LIFE AS IT IS

To a summer person, winter is perhaps the bleakest season of all, the season when Mother Earth gives up her vibrant shades to give way to copious amounts of white and grey. But if you live in a place where winter lasts four or more months, falling in love with winter is critical to your survival -- you teach yourself to love the wintertime. It could be challenging, though. Snowfall is a spectacular natural event -- absolutely one of a kind. I stood frozen with my mouth agape when I first witnessed a snowfall eight years ago; fresh snow resembling shreds of white cotton candy descended from the heavens above and turned a small city into a winter wonderland. The beauty around it was too much for me to grasp. I had seen snow before, but never in real life. I had seen snow in Hollywood movies, story book illustrations, photos, and greeting cards sent by extended family from faraway lands. As a child, I dreamed of scooping snow from the ground and hold it against my cheek....

If you love noise, laughter, clink of gold bangles, gossip, full-flavoured food, makeup, music, insincere praises, and have a skin thick enough to endure caustic remarks about your age, weight, height and marital status, a 'deshi' wedding is 'the' place to be.   The Daily Star link  Nov. 29, 2016 It is a place where you walk into people of all possible kinds – big, small, old, young, men, women, children - a microcosm of the society you live in!   Wedding season is here at our doorsteps and very soon you will be at the receiving end of one of those spendthrift wedding invitation cards calling you for a regal wedding consisting of thirteen functions and more. Consider yourself lucky if you have not been to one of those weddings but either way, royal or not, weddings are your free ticket to scrumptious meals and the Bengali circus where you will most likely encounter a diverse collection of people – some of them leaving you mentally scarred for life! You me...

Have you ever taken on any project to improve or repair your home? If not, you could probably give it a try because DIY (do-it-yourself) projects are not only fun, they are self-satisfying, too.  They also provide a rare opportunity for creativity, imagination and self-expression. The Daily Star link I myself never thought I could actually do something apparently as difficult as staining two staircases, not the steps, but the areas around them. We hired a contractor to do some household improvement jobs and staining the staircases were part of them. But our contractor had to go out of state on some work and the project of stairway staining had to be pushed back by a week. We grew restless. We did some research online to find out what exactly needed to be done for such a project. But we had never undertaken a DIY project before and therefore, lacked confidence. So we thought we should perhaps visit a home improvement supplies store first and consult the staff there; they are...

How many things can you live without? I asked myself not once, but many times. And every time I asked myself, a voice in my head answered, “You can live without most of the things you own right now!” The Daily Star link According to statistics, we wear just 20 percent of our clothes 80 percent of the time. I personally can vouch for its accuracy, because in my closet, I have some tops and dresses that I have not worn in more than three to five years. I have not yet donated them because I still like them, but putting them on never crosses my mind! I have a handful of favourite clothes and footwear that I pick almost every time I step out. Like many people, I purchase shoes, clothes, accessories and household items on impulse, but only to realise afterwards that they hardly complement me in any way. But more and more people are moving away from such impulsive shopping habits. They are moving towards leading a more wholesome life instead. The world is seeing a new kind of...

জীবন যদি একটি পাতা হয় আমি চাইব ঝিরঝিরে হাওয়া প্রতি মুহূর্ত আমাকে ঘিরে থাকুক। বসন্তের মৃদুমন্দ বাতাসে আমি দেখব নীলিমা, দেখব নদী, ফুল, মাঠ। জীবন যদি একটি পাতা হয়, চাইব হতে মস্ত কোন বৃক্ষের পল্লব, বাঁচব আমি ভূমি হতে অনেক উঁচুতে কিন্তু আকাশ থেকে খুব দূরে নয়। 

A gold maple leaf parted with its mother and glided down in a dancing motion to join its brethren on the ground; they all congregated at the base of their mother's trunk, as if waiting for something big and important to unravel.  The desiccated leaves skirted around their mother, forming a yellow-brown crunchy blanket that rustled every time the wind blew. An unruly gust would sometimes, however, disrupt this sombre congregation. The gust would send them in disarray. And when it did, the leaves rolled all over the grass, hitting stones, trunks of other trees, cars and even young joggers' running shoes.  The Daily Star link On those occasions, the shrivelled leaves reminisced about the days when they were young, green and bursting with vigour -- the time when they lived close to the boundless sky, not on the soggy ground of autumn.     The mother maple, which was green and strong even a month ago, was fading and growing frail. She seemed to be getting old fa...