The Asian News Blog

WELL first of all apologies for keeping everybody in limbo whilst I have been adjusting to my new life as a married woman. And no the honeymoon period did not last for weeks it ended the day the Husband arrived at Heathrow Airport almost two-months ago.
After persuading him to stay in Bangladesh for as long as he could he decided he couldn’t wait and just had to come and join me in Manchester.
My ecstatic family even hired a big family camper van and headed to London to pick him up -you would’ve thought he was some royalty the way everybody was making a big fuss over his arrival. My dad was even contemplating taking him around London to see all the sites before coming back north. I however was not entertaining any such ideas!
I was quite happy driving up myself and then taking him for a long drive explaining how things work in England, what I expected of him and what he would get from me, you know laying down the rules first, coming to a mutual agreement, but no the family thought it best they all met him at the airport.
So I trudged along with them wearing my favourite figure hugging jeans and a smart nice top and not the gold sari and jewellery my mum had dished out from the cupboard for me.
I didn’t want to pretend that I dressed in saris and shalwar kameez all day long and was only prepared to go being myself and wearing what I was most comfortable in.
Anyway five hours later we arrived at the airport. The Bangladeshi Biman plane had already landed and passengers were departing, we waited almost an hour but there was no sign of the husband.
My dad was panicking, I was chilling out in the cafe after making it clear that I was not going on a search for the missing husband at the airport and reminded my dad that if his son-in-law had learnt to read and write English he would’ve found his way out!
Another half-hour later the husband finally emerged.
As the family went to say hello I stood back and stared at the Husband. He was looking a little awkward in his bright multi-coloured shirt and very tight black jeans and shoes that surely had at least two inch heels to lift him up a little bit.
He looked a lot slimmer to the point of looking scrawny rather than fit and he also looked smaller and much younger. I didn’t feel as though I was about to meet the Husband, he looked like a teenager straight out of college, not a man, not a husband and he looked years younger than me.
Finally when everybody had finished greeting him he looked at me and said hello, I replied hello and we walked to the car.
Conveniently everybody had made sure we were sat together at the back.
It was awkward, I didn’t know what to say to him and he wasn’t sure how to make conversation with me.
Finally he stared talking about his flight. It was his first experience on an aeroplane and he seemed rather pleased that he had made it to England on his own. I smiled at him and nodded when I had to and sat in silent.
And then the strangest thing happened, he grabbed hold of my hand and tried to weave his fingers through mine.
I wasn’t ready for any touching and when I looked down at his hands I noticed something even stranger, he had long nails painted in henna.
It wasn’t that he hadn’t cut his nails, he had actually grown them longer than mine. Shocked, I removed my hands away from his and asked about this new trend and politely told him men in the UK didn’t grow their finger nails and they definitely did not paint them.
He told me that all his friends in Bangladesh had been competing with each other to see whose nails grew longer and then they all put henna on to paint em orange. It was bizarre and a nasty surprise. Why couldn’t they do normal things like race each other on their motorbikes or have a spelling competition?
There was no way I was sharing my nail varnish with the husband, visions of him dressed secretly dressing in my underwear went through my head.
The rest of the journey went inn complete silent with my parents looking back every so often to see of we were making any progress.