http://www.travelblog.org/Asia/Bangladesh/ Travel adventures in journals and photos from Asia , Bangladesh en-us Fri, 05 Dec 2008 01:53:50 UTC Fri, 05 Dec 2008 01:53:50 UTC Mosha is Mosquito in Bangla. I have 20 mosquito bites and they itch like crazy. I have eight of them just on my face. We have mosquito nets over our beds but occasionally one of those little buggers still gets in. I hate mosiquitos and mosquitos love me. We are staying at the home here in Chittagong. It is quite an experience living with 57 children. They don't get too many vistitors and are very http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Chittagong/blog-350673.html Da geht's morgen hin um buddhistische Tempel zu bestaunen und ein Fussballspiel zu bestreiten.Mehr gibts morgen Abend oder uebermorgen.Allet bestens hier an der bengalischen Front.Lieben Gruss Sylvia http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Comilla/blog-350670.html You heard me correctly there were roaches on the plane from Kathmandu to Dhaka. It was a horrible airplane experience with a horrible Airline. Biman Airlines I hope to never fly with you again. To start things off we sat on the tarmak for about a half hour apparently waiting for some VIP's to arrive. Once they boarded it seemed we would be on are way the engines were going we got the safety a http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/Dhaka/blog-350611.html 1. The Call to PrayerEvery time I hear the call to prayerALAAAAAAH AKBAAAAARI think of BBC Middle Eastern correspondents. Each wind blown slightly mousy Brit stands on the roof of a hotel a masque's bulbous minaret just behind his right shoulder and he starts his story As the call to prayer rings out over the city... As the people of Pashawar are called to morning prayer... It seems http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/Dhaka/blog-350486.html Bhola would clearly be a difficult place to be an adolescent girl. Of the three districts that we work in Bhola is the most isolated and rural. It takes two ferriesmdashone that is an hour longmdashjust to reach the area from the division capital. More women in Bhola wear burkas and those who donrsquot are more likely to wear other Saudiinfluenced head dresses and full length overcoats. I http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Barisal/blog-350316.html This is by far my most favorite thing we did on our trip to Thailand. Check out some of the photos http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/Dhaka/blog-349217.html As you can see I am not in India. This is just a quick message to tell you all that we are all okay here despite the terrorist attacks in Mumbai. The internet is not that great here so I will be brief. There is one volunteer in Mumbai currently that Bonnie is in communication with and trying to get her out of harms way this is difficult thought because the city is in lock down and it's hard to g http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Chittagong/blog-349093.html Before leaving for Dhaka wise relatives and friends warned me that my life would never be the same after this trip that the very substance of my being would be changed. I nodded my head titillated by the melodrama. I wanted to meet this new me this metamorphosed version hardened and unafraid to face danger in the developing world. I imagined stepping off a plane at the Charlottesville airp http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/Dhaka/blog-349011.html 2.DECAbhaengen mehr kann man dazu nicht sagen. Abhaengen und die Tage geniessen. Lachen und nix tun. Es geht mir sehr gut hier. Die Stadt ist die der Hit. Macht aber nix. Wir machen es zu einem Hit. So wie das aussieht wird der Job mit Raj nix werden da sich seinerseits alles nach hinten verschiebt und ich meinerseits beschlossen habe die letzten beiden Wochen meiner Reise hier zu verbringen. In http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Chittagong/blog-347779.html 28.NOV.Rocket ist gut. Es hat Spass gemacht auf dem Balkon zu sitzen und auf den breiten Fluss zu schauen. Es gibt keine Bruecken wie auf der Bootsfahrt am Jangze die ich machte in China. Der Fluss ist hellbraun und die meiste Zeit mit gruenen Inseln von Seerosen bedeckt. So viele dass wir oft durch ein gruenes Meer fuhren. Gegessen haben wir nicht das war uns zu gefaehrlich. Wir haben unser e http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/blog-347778.html 26.NOV.Eine 6 stuendige ausfuehrliche Rikschatour durch Old Dhaka hab ich mir gegoennt mit einem Bangladeshi der english sprach. Ein Chaos hier unglaublich. Aber doch fuehle ich mich wohl die Leute sind unglaublich neugierig und unglaublich freundlich. Es gibt noch unzaehlig mehr Sehenswuerdigkeiten aber ich muss auch mal nix tun. Wie es das Bengalileben so wollte sollte ich wieder mal eine S http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/blog-347494.html 20.NOV.Um 1010 Uhr gings los und es sollte 2.5 Stunden dauern. Da erste Klasse nur 30 Cent mehr kostete fuhr ich die Luxuslinie. Alleine in einem Abteil keiner starrte mich an. Fenster konnte man oeffnen und es war einfach schoen. Wieder mal Zugfahren und nur aus dem Fenster schauen. Was sah ich Weites Land meist wasserunterspuehlte Felder. Menschen die der Feldarbeit nachgingen Kuehe und Was http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Moulvibazar/Sreemangal/blog-346502.html Im Hotel nach einer laengeren Reise von einem Bankautomaten zum naechsten und dann einigen Stunden im Internetcafe wollte ich mir eine Route durch Bangladesh ausarbeiten. Aber.... der Reisefuehrer war nicht mehr da........SCHEISSE Ohne Fuehrer geht es grundsaetzlich auch jedoch schwer da niemand english spricht und alles in Bangal angeschrieben ist somit nicht lesbar. Also eine Rikschatour dur http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Sylhet/blog-345482.html The parallels between Kennedy and Obama have been drawn. And although I know nothing about what it was like to live in the Kennedy era of hope and absolute faith in the possibility of change it is hard not to believe that we are witnessing something just as transforming. Itrsquos true that for my generation this is a first of monumental proportions. Not only did we elect the nationrsquos fir http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/blog-343218.html Since arriving in Dhaka my linguistic aspirations have fallen precipitously. The biggest stumbling block