All about Friendship

Tomorrow is friendship day. A day to make the bond stronger with your friends, to rememeber old friends and to make new friends. But is friendship sounds so simple? You may have many friends, but just think how many of them are real friends. Good friends are hard to find. Here are some points I try to follow to be a genuine friend.

1. Try to understand what your friend expect from you.
2. Don't let your friend ask you for help. Help him before he asks for it.
3. Make jokes with your friend. But never do those to hurt him.
4. Stay beside your friend in his danger and depression. You don't need to say anything. Its enough to make him feel that you are beside him.
5. Don't behave in a way which you don't expect from your friend.

So sticky rules!! Actually good friendship comes naturally. Just keeping those in a corner of your mind may help a little. So enjoy the day with your friends and have nice friends.

Women's room

Boys, men, guys whatever you say don't have to worry much about using toilet outside. There are planty of choice for them. For many folks it's just a matter of standing beside the road and oppening the zipper. Gentlemen have to seek for a while for a suitable place, where there is a toilet to pee. There are also public toilets in busy places of important cities. sorily here public means only men!

Girl, lady and woman whoever she is needs a proper toilet, as it is not possible by just opening the zipper for them. There are not many ladies' room found outside in Bangladesh. Students, Commuters and women working outside face problem finding women's room. Women also feel ashamed asking for a toilet. As a result they come home with unbearable pressure in bladder which is also harmfull physically. The situation becomes worse in journies.

There were an attempt taken to control trafic in some points of Dhaka by lady police. Unfortunately they were withdrawn within a month. Do you know the reason? There were no good facility of toilet for them.

Bhela: a traditional transport

The picture shows a tradional cheap and easily made mediam of transport. These are called Bhela in Bangladesh. They are made of Banmboo or Bannana stump. During my journey I found many people transporting by such bhela.

Flood: as I saw

Flood is not a unusual phenomenon in Bangladesh. As an inhabitant of Chittagong I have never experienced huge monsoon or flash flood. This year I have got nice opportunity to see the sufferings during my long journey.

We all know the news of 41 districts going under flood water. But experiencing the situation by your own eye is much different. I am stunned to see the vast area effected by flood. On my way I saw only water and sufferings on both side of the road. People took shelter on embankment of road and railway. Its very pittyful to see goats, cows and human beings living together under the same shelter.

On the way I found roads and railway roads under threat of water. Increase of water by a feet or two may cause collapse in communication system. City of Dhaka is also experiencing flood. Many places is already flooded and others are under threat.

Flooded Dhaka street

There was enthusiastic activity of cathcing fish everywhere staying even in danger. Fish firm owners placed high nets around the ponds to keep their fish within the area. In spite of this there was no shortage of fish for the hunters.


Catching fish in flood water

From the road

Yesterday I came back from home after a very short trip. Till yesterday night I spent 27hr on bus and trains out of 50hr. I went to Chittagong on 22nd to attend my only brother's "Aakd"(religious formality of marriage, not the formail and social ceremony). I gathered many experience during theis turbulent tour. I like to share some of those to you -

Fire on the bus-
There was fire on the bus. It was actually cigerattes of the passengers and nothing to worry about the fire. But there was so much bothering caused by the smoke created from it. Some nuisance smoked now and then not caring much about the disturb of other passengers. They made me suffer during the whole journey.

A long and unsafe trip-
My journey to Chittagong from Rajshahi is one of the longest direct journey of Bangladesh. It is a route of more than 500km connecting two cities through Dhaka. The problem, only one driver drives the whole 12 hour long journey. Normally he drives fine, but at the end he drives fast and rough. It seems he is trying to get rid of the driving seat. Actually its hard to sit in a seat for 12hr. Just imagine if he person drives a huge bus what will happen? This is how the bus is giving survice everyday in high risk.

Sleeping in full stretch-
After the last night's long journey there was not so enthusiasm for another night journey to come back. But I was short of time and had to make first ever night train journey to Dhaka. The first class berths seem interesting to me. Much specious place to sleep in compact train! I was releived to have a sleep in full stretch with so tired body.

Highway resturents-
Probably we all take food from highway restaurents knowing about the bad quality and high price of the food. The highway restaurents face very few regular customers. So they don't care to keep their goodwill up and hope to get new customers everytime. For this they care about quality of food very little. They also claim much higher price then regular. I don't know if there is any rules and regularions about fixing the price and quality. But there is deffinitely no implimentation of anything like it.

