Biography 260: Mom's Sharee (Saaree).

My mom had two steel-made almirahs. In my childhood, I thought those were full of shaaree. That's not 100% true, but she had lots of shaarees. She started buying Sharee when she was a nursing school student.

We four sisters wanted to wear her shaarese. She kept some Shaaree separately, which were old, and she didn't feel comfort to wear them. So, at home, whenever we sisters got a chance we use to wear shaaree, tried to role play like daily soap, dance, tried to decorat face like a bride, etc.

We didn't know how to wear a shaaree. We just used to put on. Still, I am not good at wearing shaaree. It's an art to wear it perfectly. The main thing about a shaaree is it can adjust with any body shape, and every girl will look beautiful if they can put it on perfectly.

At my relative's marriage ceremony, I went to the beauty parlour to wear a heavy saree. A small girl did it in a couple of seconds. I found that she is the best. and that was the only day when I wore the Shaaree perfectly. I was looking great, I understood it from my relatives eyes and sweet talk.

This kind of uniform shouldn't mandatory

 I was a child in Bangladesh when I watched gymnastics at the Olympics on TV. My mom said, don't bother about their dresses. It's in their culture. The way, we don't bother if a kid when they dresses up like that (You can see their bums), they don't bother for the women.

I believed it. Now, I am living in the first world. I am sure women's bum is always attractive to men.

People watch the Olympics, or all sports competitions, to watch sports. To feel it's competition. To enjoy the challenges. It shouldn't be to watch the human body like porn.

People who join the sports participate in the game, but it doesn't mean they have to open or make it visible with the clothes to let people see them and enjoy it. They want their game to be enjoyable.

We (Authority) should not make both males and females wear dresses like that. They are not comfortable at all. People can see every now and then; they fix their dresses or try to hide their body parts with towels. But they can't wear any clothing which is comfortable for them.

Let's not use their bodies to gain money. Let's sports be sports.

The same strategy became a must for the singers, too. Singing is supposed to be done to listen to melody, lyrics, and music. But it mainly became to show body, movement like a whore. These singers have beautiful voices and good albums. They shouldn't be presented like that. If you noticed Celine Dion or Adele. They are one of most popular singers in the world, they didn't need to show their body and do things like a porn to make themselves famous. No singer is popular for showing body, its their singing which is making them popular, then why is this trends?

Biography 101: School dress

 Our school dress was a gray top and white pyjamas. We didn't have any selected dressmakers. Everybody was free to make it from anywhere they want. Because of that, the good thing is there was no company that got an extra benefit to make all the dresses and the minus point was we didn't have the same coloured dress. Some made light gray, too light gray, normal gray, dark gray and too dark gray. We have seen some girls' dresses change their colour after washing a couple of times. I believe my one has the perfect gray colour.

My mom took me to New Market. She had a known tailor over there. It was a big tailor shop, I mean the shop size was big. Later mom found the tailor used to take a high rate compared to the market and also used to take 4/5 times more cloths to make dresses. Well, I have seen this always. Whoever, especially when salesmen say sweet words on mom and dad or on their kids, they trusted them with heart. They never cross-checked those people's information. Maybe that's why I always look at people's actions than words. Actions speak more truth.

My mom asked the tailor to make a school dress/frock for me. She also asked me, if I want anything else. I said yes, I want pockets in the dress. I don't know why women's dress doesn't have a pocket. Why do we always have to carry handbags?

The tailor had made two small pockets at the front of the frock. I use to keep my changes in it and handkerchief. Facial tissues were not available on those days. Now a day I always carry parse and keep facial tissues in a pocket of the parse.

Later one of our class teachers gave an address to a tailor by saying, it's not mandatory, but you guys can make dresses from this place. Then all will get the same coloured dress. A few of us went to that tailor. I already made mine, so I didn't take the address. Later I felt that they gave a poor quality fabric to the girls.

One day, maybe because of coaching classes for the scholarship, we had to stay longer time in the school. So, we went to the Bulbul Lalito Kola Academy (It was just beside our school) from school directly. On that day, we were wearing school dresses. I was in the singing class. One of our classmates asked another schoolgirl, why do you guys have different coloured school dresses? In my mind I replied, are you colour blind? Can't you see that we are all wearing gray?

Biography 65: Open market

 When we were living in Umlej (Saudi Arabia) my parents uses to go outside the town. There was an open solid (Concrete) space. Businessmen put big tents over there and sell their products. Maybe it was a flea market.  As far as I remember mostly those shops were for clothes. Or my mother took me to the dress collections. Oh, there were some tents were for toys too. My mom bought lots of dresses. But those were to bring it to Bangladesh. In those days, it was difficult to find fancy kid's dresses in Bangladesh. Ready-made dress culture came later in Bangladesh. Bangladeshi parents mostly made dresses for kids by buying long clothes and give them to the tailors.

After returning to Bangladesh, the first couple of days we uses to wear those Saudi dresses. They were really beautiful, good-quality dresses. After being roughly used for a couple of years, no dress gets torn or discoloured.

But this had a disadvantage too. Local kids always keep some distance because of these dresses. I felt like an alien sometimes.

Biography 55: An old market

 In Umlez (Saudi Arabia) sometimes, my parents take us to an old market. The market is made of mud-made stores. The shopkeepers are aged men. Their products look very simple. I had never seen a crowd or many people in that market. Mostly the shopkeepers are talking and gossiping with each other and take tea.

I like their products. Those are handmade, traditional and very beautiful. My mom chooses a dress. It was a frock for the newborn to 1-year-old girls. It was a very beautiful dress. Light orange colour with cross-stitch work on it. In those days, mom didn't know whether she will have a baby girl or a boy. So, she didn't buy it.

