Translated from the Bengali by Mohammad Shafiqul Islam. Cover image: Demonstrators clashing with police outside state owned television (Photo – Reuters)
For quite a long time, a dense helix of smoke could be seen from the verandah. It was difficult to figure out its source from this distant residential area, but hues and cries of lots of people and booming sounds were floating in the air. He was inclined to watch war movies on Netflix. In his subconscious mind, he was imagining a scene from a film, but something happening on the street outside made him anxious. Once he thought he’d go down to frisk up on what was going on there.
His house was quite a ways from the main road—on a cul-de-sac. So, the boys from the precinct played cricket in the alley. But because of what had been going on around the city for the last few days, everyone seemed to have stuck within their homes. Opposite to his house, lived tannery trader Halim Sahib. He had lots of money. So what? Still in an anticipation of some extra income, he built two rooms underneath, rented one to a vendor.
The other room was a grocery shop, which was tolerable, but how come another rented to a vendor? However, he can decide anything he likes about his house—let him rent it to anyone he wishes. But the problem is that the vendor happily continued his trade, spreading all the old newspapers, broken plates and dishes, chairs and tables, and defective electronic materials on the alley. As vehicles didn’t commute much along the alley, he occupied almost the whole of it.
Although annoyed, Abidur Rahman didn’t want to talk about all this. What’s the use of inviting trouble with such a scumbag? He isn’t one to snub or frown on anyone , but he always likes to remain aloof from trouble. But for a few days the vendor’s store was closed. In the meantime, the grocery opened only once, and remained closed even now.
From the small verandah of his fourth-floor home, Abidur Rahman was watching this. As the stores were closed, the alley turned quiet. On the opposite side, there was another house—just beneath this on the entrance, there was a little space, where Idris, the security guard of the house, used to sit together with guards and caretakers of other buildings. Because of the critical situations, they weren’t loafing around there anymore. The quiet of the dawn seemed to have descended even on the scorching midday. At a little distance, people were shouting in a rally on the main road. Slogans in hundreds of people’s voices, as if the smell of ammunitions were raining down here in this quiet alley. The fire of anarchy would erupt if anyone even so slightly attempted a provocation. In these conflicts, no one could feel comfortable in the house. To go out, on the other hand, and see what was happening seemed dreadful too. Coming out of the classrooms, the university students joined the rallies—even the school and college students were on the streets, shouting slogans together. For a few days, Abidur Rahman himself was feeling excited, wishing to join them. During his student life, he had participated in rallies. Once, he marginally managed to survive the police shooting on the crowd, but that had been the military regime. Now he was physically weak—after retirement he felt ill most of the time.
For quite long, Abidur Rahman had been in the verandah. As it was a sunny day, the verandah itself was already scorched by heat, and it made him feel uncomfortable, so he went inside. Now he wanted to know where his son was. Now in the final semester, his son was studying Biotechnology at the university. The university was closed down immediately after they had started classes. In the last few semesters, he couldn’t do well, his CGPA was down, so he now honestly tried his best to study day and night and attend labs regularly. Day by day, the situation was turning more unstable. Although online classes had been scheduled, they were cancelled, because most of the students were taking to the streets. At the outset, Abidur Rahman was worried about his son, but then he felt unruffled, seeing him remain home. Then again reading newspapers every day and seeing singed, sweltered, and revolutionary faces of the young boys and girls on the television screen, he felt very sad. Indeed, he was annoyed with everything that came into his notice. Would they study or carry on the movement? Such a question kept coming into his mind. Sometimes he wondered if someone was spoiling them leading them from underground. Also, he felt a bit worried wondering why their points and claims weren’t addressed in a timely manner. The problem was that the internet had been slower since the day before; as a result, he couldn’t get the information as expected those days. He thought the boys and girls were firming up the movement utilizing Facebook and Instagram. For that reason, the internet connection was slowed down, although some other reasons were publicized.
His son kept the door of his room closed most of the time to avoid disturbance in his study. Now as soon as Abidur Rahman knocked on the door, he opened it. His hair was disheveled, eyes red, maybe because he had studied all night long and slept during the day. Nowadays the young boys and girls were accustomed to such a lifestyle, but Abidur Rahman didn’t like this at all—indeed, he had warned his son a number of times but to no effect. Now he listened to his father’s advice and then forgot. He led his life as he wished, so although annoyed, Abidur Rahman didn’t tell him anything anymore.
