'Life will not always be this way'- a street child

“The hunger for love is much more difficult to remove than the hunger for bread.”- Mother Teresa

They say life has a way deeper meaning than just spending on some wacky video games or eating out on a franchise cafeteria. But the world really is selfish with people only living for their own means- they just look out for the time to seize another opportunity, the richest don’t leave a penny, and that’s the global scenario of today. Then what happens to the ill-fated, the poor people all around us, street-vendors, beggars?? And from the indifference curse even the children ain’t spared. On a recent survey to forums of Ukraine my eyes gloated with snuffles as ruthless but very factual stories came up of those unfortunate children living drained lives yearning for someone to come and adopt them. In the insights of a teenager, it’s that simple answer to a considerate question; smilingly, “I want to live in a normal family”!


Kristina Zenina

The foster child of Zaporoshye Orphanage Kristina is nine years old. She is a wonderful girl who has the face of a grown-up and the intelligent looking eyes of an adult. She is a very hard-working, diligent and unfailing child. Kristina has had a hard life, but in spite of everything she has found the strength and ability to remain an optimist. Whatever happens, and under any unforeseen circumstances, her face is always beaming with a smile. Kristina loves animals. In general, she is able to love. It is said that a child is taught to love from their parents. Although Kristina doesn’t have them yet, she has the most important human values. It is always very interesting to ask a child her biggest dream. But I have not yet dared to ask Kristina such a question. I already know the biggest, main and innermost dream of these children. She might not voice the answer to this question, but the answer would be written in her eyes, which cannot conceal her deepest hopes and dreams. Such an answer would be louder than a shout . . . “About parents”.


Ludochka

Ludochka is a great lover of books; reading is her favorite pastime. If you can’t find Ludochka anywhere, you can be sure that she is sitting quietly somewhere with a book. And after she reads a good book, her friends will sit and listen to her wonderful stories about the heroes in these books. Ljuda is a dreamer, and if she doesn’t agree with an author of a book, she can easily make up her own version of a story.

Although Ljuda has a very active and creative imagination, she cannot stand to lie. Ludochka is very sure that whatever the outcome, it is always better to tell the truth. Ljuda’s only weak spot is candy – she loves it! But having a sweet tooth is really not such a bad thing, especially considering that this child has read all the books in the local library. It is wonderful to have such a child.






Vitalik

Vitalik from Zaporozhye’s orphanage is eight years old. He has never gone with his dad to a football match, he has never gone with his parents for shashlick (barbecue) to the countryside, and he has never seen his mum making jam for winter. He was not able to experience all those things, but he is sure that an ordinary family does live like that. Vitalik is grown up but at the same time he is still a child, who can help and who needs to be helped. He is also an extremely focused and determined child who is completely devoted to his studies. He feels good about his successes in school and does well in every subject. Everybody at his school is very proud of him.

Vitalik could easily manage without football, shashlick at the countryside and jam, but he can’t easily manage without mum and dad. A life without parents is a hard and sad life, filled mostly with disappointments.

Source: Ukraine forum

Circled thoughts...

Growing up days was really hard for all of us – the flock of three sisters who hurdled and messed up things, sometimes wondered the society must be taking us burdens. We were not all the same, but yes, there were few similarities. Cursed, hampered with life and sharing the same unfortunate circumstances to be raised without a mother beside. And here I stop like that a summer migrated bird, flying in the relentless sky reticently- does it make sense? Birds don’t fear, not the height is fright; they fear inhumanity that can come and touch them making lives hell to breathe. I believe adventure is likely not that pointlessly amusing; but threat looms all around even in the blue and bluest seas.

So this is how my life starts entering the invariable misery and suffering- I was not killed or tortured ruthlessly by some military camp, jihads or something nor there was money crisis; what lacked was the proper attention of love that one needed. The bread for stomach can be left behind instead which is the soul food: love, affection, affirmation, someone to live for, a purpose underestimates it all. Left in the middle of nowhere to walk such a big path, unless, sorrowfully for two 6 year old kids and a just grown up teenager is really a big dilemma to the young minds. They look for the same unlike faces but do they reckon any? Long ago, a day, luck played this futile game when life turned a nightmare for me, for us.

