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Bangladesh To Cali.

Akhyar Zaman Period 3a

Fish on the Battlefield


Who would have thought that a unknown river will be a historical landmark. It isnt historical because of the location, but what was in the river made it significant. The hilsa is a very traditional fish to the country of Bangladesh. Most Americans dont know Bengali cuisine. A very cultural dish is Fried Hilsa with Rice. I would like to give you a brief history of the dish. Also, you need to know what the dish is made out of that makes it so good. Back when Bangladesh was fighting for their independence against Pakistan, Bengalis had to fight a lot in jungles and villages. There is a folktale that the soldiers were camping by a river and they heard splashing near by. They looked at the nearby river and saw fish jumping. They caught and fried them. This is how the popular dish started. Every Bengali New Years, citizens would eat this dish to show respect. The hilsa became the national fish of Bangladesh. That is why the hilsa is a popular ingredient in Bengali cuisine. The dish that uses hilsa primarily is Fried Hilsa with Watered Rice. After Bangladesh got its independence they made their capital city Dhaka. The dish became popular there and spread to the whole country. The making of this dish takes time to perfect. Making this dish will be challenging at first but eventually you will get it. To make this dish, you have to get a piece of hilsa and marinate it. The spices for the marinate is turmeric, cumin, and chili powder. Then you put lemon juice and salt. You keep the marinated fish in the fridge overnight. Then you fry the fish with mustard oil.

3 While frying, you add the onions and cilantro. To make the rice you first cook the rice and let it chill overnight. Then you add the water. After two to three hours you can serve it. When you take your first bite, you will finally understand why it is so popular in Bangladesh. When I tried this dish it was amazing. The smell of the fish was remarkable. You will never find a scent as astonishing as the Hilsa. It is very spicy, but the watered rice keeps it balance. That is what makes this dish satisfying. Other cultures or ethnicity must not have tried Bengali cuisine or know much about it. Fried Hilsa with Watered Rice is a very traditional dish in Bangladesh. This dish has a very big historical background. This dish is very important to our culture. It helps us remember the soldiers that fought for us. It reminds us how we got our independence. This dish doesnt just helps us with that, it helps us connect with our family. It helps the younger tradition learn about our history. It keeps us connect with our country. It gives us more pride for , not only our country, but for how we struggled to be a country.

509 words. 4 Where the Bengalis at?

Whats a Bengali? I never heard of that race before? How does it feel to be Bengali? These are some of the questions I get from my friends. Living in America there is no sign of Bengali culture anywhere. It is up to my family and friends to preserve our countrys tradition. It is hard to make a very large Bengali community since we live in California. In Stockton there is literally no family that is Bengali except us. But usually in the Bay Area or in Tracy you will find some Bengali families and we made a community with them. This makes it easier to preserve our countrys tradition. One way that we preserve our culture is that we visit family and friends a lot. We throw parties and dinners almost every week. Since we have relatives near by we can host baby showers, Bengali traditions, and religious traditions as well. Every year we celebrate Bengali New Year with everyone from the bay area. We usually hosts these at a park, because a lot of people like to come to one of these events. We like to be loud, play games, and eat Bengali food. These events usually are very large, and it attracts a lot of attention. Some of the spectators usually ask what we are doing, and our uncles like to give them a brief description on the event. Now we are educating other people what Bengalis do for their New Years. Not only do we educate other people, we are educating the younger generation. The young generation gets to hang out with kids like them and they learn about their countrys tradition. This is also reinforced by parents. Having parents that are traditional is a great way of passing down culture. I learned everything from my parents. I learned life lessons from them, and also manners 5 when being around Bengalis. For example when you would go to someones house you should always greet the hosts. If you are a boy, you should give a handshake to uncles or

older men. The most important is to greet the elders that are there. These are very important in Bengali culture. Failing at one of these brings a lot of shame to the parents. I will use these manners and lessons for the rest of my life. Knowing them I can now teach my little cousins and maybe my children. Then hopefully they will pass it down from generation to generation. Preserving a countrys culture and tradition is very difficult when you are living in a different country. It is also very challenging when you cant find other families in your local area. But when there is other people like you, it is almost like living in the country you came from. It is not only our job to preserve our culture and traditions, but to spread it so we can get recognized. In that way, you can get your country recognized and then your kids wont have to answer as much questions at school. Preserving a countrys culture and tradition starts with your family, and then you make a community. From that point on you just start educating others on your traditions and cultures.

