A Bond beyond Green

When I close my eyes, I see the images of rain falling on earth and hear the sounds of frogs during the rainy season, the serenity of early morning, and picking mangoes in the night after a nor’wester with my childhood friends. I barely forget the village memories of spending my whole night gossiping with my siblings and enjoying the beauty of a full moon on the rooftop of our house. At that time, I used to wake up seeing the heron bird sitting on the top branch of a bamboo tree, and the squawking of herons in the early morning always amazed me. I'm Mahfuza Chowdhury, a girl from a small village in Bangladesh who grew up seeing paddy fields and jute harvesting, as well as swimming in the natural pond and river. Being a freaky and naive girl, I enjoyed all my childhood and juvenile years like a free butterfly in the green surroundings, where I could feel the smell of nature, soil, and rain. Still, I can feel the deep connection with nature that I passed behind four years ago.

Today, I'm facing asthma, low blood pressure, and low eyesight, and I can feel the reason for having these diseases. Maybe I just detached myself from nature. My life journey till the age

of 24, surrounding nature, and maybe it's a punishment to leave nature behind. It's a matter of sorrow that all my health problems started as soon as I shifted to the capital city for higher education due to high pollution. Not only do the greenish trees, paddy fields, and

Jute/solid-made products attract me, but also there is an invisible but inevitable link between the mentality of humans and health and psychology that has been understood by me. Maybe it’s a sign of adulthood to think deeply with emotions. If I break down my journey from childhood,

I can see every phase of my life linked up to nature anyhow. While I was in class 5, I went to a teacher for my extra classes at his house. On the way to his house, I often saw a man making something by carving wood that was too beautiful to forget. I was surprised and paused to see how a man can make such an art with his own hand by his hands. That was the first time I felt something for natural products instead of plastic-made toys. Furthermore, if I talk about another incident, there was an academic curriculum in our high school to make something with paper, plastic, jute, or soil. I still have the memory that I made a jute hanging shelf on my own, without taking any help from others, just by seeing another shelf. The jute shelf still beautifies my living room. Maybe it's natural to feel a deep connection with natural products instead of using plastic made products while growing up in a natural environment.

My story turned 180 degrees when I shifted to Dhaka. The contrasting emotion grew in my mind when I had to come to Dhaka (the capital of Bangladesh) for my higher education. It seemed impossible to survive in Farmgate (the most popular area for admission coaching in Dhaka). I often felt suffocated and sick due to a lack of a proper place for walking, a scarcity of enough trees, and the air pollution problem. After failing in my first attempt to get admission at a public university, I decided to go back to my village, as I felt at that time I couldn’t survive in this polluted area. Surprisingly, destiny had a better plan for me. I got a chance to get admitted to the IR at the Bangladesh University of Professionals and had a chance to live in a calm and green

environment. Luckily, I got a seat in my university dorm from the first semester of university life, and the position of my bed was amazing, just beside the balcony. I have decorated the balcony like a small greenhouse with some money plants and coin plants, as well as various indoor plants that calm my nervous system in this hectic city and remind me of my

village. Every time I return to my dorm from home, I usually take a train journey because I feel

suffocation while inhaling the closed air. I prefer to sit on the window seat of the train. enjoying the natural greenish beauty. But at the same time, when I always get myself passing Beside the brick mills, I feel sick, as I have asthma issues. Horribly, I have to experience the black smoke flying around the mills. In some of these cases I feel so helpless that I can't do anything when I find myself cutting down too many antique trees to make bricks. Coincidentally, I got IR for my bachelor's program, and my interest in nature paved the path of my academic journey too. I had to work on environmental-related policy as a part of an academic course, and at that time, I got a further chance to know more about jute/leaf-related news, data, and the environment of Bangladesh. I was shocked to find that all the jute mills of Bangladesh had decided to shut down, despite having huge possibilities as an alternative to plastic products.

I was thrilled a few days ago when I came to know that environmental adviser Sayed Rizwana Hasan banned all polythene and plastic products within a few days of having power and asked to use cotton-based and jute-based bags in every shopping complex. When I visited some of these stores, I felt excited to know the real picture, as the banning of plastic and using jute bags is a more interesting area of my policy paper for my graduation course. I was glad to see how strictly they started to maintain not using any plastic packaging and instead using paper and jute packaging. Maybe it's a little initiative towards a plastic-free Bangladesh. more deeply rooted in Bangladeshi jute/leaf-made products instead.

In all, I've realized that I can not separate myself from nature, neither before nor today. Obviously, the way is different, just like the transition from emotional attachment to policy building towards the environment. We try to detach ourselves from nature, but nature doesn't leave us. It’s intractable, and that can't be left behind. It's high time that we ignored our nature. We have to come forward to protect our nature, ecosystem, and biodiversity through micro-national initiatives and policy building.