Between river and ruin: The story of adaptation

Dhali Majhi (not his real name), is a 45-year-old fisherman from Dangmari village, Dakope upazila of Khulna district. It is near near the Sundarbans, the world's largest mangrove forest.

At first glance, Dhali Majhi appeared healthy and strong. I found him to be optimist. Despite enduring much hardship, he continues to hope for a better life. He studies up till Class Eight, but struggles with reading a detail of a statement. The statement will crop up later in this article and introduce a deeper story.

Dhali, however, has developed a practical grasp of numeracy through his years of navigating fishing cycles and dealing with household needs. His family is originally from Ashashuni of Satkhira. They relocated to Dangmari after Cyclone Sidr in 2007 due to increasing salinity and deteriorating livelihoods there in the home village. Some of the extended family members are still living in Ashashuni.

Dhali now lives with his wife, son and elderly father; his mother passed away several years ago and was buried in their original village. When we asked him about his mother’s burial, his response was quiet and seemingly indifferent. “She was buried in Ashashuni,” he said. Yet beneath the simplicity of his words lay a deeper emotional truth, a subtle but powerful indication of the enduring bond with the land he left behind, and the silent grief of a life uprooted by loss and displacement.

Dhali is a father of two children and appears to have been influenced by family planning messages over time. However, his only daughter, Bilkish, was married off before reaching the legal age of 18. She is now living with her parents along with her 3-year-old son. Bilkish’s relationship with her husband sounds unclear, subtly reflecting the ongoing unresolved challenges of early marriage within the community.

It was the middle of a dry April day when we visited Dhali’s place, with the temperature hovering around 39 degrees Celsius, and it felt far hotter. The heat shimmered on the horizon, blurring the edges of reality. Our trawler approached a suitable spot along the riverbank, not a formal jetty, but simply a place where we could safely disembark. We caught sight of his home and decided to stop by.

Dhali was sitting quietly in the narrow yard of his rebuilt house, just 100 meters from the angry Rupsha River. The house, a simple yet striking structure, stood its ground with quiet dignity. Encased in flower-printed corrugated iron sheets, it exuded a fragile kind of beauty. Though compact, no more than 1,500 square feet, and bordered by a tiny 100-square-foot yard, the space pulsed with life. In this small patch of earth, Dhali had grown a vegetable garden, a mango sapling, and a guava tree, each one a testament to his resilience and unbreakable connection to the land. It was more than shelter. It stood as a modest symbol to resilience, where adaptation wasn't a choice but a way of breathing.

The house was modest, yet aesthetically beautiful. As we talked about the floral patterns on the corrugated iron sheets that adorned it, Dhali’s voice grew heavy with emotion. He shared that the entire house had been washed away by Cyclone Remal, which struck in late May 2024. He had just rebuilt it, barely a month ago. The old one, he said, had become unlivable. Cracked walls, a sagging roof, memories weighed down by despair.

With a somber gesture, he pointed toward a nearby road—a narrow path, barely wide enough for a motorbike, once laid with bricks. “Not a single brick remained intact,” he said, his tone laced with sorrow. “The road has since been rebuilt by the union parishad, but the destruction was beyond anything you could have imagined.”

Naturally, the conversation drifted to the cost of house building. How had he managed it? With a quiet exclamation, he shared that he had taken a loan- 50,000 taka- from a local NGO. Now, he pays 5,000 taka a month in installments. We couldn’t help but ask - why pour so much into a house? Why not invest in something with returns, like cattle?

His reply quietened us. He said ‘"My family lived in ruins’." He said again – "That miserable house was silently breaking our spirit. Every day, we woke up beneath that collapsing roof, and it seemed to collapse a little more. Now, we are happy. If we have to skip a meal to keep this house, so be it. At least now, we can smile.” Then, almost like a philosopher emerging from hardship, he added: “Cattle can be swept away by floods, but this house-this shelter-means peace to us. It is dignity. Shelter is more than food. Shelter is mental comfort.” In that moment, his voice carried the weight of generations. Not just a man with a house, but a man who had reclaimed his family’s pride.

Naturally, I asked Dhali about the ownership of the land on which his house stood. He said he had once paid 25,000 taka for it. There was no formal registration or paper for it, just an agreement signed on a blank piece of paper in front of some witnesses. This, he explained, is the norm in the area. Legal registration costs more, and with the looming threat of floods, people hesitate to make such investments. “We don’t even know if the land will sustain the next flood,” he said. “So why spend more?”

