorite, orphans. As soon as one of us realize that we have successfully become a “Shaheb”, we decide to do something for the “greater good” and also to have some blessings from all mighty. And what can be better than making a Madrassa in a village, where they have no school, and never will have one. “Gorib manush er chelepuley, at least bhalo manush hobey”. We feel an orgasmic satisfaction. So we build one, have a bed and breakfast for life system for these kids and leave them to a Kari Fazil expert. From dawn to dask they start reading only one book and their entire intellectual upbringing is on that Kari Fazil expert. Day passes and these kids become teenager and start realizing one truth. The “Shaheb” didn’t send his kids to study with him, they are somewhere preparing for SAT. They have a very well defined social status. “huzur” is the only job they were prepared for and “huzur” is the only thing they can be. In a country which likes to showoff it’s secular cultural side, brushes these kids to a borderline of the social circle. The only time they are welcomed in “Shaheb’s house” is for “Quran Khotom” if someone dies, or on the day of Kurbani. Trade of death is what they are needed for and trading death is what they learn. Now the day passes to years, and the “Huzurs” get out in the wilderness looking a mosque where they can become get a work. As the harsh truth of demand and supply, many of these Huzurs don’t get work even in Madrassas and mosques. Some of them making a living in attending Chillahs as I heard from a Madrassa graduate. Interesting life isn’t it? We have created specialists with no specific job. So what do you think they see when they look at us?
Let me tell you. They see they have nothing to offer to the rest of the world. We’ll never seat with them on the same table to have a conversation, frankly speaking there’s nothing to talk. They have no future, no past and no present. Some feel cheated, some blame their fate and some just feel a vacuum. And in comes our Robin Hoods, saviors of the religion. They feel that vacuum, give them a purpose and give them a platform. “Take what is rightfully ours” was the words of the crusaders and we hear “Amra hobo Taleban, Bangla hobey Afgan”. These are the children of Bangali Muslim Bhodrolok’s orgasmic satisfaction.
We can have education board to update and upgrade the Madrassa curriculum and we can have quotas in Government job for them. But do you really think the problem is in professional incorporation of Madrassa graduates? It’s the social class system we have created for Huzurs. We make them Harijangs when they are kids and we make them spiritual guides when they are old. The youth of these kids are filled with misguidance, mistrust and misuse by every part of the society.
Do you see someone from your family here?
So for all the devoted religious people, just think about it before you decide to build another Huzur Factory, is it really that important? Before you give your two cents to them, think what else can you do for them. I would love to see these bed and breakfast hate breweries turned into places where not only someone with white long beard is telling them what is right and wrong. Where someone like you and me are also going and teaching them about the life before the after life.