Perfectionist parents

Rifat,
Hope you are doing well, I got your e-mail long time ago,but didn't reply.
I do not understand your grading of GPA and CGPA. That's I know all about you have to acheive 90 to 95 marks out of 100, otherwise it's very difficult to get in the university with a good subject or major. Don't take otherwise, try your best I hope you will make it.

Your uncle
Toronto

My uncle sent this email to me on reply to my email informing my semester final result. No doubt he wrote this mail with much care for me. But does he know what he is realy expecting from me?

As I observed since my childhood, parents always want their child as a perfect one. On the first choice they want the boy/girl to be first in the class. Mind it. They want the kid to get higest marks, it doesn't matter what he is learning.

Parents want the child to be in the school cricket team but they don't let him to go to the play ground at evening. When a debate program is shown in the TV they say, "Why you don't join the debate team of the school?" The scene is also same for music, dance etc. Thats not all. They have many more sweet wishes and dreams about us. Its realy absert to expect a boy to stand first in the exam and to be in the school cricket team. Though there are few real talents who can make this possible, they are nothing but exception.

In context of Bangladesh we can't do whatever we like. We are bounded by age old education system, which impose us to memorize, not to understand. We don't have space to play, let alone play gournds. We don't have permission to go outside of our house, which is nothing but sum of few square ft. Thats how we live and our parents wish to see us in perfection. Is it possible to be perfect or make dream of our parents true, being bound by so many dificiencies?

Allah won't ask....

1. Allah won't ask the square footage of your house,
but will ask how many people you welcomed into your home.

2. Allah won't ask how many friends you had,
but will ask how you many people to whom you were a true friend.

3. Allah won't ask what you did to protect your rights,
but will ask what you did to protect the rights of others.

4. Allah won't ask what you did to help yourself,
but will ask what you did to help others.

5. Allah won't ask what your job title was,
but will ask if you performed your job to the best of your ability.

6. Allah won't ask how many promotions you received,
but will ask how you promoted others.

7. Allah won't ask what your highest salary was,
but will ask if you compromised your character or morals to obtain that salary.

8. Allah won't ask about the fancy clothes you had in your closet,
but will ask how many of those clothes helped the needy.

9. Allah won't ask in what neighborhood you lived,
but will ask how you treated your neighbors.

10. Allah won't ask about the color of your skin,
but will ask about the content of your character.
 

My blogging life

Its been more than 4 months since I am writing blogs. At first it was so exciting to see my writings on net. Still it is no less enjoying for me. But I am managing to continue in a tough way. As I live in dormitory I don't have internet access on my computer. My varsity's free internet remain out of order now and then. So I have to go to the nearest cyber cafe (2 km away) to write a blog. I don't have a pen drive and my floppy drive is not responding properly. So I can't write a blog on my computer and publish it by just copy-paste. For the same reason I can't copy others blogs to my computer to read later and its not possible to stay on net for long time. In spite of these problems I am going on blogging. My blogging would be much enjoyable if I can manage following three facilities -

Pen Drive: I am dieing for a pen drive. I'll try to buy one in a month. It would be much comfortable then to write and read blogs.

Digital camera: Now I used to give up many ideas of writing blogs only for the lack of pictures. There are many things and incidents going around us always. But writing about those without a picture won't be up to the mark. I dream of my blog enriched with pictures of my surrounding and my country. I have a chance of getting it when my brother-in-law will go to London after a month or two.

24hr Internet access: The chance of getting internet on my computer is not so strong. But our varsity may give us a chance with some payment. How nice it would be reading blogs with a cup of coffee (self made) sitting in my own chair (relaxed).

Flood: as usual

In the western world people don't know much about Bangladesh. Who knows a little know only that Bangladesh is a country of Flood, cyclones and proverty. Its again the time for flood has come. Flood has been effecting more areas rapidly. Its getting worse. The map shows how many areas are effected so far.

The most influential person in history

"100 most influential person in history" a very famous book written by "Michel H Hart" has ranked Mohammed(sm) as the first. Its interesting that a Christian writer has ranked Mohammed first and Jesus third. (see the list) But the author has explained the matter in a nice way. Read the article. Here are some important parts of the article -

Of humble origins, Muhammad founded and promulgated one of the world's great religions, and became an immensely effective political leader. Today, thirteen centuries after his death, his influence is still powerful and pervasive. The majority of the persons in this book had the advantage of being born and raised in centers of civilization, highly cultured or politically pivotal nations. Muhammad, however, was born in the year 570, in the city of Mecca, in southern Arabia, at that time a backward area of the world, far from the centers of trade, art, and learning. Orphaned at age six, he was reared in modest surroundings. Islamic tradition tells us that he was illiterate.

