Sreemangal Sevens

Seven-colour tea served at Lawachara National Park outside Sreemangal.

Ten-colour tea.

Beyond town is the Sathrong – the Seven Colours – Restaurant. According to the signboard it’s “fully air-condition,” and it will be, at some time after you arrive when they switch the air-conditioner on. Or you can sit street side. Those tables have air all the time, occasionally mixed with a hint of traffic exhaust. It’s hardly a secret that Moulvibazar’s Sreemangal harbours a tea secret. It has to be tried.

A warning to fussy diners – don’t expect details from the waiter. In the case of the signature seven-colour or the newer ten-colour tea it’s not worth asking. “I don’t know what’s in it,” twenty-six-year old waiter Joshim Uddin will say, “It’s made behind a curtain.” Indeed it is. It’s a secret.

Tea. Bangladesh runs on tea. There’s no corner of the country to escape it. Community bonds are built, tested, destroyed and re-imagined in tea shacks in every local market. Who’s stealing whose land, who bought the expensive fish and who’s facing the false case because their uncle doesn’t like them much – all local life details can be imbibed over a cup.

Sreemangal's Sathrong Restaurant. The layered tea is made in secret, behind a curtain.

Sathrong Restaurant, Sreemangal.

Villagers argue politics while sipping, with election posters hanging expectantly, longingly or ridiculously, depending on the candidate pictured – waiting to be referenced or discussed – and hopefully not mocked – by tea drinkers. Plans are made and negotiations settled as water boils in Bangladesh. Exactly whose goat was eating which tree – it almost requires a cup or two to sort that out.

Meanwhile in the city, it is tea that a Baridharan lady will turn to, what she will offer even to a not-entirely-welcome guest, possibly with a biscuit. There’s civility in it. Tea is a nod to decent society. And being so quintessential, when tea comes in unusual colourful bands like at the Sathrong, it’s really something to consider.

It’s unsurprising the innovation should belong to Sreemangal. With its renowned row-patterned hillsides of tea bush the town leaves no guess work that it’s a national tea growing hub. Take a few solid strides up the road from the Sathrong and you’ll be staring at a tea garden.

Count the colours. Make sure it tallies with the order.

After the magic behind the curtain is completed, Joshim Uddin returns with the very attractive coloured tea. There really are distinctive colour bands. You’ll need to count them... to be sure the number correctly tallies with the order. You might be tempted to pump for further information...

“I think there’s coffee in it,” Joshim Uddin guesses, “Milk, green tea, black tea, ginger and sugar. Each layer has its flavour.”

Despite the kitchen’s curtain the secret hasn’t been entirely safe. A handful of places around Sreemangal now serve layered tea. Some establishments have a prohibition on anyone else being inside the kitchen while it’s made. All still zealously guard the precise methodology.

Brown, buff, orange and white; then fawn, auburn and raw umber: those are the seven layered colours in the earliest version, top to bottom, impressive, down the glass. Take your colour chart if you will. Test it. Taste it.

But is it possible there’s a secret within the secret? That the colours of those Sreemangal-sevens conceal inner meaning?

Take brown for instance. It starts with brown. Brown is the colour of raw earth. It’s rustic and agricultural. In that is the farmer’s cycle surely, the hope in the seed-sowing that follows the plough? Brown is the struggle of the Bangladeshi delta, the source of growth and vitality. Brown is where we’ve come from. It’s where we all end up. It’s a place to stand.

We could say that brown is the thud of the base drum in the orchestra called Earthly life. It’s quite understandable it’s the first of the layers to reach the tastebuds.

But what do the colours mean?

Now buff is altogether different. It’s a more recent colour: an innovation. Its first recorded use as a colour name in English only dates from 1686. Buff is the colour of undyed leather.

From brown it must signify refinement. The harvest might have grown in the field but it’s stored in say, mud brick homes – consider the buff-coloured farmhouses traditional to North Bengal. Sacks of hessian are also roughly buff, aren’t they? In them food heads to the cities. Even leather – that primary stuff of buff – is the start of shoes – fit for walking. It’s easy to sense that the buff layer is about movement and progress.

