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CAN WE HAVE HOPE ANYMORE?
Hope means survival for people in Bangladesh, which is facing unprecedented harm due to climate change.
There are millions of reasons to quit as an activist fighting to stop climate change, but I realise it is tough to kill hope, even if it's the slightest chance, because hope means survival for people in Bangladesh.
I was born in Bangladesh. I have seen the seasons change so rapidly, the coastal region flooded, mosquitoes overtaking cities, and people enduring immense hardships from heat and salinity. There is no hope — not in this climate — for a Bangladesh that will make it to the 2030s unscathed. Very soon, it will come down to running, fleeing, or dying for everyone.
It shakes me to my core to think that a world like that can exist. The world I know has changed so much. Even within three years, lots have changed. When I went back this time to my beloved hometown, I saw people boiling and felt the heat on my skin, and it wasn’t even the height of summer.
Yet, people in the frontlines are often clueless about the impending doom. They are distant from their bodies, floating as if weightless and formless. I feel the anger, the frustration, and the urge to leave, without truly understanding why. We rarely blame the calamities, the disasters, the heat. Instead, we blame the people we see for our misfortune.
