Two boys working in the workshop were planing with a large plane

I found myself wandering aimlessly through the dusty backstreets of Rangpur, a city in northern Bangladesh. The air was thick with the grit of the road, but my aimless stride was broken by the sight of an open-fronted workshop. Inside, two boys were absorbed in their craft, working in a silence that felt both heavy and purposeful.

They were remarkably young. I couldn't tell if they were mere apprentices enduring the rigors of a master’s tutelage or seasoned laborers already earning their daily bread. Yet, one thing was certain: they were spending their hours far more meaningfully than the stranger before them—an outsider drifting through their world with nothing but a curious lens.

The workbench was a chaotic sea of fresh wood shavings. Together, they were planing a single beam of timber. In Japan, the tradition is to pull the plane toward the body, a motion of inward precision. However, on a global scale, the Western-style push stroke is the more common practice. The tool they wielded was unlike any I had seen back home. It was disproportionately large for the width of the wood, fitted with rugged handles on either side for a powerful, dual-grip thrust.

In a brief lapse of rhythm, the boy in the foreground paused. He didn't look away or shrink back; instead, he fixed his gaze directly into my lens—a steady, unblinking look that seemed to measure the distance between our two worlds.

Rangpur on Google Map

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