Thirty-nine degrees Fahrenheit. We entered the crowd and our eyes turned to the dazzling lights and bustling energy of Time square. As the famous New Year’s Ball descends in Times Square, we started counting the final seconds of the year and celebrated a new year with a lot of expectations, dreams, and change.
Thinking back on my life, I have always celebrated New Year at my home sitting in front of the TV watching the New year programs, or by wishing my friends New Year late at night over texts. But on every fourteenth April in Bangladesh, there had been boundless joy and memories that enriched my childhood.
Unlike counting the last seconds of the year, my parents and I have always waited for the sun to move from Pisces to Aries to start a new fresh day of Pohela Boishakh, a Bengali new year’s day that starts with a long parade. Under 39-degree Celsius temperature, our Pohela Boishakh started with a procession in CRB street, an intersection where seven roads meet, wearing a red Panjabi with a white pajama. The wide street and the buildings amplified the thunderous drumming, the cacophonous sounds from whistles and horns while we lost ourselves in the infectious sense of the carnival. We used to run around, in and out of the crowd, standing on street benches through the side streets to catch every detail of the march. Standing upon a radio station office, we found ourselves eye-to-eye with those riding the magnificent elephants.
Spending countless days in New York, I discovered new communities, new cultures, and a new me. From Bengali to English, CRB street to faded Manhattan Time square road, and thirty-nine degrees Celsius to thirty-nine degrees Fahrenheit, I found a new environment and a new culture, a culture that not only reminded me of my old culture but perhaps influenced me to adapt to this new culture. Growing up in Bengali culture, my parents are always homestyle. They grew up in a sense only to live like a Bengali. Being a Bengali, I likewise experienced childhood in the sense to contain only Bengali culture however, now I need to adjust as both Bengali and American as well. Since I find those open doors that I never found in my country. So, I discovered an opportunity to be adjusted to this culture effectively through going to school and making friends.
Tanzid, the sense of description here is cinematic: as a reader, I feel like I’m right among the crowds at this pivotal powerful moment.