Goodbye, Bangladesh

This post has been a long time coming. I sit writing it in my parents’ house in Leicester, shivering in an English summer, and wondering how I got here.

Maybe this is how Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy must have felt when they got back from Narnia. Nothing at home has changed, and Narnia feels a bit like a peculiar dream. To be fair, people aren’t just exactly where I left them (i.e. coming up the stairs to shout at me for being in a room where I’ve been told in no uncertain terms not to go), but it doesn’t feel like things have moved on that much.

Which is fine, because I’d be well and truly screwed if everyone had grown up, got married AND found their dream jobs whilst I was gone. It does feel a bit like that in some cases, but thankfully not in all (sorry guys!).

Really, this post should be several. In my last few weeks, I had a load of good ideas for posts, but things were too busy and too downright emotionally traumatic to find time to write them. So this is all you’re going to get, I’m afraid.
So. Where do I begin? How can I say goodbye to Bangladesh? To friends, colleagues and the people who became my family in Bangladesh? To the rickshaw wallahs, the little children who shook my hand every morning on the way to work, the aunties and uncles who asked me endless questions on long journeys, the market men where I used to buy my vegetables every week, the woman I bought bananas from practically every day, the little boy who shouted hello every morning from behind his pyramids of cucumbers, and all the others who made my daily routine so much more colourful? How do I say goodbye to saris and lungis and salwar kameez, and silly sandals, anklets and heavy gold jewellery? How do I bid farewell to mangoes and pineapples and jackfruit and red spinach and shojna? And what about the endless emerald paddy fields, the damp heavy air and the furious storms? And then there’s the call to prayer, which I sometimes find myself listening for, even though I know I won’t be hearing it.

And what about all the things I have to say thank you for? For everything Bangladesh has taught me; for all the support of friends and colleagues; for all the experiences, which I can’t help feeling have changed me fundamentally.

Bangladesh, it’s been wonderful. Abar dekha hobe.

Goodbye, Bangladesh

This post has been a long time coming. I sit writing it in my parents’ house in Leicester, shivering in an English summer, and wondering how I got here.

Maybe this is how Peter, Susan, Edmund and Lucy must have felt when they got back from Narnia. Nothing at home has changed, and Narnia feels a bit like a peculiar dream. To be fair, people aren’t just exactly where I left them (i.e. coming up the stairs to shout at me for being in a room where I’ve been told in no uncertain terms not to go), but it doesn’t feel like things have moved on that much.

Which is fine, because I’d be well and truly screwed if everyone had grown up, got married AND found their dream jobs whilst I was gone. It does feel a bit like that in some cases, but thankfully not in all (sorry guys!).

Really, this post should be several. In my last few weeks, I had a load of good ideas for posts, but things were too busy and too downright emotionally traumatic to find time to write them. So this is all you’re going to get, I’m afraid.
So. Where do I begin? How can I say goodbye to Bangladesh? To friends, colleagues and the people who became my family in Bangladesh? To the rickshaw wallahs, the little children who shook my hand every morning on the way to work, the aunties and uncles who asked me endless questions on long journeys, the market men where I used to buy my vegetables every week, the woman I bought bananas from practically every day, the little boy who shouted hello every morning from behind his pyramids of cucumbers, and all the others who made my daily routine so much more colourful? How do I say goodbye to saris and lungis and salwar kameez, and silly sandals, anklets and heavy gold jewellery? How do I bid farewell to mangoes and pineapples and jackfruit and red spinach and shojna? And what about the endless emerald paddy fields, the damp heavy air and the furious storms? And then there’s the call to prayer, which I sometimes find myself listening for, even though I know I won’t be hearing it.

And what about all the things I have to say thank you for? For everything Bangladesh has taught me; for all the support of friends and colleagues; for all the experiences, which I can’t help feeling have changed me fundamentally.

Bangladesh, it’s been wonderful. Abar dekha hobe.

Jascim-bhai's house

As the end of my placement draws near, I’m being increasingly flooded with invitations and entreaties for me to visit people’s houses, to visit their villages, hell – even to visit their mothers, before I go. I’m trying my hardest to schedule all these invitations so that I get to spend time with my close friends and the people I really care about, while not offending those who are essentially just big boss men in the office who want to be able to parade their bideshi for the neighbours to see (call me cynical, but I know these guys).

A few months ago, going to Jascim-bhai’s house would have fallen into this latter category. He’s certainly a big boss man in the office, and until January, I’d really had very little to do with him for a whole year – except a few times when he’d called me into his office and talked at me in rapid, incomprehensible Bangla, and I’d smiled, tried to nod at the right times, and run away as quick as possible.

But since we started working together on a project in January, he’s invited me to his house several times. I was extremely sceptical the first time – I thought he just wanted me to set up his newly-bought computer. But it turned out he actually wanted me to show his kids how to play computer games (not exactly my area of expertise), and to have dinner with him and his family. I was surprised to find that, beneath the bluster, he’s one of the gentlest, kindest guys I’ve met in Bangladesh, with three of the cutest, most endearing kids I’ve ever seen to boot.

He invited me for dinner the other night, and, as usual, the visit restored my faith in the world a little. As usual, within minutes of arriving at his house, Jascim-bhai himself went out to see his mates, leaving me to eat snacks and play with his kids. All night. I’ll always be grateful to kids in Bangladesh for just accepting me as I am, and not treating me as something special just because I’m a foreigner. Jascim-bhai’s kids do quite the opposite in fact: they actually think I understand whatever they say, even if it’s an extremely long story told at top speed, or a Khazi Nazrul Islam poem recited over and over and over again, because I didn’t give the right response. We must have spent hours, playing bingo and snakes and ladders and other games that I’d never heard of before, and eating bananas and biscuits and chana chur. Then, when Jascim-bhai finally came home, we all sat on their living room floor and ate chicken curry and rice and dal and salad together.

It’s nights like this that I’m really going to miss when I go home.

Domestic failure

Today, craving something sweet and having long ago devoured the chocolate supplies I lay in every time I go to Dhaka, I decided to whip up a batch of banana-raisin muffins. Being the domestic goddess that I am, this required nothing more than twenty minutes of measuring, mixing and beating before the mouth-watering scent of baking brought the neighbours running to investigate.

After forty minutes in my oven (which is pretty pathetic to be honest, and fries every socket I try to plug it into), I judged the muffins ready. Golden brown, with a good sugary glaze on top, I couldn’t wait to have one. I only left them on the rack for a minute…

This proved to be a massive error. I can’t have been away more than two minutes, but when I came back, the rack – and all ten of my freshly-baked muffins – were crawling with red ants.

I screamed. I shouted obscenities. I might have even stamped my foot a little. But then my need to eat took over: it wasn’t too late to salvage my precious baked goods! Using the quick thinking and natural problem-solving ability that I’m lucky enough to possess, I decided to rinse each muffin under the tap. Yes, you read that correctly, I washed my banana muffins.

On the plus side, this successfully removed the ants. On the minus, the muffins became a soggy, squidgy imitation of the delight they had been. I ate one, just to satisfy my sugar craving, but there’s no denying it. They were ruined. Rather than admit defeat, I put them in a tupperware in the fridge thinking that the cold might sort them out. But I haven’t yet reopened the box again to see how they’re doing. I imagine that, true to form, they’ll stay there while I tell myself that I will eat one in a minute, until I can see the mould growing inside. Then, holding my breath, I’ll quickly the open the box and lob them into the rubbish bin, and try to forget that this whole sorry episode every occurred.

