Mahmud wakes at a sudden pressure on his ears. He starts rubbing his ears.
Then he hears the ringtone and realizes what that pressure was about. Dammit. Must be the Principal.
He rolls over in his bed, takes the phone, and receives the call without caring to look at the number.
“Hello?”
There’s quiet on the other side.
“Hello?”
“Mahmud, you there?”
It’s his wife, and the time’s probably 2 AM. Mahmud flings himself up on the bed.
“Jorina, what’s wrong?”
“Sorry, honey. But… Hasan won’t listen.”
“He’s still awake?”
“I know. I’ve been trying. But he won’t close his eyes. He wants to talk to you. Here.”
Mahmud hears the mobile handing over. And then: “Baba?”
There’s a subtle difference between someone’s actual voice and what you hear over the phone. You get used to that difference gradually, but it still feels kind of awkward first few times. Mahmud, however, doesn’t feel awkward in this case. His four-year old son’s first word over phone devastates him.
“I’m here, son.”
“Baba, tumi asho.” He wants his baba to come to him.
“I’m here, son. I’m here now. It’s okay.”
“Tumi asho.”
It takes all his strength not to let his voice quaver. “I will. Baba will be back soon. Don’t you worry.”
“Baba…”
“Hush now. I’m here. I’ll say that rhyme for you, okay?”
Aam pata jora jora
Marbo Chabuk Chorba Ghora
Ore bubu shore dara
Ashche amar pagla ghora
To translate this beautiful Bangla poem is challenging. For not only is it difficult to maintain the assonance, but also because it is colloquial literature. And colloquial literature will never have the same feeling once the words of a different language come into play. Still, if translated in decently enough, Mahmud’s recital goes something like this:
Mango leaves are paired
The scourge is whipped, the horse is ridden
Oh sister, step aside
Here comes my manic horse
Mahmud recites six times in a row. When he starts for the seventh time, he hears a whisper from the phone. “Mahmud, he’s closed his eyes.”
“Oh, right.”
“I’m gonna put him to bed, okay? Goodnight.”
“Take good care of him. And yourself.”
“You too.”
Jorina ends the call.
Something is making Mahmud’s insides squeeze. He can’t breathe. He can almost see nothing. All he can feel is two desperate urges. One is to scream, so loud that all the veins in his throat tear apart, and the other to hurl something, anything, at the wall to see it shattering into pieces.
But he doesn’t succumb to either. He shivers and cries, silently.
***
“So, what movie today?”
Mofiz seems nonchalant. “Brave Heart.”
“You watched it?” Joy asks.
“Come on, man! If I watched it already, would I be watching it today?”
“Okay, okay. Stop screaming.” Joy really hates it when Mofiz raises his voice like that. “You know what it’s about?”
“Yeah. It’s about a guy named William Wallace who led some kind of a revolution.”
“Oh, man! Another war movie?”
“Yeah, so what?”
“This is the fifth war movie in the fucking week!”
“Come on, man! What am I supposed to do about that?”
Mofiz isn’t lying. He’s annoyed himself about the frequency of these war movies, but he’s helpless. It’s the Adjutant, Major Sakib, who chooses the movies they watch.
Joy and Mofiz are the Cadets of a residential school run by the Army. Apart from studying in the regular curriculum from Grade 7 to Grade 12, cadets lead a sort of semi-military lifestyle here. The school has been on lockdown since the 27th of March. The Army Headquarters believed that the Cadets’ security would be best ensured if they stayed in school. Whereas all the educational institutions of the country were closed since the 25th, what made them decide against sending the Cadets back home on vacation was the fact that the school itself is an isolated area having limited connection with the outside world. Hence, the lockdown would surely be a safer option than a long-term vacation. The decision had its risks, no doubt, but the Army Headquarters preferred to take them to protect the Cadets, arguably the greatest assets of the country.
With no classes or PTs, the school authority took some measures to keep the Cadets busy. Multimedia-projectors were placed in the Houses—the residential buildings of the Cadets are called House, and there are three Houses in the school, namely the Green House, the Red House, and the Blue House—as well as sound systems. It was decided that the Cadets would watch movies selected by the Adjutant every night after dinner. A majority of those movies, as it turned out, were based on historic wars. They were all good, Cadets agreed on that. But most of the war movies had the same story more or less. Cruel fighting, gunshots, wounds, blood, screaming. You can’t blame the Cadets for their irritation.
“I don’t pick them, do I?” Mofiz snaps.
Joy sighs. “Okay. Sorry, dude.”
