Jeni as a Bangladeshi

Yes, I’m long overdue an update. Here’s a quick one - I’ll write more in the evening.

This is a note to say that I am safe. After hearing from some of you from back home, I’m surprised to see that news of the violence here has made it back so quickly. Here’s a quick recap of the situation from my end. Over the past few months there had been several riots and protests over the political situations here, but all of them were put under control quickly. All of a sudden, on Tuesday, there was an extremely violent riot at the downtown University here (extremely close by). I was told that student protests here are quite different from those in the States. Instead of symbolizing the exercise of public opinion, student demonstrations are almost always promoted/instigated/backed up by political influence from either side of the two opposing parties (and that’s all I’ll say about that here). Apparently the violence continued until yesterday evening, and led to several shootings. Most of us were largely unaware of the relative seriousness of it (since this wasn’t the first public protest) until early afternoon when the military declared an 8 PM curfew for the entire city. Office buildings were shut down early and we all go off work around 4.

It was extremely quiet at night - almost eerily so. I did hear a few loud whistles now and then, but beyond that I was more or less safe and oblivious in my room with my dal, naan, and old episodes of the Sopranos.

The concept of life and death is a bit different here. Maybe it’s because death is seen as a natural part of the cycle, or perhaps it happens so often here that the shock of individual deaths is absorbed by acceptance that it’s just one more death. But for me, this is still largely frightening. Once, we were driving on the highway and witnessed a traffic accident, where a taxi car was almost completely buried under a truck. To my complete bewilderment, traffic went on as normal, and those who stopped did so briefly before moving on. I was told that although ambulances and emergency rescue teams "exist", the chance that they would show up within 2 hours, or at all, is slim. That is if they could be reached in the first place.

Another time, a few of us were on a train to visit some nearby tea plantations.  Halfway on our journey, the train made a sudden stop, and we were temporarily stationed in the middle of nowhere amongst farms and rice fields. Curiously enough, no one bothered to get out of their seats or stray from their conversations. Likewise, we oblivious foreigners followed suit and continued with our card games. After more than an hour, we (ok, I) got a bit cranky, so a friend who knew some Bangla went to investigate. From what he understood, there was either something wrong with the train or we had hit something on the tracks, but the train’s sudden stop caused the operator to fall out of the car. The last hour was spent clearing the fatal accident and looking for someone else to operate the train. Just like that. I was sick to my stomach the entire rest of the ride. And what’s most disturbing to me is that I doubt either of these incidents made it in the local newspaper, which dedicates half its space to political news and the other to describing the ‘latest’ news on reducing calories in meals while advertising "American-flavored potato chips."

And on that note, I should now go get ready for work. The curfew will likely last for a few days, so I’ll use the extra time tonight to give some other, less morbid updates.