Later when Shekha, my youngest sister get born. She went to the market and bought that dress for her. Even in a couple months that dress didn't sell. I don't know how those people run that market.

Biography 37: Dress up

 If you know me, you have seen I'm not a fashion concern person. Never I was. I like to wear new dresses and I like to wear comfortable dresses. I actually don't bother how I am looking with any dress. But I like people who are concern about their dresses.

In Alkaseem (Saudi Arabia) I wanted to wear different dresses. But my mom didn't give me that luxury. I had to wear the old dresses from my older sister. This situation continued until I became taller than her. So, what I did, I wanted to make changes to the dresses. Another reason was, every day I found that my dress became dirty. So, I thought if I wear more than one dress then every day I will just put off the front one and a new clean dress will come out.

So, I wear the longest dress first, then a longer one and at the end the shortest dress. So, all of my dresses are visible (New fashion) and also I can take off one at the end of the day.

But this didn't continue for a long time. Because adults use to laugh at me and make me felt ashamed.

Biography 24: Same dresses

 There was a trend about kids' dresses when I was young. In those days parents use to make dresses for a kid by a tailor. Readymade dresses were not available much and weren't popular. It was expensive. Parents use to buy cloth. Then asked the tailor to make dresses for all kids by the same cloth. So, we had to do matching-matching without any other option.

When I look at my childhood pictures, in almost all pictures we were wearing the same dresses. As I told you earlier my older sister was a very good type of girl. Obviously, her dresses stayed in good condition. I was the raff and taff girl. So, soon it tore up. I still don't know-how.

I have seen our family always bought new dresses for my older sister. All of her old dresses were dedicated to me. I could get a new dress only on Eid. I didn't like to wear old dresses. Allah listened to me. When I was in grade 06 (As far as I could remember) I became taller than her. I thought now I will get new dresses. But my bad luck never left me. Getting old dresses had stopped, but still, my parent always gave me one dress on Eid.

When we go out, we always wear a better dress. But I don't have much, only 2 good dresses, which I got on Eid. So, I had no choice but to wear the same dresses always in my dance and singing classes. Everybody knew me, for my same dress. See, everything has a good side.

But I didn't mind. I still don't like to ask or demand anything. You will give me, whatever comes from your heart.

সবাইকে সব পোশাকে মানায় না (Every kind of dress doesn't suit everybody)

সবাইকে সব পোশাকে মানায় না. পরে যতই আরাম লাগুক না কেন, দেখতে ভালো না লাগলে বাইরে সেই পোশাক পরা যায়না. যেমন কাউকে কাউকে দেখছি, সুটেড বুটেড বা জ্যাকেটে খুব ভাল লাগে, কিন্তু টি -শার্ট এ ঠিক ভাল লাগে না. সেক্ষেত্রে টি -শার্ট পরে যতই আরাম লাগুক না কেন, বাইরে না পরাই ভাল. ঘরে মন ভরে পরে নিলেই হলো.

এদিকে আমাকে এখন আর কোন কিছুতেই ভাল লাগে না. বেশি মোটা হওয়ার কুফল. ফিগার ঠিক থাকলে সব কিছুতেই মানায়. এটা মোটামুটি সবার ক্ষেত্রেই প্রযোজ্য.


Every kind of dress doesn't suit everybody. No matter how comfort you feel, you can't wear dresses and go out side, which doesn't look good on you. I have seen some people who looks pretty good with suit and jackets, but t-shirt. So, no matter how comfortable this dress is that person shouldn't wear it outside. He can wear at home as much as he wanted.

In my case, nothing looks good on me. Too much fat always disturbing. So, to make look good, I have to reduce my weight. It works for everybody.

Dancing happiness

Shafeen with new dress, he was 1 year and 9 months old

Who doesn't like to have new dress? When I was a kid (school going) I really wanted new dresses. But our parents didn't like to invest more than enough money on new dresses. So I had to wait for long time. More over me have an elder sister. You can imagine now, my condition. I had to wear her old dresses. But Allah helped me. I became taller than her and get rid of this situation. And Whenever I get new dresses I use to wear it and then go in front of a mirror and then dance. Yes, I liked dancing very much. I had heard in my childhood I use to dance everywhere, whenever I felt happy. Dancing with new dress is really a good feeling. Now in this age, I really miss that dancing happiness and also new dresses ;)

Shafeen in my dress

Shafeen with my red t-shirt

Children always like to wear elders dress. When I was young we (all sisters) use to wear our mom’s sharee. Now my boy is following me. In this picture, my son wore my t-shirt. He was 1 year and 3 months old. I bought it for my gym class once.

Did you get your Eid Dress?

Shafeen

Still, I didn't get my Eid dress. But my husband promised he will gave me one before Eid day.

You know, in my child hood and I have also heard from my mom that in her childhood, they use to brought Eid dress and hide it till Eid day, that no one won’t be able to see it before Eid. Because Eid dress has to be brand new and nobody will see it before Eid. For long time I knew that this is our culture… but when I was in upper class in school this tradition changed. Now a day kids brought dresses and show to their friends and family, to see what they got…

When I was a child I mean I was in primary school, I use to see after Eid, that all children are talking about how many dresses they got this year, some says 2, some 3 or some 4. I always keep quite in this kind of conversation, because I always got one dress in Eid.

But, may be Allah see this happens with me. Now a day my son gets 7 to 9 dresses in Eid. We gave one then his all uncles and aunts, grandfather and grandmother gives… so he gets a lot. So, for the rest of the year we don’t need to buy any dress for my son for outing.