Day-Trippin’: In and Around Dhaka

Another holiday in the offing; another vacation to plan. However, instead of having to splurge on trips abroad and getting shepherded around when stuck with cheap, guided tours, it’s time to instead look around the city. Recent years have seen numerous resorts mushrooming all around the outskirts of the city making them perfect for a day trip. While some of them offer world class amenities, others fall behind. This week, Star Lifestyle directs you towards the best destinations around the city, for an easy and convenient vacation without having to drain too much of your resources.
Jamuna Resort
Close to Dhaka, with the trip taking around 3 hours if the traffic Gods smile upon you, Jamuna Resort has long been the weekend getaway spot. Scenic and charming, specially during the rainy season, the resort lies close to the Jamuna river and offers both trekking and boating activities. An added excitement is the presence of the famous Bengal Monitor Lizard, locally known as Gui Saap, a relatively harmless but exceptionally beautiful creature which nests right in the resort. Rooms consist of Bungalows and Deluxe Bungalows costing from 5,000-10,000 taka. Jamuna Resort also arranges transport for their visitors if asked beforehand. They can be contacted at their head office located in Pragati-RPR Centre (7th floor) 20-21, Kawran Bazar, Dhaka 1215, Bangladesh, tel: 8142971-3.
Nokkhottro Bari
Conceptualised by Bipasha Hayet and Taukir Ahmed , Nokkhottrobari recreates the romanticised notion of village life for city dwellers. The peace, tranquillity and greenery of rural surroundings merges with the urban solidity, reflecting in the architecture as thatched roofs lay atop concrete structures. There are numerous accommodations including complexes, bungalows and camping tents to select from. The option of a jacuzzi and swimming pool add another star to this serene resort. Lazing water-bodies and green fields surround the area, bringing the respite every vacation desires. All this on top of numerous other activities on offer. Nokkhottrobari is located at Sreepur, Gazipur. For more information check out their website: http://www.nokkhottro bari.com.bd. Room rates, as usual, depend on seasons and what’s on offer but usually cost 5000 taka and upwards.
Angana
Just an hour’s drive from Shahjalal Airport, nestled in the villages of Surjonarayanur in Kapashia lies Angana Resort. Angana, meaning a very beautiful woman, is different from other similar resorts in the attention it pays to blending creature comforts with the glories of Mother Nature. An elaborate fountain, spotted with pink flamingos greets you at the entrance. Ahead lies the sprawling complex, part villa and part old-school landlord bungalow. Angana is perfect for a day-trip given the variety of activities it provides. Pony rides, a deer park, badminton court and picnic facilities are all available. The quiet village setting provides a much needed break from the usual rural countryside dotted with factories. The resort also has high security and there is plenty of food to eat. Seventeen air-conditioned rooms are all available for selection in one huge area, making it a perfect for a family getaway. When boredom sets in, there’s always a boat trip to look forward if lazing around the pool isn’t what you rather prefer.
Keep in mind all of these places still need advance booking so make sure to do so. Carry plenty of snacks on you since resort food tends to be expensive. If time permits, grab a meal outside the resort in the one of the numerous local restaurants around. Take a few packs of Eno if you wish to indulge. It’s your holiday, so make the best of it.

“NOKSHA MILONMELA

Leading Bengali newspaper Prothom Alo’s lifestyle supplement Noksha celebrated its 15th birthday on Tuesday, 8 October at the Pan Pacific Sonargaon Grand Ballroom. The program was both intimate and star-studded. Actors, musicians, fashion designers, models, artists, beauty experts, sports personalities, influential women leaders and other stakeholders who have been involved with Noksha over the years were all present. The event started off with a fashion show depicting the six seasons of Bangladesh. There were some musical performances as well. Celebrities also made their way on stage and shared their thoughts and memories regarding Prothom Alo, Noksha and Lux. The aim of the night was to be an informal, social event. In the end, the presence of so many glamorous personalities guaranteed that the night would be much more than that. Noksha has provided a platform for many aspiring designers, models, TV personalities and others over its life span as a part of such a vastly circulated Bengali newspaper, and hopes to be bigger and better in the future.

