City of Joy III: What areas are dangerous in Dhaka?

According to Safe City Index 2017, Dhaka is 58th among 60 surveyed cities (Digital Security 58, Health Security 59, Personal Security 43, Infrastructure Security 60). Chicago is 19th and New York is 21st. Only Yangon and Karachi come after Dhaka.

According to Numbeo, Dhaka is the 24th most crime-ridden city. Chicago is 38th and New York is 153rd. Karachi 47th, and Yangon is not on the list. According to a report in the Independent (UK), Dhaka is the 7th most dangerous megacity for women.

The 141 spots identified by Dhaka Metropolitan Police as the most dangerous are:

Maghbazaar-Motijheel: New Eskaton Road, Eskaton Garden Road, Dilu Road, Kakrail intersection, the area of ​​fisheries, the university area and the Doel Square. Dilkusha, Balaka Square, Dainik Bangla intersection, the Dhaka Stock Exchange area, Kamalapur Railway Station area, Fakirapul, Railway Hospital Road, Pirjangi Mazar, Shantinagar intersection, Notre Dame College Gate, Lane Fakirapul Gorom Panir Goli, Rajarbag in front of the telecom building, Ittefaq crossing , Nayapaltan Dgashani Goli, Purana Paltan Mallik Plaza in front of Notre Dame.

Uttara: Some roads in sectors 11 and 13 , Abdullahpur, House Building, Jasimuddin Road, airport and railway station areas.

Khilgaon-Rampura-Badda: Goran, Malibag, Chowdhury, Khilgaon Sohrab, Pallima Sangsad area, Bhuiyanpara Balur Maath, Rampura Bridge, TV Road, Merul Badda Market, North Badda Police Station Road, South Badda, Kuril Bishwa Road, Aftabnagar Iron Bridge, Central Badda Bepari Goli, Bazar Goli, East Badda Link Road and Graveyard Road.

Jatrabari-Kadamtali-shyampur: Bibi Gardens, Kutubkhali, North Jatrabarhi Kolapotti, Dayaganj intersection, Kazla fringe, Sayedabad Bus Terminal, Janapad Road, Dhalpur Citypolli, Jatrabari Graveyeard Road , near Jatrabari fish warehouse, Maniknagar, Mir Hazaribag Ghantighar, Jurain Balur Maath, Kudar Market, Medical Road, Kadamtali Wasa Road, Shyampur incline.

Gulshan-Banani: Gulshan lakeside, Niketan in front of Shooting Club, Kakali intersection, Banani kitchen market road, Korail slum, Banani flyover, the club and the soldier Chairmanbari area.

Dhanmondi-Mohammadpur: Dhanmondi 8 bridge, Jigatala bus stand, Kalabagan playground, Circular Road (Bhooter Goli), Mirpur Road, Asad Avenue, Aurangzeb Road, Kantasur, Bansgari, Mohammadpur Embankment, Dhaka Residential College area, Adabar road 14, Baitul Aman, Ring Road and Hazaribagh Embankment.

Mohakhali-Tejgaon: Mohakhali Bus Stand, in front of Kacha Bazaar, Tibet intersection, North Begunbari, Hatirjhil, Moghbazar intersection, in front of Malibagh Super Market, Karwan Bazar, grinaroda, Indira Road adjacent to the alley behind T&T office.

Mirpur: Mirpur Embankment from Shah Ali intersection to Dhaur, Mirpur 1 Circle, Mirpur 12 bus stand, south Manipur, Bauniya Bund, Bihari Colony, Agargaon intersection, in front of IDB building, Kalyanpur Housing Estate area, the road in front of Banglabandhu International Conference Centre, Agargaon crossing, Agricultural University area, Darus Salam, Mazar Road.

Old Dhaka: Chan Khar Pool, Tanti Bazaar, Shakhari Bazaar, Nimtali, Sadarghat, Babu Bazar, Kazi Riaz Uddin Road, Dholai Khal, Shahid Nagar and Kamrangir Char.

City of Joy II: How has Dhaka changed since 2008?

Dhaka is the fastest growing megapolis in the world, growing to become one of the top cities in the world in terms of size.

