Date: Tue, 04 Jul 2000 22:08:04 -0700 From: jennifer aitken Subject: Feasts,friendship,forests and floods! HI everyone, hope all's well with you all We've just finished a magical fortnight in Bangladesh, what a hidden treasure that turned out to be. We didn't really know anything about it before we went, apart from floods (more on that later), and that we would be visiting our friend Atif's family there. It turned out to be the most awesome time, i'm sure it will be a real highlight of the trip. The country is incredibly beautiful. It's really green and lush, lots of rice paddies, palm trees, exotic trees and fruits, wildflowers, etc. And of course there is lots of water, seems like half the country is in rivers. So lots of boat trips in cool little wooden kayaks. Also in the country, most people seem to live in bamboo or mud huts. Look very picturesque, but i'm sure they are ridiculous when it rains/floods. We spent the whole two weeks staying with various members of the Rahman family, always accompanied by one of Atif's brothers, so we really made a good friends with them. Bengalis are awesome people, really friendly and massively hospitable. By teh end of the fortnight we felt like part of the family, and were quite sad to leave, promising to return again in a few years. The food was incredible! The most amazing curries, lots of fish (being a waterlogged country), and decadent sweets. We've been learning to eat with our right hand, lots of fun. Fingers are now stained yellow from the turmeric! Ate heaps of fruits, some of which i'd never heard of before let alone tasted. But best of all was mango. I really think i could make a fair crack of living on it! The national fruit is jackfruit, crazy looking thing, more than afoot long, looks like a giant hedgehog. Possibly the only bad thing about staying with the family was the sheer volume of food we had to eat, a bit scary! Also whenever you enter someone's house they like to entertain you with lots of food, no matter what time of day! We managed to see a lot of the country, given that we only had two weeks there. WE spent a bit of time in the capital city, Dhaka, which has 11 million people, but is not the concrete jungle you'd expect. There were loads of really beautiful parks etc. Dhaka also had some cool forts and palaces, awesome night markets, museums etc. It's also known as the city of mosques, for obvious reasons. Awesome to see beautiful blue and white tiled minarets everywhere you go. Were woken at 4 am on our first day by the call to prayer, pretty magic stuff. BAngladesh boasts the world's longest sea beach (Cox'sbazar) - 712 km long. A really awesome beach, lots of BEngali tourists, no-one else - we only saw 2 other westerners during our time there. (I was mistaken for a Japanese tourist! Which gives you an indication) A real shame cos there's so much to do there, just that the place hasn't really been developed for tourism yet. We went up into the hills, amazing scenery, really jungly. The hill tribe people look distinctly South EAst Asian, and wear brightly woven clothes and chunky silver jewellery, as opposed to the more 'Indian' lookin gpeople on the flat. We also went up to the far north where there are a lot of tea plantations, looks just like the cover of a PG Tips box! WE got to visit a tea factory which was awesome. Up north we stayed in a village which was an awesome experience. There was no electricity, people live in huts with (amazingly clean) mud floors. New Zealand was well known in Bangladesh for 2 reasons. The first being cricket, which is a national passion. You might have heard that Bangladesh was just granted international test status, big celebrations. The other reason is Anchor powdered milk, which everyone seems to use! WE;ve been bloody lucky weather wise, considering this is supposed to be the rainy season, we've only had 3 days rain, otherwise hot and sunny (about 34 degrees). We did get to experience the flood thing though, driving back from the mountains, about 12 hours ridiculously heavy rain, car couldn't get through the floodwaters and we had to walk! The waters started at knee deep and at the most was chest high! Crazy. WAs kind of fun though, for starters the water was warm, also the atmosphere was pretty festive! I think the locals just thought we were mad to be there, and kept shouting out 'welcome to bangladesh'! Travelling with Ants has been awesome, as expected. It's funny, the flip side of getting less hassles is that a lot of the time i don't even get addressed in conversations! (to start with anyway, people are cool once they've known you for a bit) However we have turned the attitude to our advantage and created our own little bargaining scam. It involves me playing little wifey who loves to shop (don't laugh guys) and ant playing tight wad hubby! So basically i see something i like and want to buy it, ants acts stern and says we can't afford it, i act crestfallen, and hey presto, the prices drop and drop. Pretty cool huh? Bangladesh society is pretty much conservative islamic. I think i have seen 2 girls wearing jeans. Somehow even my most modest of western clothes seemed skanky there, so i bought one of teh tunic and pants suite that everyone wears, heaps better and looks pretty cute! Apparently though i should be wearing make-up! I was given 2 makeovers by the girls, involving loads of eyeliner (3 types at once!), the end result was quite striking and exotic i thought! Traffic is pretty full on, but amazingly we didn't witness any accidents! There are thousands of rickshaws, really cool ones, all painted and covered in tinsel, somehow resembling giant tambourines! Also the trucks are dollied up in similar pattern. V festive. Despite all the beauty in Bangladesh, it is one of Asias poorest countries, and that is pretty evident. Child labour is everywhere and hence literacy is low. But things do seem to be changing, there's construction going on everywhere you look, the government seems pretty committed to improving conditions and environmental issues. So will be interesting to see what it's like in 10 years, certainly heaps of potential. Also, it's only been 29 years since the country was devastated by the war for independence, so still recovering i think. Also in general the country seems much more organised than India.