My most memorable day on my trip to Bangladesh this year was the day I stepped out of my sheltered “foreigner” life in the rich, embassy-laden north Dhaka district of Gulshan and took a journey into the middle-class life of a Bengali student. She’s also my colleague, a screenwriter and translator at BCM. But that day, she was a window into another world.
The day started when I drove (”was driven,” to be more precise) to meet Shyama at the bus stop. We crossed the highway (yes, I mean we literally played a game of frogger across a highway-like intersection with no traffic lights or crosswalks) and waited for several minutes for the old school double-decker London-style bus to come pick us up. This bus is only for students, so Shyama made me promise to identify myself as her “research assistant” if we were questioned by anyone. But as it turned out, they didn’t care. When the bus came, we just jumped on board and entered the fray of students.
“If we get a seat on the bus,” Shyama had told me, “the other girls will give us their bags to hold. That’s just the way things are on the student bus. It’s awkward to hold your own bag when it’s so crowded.”
The student bus was unlike anything I had ever seen. It looked like a regular double-decker bus, but one that had been through a number of accidents, explosions, implosions and perhaps a couple of world wars. Inside it was cheerful, but tattered. Most of the cheeriness came from the bus riders, which were divided: women on the bottom floor, men on the top. Hence, I didn’t see any young men during the whole trip. Shyama and I eyed a few remaining empty seats at the back of the bus, facing the aisle, and sat down. As the bus glided through stops and starts, picking up more and more students, it became evident to me why this “divided bus” was so critical. Until you’ve been a woman in a country where you are surrounded by men who believe it is their god-given right to oggle, cat-call, stare and sometimes even grope the relatively few women they see in public, you won’t understand the collective relief and freedom and outright liberation of a divided bus.
Soon, young ladies in colorful shalwar kameez, some in headscarves, beautiful shawls and even a burqua or two, crowded onto the bus. Not only were all the seats filled, but the aisle was filled with women standing three rows deep, chatting to each other about homework, new clothes, their favorite songs and just about anything else you might imagine 20-something girls chatting about. Shyama’s friends asked her who I was, and why I was on the bus, as they dumped their purses and bags in her lap — just as she had predicted. Eventually, I felt a “plop” as my lap became another purse-holder. Before I knew it, a stack of Gucci, Chanel, cute bunny, brightly flowered and all-out girly bags were piled on top of my lap. A girl standing near me said to Shyama, “Your friend is really nice. She even holds our bags!” I replied “Don’t you know? That’s the rule on this bus!”
A mere hour and a half later, we reached the entrance to Dhaka University, a hive of excitement. Students lined the outdoor hallways, rushing to and from class. Shyama led me past the outdoor food stalls, school buildings and quads. A few rickshaws bounced down the narrow footpaths, tinkling their little bells and hoping that the sea of students would part for them. Inside the buildings were hallways that opened onto the courtyards, like the walkways outside a 4-story motel: no windows, just open air. The hallways were dim and dingy, with notice boards of student announcements spread across the outside-facing corridors, where there was more light. I imagined students from Stanford, Yale, Harvard — even my own humble institution, Azusa Pacific — being appalled at the lack of white-walled, trash-and-recycle-cans-laden, pristine ivory towers that are such a natural trick of academic pretension in the US. And yet, in spite of the darkness (punctuated I’m sure by the city’s frequent blackouts), the lack of janitorial staff or wall-scrubbers, this was truly an institution of higher learning: this is where the young, ambitious, idealistic leaders of tomorrow’s Bangladesh struggled and strove to come. This was a university full of more grateful, anxious, voracious learners than I’m sure most of the top universities in my country could aspire to.
We sat down on a sidewalk outside one of the buildings, after Shyama had showed me around a bit. “This is Dhaka University’s longest couch,” she said as we sat down on the sidewalk and enjoyed a quick student’s breakfast of tea and samosas and something like sour cream crepes. We left the glass dishes on the sidewalk, where the food stall staff would find them, rinse them and serve the next student with them.