Inquisitively, I gently asked who actually owned the land. The area looked like khas land—government-owned property by the riverbank. For a moment, Dhali looked blank, then quietly said, “They are the powerful people who own the land.” There was a silence in his words, an untold story lingering just beyond them. Standing in front of his newly rebuilt house, where Dhali had planted a mango tree and rows of vegetables, I watched the young plants sway gently in the breeze. It felt as though his dreams, too, were beginning to take root, growing slowly and quietly, yet with an undeniable strength.

Our conversation soon turned to his livelihood. Dhali shared simply, “I know nothing other than fishing and going to the Sundarbans. The river and the forest—nadi o bon—are our lifeblood. My father lived by them, and I followed his footsteps.” He then explained how he relies on the cycle of the moon, locally called goon, to decide when to go fishing. These rhythms of nature guide his life. He learned everything from his father. His father used to take him along as a boy and taught him all these with patience and care. Based on the goon, Dhali sets out every other day, sometimes staying a week at a time in the river, especially during the hilsa season, when the catch and the income is better.

He now owns his own boat and always takes a partner along. But when I asked if he ever brings his 14-year-old son with him, as his father once did, he shook his head. “No, I don’t want to waste his life like mine,” he said quietly, his voice was steady but layered with emotion. “I intentionally taught him nothing about this livelihood. He is  going to school. He will find a different way of livelihood.”

He then spoke about the costs tied to his livelihood. Every few months, he has to spend between 13,000 to 15,000 taka on fishing nets, which typically last only three to four months. For each trip to fish in the river, he is required to pay 400 taka to the Forest Department for a 7-day permit. Strangely, though, the voucher he signs states the fee as just 51 taka. “I don’t know why I’m paying almost eight times more,” he said with a resigned expression, “but I have no choice.”

Beyond fishing, Dhali goes to the Sundarbans two to three times a month to collect firewood and honey—resources that are, in principle, free for subsistence use. Yet, every time, he has to pay an unofficial fee of 200 to 300 taka to an unidentified local authority that appears to control access.

Access to safe drinking water is one of the most pressing challenges in Dhali’s community. The nearby river is saline, making it unsuitable for consumption. As a result, families must purchase drinking water from distant sources. Dhali often takes his boat and travels for an entire day to fetch water. He fills large drums, enough to last his household for 10 to 15 days, at a cost of around 1000 taka each trip. This water is used strictly for drinking and cooking.

For bathing and washing, they rely on river water, which, due to its high salinity, often causes skin irritation and other health problems. Such conditions are widespread across the community, caused by prolonged exposure to saline water. Some NGOs have implemented initiatives for rain water harvesting in the area, offering partial relief to the water crisis. However, Dhali is not among the beneficiaries. When asked why he was excluded, he couldn’t provide a clear answer, only a quiet shrug, hinting at the opaque selection processes and possible gaps in community outreach.

The rough calculation presented in the table reveals that he needs to earn at least 1,000 taka every day from fishing, just to cover his basic food expenses, excluding costs for clothes, health care, or entertainment. Shocks like floods or cyclones compound these costs, triggering a ripple effect.

After listening to the many chapters of his life, I asked Dhali gently, “Why don’t you consider moving elsewhere—perhaps to a nearby city—for a more stable livelihood?” He paused, then said quietly that he had never been to Khulna city, though he had occasionally traveled to Mongla. But the thought of migration didn’t appeal to him. I pressed further, suggesting that such a move could offer new opportunities and possibly change his life.

He shook his head with quiet conviction. “No,” he said. “I will live by the traditional livelihood I learned from my father. The river and forest raised me. There’s no one waiting for me in the city. Here, I have my people, my community. And I’ve heard city life is harsh and unforgiving.”

When I reminded him of the hazards and catastrophes he continues to face, he responded with unshaken resolve: “I will face them. That is part of life. But leaving my land is not a solution, it’s cowardice. This land is my life. I will die here, but I will not leave.”

As we sat in the quiet rhythm of our conversation, Dhali spoke softly about the gentle breeze that rises from the river, the fish he catches that nourish his children, and the sense of belonging he finds in talking with neighbors—simple things, yet deeply precious to him. His voice held a calm reverence for the life he lives, shaped by water, wind, and community.

Then I asked the final question - If this life means so much to you, why do you want your son to live a different one? He looked away for a moment, then said, “Because the life I live is uncertain, filled with struggle and pain. My son deserves a chance at something better. Something stable.”

In that moment, I witnessed the enormous dichotomy of his world- the love for a life rooted in nature and tradition, and the simultaneous desire to break its burdens for the next generation. Dhali’s story was not just one of survival, but of quiet adaptation- of holding onto the land while letting go for next generation.

* Masuma Billah, PhD Fellow, Utrecht University, The Netherlands.