LIFE AS IT IS

Facebook's "Like" button seems to me one of the smartest virtual inventions of recent times. It has  saved its users' time and the trouble that they used to take in the past to comment on a photo, status or post. Today, a click on the "Like" button is enough to convey your feeling toward a post, but really? These days people "like" anything and everything. If you "like" my photo, I will "like" your next photo, even if you look like a lost witch in that picture. It is a give-and-take virtual relationship that people seem to have established on the Internet. Although the "Like" button saves us time and energy but I still like the old Facebook more, where if someone really liked your photo they had to scribble at least one word - pretty, beautiful, nice, sweet, hot or whatever - to express their feeling. Today, the click on the "Like" button does not really convey a friend's feeling - you will never kn...

Last August, we moved from Minnesota to Delaware, from America's Midwest to its East Coast. The move was exciting but exhausting at the same time. Coming from Bangladesh, such a relocation was like møving from Dhaka, the capital, to say, Bangkok, Thailand!  It was our third move in 5 years. But the first two relocations were inside Minnesota and therefore, less hectic. Our last move would have been super-hectic if my husband’s new employer had not agreed to provide and pay for professional movers, who packed everything for us. When I say everything, I mean everything. The movers packed our clothes, shoes, toiletries, crockery, pots & pans, spices, non-perishable food items, my child's toys and books, and what not. They even transported my husband’s car from Minneapolis, MN to Wilmington, DE. We never had a car transported before.  Considering the high costs of flying to and staying in Delaware for a few days to find an apartment, we depended solely on apartment-fin...

I was in Dhaka after four years for nineteen days. I was super excited about my trip. I was hoping to see positive changes — the new Mirpur-Airport Road flyover, the Hatirjheel project, etc. But it was something else beside the above-mentioned that caught my attention and made me fearful… the mushrooming of restaurants in Dhaka city. Growing up, fast food was something we ate only a handful of times every month. We would go to a Chinese restaurant on special occasions like birthday, parents’ marriage anniversary and own or sibling’s satisfactory performance in the yearly school exam. Dhaka did not have fancy fast food restaurants at that time. It was probably Helvetia and Dominous Pizza, which brought about a revolution in the fast food industry of the country. But before that, most of us would eat burgers, vegetable rolls, chicken or beef patties and sandwiches from local fast food shops that were neither chains nor franchises. Then slowly, days began to change and new restaurant...