May 26, 2015
Sharing an inbox message with some refinement:
Brother, please stop all this worthless rambling. I don’t like hearing any of this anymore. You’ve wasted most of your life pursuing useless things. You didn’t do anything in what you could have excelled at. Whose fault is that? Why didn’t you study properly? Did anyone forbid you from studying? I think anyone who gets inspired to become a BCS cadre after seeing you is a complete fool! You came here because you couldn’t do anything else in life. You’ve been rejected everywhere and ended up on this path. Should everyone lose to life like you? God brought you to your current position. What’s your achievement in that? I think those who listen to your speeches won’t be able to do anything in life. Every person knows what they need to do. Who are you to decide that for them? Don’t take it personally, but in your blind obsession to become a cheap Facebook celebrity, you’re becoming more irritating by the day. Most of your work seems like showing off to me. Is the job you’re doing really such a big deal? What’s with all the attitude then? And why don’t you advise students to go abroad? Should everyone sit at home doing jobs like a frog in a well like you? And why did you do an MBA? Why did you waste a seat at IBA?
My response:
I’ve done most things in my life following the principle: “Let me see what happens if I do this.” I’m someone who lives in the world of each moment. I love to dream, and whatever I enjoy doing, I try to do it as well as possible. Life didn’t come to me with any user manual, so learning by making my own mistakes or watching others’ mistakes has always felt like a birthright to me. Why must everything in life be done correctly? What’s the great obligation to be so perfect? I wasted time pursuing worthless things? Come on, brother, if I don’t waste time, what else should I waste? Time exists to be wasted, boss! What I could have been good at remains a great mystery even to myself! I graduated in Computer Engineering from CUET. But I don’t do it because I’m no good at any of it! So why did I waste so much government money? Is that your grief? The money that’s already left the government’s pocket is gone anyway. It’s not coming back. Now if I start my career in something I have absolutely no interest or love for, could I have given anything back to the government at all? Instead, doing this small job, I occasionally put several crores of cash into the government’s pocket. Isn’t this better, brother? I’m asking humbly—how much have you been able to return to the government so far? Want to hear mine? At least several hundred crores. I feel proud thinking that the government trusts small people like us with hundreds of crores of taka. Most importantly, whatever else may be, no one points at me and says, “Look, look! See how worthless CUET’s products are. Can’t do anything!” Rather, many say, “Sushanta-da is also a CUET student!” I take pride in my university. Even if it’s below BUET, rootless on the face of the earth, it’s my university! If I had taken a job matching my graduation subject, everyone would have said that. Just imagining how that would have felt scares me! Say whatever you want about me, but why should my mother bear insults because of me? I’m the one raised on my mother’s milk.
Why didn’t I study properly? Simple! I didn’t feel like it, so I didn’t. That’s the truth. Why didn’t I feel like it? Why must I feel like it? No one paid attention to what I wanted anyway. I have a lot of resentment about getting admitted to this engineering program. How so? Let me tell you from the beginning, shall I? I completed whatever studying I had to do up to HSC. After that, whatever I read was mostly just enough to get by with showing off in conversations. For instance, I’ve never actually read Derrida in my life, but I’ve read about Derrida. I don’t have the knowledge or intellect to read Umberto Eco’s works, but I’ve read quite a bit about Eco’s creations. I don’t have the patience to immerse myself in Noam Chomsky, but I can talk for hours about various dimensions of his writing. I started reading ‘Ulysses’ by James Joyce, the ‘Komal Kumar Majumdar’ of English literature—the most incomprehensible writer in English literature in my view. Whenever I sit down to read his work, I somehow get dizzy, keep needing the bathroom, get stomach cramps every now and then. Not reading that book is much easier than reading it! After reading half of it, I realized I’d forgotten the plot, couldn’t understand which character was going where. His ‘Finnegans Wake’ is one of the world’s most unnecessarily difficult books. I still dream that someday I’ll be able to read Joyce the way I can finish Murakami in one sitting. But what if I can’t read him? I can certainly talk extensively about Joyce! You’d never be able to tell that I haven’t read his work that much. You can’t maintain prestige without this intellectual pose! This habit of buying books has been with me since class seven. My book collection reached 5600 at one point. Literature was my meditation, knowledge, and practice. But look what happened to what! Here I am, having studied that dry Computer Engineering! Honestly, I had no desire to study it at all. I love arts, not science. Except for a couple of amphibious creatures, I was afraid to read science fiction, lest I accidentally like it! I loved playing with words and language, and I was good at