“Sajib had said, What about happiness – can you measure that?Rodney had thought yes, you could measure it by ease of living –how much does a person suffer compared to the next? Now, to make more people happy, how do we eliminate suffering? But happiness, in its strength or fragility, was more complex than comfort. It had so many sources, so many nemeses, and so many pitfalls. He couldn’t, in his right mind, try to instruct the happiness of others.”

“Sajib had said, What about happiness – can you measure that?Rodney had thought yes, you could measure it by ease of living –how much does a person suffer compared to the next? Now, to make more people happy, how do we eliminate suffering? But happiness, in its strength or fragility, was more complex than comfort. It had so many sources, so many nemeses, and so many pitfalls. He couldn’t, in his right mind, try to instruct the happiness of others.”

“The years of disillusion, the long debate of who-belongs-to-who, gathered at the mighty feet of the Bangladesh Liberation War like flood waters rising, gathering thick weeds and crusty dirt and pulling it all in one direction. At times, when the body count was high and the air tasted like bloody ash, the way mass graves smell, Sariyah had wondered what progress was supposed to taste like. Often it tasted like unanswered questions, stuck in the teeth. Bangladesh had given her the true answer, though: progress at its best is home-grown. It should taste like joy – pure, unhindered joy. Like the freshest sun-ripened mango on a tree, a little sunrise in her palm.”

“No more crying. Tears only cause destructivefloods. When you are sad, you build a boat.”

“Hatred happens when we refuse to see someone for their entire selves; we fear that if we see more than the qualities we hate, we will become them or worse, allow them to enter our hearts.”

“Every problem has a solution”