537 words. 6 Green and Red What do you do for your Independence Day? Independence Day is a great way to show pride for your country. Not only does America has an Independence Day, but other

countries around the world too. Bengali Independence Day is the most prideful of all national holidays in Bangladesh. This is the most prideful of all the national holidays because we get to honor those who fought for our independence. Bengalis got their independence in 1971. It started off in 1952 when Bengalis started the Language Movement. Pakistan was the country that ruled us around that time period. Bengalis found that the only way we can be different from Pakistanis is by language. Bengalis thought that language is the most important way of having a cultural expression of the people of the land. Sheik Mujibur Rahman lead us to our victory. He created the Awami League, which is a political party. The Pakistanis didnt let them form a government. On March 26,1971 Bangladesh plunged into a civil war. The Pakistanis started to genocide the innocent people of the land. When they went to Dhaka city they killed over 35,000 people, But no one let them touch the Bangladeshi flag. During the nine month struggle, over three million Bengalis have died. The Indians send an army to help. On December 16,1971 the Pakistani army surrendered. My grandparents were alive when all of this was happening. So it is nice to know that my grandparents survived those horrible times. This is a reason why most families spend time with their family on this day. Bengali Independence Day is a great way to meet family and spend time with them. It gives you a chance to get to know them better and hang out with people you 7 dont usually see. We usually go to one relatives house and all the aunties cook and talk. All the kids like to play around with toys and play games outside. The uncles usually talk and discuss about politics. The aunts usually cook a big feast at night and everybody just eats together. This is important because there are no other holidays where you can just sit

with your whole family and just be proud of your country. We also show pride by not just being together. There are many ways to show that you are patriotic. During Independence Day in Bangladesh everyone usually does something to show pride. Every house has the Bangladeshi flag waving around so people can know that they are in on the celebration. My cousins and I usually wear the flag like a bandana around our forehead or we keep it in our back pockets. Everyone wears green and red because that is the color of our flag. We also wear new clothes too. When you wear red and green in Bangladesh everyone knows why you are, but in America they will just think it is regular clothes. In Bangladesh it is easy to celebrate independence day. Over there, we have a big memorial where we go and place flowers for those who have died fighting for our country. In America we really cant do that. The other things we do is that we like to sing. We sing our national anthem at the parties we go to. Our National Anthem is called, Our Golden Bangla. That song is a very deep song and it talks about the soldiers dieing to protect our language. Music is very big in our culture. We all like to sing, so why not sing the national anthem. Us Bengalis take national holidays very seriously. We take advantages of national holidays fully. But when it comes to Bengali Independence day, we take it to the nest 8 limit. We like to celebrate it in many ways, That is why we like to use the whole weekend, starting from Friday all the way to Sunday. We like to celebrate it how our parents and grandparents like to celebrate it. This day is important to us in many ways, and this is the best way to give thanks to the men and women sacrificing their lives for the future of the country. Even if three million people died they made sure nothing happened to our flag

and made sure that flag is still waving. That flag is still waving, and Im proud to wear that green and red.

730 words. 9 An Unfinished Mission You might not know it but Bangladesh did influence America in a way. Not only we influence America, but countries around us as well. We influence the world in a positive way. But lately America has been looking down at us in a bad way. But, I know that America still needs us. We do many things fro America. We also help our surrounding countries. These are some ways we influence the world.

We definitely influence the country of India. They did help us in the war, which gave us our independence. Our language influences one region in India. They are Indian but they speak Bengali. They know the history of why we had a civil war, and how we wanted to protect our identity. Bangladesh is the only country in the world that fought for its language. We did a lot to protect our culture and we are respected for that. That is how we influence local Indians. We also give Hilsa to India. They know that this fish can only be caught in Bangladesh, so that is why we trade with India a lot. Not only Indians we have influences in America as well. In New York there is a lot of Bengalis over there, There you can find lots of Bengali supermarkets and shops. It is like a Little Bangladesh over there. It is great place to be. A lot of young kids can meet with other Bengalis and just hang out. It is a great place to meet people that are just like you. It is great way for the younger generation to know about where their parents came from. This is one way Bangladesh influences America. Another way is that we export a lot of products from here. We make a lot of clothes and they sell at department stores. So America kind of needs Bangladesh. But recently America is thinking a little bit negative about Bangladesh. 10 Due to recent events Americans arent thinking positive about Bengalis. After that incident that happened in New York, Americans arent going to trust Bengalis as much as they used to. But know Bengalis are trying harder to show America that we are not all bad. Not all Bengalis are the same. We are trying to get more involved with the government and show Americans that we like living here. We still are trying to influence more of the other races in America about the Bengali culture. We like to bring Bangladeshi artists to do concerts here in America. We want to get known.

We want everyone to know that Bangladesh is a country. We started off influencing the local countries like India. Then we influenced some parts of America. We still need to get our selves more known. We dont like when people come up to us and ask, Are you Indian? After all those Bengalis that lost their lives trying to save our identity, we cant let their efforts go to waste. We should be inspired by them and try to represent those who lost their lives. The mission we started was to protect our identity, and now it is not only protecting it but trying to influence the youth and younger generations. Lately the younger generations are forgetting their roots and starting to pick up the American culture. If we can get them involved then our influence will spread and the mission goes on.

587 words. 11 Citations Bangla 2000. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Oct. 2012. <http://www.bangla2000.com/bangladesh/war.shtm>.

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