Asian News Blog

AFTER my dad and brother left for Bangladesh and I went home to my parents house, everybody just seemed to be in a miserable lonely mood. You would think a fortnight without them, we'd be jumping for joy, plenty of parties etc, BUT no.

Instead we sat lounging around missing them like mad and then my younger brother decides it will be a great idea for us all to go and join them.

I already had planned to take a week off, my sisters seemed to be quite flexible and my brother was really geared up for it. He wanted to join my dad but the other brother decided he should go as he was older!

It seemed to be a crazy idea but we all thought why not?

When I went to get married in Bangladesh my two younger brothers couldn't join me and a trip like this meant the whole family will be together and that doesn't often happen when taking trips to Bangladesh as the air fares are soooooooo expensive. Families rarely go out in a pack and the idea of us all spending a week out there together was really exciting.

We decided to book the tickets and pay for it first and then tell our parents later as they would have been against the idea. My dad's friend arranged the tickets and found some first class ones the following day with Qatar Airlines. It meant arriving a day after my dad.

I tried to get another week off work claiming family wedding but as there was no-one else to cover for me I had to settle on a week instead whilst the rest of them decided to stay for nine days.

None of us had taken our jabs either, but there was no time for that as our flight was the following afternoon.
As soon as we booked the tickets I rang mum and told her.

She thought I was joking and when she realised I wasn't I got a huge long lecture over the phone about how dangerous it was, that it was too hot, it was raining and that we wouldn't enjoy it etc etc. I told her it was too late and that if we cancelled our tickets we would lose out on 80 per-cent of our money!

We told my aunt in Manchester and she came over straightaway with presents she wanted to give to her family whilst complaining how my mum refused to take it over for her.

My cousin, the drug user (so we think) found out and rang me to convince me to take his wife away with us as well for a couple of weeks, though his wife was not having any of it and refused to leave his side!

We spent that whole night packing our belongings. I was so excited, though Dante wasn't pleased at all. In fact it's the first time we had out first argument, he thought I should've discussed it with him and that he was worried that something might happen to me out there especially with everything that was going on in the village.

But I just knew if we were all there together everything will be OK and my parents won't be by themselves and my brothers who were big lads will protect us!

If it wasn't for the fact that Dante's passport had expired, am sure he would have come along too. My brother kept telling him not to worry and Dante kept telling us very seriously that if anybody laid a finger on me he will take a flight out to Bangladesh and find his own way to our village.

I keep telling him it's not as easy as getting to the airport and calling a taxi to the village especially when you didn't know a word of Bangla and a big tall black man will stand out in a crowd and he will get rushed at the airport! Anyway, he said he was going down to Liverpool to renew his passport just in case but he still wasn't happy about the situation and went on ranting for about an hour. I decided to keep my mouth shut and let him go on with himself until he calmed down and started helping me pack.

My sisters were excited, they love Bangladesh and couldn't wait to go shopping.

The following day my uncle dropped us off at the airport. We left the keys to our house with Dante who promised to look in every day.

It was so weird saying goodbye to him, even though I knew i'll see him in a week's time, my eyes (like a typical girl) welled up in tears. He told me to look after myself, gave my his crystal for good luck and I told him to behave!
At the airport there were several families going to Bangladesh.

Each family must have had a dozen suitcases - a number of which where way over the luggage allowance, nothing new, my mum is exactly the same and we had to take out her duvet covers, the iron, the food mixer along with a few other things before she was allowed to put her luggage through!

The flight was long and exhausting. It took over six hours to get to Doha airport in Qatar where we had to wait another three hours to catch our next flight to Dhaka which took almost five hours. At Dhaka airport we managed to catch the next plane out to Sylhet straightaway.

Flying into Sylhet airport I anxiously looked out for my dad. The airport looked pretty quiet. As we landed we couldn't wait to get off. We got our luggage and as we proceeded out we caught my dad. There was a look of shock on his face. He couldn't quite believe that we were in Bangladesh.

My brother thought I had this planned all along and wouldn't believe that it was just a last minute thing.
Outside our van was waiting for us. It was so great to be back in Bangladesh.

