text: The just-risen rosy sun nestled in the boundless blue sky as the gleam of dawn pierced into her room. Long blonde locks, tall, slender body, a perfect smile and a bright blue cap, that seemed to mirror the intoxicating colour of the sky, donned on top of her coiffed tresses. A striking, fearless blue. She was ready. The sky wasn’t the limit anymore. The sky was the goal. “Good morning, Heff! Pre-boards done?”, she asked the boarding staff with a charming smile as she smartly walked through her favourite haven, the airport, exuding a perfect aura of poise and chutzpah. A compact, black pilot’s bag rolled smoothly behind her on the glossy terrazzo floor. It was an early morning transatlantic flight departing from Paris Orly Airport headed for Philadelphia. Just when she was about to board the aircraft and head for the flight deck, “Tan, come get your breakfast”, summoned her mother from the kitchen. Tania let out a sigh of despair and landed down to reality. She caressed the doll’s hair, then carefully placed it on her ornate dresser and sprinted to her mother. She stuffed a toast with sparsely spread butter on it in her mouth and grabbed a water bottle in one hand. Tania hurryingly finished her morning meal. “Will 20 taka suffice for lunch today?” her mother asked quietly, dejection resonated in her somber voice. “Yes Maa, I’ll buy myself something, don’t worry, love you!” was Tania’s hasty attempt at helping her mother take heart and curtailing her mother’s worries. Tania had waved her father one last goodbye when he dropped her off to school on that fateful day six years back. He breathed his last, unconscious on a hospital bed after a fatal road accident as his wife wailed in inconsolable agony and his perplexed daughter stared at her mother with blank eyes. Too young to comprehend death but not too young to understand hurt. Since then, life had been painfully arduous for the two hapless loved ones he left behind. Tania’s mother toiled day and night to make ends meet and earn a meagre amount to provide for her family. She had suddenly been coerced into becoming the sole breadwinner overnight while mourning in silence. She felt wronged, aggrieved, lost and despondent. Life had dealt her a cruel card that she did not know how to play. She felt like her little bubble of a happy family had been shattered and her wings had been clipped. Having lost her father at a delicate age where daughters held their father’s hand to find the most endearing sense of security and lay on their father’s chest for solace, Tania showed precocious characteristics as she navigated the excursion from childhood to adolescence without her doting dad. Beyond all the persistent hardships of their new reality, the ceaseless challenges and the unwavering void she endured lay a determination-driven dream. The dream to fly. The dream to reach the sky. The dream to give her mother a new pair of wings. The dream to be her father’s pride. The dream to become a pilot. And this dream burgeoned the day her father had gifted her the pilot doll on her fourth birthday and the month after, he was gone. The doll’s cap was a captivating shade of Egyptian blue. Tania dreamt of landing a plane in an Egyptian city one day and flying over the longest river in the world. The dream seemed far-fetched, the sky seemed unreachable but Tania’s doll of dreams was a sign of hope, bedizened in bold blue. Her doll of dreams clung to her like the unrelenting glossy pages of the travel magazines Tania fondly collected. The doll of dreams went everywhere with her. She took it to the biannual restaurant visits that her mother could afford for them, family gatherings, friends’ birthday parties and when visiting her father’s grave. Tania held her doll of dreams dearly. Over the years, the once tranquil, stable life that Tania had known only got increasingly difficult at an accelerating pace much like a plane mustering up speed to take off gradually after taxiing slowly. Yet, the engines on Tania’s metaphorical plane of will to achieve her childhood dream never failed. Its tires were awaiting takeoff and its pilot was in the making. She took her doll to various pilot schools, it sat in her locker on top of her Pilot’s Manuals and aerodynamics textbooks while she was in training and attending aviation classes. Her doll of dreams was realizing her dreams with her - the very dreams that it had helped foster. Months passed with Tania focused and diligently pursuing a career in flying commercial planes. “Maa, I’m home”, she said breathlessly one evening. Exhausted, she callously dumped her half-open bag on the floor by the kitchen counter and the doll of dreams fell out onto the run-down, rustic floor. “Hi, Tan, how was training today?” her mother asked, carrying a bowl of freshly cooked rice and steamed vegetables into the room. The two were engaged in rudimentary conversation till Tania’s mother’s gaze fell upon the cherished doll. “You take that doll everywhere you go, Tan, and one day you will go places, you will go everywhere”, her mother said gleaming with pride. Tania had met her husband at Flight School. They fell in love quick, like a short domestic flight. Soon after, they fell pregnant and Tania’s career aspirations made an unexpected emergency landing. A beautiful baby girl with eyes a brilliant blue. They named her Dolly. The year Dolly turned four, Tania knew she had a special present for her. The family gathered in the living room and watched the ecstatic four-year-old rip apart the wrapping paper to get to her gifts. ‘Happy Birthday my girl. This helped me get close to living my dream of soaring in the skies. I hope this present drives you to fulfil any unattainable dream you have. Love, Maa’, read an intricately written note on top of a rectangular box neatly wrapped in California blue wrapping paper that had clouds painted on it. It was the doll of dreams. Tania passed it down to her daughter and the next day, she went back to flight school. Several months later, Dolly was on her first ever flight on a family trip to Australia along with her grandmother and the doll was firmly clenched in her little hands, the brave blue cap sat tightly on its head. The pale crescent moon faded behind a congregation of velvety, wispy clouds before it blended into the vast darkness. Long kohl black curls, slim, sculpted figure, a welcoming smile and that bright blue cap. A striking, fearless woman. She was ready. The sky wasn’t the goal anymore. The sky was her realm. It was a red-eye Trans Indian Ocean flight taking off from Dhaka en route to Perth. “Ladies and gentlemen, good afternoon. This is your Captain, Tania Iqbal welcoming you all aboard flight 86A to Perth where the weather is looking sunny, hopeful and like a dream. We will be taking off shortly”. The brave blue cap sat tightly on her head. And so her dreams took flight.