Ten colour tea from Sreemangal.

Buff is archaeology, civilisation begun. It recalls the rushing rivers of the monsoon. It’s the colour of that line across the water to be seen from the Chittagong to Barisal ship, where the water of the Bay finally encounters the buff-coloured Meghna’s outflow. A quickening in the tempo of the human song is the buff.

The colour orange comes in at number three. That colour was once referred to as yellow-red. It didn’t find an English name until the first oranges, the fruit, arrived from the east in the late fifteenth century. It was first fruit, then colour.

Orange brings excitement: amusement, elation and joy. Orange stands for the excesses of jackfruit, the exquisiteness of mangoes and the frivolous indulgence of jelabis. Happy Krishna wears yellowish-orange as often as not.

With the brown of the land and the buff of progress taken care of, it certainly seems like the time for orange – there can be no mistake here. It’s the step toward literature and poetry and emotion. It’s the colour of human expression. It befits that the orange layer tastes intoxicatingly sweet.

The fourth of seven is white. In a western sense it could denote purity. In China it might signify death. But Sreemangal being a South Asian town it’s as likely to represent cow’s milk – perhaps exactly what it is. White is that fertility symbol that leads to family and society. It makes sense because it’s hardly worthwhile to be elated with orange if there’s no white to bring about those to share it with.

From the Renaissance European artists started to dabble in white, adding it to other colours to bring new brightness, and it’s not a solitary brightness, but of society, of the many...

Next comes fawn. It’s an interesting shade of brown, mostly used to describe furnishing or fashion or the lighter pelts of some dog breeds. At the Sathrong it will take some thinking – perhaps it’s as simple as luxury. By the time we’ve reached fawn the cities are built, society is there. It’s time to decorate: a nice sofa, a pure-bred, shiny pet dog?

Each layer has a distinctive flavour.

The penultimate colour is auburn – reddish brown – and it’s even more cryptic than the fawn. Auburn usually refers to hair colour – especially women’s hair. Ann Boleyn is said to have had auburn hair, and just because King Henry VIII beheaded her in the finish is not to say she wasn’t attractive. Her fate wasn’t driven by her looks. It’s just a guess – only the tea maker behind the curtain could ever be sure, but could auburn signify lasting beauty, or love? It’s beyond the fashion of fawn – something higher, something more valuable...

Raw umber, last – it’s a teaser, it must be. It’s ironic in being prehistoric. It was with iron oxide and manganese oxide, the powder called raw umber, that over 40,000 years ago mankind painted horses on the walls of European caves. Now that’s humour, isn’t it? To remind us that no matter how far we might think we’ve come we are never far from our primitive roots. Read the horrors in any newspaper and it’s clear. That final colour in the seven-coloured tea is actually the most ancient. Our end is our beginning.

Seven and ten-coloured tea is a little adventure. Analyse the colours, sample the flavours and wonder at the secret... because, ultimately, it’s tea. And tea, as much as anything, is what keeps Bangladesh running.

It's still tea... what keeps Bangladesh running.

This article is published in Star Magazine, here: Sreemangal Sevens

Test it. Taste it.

Raw Hospitality

At Hotel Samrat the service is loud, very loud.

At five hours north it starts with dal bhajee – lentils. Poached eggs laze on tea cup saucer, fresh porota flat bread, piping, is ready to singe the fingers and tea from across the road will sweeten the throat. A little salty, a little savory, a little perfect: Bangladeshi breakfast arrives as an old friend tapping the shoulder saying, “Wakey, wakey. A new day is here.”

Breakfast underway... Hotel Samrat, Jamalpur.

At Hotel Samrat on Medical Road breakfast goes further, venturing beyond its usual habitat of delectable and delightful. A Samrat breakfast isn’t only a feast for the stomach but overwhelming for the ears. A Samrat breakfast is deafening.

 “What’ll you have?” he’s shouting. It’s morning. He’s shouting and it’s the morning.