Workshops from hell 1

Over the last few months, I’ve facilitated a lot of trainings and workshops. While I really enjoy facilitation, some of my experiences of the last few weeks have driven me to such disbelieving distraction that I had to take a note of proceedings. It was either that or start beating my head against the nearest hard surface… Here is an example of just one of many particularly frustrating workshops.

9.30am Scheduled starting time. Approximately half of the participants have arrived. All are sitting very quietly, but smile when I walk in.

9.47am Almost all participants are here now.

9.49am Deputy Director slouches in. Proceeds to go through the workshop outline I hand him, smiling brightly, demanding changes and alterations to everything from the grammar to the timetable. Had he been available to discuss the schedule any time in the last two weeks, I wouldn’t mind him pointing our errors. But as it is, I mind rather a lot.

9.52am People have started leaving. For cigarettes, for a stretch of the legs, to breast feed (that’s my co-facilitator, by the way).

10.15am Director waltzes in with a cursory ‘sorry’. Everyone leadps to their feet, rather as if their seats have been wired to an electric current that activates when he is present. Although he does apologise for being late, he seems to think he’s only 20 minues late, rather than 45. In workshop terms, I reckon 20 minutes is just about recoverable. 45 minutes is an entire session. I have to take quite a few deep breaths.

10.19 am Finally get started. However, Deputy Director continues to interrupt and find fault with everything we do. He wants to know where the marker pens are, why something hasn’t been explained (my colleague is, at this moment, mid-sentence, explaining precisely the point he’s harping on about. If he’d only listen…) I’ve seen few such overt displays of power in my life.

11.36 am Break morphed from 15 minutes into 30 minutes. I try to be understanding, but the main reason for the delay is that one of the facilitators, who’d assured me a particular document was translated and printed, was actually attempting to do it during the break (all 3 pages of it), and hoping I wouldn’t notice. More deep breaths. I contemplate praying.

11.42 am Group work. It quickly becomes apparent that one of the groups is really struggling. The project coordinator, who has the best English, didn’t turn up, and without the Bangla translation, it’s proving really hard for them to participate. I turn to find my co-facilitators for a bit of support. One is on the phone outside and waves me away in irritation. One refuses to go and help translate the document because there’s a senior staff member in the group and he doesn’t want to show up his boss. And one is off breast feeding her baby. Realise I’m grinding my teeth.

12.00 Deputy Director approaches me and asks if it’s possible to wrap things up before lunch. I must be hearing things. But when I ask him to repeat himself, it turns out I’m not. Want to scream. Instead, explain as politely as possible why there’s no way in hell a whole day workshop can be compressed into half a day – or rather, the remaining five hours cannot be squeezed into one. He nods understanding, and I think I may be getting somewhere. Then he explains that the senior management have very tight schedules. As if this is something I’ve never heard before.

12.04 Have to excuse myself for a few minutes. More deep breaths. I try to remind myself that it isn’t my strategic plan that we’re trying to develop, and that it means absolutely zilch to me whether or not it’s a good strategic plan.

1.16 pm Valiantly trying to finish the workshop as requested (because, after all, what’s the point in continuing if no-one will be there?) Gently remind the groups that they have 5 minutes to finish off their activity, and get yelled at by the Finance Manager. Want to yell back, with as many obscenities as I can think of, but with great self control I don’t. Have to go outside for some more calm talk though.

2.12pm Finished. As everyone slopes out for lunch, I think dark thoughts about all of them.

2.14pm Need to go and lie down in a darkened room.

Bizu

Unbelievably, or so it feels, I have just passed my second Bizu in Bangladesh. Last year, I spent it in Khagrachari, enjoying lots. This year, I went to Rangamati because the security situation in Khagrachari is still not great, and – if it’s possible – I enjoyed even more there!

Bizu is the Chakma name for new year celebrations, which are observed across much of South and Southeast Asia according to the movement of the sun (usually on or around 14th April). In the hills, the Tripura, Marma and Chakma groups have given it their own name: Boisabi, an amalgamation of the different names given to this festival by each group: for the Tripura, it’s Boisuk, for the Marma it’s Sangrai, and for the Chakma it’s Bizu.

Although Bizu or Boisabi is observed differently in different areas, in the hills it generally involves three days of festivities. The first day, Phul Bizu, is a flower festival, where people exchange flowers and hang them in their doorways. Bitter neem leaves are also hung up, apparently to freshen the hew year. Unfortunately, owing to bad timing on my part, I have spent Phul Bizu both years sitting on buses, on my way to the hills.

Not to worry, however, because it is the next day, Mul Bizu, that’s the big daddy of Bizu. On Mul Bizu, it is the tradition to ‘go visiting’. Well, that’s what you do if you’re a bideshi and therefore not expected to receive visitors yourself. If you’re not, you probably spend a lot of time cooking for and serving the steady stream of visitors who will no doubt pass by. Going visiting may sound like the jolly past time of nineteenth gentlewomen, prone to attacks of the vapours, but in the hills, it’s a marathon of eating and drinking that pushes your stamina – and your stomach capacity – to the limits. In order to bring good luck to the new year, we were repeatedly told, you should aim to visit at least seven houses. Last year, we made it to thirteen houses. This year, I made it to fourteen before conceding defeat.

What makes going visiting so difficult is the pace of the schedule and the sheer quantity of food you’re expected to consume at each and every house you visit. I’m sure we were supposed to visit at least twenty houses, and doubtless caused great offense in our failure to do so. Estelle and Tony, who both live in Rangamati, made it to seventeen and eighteen houses respectively, even though they began at 9am, three hours before my friend Amy and I arrived, and didn’t stop until almost midnight.

In every house you go to, you’re usually offered the same dishes and drinks. Depending on how you feel about the food, this can be a good or a bad thing, but I don’t think I’ll be eating brown mishti or watermelon again for quite some time.

The classic Bizu dish is a vegetable dish called pachon, supposed to contain at least twenty different types of vegetables – the majority if which I was unable to identify. As it is cooked with the dried rotten fish paste that is so common in cooking here, I can’t say that I’m a big pachon-fan. Birani, however, is a different matter. This is boot dal (big round lentils, a bit like chickpeas), and usually has egg or meat bones in it as well. Even at my fourteenth house I was still reaching for a second helping. Watermelon is also offered, Bizu coinciding with the peak of watermelon season in the hills. Other foods on offer included: delicious curried pork, different kinds of pitha (cake) made with rice, coconut and green bananas, noodles with egg, brown mishti, jalepis (just like skinny donuts, according to Amy), omlette, rice pudding, noodle pudding, papaya, orange, apple, banana, grapes, fruit custad, deep friend fish, chicken curry, beef curry, ruti, paratha, boiled rice… the list goes on.

Now, don’t get the idea that you can somewhoe have a little of one or two of these things and then just say you’re full. This simply doesn’t wash as a reason not to eat in the hills (or all of Bangladesh, for that matter). The key to survival is to make sure your plate is never empty. This means you can point to your single piece of watermelon and truthfully claim to still be eating. That way, your host is less likely to stick another fried fish on your plate, or a generous spoonful of pachon. Another trick is to avoid stodge, as there is absolutely no way you can eat rice pudding fourteen times, even if it’s really tasty.

But this is only the food. Drinking begins early on Mul Bizu, and as early at 10am people were pissed. I thought we did well to avoid alochol until 12.30pm. After that, the parade of rice wine, rice beer (good for ladies, apparently, because it’s ‘softer’), whiskey, rum etc etc blurred into one. With all that eating, I can’t say that I got drunk, but walking up and down all those hills, especially after dark, required rather more concentrationt than usual.

