EngineerRower in Bangladesh

Week 59: Two days in Singapore. And then that was it. I came back home.

noreply@blogger.com (Donny) — Sun, 11 Jan 2009 03:09:00 +0000

59th-1st in Singapore 10/15

Early in the morning we arrived at the border of Malaysia and Singapore. At the last stop in Malaysia, immigration officials came on board and checked all our passports and visas. However, we did not get stamped out of Malaysia here, and in fact we would never get this stamp. When we reached the actual border with Singapore we had to alight from the train, and go through off board immigration. We submitted our immigration documents and got stamped into the country. Comparing this whole border train crossing to Bangladesh and India, this was incredibly fast.

From the border it was only a short trip to the final train station in the island nation of Singapore. Despite what we hoped, that we’d have an MRT stop right nearby the station, this ended up not being the case. We had to walk several blocks to an MRT station.
She had booked us at the same hostel she had stayed in a few weeks back for three days. We arrived but couldn’t put our stuff in yet, beds not ready. So we left our things and sought out foreign exchange, breakfast and internet in that order.

After finally getting our bunkbeds, and showering, we set out to explore the city. She was gracious to re-see some things she’d seen before, but also was excited to show them to me. We made an okay balance. I first got lunch, she wasn’t hungry. We sat at one of Singapore’s famous outdoor food courts, perfect for the nice year round weather.

She showed me the city’s main library, and got a view from the top. The city itself is super nice. Everything is impeccably clean, not surprising as Singapore is famous for strict rule enforcement. At one point I spit on the street, and instantly I realized that this was finable here. Luckily I wasn’t caught. (pics: myself in front of Singapore's National Library, view from the top of the library over a part of Singapore)

I was excited to see their transportation system, which is a model for all the world. Their inner city congestion pricing is also famous. (pic: the signage and information board for the congestion pricing system in place in Singapore)

She brought me over to Suntech City, which has the Fountain of Wealth, the largest fountain in the world. The whole place was really nice. In the area around, Amy pointed out to me the structures erected for the Formula 1 race held here a few weeks ago. She was here when the race was in town, although she didn’t get to watch. I was jealous. She said you could hear the cars ripping through the city from far away. (pics: myself in front of the Fountain of Wealth at Suntech City, remannts of the stands and track lights for the F1 race in Singapore)

We decided to head to Singapore’s big tourist attraction, a giant Ferris wheel called the Singapore Flyer, similar to the London Eye. We knew it’d be expensive but it was more than we thought. We decided to do it anyway; it was the one thing she’d wanted to do coming back. I had an HSBC credit card, and it ended up giving us a 20% discount. (pics: Amy with the Singapore Flyer in the background which was the one thing she missed on her first visit, myself at the base of one of the support poles for the Singapore Flyer)

The views from the top of the Singapore Flyer were incredible. You could see out all over the island of Singapore as well as the ends of Indonesia and Malaysia. The little map they give you onboard was real helpful in identifying places. (pics: Singapore Flyer's 20+ cars, myself on the Singapore Flyer, Amy with Singapore's central business district behind, boats sitting in the Strait of Malacca with Indonesia in the background)

Singapore is the most expensive place I’ve traveled in this past year. Meals, hotels, and everything else were two to three times more than what I’d expect in other Southeast Asian countries, and much much more than South Asia. You pay the price for clean and orderly.
After lunch we walked out on the F1 race course. The grandstands were right behind the Ferris wheel. The track was smooth, and it was so great to look down the finishing straightaway. We straddled the finish line and took photos, while workers dismantling the temporary stands giggled at us. (pics: finish line and grandstands for Singapore's F1 racetrack, myself standing on the F1 finish line)

We walked through the city some more, passing through the Esplanade Mall, and getting some ice cream on the street. We walked into the financial district and crossed over a small pedestrian bridge over the Singapore River. She brought me to a third mall, this one which had two fountains she really liked, however one was not on and that was disappointing. (pics: Amy on our way to the central business district of Singapore, myself and the Singapore River)

We took a ride on the MRT to Orchard Road, the Rodeo Drive of Singapore, except larger, and not as fancy. We walked down it to the end and made our way, a long walk, to the Botanical Gardens. We passed the US Embassy on the way over. We sat in the botanical gardens for a long time, but less than an hour. We watched the ducks, stared at the water, and talked a bit. The place was huge and we only saw a small part of it.
We headed back to Orchard Road looking to get a drink somewhere. One place we sat down at didn’t serve alcohol but we got some mozzarella sticks instead. The second place we found had drinks, so she got an LIT and I got a beer.

For Amy’s last meal in Asia we ate dumplings at a Chinese restaurant.

By the end of the day, my feet were very sore from walking. We had some beers back at the hostel to end our day. It was our last together in Asia. I would be sad to say goodbye in the morning.