But such feelings from my part no longer exist, not that I can hug her and rub my hair off her cheeks, she doesn’t pray prayers for me to pass exams clear, nor she ties my hair into bun as I may reminisce. Life without her is meaningless and how do I carry on with it? But they say life has a way deeper meaning that just ‘death’. The going of a single person doesn’t stop you from living, it always goes on, and mine here. But some lacking always stays and no longer do you have the urge to resist, because you lose touch from your life. This is what happened to me at first. It came like a howling storm in my life and torn everything apart in its crimson love….


A murky afternoon with the sun set high above the mountains reflecting a grey daylight shadow in the skies. It was 29 June, 2000 when I happily sung out my lungs in my musicals forwarded at school hoping to tell mom I was selected for the annual function. She would really burst into laughter and hug me tight. The school day ended and as everyone got out in serial according to class teachers and met their parents\guardians on gate. I waited very long when our car finally buzzed and the ‘darowan bhai’ took my bag from the usual place it was positioned and yelled ‘hurry up car’s here’. (Of course he said that in Bengali but I translated it, slightly lets say modified). Mommy wasn’t there waiting maybe she had some work needed to be done.

Then it all came so uncertain and shock that it almost took three hours sitting under the Air conditioner freezing the room and working out two jugs of cold water on our heads; finally she left us. We hadn’t been on the prospect and seen the luggage being packed and unpacked times, how they smashed and she knocked him down and went away, very far. But everything was a mere blur. My dad no longer smiled useless nor he had this broad grin and I understood what it meant to be living without your same-old queen. It never seemed to matter to anyone. People came and showed sympathies knowing we had almost lost our mother, no one really felt the pain like we did. They just came and overheard us with taunts that we learned all these as motherless daughters. Then man can’t ever just you properly; they are unjust, but God is just and someday you’ll have your justice. If you keep judging people you have no time to love them.

Today after the long race of 7 years, its 2007, when we stand almost changed: all grown up faces, faded pains (or unladed) and searching that we built something and flashbacks come as a big force flashing everything that had once occurred…with the same hearts sore. We may laugh some time say that beat the blues, it never really happens this way. One who suffers this way only feels the pain; others just only compare it to their luxuries and most importantly the support they have from ‘rue buds’ and ‘life partners’ that make life rather soothing. I’d like to also mention that ‘pain is for some moment, but life is another era’ just in the quest of my mother, that I undoubtedly miss her so much even today, she is not that farer, but in that every rippling aches of my heart thrown on terrible nightmares sweating my worst most fears and when lumps after lumps follow the silent figure in distinctive rays. The readers won’t have any idea what you mean to me by reading this; you are making lives connect and putting a smile in the distressed cheeks. As kazim Ibn Sadique (writer Daily Star) says ‘This is what you feel inside not what other people feel and say you feel’. You are always there in my heart, until this daughter is alive, even when I die, you just belong.

Happy Birthday to you!

The reign of bloodshed

November 29. By the exteriors of Gazipur Courthouse. It was a normal day for the common people. Most of them ignorant of how they were to be betrayed, until then. At around 9:45 a diminutive-young man was seen roaming around with a bag on his hand. Now, near the gate. He looked suspicious and had a worn out face. Maybe struggled off on a fight with his mother, he bore marks that resembled alike. The clock alerted 10 am. Abdul Razzak didn’t look back but grabbed and tapped the remote controller on his hand tight, freezing for a while. A blur. The whole area was on ashes and after a moment the fire of the bomb leapt out on the whole building and ceiling. Along with himself this legendary suicide-committer killed seven. Injured: more than 40 innocent people victimized and clashed on a deadly game. The frontline of newspapers, terror sovereigns.

Black vestiges enveloped the entire place. People ran for their lives and others were too much in an awe of shock to walk a step, rest betrayed by their legs and now all collided in the middle. After, 40 minutes the irresponsible police of ours arrived…quiet normally, as if nothing happened. Journalist for BD TV Nazia ahmed arrived with her camera man Sadique. They captured snapshots of lying dead bodies, bones, mayhem, with a man half-naked except only a piece of cloth. On other side of the court stands animate the brazen statue of justice, which was solely blind.