Meaty fiesty

Hunter beef
Ingredients:
2 kg Beef (roast cut)
3 tsp Black pepper
4 tsp brown sugar or molasses
4 black cardamom
1 large piece cinnamon
Salt to taste
1 cup raw papaya (paste)
3 tbsp lemon juice
1 cup vinegar Method:
Wash and clean the meat. Pat dry. Grind together all the dry ingredients. Mix this spice powder together the remaining ingredients to form a paste. Rub the paste on the meat thoroughly, and prick it throughout with a fork. Place the meat and marinade in container, cover and refrigerate. Repeat this process for 3 days (pricking the meat once each day). Place the meat in a large pot and pour in 3 cups of water.
Cover and cook over very low heat, turning the meat occasionally so that it is cooks evenly on all sides, until the water is fully absorbed.
Use one day after cooking. Hunter beef tastes great in sandwiches.
Easy nihari
Ingredients:
1 kg (cut into 4 to 6 large pieces) beef
1½ kg knuckle/marrow bones
250g ghee/oil
1 cup onions (finely sliced)
1½ tsp garlic paste
2 tsp ginger paste
1 packet shan nihari curry mix
100-150g wheat flour Method:
In a large pot, heat 150g ghee or oil, and add in garlic paste, ginger paste and ½ cup onions. Stir for a minute and add the meat, bones and Shan Nihari Mix. Fry for a few more minutes then add 10 to 12 cups of water. Cover and cook over very low heat for about 6 to 8 hours, or until the meat is tender. Mix together the wheat flour with 3 cups of water. Add this to the pot gradually, stirring constantly so that it mixes evenly. Remove the bones and cook on over high heat for 15 more minutes. Heat the remaining oil or ghee, and fry the other ½ cup of onions in it until golden brown. Add the fried onions to the nihari, cover and simmer for another 30 minutes over low heat. Garnish with finely chopped green chillies, sliced ginger and lime juice.
Leg of lamb with saffron
Ingredients:
1 (about 1 kg to 1½ kg) leg of lamb
2 garlic cloves (crushed)
2cm piece fresh ginger (sliced)
Lemon juice (fresh)
1tbsp saffron
A pinch sugar
A pinch salt
½ tsp chilli powder
125g yoghurt
4 tbsp olive oil
2 onions (sliced)
2 (optional) star anise
1 cinnamon stick (broken in half)
Method:
In a food processor, blend the garlic and ginger with the lemon juice, into a paste. Place the saffron strands in a small bowl with the sugar and salt, and pour over 2 tablespoon of hot water. Let it soak for 5 minutes. Mix together the garlic-ginger paste, soaked saffron, chilli powder, yoghurt and 2 tablespoon oil. Make a few deep cuts through the surface of the lamb. Pour the marinade over the lamb and rub it into the cuts. Leave to marinate for at least 4 to 6 hours, or preferably overnight.
In a large casserole dish, heat the remaining oil, then add the sliced onions, star anise and cinnamon sticks, and sauté until the onions are soft but not brown. Place in the lamb. Preheat the oven to 170C (gas mark 3). Seal the casserole dish with foil (or cover with a lid). Cook in the oven for 1½ hours.
Take out of the oven and baste. Return to the oven and cook for another 30 minutes without the foil/lid, until the lamb is golden brown, very tender, and fully cooked throughout.
Allow the lamb to rest for 10 minutes before carving. When serving, spoon over the onions and roasting juices.
Microwave lamb chop
Ingredients:
4 lamb chops (chump chops)
2 tbsp sweet chutney
1tsp curry powder
1tbsp brown sugar
2 tsp soy sauce
1tsp vinegar
Salt to taste
Method:
Remove fat from the lamb, and place in a single layer in a shallow dish. Combine the remaining ingredients and pour over lamb. Cook in a microwave oven on high for 5 minutes, or until chops are cooked and tender.

Last minute EID SHOPPING

Mayasir, by Maheen Khan is one of the leading fashion houses in the city with its unique approach to creating designer outfits that blend traditional and modern styles. This eid Mayasir presents a collection of exclusive traditional wear for men, women and children which come in vivacious colours and designs. It’s ever graceful jewellery collection also makes it a shoppers’ haven for the entire family’s eid shopping.
Since Eid-ul-Adha is a much busier time for women, Mayasir has a variety of Tangail cotton saris that can be worn during the day and an evening-wear collection of in silk, endi silk, jamdani, and chiffon. The colour palette is red, green, blue and black and the saris are priced from BDT 1050-84500. There are kameezes in “rumal cutting” styles as well as “anarkalis” which have an essence of exclusivity within them. You are most likely to find a dress in your favorite colour with hand-stitched embroidery lending an element of subtle elegance. To go with the saris and dresses are a collection of beautifully designed clutch bags and sandals that come in various colours, mostly in golden with paisley motifs. Clutches are priced between BDT 1250-3050 and sandals between BDT 1200-2650. Women can also accessorise themselves with Mayasir’s traditional and very classy silver, antique and pearl jewelry.
Mayasir has much to offer to the gentlemen as well. Fatuas and panjabis are available in pure cotton keeping the occasion in mind. There are a variety of colours to choose from, including green, maroon, and white. Prices range from BDT 1600-2450.
Mayasir has a wide collection of children’s wear as well — panjabis, kameezes and frocks that come in the brightest colours and designs.
If you’re lagging behind with your eid shopping, Mayasir is a complete solution for all your last minute Eid purchases. It is located at House 76, Road 127, Gulshan Avenue and Road-3, House-2, Sector-1 Uttara. For more information contact- 9890533.

