A Glimpse of a Chittagong Childhood

Pic by: Tania Sarcar

Chittagong, Chattagram as its real name is, must be amongst the most beautiful places on this earth. It is unfairly endowed with the natural beauties of towering mountains, grand rivers, verdant meadows, lush forests and even beautiful sandy beaches. Amongst these wonders live several Mongoloid tribes like the Chakmas, who have until today, preserved their tribal customs, dress, diet and lifestyle.

My mother’s family were originally from Dhaka Bikrampur, its rich and hoary past ingrained in lives of its peoples. However, my maternal grandfather moved to Chittagong in the course of his government job with the Customs department. It was a struggle to make ends meet, with his family of eight children- a fact the children were unaware of. They grew up in the riches of their transplanted home, enjoying a carefree life in the fringes of a Chakma village. Their humble home was made of ‘byara‘, a kind of matted bamboo sheet, and topped with a tin corrugated roof. There was a small cottage garden surrounding the modest dwelling, with the ubiquitous ‘chal kumro’ white gourd growing on its roof. My thrifty grandmother wasted nothing. Every part of the vine was cooked and eaten. The recipes are now treasured in the family’s kitchen.

The Not-so-well-known Stories

Around the 1920s, the push for women’s education had begun in a big way in East Bengal. At the forefront of this movement was Barisal, in the south of the country. The late 1880s had already seen a blazing star with Barisal roots, in the form of Dr. Kadambini Ganguly, the first woman physician in South Asia to be trained in European medicine. Inspired by the likes of her, women surged into the field of the educated.

However, it was not possible for every girl and woman, in that era, to step outside the home, in order to study. So the problem was resolved by the ingenuity of those remarkable women, by having women teachers, who were willing and able, to come into antahpur – the very heart of their homes – to teach.