for me has been the Bengali alphabet. Based on ancient sanscrit text it is a mean loopy creation each letter expressing one of seemingly twenty different sounds that a single tongue position is expected to produce. There are the aspirated Hrsquos and Drsquos the Brsquos that sound http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/Dhaka/blog-341132.html Penguins and SharksSo I mentioned a cool quote from a book Tara was reading and itrsquos pretty simple. In every group of penguins when itrsquos time to jump into the waters there is always a high risk of killer whales and danger but one of those penguins always has to be first. I think Irsquod like to begin my life tomorrow being the first penguin in the water. Irsquom talking about http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Barisal/blog-340345.html Life in the lsquodeshItrsquos been six weeks since Irsquove returned to the ldquodeshrdquo and life has been moving fast and furiously or as fast and furious as you can get in South Asia ever since. Traveling between Dhaka and Barisal makes the time fly and I am easily sucked into a routine with Parendi whereby we spend most of our time talking about Safe Spaces and Field Trainers. http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Barisal/blog-338898.html Last night I went to a Vietnamese dance club called Le Saigon with two of my best friends in Dhaka. Lacquered black tables lined the walls and the ceiling was accented with old wooden beams. A cover band played hits from the 80's and 90's until 200 in the morning. The crowd was mixed but there were quite a few British American and Australian expats doing the cracker clap to Billie Jean and http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/Dhaka/blog-338354.html I've been back in Bangladesh for almost six weeks now and must admit that I have been remiss in my communication. Life moves very quickly here especially with our frequent traveling between our office in Dhaka and our field site in Barisal. I am working on an entry that will briefly explain what exactly it is that I do here in Bangladeshthe acronyms and places and terms and people that define http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Barisal/blog-337979.html A couple weeks ago my friends and I drove to old Dhaka to see the Hindu festival Durga Puja. Old Dhaka is in the southern quarter of the city and lies on the Bariganga river Dhakarsquos main waterway and apparently sewage repository. We started in the north of old Dhaka with the intention of walking and taking rickshaws until we got to the river. Rickshaws are not comfortable to begin wit http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/Dhaka/blog-336038.html I took a muchneeded respite from Dhaka last weekend in Sylhet. Sylhet is probably the only district in Bangladesh that has a fairly active tourist industry. My friend from Brac accompanied me north on the midnight bus to Srimangal. Every hundred yards or so the bus would drop precipitously into a pothole giving the illusion that we were descending a very long flight of stairs. We were suppos http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Sylhet/blog-332215.html Irsquove always believed that a personrsquos diet can tell you a lot about his or her personality. I hold as a corollary to this belief that a regionrsquos culinary traditions can tell you a lot about its culture. Could you imagine Nashville without barbeque New York without mad artistic towers of Asian fusion haute cuisine Louisiana without Jambalaya I spent the first month in D http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/Dhaka/blog-332181.html My mood has improved substantially since the arrival of a shipment of Kona coffee smuggled through customs by my boss from UVA. It's hard to get a good cup of coffee in Dhaka. The powdered stuff which is the only readily available brew yields a foggy bitter concoction not unlike bark water. I don't drink a lot of coffee. I try to limit myself to a cup a day. But that one cup has come to ho http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/Dhaka/blog-329260.html Bangladesh like any developing country has its quarks qualities that make it uniquely infuriating. Like the sub sub atomic particle these qualities are fundamental. But as simple as they are they dramatically affect day to day life in this beautiful vibrant crazy city. Most of my personal journal entries concern these perception altering details. Here are a few of the many1. Bandwidth http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/Dhaka/blog-328618.html Did any of these words manage to pique your interest Well we certainly have had an interesting week here in Dhaka is there such a thing as a normal week here And before we fly off to Thailand for a week we thought we might leave you folks with something to chew on for a bit back at home.We are finally starting to enjoy the feeling of settling into a routine here. The apartment is painted our http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/Dhaka/blog-328011.html People ask me for money on average 12.31 times per day. I took a tally last week because I was curious. The mean daily score was 12.31. Old young maimed healthy men and women alike cry ldquoBoss Money. 10 Taka Bossrdquo raising cupped hands to foreheads in the traditional Muslim greeting. I canrsquot speak for every westerner in Dhaka but I have gone through three charit http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/Dhaka/blog-326360.html Irsquove finally met a group of Brits and Americans. But three of them are leaving in the next week. All five of them work for Brac which is a gigantic NGO a private university and a bank all at the same time. Really smart genuine people and Irsquom so sad that theyrsquore leaving.On Thursday night we went to the Bagga Club where all of the British expats hang out. It was lovely to http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/Dhaka/blog-325926.html Blogger Dougo So I am sitting on the couch trying to ignore the pile of homework books that need marking before tomorrow and I pick up my laptop to read the writeup on the AFL prelim final between St Kilda and Hawthorn. Having just watched the game at a mate's place next door I thought it might be nice to hear what the critics have to say about a very onesided game of football. Next thing I http://www.travelblog.org//Asia/Bangladesh/Dhaka/Dhaka/blog-325598.html