1998: Where the tragic story of becoming an expatriate began
That sunny summer of 1998. The heart of a young man who had just turned sixteen was filled with dreams. The red brick walls of the college, the smile of his beloved in the shade of the mango trees on the campus—everything seemed like the feet of poetry. Life was then nectar-touched; every moment was colored with the colors of love. The eyes of the beloved bowed in shame, the cheeks that turned red when they suddenly appeared—all these were like the wings of heaven. I thought, holding this hand, I would build a house, float the boat of my dreams across the two banks of the river of life. But fate smiled cruelly. One day, for no reason, unexpectedly, that familiar smile disappeared into the gray clouds of pride.
In an instant, everything collapsed. I would sit in class, but my mind would drift somewhere. The dust accumulated on the pages of the book, and tears would be covered in cigarette smoke. Friends would say, “So broken for a girl?” But who would understand? I would mingle with strangers at night; I would drown my heartache in the intoxication of bad company. My family would see my degradation and silently wail. My mother’s tears, my father’s sighs—everything seemed to say, “There has to be a way.”
The family’s decision came suddenly—abroad. They would send me to an unknown land, where there were no familiar faces, no alleys full of memories of that beloved. I agreed without a word. Maybe if I went far away, I could survive, maybe I could forget…
The news reached his ears exactly three days before the farewell. That evening, we met for the last time. The girl who had not held my hand in seven years came and fell on his chest—the sky between them both was flooded with tears. He said, “If you get yourself together, I will be here…” But did I hear anything then? The pain in his eyes at the time of farewell still burns deep in my heart.
The day of farewell. The cold air of the airport soaked the mother’s arms with tears. The younger sister hugged her legs, “Will grandpa come back?” Father, who never cried, was shaking silently with his head resting on the glass wall of the terminal. When the plane took off, it felt like my heart was being torn apart—an invisible thread was dragging my heart away into the unknown.
The first nights of my exile were spent sitting by the window. In the innocent light of an unfamiliar city, I searched for the scent of Dhaka’s sunshine. I would wake up at the sound of the calling bell, thinking that he had arrived… but no one comes here. I threw myself into the wheel of earning—one day the news came that he had gotten married. Mother cried over the phone, “Dad, Dad called you in his last moments…”
Today, when I stood at the London tube station and saw the festival poster, it seemed—a million stars of this city had gone out for me. The hand that I dreamed of holding and walking with is now in someone else’s world. I didn’t leave a single drop of water for my father, whom I couldn’t bid farewell to.
But this story isn’t just mine. Rahim, a construction worker in Malaysia, Karim, a restaurant worker in Saudi Arabia, Mamata, a factory worker in Italy—they’re all heroes of the same story. Some have sent me to raise money for their children’s medical expenses, some to pay off their father’s debts. Our blood and sweat have built foreign towers, and the remittance graph in Bangladesh is growing.
It’s funny, when money comes home—everyone smiles. But when we go, no one even sheds a tear. Maybe my mother keeps my childhood photos in the next room, smiling—”My son has gone to a faraway land to build his dreams…”
And us? We are the peddlers of time. We sell the best years of our lives in exchange for foreign currency. Sometimes in the silence of the night, I wonder—how much of this city shining across the sky is mine? Or am I just a guest, whose address is now close to zero?
These stories born in the land of exile cry, laugh, and write invisible letters every day—
“Mom, your son is still alive… Not just to survive, but for the smile on your face so that I can return to my homeland one day.”