“Maybe it’s be a good one. You never know. I saw the IMDb review. It looked good.”
“Yeah, maybe.”
***
Shakil Ahmed is furious. There’s a torrent of curse words hanging about his lips and he would’ve released them all if he had the chance. Except that he’s sitting in the House Office now.
“Did you see the new roaster, Parul?”
Parul Akhter is no less furious herself. She looks up at her senior colleague and says, “Course, I did, sir.”
Shakil Ahmed shakes his head. “I’ve got eight Morning duties, four Prep duties, and five HDMs in fifteen days. It’s torture, for god’s sake!”
“I’ve got even better, sir. Ten Morning duties, five Prep duties, seven HDMs.”
“Goodness! That’s even worse.” Shakil Ahmed shakes his head again.
“It makes sense, sir, doesn’t it? We are the ones who never raise our voice. We always keep quite while they keep wrangling over. So we get the axe because we’re easy to handle.”
Teachers aren’t mere teachers in this school; they have an additional responsibility of watching over the Cadets. When Cadets stay in the House, a teacher stays with them in the House Office to monitor their movements, who is called the HDM, House Duty Master, for that particular day. When the Cadets are in the school building at night and studying—this studying period is called ‘Prep Time’—there are teachers on Prep duty to supervise them. To put it succinctly, wherever the Cadets are, they have teachers to watch over them.
Since the lockdown, some additional duties have been assigned for the teachers. It has been decided that instead of one, there will be two teachers on duty in the Houses all day long. Every morning, from 8:00 to 14:00 hours, there are three shifts of duty. First shift is from 8:00 to 9:45 hours, second shift from 9:45 to 11:00 hours, and the last from 11:00 to 14:00 hours. Two teachers will be on Morning duty in each of these shifts. As per the previous normal schedule, the HDMs were supposed to be on-duty from 14:00 to 16:00 hours—that is, from the lunch time of the Cadets and till the Games time. The same instruction remains, except that there are two HDMs instead of one now.
Partiality is a common aspect when it comes to the distribution of these duties. Since the amount of duties is high, it is undoubtedly difficult to make an equal distribution. However, there are other factors that fuel the partiality. Teachers senior by age and post get more flexibility than the junior teachers because of their seniority. Among the junior teachers, those who are easygoing, who never bother to question or argue with the higher authorities, are typically given more duties. Because they are easy to handle, as Parul Akhter put it, they always get the axe.
“Who does he think he is?” Shakil Ahmed says.
“Who, sir?”
“Who else? The one who made this roaster!”
“Oh, him.” Parul Akhter checks her tone, because the teacher who is referred to here is considerably senior to her.
Shakil Ahmed, however, doesn’t care at all. “He’s always doing this. I won’t mind a bit if he considers everyone equally. But he won’t. He has to make a discrimination all the time. Look at his duties. Four Morning duties, three Prep duties, three HDMs. What is this? A bloody joke?”
Parul Akhter keeps silent.
“I’ll talk to the Principal about this. I’ll complain. Just because I’ve been tolerant all this time doesn’t mean I’ll accept everything.”
Parul Akhter smiles. “Looks like you’ve really lost it this time, sir.”
Shakil Ahmed tries, but can’t resist the smile in the end. “What can I do? It’s so tough to be calm these days.”
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137,902 Literary Works • 672,070 Reviews
Hey Tawsif!
RandomTalks here with a short review!
Wow...these three short stories hit so close to heart. You have done such a wonderful job in portraying real life situations in words and they feel so genuine and honest that I can almost believe each of these interactions took place in some household or some school in the world.
First story:
These one was my favorite. And its not only because I am a Bengali and I have grown up playing "Aam pata jora jora" with my brother. It is mostly because you have included so much emotion in this short interaction between a father and son. I could feel the pain of their separation, the longing to hear your loved one's voice, not over the phone in a tinged mechanical version of the real thing, but their real voice that has loved and supported you throughout your life. I don't think you could have written it more beautifully.
Second story:
I thought I would relate to this one more, being a student myself, but I think this one took a different approach. You mostly described the situation of the school here, and it felt more like a narration of all the changes that took place since the lockdown. I feel like if you had focused more on the interaction between the two kids, it would have made some bigger impact on the reader. Kids often struggle the most when they are confined and I think there was this amazing chance for you to capture that feeling. But instead you took a different direction.
Third story:
This one was very realistic and I liked how you have shown the struggle of the teachers as well. We do not always acknowledge it, and so I think it was a great way to ring their hard work and sacrifice of personal time to the forefront. Their frustration is understandable, and the exhaustion of the two characters as they complained over the unfairness of the situation was very relatable.