Emon Hossain, 27, takes service seriously. Good service means nice behaviour, speaking politely, providing what the customer wants and bringing the dishes on time, he says. He doesn’t mention volume.

Customers are talking, filing in, mulling about – nothing in that. There’s the dish clash, the chair scrape, the bang of glasses of filter water hitting the table four at a time – all usual. Honestly, it couldn’t be Bangladesh without a bit of breakfast bustle but Samrat waiters engage voices that seem to rumble up like lava from somewhere deep underground.

“Do you need anything else?” somebody else’s waiter is saying to the table across the room. I can hear it as effectively as one of those mobile megaphone movie announcements that circle the town by CNG. The tone is serious. It’s like a courtroom scene where the victim is pointing and saying “That’s the guy who robbed me!”

Waiter Emon Hossain takes pride in providing good service.

Wait! Wait! Wait! The waiter, Emon, he’s got his hand on my dal. Think quickly! There’s nothing wrong with my dal! I don’t need a refill. “More?” No, really. No. “Slight?” Each word is a thunder clap. And the storm is never far off, not at all! Samrat is a breakfast epicentre.

Thought wandering in: is it because the Samrat is a singular long room that voices are overly voluminous? Did they grow that way, nagged upwards on the audio scale by the need to traverse the distance to the little window slot before the kitchen? But they are also shouting when standing right in front of that window. I can hear it: “Two cups tea! Dal! Khashir paya!”

Wait! Wait! Wait! The waiter, Emon, has his hand on my porota! I’ve just picked it up. It’s hot, too hot. He’s tugging at the flatbread. I’m pulling it back. He’s offering to heat it up again. Only the hottest and freshest porota, is his thinking. He must be aiming for molten! His quest for good service is grand. In my food is his hand!

A world within the world: the Samrat, Jamalpur.

Thought circling: circular tables, aren’t they supposed to be egalitarian and soothing? They don’t suit the Samrat where jarring, square ones would well fit. Or do the round tables act as a kind of counterweight? The hotel’s service is raw, industrial, metallic... It’s so authentic it’s possibly post-authentic... maybe the round tables are the only thing preventing the whole restaurant collapsing into the abyss of some strange alternate dimension, some void devoid of calmness?

Couldn’t they use legs in order to speak at a room temperature volume? Oh, but they do: there’s movement, dishes coming, orders going and all the while, “Two cups tea! Dal! Khashir Paya!”

Thought approaching: was it some quirk of the architecture that gave the Samrat acoustics like the Sydney Opera House? Is it the tiled interior? Is there reverberation to account for, things sounding louder than they actually are?

Emon takes time out for his own lunch.

“When the customer is happy, I am also happy,” says Emon, and he means it. When a customer is rude he feels it. “Then service does not come from the heart.” And he feels poorly if anyone leaves dissatisfied. Perhaps in the volume is extra effort. Perhaps he works on the theory that things delivered loudly are delivered better?

If a customer makes a mess Emon doesn’t mind, he says. “It’s up to me to clean it.”

Emon really is putting his heart into it. He’s got the filter water from a recycled coke bottle in the fridge – chilled, but he’s put some ordinary filter water in the bottom of the glass first so it’s not too chilled. He’s tucking napkins into my diary so they don’t blow away. He’s bringing tea from across the road not at a walk but at a run. He’s dodging traffic. He’s nearly ready to reach into my wallet to take out the money I need when it’s time to pay. But he thinks twice about that.

Emon’s mother died when he was four – snake bite. His father passed on when he was fourteen – lung cancer. Since then he’s been on his own without siblings to rely on. There was no chance to continue study and the Samrat gives 180 taka per day plus tips plus food. It gives a kind of family.

“Every day is good,” he says, “Everything is good. The manager, the food, the customers...” Female customers always behave nicely with him. They leave bigger tips. “And after work with the other waiters I move about the town. It’s enjoyable.”

