It’s almost a year on from when I, Wifey, Thing I and Thing II left Bangladesh and returned to the land of our birth, England.
We knew it was going to be tough. Thing II could barely remember what it was like to live in the UK as we moved to Bangladesh when he was five. Thing I was older but she had adapted and evolved into Bangladeshi teen culture so much over the years that it was always going to be hard trying to figure out British teenage culture. For Wifey and I it was simply the pain of leaving a people we loved and a country we had very quickly come to think of as ‘home’.
Added to that, I had (and still have) a healthy paranoia of British state culture. I’ve long been a critic of the corruption inherent in a dominant Orwellian state – a corruption ‘hidden in plain sight’ in that the people have tacitly approved of the corruption written into our our rules and laws. These laws pretend to protect the innocent but are fatally flawed because they assume one thing which simply isn’t true: that bad guys won’t be bad if you make a law to stop them. By definition, bad people will do bad things regardless of laws and rules.
And so we see banks conning people out of money, politicians bending legislation to suit their goals, paedophiles working with children undetected for years and laws protecting those who would destroy the lives and reputations of others.
I knew all this and thought I was prepared for it. None of us could have guessed that the second half of this year would be so awful for us all. It’s been special too (I have to see positives everywhere were I can) – we have a place of our own again which we can call ‘home’ and the children have settled into a wonderful school with supportive, caring staff. My life as a professional writer has blossomed too and, inshallah, will be increasingly profitable next year. Nevertheless, we’ve been shaken by just how cruel people can be and how uncaring society is to its own. We honestly don’t want to be here, I’m afraid.
Normally, around this time of year, I’m looking forward to the coming year – perhaps with fear and trepidation, admittedly, but looking forward nonetheless. This year, however, I don’t want to even consider 2015 as a possibility. I can’t stop it coming but I refuse to acknowledge its presence.
There be monsters in the sea.
Oh my God. Really? I thought such things happened only in India.
It’s sad that the place of birth should feel so alien.
If it is any consolation, India too has gone from bad to worse – and getting worser (if there is such a word!)
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Ha ha – I’m all for allowing new words even if it doesn’t! Sad to say, yes things are not good here – at least not all the time anyway
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Ken
I do hope it gets better. Moving is rough, and we only moved across town. I wonder what stops you from going back to Bangladesh?
I think focusing on the positives is a good strategy.
Best wishes
Doug
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Hi Doug – the reason we came back is the reason can’t return to Bangladesh: Our daughter’s education! Thanks to a silly set up in the UK she gets counted as a foreign student and has to pay more at University if she hasn’t had so many years education here. So we moved in readiness for the coming years of examinations. Then my son will be shortly behind her! All in all it’ll be about another 9 years before we can consider returning to Bangladesh. Even then, it’s not certain.
The hardest thing though isn’t the fact we’re in the UK and want to be in Bangladesh – hard though that is. It’s something else which I can’t go into publicly as yet which is pretty catastrophic to us right now. Believe me – we’re surviving by focusing on the positives as much as possible!
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ken – boogers. that’s too bad. prayers for your other thing.
doug
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Hic sunt dracones….
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I think I just said that 😉
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Oh Ken! I do hope you’ll find the still center where everything IS, good, bad, awful or developing.
A warm hug.
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Thank you Audrey. I hope so too – and thank you for the hug! 🙂
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I am sure things will get better, take care…
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I would truly like to think so…
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Let us be optimistic and hope that better times will come. Life will be unfair. But it’s also beautiful.
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Very wise words there, very wise indeed – thank you for them 🙂
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You’re most welcome! Writing these words inspires me too.
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I don’t “like” this – if you know what I mean..
Anxiety about the new year will come.. But I think it will hold better things than this year let’s hope..
If it makes you feel any better I don’t want to be here either.. But at the same time I don’t feel as if I can leave..
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Yeah I know how you feel in every sense…
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It will get better.. It *has* to..
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