Thursday, March 5, 2009

Halima Khatun

If you walk through the roads of Gawair, Dhaka, you can often see a 97 years old man selling tea. His name is Md. Damesh Ali. There is no sign of regression in his face and very serious about his business. He has no other way to feed his family. He spends so many years of his life in poverty and discomforts that for him the definition of life is fighting hard and suffering misery. But his daughter defines life in the other way around. His daughter’s name is Halima Khatun a bright little star of The Dhaka Project.

Halima, her father and her mother forms their poor but happy family. They live in a single room house. She used to be a very bright student. Before The Dhaka Project she used to be in primary school where she won first place in class three. The sad part of the story began when it was not possible for Md. Damesh Ali to continue her study. She was crying outside her house knowing that she can’t achieve her dream and will have to walk in the same path as her father did. Suddenly she meets with a senior student of the project who influenced her to get admitted in the project’s school. Halima’s journey in her dream path started again. We made her believe as far as we and our respected supporters are with us she won’t have to look back. She worked hard at school and home to keep up with the English medium curriculum as her former school followed Bengali syllabus. The first term result was not satisfactory in compare to her proven smartness. But it did not take her long to be on track. She started to work harder and now she if on the verge of achieving the goal. She is looking forward for a very good result in the final term and her teachers believe she can. We wish her all the best for the exam.

Halima has a very wonderful dream of becoming a professional dance teacher. She has a small and sad story behind it. A relatively rich friend of her had a dance teacher. Everyday after school Halima used to see her friend dancing by her window. One day Halima went to the dance teacher and asked him that her father cannot effort to pay her for a dance teacher but she is very eager to learn classical dance and in reply the teacher pushed her away telling that he has no time for free service. She cried the whole week requesting her father for a dance teacher but it was quite impossible for a 97 years old tea seller. Her aim in life now is to get educated and to have higher education on classical dance from professional dance institution and teach poor slums’ children dance for free.

No comments: