Missing Bangladesh

When I lived in Bangladesh, I never felt I was cornered, because I was born as a member of the majority. As I came to my senses, I saw all brown people around me, who spoke the same language, wrote the same letters, and who behaved and thought almost the same way. So much blended I was with them that I did not even realise that we were all brown until I was in the US. I miss being the majority in Bangladesh. I miss the good food, I miss the friends and families I left behind, I also miss everything that I missed being in the US. Even though all my family members are US citizens now, in my head and heart, I am very much a Bangladeshi ---I feel like I am the product of Bhashani's self-less struggle, Bangabandhu's powerful Bajra Kantho, President Zia's constructive Khal Khonon, President Ershad's romantic poems, Begum Hasina and Khaleda's women's right and upliftment. I am a mixture of time and political events. I miss it all.

In the US, we speak English with an accent and my daughters can say a few words in Bengali with an accent. They don't understand Rabindranath, Sharat Chandra, Nazrul and Mujtaba Ali, and we do not understand many slang words that they use. The culture gap, language gap and the generation gap all are distancing themselves from us, yet we all feel we are very much the minority here and that unites us as a family despite all the gaps I have mentioned. Being a minority has its rewards as well. You become more competitive to overcome the power of majority, you become more distinguished by working harder and smarter. Yet it is a pain to be minorities. You can live abroad for thirty plus years, but you may always face the question from a six-year old majority," Where are you from?" This often makes you feel a stranger in a strange land.

One important note, despite all the differences our political leaders have, at the end of the day, they know they are all Bangladeshis. That's really important.