Monsoon Season

I haven’t actually seen the recent film Monsoon Wedding but my impression from the trailer is that it involves a lot of slow-motion dancing in the rain, some smouldering stares, and much flinging of marigolds. So far, the monsoon in Dhaka has not been nearly this romantic. Both Alana and I have moderate cases of cabin fever, wherein our heads loll about and our work productivity goes kaput. Several mornings, as Alana has made slurred conversation over granola, I have gently asked whether she was nipping from her Duty Free alcohol stash—she could tell me, I am a friend. “No,” says Alana, “it’s just the monsoon. It’s hot. I haven’t been sleeping. I get a little nutty during the monsoon.”

Obviously, it rains a lot during the monsoon season. It can rain fiercely in a sudden downpour, or it can just spit for a while. Usually there are one or two rain outbursts a day, and these can feel wonderfully cathartic. We play something epic on the iPod (Arcade Fire?) and throw imaginary marigolds from our balcony. It’s not the rain that’s the problem. It’s the constant hug of the unwelcome humidity, like a clingy younger cousin whose love you do not reciprocate. This humidity love expresses itself by blossoming mould patches on our clothing (if you let it sit for say, three days). Or the humidity love appears on your upper lip as beads of sweat; “why am I sweating here?” you wonder, “I am not a gross old man.” Humidity love tries to get your attention this way.

Humidity finds a much better match in Bangladeshi foliage. When this wet season comes, Bangladesh’s trees, flowers, and rice paddies all shift to the same colour swatch—eye-popping green. “Hooray!” they say, “We are lush and fertile!” It’s hard to be cynical in the face of this celebration, especially if one is riding through this landscape on one’s very first motorcycle ride, just after the rain, and the world really does seem fresh and beautiful.


Really, I was thrilled out of my mind here, as you can tell from my kindergarten smile. This was my very last field visit, along a muddy road to a remote Sherpur village.



I don’t think Bangladeshis even notice that the monsoon is happening, so obsessed are they with the World Cup. There were Argentinean flags all down this street.



I turned 90 degrees from “The Land of Argintina” and saw these two wives in burkas. When I showed them their picture they simultaneously exclaimed “Allah!” This is a common expression of surprise, one that our missionary neighbour’s three-year-old has picked up from his Bangladeshi preschool: “Allah! I can’t find my Finding Nemo book!”