Inside her department’s building, we walked down a hallway and through a curtain, into another magical room: an all-women study room. Shyama explained that the university had two rooms like this, which included a few bathrooms, a convenience store full of everything from snacks to pencils to tampons, a copy center (walled off and staffed by a few men) and a large room full of tables where the ladies could eat, study, or just sit. The room ran on the quiet hum of girls studying, whispering and waiting in line for the toilet. The copy machines, in their enclosed room, churned in the background.
Shyama introduced me to a non-university friend just before she went to class. He was to entertain me during the lecture. I thought I might go to the lecture, but then I realized that it would all be in Bangla, and probably not that interesting for me to listen to; so I went with her friend, whose name to me sounded like “Orchid,” so that’s what I’ll call him here, a gruff, smiling teddy bear with a beard and curly hair — and I’ll call him Orchid.
Orchid, who I learned was in the business of marketing and advertising, took me off campus to the poet’s cemetery next door, and the art college after that. The art college was full of students performing different disciplines, as you would expect: a group sitting next to a brick wall, sketching the flowers, grass and cracks of the wall; some students sculpting busts and statues; scattered painters capturing pastoral scenes of flowers, sunsets, gardens, trees. This too, was a world different from the bustling, busy Dhaka streets as well as the churning, active youth of the university. It was peaceful, quiet and forward-thinking. Philosophical even, maybe. In the philosophical mood, Orchid told me about his advertising job and complained of the corruption that’s so rampant in so many industries in Bangladesh (and in fact, this is the subject of the TV pilot I shot there).
“This is how a pitch meeting works,” he explained to me. “The client will call up different agencies and ask for a marketing strategy. The company will send a mid-level manager to have a meeting with me, at my agency, and I’ll deliver the pitch. Once I deliver the pitch, he’ll ask, ‘What’s in it for me?’ This means, what extra kick-back am I willing to give him in order to get the contract. He’ll make this request to every marketing agency he has a meeting with, and give the contract to the agency who promises him the highest bribe. And the only way for us to pay this bribe to get his business is to include the kickback in the bid we’ve already given to his company.”
Sad, but true: it doesn’t matter what marketing genius agencies come up with; if they can’t pay the bribe to the client, they’ll never get the job.
I filed this little piece of social commentary away in my head as we kept walking. We made our way to the public library, where I regarded the outdated 70s textbooks in the English section with suspicion. A fascinating place, this library. Soon Shyama called, finished with her class, and we reconvened for a cup of cha at The Campus Shadow (”The cheapest cha you’ll find at Dhaka University,” Shyama assured me knowledgeably) with several of her friends. I bought an English-language newspaper and caught up on Pakistan’s latest blunders, the Bengali election race and news of Mitt Romney’s victory in an East Coast primary.
After saying “goodbye” to Shyama’s friends for a full 20 minutes (a “goodbye” followed by more chatting, followed by another bid to depart, followed by more socializing, etc…), we were almost on our way off Campus for a look-see at the local market. We ran into a few more friends, one of whom told us his name was “Dude.” I asked, smuggly, “Have you ever seen The Big Lebowski,” expecting a blank stare. But he replied, “Yeah, that’s where I got my nickname!” We talked about movies for awhile, of which Dude had seen tons. In fact, the whole morning, as Shyama introduced me and said my name, Bengali students kept asking if I had seen the movie Amelie, because they all heard my name as “Amelie” instead of “Emily.”
Soon we continued on to a shopping market nearby to the university. Shyama showed me a shop she loved, where carvers made little statues of the Buddha, Shiva, Vishnu, classical statues, scenes of Dhaka and rickshaws. We were searching for desk lamps for our office, but only found a few awesome shops, like a t-shirt shop with a blue shirt featuring a glass of water that showed a half-full glass. The half with water read, “1/2 water” and the other half read “1/2 air.” Below the glass, it read, “Technically, the glass is always full.”