I think we finished our last visit at about midnight, at which point we all stumbled gratefully home and into bed.

Day Three
The third day of Bizu is known as sleeping Bizu, or rest Bizu – and after the delights of Mul Bizu, you can probably guess why. It’s also the New Year’s Water Festival for the Marma indigenous group, so for many people – us included – there’s not rest to be had.

The Water Festival is celebrated throughout South and Southeast Asia, in Burma, Thailand, Laos and Cambodia, for example. The idea is that you sprinkle water on others, to cleanse them in preparation for the new year. Given that the festival falls in April, one of the hottest months in this region, it’s no surprise that there’s actually more splashing, squirting, dousing and dunking than ‘sprinkling’. If the splashing of water is supposed to cleanse you for the new year, I’d say we are all positively spotless by now.


We hired Moanaghar’s ambulance to take us to Chitmorong, a Marma Buddhist temple about an hour from where we were staying. Don’t ask why we hired an ambulance. It seemed like a really great idea, until we realised it lacked AC, windows and proper seats. At least it was easy to spot in a crowd – except when our two young drivers were off joy riding. Anyway, it was a lovely scenic drive around the Kaptai reservoir and along the banks of the Karnaphuli river. Tony said Chitmorong, a short boat ride across the river, was a lovely peaceful place, so I was imagining a day of lazing around, with maybe a dip in the river if there weren’t too many people about.

Unfortunately, on this day, Chitmorong resembled a zoo. It was heaving with visitors, monks, beggars and hawkers, and the sight of four bideshis was obviously too much to handle. Because we were all really hot after our ride in the ambulance, we foolishly decided to have a quick cooling swim, even though the river smelled suspiciously like sewage. It nearly caused a riot. Crowds thronged the banks of the Karnaphuli, everyone trying to catch a glimpse of the crazy foreigners. Well, kind of. That’s what it felt like as we climbed back up the banks in our wet clothes.

As we wandered over to the temple, the double takes and the ‘wows’ were flattering at first. Then, the sensation that I would never like to be a famous person quickly took over. At one point, we must have had a crowd of at least fifty young men trailing us, camera phones extended. As someone said, it was a bit like being pursued by a troop of zombies.

The real fun began when we went to watch the water splashing. Again, I couldn’t’ get a straight answer on the origins of this ritual, but it’s quite a spectacle to behold. Two boats are drawn up side by side, about six feet apart, and filled with water from the river. The contestants line up in front of each boat, girls in their beautiful Marma dresses on one side, boy on the other. Everyone is handed a little tin cup. Then someone blows a whistle and both sides have to fling as much water as they can at the other side, for what feels like an agonisingly long time. What the aim is, how a winner is decided, and whether this actually is a competition, I couldn’t say. But when they asked us if wanted to have a go, I didn’t hang around. By the end, you’re soaked, exhausted and filthy. Your eyes sting from the water, and your flinging arm is trembling. It was incredible!

After that, we spent the rest of the day eating and swimming on a quieter stretch of the river. That evening, we firmly refused all invitations to further programs, and organised our own program, involving rum and cokes, and honey roast potatoes. The perfect end to a perfect day.

One night in Chittagong

Whatever romantic notions the title of this post may conjure up – discard them now. For those of you who’ve never heard of Chittagong, it’s an old port city in southeast Bangladesh, set in the hills, with a natural deep water harbour and a beach. While that might, to the uninitiated, sound appealing in a mouldering colonial grandeur kind of way, it’s actually Bangladesh’s second city, a busy port, and just as chaotic as the rest of Bangladesh.

My friend Amy, who was over visiting from Abu Dhabi last week, and I found ourselves with six hours to kill before our 11.30pm bus to Dhaka. We’d arrived at 6pm, expecting to just jump on a bus, but it was not to be. If you are ever be unlucky enough to find yourself in such a predicament, here’s our suggestions on how (not) to spend your time. We didn’t exactly stray far and wide in search of a good time: it being dark and me being so socialised after eighteen months in Bangladesh that I now regard darkness as indoors time, we weren’t particularly adventurous. The following recommendations are things to do on and around Sheikh Mujib road , so if you ever get stuck waiting for a Saudia of Green Line bus from Dampara, read on…

• First of all, don’t rely on the Lonely Planet to guide you. We were thoroughly disappointed by the LP’s recommendations, as you will see, and the map is highly misleading. At one point, we almost set off walking with our big backpacks to find a hotel that looked like it was just around the block. Two steep dual carriage ways and thirty minutes later, we still hadn’t reached the hotel by rickshaw. So be warned.

• So long as you’re not questing after authentic Bangladeshi cuisine (and after two days of forcefeeding in Rangamati, we were ready for a change), there’s a Pizza Hut on Sheikh Mujib Road that perfectly hit the spot with some appetizers (garlice bread) and aperitifs (well, ok, it was just iced tea). I know a lot of travellers would turn their noses up at going to a Pizza Hut in Bangladesh, but sometimes only the preprocessed comfort of a multinational chain will do. If you ensure that you manage your time well (no multi-tasking of any description, for example), you can quite easily pass a good forty minutes there.

• Next, you could think about heading out for a real aperitif. I say ‘could’ because, given the available options, I’m not sure it’s worth the hassle. The LP recommends an entertainingly seedy-sounding bar somewhere near Station Road, but as two bideshis alone, and after 8pm, for crying out loud, we decided it sounded like too much hassle. Far better to plump for a hotel. And seeing as Amy was paying for everything, we lighted upon the Hotel Agrabad – described by the LP as ‘plush’ (not my italics). I was wildly excited about the prospect of going to a hotel that apparently charges $110 for a single room, even if only for a drink, so perhaps my expectations were unreasonably heightened. Suffice to say that, although there is a bar, it is anything but plush, and two women there alone after dark were distinctly frowned upon. Add to this the fact that two local vodkas and a shared can of sprite came to 500 taka, and it really is a waste of money. You’re certainly not paying for the ambience.

• By this point, we were both pretty hungry, so decided to grab a rickshaw to try out another LP recommendation: Chung King restaurant, also on Sheikh Mujib road. The LP says that Chung King is “reputed to have the best Chinese food in town, as well as Indonesian, Thai and Indian selections.” Now, I don’t know if the writer actually visited this restaurant, or just heard about it from someone (maybe the owner?), but on the night we visited there was no selection – there was Chinese or Chinese, and it was bog-standard at that. On our way to Rangamati, we’d stopped in Comilla in a service station and had chowmein that was tastier. It wasn’t offensive at all, but it certainly didn’t live up to its recommendation.

• Feeling a bit disheartened, but a full two hours later, we struggled back to the bus counter and deposited our bags. On an earlier rickshaw ride, we’d spied an ice cream parlour a little further down the road from Pizza Hut, so went to investigate. Sadly, it was almost 10.30pm so the parlour was closing. The staff went a bit goggled eyed when we knocked on the door, but still refused to give us a scoop of ice cream each. Not to be defeated, we went back to Pizza Hut and plumped for a slice of chocolate cake and an ice cream sundae. All I can say is, the multi-national chains rarely let you down.

• Finally, after a slightly embarrassing incident where I had to sprint back to the Saudia counter to get some emergency cash from my backpack to pay for our outlandish desserts, we boarded the most lux bus I’ve ever seen, and promptly fell asleep. If the LP wants to throw the term ‘plush’ around, it might best be applied to the 760 taka Soudia S Alam Dhaka-Chittagong bus: it was like sleeping in a gently rocking arm chair.