Two things about dhaka have increased dramatically in the last 8/9 years - wealth and population.

Dhaka, already the wealthiest settlement in Bangladesh, has received so much private sector attention and state facilitation that economic growth of Dhaka constantly remained the same till mid 2000s. It now grows even faster, and despite policies and state investment into outer regions increased dramatically in the last decade, Dhaka has maintains the same wealth ratio against rest of Bangladesh.

You would notice wealth everywhere - new movie theaters, shopping malls, car showrooms, spas and salons, hotels, restaurants and cafes, beautified city, beggar free zones (in fact beggars are now a vanishing breed, who appear in Ramadan to supplement whatever income they have in villages), resorts and clubs, amusement, imported brands, luxury apartment blocks, gated communities, school and university campuses… the list is endless.

There have been hundreds of them coming up since 2008, changing old neighborhoods and the cityscape forever. Many of the dilapidated blocks in the old town now features glass fronted banks and shops, shopping malls and superstores, as well as brand shops of the luxury kind. Many quint little parts of the city (like northern parts of Uttara, western parts of Mirpur etc.) are now busy hubspots with tall modern buildings. Many more 1–3 story buildings have been replaced with 10–12 story buildings, and as a result some of the more tightly built neighborhood streets to become narrow urban canyons.

Even cars, of which there are tens of thousands more than 2008, are not just second-hand Toyotas. From Geely cars to Mercedes cars - the choices are endless. Bicycles have come back, motorcycles are everywhere. More streets have banned rickshaws, while electric rickshaws are plying all over the periphery of the city. Black/blue cabs have almost vanished. Yellow cabs are run only by two companies. Uber and car rentals have taken over. And, there are way more flyovers. Home delivery and superstores now covers one third of Dhaka, a 100 times increase in a decade.

With all the wealth visible one would expect poverty to become negligible. It didn’t. Because, millions and millions of climate refugees escaping floods, cyclones, droughts and what not have arrived in Dhaka in the last decade, way more than any time in history. 40% of them live in informal shelters, 80% of them are engaged in informal economic activity. Life is tough for them. But, they still share the general optimism that a flourishing economy brings. Housemaids, once a common feature of every household, and porters, a common feature for almost every public place are dwindling fast in numbers, as neither are consistent with the status they seek.

Informal business is the key. 45% of Dhaka economy is still these micro-enterprises, though the sectors are often different from 2008. Once a ubiquitous feature of every street corner, the common cigarette and candy sellers are becoming increasingly rare, while the once popular modes of transport - the “tempo” or the “hauler” are also vanishing.

This tremendous building boom and population increase has taken toll on the infrastructure. Newer neighborhoods are not getting piped gas, and older neighborhoods are suffering from chronic shortage of water. Safety and security is also lower than before, for four reasons - (a) government affiliated organizations and persons; (b) diverting law enforcement resources to fight terrorism; (c) a corrupt police empowered by extra-judicial power, while the judiciary remains low priority; and (d) extra population that makes governance almost impossible. This has led to a serious decrease in outdoor events like concerts and fairs, as well as serious discouragement of celebrations like international new year and baul festivals.

SHADOWS (Chapter 3): It's hard to hold a candle in the cold November rain

Edvard Munch, The Scream

What shall I do now?  What shall I do?
I shall rush out as I am, and walk the street
With my hair down, so.
What shall we do tomorrow?
What shall we ever do?
— Wasteland, T.S. Eliot


I found me sitting on a box covered with a dusty and torn carpet still staring at the crystal jar, not seeing anything in particular, as if I was coming back from a nightmare. Or maybe I was waking up into the nightmare. I tried guessing how long I have been lost in thoughts, not a bad place to get lost in. Difficult. Shafts of light that poured in were still burning with the warmth of the sun, dust particles fleeting in a gray mist. The next door cat whined like it always did, a very irritating cat that one. Some heavy vehicle roared down the street that was invisible from here, I judged it to be a truck.

And, then it moved. Oh my bloody sisterlicking brotherblowing motherfucking GOD! It moved.