“That woman is asking if you speak Bangla,” Emon says. I know. I heard the waiter yelling an answer at her, a few tables up.

The bustling Samrat Hotel.

“How do you live here without A/C?” Emon asks. For a short while he worked in Karwan Bazar in Dhaka, at the Star Hotel, he says. He didn’t enjoy it much – Dhaka was too cluttered and there was no good accommodation. The city was too loud. With his hand he makes a water dripping gesture. “There was a problem with the water,” he says. It’s easy to imagine it dripping onto his bed. But while in Dhaka, after work, moving about town with his friends as is his custom, he once went to the airport. Zia he calls it. It was Zia then. “I saw the foreigners,” he says, “Coming in from Hong Kong, Bangkong... and taking a flash car to a fancy hotel.” Hence, there’s the curiosity of me turning up.

I’d recommend it to anyone. Samrat service is gritty, rough, abrasive, bold, existential, uninhibited, primal... but more than that it’s sincere – somehow more real than reality itself. And you can’t beat real. You could walk the length and breadth of cities like Paris or Tokyo and never find service quite like it. Emon has earned a decent tip, of course, of course. After all, he’s taken the trouble to put his hand in my food. Welcome to Jamalpur!

The Samrat Hotel, middle, on Medical Road.

Compass Points

Coloured stuffing for sale in Ulipur.

Who am I? Well, originally I come from 9,272 kilometres away, give or take some kilometres, almost precisely in the southeast direction.

I’m assuming for the moment that the centre of the universe is at geographic coordinates 25°39′30.05″N, 89°37′08.52″ E, give or take a second or two, at the precise spot known as the Al Shad Hotel on College Road in Ulipur, Kurigam. While the needle might always gravitate northwards the compass has to sit somewhere. It’s not much of an assumption – for both management and regular customers the centre of the universe the Al Shad just about is.

Centre of the universe: the Al Shad Hotel on College Road.

I come from coordinates 33°51′35.9″S, 151°12′40″ E, a place that’s referred to as Sydney, Australia - but at the Al Shad it’s called ‘bidesh’ – the foreign zone.

A convenient geographic descriptor, bidesh covers all areas beyond the borders of Bangladesh absolutely and may also find application to Bangladeshi areas outside Kurigram District depending on how humorous the conversation has become. Sydney is ‘deep bidesh’ – one hundred percent exactly.

There was time to eat breakfast at the universe’s centre before finding my bearings.

Who is he? Bideshis are guests at the Al Shad. They’ve travelled far – they might need three napkins during the course of their lentil, egg and roti-bread breakfast, while for customers from nearer coordinates one will do. The water glass should be refilled or replaced after even a sip is removed – it’s important they feel welcome. And they certainly do!

The small town of Ulipur, Kurigram, Bangladesh.

Side view of the munshibari in Ulipur.

What’s his story? It’s impossible to communicate with bideshis since they don’t speak Bangla – to be assumed – but the bideshi’s life story can be gleaned from tiny details. For example, if the bideshi is wearing a t-shirt with a miniscule “Feni Leisure Club” logo on its sleeve, it’s certain enough to tell others he works for the Leisure Club in Feni and is on Leisure Club business in Ulipur.

If however, by way of some miracle he does speak some Bangla then it’s all the more enjoyable. The Al Shad manager can ask what he’d like for lunch since they could make something special – and the stool beside the counter may be offered for chatting.

What does the compass say? To the north northeast on the Dharanibari Road, roughly at coordinates 25°40′12.68″N, 89°37′49.17″ E is the decorative munshibari, the gentrified manor dating from the mid-1700s that was home to the local ruling family, by title - Munshis.

The munshibari estate in Ulipur.

The original 34-acre combined estate was first granted by the sixth Nawab of Bengal, Bihar and Orissa, of the Afshar Dynasty, Nawab Shirajuddaula – to Bonwari Munshi who came to the area for hunting initially, so it is said.