On not getting the message

I’m going to shout at someone soon if I don’t get this off my chest, so please forgive me another rant…

What is it with Bangladeshis and not getting the message? Back home, if you call someone twice and they cut your calls, you’d probably assume they are either too busy to talk or not your friend anymore. Here, however, if someone wants to talk to you, there’s simply no stopping them.

Last night, I was really late with for a deadline thanks to the national power board, and two colleagues were trying to get hold of me. I knew it was nothing urgent, as I’d spoken to them both less than an hour before. I rejected twelve calls from the two of them in the space of thirty minutes. TWELVE. Now, it isn’t unreasonable for a person to feel hounded under such circumstances, is it? Because I’m really losing perspective here. In the end, I turned off my phone (I wanted to chuck it out the window).

When the article was finished, and I called my colleagues back, they were both outraged that I had ignored their calls. They were understanding when I said I had been very busy finishing some work, but that’s not the point, is it?

Today is a Friday, what I like to think of as me-time. Working six days a week doesn’t give you a whole lot of time to relax, so on Fridays, I tend to reject all but essential invitations and disturbances, and spend my day reading, writing, watching The Wire and painting my toenails.

About an hour ago, a neighbour came over. I heard her downstairs chatting to the other housewives, before she came upstairs. Unfortunately for her, I was really not in the mood for idle chitchat, so I decided to ignore her knocking. My lack of response did not, however, discourage her.

Meanwhile, I was checking my emails or something. At first, the knocking was easy to ignore. I assumed she’d go away after a couple of unanswered knocks. But as the minutes ticked by, I found I couldn’t concentrate. Then, I heard her telling her son to go outside and see if he could see through the windows. I cursed, and turned the main light off, starting to feel like a fugitive in my own home. I heard the kid calling to me from the front yard, then telling his mother he couldn’t see me. Then my phone started ringing.

Eventually, they must have got bored, because she went back downstairs, complaining loudly. Then I heard the gate screech as she left.

Fifteen minutes later, I judged it safe to put the light back on.

Am I being unreasonable? Am I being rude to act like this? Part of me thinks so. But the other part thinks that if everyone could just take the hint and bugger off when I occasionally don’t answer their calls, we’d all get along much better.

The bastard ants

Regular readers may remember my rants about the ants last spring. Well, they’re back and they mean business.

I don’t know if it’s a seasonal thing, but my flat has suddenly been overrun by ants of all descriptions. We’ve got tiny red biting ants, whose bites leave big red swellings for days afterwards; we’ve got big black buggers, who patrol the floor of my sitting room and give the most painful bites I’ve ever had from an insect; and we’ve got little black ‘uns, comparatively harmless, but bloody everywhere.

I noticed the first ones a few days ago, criss-crossing the wall above the dining table. They were black and small, so I ignored them. Then, I came home from work to discover a black stain on the floor that, when I approached appeared to dissolve in all directions at once. A dead cockroach makes a nutritious meal for most of the ants in the sodding neighbourhood, apparently.

And now they’re everywhere. In my grapes, on my table, emerging from the plughole in my sink… there isn’t a place these ants will pass over. I made the mistake of dropping a fragment of Crème Egg wrapper (from a crème egg, lovingly sent by my sister) during a blackout one night, and awoke the next morning to find it heaving with ants.

Now that I understand. If I’m going to do something so stupid as leave sticky chocolate wrappers lying around, I’ve got to expect an ant party. Of course ants want crème egg goo, delicious as it is. But what do they want with the dreggs of my (unsweetened) coffee? And how dare they attempt to infest my goddamn oats? Not to mention violating my water filter, which I really feel is taking the piss.

I think me and the bastard ants need to sit down and try to come to some sort of mutual understanding about what is and what isn’t fair game in this flat. Otherwise, the only option is war. And I really don’t like the odds on me plus a can of Mortein, versus an army of endless ants.

Dirty Dhaka stricken by diarrhoea epidemic

As some of you may have picked up from my pathetic-sounding tweets over the last few days, I was recently struck down by a rather nasty bout of ‘the episodes’. I have never been this sick with diarrhoea before, and have never realised how truly unpleasant – and frankly dangerous – diarrhoea can be. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve had travellers diarrhoea, and even giardia, many times before (I didn’t get the nickname Windy-bum Whitaker for nothing). I’m also well versed in the usual coping mechanisms (lots of oral rehydration salts and lots of water, combined with a tantalising selection of any of the following: flat 7-Up, bananas, toast, boiled rice, boiled eggs etc. My approach is always eat if you feel hungry, don’t eat if you don’t, and go to the doctor if things aren’t improving after 48 hours).

However, I’ve truly never been this sick in all my days in Bangladesh. I was only the other day thinking how lucky I’ve been, not to have been hospitalised, operated upon or airlifted out of the country, like many of my fellow volunteers. I was even applauding the steeliness of my immune system a little bit. I should have known that such thoughts only tempt fate.

Not to dwell on the gritty details, but things were BAD for quite a few days. To cut a long story short, I was practically bed ridden for three days, was given horrendously strong antibiotics, and lost about 4 kilograms in less than a week. Luckily, the antibiotics seem to have done their work, and I’ve managed to progress to non-toast-based meals over the last two days.

Usually, I can identify a likely culprit when I’m struck down with the episodes. This time around, however, I couldn’t think of anything suspect I’d eaten in the past few days. My only conclusion is therefore that the general grubbiness (read, pure filth) that characterises Dhaka simply makes one more susceptible to sickness of any kind.

During my hour of need, I was (slightly) comforted to learn that I and my liquid bowels weren’t suffering alone. ICDDR,B, the diarrhoea hospital in Dhaka – and obviously the place you want to be when you’ve got diarrhoea – has recently seen a major influx of patients as the temperature here climbs day by day. Apparently, it’s a common occurrence during this season – and one instance in which the ‘change of seasons’ can genuinely be seen to be affecting health. When I went to the travellers’ clinc that is also at ICDDR,B on Thursday, feeling extremely sorry for myself, it was sobering to see where the Bangladeshi diarrhoea patients wait out their episodes: on rubber-covered gurneys with holes in the middle and buckets beneath, in what is essentially an open air ward.

A bit of an epiphany

I’ve had a bit of an epiphany lately, dear readers: I am ready to leave the ‘desh.

Although the thought of leaving regularly makes me want to weep, a very wise friend pointed out to me a few weeks ago that, when working in development, just as it is important to see out your contract, it’s equally important to known when to leave. And I’ve come to see, over the last few weeks, that my desire to stay here at GBK is more about my fear of the next step, than about what I can really contribute to GBK in addition to what I’m already doing. The skills that I have, and the support that GBK now needs, no longer match. It’s time for us both to move on.

I think my work here is (almost) done.

Now all I have to do is break this to my colleagues. Like my neighbours, they are forever trying to convince me to stay on in Bangladesh. For a while, I was genuinely searching for ways to stay. But now that I know this is not what I want, I just don’t know if I have the heart to tell my friends that, actually, for the time being at least, I’m done with Bangladesh.

Silver linings

I arrived home from work the other day, pretty tired, and ran into Meena, my landlady. Because I’ve been working such long hours lately, I hadn’t seen her in a few days. She insisted that I come in and sit down. In between making me tea and piling at least a dozen biscuits onto my plate, she began to tell me how much she was going to miss me when I’m gone. She kept insisting that things would be altogether much better if I stay for at least one more year, that I live in her flat and (when I pointed out that I would have no job beyond 17th May, and therefore would not be able to pay the rent), that I get married in Bangladesh. Sumaia’s mother, who was passing by at the time, popped in to gossip. She said the same thing. Then Auntie from upstairs came downstairs and joined in.