It was hot and it had been raining but the country looked so green and so refreshing. The roads were mad as ever as we beeped our way through the traffic. I had to hold my breath many a times as I kept on thinking we were going to hit an oncoming bus, or a rickshaw driver was going to pull out in front of us, our driver hailed abuse at other drivers but we managed to get to our village safely.

Once we arrived my mum came running out of the house to hug us all. She was also in disbelief.

Our aunts, uncles and cousins came out, there was a crowd of about 30 people all watching us. I went and greeted most of our cousin's and settled into the house. Mum had the fans going in all the rooms. She had bottled water ordered for everybody and made sure all the rooms were sparkling clean. My sisters put on their Benglish accents pretending they could hardly understand what was being said let alone speak Bangla themselves.

Some younger cousins came and joined me in the room, one young girl was holing a fakha, a hand held fan for my convenience and under my mum's order. It was afternoon and the sun was blazing hot and I could feel the heat prickling my skin.

Mum was hurriedly getting the food prepared, she just couldn't believe the whole family where in Bangladesh. I could tell she was really happy and so was my dad.

After dinner we all sat in the main living area talking. The electricity kept going so we lit the lanterns and every few minutes I had to fight off the mosquitoes. My cousins kept telling us that they loved fresh blood which is why us Londonis got bitten to death.

My brother said they managed to get to the bottom go the crazy phone calls and the guys on the motorbike. It turns out the ex husband had rang this guy called Mohammed who lives near our village to find out about my mum and what she was doing there.

This Mohammed person isn't very fond of us because he had wanted to marry me and when his family came with a proposal we turned them away. Mohammed is 5ft and I am 5ft 5ins. My parents didn't want to hear about the family background etc they just took one look at the guy and said no.

Well the ex told Mohammed that we had said no to him because his family were not rich like his. He even went on to say that whilst his family put in £10k into my bank account before the marriage because we had demanded payment, we knew that Mohammed will not be able to afford that amount. Well this was all bullshit of course.

There was no demand for payment and I certainly didn't get £10K - my God if I did, I could've paid off my credit card bills and gone off on a world cruise.

So to wind my mum up, whom the ex as you know really dislikes, he got Mohammed and his friends to scare her by riding into the village and giving her crank calls.

It took my dad a matter of few minutes to find out what had happened. Mohammed however got a right beating from his dad and uncles after my dad found out and the ex, well my brothers were very furious and can't wait to get their hands on him. My mum also wants to knock the rest of his teeth out. I mean anything could have happened.

What if Mohammed was a psycho and decided to physically hurt my mum, who they knew was in Bangladesh on her own.

It makes me feel physically sick to think about it.

My dad went around to Mophammed's house the following day to find out all the details and whilst he was there guess who rang? The ex to find out if it was true that the whole family had gone to Bangladesh.

My brother managed to get hold of the phone and spoke to the ex directly and told him yes it was true we were all there and that he better go and hide when my brother returns because he was going to make him wear his
mother's bangles and dance around like the little ***** that he is! Mohammed also had to come to our village and beg for my mum's forgiveness, he really had no choice as his dad kept on slapping him across the head!
With that sorted I decided to enjoy the rest of the week.

I got shopping out of the way first. There was so much choice. We went to the Al-Hamra shopping plaza. There were so many lovely saris and all the shopkeepers were trying to entice us into their shops calling out 'afa' - sister - and inviting us in.

Us Londonis stick out like a sore thumb and we knew we will get ripped off. So I took my cousin with me, chose what I wanted and later sent him the following day to get it for us at a decent price.

I filled a big bag full of DVDs, I even got Dante a huge selection of RnB albums, they were like 40taka each with is about near enough 50pence.

Though mum sent us out in the big van, we loved nothing but to travel on a rickshaw and Sylhet was so crowded these days it was the best way to get around.

I had a friend who lived in a Uposhor, which us a very nice and "posh" part of town so I went to see her. My sisters loved her place, it was very modern and only about a year old and felt like a five-star hotel!
We had lunch on the roof terrace. Her father-in-law slaughtered a fresh chicken for lunch - which we couldn't eat cos we had seen it alive a couple of hours ago.

Instead we ordered noodles from the Chinese restaurant down the road. There were loads of Chinese restaurants. It was the place to be if you wanted non-Bangladeshi cuisine. We then went to London Fried Chicken which was a bit like McDonalds and you know what I really enjoyed it, the chiken's not as meaty but it was a good effort.
Back in my mum's village we had relatives pouring in everyday.