Sri Brojendra Lal Munshi

As Bonwari Munshi had no child, a son, Binod, was adopted for inheritance. Binod in turn was without an heir so adopted probably the most renowned Munshi, Brojendra Lal - a dusty portrait of him is to be found inside. Brojendra Lal also fathered no son and his younger daughter followed that fate – adopting a son to inherit.

After 1971 the property was ultimately taken over by the government. From 1987 the local Revenue Office has been situated inside. A single officer sits in a large room at a weathered desk.

The home is in a state of disrepair, but its charm plants in one bideshi’s mind the foolish notion that it would make a nice boutique hotel – that there could be a string of such hotels at historical homes across Bangladesh. The unique tourism experience could be marketed internationally. Of course, there is little organised activity for the bideshi in the villages but the scenery, culture and friendliness are untapped major drawcards.

Jute truck, Ulipur.

How do bideshis eat? Being from so far away nothing can be assumed. It’s considered that bideshis don’t eat in the normal way, with hands. He requires cutlery – and there being no full set available, at the least a small aluminium fork can be brought on a plate and placed in front of him. On second thought – do they even have forks in bidesh? It might be worthwhile to mime putting the fork into the roti and then into the mouth to ensure he is exactly certain of the utensil’s utility. He’s sure to enjoy the meal!

Eroded road in Hatia Union, Ulipur.

And then? To the east northeast on Anantapur Road I find the serene walled garden of the Sri Sri Kali Siddheshwari Hindu Temple complex, a good place to pause. The ruins of the original temple dating from around 1700 are nearby. Beyond in Hatia Union one meets the majestic Brahmaputra at approximately 25°40′39.97″N, 89°41′23.62″ E. But it’s not so regal a river when it is explained that the half-remaining riverside road was just a week earlier a full road, since devoured by erosion.

Meanwhile at the Anantapur tea shop is a dispute: one villager is arguing that all people can speak Bangla. The other says, “Not all people speak Bangla! If he speaks English, will you understand it?”

And when local Mohammed Nazi Hossein speaks of the severe erosion there should be no humour in it: yet he doesn’t speak grimly. “The river used to be five kilometres away, four or five years ago” he says, “and now my kids can take their bath in front of the house!” I am left to wonder if there isn’t a poet inside every Bangladeshi villager.

How does he take his after-meal tea? It’s an important consideration at the Al Shad. It should probably be double-size, in the glass with no chip in it, with extra milk and any flavoursome tea spices that may be around – he will certainly be unable to say afterwards that Ulipurians didn’t do their best. He will admire the kindness!

Street scene in Ulipur.

Where to now? To the west at some seconds away is the bustle of Ulipur, with coloured stuffing in sacks for sale, the lively buzz of traffic and the crowd and jute being loaded onto a truck up a long ramp. See the modest pond, the dighee behind the mosque that the congestion doesn’t reach!

The tank behind the mosque, Ulipur.

Alomgir at his betel and cigarette stall.

Do they chew paan in Australia? Alomgir the betel seller on the street outside the Al Shad has curiosity. When the answer is no, he suggets it would be no trouble to take a bunch of betel leaves to Australia since they are easily packed together and tied with string – a convenient knotted carry-handle can be included. When it is explained that plant and animal material can’t be taken into Australia – that it would be confiscated at the airport – well, it’s frankly puzzling. It may be the general rule but “What could they care if it’s only betel?”

Doesn’t the compass needle ultimately point north? Yes, and to the north at coordinates 25°44′52.18″N, 89°38′00.12″ E, quite some distance from Ulipur is the Zia Pond, a large dighee surrounded by trees that must for the townsfolk be an enjoyable picnic spot.

Zia Pond, north of Ulipur.

But the forces of the universe are many and even at its centre unthinkable things can happen. The Al Shad is without chatter! All faces are frozen – without exception pointing in one direction. Has the universe collapsed? Has time ended? No, it’s the TV that has them engrossed, without exception, to a man, to a face – they’re watching the BBC series “Walking with Dinosaurs”, one hundred percent absorbed in considering things Jurassic.