“Were you sleeping?” Abidur Rahman asked.
“No,” replied his son. “Do you need to tell me something?”
Abidur Rahman grasped that his son sneaked away from the response. He didn’t go out much after the university had closed. He had two tutoring sessions in the evening. Besides, he regularly fed the dogs in the adjacent area. Offering the dogs food at midnight, he returned home and went to bed. Abidur Rahman was yet to confirm if his son was part of the movement. He didn’t have many friends, so he was busy only studying and taking care of the street dogs.
Normally his wife would take care of the street dogs, but she had died of ovarian cancer about two years before. Then Abidur Rahman had been worried about the dogs. One day he saw his son in the kitchen, boiling rice, along with chicken feet and heads, in a big pot. Indeed, Abidur Rahman’s wife used to cook this food for the dogs, but now his son took the responsibility, for which he definitely felt happy.
But Abidur Rahman didn’t want his son to participate in the movement. What’s the outcome of this movement? He had indeed witnessed a lot. Only the families who lose one of their members lose everything, and the greedy devour the fruits. So, after the classes had stopped, fear about his son seized Abidur Rahman. After stern measures were taken to curb the movement, he feared that he would lose his son. After his wife’s death, Abidur Rahman had become very weak and disheartened, so he was anxious about his son.
His son was standing by the door. Since he was supposed to say something, he said, “I’ve come to see if you’ve gone out. The situation outside is very unusual.”
His son remained silent.
2.
Abidur Rahman was indeed unable to understand this generation. They always seemed to be rootless and extremely self-centered, sometimes they even seemed to severely lack commitment to their motherland. One day, his son let slip that he didn’t believe in any form of nationalism, and patriotism was quite relative to him. That kind of thinking, in his opinion, incites people to form a blind allegiance to their nation, as a result they don’t grow a sense of responsibility to any other nation but theirs. In the whole narrative, people become secondary and the nation primary. This extreme nationalism is to be considered responsible for warfare around the world.
Abidur Rahman was stunned that day hearing these words coming out of his son’s mouth. Indeed, he hadn’t matured that much.
Where did he learn to talk like this? His son didn’t talk so much with him, but he did with his mother. Yes, he saw his son busy on the laptop most of the time and frowned on it.
In the last few days, the situation had worsened. Internet service was completely shut down. They had also disconnected the dish service earlier. There were very few channels in operation, and the few functioning ones had no clear reception. They didn’t work even after several complaints, but yet they’d claim the four-hundred taka just after the completion of the month. After the dish service disconnection, he used to watch TV news online.
Now he went to a tenant’s house on the second floor to watch TV news. Sometimes he also called one or the other to know the updates about the country. This was almost a suffocating situation. Police shootings and rallies were going on simultaneously outside. Someone informed the police were also shooting from helicopters to stop the movement. Abidur Rahman noticed one or two helicopters hovering over his house, but this had happened earlier too, so he didn’t worry much.
The hawker supplying the newspaper hadn’t been coming for a few days. Under other circumstances, Abidur Rahman would have been angry, but today he felt concerned about the boy.
As noon just passed, they’ve got some bad news—the young boy from the next door hadn’t returned last night. His dead body was found at Jatrabari; the bullets had pierced into his chest. Hearing an uproar downstairs, Abidur Rahman went to the verandah and could see the dead boy’s parents running forward crying their hearts out. He knew him, he had been studying at a college nearby. They had come to the area as new tenants not long ago. While going for a walk in the afternoon, he had met him now and then. While returning from college, backpack on his shoulders, he looked him in the eye with a soft smile, offered him salam, and said, “How are you, Uncle?”
Abidur Rahman began to feel restless along with a bit pressure in the chest, so getting back to his room, he took the inhaler. He found his son’s room closed from outside; maybe he had gone out. Why had he gone out at this awful time? In his subconscious, Abidur Rahman felt worried.
