Glorious and Free, O...

I spent Canada Day cycling through tea gardens in ninety degree heat. Alana and I were up in Srimangal, the tea capital of Bangladesh, for a last hurrah vacation weekend. We stayed in the relatively posh Tea Resort and spent our days avoiding tour touts in favour of “busting it out on our own.”

Acquiring Goods
Canada Day began by packing a knapsack and leaving the Tea Resort by foot. The objective was to catch a local bus, of the loud-honking and jam-packed variety. One appeared within minutes and after paying 2 taka we found ourselves beside women in burquas, bouncing along in “the Jesus seat” (the front seat, so named because in the event of a crash, you will be first at the pearly gates). Ten minutes into Srimangal, a mid-sized town that looks the same as every other Bangladeshi town: busy, full of rickshaws and the familiar repertoire of mishti, grocery, and furniture shops. We walk around, taking furtive peeks at The Lonely Planet which I hide beneath my orna. Eventually we find a closed store that Alana identifies as “Classic Tours.” To kill time until its ten o’clock opening we buy cold water from a dejected Argentina supporter and take a rickshaw tour of the main strip. We also buy two handwoven rice paddy hats, apparently the uniform of Srimangal rickshaw wallahs, but also with a wide, colonial-safari type brim.

At ten o’clock Classic Tours turns out to be Classic Tailors, so we rent bikes from a suspicious little man at Hotel Tea Town; we are convinced that the bikes were coerced from random bystanders. However, we pay our three dollars and take the bikes anyway—the Chinese, one-speed, Mary Poppins bikes with high seats and cheerful bells. With our hats and bikes and shalwar kameezes, we head off to the hills.

Lost at the BTRI
This is worth noting: there are actually small hills in this part of northeastern part of Bangladesh—technically the foothills of the foothills of the Himalayas. There are also large wild sections of untouched forest, even a national rainforest park, dense with fat trees, vines and that ubiquitous electric green foliage. But the most prominent feature of this area is the tea gardens, beautiful hills of carefully tiered dark green bushes. These gardens spread for miles around Srimangal, dotted with the colourful sharis of the women workers, who pick tea leaves for 60 cents a day.



We drive past dozens of these gardens before turning right at the Bangladesh Tea Research Institute. We find carefully manicured test plots and lawns, but also some very tempting dirt paths leading deeper into the garden. As we begin to explore, we are stopped by an overseer, a thin Hindu man carrying a black umbrella. We needn’t have worried about a reprimand, the man was just happy to talk. Through Alana’s translation (thank God for her Bangla) we learn that this man emigrated from Pakistan at age 10 to work at these tea gardens. “It was better when you British were in charge,” he tells us. “The wages were better and we could buy good food in those days. Your sahibs used to give our children poisha (cents) to buy biscuits.” Since we are wearing the colonial hats Alana and I don’t bother to correct him. Instead, we smile, press our hands to a “Nomoskar” and bike away.

The dirt paths are fascinating. Up and down the tea garden hills, each hard-won hill revealing another green vista. We are addicted, and navigation takes a back seat, hence we find ourselves stranded on a white sand riverbank, looking desperately to our main road destination up and beyond the ravine. We are hot. We haven’t brought enough water. Our kameezes are soaked through with sweat. While thinking of what to do, we spot a young tea worker above on the ravine. After the obligatory strange-foreigner stare, he hops down the sandy/muddy/treacherous ravine to portage our bikes up, much to our relief. We press our hands together again and, since we still have our colonial hats on, we give him some taka for his efforts.

Our main road is in sight now, but before we are home-free another overseer stops us. This one has a car, a cane, and doesn’t look like a storyteller. “How did you get over there?” he asks. Alana and I communicate telepathically, and decide not to engage. He asks again, “Where are you staying?” but we are on the move, whizzing by his car. I respond rather cheekily in Bangla: “oy dikay!” the equivalent of saying “thataway!” We hit the pavement and zoom off, feeling like little rapscallions.



