চিঠি, an anonymous inbox that is a sheet of paper, not a form
Every other mode changes the question a page asks. This one changes what the page is made of, ruled paper, a red margin, a salutation in somebody's handwriting, and a signature at the foot.
A page made of paper
চিঠি is the Bangla word for a letter, the handwritten kind, on ruled paper, that arrived by post and was read twice. Put your page on চিঠি and that is what a stranger opens: a sheet, ruled at the height of the hand it is set in, with a red margin down the left the way an exercise book has one.
Every other question a fisfis page can ask changes the sentence at the top of the same page. This one changes the page. The date sits in the corner where a date goes. The ask is the salutation and is the only thing on the sheet written in a hand. Your name is not a headline over a photograph of you, it is a signature at the foot, which is where a name goes on a letter and nowhere else.
The composer takes the same sheet. What somebody types lands on the rules rather than in a box drawn on top of them, because a letter is not a form with a paper background, the lines the writing sits on and the lines behind it are the same lines. And when a letter reaches your console you read it on that sheet too, rather than as a quotation in a card.
In Bangla, and not translated
The whole mode is written in Bangla and there is no English version of it. That is a decision rather than work left undone: a page that said “Write a letter” in English above a Bangla hand would be two products arguing on one sheet, and the word চিঠি is carrying the form rather than only the meaning.
The page declares its language, so a screen reader reads it in Bangla and a browser hyphenates it as Bangla. The typefaces are four Bangla handwriting faces served from this site itself, no font service, no request to anybody else, nothing loaded on any page that is not on this mode.
A letter you can answer
Here is the part that is worth the whole feature. A letter arrives, and then it is the opening of a thread rather than the end of one.
Your answer waits on the link the sender already holds. They come back, read it, and write again, with nobody named at either end, and with the whole exchange in one place from both sides. That is what a correspondence is, and it is the thing a one-way letter box cannot do however well the paper is drawn.
| A letter box | চিঠি on fisfis | |
|---|---|---|
| What arrives | A letter, styled as one | A letter, on ruled paper, in a hand |
| Answering it | A screenshot on a story | A reply on the thread they already hold |
| Writing again | A second letter, unconnected | A follow-up on the same thread |
| Reading it later | Whatever you saved | The thread, from either end |
| Getting in | Wherever it is published | A browser, either side, no install |
If you are weighing this against a dedicated letter app rather than against the American question boxes, that comparison has a page of its own: fisfis and Chithi.me, side by side. It was written before this mode existed and it was generous then, which is the only kind of comparison worth reading, what changed since is that the letter is no longer the thing fisfis does not have.
Words only, and no telephone
চিঠি takes no photographs and no songs. The proposition is one sheet of paper, and a letter with a record and a photograph stapled to it is a parcel.
The same reasoning takes the telephone off. A page on Call Me carries a round green button; a page that is a sheet of paper does not, and the request path is told so rather than the button merely being hidden, so nobody reaches a call screen through a link they were handed earlier.
- What a letter carries. Words, at the length people write letters at, in the language the page is asking in.
- What it does not. Images, songs and calls, on every surface at once, the page, the composer, and the server that would otherwise accept them.
- What is kept. The same as every other message here: the words, and the arrival record described on the about page.
Seven ways to print one
Every message on fisfis can be printed as a card to share. A letter gets seven of its own, নকশি, গোলাপ, ডাকঘর, টেলিগ্রাম, চিঠি, দিনলিপি and খাম and no other mode is offered them.
That is not a decoration budget. They are seven printings of one object rather than seven colourways of a poster: a sepia block print, a letter written at night, a post office in kraft and stamp red, a telegram form, the bare sheet, a page out of a diary, an airmail envelope. Offering them to every mode would set an English confession in a Bangla hand; offering the bright ones here would throw the whole proposition away with one press.
Switching it on
Three days, then it is a normal inbox again
A mode you switch on runs for three days. Long enough that a link shared on a Friday is still asking on Sunday, short enough that a question you asked for one evening is not still on your page in March. Nothing has to be switched back.
Your address does not change
There is one address per person and there will only ever be one. A link somebody saved a year ago asks today’s question, which is the whole reason the mode is a property of the page rather than a second link to reshare.
Your inbox keeps its history
A letter is filed as a letter for ever. Switch to something else next week and the letters already in your inbox are still letters, the row, the pane and the card all read what the page was asking when it arrived, rather than what it happens to ask today.
- Claim your name, it becomes the whole address, and it is permanent.
- Open the switcher at the top of your inbox and choose চিঠি. The rest of the ten are in the guide to modes.
- Then put the link somewhere people are: on a story, with the ask written out rather than left to the page.
Questions people ask
- What is চিঠি mode?
- It is a mode you can put your fisfis page on for three days, in which the page stops being a message box and becomes a letter: ruled paper with a red margin, the ask set in a Bangla handwriting face, your name dropped to a signature at the bottom the way it sits on a real letter. The whole page is in Bangla and is deliberately not translated, a sheet that said “Write a letter” in English above a Bangla hand would be two products arguing on one page.
- Can I reply to an anonymous letter?
- Yes, and that is the part a letter app cannot do. A letter arrives as the opening of a thread, so your answer waits on the link the sender already holds. They come back, read it, and can write again, with nobody named at either end, and with the whole exchange readable in one place from both ends.
- Does চিঠি accept photographs or songs?
- No, and that is a decision rather than a gap. The whole proposition is one sheet of paper, and a letter with a record and a photograph stapled to it is a parcel. Words only, which also means the round green call button is off on this mode: a page that is a sheet of paper does not carry a telephone.
- How long does চিঠি stay on?
- Three days, then the page puts itself back to Say Anything without anybody having to remember. Your address never changes while it is on, so a link handed out a year ago asks today’s question, and every letter already in your inbox keeps the mode it arrived under for ever.