But a new question began to create an embarrassment in his mind. During the martial law in the country, he had been a university student. Although he wasn’t directly involved in any party politics, he took part in almost all rallies against the martial law. Once or twice he also fell victim to police charges with batons. After the end of the martial law, Abidur Rahman had hoped for a free and fearless environment, but within a short span of time, the dream began to fade away. As a result no movement appealed to him anymore. But he couldn’t remain silent about what was happening now. How could a movement to wrest an apparently innocent demand suddenly turn so violent? And why was the government in such a frenzy to put it down?
Anwar, the caretaker, came up from downstairs. He knew he didn’t have TV in his house. He was indeed panting. Then he said, “The government has declared curfew from 6 pm. The students are on the street. I’ve heard no one will follow the curfew.”
“Who said all this to you?” asked Abidur Rahman.
“I’ve heard on TV; besides, people are also saying so. Where’s the brother?”
Here, Anwar meant Abidur Rahman’s son.
“He isn’t home,” Abidur Rahman replied in a worried voice.
“What are you saying, Sir? I saw him going out at noon. Hasn’t he come back yet?
He sometimes goes downstairs to buy chips or sprite, but it was already afternoon. Now he was supposed to return home.
3.
Abidur Rahman himself went out, although Anwar forbade him. He wasn’t feeling well staying home, as his son wasn’t picking up the mobile phone. But it was also his bad habit—not picking up phone. He also went short of medicine for high pressure. He had to take two types of medicine for pressure every night. For the last few months, he had placed an order for medicine online, but the internet was disconnected. Once he thought of sending Anwar to the pharmacy to refill the prescription, but noticed he had thrown the container away.
Reaching the street, Abidur Rahman became flabbergasted. Hundreds of people were on the main road, a majority of them being young boys—girls too—carrying sticks in their hands and tying up flag bandanas on the forehead. Among them, there were also some ordinary lungi-wearing people. All the people were shouting out slogans together. A bit farther, a bluish van, was overturned and then set on fire. Heat from the flames was touching his body. Brick chips were scattered everywhere; even the road dividers were overturned. A young boy with a stick in hand passed him running, and said, “Uncle, please go back home.”
Abidur Rahman began to sweat. Suddenly something exploded nearby. For a moment, his ears were blocked, when he was standing by the footpath—maybe he fell down too. Somehow, he tried to get up, scuttling on the side of the footpath.
A few young boys—blood-smeared bodies—appeared out of the spiral of smoke. Abidur Rahman found his son among them. Behind them was an armored van.
His eyes turned to the sky—the clear blue sky with a smattering of white clouds. He was keeping his eyes only on the floating clouds. So many things were happening underneath, but the sky was quiet and candid.
The expected structure of the state that he had been cherishing so long was falling into pieces in front of his own eyes.
Author’s bio
Hamim Faruque, a poet and short story writer, was born in Dhaka, Bangladesh, in 1963. He completed his MA in English literature and development studies. He also studied at Leeds University in England. Hamim Faruque began his career as a journalist, but later worked in non-government development organizations. In the eighties, he regularly contributed poetry and short stories to the literature pages of dailies. After a long gap, he has started writing again recently. He has four collections of poetry to his credit.
Translator’s Bio
Mohammad Shafiqul Islam, poet, translator, and academic, is Professor in the Department of English at Shahjalal University of Science and Technology, Sylhet 3114, Bangladesh. Email: msislam-eng@sust.edu, Cellphone: +8801712282136. He is the author of two poetry collections, most recently Inner State, and the translator of, among others, The Glorious Afternoon, Humayun Ahmed: Selected Short Stories and Aphorisms of Humayun Azad. His work has appeared in Journal of Postcolonial Writing, Critical Survey, Massachusetts Review, Poem: International English Language Quarterly, Journal of World Literature, South Asian Review, English in Education, Scrutiny2, Psychological Perspectives, Journal of Poetry Therapy, English: Journal of the English Association, Modern Poetry in Translation, Five Points, Comparative Literature: East & West, Asia Pacific Translation and Intercultural Studies, Forum for World Literature Studies, Capitalism Nature Socialism, Dibur, Vittles, and elsewhere. His work has been anthologized in a number of books, including The Book of Dhaka: A City in Short Fiction, The Best Asian Poetry, Poems from SAARC Region, When the Mango Tree Blossomed, An Ekushey Anthology 1952-2022, Of the Nation Born, Meet Human Meat and Other Stories, and Monsoon Letters: Collection of Poems.