A Season for Gormandising

How soon time flies! Believe it or not, Eid is here again, the second of the two that Muslims celebrate annually. Now, Eid is a most wonderful happening, especially when you recall the near hunger with which you waited for your eidee when you were young. Dressed in your best, not ready to sit down on a chair or anywhere else for that matter, lest your shirt and trousers develop unseemly creases, you waited for your parents’ guests to arrive. And they did. You watched them furtively as they partook of all that khichuri and pulao and kheer your mother offered them. You waited for the moment when they would dip their hands, once the feasting was over, in their pockets to bring out the one-rupee notes that were your eidee. A positive gleam, indeed a beaming smile, spread over your face. You blessed those guests as you ran out to look for little toys to buy.
That was Eid then, in our childhood, in the 1960s. The new clothes we wore had something of a natural fragrance about them, to a point where we refused to change into anything else at the end of the day. It was a situation where we were determined to wear those Eid clothes all day and night and even into the next day. Or we would wear nothing at all. Ah, those days of innocent folly is what we miss these days as we watch our children (and even our grandchildren, assuming our children have decided that marrying very young gives a spurt to life through ensuring that new life sprouts from their loins and their bellies) celebrate Eid.
And if you speak of Eid-ul-Azha, it is an entirely different proposition altogether. There are too many dimensions involved with the day; and these dimensions begin to take form and substance weeks before the actual day of celebrating the event. Well, first things first. Notice the sheer glee, indeed masochism of a sort, which comes into those who dream of all the feasting they will do on Eid day. It is talk of the cow, with sometimes a few moments given over to discussions of the goat, that dominates every kind of social interaction. Men and women, or husbands and wives, spend days deliberating on whether to go for a sharing of the cow with their neighbours or buy a whole and wholesome cow alone. If the decision leans toward a whole cow for the family, the happiness of the children is palpable. They whoop for joy. Their parents would like to do the same, but are held back by embarrassment or by swift developing gout in their aging bones. Note, though, that they are dying to inform their neighbours of the high price they have paid for that cow tethered to the gate.
But does anyone ever think of asking the bull and cow and goat about how they feel? You can be sure that when you cheerfully part with anywhere between thirty and fifty thousand taka for a cow, place a garland around its neck and walk down the road with it all the way home, the cow has precious little idea it is going to its execution. That is when you remember Farmer Jones of Animal Farm fame. You see, those horses and cows and chickens, transported into revolutionary fervour under the leadership of the pigs, certainly understood the exploitative nature of man. And because they did, they drove Jones out of his property one dramatic night and took charge. And then you wonder about present times. Why have all those bulls, roused to Olympian fury by young Spanish matadors year in and year out, never thought of carrying out a coup d’etat in Spain?

In defence of cultural identity

Every year, we take a step back to remember those who laid down their lives on the fateful day of February 21, 1952 to defend and uphold our mother tongue and establish it as state language. These young men took on the powerful state machinery of Pakistan to defend the right of every Bengali citizen to speak their own language. The language movement in many respects was more than a movement to defend the Bengali language; it was an endeavour to defend all that we hold dear in terms of national cultural identity.
The young men who died in 1952 were the earliest of Bengalis to shed blood for their land in a state that had turned its back on them with brazenness of the worst kind. The attempts at silencing the movement only paved the way for greater struggles that would face the nation in coming years. Countless Bengalis would be called upon to shed blood in consequent movements of ’69 and ultimately culminated in the independence struggle of 1971. The language movement remains a reference point for national inspiration.
Today in the month of February, 2013, we are witnessing history being reborn with tens of thousands of young people clamouring for justice at Shahbagh. The premise may be different for these young people but their cry for justice is essentially the same as it was in ’52 or ’69. The quest for upholding the basic cultural values of this nation has found a new voice at Shahbagh. Today’s youth gain strength and inspiration from the martyrs of February 21. Barkat, Jabbar, Rafiq, Salam and all those who were gunned down in cold blood on that fateful day gave inspiration to successive generations of Bangladeshis at home and abroad to carry forward their cultural values.
The Unesco’s declaration of this day as the International Mothers’ Language Day obliges us to not only develop Bengali language through its use in various spheres of national life but also to show respect to all languages.