Unnoticeably, softly, slowly… the head opened its eyes, and stared back at me in a hollow and blank uncomprehending meaningless stare. I knew severed heads were not supposed to open eyes that suddenly, I never heard of that kind of rigor mortis in my life. Mesmerized I kept staring at it. It was a stalemate. I did nothing. The head did nothing. Every motion frozen in time, like so much refrigerated lobsters, two heads, one attached to a body and the other without any such commitment, stayed unblinking with eyes locked. Meeeow – it was that nagging stupid cat that broke the spell. I shifted my gaze to my hands, yes, as I felt there was something I held very tight in a double handed grip. Must have been something I picked up when I sat on the box. It was a girl’s bag in tatters – red and black, leather and hemp, with a braided strap and a bell metal buckle… instantly recognizable.

One thing always unfailingly and invariably leads to another. This time the bag led me to a great crossing. The train of memories passed through the great barrier, and, I remembered her face. Ash’s face. That face was a curious concoction that I would never dare to understand – austere like a tava-baked plain flatbread, handed out off a roadside eatery for truckers, or festive like a bowl of Kachi Akhni, the biriyani coming right of the Nizam’s kitchen sporting 50 varieties of meat – changing shades in an instant, and always inexplicably. Tired eyes that sparkled like the night sky whenever she flashed a smile, full lips that always looked a bit chaffed but never felt so when she kissed, cheeks that never could decide between sinking and blushing – the wonders never ceased. And, she lived in a perpetual twilight of fear. She believed no one. Not even me. Not that she had any reason to believe me in any damn way. It was almost like she lived in my shadow, a shadow that only stunk of death and debauchery. Sweet and sad, she still clung on to me.

It was Ash’s face that was looking back at me from inside the jar.

I felt like I was hit by the train that just made the crossing straight in the face, full blast, wheels cranking, rails screeching, winds hissing past. Boom. I started to scream, a completely involuntary and desperate wail of terror and anguish. I screamed on until blood spurted out of my mouth and my nose. Damn! I surely had ruptured some stuff inside. Blood trickled down the side of my neck. Warm and sticky. I toppled off the box headfirst into the dust. And, I lay there. No strength left in me to stir an inch. Then the head chuckled. No, really, Ash chuckled. She never laughed once in all the years she was with me like she did now. Eerie and sarcastic, not an aorta of humor there.

I lay stiff on the floor waiting for Ash to stop chuckling.

SHADOWS (Chapter 2): There's no one left to blame so never mind the darkness

René Magritte, The Lovers

From the old familiar faces and
Their old familiar ways
To the comfort of the strangers
Slipping out before they say
So long
— Run Baby Run, Sheryl Crow

That’s when I found an interesting fact about memories. They are like those Russian dolls, the big one opens to a smaller one, which opens to an even smaller one, and so on. I kept opening pieces of memory only to find more inside, waiting to be opened in an endless journey taking me further, deeper down the roads long forgotten. That winter noon led me to that crow, and then another that I remembered lying on a roadside, guts spilling out, ants making a feast on half-rotting intestines that already were sporting a sickening shade of teal.

I remembered the mountain goat that my mom kept as a pet bleating at the sight of the crow. Well, a goat will always be a goat, and it followed me on most days on my way to school. So bloody humiliating it seemed at the time. That was before we left the little town that saw me running down my first soccer field, falling off my first bicycle, choking on my first chocolate fudge. I remembered taking the first drag on my first smoke at that very town. I vividly remembered the peas my mom served me that night. Amber peas floating on pearly melted goat cheese making acquaintances with crab meat and some sour sauce. Those were quieter days. Gentle. Calm. Laid back. Monotonous.

That was before I started to run. And, those were bad days. Real bad. Abes died, Shib died, and Saif too. It rained death. Death hung over us like filthy sunset clouds painted with factory slime, red and black and gray and gang green. Raja vanished, never to be heard or seen again. Murad got caught. He was tired of running. And, Pat… ah! Pat. They said he turned insane. They said he had an intimate encounter with the divine. They said he was just pretending a lot of fluff and stuff. But, they always were ignorant. Nobody knew Pat, not even us. He liked it that way.

