About Him 3 - Last Look Back

He packed his items in a small bag, when he gets to London he will have to buy thick winter clothing, because the weather at that time was freezing cold. This was in 1988, when he just turned 6 years old. He packed one jumper, two shirts, one trousers and two vests. The vests were for bed time, and generally everyone wore them in bangladesh, that is all males for all occasions, and sometimes would wear anything over them aswell. The small room his mother used to feed him secretly, was packed with people, who came to say their goodbyes. He was not at all fazed by all the people who were excited and chatting, crying and holding his hands. He could only think about what's over the mountains, one long walk through them and he'll end up in London.

Walking out of the room, he stood on the pavement and looked up at the trees reaching the sky, and thought, 'I will miss all these trees, with their fruits falling to the ground.' At which point he remembered the times when it used to thunder and one of his aunties used to wake them all up before dawn to go running out to the trees and pick up all the fruit, bring them back and eat the ripe ones, and make chutneys out of the unripened ones. He thought he would take one last walk around the village, and see how he leaves it, if he comes back then he will try to spot the differences.

As he left the house for a walk, all the young children followed him everywhere he went, wearing torn grey vests and shorts, or nothing at all. He was looking for a girl he wanted to say bye to, who lived at the end row of house in the village.

Her name was Lippi, and they both went to school and mosque together always. He knows he will miss her, because she was always there for him for anything he needed. He asked his aunt who lived at the end row of houses, and she said Lippi has gone visiting her cousins in another village. He felt guilty because he couldn't say goodbye to her earlier. Anyway, he carried on walking towards the open fields, with the other children still following him everywhere he went.

The graveyard was an open place, without any fences or walls, and animals could go in and eat the grass, basically roam around freely. He walked over to see his mother's grave, and pray for her. He knelt down and put his hands together, said his prayers and started walking back to the village. As he was walking back, he could remember a time when he and his young uncle were playing aroung the graveyard and they realised hearing some noises coming from the ground. Thinking it was an earthquake, the held one anothers hands and were looking around to see what was happening. They realised an area of the graveyard was slowly shaking and starting to crack open, with the ground coming up in the shape of a volcano. They got closer and suddenly there was an earpiercing sound and the grave that had cracked up had vicious flames coming out! They were very afraid and started to run back to the village shouting and running as fast they could. when they got there, they told everyone they could find and all the men grabbed spades and other digging equipment, ran towards the graveyard. He and his uncle followed them, and because they couldn't run fast enough as they were very young, by the time they got there, they saw that the men had digged up the grave and were wondering who was buried in there and what had actually happened.

The luggages were packed and put safely in the boat. As they were leaving the village, walking towards the boat, hundreds of people were following them. Some were crying, others were whispering. He was walking holding his grandmother's hand, with his stepmother following behind with his sister in her arms. His uncle, aunt and cousin got into the boat, after saying their goodbyes. His dad came near him and they touched ech others noses with their nose. His dad said, 'If you say goodbye then walk off without looking back again. Keep in touch, and don't forget Allah, always remember who you are and become a good person where other people will look up to you, and respect you. The most important thing is, don't put a black mark against our family name.'

He said his goodbyes to everyone and turned around, walking towards the boat, didn't look back and walked onto the boat.

The destination was London. He slept all the way through the boat trip to Sylhet, then the train trip to Dhaka. The next thing he remembers is being sick on the plane, not eating any food, although the air hostesses tried everything, even fish and chips. Nothing worked, and he kept on being sick and became very ill.

His image of walking through the mountains to reach London was all he could think of, but as long as he reached his destination, he would be happy, not knowing what he will encounter next.