‘Language is the soul of nationalism

These are quotes fromindividuals I have debated with; asked questions. Yes, we have heard such sentiments many times. And yet, in context of the Language Movement, there is the history, the finesse captured in the terms ápon and ‘nationalism’ that prompts me to pen a few words; brood on Ekushey BhashaAndolon. 
On Falgun 8, 1359, (February 21, 1952), demonstrators on Dhaka University campus protested the ‘Urdu only policy’ and demanded the then government to recognise Bengali as one of the official languages. Bullets were fired by the police to halt the protest, killing several students and activists. This engagement ushered the Language Movement to the forefront, provoking long-term civil unrest, which eventually forced central government in 1956 to enact legislation granting Bengali language its official status.
This violent episode gave birth to an image so compelling that it served as the catalyst in shaping mood of the nation into oneness, one people; moving away from the makings of past colonial decision-makers of being a nation grounded in religious precepts.
The incident cemented language attitudes and identity strategies in a manner that till date cannot neglect the social and political forces which shaped the language-nation relationship.
As a nation of unique culture with a distinct sense of nationalism, every year on February 21st we re-create that unified character which proudly announces: I am my language — a powerful dimension of personal and social identity. The conventions, the contents, and symbolic meanings of our language create an intricate correspondence between internal (as a Bangladeshi), and external interpretation of the identity of our people (as a nation).
True, language is more than the repertoire of shared programmes and practices. It is the connector that validates our sense of nationalism: the shared feeling of pride and socio-cultural experiences.
However, nationalism and language are both dynamic notions depending on time and place in history. Today, ever so gradually and with quiet persistence in the discourse of language loyalty the old proposition has resurfaced: Is our language unique to our people? Do we or should we ‘Islamise’ our language so it resonates our uniqueness? Reflects ‘our kind’ of nationalism? Thus would ‘Islamising’ the language anchor the ‘right essence’ of loyalty in our hearts?
Such assertions are obviously very socio-politically loaded. The codification of a written language with the ‘right kind of’ words is a complex one; it is not only a consequence of the combination of political and cultural power, it is also a matter of being attentive to the shared phonological, lexical, morph syntactic etc. linguistic features of the language.
Before we rush head-on into the debate, the pundits need to educate us on this not so simple matter. Language simply does not stand for literary narratives. For us, the general people, perhaps it suffices to say that a writer writing in Bengali does not reconfigure the language boundaries rather it is through the implicit condition of capturing the symbolism of our culture that a trail is set toward representing our national identity and build our sense of nationalism.
We have schools where Bengali is taught as language and in others it is the medium of instruction. We need both, and let the foundation of ‘proper Bengali’ be laid there. Instead of initiating a ‘language cleansing’ movement, perhaps we should celebrate the fact that vignettes of our culture does indeed filter into our literature defining the integrity of our language, and thus gets anchored.
Needless to say, simply ‘soil-right,’ ‘birth-right,’ and ‘language-right’ does not lead to the perception of nationalism, neither is it the awakening of a nation to awareness by virtue of one incident; rather it is also the benign everyday construction of a sense of national identity through the inconspicuous symbols of ‘fairy tales, folklore, arts and crafts, the countryside, the regional differences, and yes, even the etiquettes that invents’ and reinvents a nation.
It is this collage that is held together, expressed, codified, practiced, and indeed captured through language that generates the unique oneness.
Another popular concern is the role of media in muddling the Bengali language! The worrisome issue is the heavy intrusion of local dialects in TV sitcoms and radio programmes. We need to remind ourselves that the ‘speech communities’ of Barisal, Noakhali, Sylhet, Chittagong, Dinajpur and other areas practice no more than regional accents — varieties of same language. Their particular phonological and prosodic markers simply constitute accents which in linguistic sense are not varieties of language that are distinct from each other by grammatical and syntactic criteria.
Perhaps a speaker from Tangail may not fully understand a speaker from Chittagong (!), yet they operate within the common language script. Language is indeed an abstract construct, based in part on linguistic canons, but more importantly on socio-psychological factors. So, should we be concerned that such regional accents are a threat to our language? The key to distinguishing a language from a classification lie more often than not in socio-political conventions. Perhaps, a discussion for another day.
I would rather our language experts expand on the linguistic technicalities so our sentiments do not run amuck on such sentimental issues. I, for one, wish to contemplate on Billing’s assertions that “a language (dialects, regional accents) will die for want of regular users, so a nation must be put to daily use.” The variety is our uniqueness, the fabric of our national identity, one of the foundations of nationalism. It is time we celebrate inclusion; preserve the variation. Luckily, our culturally conscious community is already in that mode.
I humbly sign off by saying I am multilingual, and yet my dreams always speak to me in my mother-tongue! I share with my children the folk-tales that paint the magic of our language for them. To us, our language is lyrical and amarder ápon; a clear validation of our identity, our roots.