A portrait of a boy gazing intently at the camera, smiling to reveal his white teeth

Wandering through the backstreets of a foreign land with a camera dangling from one's neck is, in some countries, an act of self-invitation to become a target of restless curiosity. I found myself in Rangpur, a city in northwestern Bangladesh, trudging through the heat, drenched in sweat. Though its name translates to "City of Colors" in Bengali, the reality before me was a landscape of relentless earthy browns, submerged in a stifling, dizzying cacophony. It was there, on an uninviting street corner where I felt profoundly out of place, that a young boy spotted me and approached with an easy gait.

The boy seemed to have left that cumbersome thing called "caution" behind in his mother’s womb; his face was a portrait of pure, unadulterated inquisitiveness. He appeared mesmerized by the black hunk of glass and metal in my hands, his eyes shimmering with an unusual intensity as he stared. They say that people across the Indian subcontinent generally love being photographed, and he was clearly no exception. Relenting, I paused and brought the viewfinder to my eye. As if he had been waiting for that very moment, the boy offered me a magnificent, flawless smile, devoid of even a shadow of hesitation.

What struck me most about that perfect smile were his teeth—strikingly white, almost defiant against his sun-darkened skin. In this part of the world, there is an ancient custom of using datun, a natural toothbrush made by chewing the tip of a neem twig into bristles. They say it is a scientifically sound method for dental hygiene, and looking at the brilliance of his mouth, I couldn't help but think he was a living testament to that humble, earthen wisdom.