59th-2nd in Singapore 10/16

In the morning Amy got up early, it was her time to head to the airport to leave. I walked her the 10 minutes to the MRT stop, and hugged her goodbye as she left to fly to Australia. We both were sad to see each other go. I walked back in the dark to get an hour or two more of sleep before starting my last day in Asia. (pic: Amy leaving me at the MRT station off to catch a train to take her to her flight to Australia)

I went to an internet café in the morning. Then went to get breakfast and packed up at the hostel. Complimentary eggs you cook yourself. Had to remove my bag from the dorm room and leave it under the stairs until I was ready to leave later.

My goal today was to see the communities in the suburbs of Singapore which are based around an elevated train system called the LRT. These trains meet with the MRT trunk lines of the city system. It creates communities where one can work, play, learn, and live. The MRT ride out took about 40 minutes. I chose a random station far out at the end of the line where these train based communities were. There, I could transfer to the LRT, or shop at the shopping mall which doubled as a transit hub. (pic: long MRT train)

Very intelligent design. Each stop on the community line served as a hub for the area’s growth. All buildings were centered on it. It was really cool. At the stops there would be a commercial center with shops, and a school nearby, as well as a gym sometimes. This was all centered on transit, enabling everyone to live car-less. (pics: information board on how to connect to the LRT, suburban LRT on its tracks through apartment complexes, clusters of apartments are built around schools and community centers reducing the length of trips people need to take, commercial and residential areas are easily connected to the LRT)

I’m trying to experience a last bit of Asia, and I think this was a good way. To see where the future of development for these cities can go, and how the transportation links it all. I’m excited to see their future projects.
I went back to the mall at the main line transit hub for lunch. Walked around its stores and went to the food court up top. Similar to what I saw in Bangkok and Kuala Lumpur, lots of Asian options with one tiny western food stall. Got to choose which delicacy I wanted. I sat in the food court after eating and absorbed where I was spending my last few hours in Asia.

I took the MRT back into the city. I had a postcard from the Singapore flyer yesterday and wanted to mail it out. I’d written a letter to the crew team on it. Finding a place to buy a stamp and then a postbox was difficult for some reason. After getting the stamp from a 7-11, I found a postman but he wouldn’t let me give him the postcard directly. Finally after searching for 20 minutes I found a postbox.

I meandered the streets where my hostel was in Little India. Walked through a streetside flea market, not very good or big. Paused to listen to two men speaking Bengali. I went back to the hotel and sat around for a bit. I was done. Nothing else I was wanting to go out and see or do. So I decided to go sit somewhere near a train station and just watch the city go by. So I got my stuff and walked to the MRT stop near us. I sat on a bench and read my book A Good Man in Africa. When it was time to go, I went into the nearby outdoor food court and got one more fresh fruit shake in Asia, my favorite, dragonfruit. I then got on the MRT to take me to the airport. Of course the whole system of getting there was easy and flawless. (pics: the bench and area in which I spent my last time in Singapore reading, the juice stand I got my last dragonfruit juice)

I had tried to buy gum for the airplane before leaving, but they don’t sell gum in Singapore. They don’t want you spitting it out on the streets. I wondered if chewing it is punishable by law.

Amy had talked about the airport a lot to me. Told me how great it was, free internet, amazing shops, a movie theater inside. Well since I was flying Tiger Airways back to Bangkok, I was not in one of the cool three big terminals. I was in the budget terminal, which to get to, you have to take a shuttle bus from there the train stops. Luxuries are lost when you fly budget. The terminal was empty. I was able to get a muffin for a snack and exchange my Singapore dollars for US dollars. And they still had free internet, which I used. (pic: Singapore's budget terminal which appropriately lacks flair and tons of amenities)

I waited for my flight. We all got on line. And then they told us the flight was delayed. I started getting really scared. They said one hour we would have to sit there. I only had a six hour window between flights in Bangkok, and had to use that time to get my stuff from the hostel. Worried. Praying. Worried. And then we left. It ended up being only a half hour delay. Phew. Should still have plenty of time to do what I needed to do in Bangkok.

The flight was fine. Everything went smooth. I arrived in Bangkok and rushed as fast as I could to leave the airport. Honestly, it felt like all the staff was rushing with me, because all necessary steps such as immigration and getting transport went TOO smoothly. No lines anywhere. In my mind I imagined everyone knew I had limited time and was helping me out.
I found the shuttle bus easy to take me to the bus terminal. It was packed. We got to the bus terminal and I got on the bus to take me to the hostel. I had budgeted this out all perfectly. I knew where to get off and paid the bus conductor. Really feel like Bangkok is very familiar now. Getting off at Sukhumvit Road near the hostel and walking there was like walking up my driveway.
I arrived and gladly presented my claim receipts for my stored luggage. Everything was safe, laptop and all. I dragged my now six bags into the dining room, spread it all out on the floor and set to work combining all my possessions into my four travel bags. No problem at all. A New Zealander was watching me do it, and we chatted while I packed. I also overheard an American guy talking about having to pick his wife up from the airport, so I asked him if he’d like to split a taxi when I had to go. We would be heading there around the same time anyway.
I had enough time, budgeted well, and packed so fast, that I could even take a shower at the hostel. Refreshing to spruce up for the long flights.

