The power has gone out...again.

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Blogger Dougo

Right. So, here I am sitting in the living room of our apartment in Dhaka, Bangladesh. The power has gone off as it has at about 7pm every day since our arrival. Every few minutes the lights will surge as the backup generator kicks in and sends power to our apartment. The Uninterrupted Power Supply or UPS as we have quickly learned, is pretty good. We can still turn on the fans above me and our room, as well as a lights in all rooms but the kitchen. No TV and no refrigerator though. The latter could pose a problem.

Anyway, as you can see from the photos Bec took a couple of days after our arrival, our apartment is massive. So massive that yesterday I went and got a quote for pool tables AND table tennis tables. That’s right we have enough spare rooms to fit both! Not that I would even consider purchasing them, when will we ever get a place like this again? We took the apartment over from another couple who left for maternity leave. It’s got a slap of paint on a few walls, lots of picture hooks and plenty of room for all our stuff. A quick summation of our space:

Hall way, living room, master bedroom with ensuite, study with ensuite, spare bedroom 1, spare bedroom 2 with ensuite, dining room, kitchen, maid’s room with ensuite.

Yes, that’s right, we have 4 toilets.

So what has life been like so far. In a word, Busy. Our first week was a great bonding experience for all the new staff. We had tours of the area by bus, supermarkets, imported butcher, bakeries, markets etc. Oh, and stuff is so much more readily available here than in Suzhou or even Shanghai. Cheaper too. We could come close to buying everything we’d buy at a supermarket in Australia, the only catch being that it is not all located in one store.
A huge bonus here is that English is widely spoken. I am not sure I will learn much Bangla without have to really study it as I simply do not need to speak it. Unlike China when I would have to find someone to tell the maintenance man what I needed fixing or a store person where I can buy something, I ask them myself. So much easier!
As this is a Muslim country, alcohol consumption is prohibited to all but diplomatic areas and some restaurants that you BYO. Thus, the diplomatic corp, who could not possibly go without, have set up what they call clubs. Basically, it’s a place to escape the smelly, busy life of Dhaka. Standard facilities include a tennis court, gym, swimming pool, bar and a restaurant. We have had drinks at the International Club, the Nordic Club and the Bagha Clubs so far and the prices are much the same as home. As new hires we were signed in as guests, but normally you can only enter if you are a member. Memberships range from $400 for the Aussie Club to $1000 for the International. Some have monthy fees, all have an alcohol quota of about 8 slabs(cases) of beer or 4 bottles of spirits - you need to purchase duty free alcohol to restock their bar. We are yet to join one. We are hoping to scope out the Aussie club this week.

Aside from the clubs there are plenty of restaurants. Just 200m from our house is a Vietnamese and a Thai restaurant, both of which we have tried already - very nice.

School has been pretty exciting, but hectic. We are trying to set up our enormous classrooms, whilst also fit in, info sessions on the library, a new student management system, PYP professional development and team planning. My timetable looks pretty good. We have certainly gone from one extreme in EtonHouse with little to no specialists (until this year) to ISD. The kids have PE twice a week, IT once, French 3 times, Bangla twice, Music once as well as a library and art session (no specialist only a teaching assistant). We also have a two hour literacy block first thing every day from Monday to Friday…I mean Sunday to Thursday. That is something that is gunna take a lot of getting used to!

I am working with a kiwi guy who actually worked at SSIS in Suzhou about two or three years before we arrived. He seems great and we are already sharing stuff which is always a plus.

Our shipment still hasn’t been cleared from customs. I say ‘still’ because it was in Bangladesh before we arrived and has been sitting in a port in Chittagong, Bangladesh ever since. It is so frustrating to have to make up class signs that I know are sitting in a box not more than a few days away. We are hoping that it gets released by customs by the end of the week. Hopeful, not expecting.

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Photos

The front door (from the inside)
The doors are massive in our place. I am not sure why.

Kitchen
A big plus: We have an over
Minus: The sink is in the left hand corner. You can't actually stand in front of it!

Laundry
Nothing special but does the job directly opposite the kitchen.

Laundry Room 2
Also known as the Maid's room, it has a dryer, coz it is so humid here that sometimes things just don't dry.

Kitchen balcony view
No, not China, we are in Dhaka! Gotta love the bars, really makes you feel secure...until there is a fire of course
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Dining room
To the right is the kitchen.

Dining room to horizon
No camera tricks people, that is how far it is to get to our bedroom door.

Spare bedroom 1
The first of 1000 spare rooms. This one leads off the dining room.

Spare bathroom and toliet 1
Every bedroom has an ensuite. 1000 bedrooms = 1000 bathrooms

Living room
A great space with some great paint on the walls.

Hallway past our bedroom
Not quite sure why they didn't incorporate this area into the living room. Bec wants to make this into a reading nook.

Our bedroom
Large enough to fit ten local families and one double bed with four post mosquito net.

Our bedroom again
Same but different angle. We love the paint in this room too.

Vanity and cupboards
Seen as I don't require a mirror that doesn't have a sink in the morning, Bec has claimed this.

Our ensuite
Or should I say Bec's. She claimed this too. I am using the ensuite in the study. There is a shower/bath to the right.

Spare room 2
This has a safe in it. The door leads to another balcony that is pointless to go out to.

Study
We have a free wireless connection already in the study. Seems you can use it elsewhere in Dhaka too. pretty unreliable though. We are looking into using (for a fee) the schools bandwidth. That way we can use Skype to contact peoples.

Study Ensuite
This is my territory. However, there is no shower curtain so I am using Bec's bathroom. Heh heh!

Comments

[Greg]

Pictures
Trouble with download. No pictures, they are there , but all black. Maybe that is because of no power!!!!