The Evening Commute

Happy October, everyone. Here it is still 90 degrees with 150% humidity, so I'm guessing that means I don't get a Fall. Sorry for my brief hiatus. School has been in full swing and I've been sick twice-- nothing too serious but definitely unpleasant. I've been able to work more directly with students this past month and that has been like a breath of fresh air. By and large they are earnest and hardworking, and curious about the world around them. It's clear that they are trying to figure out exactly who they are out from under the shadow of elders but mindful of their families' expectations. Still-- these women aren't a homogenous group. Some work harder than others. Some write better than others. Some have incredibly tragic pasts. Some are funny. Some are demanding and inconsiderate.

After most (long) days at AUW, I enter the Circus of Crazy otherwise known as the hours between 7-9pm on the streets of Chittagong. We don't live far from school but their are nights when the walk home feels twenty years long, mostly because so much is happening in between here and there. It's dark. Bodies are everywhere, crawling along the narrow avenues we pretend are sidewalks. The streets are choked with cars, trucks, CNGs, rickshaws, and pedestrians weaving in and out each other, like ants making paths in their encased plastic farm. The smell of sweat and dirt and heat mix with the abundance of street food, popcorn, chicken rolls, curries, fried anything. Men wrap paan by candlelight for passersby. Tiny generators vibrate outside the bright one-room stalls that sit one right after another and act as anything from restaurants and tea shops to pharmacies and fruit markets.

People shout. Men stroll holding hands, enjoying each others company. The women out and about are few and easy to spot and the later it gets, the more scarce they become. Sometimes I feel a bit like an endangered species, always amazed when they find one of their own kind. There are beggars galore. Children who pull at your arms, old men with deformed arms and legs, women with matted hair and soiled clothes, the blind of all ages, wearing white and chanting softly in Bangla.

Crossing the street becomes an adventure all of its own. We all have different methods. Julia is the calmest of us all, certain the cars and CNGs will stop, no matter how fast they barrel in our direction. Calynn's feet start in a walk but quickly fall into a scurry reminiscent of a chipmunk just before it is squashed. Trishna and I are somewhere in between, often waiting for a local to cross and tagging along behind him. But we're either doing something right or are just plain lucky. Their haven't been too many close calls.

I always feel a sense of relief when I finally get back to the apartment. The quiet of my solitary room is an incredible contrast to the journey home. But there's something in the heat and immediacy of the city that cannot be shut out by the gates we foreigners surround ourselves with. The smell, the memory of the old woman lying on the ground covered in flies, the brush of CNG metal as it whirs by my shoulder. There's a kinship in this chaos, in this exposed, unvarnished exchange of life. I barter with my students, trading nouns, verbs, and adjectives, simply hoping that knowledge will be currency enough to buy change. The rickshaw driver barters with his customer so that he can eat at the end of the day. The call to prayer barters with souls, giving us five reminders a day of faith's discipline and demands. We are all vendors, selling our street food, whether the goods we are peddling are religion, the English language, addictive betel leaves or even just our point of view.

I just wish I could find a stall that carried the colors of leaves changing and roasted coffee beans. Maybe next week.