Dhaka: The city we never want to return to, but always do | The Business Standard
Skip to main content
  • Latest
  • Economy
    • Banking
    • Stocks
    • Industry
    • Analysis
    • Bazaar
    • RMG
    • Corporates
    • Aviation
  • Videos
    • TBS Today
    • TBS Stories
    • TBS World
    • News of the day
    • TBS Programs
    • Podcast
    • Editor's Pick
  • World+Biz
  • Features
    • Panorama
    • The Big Picture
    • Pursuit
    • Habitat
    • Thoughts
    • Splash
    • Mode
    • Tech
    • Explorer
    • Brands
    • In Focus
    • Book Review
    • Earth
    • Food
    • Luxury
    • Wheels
  • More
    • Sports
    • TBS Graduates
    • Bangladesh
    • Supplement
    • Infograph
    • Archive
    • Gallery
    • Long Read
    • Interviews
    • Offbeat
    • Magazine
    • Climate Change
    • Health
    • Cartoons
  • বাংলা
The Business Standard

Thursday
June 12, 2025

Sign In
Subscribe
  • Latest
  • Economy
    • Banking
    • Stocks
    • Industry
    • Analysis
    • Bazaar
    • RMG
    • Corporates
    • Aviation
  • Videos
    • TBS Today
    • TBS Stories
    • TBS World
    • News of the day
    • TBS Programs
    • Podcast
    • Editor's Pick
  • World+Biz
  • Features
    • Panorama
    • The Big Picture
    • Pursuit
    • Habitat
    • Thoughts
    • Splash
    • Mode
    • Tech
    • Explorer
    • Brands
    • In Focus
    • Book Review
    • Earth
    • Food
    • Luxury
    • Wheels
  • More
    • Sports
    • TBS Graduates
    • Bangladesh
    • Supplement
    • Infograph
    • Archive
    • Gallery
    • Long Read
    • Interviews
    • Offbeat
    • Magazine
    • Climate Change
    • Health
    • Cartoons
  • বাংলা
THURSDAY, JUNE 12, 2025
Dhaka: The city we never want to return to, but always do

Features

Jannatul Naym Pieal
09 June, 2025, 10:50 am
Last modified: 11 June, 2025, 09:11 pm

Related News

  • Dhaka's Eid waste cleanup mostly satisfactory with some hiccups
  • Begging booms in Dhaka while demand for domestic help remains high
  • Eid travel: Bus passengers suffer as schedules collapse due to jams on highways
  • Govt working to ensure hassle-free Eid travel, says Adviser Asif
  • Homebound rush to the south continues via Dhaka-Mawa Expressway

Dhaka: The city we never want to return to, but always do

Dhaka is where life happens, yes. But it’s also where life stops. And in between, we do the only thing we can do: Survive

Jannatul Naym Pieal
09 June, 2025, 10:50 am
Last modified: 11 June, 2025, 09:11 pm
File photo of Eid holidaymakers returning to the capital from their country homes/Rajib Dhar
File photo of Eid holidaymakers returning to the capital from their country homes/Rajib Dhar

There's no love lost between me and the city I came from. 

A small town where the air is thick with gossip, politics, and dust. Everyone knows everyone, and no one ever forgets how stupid you looked fifteen years ago.

It's like a monument to the full catalogue of your childhood trauma.

It's the kind of place where nothing ever changes; except the roads, which only get worse, and routinely disappear under the slightest rainfall.

The Business Standard Google News Keep updated, follow The Business Standard's Google news channel

Here, time stretches, people shrink, and all your dreams feel like they're sitting in a waiting room with no appointment.

So I left. Ran, even, for Dhaka. Thought I'd never look back.

But I hate Dhaka even more.

And yet, here I am again, returning to Dhaka after Eid, after a few short days of pretend peace, boarding a bus for the journey back into the belly of the beast. 

Not because I want to. But because I have to.

This year, the one-way journey from Dhaka to our respective hometowns before Eid took 12 to 18 hours for many of us. I mean, for those of us who could, at least and at last, secure a ticket.

A hellish crawl through highways choked with endless traffic jams, broken-down vehicles, and the occasional roadside tragedy.

A journey that should have taken four to six hours ended up taking almost an entire day and night.

We sat sweating beside crying children and coughing elders, eating stale jhal-muri, and staring at red veins on Google Maps that refused to turn green.

But we endured it. Because staying in Dhaka during Eid was never a choice. Just like staying in our hometowns after the vacation isn't a choice either.

We must come back to Dhaka. Broken, but we must come back. Even though Dhaka doesn't want us back.

The OG Dhakaiyas love their "Faaka Dhaka"—those rare few days when the roads clear, the city exhales, and silence falls like mercy. 

They post bird's-eye views of empty intersections like it's some utopia. "Dhaka now does feel like Europe," they say with the same energy as hero Riaz, sipping iced coffees with no queues.

And sincerely, we too don't want to bother them again with our return. But we do come back. Because life happens only in Dhaka. And for many of us, it only happens here.

But what is Dhaka now? Certainly not a city for people. It belongs to machines, bots, and, of course, autorickshaws.

Humans? We're background noise. An inconvenience.

We dodge traffic like dancers in a war zone, speak in filters, and live on borrowed time. The footpaths are gone. The lungs are full. The pace is claustrophobic.

Dhaka is not a city. It's a system. A trap. A machine that feeds itself with our hours, our bones, our agony.