Really, it was all very touching, and began to make me feel rather tearful.
But then, as Meena was bringing me my dinner (I only put up a feeble resistance to her offer of goat curry, I’ll admit it), the mood changed. She pulled her chair closer to mine, and glanced around nervously. Jumping up again, she pushed the front door closed. I began to worry she was about to offer me her son’s hand in marriage. As she leaned in towards me, I began to panic, racking my brains for polite ways to say no.

Alas, my consternation proved to be needless. Her proposition was of quite a different nature. She asked me very softly, as if afraid the neighbours would overhear, whether I planned on taking my rice cooker back to England with me.
I gazed at her in wonder for a moment, before carefully explaining that no, it was unlikely the rice cooker would fit into my backpack. She beamed enormously. Then she asked if I’d be taking the china teapot my parents bought while they were here. And so began an inventory of all the household goods that I’ve accumulated, and which she’s obviously had her eye on for the last year and more.

I suppose the lesson here is that every cloud has a silver lining. And the cloud of me leaving Bangladesh is, for Meena at least, lined with electrical appliances and crockery.

Job hunting

The bright sparks amongst you have probably guessed from the title of this post that, finally, after many months of denial and procrastination, the time has come for me to decide What I Want To Do Next.

Oh, those six dreaded words. This question, while I was at home and being clouted over the head by it at every turn, made my heart constrict and my natural ebullience wilt, before the questioner had even reached the inflection at the end of the sentence.

Now, however, as I sit here in Parbs, I see the long, dark years stretch out before me, rather like the road does in Cormac McCarthy’s The Road (think nuclear winter, with a bit of cannibalism thrown in for variety), and I know that attempting to answer this tortuous question is infinitely preferable to living in Leicester for the rest of my life.

I suppose I hadn’t realised, until the possibility of extending my placement here was torn to shreds, set alights and the embers danced upon by a thoroughly ridiculous decision (I’m not naming any names, before you ask), how much that possibility had been cocooning me from facing this depressing prospect. It was only when that particular rug was whipped out from under my feet that the need to Find A Job hit me square in the jaw.

Unfortunately, I’m no closer now to knowing what I want to do with my life than I was when I arrived here. Convinced I was going to have an epiphany in a Bangladeshi village, I quietly pitied my university friends, all madly applying for jobs the summer we graduated. And now, here I am, not so much closer to The Answer than I was when we took off from Heathrow back in 2008.

Back in the desh

Bangladesh got really annoying while I was gone. Perhaps it’s just going through a particularly irritating phase. Perhaps. More likely, Bangladesh has always been this annoying, only I’d been here for so long I’d stopped noticing. Either way, I am struggling to readjust, especially after the blissful two days I spent on St Martin’s island last week – probably the best part of Bangladesh I’ve been to yet, precisely because it’s nothing like Bangladesh.

(I should probably give a slight disclaimer here – I’ve had a crap day and am feeling premenstrual . But I’m not going to make excuses anymore. Oh no. I’m telling it like it is.)

It began yesterday when I got back to the office for the first time in six weeks. I went in to say hello to my director, and after the initial pleasantries, he kept me waiting for ten minutes in silence while he rifled aimlessly through papers on his desk. When I asked if I should come back later, after he’d taken the second phone call, he said “No, no, just wait, one minute”.

Then the demands for “some demandable gift from London” began. Not just from the friends whom I’m promised to bring a little something for. Oh no. Nearly every single person in the office has stopped me over the last two days to ask where their present is. Even the people I don’t like, the high up management people who generally think it is beneath their dignity to talk to me unless they want something, such as helping them to get British visa, or bringing them a cheap English laptop from home. They have no shame, I tell you, none. It all came to a head today when one particular member of staff came into my office. I thought he’d just come for a chat as we hadn’t really seen each other since I’d come back, but I was sadly mistaken. After merely 30 seconds of small talk, he asked if I had something for him. I scowled, then explained that I had brought some traditional English biscuits and chocolates (which took up a sizeable amount of space in my backpack, I’ll have you know), which I was planning to share on Saturday when many people who are away on training will return to the office. It was his turn to scowl.

“Just food presents?” he demanded, clearly not impressed with this. I nodded.

“No useable item?” My scowl deepened. I explained (with some dignity, I think) that I am not a millionaire and therefore couldn’t bring a proper present for all 30 people in the office. He didn’t understand the word millionaire, however, so my dignity was somewhat lost. When I said that I am not a rich man, something that definitely translates, he laughed. Mirthlessly. No-one here believes that it’s possible for me not to be rich. I know that by Bangladeshi standards I am, but when we’re talking about buying 30 Christmas presents in England, I’m definitely not.

Anyway, this exchange continued for some ten minutes, with my face getting stonier by the second. When I asked, in exasperation, what he wanted me to do, he replied that I should have brought some small useable item for him. When I asked whether he rather not have any of my sodding biscuits as they clearly weren’t good enough for him, he asked whether I was feeling angry. In the end, I had to stare at my computer screen and count to ten whilst breathing deeply until he got the message and left.
After that, I had a good cry – more rage-induced than anything else – and decided that if no-one was going to appreciate me in this bloody office, if everyone was going to take me for granted as a limitless money-lender and bringer of “demandable” gifts, then I may as well just bugger off home.

Only Bangladesh was also waiting outside. My back was already up about this gift thing, but then, as I marched up the road to the rickshaw stand, the legions of “Hi madam, how are you’s?” began to grate against my soul, rather like a cheese grater would on bare flesh. I had on my best don’t-bloody-talk-to-me face, but some in this country are impervious to all subtle hints except shouting at very close quarters. Unfortunately for them, I swore loudly at many of the banana sellers in Haldibari today.

I finally made it back to my house, where I came upon Lily. I knew immediately that she was sulking with me for not keeping in touch, or not going to see her yesterday, or some other cultural faux pas that I was unaware of. She refused to even make eye contact with me.This is another really annoying Bangladeshi habit – expecting that the only thing you think about when you’re not with someone is them, and not really understanding that when I’m in Dhaka, or at home, I actually have other things to do (don’t get me wrong, I did keep in touch with my close friends, but if I’d kept in touch with everyone while I was at home I’d have done nothing by skype Bangladesh, and frankly, I’d had enough of it). At this stage, I couldn’t even be bothered to explain why I hadn’t been in touch (a broken mobile and a sim card left on my desk in Leicester). I just shrugged and sloped off.

By this point, I was about ready to break. So I decided that there was only one thing for it: Davina. Exercise has long been my saviour here, giving me a shot of endorphins when I’m at my lowest, ready to go out on a killing spree. My new Davina dvd thankfully did not let me down. There was enough punching and kicking in it to reduce my colleagues to blubbering wrecks who would not even be able to form the words “demandable” and “gift”, let alone tell me that my gifts aren’t good enough.

The last straw came during the abs section. I was feeling pretty good, had worked up a nice sweat, and was almost through. That’s when the knocking on my door started. It went on for the rest of the abs section and the entire cool down section (about 20 minutes). To be fair, it was only Shahanaz wanting her wages, and I can’t really blame her for that. But I was so close to the end and wearing only tiny little shorts and a sports bra (i.e. not in any fit state to answer the door), that I decided to ignore it. I assumed she’d just go away and come back later.