The guy and I got in our taxi around 10:30 pm to head to the airport. On the forty five minute ride there he told me all about his time living in the Phillipines, and that place in general and how he met his wife there.
He helped me bring my bags into the terminal then went downstairs to arrivals to wait for his wife. I went to check in and found out my big bag was too heavy, my small bag still had room to spare. So I sat down in the check-in area and started transferring things to the smaller bag. Walked back over and now everything was in the proper weight range, 24 kg for each bag! They didn’t give me any trouble about what carry-ons I had. Was real happy not to have issues like I did leaving Dhaka. The check-in lady was really helpful and explained everything very clearly too me. Just the opposite of what I had at JFK leaving 13 months ago. At the end, she told me I looked very handsome when I smile. Not a bad way to start a trip home. (pics: repacking my bags so the make weight in the Bangkok airport, my flight to Seoul/Incheon and the start of my trip home)

It’s so weird how you can never really picture your last day somewhere. I never thought I’d be cooking eggs or riding a suburban monorail on my last day. Or sitting and reading by a subway stop. Or walking through a junk fair. But I did. I kind of like that life doesn’t make the important days anything special.

59th-3rd on the flights to Newark 10/17

In the airport I got Burger King for dinner. A wonderful American way to transition back, and also within my budget of the last of my Baht. I then slowly meandered the airport. I had a few more Baht and used it to buy some peanuts for the flight, in case I got hungry beyond what they served.

My flight was on time. Korean Airways flight left at 1:30 AM carrying me from Bangkok to Seoul. My flight schedule was tight, with just an hour in between flights in Seoul, and an hour and half in Atlanta before heading to Newark.

The first flight was fine. Most people were sleeping. I didn’t doze off much, I don’t sleep usually on planes. Before we landed they served us breakfast. I chose the Korean meal over the western one, and I regretted it. What they served me was a bland hot cereal, yet served cold. In order to flavor it they give us dried seaweed flakes to spread on top.

We deplaned in Seoul, and I had 40 minutes until boarding the next flight. We all had to go through security, and it was a bunch of novices handling it. They moved slowly and cautiously beyond what I’d ever seen. They also seemed very confused at times, and kept having to phone out questions. All of us transferring were very nervous. And they only had one line! I’m lucky I had gotten there near the front or I would’ve been a wreck.
Well the one problem of the trip home happened here, I had forgotten to take my pocketknife out of my carry-on luggage when I repacked my bags in Bangkok. So they confiscated it and had to wrap it up and put it in a pouch underneath the airplane. This is the knife my Uncle Frank got me for my Bar Mitzvah 10 years ago. Didn’t want to just say throw it out. It took them 20 minutes until someone came to retrieve the knife. I had to sign some forms.
Finally I was on my way and could go to my gate. Already there was a long line. But there were no issues after that. I checked in, went through two more rounds of security, and finally got to sit on my trans-Pacific flight home.

The man next to me was handicapped. I had wanted an aisle seat but they were all taken when I had checked-in in Bangkok. So I was in the middle. That meant every time I wanted to pee, I had to get past him. I especially don’t like climbing over people when they are sleeping, and that’s what he did the whole time. I had to make sure to use the toilet when he called the stewardess to assist him in getting to the restroom. He was out of his seat enough time to use the toilet myself and stand around stretching for a bit. He got up twice in the whole 12 hour flight. I was proud of myself to stay seated that long.

On the flight I watched four and a half movies: Forgetting Sarah Marshall, Kung-Fu Panda, The Promotion, and Hancock and made it a bit through Get Smart before I turned it off.
The food on this second flight had the same two options, Korean or western. Well clearly one would think that I learned my lesson with my first Korean breakfast, but I hadn’t, I took the Korean lunch. This wasn’t as bad; we got noodle soup, but it was extremely seaweed salty. The not so great part was the bitter/sour side dish, which of the pieces items, I only ate one.
So after those first two experiences with Korean Airways Korean dishes, you think I would take the western dinner. Nope. For dinner I chose Korean again, and I got a rice dish. Again, didn’t like it, and the dessert was hard for me to eat as well. Oh well. I may not have liked these foods much, but I was glad to taste Korean food (apart from the Korean BBQs you find in the US) regardless.

On the whole, since I left Singapore until I landed in Newark; I think I slept maybe a total of 4 hours. But never once did I really feel tired.

