nafisa in the south

001

Grandma is awesome. My Nanu. She picked me up from the airport with her sister and the two of them have a game where they try to out-frail each other.  They’re full of crap because my Nanu is a boulder of a lady.  She cusses, yells, does way too much work for her age, has a real farmers tan …. damn it she talks about her village getting washed away and LAND.  So she goes, Ooooh me, oooohh my, I saw all these old bags come out of the airport (my grandmother is 75, this is her humor) and it gave me a lot of courage.  Her sister will be like, Are you sure, you didn’t forget to take your insulin?

This morning my cousin Tonu gets locked in his room and turns out, Nanu is a lock pick! She starts yellin, asks me if the mosquitos bit (“A few, it’s okay Nanu.” .. “Well that’s because youre an American! Us Bengoolies are used to getting bit up all our lives.” and her “bit up” sounds more like the metaphorical, we get screwed sense.) and so grandma takes the end of a spoon she’s sort of fashioned into a pick (now dont ask me how) and busts open the door.

Though I think it was force rather than technique that helped her win.  Damn.  That sentence sounded too meta than intended.  I love these folks.

Just this morning I had a long conversation with a cousin over tea, I was trying to instigate some stuff because I’m a bad person and curious, about women.  There’s a woman sweeping underneath my feet right now in fact.  I can talk to her daughters but I’m intimidated to talk to her.  Will do.  Especially if I’m working on a domestic workers billl.  My cousin was like,

I can’t even conceptualize running away from a marriage because there’s no instance where women can be alone.  If I ran away what would I do?  Nafisa, I can’t even sit in a park without people coming up to me asking if I’m lost.

This month will be goooood. 

    NAFISA IN DHAKA