I was ready to scream by the end. My exercise-induced zen was utterly destroyed. But when I answered the door, a look like thunder on my face, they all just came trundling in as usual to poke around my things and ask inane questions. When Shahanaz asked if the winter weight babygro with attached mittens and booties, which my mother had sent for my colleague Sarah’s new baby, was for her five year old son, I really did think it was the end. She said that she’d seen it earlier, and that Meena-auntie had said I must have brought it for him. I forced to explain, with the poor boy standing there gazing at the babygro in wonder, that there was no way in hell it was going to fit him, and no, actually, I hadn’t brought it for him. His crushed and accusing eyes as the whole dog and pony show trooped out of my flat really were the straws that broke the camel’s back in this case.
I have to admit it. I cracked. Those chocolate supplies that were supposed to last me a good few weeks have been reduced to wrappers. However, having splurged my pent up rage onto this blog, you’ll all be pleased to know that I’m feeling remarkably better.

Welcome home, Dhaka style

I was slightly disappointed not to be met by cheering fans as I emerged from customs, especially after an annoying delay in Calcutta airport (where there is not a bloody thing to do – it’s like they have a special second-rate terminal for flights to Bangladesh).

It was rather rewarding, however, to march out of the terminal into the staring, shouting, hustling crowd that always swarms around the airport in Dhaka, and inform everyone who made a grab for my bag or attempted to usher me into an outrageously overpriced yellow taxi (who needs airconditioning in January?), that I would not be requiring their services – all in fluent Bangla, of course. Hopping into a CNG for the first time in a month was like a warm embrace from Bangladesh, and I was surprised to find myself glad to receive it.

In the evening, I enjoyed a typical Dhaka Thursday night in – cheap nasty whiskey and a dirty kebab. Unsurprisingly, delicious as it was at the time, this delightful concoction gave all participants stomach upsets throughout the night.

God, it’s good to be back!

Homecoming, or, Searching for a Love Actually moment

As many of you (but not my parents) already knew, back in July I booked flights to come home for Christmas. Since then, I have been looking forward to it like a small child looks forward to Christmas: the thought of Christmas in Blighty has got me through many a tough spot since July.

However, when the time finally came, it was slightly more bogged down in anxiety and self-doubt than I had anticipated. The bureaucratic challenges were many – I spent a sleepless week plotting my options if the Indian embassy refused to give me a visa – but I think the main cause of my disquiet was the idea that I might go home and find things irreversibly changed. As luck would have it, I came home to find that absolutely nothing has changed. Not one thing. Friends, relationships, habits, old haunts – all are pretty much the same as I left them. In some ways, I could find this depressing, but it is actually deeply comforting.

Landing at Heathrow at 7am was something of a shock. When the pilot announced during our descent that the temperature outside was minus three, I think I actually laughed. Having only my flip flops and a cardigan for warmth, I think I was attempting to block out the fact that such a temperature was going to be physically painful. Needless to say, the moment I stepped off the plane, before the air-conditioned blandness of the airport enclosed me, was a tough one.

Of course I was extremely excited to be in London after so many months of fantasizing about it, but I was nevertheless a little disappointed not to find everything a bit more momentous. The man on immigration didn’t say welcome home, for example, and there were no cheering crowds awaiting me in the arrivals hall. There was, devastatingly, no Love Actually moment. Instead, there was me with my stupidly heavy backpack (eighteen kilos, for god’s sake!), my stupid flip flops and my stupid little cardigan.

My first encounter with the rush hour underground brought me many a strange look, which I’m hoping were due to my bare feet and copious scarves than the fact that I hadn’t showered in 12 hours. However, I did note the lack of staring – or eye contact at all - between my fellow passengers – with some sadness.

Arriving at Victoria to meet Emily, I did get to have a bit of a Love Actually moment. She’d got up at 4.30am to get the train from Leeds, she’d brought me socks and a coat, and just as we headed outside to catch the train home, it began to snow. Cue much gleeful shrieking on my part, which did manage to earn one or two stares from passers by.

Later, I had the pleasure of a series of faintly Love Actually moments as I was reunited with friends and family at various stages. The highlight, however, has to be leaping out of a box to greet my unsuspecting parents as they arrived home from work. Bizarrely, I was unaccountably nervous about seeing them – as if they might not be pleased to see me (ridiculous, I know). Although I was momentarily concerned that my mother was going to pass out, it was a priceless moment. Both my mum and dad had fully swallowed the counter story Emily and I had been feeding them since July, that I was going to Vietnam for Christmas. Initially constructed to explain the airline’s debit from my bank account (which my parents consider is there duty to monitor), this bluff had evolved into a fully formed narrative involving the names of travelling companions, hotels and even itineraries, helpfully supplemented by several long conversations with my dad about which were the best places to visit in Vietnam.

Kolkata

Back in July, when I was booking my flights home, a minor stroke of genius led me to book flights from Kolkata to Heathrow, rather than Dhaka to Heathrow. This was mainly because I was feeling cheap (flights from Kolkata are more than £150 cheaper), but also because I’m actually genuinely interested in seeing this famous city, the one-time capital of the British empire.

It was with some trepidation and much battling with bureaucracy that I ventured across the border, due on the one hand to a previous trip to India in which I found the hustle altogether too much to bear, and, on the other, to the glories of sub-continental bureaucratic systems. This time, however, things were different. I don’t know if it was being able to speak Bangla, or just knowing that home was only a few hours away, but I had a wonderful few hours there. Actually, scrap all that – it was most likely because I spent the majority of my time in this majestic city taking hot showers (three in less than 24 hours – my personal best) and watching Star Movies in a gloriously comfortable bed in the Fairlawn Hotel. This is a very nice hotel (although I speak as someone who has spent her life either camping or staying in the very cheapest hostels, so I don’t think my standards are very high…), and I would highly recommend a stay there to anyone visiting Kolkata. It’s not exactly fitted to a back-packer’s budget at $50 for a single room, but it has amazing character – think last bastion of empire, with wonderfully incongruous paintings, ornaments and newspaper cuttings – and the tariff includes a lovely, scrupulously clean room, a more than ample breakfast (watermelon, cornflakes, and a fry up, anyone?), and afternoon tea at 4pm (glorious, simply glorious!).

I can’t really write much about Kolkata yet, as aside from a very interesting Discovery channel programme about the formation of the Sahara desert, I only saw two sights of much interest: the Victoria Memorial, and the Indian Museum. Although I was stalked by a slightly strange guy around the natural history section of the Indian Museum – I even (vainly) resorted to hiding in the invertebrates room (yawn) in the hope that he’d get bored and go away – I would thoroughly recommend both places for a visit. The Victoria Memorial is a wonderfully overblown testament to the folly of empire (Kolkata ceased to be the capital of the empire ten years before this monument to the Empress of India was finished), and well worth a visit (especially at only 150 rupees for entrance). It’s architecturally extremely impressive, and the museum contains a really interesting exhibition about the development of Kolkata and the various different socio-political movements that originated there. The Indian Museum is not quite so impressive, and although it is reportedly India’s best museum I didn’t find it as riveting (although admittedly, this may have been because my attention was somewhat diverted). However, it does have some natural history and art exhibitions that are worth a look. There’s also a central courtyard with a fountain and some handily placed benches – good for plotting stalker-avoidance strategies, but probably also for respite from the summer heat.

Despite my failure to really ‘do’ Kolkata – which some might hope would bring this post to an abrupt end – my twelve hour bus journey from Dhaka gave me ample time to reflect on the differences between West Bengal and Bangladesh. Once we passed the border, reportedly a nightmare of hassle and extortion but really quite straightforward, the bus bounced and rattled its way through mile after mile of villages that could almost have been in Bangladesh, before we reached gridlock in the Kolkatan suburbs. One of the most immediately striking differences between West Bengal and Bangladesh is that nature in West Bengal seems to be altogether more verdant. The trees that line the sides of the roads, just as they do in Bangladesh, are much bigger and older than those on the other side of the border. In Bangladesh, nature feels very much like it’s been shoved aside to make room for all the people. While there are trees and plants everywhere you look, they seem to be much newer, or more temporary. It does make you wonder what has happened to Bangladesh’s trees – perhaps they too were casualties of the liberation war? Or perhaps it’s simply the result of unsustainable population growth and too many poorly thought through development interventions?