Because, from the centre of the universe it’s fascinating to look outwards – and dinosaurs are not less interesting than learning about bidesh from the bideshi who’s just walked in again.

Zia Pond must make for an ideal picnic spot.

Yet it’s Alomgir who has the final say. “Of all the places you’ve been,” he asks, “Isn’t Ulipur just the best place of all?” And right then – for that singular moment – the bideshi wonders if Alomgir isn’t one hundred percent accurate.

View of the Brahmaputra from a tea shop in Hatia Union.

Boat on the Brahmaputra.

This article published in Star Magazine, here: Compass Points

Loading jute in Ulipur town.

Starting with Dessert

A dish of kheer mahan at Pabna Sweets, Ulipur, Kurigram.

The bell at Ulipur fire station.

Fire. In the long struggle for advancement, since the dawning of the first fireball sun, it is difficult to overestimate its value. For warmth, protection, cooking and light – fire has proved humankind’s ally.

The ability to harness fire is one of those attributes which seperate us from the rest of the animal kingdom. By way of comparison – and a word of warning from Ulipur, Kurigram – cows don’t understand fire much.

Kheer at the Kumar house takes a minimum of six hours of simmering.

But I’m telling it wrong. Let’s start again. You’ll know the bus journey from Dhaka to Kurigram is a long one; you’ll understand if I say those city passengers of haste, hassle, scrambling for attention at the bus counter and trying to squeeze through a traffic jam got down somewhere long before the destination. These are not the sort of passengers to reach Kurigram.

Kheer mahan destined for Pabna Sweets

As you know, in Kurigram you’ll find that old Bengal: life runs slower and there’s not only time to stop to chat to friends met on the street but also an expectation. Kurigram is the quiet courtyard of a mossy, high-ceiling government building. It’s winter badminton, impromptu, time-passing. In Kurigram traditional Bangladeshi hospitality reigns undisputed king – kindling homemade philosophy about fire and words of warning concerning cows are not the way Kurigram begins. Certainly not on an empty stomach...

In small-town Ulipur, for her part – and there’s fame in it – when it comes to stomach filling it’s as well to start with dessert. The best dessert, my friend, starts in the area behind the bazaar that’s dedicated to laneway and pond. Please bear with me – we’ll get there soon.

The area isn’t large, but to take the correct turns and find the exact gate of the Kumar residence isn’t easy. One would just about need assistance from a search and rescue expert to find it – so it was a good thing I had one with me.

Md. Makbul Hossein is my friend Mostafiz’s younger brother. He’s been working as a fire fighter for the Fire Service and Civil Defence for six years, stationed in Ulipur. We met in that most Bangladeshi way – randomly. I’d forgotten, let’s be honest, that Mostafiz was a Kurigramer, and it just so happened he called me at the very moment I sat in an electric JSA auto on the final leg from Kurigram town to Ulipur. “Where are you?” Mostafiz asked.

Md. Makbul Hossein at the Ulipur fire station.

Of course it had to be that before the remaining kilometres were covered everything was organised – one of the officers was on leave so it wouldn’t be a problem to stay at the fire station! The choice of hotels in Ulipur is limited but to stay at a fire station was a first for me.

Unlike at a hotel, just outside the room was a large rusty bell which tolls for shift changes – there’s always someone on duty. It tolls for morning roll call, but I’d let you know visitors don’t need to attend. It can toll at any moment, repeatedly, in case of emergency.

There’s a fire emergency almost every day and the officers are trained to ready themselves and be on the fire truck within approximately thirty seconds. I bravely suggested I could be at the fire truck first: brave only in words – they would’ve been returning home again before I got my act together. My claim was never tested – fortunately those days were quiet.

And one afternoon, I confess, on returning to the fire station to find nobody in the yard for adda, I was tempted to ring the bell – a chatting emergency, conversation within thirty seconds! But of course considerate guests don’t do such things.

Anyway, with his fire fighting training and rescue knowledge locating the Kumar residence wasn’t challenging for Makbul.

The kheer mahan kitchen at the Kumars'.