it too. I spent tremendous time and effort on this, day after day. I don’t think anyone else in our batch at Chittagong College had a bigger vocabulary than me. Very few boys and girls at that age read Bangla and English literature better than I did—I can say that with confidence. It would be natural for me to want to study literature, wouldn’t it? I did want to. My family wouldn’t let me. I came 2nd in the merit list in CUET’s admission exam, and when you rank 2nd like that, you apparently have to study at CUET—that’s what everyone said. Alas, I didn’t know this rule beforehand. If I had known, would I have solved all the math problems correctly in the entrance exam? How much does an HSC-passed boy understand about what sin it is not to study engineering? What position does he have to speak from? Who would listen to him? If you study science, becoming a doctor or engineer is the rule! I was furious, cried a lot too. Why? There wasn’t much more I could do. But I got my revenge too. I didn’t want to become an engineer; I didn’t! From the first day to the last, I copy-pasted all computer programming assignments. Throughout my time with engineering, I always felt like I was being forced to live under the same roof with another man’s wife. I could never love that other woman. Yes, I accepted it—otherwise you don’t get the certificate—but I could never accept it from the heart. Honestly, it was so hard to pass! Where others don’t eat for two days in infinite sorrow over getting an A-grade instead of A+, I’d throw parties for friends even if I got a D-grade! I didn’t think about what I didn’t get. Instead, I’d think: Lucky me! I passed with a D! A little less and I would have failed! Let me share one day’s incident. I went to meet the professor, happy about getting a D-grade in a difficult subject called CPI. The professor knew me beforehand because I worked in various cultural programs at CUET and did writing. Seeing me, before I could say anything, the professor said very sheepishly and hesitantly, “Sushanta, I understand why you’ve come. But brother, believe me, with what you wrote in the exam paper, I broke into a sweat just passing you with this D.” I immediately said very gratefully and humbly, “No no, sir! Please don’t misunderstand me. I was sure I wouldn’t pass CPI. I know you kindly let me pass. That’s why I came to see you, being happy.” The professor looked at me very surprised. He said, “Brother, I’m amazed! Students don’t come to see me even after getting A+! Can’t you study a little?” I was that kind of student at CUET. Why would such a student study? How many times I failed! You tell me, does anyone fail happily? I used to think, let me see how many times I can fail! Sooner or later, the professors will pass me anyway. Algorithm exam the next day, and the night before I’m sitting at home reading GRE Big Book, Fowler’s Modern English Usage. This happened many times. Not out of necessity, but from love for language. I got tangible results from this too. It took me almost two and a half years longer than my friends to graduate from CUET. A few more days and my studentship would have been canceled!
Have I come here because I couldn’t achieve anything in life? Indeed, that’s exactly right! It took half my life just to understand what ‘achieving something in life’ even means. In this mistake-ridden existence, all I’ve gained is mockery and contempt. How I’ve squandered time on so many things! Coaching business, share trading, gift shop ventures, supply business, dreams of turning life upside down—and so much more! ‘Achieving something in life’ apparently means doing whatever ten other people want me to do. But what should I do, tell me! I have no desire to live my life according to someone else’s whims. What’s the point of living in someone else’s life? One day I’ll simply die! How can someone who never truly lived in their own life even die? At best, they just leave this world. I at least wanted peace when the time came to die. That’s why I never wanted to ‘achieve something’ in life that way. Why must everyone achieve something? Perhaps I’m living by doing something different. With what I had, I couldn’t possibly have done anything better. My professional education is limited, my knowledge even more so—how could I dare to achieve anything in life? And whatever I started out to accomplish, at some point I began to realize that what I was doing might make me very wealthy, but I wouldn’t be able to live the life I dreamed of living. So I stepped away before it was too late. I’ve lost millions of rupees from my life, lost considerable time—that’s true. But I haven’t lost myself. If I had lost myself in the lure of all that money, what then? I know all too well how much it hurts to lose yourself! So with whatever my abilities allow, I’ve tried my best and done the very best I could. If someday I feel it’s possible for me to do something greater, I’ll leave this job and start doing that instead. Has God brought me to my current position? Of course! Everyone needs His grace, don’t they? I should have been lost by now. But I’m not lost! You’re absolutely right—there’s no credit due to me for this. But if I had failed, surely you wouldn’t have said it was because God didn’t show favor? Instead you’d have said I lacked ability, that’s why it didn’t work out. Ah, the cruel thinking of people! I wonder, what harm would come if the world were a little easier?