I like what you have done with these stories. But most of all, I like the fact that these stories do not contain any plot in itself, they just contain emotion and it is up to you what you take from it.
Keep up the good work and I really hope to get back to the other parts someday very soon!
Hello Tawsif! I'm here for the requested review!
I'm going to review each part, and then give you some overall suggestions. I hope it is helpful!
Let's jump right in!
First part
You beautifully evoke very realistic emotions in the characters, and the dialogue seems natural and unpretentious, like the actual simple and uncensored dialogue you have with your family.
I have a few wording suggestions, though.
These two opening sentences feel a bit disconnected. To make it flow more naturally, you could consider trying something along the lines of:
Or something similar; whatever feels like it fits in with your style.
Again, this feels a bit awkward. One way to reword it is,
Or something like that. Again, whatever feels natural to your writing.
The way this is worded feels too matter of fact, and not likes it's part of a story.
This feels more like it's part of the story, like a thought that Mahmud might be having as he recites it to his son. Again, you can improvise with your words, but I would recommend styling it more in the altered manner, so it's more story-like.
Otherwise, this section is written beautifully and the emotions in it are raw and very well depicted. You stay in the present tense throughout the whole story, and your grammar is flawless.
Second part
Whoah, that is very abrupt and the reader doesn't have time to realize that we are listening to new characters now.
If you include strong swearing in a piece, you need to rate it 18+ for language.
Also, look at the first part of this story:
It's a lot of dialogue and not much else. Then, the next two paragraphs are just INFORMATION. I'm not saying that's completely a bad thing, but try to spread the dialogue out, or at least add some descriptions. I would recommend adding some dialogue tags (he said, she whispered, we screamed, they laughed) to these quotes, as well, as it can be easy to lose track of who's talking.
On a related note, as a couple other reviewers have mentioned, this section doesn't have much going on. All that happens is a lot of information is thrown at us.
Spoiler
These two lengthy paragraphs are telling us information. As an author, you want to reveal and describe information in a way that feels like a natural part of the story.
Instead of throwing dull details at the reader, try and work the information into the plot. You don't need to give us every single detail in the first chapter. As long as we have enough to know what's going on, we don't need to know every single minor fact.
Third part
Spoiler
Again, look at all this information! All this fact-like language is likely to bore the reader. Try to keep more emphasis on the plot and the characters and the setting, to keep the reader engaged.
Overall thoughts/comments
- Your grammar and spelling is flawless, well done!
- The dialogue and characters seem believable so far, though in some places it'd be nice if there was more focus on the characters
- I recommend describing the setting more, throughout all three works. What is Muhmad's room like? Can he picture where his son lives? Where are Joy and Mofiz sitting as they watch the movie? etc.
- All in all, this is well written, there are just a couple of parts where the flow could be improved or where the information is delivered all at once, which is a little boring.
I hope this review was helpful, and that you for stopping by my review thread! If you have any questions, please ask!
Keep writing!
Whatchamacallit
Thank you so much.
Hi there Tawsif. Here to review your first chapter of the LockDown short story. Let's begin.
Since this piece already has a decent amount of reviews and comments, I read them to get more context about the story.
Clearly there are three stories happening concurrently and I assume you are going to tie them together towards the end in Seinfeldian fashion.
Since Xerphrox has already extensively covered aspects of each story in depth for you, let me try to take a slightly different route.
Characters
[1] The first story is clearly my favorite in terms of fleshing out characters. You skimp on details and description but the dialogue gives great context to the father-son bonding and their bangla setting.
As the previous reviewers have mentioned, this is easily the best part of your story.
Here you can see what's going on in Mahmud's mind. What he's going through. How the lockdown is impacting him. It gives me as a reader some insight into your character's mind and setting.
The Bangla poem is a really nice touch but the exposition around it bogs down the narrative.
[2] The second story is pretty weak in terms of character development because you rely on lot of exposition to give me context to the story.
Once this description begins, there's not much that happens to the story. I read your reply to Xerphrox's review that you are trying something different with the exposition aspect of the narrative, which is great but you need to give some sort of an action and/or payoff to your readers for it.
Aside from the character names, there isn't much to distinguish them here. A reader is supposed to be invested in your characters so you have to flesh them out describing their body language, differentiating their tone and style of speaking. Try to bring Joy and Mofiz to life instead of telling us their backgrounds.
[3] I enjoyed the way you finished your third story. Shakil and Parul's interaction about partiality set amidst the backdrop of lockdowns is quite a unique spin on a mundane topic. There's lot of room to flesh out the characters again, but the plot itself drives provides room and setting for you to do that.
