First night...first day.

My first night was spent recounting, on the drive home and then in my grandmother’s house, the highlights of my journey and what the flight from Malaysia was like, jam-packed and loud. I also met my cousins Sadia and Zul (sounds like Jewel), my aunt and the maids who live and work in that house. The rest of the time that night was spent preparing to sleep. Part of that included getting out of my jeans and cotton blouse and into a cotton salwar kameez set with a dupatta, a kind of long scarf hanging over the shoulders, or worn around the neck, and almost always covering the chest area.

In case you don’t know what a salwar and kameez are, the salwar is like a pair of pajamas with or without a drawstring, depending on the design. The kameez is like a dress with slits on each side, and can be any length from just past the hip level to just past the calf muscles. They’re decorated in all kinds of colors, laces, tiny mirrors, multi-colored or single-colored beads, or colored threads.

I was too exhausted and just wanted to sleep but everyone around me, especially my grandmother, my mom, and aunt were supportive of me changing into a salwar/kameez set and, what seemed to me at the time, a little too insistent about it. I’m sure they were only thinking of my being more comfortable because they are too, but I’ve always felt a little wrapped up and confined in those clothes. I had only worn salwar kameez sets at dinner parties and special occasions, not everyday and certainly not at home. To me, wearing jeans are like wearing pajamas. I’m extremely comfortable in them. Sadly, I couldn’t say no to my family. After trying to question it, and getting surprised looks with a firm ‘of course you will,’ I just went with it but felt uneasy.

Dhaka City and Bangladesh in general, being right at the Tropic of Cancer, is so hot and terribly humid in the summer that one sweats everyday. Also, the city is so dusty that one just has to shower everyday to avoid feeling icky. In that salwar kameez set, I was feeling stuffed and hot, even though the set was made with cotton.

In looking back it was an automatic reaction, and I understand why they did as they did, being more conservative than me. In fact, a friend of mine told me later that she always wears a salwar kameez set when coming to my Dhanmondi residential area. People around this area are still uncomfortable with woman wearing jeans or anything modern or “Western.” They’re still conservative and dress accordingly. While I’m in Dhanmondi, so do I. If I go to the Gulshan or the Bonani residential areas where those who are well off live, I’ll wear jeans. This is where the well-off and/or foreigners and diplomats live and work. Near these areas are the foreign embassies, schools, World Bank, UN and other organizations’ offices.

After many years of sleeping without a mosquito net around my bed, I have to start getting used to putting one around my bed and then sleeping under it. By the time the sun starts to set, the mosquitoes are out in full force. I’ve gotten plenty of mosquito bites already…but I’m safe under the mosquito net at night, as long as none sneak in.

As I found out the next day when I explored the house, the main porch that wraps around the house is netted so that mosquitoes find it hard to squeeze in other than through an open door or a hole in the net. We keep the doors closed to keep the bugs out. The part of the wraparound porch around the side and corner of the house is not netted so many mosquitoes tend to fly around there. As I also found out this day, Sadia has a little kitten, Cooper, that’s an orphan. It’s about 3 months old and growing fast. Such a cutie and so soft! Sometimes it mews so plaintively, that I just can’t help feeling bad for it. Poor thing!