Blogs from Bangladesh, Asia - page 3

We started our five-day journey in Dhaka, Bangladesh! The sun rose at 6 this morning, making for an early start to our long day ahead. You could feel the sun today, as it was 67 degrees Fahrenheit as soon as we stepped outside to rent our bikes. We biked to New Market, a shopping center filled with many shops, so naturally, we spent almost all day there. The temperature even got as high as 80 degrees, I guess we didn't need those winter coats after all! After our long day shopping, we made our way inside a local restaurant, which was a great rest from the sun beating down on us all day, and saving us from our thirst after the dry weather. After eating, we biked all the way back to the hotel, putting an ... read more

Travelling in to Dhaka from the airport at 1 am, the traffic is horrendous. Three or four lanes of vehicles interwoven; hooting, flashing lights, sirens, belching fumes, dust; road works and half-built structures in the gloom beyond the headlights; dense housing, shops, advertising with the distinctive sanskrit letters of the Bangla language. Welcome to Bangladesh. The lane to the hotel is blocked by a truck that is unloading bricks … at one in the morning. We discover the next day why: trucks are banned from Dhaka during the day so have to unload at night. The next day we meet the labourers who carry the bricks into the site; each man has 20 bricks balanced on his head on a board; they use one free hand to help them climb the ladder to the second story. ... read more

One of my absolute favorite things about traveling is getting to experience different parts of the world. All of us have unique histories and cultures, and today, we had the privilege of learning from the people of Bangladesh! We started this morning off bright and early with a hotel breakfast before biking out to the national parade grounds for Dhaka's Victory Day Parade! Today is the 50th anniversary of Bangladesh's freedom as its own country, and the atmosphere in the air as people gathered around to watch the parade was absolutely ecstatic. We were also lucky enough to be able to interview one of the locals at the parade to find out what their country's independence means to them. Afterward, we biked a few minutes down to Weston Restaurant, where we got another delicious meal and ... read more

With no real expectations based on other peoples stories because we don’t know anybody who has ever visited nor any proper research we entered Bangladesh and were immediately engulfed by its chaos and the sheer numbers of people living in Dhaka, in what apparently is one of the most densely populated areas in the world. Bangladesh is one of the poorest countries of the region and we have seen some of the worst living conditions. But we have also seen that Bangladesh is an extremely green and fertile country it being one big delta of 700 rivers with rice paddies, tea plantations, rubber plantations, pineapple gardens, a lot of bananas and an unbelievable number of watermelons. A lot of Bangladeshi live under the poverty line and especially in the rural places too many people cannot read ... read more

Woolly says – Our second day in Dhaka didn’t start according to plan, Zoe had gone to bed the previous evening with a case of the trots by morning it had turned into the gallops. Having googled the symptoms and discarded Beri Beri, dengue fever and ingrowing toe nails I was left with Montezuma's revenge or Delhi belly, as we hadn’t been to Delhi and it had started in Kolkata it only left the revenge option. The revenge was awful and far worse than any horror film I’ve ever watched, Zoe must have really upset Montezuma to make her this bad! There didn’t seem much that Jo or I could do except offer sympathy and water after she had been dosed up with all the relevant medication that we carry around with us. With nothing to ... read more