A Cultural Programme
Noon to three is too hot to bike. We eat curry then read in our room. At three o’clock we head out again, looking for a Monipuri tribal village called Ramnagar. Everyone assures us it is easy to get to, so we happily putter along this gorgeous flat road, stopping periodically to take pictures of jackfruit haulers and giggling school girls. The weather is glorious—extremely hot of course—but bright bright green and bright bright blue. Every few minutes we make a joyful noise.

The villagers are mightily amused. They think we are exceptionally strange; not only are we women on bikes, but we are white women in funny hats on bikes. Men wave and hoot, while women smile and touch their foreheads in a salaam. An older man on a bike offers to take us to Ramnagar, so off the beaten path we go, off into rice paddies again, and into a cluster of mud houses.

It turns out this isn’t Ramnagar, but another Monipuri village. The first person we see is a toddler, alone in his back yard. We wave cheerfully and he stares for three full seconds before screaming in terror and running away. I suppose we were his first white people. We continue to bike, but begin to wonder how we should interact with the rest of the villagers. We came because we were curious about a different Bangladeshi culture, but we would like to do more than just stare, like we are constantly stared at. We bike carefully past fenced homes and gardens, and then stop at a pond where some teenagers are washing their clothes.

Conversation is stilted. We say hello and ask friendly questions about families and houses, all the while observing their different appearances. The Monipuri look more east Asian, maybe Burmese, and they wear different clothes, like long straight skirts and half-shari ornas. Meanwhile we are under the same scrutiny, two sweaty red-faced foreigners in rumpled shalwar kameezes. What do we want from each other?

Then a svelte young boy hops out of the water. He’s maybe fifteen, with a bowl-cut and a plaid lungi. “Would you like to see a Monipuri dance?” he asks us. Alana and I exchange glances. Really, we weren’t exactly going to ask the natives to dance for our amusement. We were wearing the colonial hats, yes, but we were also way more politically correct and sensitive than that. The boy, however, is insistent: “Please come along! We have a dance rehearsal this afternoon.” The others in the water nod their encouragement, so the foreigners exchange another glance.

Minutes later, we find ourselves in the dance teacher’s home, drinking Tang and eating chanachur. She tells us about how famous the Monipuri dances are, and how they are practicing for a big show in Dhaka. We are then ushered into the clean packed-mud courtyard, where the boy returns, accompanied by a sweet-faced girl of the same age. The community’s boom box is set up to our left and the teacher cues the music.

They are wonderful dancers, light and fast on their feet. Alana and I sit there in amazement as they skip and sway to at least four numbers, solo and together. The late afternoon sun is still so hot, but every wrist flick and step is done with smiling, confident accuracy. We applaud heartily, along with other villagers who have gathered to watch the rehearsal.

This half-hour is charmed. Caught up in the beauty and absurdity, we have to jolt ourselves awake in order to leave. They ask us to stay, but we have a long ride back to Srimangal before night and storm clouds catch up with us. We take their address to send them pictures, thank them profusely, then zip off. I mean, we tour a local handloom facility, admire Monipuri fabric, play with some babies, and then we zip off.

It’s a wild ride back to Srimangal. Monsoon clouds chase us, and we have a deadline to meet back at Hotel Tea Town. Alana and I put our Bangladeshi driving skills to the test; we pass rickshaws and cows, dinging our bells furiously, and hold our ground when the big buses past. Of course we keep making joyful noises, and this is what gets us back to Hotel Tea Town with fifteen minutes to spare. What a thrill! We take a rickshaw back to the resort, where we meet up with three very classy Bengali ladies who we befriended on our train trip up. They have had a civilized day at a popular waterfall, and had apparently seen us biking on the road, out in the sun with our local hats. We grin at the note of condescension; we much prefer to be savages!



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I'm back in Dhaka, packing and farewelling and feeling fairly stunned. What a wonderful time I've had here! How many thoughts are forming, unresolved, or unexpressed! How hard it is to say goodbye!