Story-1

Abeda heard a loud noise by her shack, still sleepy, maybe it was the black cat getting for the remained piece of fish bone. Another bump. Her instincts told that someone was being hard-pressed and he likely protested and screamed. Her mother heart sunk. It was him, Rahim, her son. She quickly bashed out neglecting her sari swaying all muddy way and made it to the door. By the dark horizon was a clearer face of two men purging someone. Abeda knocked down the other man and begged and cried to leave him. But they didn’t. With the two strengthen men in black, Rahim, and Abeda, the heads soon flopped the window. But, not a single soul wished to help. The windows again mushroomed with the curtains. He left her hand.
Rahim never came back to her, but alas, one day came his bones, skeleton, and bloody shirt. Clinging the shirt tight to her chest point, the lady mother, over-flooded with the emotion of loosing her son and protest to bring justice. Her gone son, Rahim, was one who supported Awame League and didn’t heart on the JMB commands. The sorbohara people also came the other day. Abeda begged to forgive Rahim if he had made any mistake but all they could do was: kick her on the stomach. He would never come, she knew, never ever…


Story-2

This family situated in the Baghmara upazila slept serenely. The father, Abdul Motin was a peasant and his wife Rabeya a house wife supported by their one girl of 16, another 12 and their 7 year old boy. The parents never cringed to the situation of terror in their place; but rather faced it in the stripe. The girls slept hand and hand, ascertain of what happens next. A thump sounded on the door. Rabeya went to get the hariken and see who was there so late at night. Around 1 of nighttime.

Three days later. The neighbors now grew even more tenser. The Motin house was on a stinky smell and no one ever opened the door. The police arrived. They kicked the door unlocked and found, what was a terrific scene: Abdul Motin and his wife Rabeya ‘kolli kata’, their small boy on rope attached with the fan, 12 year old sumi disgusted on bed and 16, Nila laying on the floor amid blood…how could anyone do such disgusting crimes? The walls that conceded their happiest memories, laughs and tears now shook with them the victim. If those ‘jollads’ could only look once in their eyes…and see…how it feels…a father…a mother…a sister…a brother…what remains…

Story-3

The judge daughter cried her heart out while the people present moaned on her father’s body clothed on white with cotton on his nose and unlimited fragrance. But, It didn’t matter anymore. The 10 year old pale body saw her daddy being taken to the grave and buried, her mother cried a lot and fainted. She was taking rest on bedroom. The press journalist came and she had to attend them. While everyone looked pitifully at her, she was strong enough to say ‘My father was a true believer in justice. He’ll never come back, I’m pretty much aware. But someday we’ll get justice, real one’’ and her voice broke up.

The house was now deeply on silence. Zaira searched for her mother, a long time, but couldn’t find. Alas! A worker called her and pointed to the ceiling where her mother had hanged herself. Near the scene, left-open a letter. As Zaira finished reading it, she cried ‘mummy, now who’ll I live for’…


March-6 ,2007

The News headlines flashed with a sense of rush and flashbacks, Bangla Bhai along with his JMB partners’ were arrested. The reporter Nazia Ahmed covered the event with thousands of people gathered around the court to get a glance of Bangla Bhai. He felt like a celebrity inside, but unfortunately, luck wasn’t his side this time. The court declared its judgmental procedure and ordered Bangla Bhai to be hanged along with Sheikh Abdul Rahman and his followers’. As the rope tightened and the cloth fell covering his head, good; bangla bhai for the very last time smiled, in horror to the unforgivable curses he would receive for a reign of destruction.

Nazia Ahmed now finished her story and peeked at the pen…how freedom of words killed journalist for decades. But, she didn’t care or dare to do so. She wrote her last lines ‘and until, when people like us, fear talking of such things, rape, protest, atrocity, these will go on. We have to fight for lives not be tottered, a women’s body smacked, and I’d say them ‘kill us rather, for even if we hold crutches, we’ll linger awhile in the roads and keep protesting’.

