What is happening to me?

Shaela's House
Originally uploaded by Bangla, Biryanis and Badminton.

The left side of my body, in particular my left hand, is slowly but surely being taken over by the right, and while it is not, and cannot, be made completely redundant, it is beginning to feel a bit like the dirty, uglier and less capable employee in a workplace that used to be equal opportunity.

Over the past few months, I have been subconsciously trained into making sure that everything that involves hands is done with my right one, including:

(a) eating;
(b) handing anything to anyone;
(c) waving;
(d) holding things (unless doing this will prohibit me from doing any of the above);
(e) scratching myself (ditto).

I even went to hand something with my left hand to my Australian friend the other day, and I caught myself changing it to my right half-way through the motion. I must say, I don’t enjoy having a “dirty side” and a “clean side”. I like my body to be equal on all accounts. But the stigma that goes with the right hand/left hand thing is not merely a hygiene issue (not that it is for me – I use toilet paper), it’s also a social one. Thus, my poor left hand is being frowned upon, not only by the general public, but also by me, it’s once faithful owner.

I will add here, for your information, that I am not aware of any left handed people in Bangladesh, and I know the reason why. From a VERY early age, children are trained out of using their left hand for anything, including writing at school. This was caught on video at a friend’s NGO school, where a 6-year-old child picked up her pencil with her left hand every time she started writing, only to have it taken out and placed in her right by the teacher whenever he happened to catch her. Ditto the 1-year-old child who reached out with his left hand to take a guava that I was handing to him (with my right hand, of course) – his mother lovingly swatting the left hand away and awkwardly yanking out the right.