And what do we even get in return? Not joy. Not meaning. Certainly not rest.

There is nothing remarkable here, except noise and hunger. Nothing to enjoy except, maybe, the Eid cinemas.

Ah yes, "Now showing in your nearest theatre." What a joke. Because in three-fourths of the country, there is no nearest theatre. They've shut down, converted, collapsed. 

But the movie promos still cling to the lingo. Because the film industry, like everything else, lives and dies in Dhaka.

Dhaka hoards the spotlight. It hoards tragedy, too. 

A flood in the north? Barely a news blip. A fire in the south? Silence. But let a wall crack in Gulshan or a tree fall in Dhanmondi, and suddenly it's breaking news.

It's as though everything that matters in Bangladesh must happen in Dhaka. Everything else is a footnote. A statistic. A blur. 

This city doesn't just run the country. It eats it. And still, we return. With blistered backs and empty wallets, we return. 

Not because we love Dhaka. Not because Dhaka deserves us. But because we are caught between two places that will never make space for us.

Our hometowns have no work. Dhaka has no soul. We simply go where the machine tells us to go. And we move when it tells us to move.

Until, maybe one day, it stops us permanently—on a highway, in a fire, under a collapsed building, or in a forgotten corner of a forgotten news cycle.

Because Dhaka is where life happens, yes. But it's also where life stops. And in between, we do the only thing we can do: Survive.

 

Bangladesh / Top News

Eid Travel / return / Dhaka

Comments

While most comments will be posted if they are on-topic and not abusive, moderation decisions are subjective. Published comments are readers’ own views and The Business Standard does not endorse any of the readers’ comments.

Top Stories

  • Saifuzzaman Chowdhury. Photo: Collected
    UK crime agency now freezes assets of ex-land minister Saifuzzaman: AJ
  • Chief Adviser Muhammad Yunus speaks at the Chatham House in London on 11 June 2025. Photo: CA Press Wing
    No desire to be part of next elected govt: CA Yunus
  • File photo of BNP Standing Committee Member Amir Khasru Mahmud Chowdhury. Photo: Collected
    Khasru flies to London ahead of Yunus-Tarique meeting

MOST VIEWED

  • Illustration: Duniya Jahan/ TBS
    Forget Katy Perry, here’s Bangladesh’s Ruthba Yasmin shooting for the moon
  • A file photo of Bangladesh Bank Governor Dr Ahsan H Mansur. Photo: Collected
    'I have no relation with this': Ahsan Mansur debunks Joy’s allegations over daughter’s Dubai flat
  • Faiz Ahmad Tayeb. Photo: BSS
    Import duty on raw materials for e-bikes, lithium batteries reduced from 80% to 1% in some cases: Faiz Taiyeb
  • File photo of ex-prime minister Sheikh Hasina and her son Sajeeb Wazed Joy. Photo: Collected
    Joy spends Eid with Hasina in India: Indian media
  • Mercantile Bank withholds dividend amid Tk1,700cr provision shortfall
    Mercantile Bank withholds dividend amid Tk1,700cr provision shortfall
  • Shakil Ahmed. Photo: Collected
    DU student allegedly hangs himself following threats over old derogatory comment about Prophet on Facebook

Related News

  • Dhaka's Eid waste cleanup mostly satisfactory with some hiccups
  • Begging booms in Dhaka while demand for domestic help remains high
  • Eid travel: Bus passengers suffer as schedules collapse due to jams on highways
  • Govt working to ensure hassle-free Eid travel, says Adviser Asif
  • Homebound rush to the south continues via Dhaka-Mawa Expressway

Features

Among pet birds in the country, lovebirds are the most common, and they are also the most numerous in the haat. Photo: Junayet Rashel

Where feathers meet fortune: How a small pigeon stall became Dhaka’s premiere bird market

7h | Panorama
Illustration: Duniya Jahan/ TBS

Forget Katy Perry, here’s Bangladesh’s Ruthba Yasmin shooting for the moon

1d | Features
File photo of Eid holidaymakers returning to the capital from their country homes/Rajib Dhar

Dhaka: The city we never want to return to, but always do

2d | Features
Photo collage shows political posters in Bagerhat. Photos: Jannatul Naym Pieal

From Sheikh Dynasty to sibling rivalry: Bagerhat signals a turning tide in local politics

4d | Bangladesh

More Videos from TBS

Why is Omicron XBB more contagious?

Why is Omicron XBB more contagious?

3h | TBS Stories
What did Dr. Yunus say at the Chatham House Dialogue in London?

What did Dr. Yunus say at the Chatham House Dialogue in London?

4h | TBS Today
News of The Day, 11 JUNE 2025

News of The Day, 11 JUNE 2025

5h | TBS News of the day
WB predicts worst decade for global growth since 60s

WB predicts worst decade for global growth since 60s

7h | TBS Stories
EMAIL US
contact@tbsnews.net
FOLLOW US
WHATSAPP
+880 1847416158
The Business Standard
  • About Us
  • Contact us
  • Sitemap
  • Advertisement
  • Privacy Policy
  • Comment Policy
Copyright © 2025
The Business Standard All rights reserved
Technical Partner: RSI Lab

Contact Us

The Business Standard

Main Office -4/A, Eskaton Garden, Dhaka- 1000

Phone: +8801847 416158 - 59

Send Opinion articles to - oped.tbs@gmail.com

For advertisement- sales@tbsnews.net