When did the run begin? I didn’t know, probably sometime after I was done with my medical studies. Why were we running? I didn’t want to remember. Too painful, muddled and stupid. Not worth it. When did it end? Now, that I recalled with the sharp precision of a surgeon’s scalpel freshly bathed in glutaraldehyde. I stopped running when Raja’s kid sister Ash appeared at my door, slightly out of breath, somewhat trembling, heavily drenched in rain, and totally demolished by the look in her eyes. She came to seek a shelter, and I was the only one left of us. And, she looked heartstopping beautiful. So vulnerable, yet so ravishingly adorable.

I packed up, and moved to the city, bringing her along. It was a very small bag that she carried all her stuff in, as if she was ready to run again. Probably she had do some amount of running to before she reached me. She never talked about it. I remembered the bag – red and black, leather and hemp, with a braided strap and a bell metal buckle shaped like a hippie peace sign, three zippered pockets in the front. The rush of the memory train hit a wall exactly at that moment. How in the fucking hell did I forget what she looked like? I remembered everything – the breeze, the fragrance of her hair, the coolie who helped me get my heavier luggage into the taxi, the warm tarmac, the sun shining down hard… even the color of her nail polish (black, it was always black). Not her face.

SHADOWS (Chapter 1): When I look into your eyes I can see a love restrained

Willem de Kooning, Attic

Leaving the things that are real behind
Leaving the things that you love from mind
All of the things that you learned from fears
Nothing is left for the years
— Toys in the Attic, Aerosmith


It was a head, a human head, severed from the rest of the body, and perfectly pickled in olive oil, mustard and rock salt. It floated gently in a crystal jar among bay leaves, cinnamon, clove and cardamom, eyes closed in a perpetual expression of bliss. There was sodium ascorbate mixed in the olive oil for preservation, like they do for canned apples and tuna. It could use a little chili and pepper, probably a twist of lemon. But, I didn’t know that.

All I knew was I had a head floating in a jar, a goddamn motherfucking head, perched in my attic between a pile of old vinyl records – Frank Sinatra, Duke Ellington, Ella Fitzgerald, and Louis Armstrong – and a box full of old yellowing letters carrying the mundane from fading friends – “hello, I’m in Greece now”, and “last night my dog passed away”, and “Shifat is getting married to Jihan”, and whatnot. The very right end of the shelf was piled high with poetry books (no, I don’t like poems) – mostly Sylvia Plath (“We are meek/ We are edible”) and Edgar Allan Poe (“All that we see or seem/ Is but a dream within a dream”). The left end was a total anarchy of porcelain figurines – a Gujju folk dancer, Ming the Merciless, the Little Mermaid, a group of Maasai hunters, Sherlock Holmes… and more of that accumulated from around the world (nah! I was never much of a traveler myself). In the very middle was a head without a body.

And, I had no clue how it came there.

Did I put it there? Did someone leave it accidentally? Perhaps that someone left it on purpose. What could be the purpose? Ummm… that someone probably needed a safe place to hide it. Hide it? Why would someone hide something prepared so lovingly, with such care? Besides, no one from the old days knew where I was, what I was doing, or even what I called myself. Could it be that it was placed there to implicate me? But… wouldn’t that purpose be served as effectively if it was not pickled? Hell, I didn’t know, and the head made no sense.

Where the hell did you come from, sweetheart, and why exactly?

The head didn’t answer, of course. So I put it back on the shelf again, and couldn’t help noticing the way the shelf was rusting away. Woodworms, damp and dust – this shelf wouldn’t hold much longer – I thought for a moment. Then – okay, so what’s wrong with this picture? I had a rusting shelf in an attic, covered with dust, and hosting myriads of knickknacks, old letters and older records, and a head floating in a crystal jar, pickled and peaceful. Did I see anything wrong there? Well… just a little detail. Everything was covered with a thick layer of dust, but the jar.

Yes, it was clean, at least cleaner than the rest of the stuff there. Surely that head couldn’t have come here a long time back. Hey ho, it was freshly pickled, or that’s what it looked like. I stood fixed in front of the head, staring straight into its closed eyes. It wouldn’t open those eyes, though. Memories started trickling in, sipping slowly upwards to consciousness. Those winter noons, sitting with mom on the porch, swimming in the heady aroma of pickles put out to the sun, thinking how to bring down the crow making funny faces at pickle jars. The sun shone, having no alternative, on the nothing new. She loved to cook, for the family and for guests, and she always was eager to spread the joy of culinary adventures around. She was a wonderful woman. Like all moms, well… most moms. No complaints.

