Balling in Bangladesh...
It would be so much easier to come home.
So much easier to leave this place, leave the responsibility, leave the pain and the suffering and the constant stench of rotting and sweat and feces.
So much easier to not have to deal with the poverty, the homelessness, the severely disabled, the orphans, the diseased, the malnourished.
So much easier to go back to my big house in the right suburb, my new car with expensive gadgets, my comfortable, well paid job on the top floor with a window seat.
So much easier not to have to be here.
So yes, I do continuously ask myself why I’m here…
The answer is pretty simple, really; I play basketball in the afternoons at the Gulshan Youth Club, which is just a soccer field surrounded by a wall. There’s a tennis court and a basketball court tucked in the back. Garbage, organic waste and feces surrounds the basketball court. There’s a little boy who lives in the corner. Not on the corner, in a house or an apartment, not even in a tent or a make-shift shelter. Literally just in the corner of this little compound. Every afternoon that I show up, he runs over and plays with me. He is no more than 5 years old, yet he barely makes it past my knees. He shoots around with me, he chases the ball, he plays defence, he tries to get around me and score… and he smiles, he laughs, every time he gets the ball in the hoop, every time I block his shot, every time I show him a cross over or a juke… he smiles and he laughs, and at the end of the night, when the sun is about to lay its head to rest, he wishes me good night and we go our separate ways until the next time…
That’s why I’m here. Because this place broken-spirited at the moment, There’s no more honest way of saying it. They say Afghanistan is full of children, but very little childhood. The same can be said about Bangladesh. So that’s why I’m here. This place is broken-spirited at the moment, and I couldn’t face myself in the mirror if I wasn’t here at least trying to play my part to renew that spirit.
So much easier to leave this place, leave the responsibility, leave the pain and the suffering and the constant stench of rotting and sweat and feces.
So much easier to not have to deal with the poverty, the homelessness, the severely disabled, the orphans, the diseased, the malnourished.
So much easier to go back to my big house in the right suburb, my new car with expensive gadgets, my comfortable, well paid job on the top floor with a window seat.
So much easier not to have to be here.
So yes, I do continuously ask myself why I’m here…
The answer is pretty simple, really; I play basketball in the afternoons at the Gulshan Youth Club, which is just a soccer field surrounded by a wall. There’s a tennis court and a basketball court tucked in the back. Garbage, organic waste and feces surrounds the basketball court. There’s a little boy who lives in the corner. Not on the corner, in a house or an apartment, not even in a tent or a make-shift shelter. Literally just in the corner of this little compound. Every afternoon that I show up, he runs over and plays with me. He is no more than 5 years old, yet he barely makes it past my knees. He shoots around with me, he chases the ball, he plays defence, he tries to get around me and score… and he smiles, he laughs, every time he gets the ball in the hoop, every time I block his shot, every time I show him a cross over or a juke… he smiles and he laughs, and at the end of the night, when the sun is about to lay its head to rest, he wishes me good night and we go our separate ways until the next time…
That’s why I’m here. Because this place broken-spirited at the moment, There’s no more honest way of saying it. They say Afghanistan is full of children, but very little childhood. The same can be said about Bangladesh. So that’s why I’m here. This place is broken-spirited at the moment, and I couldn’t face myself in the mirror if I wasn’t here at least trying to play my part to renew that spirit.
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