I usually looked a right mess as the humidity made our hair go frizzy and no amount of hair straightening helped thought soem of the villagers found our attempts at doing our hair funny and suggested we used hair oil and tie our hair back!

Everybody wanted to know what had happened with the ex husband, my mum's brothers kept on telling me that they told my mum they didn't like him from when they first laid eyes on him and they thought he was a little shifty but that my parents wouldn't listen to them.

The un-avoidable also happened. Me and both my sisters were inundated with wedding proposals. At times I had to tell people that I was going to give the ex another chance so that they will stop harassing me. My sisters carried on pretending they didn't understand any Bangla and that they were going to marry white men! My mum went along with it. She told people hundreds of times that she's not getting any of her children married in Bangladesh but she was told in return that the fingers on one hand aren't all the same, hence all men are not like the ex.

But you know I was very disheartened to see so many young men who weren't doing anything for themselves. They all went to school or college and then just sat around waiting for a Londoni bride. I admired the very few that did do something, because even though Bangladesh is a poor country, it's a prosperous country and if you put your mind to it you can do well. My mamu (mum's older brother) has bought himself two three-wheeled taxis that he rents out to drivers and earns a decent whack every week from it. Another cousin buys and sells goats and again earns a decent living and doesn't have to rely on handouts from the cousins in England.

And you know what - the elderly are a lot fitter as well.

My granddad has a six pack. He is so fit for his age. He's out in the fields with the bulls looking after the crop. He doesn't have to work, but he enjoys being out in the fields and he'll give any young man a run for their money. I reckon if he was in England he would have been sat in front of the telly without much exercise complaining about every ache and pain!

My week went really fast. Another week would have been great.

My brothers and sisters decided they will stay until mum comes back.

I tried blagging to work that I had lost my passport but I don't think my lies went down well and Dante wasn't having any of it. He wanted me back safely, and am sure he was just a tad little jealous. He rang every night. I had to go to the rooftop to talk to him and mum eyed me suspiciously every time wondering who I was talking to.

Dante must have ben missing me. He was telling me that we shouldn't care what people think and that we should have children and he was looking forward to having mixed raced good looking half black half Asian kids and how they were going to be so unique! He wants to move in and everything. It was nice to hear that soft side to him which I rarely see in Manchester so as soppy as some of our conversations were I enjoyed every milli second of it.

I arrived back in the UK on Sunday morning, shattered and I looked a right mess when I arrived in Manchester. My flight back was not first class and what a difference.

Some pervert sat next to me from Dhaka to Doha and he tried touching my leg until i finally got hold of his finger and twisted it.

From Doha to Manchester I had a chatty young woman who wouldn't stop talking about her new husband whilst all I wanted to do was sleep and on top of that I caught a cold.

Dante almost didn't recognise me at the airport cos my hair was a right mess, i had no makeup on and I really did look like the cat dragged me home.

I was also feeling sad cos I didn't want to come back so early. I had such a lovely time and every time I visit I fall in love with the country and its people even more.

Mum and dad told me not to make a big deal about the ex husband situation cos my brother wanted to sort it out himself.

But my cousin has informed me the ex had packed his bags and left for North Wales after my brother threatened him over the phone. But it wasn't my brother he was worried about, it was my mum he was most scared of.
Dante as promised looked after my house and my parents house.

I'm glad to be back and see him, but honestly right now I really wish I was still in Bangladesh enjoying the rest of the holiday with my family instead of being back at work pretending to write a press release when i'm updating my blog.
There was no internet cafes in Sylhet, but I really didn't want to be sat on the internet when there was so much to do and see.

By the way whoever commented about me hating men at one point and then going of with a big black ******! I think many women goes through a man-hating phase at some point even if it's for a short while but when you meet someone nice, caring and considerate and you fall in love one's mind can easily be changed! It has nothing to do with any physical aspect! Someone else said that I cannot pick and choose which comments I post or not, well actually I can especially if they are just full of disgusting expletives aimed at me and Dante. 99.9 per cent of comments get posted and only a few hate fuelled comments get deleted cos they're just too rude and offensive!