And So We Get Older...

I have always dreaded growing up. I have numerous well justified reasons to support the previous statement. To begin with, the first few months of life to me resemble living in a posh hotel with great food, unbelievable room service, and even more. Think about it, you are fed, bathed, always entertained, and even when you need to use the toilet, the toilet comes to you! aka diapers; If you experience the slightest bit of discomfort, a nice little scream ought to get you all the attention in the world and have your parents go nuts in a futile effort to figure out what is bothering their precious little one. Not being able to speak also comes in handy. Feel free to poop on somebody’s lap or break that expensive piece of china your mother got from China, for there is no explaining to be expected from you. Now who would want to give all of that up? It was all going too well until you learned to speak and later walk.

At first it might get you a little stupefied to witness your parents reaction when you blurt out your first words, and I’m sure most kids wonder in bemusement, ‘What is the big deal? They do this all the time!’ I know I did. And it’s also rather overwhelming to see how they go gaga over you being able to walk, but sadly that phase, like all things in life, does not last for long. With every year that keeps adding to your tiny age, things gradually begin getting arduous. No more ‘toilet service’, for most kids no more being fed (although I have a 26 year old friend whose mother still feeds him, it’s absolutely inexcusable), sleeping alone in the dark, and the worst of all you can’t get away with the petty crimes of breaking random stuff anymore; now there is a lot of explaining to do, along with scolding, grounding and all of that drama.

The best part about the freedom of conquering more territory with the newly obtained skills of walking and speech is undoubtedly, going to school. Now I am aware that school has all the complexities of trying to belong, doing good yet strictly abstaining from the ‘geek’ title, and several other juvenile issues, but none of that surfaces when you are in your first or second grade (except maybe for some awfully mature kids..cable TV); it’s all about coloring, singing and learning the alphabets, yet the first day of school is perhaps the most gruesome day for most children. I was petrified to be in the same room with 25 other little monsters like myself, thinking ‘so how should I defend myself if I’m being attacked? Whose side is the teacher on?’ Turns out we were all individual teams and the teacher thought it best to stay out of the massacre.As you soon begin to get acclimatized to your new surroundings, you find yourself in middle school and later high school and all those juvenile issues are at full swing now. Despite of how juvenile they may appear, be sure to know that you will always be judged according to your image back in school by your school friends. Say you are big shot model now, the whole country knows you and you have a massive billboard of yourself up on Gulshan Avenue drinking ‘Tiger Energy Drink’, but when your school friends congregate and talk about you, be certain for somebody to point out, ‘Remember how she wet her pants in 3rd grade? That was firkin hilarious and now she is a model!’ And you can almost hear the laughs reverberating in your head.

Regardless, school would perhaps have to be the best part of your life. That’s where you discover all about life, the opposite sex and sex itself, a bit of love, cheating, playing pranks on people, geography, the often capricious human behavior, have a little exciting encounter with tobacco, pot or alcohol and the list goes on.I never wanted High School to end; yes I have had my bad times too which were often excruciating, but it’s the time when you are with the friends you've been with since childhood, and it feels like home. I do believe that the best friends you can ever make are the ones you make in school and no one can interpret you better, well that is usually the norm for the most part.

The next phase is going to college. As exciting as it was to ponder about college life and indulge into the idea of a new beginning with new people and undo all that went wrong in high school, it is undeniably not the scenario when you are studying at North South University, or any other university in town for that matter. Why I mention North South is because that is where I go to and can safely say that I absolutely detest the place. The reason behind this perception regarding universities in town is because Dhaka is a very small city and no matter which college you go to, you will inevitably end up with random friends that you wish you had never seen again, the new ones you meet probably have their own little group of friends, and it is better to keep a safe distance away from the rest of them that is out there. It’s almost like you are in your 30s and making new friends is like trying to pass for a 15 year old. In my case almost all my friends from school have escaped to the different continents looking for quality education while a couple of us who are too unfortunate to have that fancy, settled back for the last best thing aka NSU

It is hard to oversee that even though we are in our much anticipated 20s, and amidst more forms of entertainment to spoil ourselves with than ever before, we are also getting increasingly bored of life. Remember when you were a kid all you had to do was get together with your friends and simply run around in a room or jump on the bed and that the most fun thing to do in the world! Now it’s all about, ‘So where are we gonna go eat? do you have a smoke? Who is getting the booze?’ and the invariable and unsolvable monetary problem persists. ‘I’m broke’ is arguable my most used statement. There is no place for recreation (and by that I do not refer to the sauntering/lingering around in creepy shopping malls) in Dhaka and all you can do is go to some restaurant with friends to have not-so-great food for a considerable amount of money, a sad result of the skyrocketing price hike we are experiencing now and the lack of implementation of the consumer protection rights. Life certainly does not seem fair.

The worst aspect of growing up to me is all the growing issues that tag along with it. Learn to be selfish, diplomatic, political, hypocrisy can also be utilized at times, ability to handle terrible levels of stress, tension and all the other unwanted terms. Hell I just want to be myself! But apparently that is too much to ask for after you are of a certain age. It’s all about being socially and politically correct.
The scary part about all of this is we are barely reaching our mid-20s and it freaks me out to think about all that is in the offing. Soon will come the 30s, 40s, 50s and more if you are lucky, and if we are freaking out at our 20s, there palpably is going to be a lot more to freak out about later. Why it is probably scary for me is perhaps because I do not plan out my future, never have. I take each day as it comes, a risky move maybe but that is the only way I can survive. I have friends who have the next five to even ten years planned out and I can barely plan to finish an assignment on a scheduled time! Something tells me life won’t be fun for me after graduation and I can’t ignore the whole frenzy of trying to find a job in this corporate whirlpool and being able to keep it. I have had almost a years' experience working for a news paper though and to be honest, it was the most exciting thing I had ever done. Don’t know if I will have the same opinion about the one that will earn me a living.

Let’s not overlook the fact that you also have to find someone to woo lest you end up an ‘old maid’. I can safely say that I'm not worried about that. I do have a great plan though; the only future I see myself in is living in an astounding beach house with a ton of money, sitting alone on the terrace overlooking the undulating waters in a windy evening. (No idea where the money or the house is coming from). And so my mother tells me ‘what happens when you get sick, who is going to take care of you then if you are alone?’ And I tell her ‘I’ll have enough money to hire people to do that for me and look at you, you spend all your money on your children and they disappoint you at times, make you miserable, and taking care of the family is simply exhausting and what is so great about that? You should’ve never gotten married and had kids, rather you should’ve spent all your money on vacations!’ and she smiles back and tells me that it is gratifying. I know the woman has a point but I refuse to comply. I would rather buy a puma store for myself than spend money on my nonexistent kids.

With everything said, I should also admit that growing up isn’t always bad, in fact it can be pretty wonderful. Growing up unveils all the things that you had fantasized about as a kid, such as being independent, earning your own money (which isn’t working out great for me, since I quit my job a few months back), dating, being responsible for your actions etc. It’s terribly ironic how when you are a child all you desire is to do is grow up, and when you are there, you wish you could go back to being a child, undo all that you could and just relish the simpler things in life. I guess that’s why they call life an enigma, who knows when we will figure that one out!