Another obvious difference, from my elevated vantage point on the bus, was the omnipresence of flashes of vermilion in partings. Perhaps it’s unsurprising, given that India is a majority-Hindu state, but Hinduism is definitely much more visible in West Bengal.

My favourite sight was the number of sari’ed women riding bicycles. In Bangladesh, I’ve never seen such a sight in all my days. I find myself staring with much curiosity whenever I see a woman on a bike in Bangladesh, and they are almost always wearing headscarves, but in India I’d got bored of the spectacle by the time darkness fell.

A slightly more disheartening difference (purely from the standpoint of my personal vanity) was that the moment I stepped across the border, I immediately became less of a celebrity. At immigration, I got stared at a little – but I suspect this was mainly because I was pig-headedly refusing to allow anyone to carry my 18 kilogram backpack, and explaining my reasons for this in broken bangla. On arriving in Kolkata, I was terribly overwhelmed by the number of foreigners: I was no longer unique, I was no longer special simply because I was the only foreigner in view, and I have to say, I found the experience extremely upsetting. Needless to say, I lost no time in explaining to anyone who would listen that no, I was not travelling or on holiday, but that I actually worked in Bangladesh, and actually I’d been there for over a year and yes, I could speak bangla. I even proudly explained all this in bangla to a guy I got chatting to at an egg-roll stall, only to discover that he was in Kolkata on holiday from Bangalore and did not, in fact, speak any bangla.

Although I did very little of note whilst in Kolkata, I’m very glad I went. I had an instinct that I was going to like the city, and I do, very much. But it also served, with its bright lights and slightly saner traffic and buildings that have been around for longer than thirty years, as a kind of decompression chamber. I think flying from Dhaka to London would have been too much of a culture shock, whereas spending even a few hours in Kolkata reminded me that there was a world outside Bangladesh, before I was catapulted too harshly into it.

How to drive in Bangladesh

Travelling in Bangladesh is rarely easy. Despite being a country so tiny its name usually has to be written outside it on maps, travel over even short distances can (and almost without fail does) take hours, even days. For example, even though it’s barely 300 kilometres between my base in Parbatipur, in the northwest of the country, and Dhaka, the capital, the journey takes at least eight hours, and it recently took a friend over twenty hours to make the trip in traffic that was bumper to bumper the entire way.

The fact is that the existing means of transport, whether train, bus or boat, public or private, are wholly insufficient to meet the needs of Bangladesh’s burgeoning population. The roads and rivers are simply not big enough, and there simply aren’t enough buses and trains. Add to this the fact that every road is also clogged with rickshaws, bicycles, motorcycles and pedestrians as far as the eye can see, and you start to understand why travelling in this country is such a nightmare.

During a recent visit to a friend’s village, I rode for three very cold hours on the back of his motorbike. Alternately elated and terrified by National Geographic views and thundering Tata trucks, the journey gave me the (un)enviable opportunity to observe Bangladeshi road travel at worryingly close quarters. To my surprise, it quickly became evident that there is, in fact, logic to the way that people drive in Bangladesh. While it may bear no resemblance to any highway code we in the UK are familiar with, it is nevertheless a system, with identifiable norms, rules and typical behaviours.

The following tips were compiled to give the unwitting traveller in Bangladesh a fighting chance of getting from A to B without fatal mishap. I have learned from somewhat painful experience that you cannot beat the traffic in Bangladesh, leaving you with only one choice: to join the heaving, honking, lawless melee with your wits about you and your elbows out.

Basic principles
It is best to begin by trying to understand the basic principles that guide road users in Bangladesh. It is only with a clear understanding of such principles that you can hope to compete with other drivers.

The fundamental principle of Bangladeshi driving is very simple: never slow down. Slowing down is a sign of weakness that will be leapt upon – or, more accurately, mown down – by other road users. Do not slow down at any cost. Not when overtaking on a blind corner, not when passing through a crowded town and the road is littered with pedestrians, livestock and rickshaws. Not even when the vehicle you’re attempting to overtake is speeding up to prevent you from doing so and a much larger vehicle is rapidly advancing towards you in the oncoming lane. Your aim at all times should be to get to your destination in as little time as possible, whilst showing as little regard for other road users as is feasible without damaging your vehicle/killing someone.

This leads us to the second most important principle of driving in this country: show no consideration for others. Considerate driving will be seen as a sign of weakness, and others will rush to take advantage of it. So if a vehicle is, for instance, turning off the road, do not slow down or – god forbid – stop until the vehicle has cleared your path. Hell no. Just maintain your speed, swerve into the opposite lane and use your horn to communicate your extreme displeasure at such an inconvenience. Likewise, if there is a blockage of some kind in your lane, don’t hesitate to swing out into the other lane in order to overtake, even if this means driving on the wrong side of the road for several kilometres and forcing tens of other vehicles into the verge: in such a situation, you’ll have the element of surprise, especially if you use your horn to announce your presence, so other drivers will clear the way for you.

Now that you have these two principles firmly in mind, we can turn to advice for specific road situations.

Overtaking
Overtaking is a necessity on roads in Bangladesh. Whether it’s due to overladen lorries, broken down buses or out of control cows, you will need to overtake if you are to get further than 200 metres. When overtaking, do not let oncoming traffic intimidate you. One of you will, in all likelihood, be able to swerve out of the way at the last minute, and the faster you go and the more you use your horn, the less likely it is that it will be you who is reduced to this humiliation.

Traffic jams
Being able to deal with traffic jams is an essential skill, given the omnipresence and intractability of jams on Bangladesh’s choked roads. Road users must be prepared to deal with them head on, rather than mincing along patiently as one might feel obliged to do in the UK. No – a rather different approach is required if you are not to spend the majority of your day sitting in a traffic jam, drowning in your own sweat whilst acrid CNG smoke fills your lungs. Probably the commonest response to this is the frequent and demonstrative use of your horn. It may not make the traffic move any faster, but it will leave fellow drivers in no doubt as to your status on the roads. Another commonly observed response to traffic jams is ‘pavement driving’, which can be broadened to include squeezing your vehicle into any possible space in the vicinity of the road itself. Whether this is a filling station forecourt, a sewage ditch or a roundabout, this manoeuvre should be used whenever possible. Even if it ultimately slows down the flow of traffic, at least no-one will take you for a sucker.

Speed bumps
For vehicles with suspension: Speed bumps may damage your suspension, so you shouldn’t take them at full speed unless it’s absolutely necessary. Instead, speed up as you approach them, slam on the brakes at the last minute, and floor the accelerator as soon as your rear wheels are clear. This is a tried and tested method for losing as little time as possible in the name of protecting your vehicle, while ensuring maximum discomfort for any passengers.


For vehicles without suspension: proceed as normal.

Ambulances
Do not slow down or move aside to allow an ambulance to pass. After all, you don’t know if it’s a real ambulance with a patient in a life and death situation inside, or a truck full of officials on ‘emergency export duty’. Proceed as normal.

Speed limits
What speed limits?