We landed in Atlanta and I immigrated. No issues. Was upset not to get a stamp for entering America, but policy is policy. The bag management system was easy. I picked up my bags, and didn’t have to go to any counters to check them back in, just put them on a second carousel after going through customs. I waited for fifteen minutes to get my knife, but it never came out of the baggage claim. Thought it was gone forever. Asked a man if there was any other places it would come out and he advised me to check oversized baggage claim. He was right, there it was. My little knife buried amongst all the big baggage.

Being back in America after one year was not as shocking as people claim it to be. I was happy to walk through the airport and hear southern accents again, and see the clothing. I was excited; nervous only a bit. I was hungry in the airport, and since the flight to Newark didn’t have any special food, I finally ate the peanuts I had picked up in Bangkok; the entire bag in the Atlanta airport. Actually, reflecting on the whole time I was in the airport, I did feel a bit uneasy at first being back in America. It’s been so long, and I felt like I stood out, for no reason at all. Again I was nervous, but not as emotional as I thought I would be. It was petty incredible when we finally flew into American airspace over Washington state. I was beaming then. Later touching down on American soil was pretty cool too.

The flight to Newark seemed short and quick. I was glad to land. To my surprise, when I walked out of the gate, my sister Sandee was standing there. My first thought was, “What is she doing past security?” Then I realized that she should be at the University of Florida. She told me she flew up just for this weekend to see me, first time in 15 months. It was so great ot see her. I had no clue she would be there. Together we walked through the terminal and she told me how she asked security if she could go to the gate to pick up her “little brother”, but my whole family is sure she just got by on good looks. At the other end of the terminal we met our parents. We all hugged, picked up my bags, and walked out of the airport to the car.

On the way home we got Subway.

Week 58: If you gave me the paddle, I'd probably kayak us all the way from Angkor Wat to Kuala Lumpur

noreply@blogger.com (Donny) — Sat, 27 Dec 2008 04:38:00 +0000

58th-1st in Siem Reap 10/8

We were up early to see Angkor Wat. Our driver showed up late, and I almost had found us another guy to take us. We got breakfast on the way, myself some noodles, Amy an egg sandwich. The tickets were expensive, but they take your photo and put in on your pass. The whole system was incredibly well done. (pic: myself with my Angkor ticket)

Angkor Wat was stunning. Too bad part of it was under repair. It still was impressive. Although, I thought it was supposed to be taller. I need to look back at my architectural history books to see the images they showed of these places, and recall how I had imagined things looking back then. (pics: Angkor Wat, myself in front of the backside of Angkor Wat, inside the second gallery with the third up above, Amy/myself in front of Angkor Wat)

My first camera battery only had 24 minutes left, and my second was still at the hotel, so I had to play conservation all day. It was tough. I kept the screen turned off, and only turned the camera on quickly to take a photo using the viewfinder, and then quickly turned it off. I also was careful in the pictures I chose.

At our second stop of the day at Angkor Thom It started to pour. We had just finished seeing two temples in this area when it really started coming down. At that time we ran underneath to a restaurant our guide was at and ordered lunch. We explored two more temples in this area after it had stopped raining. (pics: myself at the gate of Angkor Thom, the faces made of stone of Angkor Thom, myself inside Angkor Thom, Amy in the Phlmeanakas temple)

The Angkor site is immense. I didn’t realize how big it was. You have to drive from temple to temple and it takes several minutes. Taking the tuk-tuk around was necessary, and actually added a bit to the experience. (pic: Amy and our tuk-tuk driver pulling up)

All the places we stopped at were of a good variety. Two were Angkor Wat and Angkor Thom, but the others were either overgrown or not completely finished. Although you can get multiple day passes to Angkor, I think one day is fine for me. The temple Ta Prohm, overgrown by trees, was a neat spot. Angkor Wat itself though was definitely my favorite though. (pics: myself inside Ta Prohm and one of its overgrown trees, an tree growing on top of Ta Prohm)

At each place we went, there were lots of hawkers. More than I’d seen anywhere else in Asia, and asking for outrageous prices. The high prices for things are a result of them selling only for American dollars, meaning the lowest price you might get is $0.33 when you buy 3 for $1.00. I wasn’t interested in buying as usual. Amy enjoys souvenirs more, and had purchased a few items by the time we had left the many sites. Kids were the primary sellers of the souvenirs and snacks. I actually ended up buying one small item, but even then I told the girl I claimed I only had Cambodia Riel, and we carried out the purchase in that currency instead. (pic: Amy buying nick-nacks from a kid)

The tuk-tuk took us back around 4pm. We spent our last bit of time sitting by a lake near a temple and reading. We had dinner at a barbecue-it-yourself place. It was a buffet of items, and you took what you wanted and brought it back to cook it. We had some trouble at first, but the staff was super helpful. We had a lot of fun preparing the food. (pics: myself grilling a variety of foods, Amy at dinner)

