A popular practice among Bengalis is sending things overseas and vice versa through other Bengali friends and neighbors (popularly called chalani/salani). It displays love for your relatives back home, right? But at what cost? At the cost of putting extra burden on someone who is simply trying to take a break from their busy schedule and visit their loved ones or return to USA from their loved ones by giving them unnecessary loads to carry in their luggages. Shampoo, lotion, soaps, Fair & Lovely, shutki? What sorcery is this? How essential are these to preserving ties of kinship while putting the quality of others lives in the gutter? This comes with many other repercussions, such as the I scratch your back, you scratch mine mentality. You will have to fit their *essentials* in your luggages even if it means you leave behind some of the essentials you planned to take, because you feel too embarrassed to tell them that you cant take their shampoos and Fair & Lovely. They will refuse to understand your circumstances. In case you deny, they will have a special enmity towards you because you failed to return the favor, no matter the circumstance. Then, drama! I remember returning from Bangladesh last time I visited it. People gave us so many things to bring back that we ended up having an extra luggage. Turns out, we will have to pay an additional 15,000 taka ($200) to take the extra luggage. If youre that desperate, go find the nearest DHL, FedEx, or UPS office. Use paid services, stop using people.
Posted on: Fri, 03 Oct 2014 22:04:22 +0000
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