Oh Our Lord, Give us Patience, Now, Right Now!

Patience is a chemical defect which is found on the losing side. Or so what every Bangladeshi thinks.

You are living in a fool's paradise if, standing in a queue, you think that sooner or later the line will move forward and you will be able to buy the ticket for the Ananta Jalil flick you have been patiently waiting to watch. The very fact that they have had to wait in a line is degrading enough for a Bangladeshi; sooner rather than later you will realise that 8/9 of your fellow countrymen have appeared from nowhere and have formed their own line, which, to your horror you will realise that, is longer than the queue that you are in. You will be left with a Shakespearian puzzle: to move to that line or to remain here. But to be or not to be is not really the question, as that line too won't move forward: newer queues will be formed by some more people and you will be left in the middle of a crowd or perhaps a scene that is funnier or even more tragic than the one that is going on in the theatre.   

It's not that only ordinary Bangladeshis are afflicted with this disease of the mind, the country's politicians are also its innocent victims. The main opposition doesn't want to wait for five years for its turn to run the country. The party in power is making off with everything from the government exchequer and the opposition leaders want to take a detour (read street agitation, hartal and Oborodh) to reach that much coveted destination (Gonobhaban). Is it not famous 'political scientist' Ricky Martin who has said, "When your soul is tired (because of police remand) and your heart is weak (people are tired of strikes), do you think of love (power/ getting a chance to steal people's money) as a one way street"?

Well, the street does run both ways, but we'll always drive against the traffic. We have to reach fast, before everyone, to get to work to gossip about every alternate person who's absent in the "meeting". Patience is definitely a virtue in Mecca, but not in Dhaka where to have to stand in a line is itself a proof that you are nobody, which no Bangladeshi thinks he is.