58th-2nd on bus to Bangkok 10/9

Our bus picked us up for the ride to Bangkok on time. It was a packed bus with air conditioning, but it didn’t work. The road to Thailand is the worst you’ll ever see. It’s dirt almost all the way to the Thai border. Granted, it’s under construction, but it’s infamous for being slow and dusty. I’m sure in two years it’ll be fine. There is some rumor that some airline company is paying to keep it in bad shape to force people to fly, and it got annoying to hear people repeat the same thing repeatedly. (pic: Amy and the rough road from Siem Reap to the Thai border)

I ended up sitting next to a UNC student! Incredible, I travel all over the world to get as far as I can from Tar Heels, and here is one next to me. Seriously, I was pleasantly surprised. Granted, I had seen a Tar Heel in July when Emily visited. Anyway, him and I talked a lot about the state of North Carolina, football, basketball, and sports in general. He had just finished covering the Olympics in Beijing

The border was actually surprisingly easy, after all the build up that we’d face difficulties. It was nicer than any border I saw in India, Nepal, and Bangladesh. I guess it was a bit sketchier than the others we’ve crossed in Southeast Asia, but it was clean and quick.

Our bus was split up into two minibuses, and these zoomed us to Bangkok super fast. It was fun for me to finally approach the city by car, and see the highways start to widen and more overpasses pop up, and then see the start of the skyline. (pics: approaching Bangkok on massive superhighways, slipping past Bangkok on the highway)

They dropped us off at the train station where we could easily catch the subway back to our hostel. From the subway we transferred to the BTS. It was neat to come back to the place we had started it all.
At the BTS stop we had boarded from, a song started playing over the station’s loudspeakers. Amy and I didn’t know what it was but everyone instantly froze. They remained standing where they were until the song finished. When the song ended, everyone started moving again. I’d never seen anything like it.

My bags were safe, including my laptop. Felt great to see it again and know things were okay. Coming back to this hostel was like returning to a sort of home. It felt very relaxing and calming.

This evening Amy got sick. She was feeling sick on the BTS, and walking from the station to the hostel made it worse. After checking in, she threw up in the bathroom.
We went out to dinner but Amy wasn’t too hungry. We ate at an outdoor restaurant in a parking lot. The menu they handed us was all in Thai. We tried describing what we wanted, but that didn’t work. Then two guys who had been chuckling at us decided to help. One came over and asked in English what we wanted. We got some soup and a rice and curry dish. Despite having just thrown up, it looked to me that Amy ate normally.

She went back to the hostel for some rest, so I went out and explored alone. I headed to the mall near our BTS station. I was thinking about getting a McDonalds hamburger, but the cheap part of me decided against it and I just admired the menu instead. Earlier, anyway, I had bought a milkshake on the streetside.

58th-3rd in Bangkok 10/10

I woke up early, showered, shaved, and checked in my bag again with the laptop. I then sat around for Amy to get up.
Amy was still feeling sick this morning; she had thrown up again last night. I didn’t even hear her get up. So today she was tired and still sick. Didn’t know what to do to help her, so I just tried to keep her relaxed.

We had considered going around Bangkok today after buying our bus ticket. We weren’t exactly sure what time the bus would leave so we’d have to go there first. This was a real problem in SE Asia. Everywhere we went, we got conflicting information on bus schedules, and we didn’t know what to trust.
I hadn’t realized how far out the bus station was. In fact, it was a real good thing we took a taxi, because no mass transit service, besides buses, went there. We found the ticket counter for Phuket upstairs. The whole building, called the Southern Bus Terminal, has lots of shopping and restaurants. It’s exactly what terminals in the US should be trying to do. With Amy sick, and the bus terminal being unconnected to the transit system, we decided to scrap exploring Bangkok.

All day we sat in the bus terminal. We were there for about 7 hours. She was back and forth to the bathroom. I sat there and in the spurts of time she was able to sit at the bench, I went and got food to eat. There was a cool Thai food court upstairs with all different types of Thai entrees. They had pictures, making it very easy to order. I also got some doughnuts from Mister Donut. And I had dinner at a fast food place unique to Thailand. For me it was a fun culinary day. (pics: inside Bangkok's Southern Bus Terminal where we spent the day, the food court upstairs in the bus terminal with a wonderful array of options)

All day I worked on reading a new book that Amy had picked up called “The Void”, a true story about two mountain climbers who go through an unimaginable ordeal. Its good, I fly through it, despite the pages of slightly technical climbing talk which I had to reason out what they were talking about.

Luckily, after the stressful sick day, Amy was feeling better for the bus ride. Since there was a bathroom on board and it was clean, we only had to stop once the whole time. It was 7 hours into the 12 hour trip, and we could get dinner as well. I bought some snacks and fruit, but was not going to eat a big meal.