Why would anyone be inspired to become a BCS cadre by looking at me? Everyone thinks they’ll be a bit better off. Everyone knows this magic of ‘being better off’ more or less, understands it. Yet when you hear it from someone else’s mouth, somehow you want to believe it. That’s all! Have I ever told anyone to become a BCS cadre? I can’t recall it at all! All I ever tell everyone is to be well. I want everyone to be well, that’s my only wish. Whatever work they may do! How does anyone’s job become ‘something big’? A job is nothing but a contract to sell your freedom! And this is supposed to be good? Let me quote my poet Jibanananda: “There is no pure job in this world.” If I were a literature student, in the marks-seeking exam I would have given ‘good job’ as an example of an oxymoron. I truly would have. Let the exam paper show zero, even so. Getting zero for writing life’s story doesn’t matter. How much I’ll compromise with a job to live my life—that’s what determines which job is right for me. A job means deciding to live your life according to someone else’s wishes. Then why am I working? What else can I do? I can’t do anything else! I have to work. In the life of a Bengali middle-class person, the conflict between life and job is very old. For someone without a job, what use is life itself? Oh brother, to ‘criticize jobs’ you need to have a job first! I’m middle-class too! If my father had piles of money, would I have taken a job? (Thank goodness he doesn’t!) After careful consideration, I decided that doing this job might not feel too bad. If I had the ability to do something else, I would have done it!
Yes, every person knows what they need to do in their life. I’m truly no one to decide that for them. Come to think of it, I can’t recall ever sending police to anyone’s house to drag them to my career sessions! Rather, seeing the huge crowds, I’ve folded my hands and told everyone at the sessions, not today, please come to another session. Alas! Why does everyone understand so little? A person or two might make mistakes, but does that mean thousands and thousands of people are making exactly the same mistake at exactly the same time? Everyone is wrong, only you are right? They won’t be able to achieve anything in life? Each person’s meaning of ‘achieving something in life’ is different. Who are you to decide what someone else’s ‘achieving something’ should mean? I ask you this question with all humility.
Now tell me, brother, what makes an expensive celebrity? Someone no one recognizes? Someone who’s of no use to anyone? Someone who selfishly thinks only of their own and their family’s happiness? Someone who doesn’t bite the hand that feeds them? Most ‘Facebook celebrities’ don’t have much to boast about regarding their identity outside Facebook. I say with great humility that my identity outside this Facebook is not entirely negligible. I like to write, friends say it’s good, I get some likes, so I write, I come to Facebook. What if I didn’t come? I wouldn’t be able to write? No one would know me? How many famous people had Facebook accounts, can you tell me? I have an identity outside Facebook that allows me to walk with my head held high. Please, say what you have to say with understanding. Why are you saying I’m being annoying? I only write on my own wall. I don’t post on your wall, I don’t tag you. You’re reading at your own responsibility, getting annoyed at your own responsibility. Do I unnecessarily appear in your news feed? Why are you staying around me? Who’s stopping you from getting rid of this? Showing off? Yes brother, I’m quite the narcissist. If I weren’t a narcissist, would I spend time and effort writing such long pieces for the lure of a few measly likes? Or would I pose in various colorful ways taking pictures to post? See if it suits you? If it doesn’t, go far away and eat puffed rice soaked in Sprite without making any sound.
Who am I to advise students to go abroad? Do you think if they had that opportunity or desire, anyone would voluntarily come to career sessions? And am I a narrow-minded frog in a well? To jump, you first need to stand on solid ground. Don’t you know that? Of course I’ll go abroad! Don’t I need to do a PhD? But I won’t go abroad just to do a PhD. After marriage, I’ll go abroad with my wife for travel. I’ll also complete the PhD alongside. Travel combined with studies. Isn’t that a good plan? Why study? Oh brother, if I say I’ll do a PhD, the government will give me long leave. Would I get such long leave if I said I’m going abroad to travel? I’ll roam around, and along the way arrange to add Dr. before my name. What do you understand? If you don’t understand, try separating rice and paddy mixed together. While doing that, at some point you’ll understand perfectly.
Why did I do an MBA? One answer only: because I got a chance at IBA. If I hadn’t gotten the chance, I couldn’t have done my master’s from IBA, at best I could have sent someone a personal attacking text like this. Why did I waste a seat? Are you sure that if I hadn’t taken admission in that seat, whoever would have taken it could have completed the degree without dropping out? Or wouldn’t they have left the MBA upon getting some other big opportunity? Like how I got the opportunity to enroll in an MDS course but couldn’t complete it. Is all education only for jobs? What IBA taught me—the smallest part of that is bookish knowledge, meaning studies. If I hadn’t gotten the opportunity to study at IBA, many lessons of life would have remained unlearned.
Final words: Thank you. If you hadn’t sent that text, I wouldn’t have written this piece.