This gives me 5 weeks to post about the 5 things I’m going to miss loving, and the things I’m going to love not missing. Oh yes, a list, one of my favourite things. Instead of doing the ole’ bullet point number, though, I thought what better farewell to the ‘desh than a long and drawn out departure, spread out over – yep – 5 weeks. So, taking it away at number 5, I bring you:
Things I’m going to love not missing
1. No, no way, oh no, uh uh, that’s not even…you mean it’s…my dinner?
The first thing that probably comes to mind on reading a sentence like that is a scene out of Survivor, you know that old reality TV show where they stuck a bunch of people out in the middle of nowhere (i.e. Australia) and made them do silly things like obstacle courses, jigsaw puzzles, and eat rare and exotic food like bull’s balls, spiders, brains etc. But that’s not the direction I’m headed in here.
What I’m talking about here is B – L – A – N – D. Not a word I associated with food from the sub-continent before coming here, but wow, how things change. At first it seemed like a dream. Lentils, naan bread, mixed curried veggies, tropical fruits, roti for breakfast and sweets for dessert. How can you go wrong?
Wrong, though, is exactly the word for Bengali Cuisine. Actually, I take that back. The word I’m really looking for is yellow. Everything here is yellow. Yellow dal, yellow vegetables, yellow meat, yellow bread, yellow fruit, yellow yellow yellow. And while I have nothing against bananas, and think they’re actually on the tasty (and safe) side of the Bengali food equation, there is just something slightly disturbing about an entire nation’s food relying so wholeheartedly on one colour. Especially when you’re from a country that says something about three colours on your plate at every meal (or a rule to that effect). And colour on my plate is something, as a vegetarian, I normally excel at.
Not here I don’t. It’s all yellow.
A typical meal in a Bengali restaurant goes something like this. Get a big bowl of yellow, oily water which we will hereto refer to as ‘dal’, despite the complete lack of, well, ‘dal’ (which means lentils). Throw in a small side bowl of yellow vegetables, or ‘shobji’ cooked to within an inch of their life then thrown into a big pot full of yellow, oily water and simmer until everything takes on a mush-like consistency. Throw in a plate of white rice (which is destined to become yellow as you ‘moosh’ the dal and vegetables together), a side of cucumber, some salt and a slice of lime and there you have it. A la carte, deshi style.
For the meat eaters, it gets slightly better as you get to add yellow, bony, deep-fried fish or fatty, yellow goat/chicken/beef to your plate, depending on Today’s Special.
As a surprise, you never know how fresh the food is when it reaches the table with worrisome speed, suggesting a whole load of ‘here’s something I prepared early…much earlier…maybe even yesterday, or the day before that…’ which can leave you feeling like you’re just a mouthful away from salmonella. Lip-smacking stuff.
Things I’m going to miss loving
1. ‘Hey, kali!’
Bangladesh is deservedly renowned for it’s cycle rickshaws, and the art that adorns them, which some rickshaw wallahs take very, very seriously. Combine this cycle power with the motorised CNGs, and the buses of all types from the dodgy ‘I-need-to-upgrade-my-travel-insurance’ variety right up to the ‘here’s your water, your biscuits, and a blanket, just nod in my direction and I’ll be up in a jiffy to help’ kind, and you’ve got pretty much the whole country covered.
Transport in general is something Bangladesh does well. In fact, it would be entirely possible to not walk more than about 10 steps in any direction for a week or more. All you have to do is walk out the front door, shout 'hey kali!’ to the nearest empty form of transport, and off you go. It’s cheap. It’s everywhere. Come to think of it, it’s like the McDonalds of the sub continent, and just as likely to contribute to the obesity epidemic overtaking the middle class here. It is scarily easy to say ‘why walk?’ when, for 20 cents, you can pay someone else to do your sweating for you. (…Unless it happens to be one of the ten months of the year here when it’s stinking bloody hot and you’ll be sweating anyway…but I digress).
Now every time I curse and swear at the lack of taxis in the city on a Saturday night, I can reminisce about how, “In Bangladesh, we’d be able to just stick out our arm and…”. Oh, I’m going to be such great company when I come home.
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