Makbul makes his living from fire; so do the Kumars. Inside their yard an enormous pot of milk slowly boiled over a pit flame – into it are added bay leaves and cardamom, and other ingredients which Sunil Kumar, head-of-household and the other side of 50, ‘doesn’t want to say just now.’ You’ll understand it’s hardly likely this culinary inventor was going to divulge the entirety of his secret recipe for kheer, that sweetened, thickened milk used in several Bangladeshi dishes.

He did say however – a little tip – that there’s no sugar in it and the slower the milk cooks the greater the sweetness retained. Kumar-kheer requires six hours of boiling and stirring.

The humble but famous Pabna Sweets, Ulipur main road.

There’s history in that fire – in Kurigram town it’s universally acknowledged the finest kheer mahan, that type of sweetmeat, comes from Ulipur. And in Ulipur the recommended shop name is likely to be Pabna Sweets. Sunil, originally from Belkuchi Upazila in Pabna, has passed on business and culinary secret to his thirty year old son Sanjid. They’ve been making kheer mahan for twenty-five years – indeed, Sunil says he invented it.

Kheer mahan, the finished product, is an elongated ball of that fresh, unripened curd cheese called chhana, made in a process similar to ricotta. The milk is boiled, curdled with a small amount of whey, and the resulting coagulated curd is collected, wrapped in cloth, strained, beaten and kneaded until it becomes firm and smooth. The lengthened ball of chhanna, when draped in the attire of the Kumars’ kheer, takes on an altogether new dimension of delicious.

It won’t surprise you that kheer mahan, both the Kumars’ and the many versions from other kitchens, are sold all across Ulipur. You’ll see in the main street an oversupply of kheer mahan vendors.

Three generations of the Kumars, Sanjid with his son on the left, Sunil on the right at home amidst the day's kheer mahan production.

Sunil Kumar first learnt the sweetmeat trade at a shop in Dinajpur where he refined his skills on all manner of sweets – cham cham, rasgulla, rajbogh, chhena jalebi – before he got creative. His innovation starts with an idea that slowly cooks and curdles in his mind – then there are experiments before the new variety emerges. These days his imagination has grown big – you’ll understand as he explains his ‘atomic bomb’ project. A single piece of this industrial-sized sweetmeat, perhaps in the shape of a fish or a boat, can weigh several kilograms. His first atomic bomb involved a 2.5 kilogram chhanna armament sent to Dhaka for somebody’s birthday.

Sanjid Kumar has taken charge of Pabna Sweets.

His son Sanjid meanwhile dreams to expand the business that currently sells 15-20 kilograms of kheer mahan per day. The problem is finance – and Sunil’s atomic programme suffers similarly from a lack of capital.

Yet according to Sunil the most important factor in running a successful sweetmeat business is cleanliness – high hygiene standards bring customers back.

Back at the fire station you’ll be hearing of the rough driveway and the five turns down narrow laneways that the truck has to negotiate before reaching the main road. Vital seconds are lost and it’s disheartening for the fire fighters, well-equipped and ready to be on-truck within thirty seconds. They’ve written letters but it came to nothing.

And the leading cause of Ulipur fires? It’s cows kicking over the mosquito coils their owners thoughtfully placed in the barn of an evening to keep livestock well-rested and comfortable. Cows don’t understand much about fire.

Morning roll call at Ulipur fire station.

Meanwhile Sohel – another fire fighter – is on his way back to the station from a home visit in Rangpur. He’s excited, his head is buzzing because his colleagues have told him to expect a new ‘team member’ on his arrival. Who could it be?

The fire station at Ulipur.

Now that you’re satisfied with a good helping of kheer mahan, a final word of warning: it might be best not to mention Ulipur’s atomic bomb programme – it’s not a good world we live in – weapons of mass destruction – there are those who wouldn’t hesitate to launch a military strike before discovering that Ulipur’s atomic programme is milk-based.

Measuring ingredients in the Kumar household.

This article is published in Star Magazine, here: Starting With Dessert