Lyrical love

They met in the middle of a murky afternoon with the sun set high on mountains. The beauty of that day was undeniable and perfect for a romantic date. Both of them, coming from different backgrounds, races and culture acted like they’d met before. It was like their world comprised of that small window, they lived and happily in it. Only words seemed to meet the distance and suffice their insatiable hunger. This two people connected, touched, over-flooded with anger on each and then again sung on top of their lungs about the love they possessed, the most unnatural of all.

10 years ago

Crazy boy: Hello angel, anyone there?

Sweety pie: hmmm….how are you today love?

Crazy boy: I am fine only after I talk to you. I missed you so much throughout the day. I’d gone to tutor and it went quite boring. How was your exam, anyway?

Sweety pie: Yah, as usual jotil. So what are you doing now?

Crazy boy: collecting pictures for a slideshow. Remember saying me the other day how you love roses on your profile?

Sweety pie: Oh, yes…I don’t know what to say. Why do you care for me so much honey?

Crazy boy: For you are the girl who taught me to love. You were the one to make a significant difference in my life, you make me. I want to love you, marry you, have kids with you and grow old and die. Without you I’m nothing and nobody. I’m great and special for I’m with you.

Sweety pie: Sometimes I’m so much saddened with why was life so unjust to me. But having you in life is a blessing. Never leave me, please, until death tears us apart.

Crazy boy: I’ll love you forever…and forever. My love will never die but live eternal not decrease but rather increase in time.

He winked on the monitor. Some say that you are emotionless people if you fall in love with a girl on net. That’s not true, not all the time. Love is something that happens; you have no control over it. It is where you find it. And until you believe in love of any form never give up.


7 years ago

She silently waited there, in her full consciousness. He would soon arrive and it would be the first time they’ll personally meet. For like three years they just chatted on messenger and he seems to have no objection with virtual keepings. Zaira wore a black dress with her hair made into a bun, as he had stated his dream girl would be like. She waited insanely and as her heart beat increased, a silent wind swayed her lust. He gave a miss call. Sameer arrived with a bundle of flowers in his hands that fell down as soon as he saw Zaira.

Sameer: Zaira what are those crutches on your leg? How come you never told me about that…err…your leg??

Zaira: I’m sorry Sameer…I cheated you for my own selfishness. I was attacked by polio years back and from then am leading the life of a paralyzed. I couldn’t say, if you’d leave me.

Sameer: No, you should have believed me. My love is not the symbol of such occurrences. Those who are frauds will leave you, but I’ve loved you truly!

3 years ago

Sameer: I’ve decided to meet up with your parents and ask for their consent about our marriage. What do you say sweetheart?

Zaira: They are going to be a bit frustrated but then again, what I’m for. They’ll surely agree.

Sameer: So ready for the dinner? Oh…you put on the pink dress, looking gorgeous my princess.

Zaira: oh sweety, it’s your choices that make me so beautiful. I’ll also put on the locket with our picture.


They slammed the door behind and started for the road. Zaira’s best memories settle to be in this time when they walked on the golden fields, sat by the lake, made names on the sand and spoke on ears. Like a psalm of love. They now crossed the road, holding hands when Sameer got pushed by a truck. Zaira’s world crashed there and her dreams shattered.


Present times

As the 30 year old writer received flashbacks and shared her past with the big crowd…she tried not to cry. Finishing the speech and gluing what a very attentive troupe of people…she spoke slowly of what a tragic shock it is to lose someone you love. Her words seemed to speak for her. ‘While I look at the sky in the dark, the brightest star is him. He said to me that waiting is another part of love. And I’ll wait for him, forever and ever…’

The audience rushed into a big applause and a small pair of brother and sister got up on the stage gifting Zaira with a bunch of flowers…’you didn’t lose him, he’s up their’ said the boy pointing at something he wished was the sky. The innocence of a child.

Love never really dies, only we die when we have stopped loving
Fariha

(This is the best love story that I could possibly ever write and it shall remain consistently. Love, a feeling that keeps two souls together even after 50 years is the symphony of a sea when it's ebbs sing of freedom. Two people who had been two pillars of a the cathedral of true love are simply blessed- that's what I deemed when I stepped in my petrifying 13s and wrote this story that stirs my heart's ribcage even today because the power of love is so empowering. )