58th-4th in Phuket 10/11

We arrived in Phuket at 5:30 AM. My suggestion was to sit at the open air bus station until it was light enough to find a hotel. But Amy asked if I could go and find one right away. So I set out and started walking around the area near the bus station for a cheap place to stay. I was unsuccessful. The bad part was getting barked at and followed by a wild pack of dogs. I came back with my negative report, and that wasn’t really what she’d been hoping for.
So I went and asked a taxi driver if he knew a cheap place in our price range. He did, but was going to charge us an arm and a leg to get there. So I asked a motorcycle taxi driver the same thing. He knew a place for 300 Baht a night, and wouldn’t charge much to take us. So we got another motorcycle taxi guy and retrieved Amy. We boarded, and arrived at our shabby hotel. It was bare minimum, but just fine for us. We got in, and she laid down in the bed and went to sleep. I tried as well, but wasn’t tired. I got up and decided to go for a walk.

I walked down the road of our hotel. This part of Phuket, the town itself is not beachy. It is a decently sized city but had no major buildings. I saw a place that was serving a Chinese breakfast and sat down to eat dumplings, soup, and some sweet patties.

I roamed in the direction of the bus station again to check to see when we could catch the bus to the airport two mornings from now. While I was there, I figured I’d see when I could get a sea kayak tour booked for us tomorrow. I stopped into an office and the guy there informed we could go today, but only if we let him know in the next half hour. The prices were expensive as I expected, but he said he could discount them, almost 30% off! He handed me one brochure, said there were spots left on this tour and another company’s same tour.
So I ran back to our hotel, literally ran. Woke Amy up, and asked her if she’d want to go. She’d wanted to, but it was really the one thing I’d really been pushing. Once she heard the price, and in her post-sick state, we came to the agreement that it was better I just go alone today, letting her rest, and tomorrow we could spend at the beach together. She was happy for me because she knew I’d really wanted to do this.

I’d been looking forward to sea kayaking in Thailand since my friend Farabi had told me all about his time kayaking back in July. It sounded awesome. They got to go alone out on the water and explore as they pleased. They’d been out for hours. I was really looking forward to doing this, especially amongst the limestone cliffs that are found in this area.

I called the guy up, and said I’d be coming. I changed, then literally ran to find an ATM to get the money, then ran back to the tour office. I was sweating by the time I arrived. The guy told me the first tour got booked up while I was gone, so he had put me on a tour with the second company running the same thing with the same price. He had me get on a bike with his coworker who would speed me across town to the pickup spot.
The ride was crazy. I’m now more used to taking motorcycles in Southeast Asia, but this was ridiculous. I’d never seen a guy zip and zoom so quick. Felt like a video game and I was strapped on back. We arrived at the pickup spot for vans. He searched out which company was mine. He found it, and I got in. had to sit in back, and two very nice Australians on their honeymoon were next to me. I asked if this was the sea kayaking tour, and they said yes we are doing that, but the tour also going to James Bond Island, and elephant rides, and goes to a Muslim sea village. I wondered why I was put on this tour, but as we sped quickly down the road, I realized there was nothing I could do. I decided that this tour wouldn’t be so horrible, although I had really wanted to go sea kayaking all day as the program had said.

A few hours later I was not as passive about having to take a tour I hadn’t really wanted. We only got to go kayaking for 45 minutes, and even then, we were paddled around by someone else. The James bond island was cool and the Muslim sea village was just a lunch stop. When we arrived at the elephant riding, I was denied a ride by the tour’s leader. He said I had only paid for the morning’s activities. He showed me his typed up list of tourists where my name was scribbled in pencil and next to which it was written that I’d only paid 1200 Baht. I told him I paid 2000 Baht that morning to the booking agency, but he had his records though, and told me I couldn’t, they had only gotten 1200 of that 2000. It meant the tour office pocketed 800, and I recalled when I got dropped off with the tour van seeing the biker take some money, but at the time I figured that all tour agents got their cut. Didn’t realize it had left me with nothing to do while the rest of the group went elephant riding.
The tour leader himself felt badly for me after I told him the whole situation. He went ahead and called the government tourism board and asked to be connected with my booking guy. They talked for awhile and then he handed the phone to me. I explain to the guy who had booked me what was up, and he said he was not aware that I had wanted to go kayaking all day, only that I had wanted to go kayaking. He claimed he assumed anything with kayaking, even just 45 minutes of it, would be satisfactory to me. He said I could come back to his office so we can talk. Meanwhile I sat at the elephant riding place doing nothing except steaming. I had paid all that money, more than everyone else on that tour it turned out, and was the one sitting out wasting part of my two days in Phuket.
The tour leader who was compassionate gave me a free copy of the photo they had taken of us when we were kayaking. It was an expensive gift, and it was really nice of them to do it.

