House To-Let

The sign says it all....

Repair shop

What I like about living in Bangladesh is that many more items than you would expect can be repaired and thus, they live on to see another day rather than the bottom of a rubbish bin. I mistreated a pair of earphones and rather than simply throw them out and replace them, I took them to this shop this morning to ascertain whether they could be saved. For the princely sum of one hundred taka, it seems they could.

The technician cut off the plug, stripped the cord back to the wires and then spent ten minutes welding the fiddly wires back together, before re-attaching the plug. The finishing touch was  winding some industrial-strength black tape around the exposed wires. The earphones no longer look so pretty but I am  relying upon the stark ugliness of the black tape to remind me to remove them more gently in the future. 

And since what they look like doesn't affect the sound in any way, and I don't need to fork out to pay for new earphones, (did I mention this was the second pair I had vandalised in a year?), I was happy.

Traffic

A friend asked me about the traffic in Dhaka and today's blog is in her honour. She was interested to know if it was safe to walk on the streets, if I could cross the road easily, and if there were any traffic lights here. It is safe, and I walk to the office every day for lunch along these roads (see Google Maps for route) although I do take the  precaution of travelling by car once it becomes dark. I took the photos seen in this post on January 8th, 2013.

Most people (80% male) I meet on the streets are friendly, and only one time have I felt uncomfortable due to inappropriate attention. It happened quite soon after I arrived that a rather young lad, while passing me in the street, asked me a impolite question. Incensed, I turned without thinking, and yelled, "You little sh*t!!!". Luckily, he was smaller than me and he sensibly fled from the scene as fast as his short legs could carry him. However, that is a rare case. 

Many other people I have met have been very friendly  and will strike up a conversation as we walk. One time, a literature student from near Cox's Bazar told me about his favourite Shakespearian play, and another time I met some JICA Japanese volunteers in their twenties from Rangpur who were involved in a dengue-prevention project. I actually approached them and said hello first and asked them what they were doing in Bangladesh. Disappointingly, they struggled to answer my question in English, and I switched to speaking Japanese to continue the conversation and satisfy my curiosity.

The traffic can become very heavy and it can take a long time to travel less than one kilometre (one hour due to rain is my all-time record). This area houses the embassies and high commissions of many countries and there are often bottlenecks around this roundabout. The red brick building in the picture below is the Canadian High Commission. The man in the green uniform directs traffic. Not included in the photograph are the checkpoints on either side with men in uniforms with guns. I didn't like to get too close and take their photographs. We saw them checking people's bags on New Year's Eve here, and as I was carrying a bag with a bottle of wine (not the smartest move), I felt a little anxious and walked just a tad faster. Saburo said he noticed them looking at me, but fortunately they let us pass without incident.

The traffic is beginning to build up here. Madani Avenue leads onto the main thoroughfare of Gulshan Avenue. To the left, you can just see a man dressed in red sitting on the pavement. He  has a condition where his hands are all twisted and I have never seen him stand, so I assume his legs are also affected. He is there almost everyday and always greets me with a very jolly and very loud, "How are you?" when he sees me and then smiles the biggest smile you have ever seen. He has a friend who comes by regularly and counts his earnings for him (approximately taka 400 and 250 on the days I have observed this) and folds his bank notes into a roll for him to hold easily. 

It is very easy to cross the road when the traffic is like this. There are traffic lights at the roundabout further along this road. But I have never seem them working. I rely on watching when other people cross to know when to move. There are traffic guards who direct the traffic here. On Christmas Eve, the amount of traffic on this road was insane, and we waited for an inordinately long time without making any progress towards our destination.

Another traffic shot.

We are experiencing another cold snap in the capital. It was eight degrees celsius (46F) this morning. Our future home, Naogaon, has even lower temperatures. Saburo and I don't remember it being so cold in Chittagong. Although we had just arrived from Japan where it really is cold so perhaps it took a few years for the cold to set into our bones. These days, after living many years in the tropics, I am wearing cardigans, scarves and socks, and it really does feel COLD!!!

The last day of the year

For a change of scenery, we headed in a south-westerly direction to visit Jatiyo Sangshad Bhaban (the National Assembly Building) after lunch on the 31st. It was quite a busy time to be on the road, and I would never have guessed the distance was less than ten kilometres from Baridhara, as it took nearly an hour to arrive on the south side of the building (please go to Google Maps and zoom out for an approximate map of our route). 

The monument was unexpectedly imposing and impressive, and I really wished I could have seen what the lighting was like inside, because from the outside, the Parliament building does not appear to have any windows. It sits upon a sprawling two hundred and eight acres of land and Saburo was more daring than me and walked onto the hallowed grassy area. Typical of me, I was a coward and stayed well behind the fence. 

Foreigners who would like to visit are required to submit a form, pay a fee, and provide copies of passport front pages and visa stamps, and I was just not that organised in advance of Saburo's whimisical desire to hit the road. (Plus, after my experience with various countries over the years, I am also sceptical about whether the procedures outlined on the webpage are adhered to or not. I will have to ask around). 

Louis I Kahn, an American architect who graduated from the University of Pennsylvania, and whose other buildings include Bryn Mawr dormitories, Yale Art Gallery and the Salk Institute, was responsible for the design. (Design junkies and engineers, please refer to the specifications here.) Construction started in 1964 with a budget of $15 million, and was completed in 1982 at a cost of $32 million. It compares very favourably with the Sydney Opera House statistics: construction period 1959-1973, budget of $7 million, and actual cost of $102 million. (Update: please visit my friend's blog here for more information about Louis I Khan.)

The weather was lovely. It was not very crowded on the path (most people were sitting and talking with friends, family members, or sweethearts) and we walked along Manik Mia Avenue and leisurely gazed at the structure. It was our first touristy activity together and it was a pleasant (and completely necessary) way to unwind after all that has been in 2012.

I took this mystery photo on the right. We could not work out what he was making. People were selecting moulds, and the man was putting the light coloured dough in them, but then there was a pile of solid, black discs in front of him. 

   

Next stop was Lal Bagh (Red Fort), check out here for more details about this incomplete Mughal fort from the seventeenth century. We made it in the nick of time and had 15 minutes to take a quick look around. Although, this in fact, was our second visit. Saburo remembers taking Bethanie to see this when she visited Bangladesh. I probably even have video packed away in Japan as we had spanking new Sony camera back then and I used to record everything.

The sun was beginning to set and the light was lovely and warm on the fort buildings. The beautiful fuzzy feeling of contentment this engendered lasted but a brief moment, as alas, the fort staff shattered the atmosphere. They started blowing their whistles at everyone and began to herd us all out of the fort. It was difficult for me to ignore that dratted authoritian whistle, but I did my best to dawdle and enjoy the garden for as long as possible.

Lastly we visited the Hindu Dhakeshwari Temple which is a national temple and owned by the state (I wonder how that works?). Some experts believe the original temple was built in the 12th century and others say there may have been a Buddhist temple prior to that even, but any remaining buildings from this time period were destroyed sadly during the 1971 Liberation War. All of these details are courtesy of Wikipedia's listing here, and not because I picked up any nuggets of information in situ. In my ignorance, it appeared to me to simply be a regular temple where we saw a number of people buying their offerings and making their prayers. I did especially like the music. Have a listen here (sorry non-FBites, but I can always email the clip to you if you like).

Traffic on the way back to the hotel was horrendous (as usual). We hit a bottleneck in Banani and decided it would be faster to walk home. It was a good decision which we wished we'd made earlier, as our driver arrived back 15 minutes after us. Overall, it was not a bad afternoon of sightseeing at all - whoever said politics and religion don't mix???