If you live in Dhaka and are not from around here, chances are you had to look for an apartment one time or another. Apartment hunting in Dhaka is a special kind of punishment.

My grandmother-in-law watched the cult Bangla cinema Shujan Shukhi eight times in the halls of Narayanganj, back when she lived in a wooden two-storied bungalow -- the downstairs serving as her husband’s gaddi, his office and business hub.

I found myself back on Bailey Road with my friends last weekend, after what felt like ages. Joining us was Anisul Haque, a friend’s better half and the celebrated writer who makes pop culture look effortlessly stylish.

Dhaka has a love-hate relationship with rain. The city desperately craves rain, yet remains poorly equipped to handle the downpour when it does come.

Before I start, let me acknowledge something our beloved Dhaka does with unsettling efficiency: it turns almost anything into a competition.

A tree toppled during the recent nor’wester is being cleared away from Ramna Park.***

Like the song “Summer Nights” from the ’80s blockbuster “Grease”, I keep humming my own parody these days: Summer lovin’, had me a headache.

The Liberation War Museum has recently hosted a special screening of the documentary “The 1971 War: In the Eyes of Pakistanis”, an emotional exploration of the 1971 genocide through the realisations and reactions of the Pakistani people.

For Lubna Marium, acclaimed dancer and choreographer, reviving her grandmother Rahat Ara Begum’s literary legacy has been a pilgrimage.

Now that the hullabaloo of Pahela Baishakh is over, the festival colours have yet to fade.

In 1930s colonial Dhaka, bed tea was the first act of waking life.

You must be reading the heading and thinking -- since when did Bangladesh quietly enter the Tesla-importing business, and more importantly, what does any of that have to do with Dhaka traffic?

Biju, Boisu, Sangrai, Bihu, Shangkran, and Bishu are different versions of a festival celebrating the New Year and the arrival of spring in the Chittagong Hill Tracts (CHT). Each indigenous community has its own name for it in their dialect, and together they are often grouped under the umbrella term Boisabi.

My first encounter with the word “aam tel’” wasn’t in my own kitchen, but through the West Bengal series “Indubala’s Bhaater Hotel”.

At the centre of the capital, a new kind of park is quietly emerging. Nestled in Agargaon, adjacent to the Bangladesh Air Force Museum and the Agargaon Metro Station gate, it features a glass tunnel aquarium, a bird aviary, a koi pond, and a waterfall.

Dhaka has always been a city that returns to itself. Every alley, riverbank, and ruin seems to hold another story waiting to be rediscovered.

By sheer stroke of chance, I stepped into the exhibition space of Galleri Kaya in Uttara and managed to take a quick look at the group art exhibition titled “CROSSROAD … not a project”.

“Go back to where you came from, leave us alone,” I bet that line made you angry. It’s one of those lines you hear from certain elitists across the world, and, ironically, even in Dhaka.

A city that never sleeps, a buzzing metropolis sheltering millions grappling with the race against time -- Dhaka might pose as an architect’s dizziest dilemma.

In moments of dreamy, wistful escape, I wish I could live a stranger’s life in a forgotten world, or even stand rooted like an ancient tree, radiating a quiet, zen-like energy to all who come near.