Since there are roughly twice as many Christians as Moslems in the world, it may initially seem strange that Muhammad has been ranked higher than Jesus. There are two principal reasons for that decision. First, Muhammad played a far more important role in the development of Islam than Jesus did in the development of Christianity.

In fact, as the driving force behind the Arab conquests, he may well rank as the most influential political leader of all time.

From Iraq to Morocco, there extends a whole chain of Arab nations united not merely by their faith in Islam, but also by their Arabic language, history, and culture. The centrality of the Koran in the Moslem religion and the fact that it is written in Arabic have probably prevented the Arab language from breaking up into mutually unintelligible dialects, which might otherwise have occurred in the intervening thirteen centuries.

Islam and progressiveness

Do the modern Muslims follow or believes on all the principles of Islam? If you are a Muslim you may be thinking that- yes, we believe and try to follow all the codes. We pray Namaz quite often (if not regularly), we pass the day fasting during Ramadan, etc. No doubt we do. Think, is there anything left? Actually there is everything left. Islam is not a religion to make people pray seldom and to forget it on rest of the times. Islam is the complete code of life. Everything you need is said in Quran and Hadith. But most of the so called progressive persons try their best to keep Islam away from politics, economy and society. It is true that in Muslim countries many people misusing Islam and the laws of Islam for their own interest. But this never implies that the codes are faulty, ancient and unable to cope up with modern days. There may be faults on who implies the rules. We should try to cure them, none should dare to cure the rules of Islam. All we have to do is to keep our full belief on Islam and keep trying to follow as far as we can.

Life of a servant (child)

In Bangladesh thousands of children work as household worker. In city houses child working for household is very common. They are generally of the age 8 to 15. Lets know about their life.

What he does:
1. Brush the carpets, dust the furniture at early morning with sleepy eyes. Still everyone of the house is sleeping.
2. Wash the glasses and plates after and before every meal.
3. Make the table ready for Lunch, Dinner and if there is any other meal possible.
4. Guide the boy of the house to school twice a day. Its funny to see a bony boy wearing worn cloths with a heavy bag in shoulder and a fat boy wearing nice dress beside. He used to guide someone may be elder than him.
5. Go to bazaar(market) to buy the daily groceries, vegetables etc. He also have to go to the nearby shop to buy the necessaries. It may be a cigarette or a minipack shampoo.
6. Help making the lunch and dinner.
7. Play and give company to the child of the home, though he is not allowed to play with those toys. He also has to arrange the hap-hazard toys.
8. Do whatever ordered, whenever it is. This is the worst thing about a child's work. He always remain busy to response the calls and to do the tasks. He may be ordered to wash the whole house or to lift a bad heavier than him to the 5th floor.

What he eats: Rice, two times a day surely. There may be some vegetables and small piece of meat. For breakfirst he gets two/three pieces of bread and a cup of tea. At evening another cup to tea with two biscuits. Isn't it enough?

What he wears: He wears worn up cloths, most of which are abandoned by the family boy. A servant usually possess two sets of cloth, with a set extra, which he got on the last Eid. Set may sound luxurious here. But they are never like that.

Sleeping time: They used to wake up at 6 am. When its 12 at night, everyone of the house still watching TV. He has to sleep on the floor of the living room where the TV is. So he has no other way but to wait with sleepy eyes trying his best to keep those open.

Tortures: As a child doing mistakes is of no wonder. But almost none bear this. He used to hear the scold and shouting all the day. Shouting is bearable. But its hard to bear beating. Ya. There are lots of family used to beat the child worker for even little mistakes.

This is a very simple description of a child's life. There are many other facts too. In fact its hard to feel them being so away from them.

Ullah published a picture of overloaded train of Bangladesh. He turmed it enthusiastic and exciting

Sleepless nights

Most students of our varsity used to study till deep night. Me and my 3 room mates are a bit aggressive. We are not even sleeping at night for the last few days, because of our semester final that has started today. Don't be panic! We used to sleep all the day to recover this. We start study after 8 at night and we go to sleep after praying Fazar. Its not a continuous course of study either. There are gossip going now and then. I also like to play Table tennis when it is 4 am! Today it went worse. I haven't slept at all even in the morning. I went to sit for the 3 hour long exam without sleeping for a minute. Ya I suffered for it. My fingers were chilling a bit. There was tiredness all over the body.