Room for Improvement
1. The idea of three concurrent stories is ambitious but needs fair bit of work.It's especially going to be a problem to make sense of everything if the stories intertwine. There's lot of characters in these stories and some of the name dropped ones I assume might show up the later parts.
Just remember that your readers need to recognize and distinguish these characters as they read the later parts of your story. I think you can surely improve that aspect in a rewrite.
2. As Xerphrox stated this is a very topical premise and the story might feel dated to people reading this after few years. But really take this with a grain of salt.
3. I especially had a hard time finishing your second story because of the exposition. A trick I often use to tone down exposition is having a new character trying to figure out how things work. So instead of you describing how cadets function, you can show Joy or Mofiz reminiscing their life before lockdown.
This is a personal opinion but I like to read stories which flow as if characters are just people resolving or dealing with some conflict. Since you acknowledge and translate portion of the text to your readers I feel it slows down the narrative significantly and doesn't let me invest into your story.
That's pretty much all I have for this chapter. I will see if I can review the later chapters if I get time. I hope you found some value out of it. Thanks!
Thanks for the review. It was incredibly helpful. I'll try to work on the expositional paragraphs.
hey, this isn't a review, just a brief suggestion: I liked the story, but could you possibly rate future works as "L" for Language if they include swearing, especially the F-word. Again, not a judgment on your writing abilities.
Okay. Will do.
Hmm! Part one is very interesting and I must say that I enjoyed reading it quite a lot.
Here's my review:
The three different perspectives were quite interesting, and I can't wait to figure out how they're all connected. The one thing I would say would be that the plot was a tad hard to follow in section one. Not very hard, mind you, but a little. I think it is because you don't know what's going on quite yet until you read later. I don't think it's much of a problem though, because, like I said, everything makes sense a little later. I also liked how you put it in present tense. Most people use past tense so it read slightly strangely, but it was a nice change from the constant past tense. Also, you made a couple grammar typos, so I would look it over and fix those.
It's usually not written as "pressure" on your ears when you're hearing something, but that means that it is creative and gets your attention, which is a plus.
This part was very emotional.
Braveheart? Okay, two things. One, there's not supposed to be a space between "brave" and "heart" and for the other thing Braveheart is a super long movie.
This part was funny.
This is where things make sense for section one.
Well that's not very fair.
This would be a very frustrating situation.
This would be an unsatisfying end, (because too many loose ends) if there wasn't a part two, which I can't wait to read!
You conveyed the annoyance of the different people's situation very well, and the descriptions were rather good, plus the plot was interesting. So, all in all, good job.
Well, that's my review! I hope it was helpful.
Thanks a lot. Glad to hear you liked it.
Thanks for sharing this to us. I love reading about things that are actually new to me. Often I read the same things on news, watch the same movie plots, hear the same songs. It’s so rare to find a work like yours that, for me, is a portal to a part of a world I will never step foot on. I doubt I’d ever get to Bangladesh, so I thank you for taking your time to write this and show this to us.
I adore the style you chose to write this. I wonder if Part Two will introduce more characters from the military or if they will show us new characters from entirely different background. But let me focus on Part One for now. I’ll go through the three stories one by one.
STORY 1
I find the story extremely touching. The way Mahmud sung the lullaby in your native language makes it feel extremely intimate, as if I’m not supposed to be there to hear him sing it. I actually looked the song in Youtube and unfortunately only saw upbeat versions of it. You know? Those kind of videos you left in autoplay so you have something to distract a baby with. I would love if you can send me a video of how this song could be sung in the way you imagined it for this story.
Here are my notes:
There’s a subtle difference between someone’s actual voice and what you hear over the phone. You get used to that difference gradually, but it still feels kind of awkward first few times. Mahmud, however, doesn’t feel awkward in this case. His four-year old son’s first word over phone devastates him.
…I am confused if this is either brilliant or just out of place. One moment I think it’s out of place, the next moment I amazed by the contrast you attempt in the last sentence. But I’m conflicted if awkwardness and devastation is a good enough contrast to warrant the technique.
Something is making Mahmud’s insides squeeze.
…I bet you can do better with this line.
One is to scream, so loud that all the veins in his throat tear apart, and the other to hurl something, anything, at the wall to see it shattering into pieces.
…Brilliant display of your ability to depict action.
But he doesn’t succumb to either. He shivers and cries, silently.