Eventually, we continued on to a place that Orchid insisted would have the best lamps: a 40-minute rickshaw ride from campus. The three of us piled onto a rickshaw, a three-wheeled bicycle meant for 2 passengers and one rickshaw wallah. The struggling wallah dutifully carried the three of us, with Shyama sitting on the top and Orchid and I on either side of the downward-sloping seat, for a good 25 minutes before he pulled over on a side street to stop for a break. Then we switched spots, and I sat on the top of the seat. It was brilliant! Best rickshaw ride I’ve ever head. In fact, I’ve since thought about riding on top of the seat rather than on the seat when I’m by myself. Why? Because the seat is slanted forward — downward. Even if I ride by myself, I always feel like I’m fighting to hold myself to the seat. But sitting on top of the seat-back is completely flat. It’s brilliant!
Once we reached the lamp store, we found an amazing collection of hand-made goods, including a desk lamp fashioned in the shape of a palm tree with several bouncing fronds atop the coconut punctured with holes, in which sat a tiny light bulb. Besides these amazing desk lamps, I picked up two mugs: one carved out of bamboo, the other made of a coconut shell (what a versatile material!). We asked for 2 additional palm tree lamps, which prompted the shopkeeper to call the local artist. He said he could make us two more in a few days.
After this shopping trip, we were miles away from the university and hungry. And on top of that, Orchid needed the internet for some emergency work task. So we ordered some take-out and headed to Orchid’s friend’s house. His friend turned out to be a completely western Bengali, complete with a fro, Latin r&b bumping from his computer speakers. He cautioned us that his grandmother had better not see our take-out, otherwise she would be very offended. (It’s not polite to visit someone’s house and not drink their tea or eat their biscuits; bringing in food from the outside is incredibly rude.) So we hid and ate in his room. We passed an hour with him, trading musical suggestions, looking at pictures of Facebook and talking about economics books. I recommended he start listening to kcrw.com. Finally, his mother poked her head into the room and said hi. The whole situation was extremely awkward, unusual and a little salacious in the Bengali context I was used to, but Shyama and I were in the company of such “normal” (to my western standards) young dudes, that it was actually not all that awkward.
Eventually, we continued on our way back to Dhaka University, which was hosting a huge book fair. I was asked for a number of photographs, conversations and even an interview at the book fair, all of which Shyama flatly rejected for me. This was the awkward type of unwanted male attention I had feared all day: and oddly, it wasn’t until we encountered the “bookish types” that I actually experienced what is so normal in north-west Dhaka.
As dusk set in, we realized it was time to go home: in rush hour. We took a taxi, three rickshaws and our own feet to the American Club, where I met up with my boss and his family almost 2 hours later. Both Shyama and Orchid accompanied me the whole way, although Shyama’s mother was I’m sure worried about her late homecoming.
And herein lies the main difference between life in my world and hers: for college students and young adults like me in Los Angeles, nighttime is only the beginning. There are plenty of places to find yourself after dark — a movie, play, museum, dance party, bar, concert — and it’s up to you when you go home. We’re so mobile and independent. But for a young lady like Shyama, contemporary as she may be, life after dark is meant to be experienced at home. And if it’s not, it’s headed home. Hopefully accompanied by a watchful male protector.
We just shot a scene from my feature, Transnationals. What happens in the scene? A woman traveling in Korea buys birthday cupcakes for her translator. On the surface, not such an exciting scene. But what is really happening? The girl, who is falling in love with the translator, learns during the scene that the translator is her biological brother. Needless to say, the stakes in the scene are fairly high.
I’ve been thinking a lot recently about what draws me into drama, and why it punches me in the gut when it’s done well (in the way all lovers of a good drama are somehow masochistic, which is worthy of a separate psychological appraisal). What draws me in, first of all, is people who are different from me. This is probably a carry-over from my inner cultural anthropologist and philosopher. What makes people tick? What cultural references cause them to tick differently? How can values and core beliefs be so deeply ingrained by culture? And what causes all of us who are so different to be the same? It’s quite interesting that faith (both in the ‘organized religion’ sense and at the deeper spiritual/moral/philosophical level) unites us, even though sometimes theology can be divisive. For me, good drama will bring me into a completely different world or lifestyle but then give me something familiar to hold onto there: something that is a deep, enduring and truly universal need expressed in a specific, culturally relevant way. Perhaps a way I didn’t see, because it wasn’t taught to me by my culture. Maybe that need is even mediated in some way by the culture at large.