Traffic police
For drivers of large vehicles (private car, bus, lorry etc): proceed as normal

For drivers of rickshaws and CNGs (in which you, as the driver, are physically exposed): do as they direct you, however counterintuitive it may appear. In situations involving traffic police, do not try to go against the grain: you may receive a good beating with a wooden stick in return for your obstinacy.

Pedestrians
If you are reading this as a future pedestrian on a Bangladeshi road, please bear in mind that you are without a doubt the lowest form of life on the road, and will be treated in accordance with your status in the food chain.

When crossing roads: use a slightly elevated hand to signal to the oncoming wall of traffic that you wish them to slow down. This is a surprisingly effective gesture in most cases. Don’t feel reassured? Take comfort in the fact that while the road traffic accident fatality rate is sixty per 10 000, one of the world’s highest, only 75% of these fatalities are pedestrians (according to this report, road traffic accidents are on the rise, while fatalities bloomed by 400% between the early 1980s and 2005).


Disclaimer
The author neither encourages road travel by any means in Bangladesh, nor accepts liability for any mishaps encountered whilst in transit.

Bangladeshi Baburchi

At the risk of sounding like a complete wuss, until today, I had yet to cook any meat in Bangladesh. Instead, I’ve happily existed on a diet of vegetables, pulses, rice, noodles and the occasional deep fried bread (okay, it’s not occasional, it’s more like a habit). Don’t get me wrong, I’m no vegetarian – I’ll eat meat that others have cooked for me with relish – but the idea of going to the slaughter house and actually purchasing the meat has always seemed like one challenge too many.

Picture it: a tin roofed shed, seemingly designed to ensure that the interior temperature is significantly higher than that outside. Enormous hunks of cow, strung up from the rafters, always a strange purple colour and invariably dotted with fat flies. It’s such a far cry from Sainsbury’s convenient polystyrene packed ‘steak’, or Marks and Spencer’s’ individually wrapped chicken breasts, that I – with my sheltered English life – don’t have the first clue where to begin. I don’t even know the names for the different parts of a cow, for instance. Pathetically inexcusable, yes, although I hope for others who have always bought their meat clinically separated from the animal of origin, understandable. It’s not that I’m particularly squeamish about the thought of my dinner coming from a once living and breathing animal. The only reason for vegetarianism that I’ve ever found seriously convincing is the environmental impact argument. It’s just that the whole business of buying, cooking and keeping meat has always felt a bit too much here. You might call it sheer laziness, in fact.

I have, however, managed to overcome this hurdle today. Not by seizing the bull by the horns (literally), and marching down to the slaughter house to buy me some beef. Oh no. Rather, I’ve totally dodged my underlying issues and taken my landlady up on her kind offer to buy my meat for me.

So today I had my first experience of cooking beef in the Bangladeshi style. And it’s amazingly simple! The beef comes ready chopped, so all you do is give it a good wash, bung it in a pan with a load of herbs and spices, a sickening amount of oil and salt, add some water and boil it for about half an hour. Then, hey presto, you’re done. Easy.

The only slight drawback is that I think my landlady was rather optimistic about how much meat I can consume, and – rather worryingly – I now have a kilogram of beef curry to consume before it goes off.

So please excuse me while I go back to gorging myself on red meat. There’s no time to lose.

A room of one's own

Having lived here for a year now, I can safely say that one of the best things about living in Parbatipur is having my own flat.. I mean, sure, I’ve had my own room before, but this doesn’t have quite the same potential for dancing around in one’s underwear, say, or being a ginormous slob and not cleaning up after myself for days at a time (you can make a mess in one room, then close the door and pretend it doesn’t exist! Magic. Until the ants force you back in to straighten things out, that is). So it has been with great pleasure that I have discovered, like so many before me, the joys of living solo.

However, as in so many things, the Bangladeshi context is filled with idiosyncrasies and surprises. I’ve written a lot already about how the concepts of privacy and personal space are understood rather differently here. Privacy, for instance, does not cover things like bowel movements or intimate medical conditions, although it does apply to ankles and décolletage (if you’re a woman, of course). Personal space does not apply to one’s home in any sense, and really only begins a few inches from your body if people are feeling really interested in you.

I’ve become accustomed, consequently, to being barged aside the moment I open the front door, and standing idly by as whoever has come a-calling gives their brother’s wife’s sister’s son’s daughter a grand tour of my home – which naturally will include a running commentary on me and my life and all the hilarious things I’ve ever done (forgetting my purse when going to the bazaar, getting to the bottom of my stairs before realizing I’m not wearing an orna, leaving a bag of spinach outside my door all night because that’s where I put it down when opening the door, etc, etc).

Despite what I think is my enormous flexibility and adaptability in the face of what some might term an assault (not me though), things have stepped up a level of late: last week, my good friend Lily actually broke her way into my flat in her eagerness to see me.

I hadn’t been feeling well for a few days, so had decided to ignore the knocking. I knew it’d be one of my neighbours, and I couldn’t be bothered to make small talk about our respective lunches, so decided this was as good a time as any to reassert some boundaries (something I’ve been meaning to do for a while. Seriously, jumping up from whatever I’m doing every five minutes to talk about the weather or dinner, or to be force fed misti has been getting to me a bit recently). However, this grand plan was to be in vain.

I sat on my bed, valiantly trying to read my book as the knocking persisted for ten solid minutes. And it wasn’t a continuous, regular sound that might easily fade into the background. Oh no! There was some straight forward knocking, a lot of serious-sounding thumping, and even a bit of rattling thrown in for variety. My patience began to wear thin. I was just fixing to march over, throw open the door and demand to know what imminent disaster necessitated this barrage in perfectly fluent Bangla (yeah, ok, maybe not the last part), when I heard the familiar clatter of the bolt dropping on my door.

Peering rather apprehensively around my bedroom door, I saw Lily framed in the doorway, glaring at me. What was I doing, she demanded to know, that meant I couldn’t answer the door? Furiously, I mumbled something about taking a bath. Sadly, this brilliant piece of subterfuge didn’t seem to take her in, perhaps because I was standing there fully dressed, book in hand. Anyway. It transpired that the house was not in fact burning down, and no-one was in dire need of any assistance that an unskilled bideshi might be able to offer. No. The big emergency was cake. Lily and Tarra were making cake, and I simply had to go and partake. Sighing in defeat, I threw on an orna and sloped after Lily.

As perturbed as I was by this incident, I have decided to press ahead with this reassertion of boundaries thing, and now only answer the door if I’m not in the middle of doing something else fairly urgent. Slowly, I think the message is getting through, and the knocking is getting less persistent. However, I don’t think anyone quite understands why I’m not answering: I’ve caught wind of several speculative conversations that there’s a problem with my hearing, and perhaps I should get my door bell fixed (hell, no!).

On a related point, now that I have my own place to take pride in, I’m becoming somewhat house proud. One of the things I’m enjoying about this is inviting people to tea, and trying to return (on a small scale) the staggering hospitality that I’ve been shown here. Adjusting to being a host in Bangladesh is proving to be a little challenging, unfortunately. For instance, I’ve never been able to get used to the practice that the host does not eat with the guests – rather as a guest, you are waited upon and watched as you eat. When it’s my turn to be host, I’m not particularly good at doing that: when other people are eating cake, I want to eat cake too!

But this is not the biggest challenge, however. The biggest challenge has been getting used to my guests throwing their food waste onto various inappropriate surfaces (the floor, the table, the work surfaces in the kitchen, all spring to mind). I know that it’s a different culture, I know that nothing is meant by it, but it doesn’t stop me wanting to shriek, in a manner rather reminiscent of a harpy, “what the hell are you doing?” or: “there’s a bin right there!”