…This story I think has the best ending out of the three as it is the only one that fully depicts a proper story with conflict and ending. And that was all done in just 430 words. I don’t know your plans for Part Two so maybe all these stories will be connected in the end, but I feel that if all the stories are going to be independent from one another, I would rather prefer that all stories be interesting with their own proper endings. I feel that this first story is a complete story while the other are just slices of life.
STORY 2
Whereas story 1 got me engaged in the story, it was in story 2 that made me believe I was reading something very new. What worried me about this story is that it forced me to recognize an issue that is also present in story 1. You tend to dedicate certain paragraphs for exposition, and very lengthy ones. At times I feel they displace me out of the story. But I reckon this might also just be a part of your style. I actually find it interesting as it reflects on the matter-of-fact attitude of the military. But I think you need find the perfect balance between exposition and actual plot, because I felt story 2 was devoid of plot. Story 1 has just the right balance because its paragraphs dedicated for exposition (the ones providing details about the lullaby) was supplemental to the emotion of the story. Whereas in story two, the expositional paragraphs only serve to elaborate the situation. I’m sure you could have written this in a way that the expositions blends with the plot instead of having them together in two big paragraphs. But you do you. If this is the way you want to write this, then so be it. But I feel it would be even more engaging if done another way.
NOTES:
“This is the fifth war movie in the fucking week!”
…Just my personal taste, but I consider “fucking” a trite word to use in dialogue, especially since they’re talking something as simple as movies.
Multimedia-projectors were placed in the Houses—the residential buildings of the Cadets are called House, and there are three Houses in the school, namely the Green House, the Red House, and the Blue House—as well as sound systems.
…This is difficult to read. I would suggest you split this into two sentences.
STORY 3
I wonder if you’ll follow up on this story with Part Two as this story ends when the story could have been most interesting. I have the same issues on this with story 2. I prefer that you blend the exposition into the story. What if you could have described how one of the character went to each of his duties and show the nature of his duties while doing so. Along the way, you could introduce the conflict of the character (which he finds the allocation of duties unfair). But I guess that would have made story 3 a lot longer, doesn’t it?
NOTES:
He has to make a discrimination all the time.
…I would rather write: He has to discriminate all the time.
“What can I do? It’s so tough to be calm these days.”
…This resonates to me very well. I guess this is the sentiment everyone has on this entire tragedy. A lot of things are going bad, not just COVID itself, but also to how people and the government are reacting to it. This tragedy gives us a preview to how feral some people could be, and how incompetent a government can be. It’s all this insanity that I agree with you that it’s tough to be calm these days.
FINAL NOTES:
One last note… One day when COVID ends, people in the future will not as easily understand the context of this story. I’ve mentioned that your writing style is very matter-of-factly, very military-esque. I think it would be nice to use this technique to reveal that there’s a pandemic out there.
Thanks for sharing this. I want to ask how come up with this by the way. Are you or someone else close to you a part of the military?
This is the kind of review we writers seek. Detailed and honest. Thank you so much.
Well, I am enrolled in a military school myself. It's a story based on my experiences in that school.
About the 'exposition-paragraphs', you hit the right point. This is a new style I'm attempting, kind of an experiment. I'll try to make a balance. Thanks for pointing it out.
As for the story, it is actually a single story written in different parts. You'll get your answers, but you'll have to read the part 2 I posted. (And wouldn't I LOVE to have another review from you!)
Also, thanks for pointing out that COVID-19 will be history at some point. I'll keep that in mind.
Oh, I just remembered. Isn't it Xerphrox who said to me: "I might be reviewing some other people's work soon. But if I only know how to do it"?
Told ya, man! You only had to start, and it all came to you by itself!
Thanks again! A lot!
I didn't know part two was already posted. I'll look into it tomorrow.
The quarantine is giving me an unusually large amount of free time on my hands. I could have never done a review like this on my regular days. I didn't thought i would feel so many things about your work.
Hi there
First off i just wanted to say how beautifully written this story is, bravo to you! I really enjoyed your piece as a whole, however, my one piece of advice would be to make the transition from the ending of the phone call and the talk about the movies to flow better. All in all, good job! I look forward to reading more of your work
Thank you. Glad to know you liked it.
Thank you. Glad to know you liked it.
Very good! I love your writing style! I'm sorry this is so short, but I'm really not good at reviewing things. Keep writing!
Thanks.
You'll get used to reviewing once you start doing it. Just talk about how the story made you feel, which parts you liked most, which parts needed some changes, and things like that. I was like you in the beginning, but I think I've improved with time. You have to just start reviewing first, and then you'll be better at it gradually.
Thanks again.