They took us back, and I was dropped off at the booking office. I was really angry. The booker insisted again that he didn’t know I wanted to go kayaking all day. He said he would refund me 200 Baht, the price difference between what he said I had done and what I had paid him. That was baloney, because the tour leader showed me how it had cost only 1200 Baht. He showed me a pamphlet which he claimed was the tour I went on (note, a different tour than the agency running the “same” tour he told I’d be with this morning) to defend his argument. It was not even the tour I’d been on. I sat there, shocked and thinking of what to do for about 20 minutes. They wouldn’t budge for whatever I said. So I took the 200 baht, angry, and left. I walked back to the hotel and told Amy what happened. She felt so bad for me, knowing this was supposed to have been my trip’s highlight, but was now my trip’s disaster.

Although a bummer of a day, the kayaking itself was good. I was glad I got to do it, even for those 45 minutes. We went in and out of limestone caves, through waterways passing below the cliffs. We each had someone paddling us around, but I was the only one form the tour who who paddled myself for a bit. I had asked my guide if I could, and he had no problem with it, and laid back and lit a cigarette. Really glad I got the chance and made the most of my time. It made the 45 minutes extra special, maneuvering the kayak myself in and out of places was really awesome. (pics: winding along the limestone cliffs in sea kayaks, passing through caves, the limestone cliffs that we paddled through, myself getting the chance to paddle, my guide taking that opportunity for a cigarette)

The James Bond island thing was neat too. Was the setting for James Bond: The Man With the Golden Gun. We stayed there for about 25 minutes and got to roam around. (pic: myself at James Bond Island)

The lunch at the village was delicious, but even cooler was the whole village was built on stilts over the water. (pic: Muslim sea village where we had lunch)

And the way we went about between these places was cool too. A longtail boat that powered over the flat waters of the bay. If I hadn’t been scammed, this would’ve been a fine tour. (pics: longtail boats parked at James Bond Island, the limestone formations on the sea)

Of course the elephant riding part was a lowpoint. (pic: everyone else having fun on their elephant rides)

This was one of the worse days of my travels. I had never felt so cheated. The worst part is that I didn’t even really get to do what I wanted to do for very long. I wouldn’t have minded if I had overpaid for an all day trip, as opposed to overpaying for the wrong one.

58th-5th in Phuket 10/12

Today was a lot better, a recovery after yesterday. Amy and I spent our entire day at Kata Beach, one of the most famous in Thailand. During the day it rained a bit, but still we stayed out there and played in the water.

We took a songthaew from the town of Phuket 30 minutes to the western coast, the Andaman Sea. It started raining when we crossed the hills along the coast, but down below on the water’s edge it was still beautiful. Before we even touched the sand, we got breakfast.
On the beach we rented two beach chairs and an umbrella. The sun was out so I went down and played in the water. Water wasn’t choppy, and I went swimming down the beach. Amy took her chance after me. Soon the rain came in heavy, so we went back to the beachside shops and got lunch. (pics: looking south on Kata Beach, looking north on Kata Beach, our beach chairs and umbrella)

Back at the beach after the rain stopped I started playing in the sand. She came over and together we made a sand sculpture; it ended up being a gigantic face. The water was warm, and nice to play in. There were some beach hawkers who came by ever few minutes selling a wide variety of items, some even tempting. (pics: Amy and our sand creation next to her, the gigantic face sculpture we created)

We tried to catch the last songthaew for the day back to the town. Seemed liked they ended earlier than what the guide book said. We walked down the main road looking for one, and watching if it passed. At one point, we stopped and asked a tuk-tuk stand how much it’d be back to town. It was much more expensive, but while we were asking, a songthaew passed by. Such irony. It ended up being the last of the day. We waited and hoped for 40 minutes for another, but we were out of luck.
We finally decided that we would just take out some money for a tuk-tuk, and just eat dinner here at the beach. Might as well since we were stuck. We went and watched the sunset on the water, and then went back to the strip of stores. Despite there being a cool dinosaur themed restaurant, we chose a place that delicious yet a lot cheaper. They also gave us a free appetizer, and a discounted dessert. They had a complimentary pool to swim in too, that was attached to a hotel. We stuck our feet in, but didn’t want to be wet for the half hour ride back. (pics: sunset over the Andaman Sea from Kata Beach, Amy at sunset at Kata Beach)

For that we got a tuk-tuk and headed home. When we got back we checked email one last time. She printed our plane tickets for tomorrow. We went to bed.