If European kingdoms united to conquer the Middle East in the medieval time

This army against that army? You must be joking

During then high middle ages, Europe was divided into small feuding kingdoms, duchies and principalities, most as small as 200–300 square kilometres, with the Holy Roman Empire as the largest state (naturally the crusades were largely led by the Holy Romans). Confederated armies of these small states was so ineffective that it took them four centuries conquer back the Iberian Peninsula (the entire Middle East east had 400 times more land and 300 times more people than the peninsula).

By the end of the misadventures of Richard the Lion Heart, Middle East was pretty well organised by Seljuk Empire, Timurid Empire and Abbasid Empire. It would mean a ragtag army without a command structure going against some of the most organised armies in the world.

If you could still gather an army with an effective command structure, it would be clearly have two components - knights (5% of the army) and peasants (95% of the army). None of the peasants went into battle on their own. They did not know how to fight, had no intention to fight, and were very poorly fed and dressed to be effective in a battlefield. That is the reason why in every battle in Europe all belligerent parties lost large number of soldiers very quickly.

Those feuding commanders with the army of unfed peasants, if they could gather, together would then have faced a longest supply line possible over hostile territories. In the way of the army there stood either the Mediterranean or the Byzantine Empire, the biggest adversary of the Holy Romans, up to 14th century, and then by the Muslim Ottoman Empire since 14th century. Getting a horse or a soldier fed, a weapon mended or wounded soldier treated would be perfectly impossible. Every day of fight would take that army closer to annihilation, not victory.

On top of it they had the quick moving, agile Saracen soldiers who lived by the sword from early childhood. If the European army managed to get past the Byzantines and the Seljuk Turks, they would have faced the Mongol and Persian armies of the Timurid Empire, as well as the desert warriors from Bedouin tribes of Arabia, masters of hit-and-run campaigns.

The elite soldiers, i.e. the Teutonic Knights, wore 50 kilograms of metal armour that not only could slow the soldier down by two thirds, and fried the skin of the soldier in sweltering desert heat. The Slavs and Norse were anyways completely ineffective in hotter southern territories. Throughout the medieval times they never won a war in the southern regions. Middle Eastern did not need to fight them, they just could wait for them to boil in the armours or die of hunger and thirst.

The army of peasants would be a very small army compared to the Middle Eastern, as 30%-60% of those hapless peasants were dead in the Black Plague. The entire population Europe was little more than 50 millions, and most of them were children as life expectancy was less than 30 years. They would have been fighting a population of 70–90 millions with a life expectancy of more 35 years. Even if they could gain a quick hold of the coastal areas, a protracted war would only have meant a Europe further depopulated.

Europeans were very good at getting in the medieval times. In the 13th century the Mongol Hordes had already put the entire Eastern European military to shame by cutting them down like grass, knights included. After the Black Plague and Mongol Invasion, these Slavic armies would have been in no shape to join capture one Middle Eastern waterhole, let alone the entire Middle East.

Finally, the people of Middle East would have fought very hard for their homes and their land, as they would have had no place to go to if they lost. Every wadi, every dune, and every village would have become like Stalingrad in WWII, where the might of the Nazi storm troopers stopped at the door of unyielding Russians, a battle that changed the tides of that war.

In short, if the European Kingdoms tried conquering the “entire Middle East” it would mean total destruction of Europe, not the Middle East. Every last European soldier would have either died of hit, hunger, thirst, Saracen swords, and Mongol arrows. With everyone able to lift a sword dead in the deserts of Arabia, Europe would have become an walk over for North African Moors and the Mamulk Sultanate.

How Profound 😛

Lean On by Major Lazer & DJ Snake keeps bursting forth from the damned speakers. One drunk girl hugs another drunk, "I need someone to lean on. And, that's you." The other girls tumbles and sways. The first girl complains, "How do I lean on to you if you keep tumbling and swaying like that?"

Then they both fall.