58th-6th in Kuala Lumpur 10/13

We walked to the bus stand in the morning, and caught the shuttle bus to the Phuket airport, a one hour ride from the town. The airport is one the coastline, so when you taxi to the runway, you are along the sea. (pic: able to see the sea from the taxiway)

We were flying AirAsia to Kuala Lumpur. First time for both of us, and definitely won’t be our last; it was exceptionally nice. The plane ride was a lot shorter than both of us thought it would be. Neither of us had realized we crossed time zones! (pics: AirAsia plane parked at Kuala Lumpur's budget terminal)

We landed at Kuala Lumpur’s airport at the budget terminal. It was my first time in one, and it was cool how well they’d minimalized to keep prices low.
We took a bus into the city. Before getting on, I grabbed lunch for us at McDonalds. First time having that in a long while. On the drive we could see the sprawl of Kuala Lumpur. We entered the city emerging from rolling hills. When I first saw the Petronas Towers I became very excited. They were incredible, towering over the whole city. Couldn’t wait to see them up close. (pics: myself with my first McDonald's since I ate it in Delhi in July, suburban sprawl on Kuala Lumpur's exurb fringe, my first view of the Petronas Towers)

We arrived in the city and immediately after getting off a bus a hotel tout found us. But he seemed very credible and was offering great deals at places. We went with him and really liked the second hotel he showed us and we decided to stay there.

We had lunch at a Chinatown restaurant and then set off to walk around the city. roaming here and there. We made our way to the Times Square Mall. We had been told that there was a roller coaster inside. The mall was huge, and incredibly decorated. We couldn’t find the roller coaster immediately, but after checking a map, we saw it was on the 6th floor. Took an elevator up and we finally got to see it. It stretched from floors 4 to 10, and even had loops. We really wanted to ride, but the park admission was for entry, not per ride, and was much too high to warrant the only ride we wanted to go on. (pics: Times Square Mall and their display for Eid-ul-Fitr, myself inside the Times Square Mall and the giant rollercoaster inside)

What was most excellent was that this place had an IMAX, and they were showing “Dark Knight”. I had wanted to see this in Bangkok on our one day there, because Naira had told me it was playing and it was supposed to be incredible on IMAX. That had gotten my hopes up, but it wasn’t in theaters anymore in Bangkok. But in Kuala Lumpur it was still out. Noon tomorrow. We decided we’d come back for it.
We meandered to another mall. We were currently in the Golden Triangle of Kuala Lumpur. which is super nice with lots of shopping. This mall was all electronics. But we sat downstairs, and I got a muffin and she got a cinnamon bun. We then walked some more in the shopping area and went in another mall. We shopped around a book store and then wound our ways through the floors of stores; this place was very much like Bashundara City in Dhaka. (pic: an entire mall Kuala Lumpur dedicated to electronics)

It was nice to be able to be amongst these luxuries, and it was exactly what we had come to Kuala Lumpur for. I know Malaysia has more to offer, but Kuala Lumpur was our prime destination with our time limits, and we soaked up what we could. It felt magical being in Kuala Lumpur, like we’d entered the future. It was the exact feeling we’d hoped for. (pic: myself with the KL tower in the background, Kuala Lumpur's monorail sweeps past the Times Square Mall)

We got Subway for another lunch; we just kept eating. It had started to rain for a bit too, so we stayed inside and talked.
We decided to go to the Petronas Towers in the evening, to see them all lit up. We finally had our chance to ride on the mass transit system. Kuala Lumpur’s subways, monorail, and commuter rail system was pretty seamless. It connected everything very well and was accessible. Sometimes it was a bit confusing on how to find a particular station, but that was our only frustration.

We arrived at the Petronas Towers, and it was still drizzling a bit. But they looked gorgeous lit up. I couldn’t believe my eyes, I had not been in awe like this my whole trip. Around their midsection some clouds were passing through, and this heightened the sensation of how tall they were. We took tons of photos and tried to see the buildings from a variety of angles. We were there about a half hour, and then took the subway back to our hotel area. (pics: Petronas Towers with fog sweeping in, myself in front of the Petronas Towers, tree branches and the Petronas Towers, Amy/myself at the base of the towers, the Malaysian flag hung vertically on the Petronas Towers, front shot of the Petronas Towers)

58th-7th in Kuala Lumpur 10/14

Cannot believe I’m leaving Asia in a few days.

We got up early to see the Petronas Towers again, this time to actually go up inside. We were advised to arrive early to wait in line, as it gets long quickly. We took the subway over, and when we got there, the line already had about 40 people in it. We took our place. We took turns holding it while the other went and found and ate a breakfast. The mall below the Petronas Towers is immense, and although not the biggest, had the nicest array of stores; an interna Rodeo Drive.

We got the first batch of tickets to go up to the tower’s famous skybridge. What’s really cool is that going up is totally free.
From the skybridge, 40 something stories up, the view was good, although not spectacular. Because of the placement of the buildings, from the skybridge you cannot see the main parts of the city. For us it was neat to just be inside these iconic towers. After you come back down, there was a neat science museum about the towers. I read everything and tried all the exhibits. Amy got through a lot faster than I did. (pics: myself on the Petronas Towers' skybridge, the support poles for the skybridge braced on the tower itself, Amy and looking down the length of the skybridge, Amy/myself on the skybridge with Kuala Lumpur in the background)

We headed to the back of the towers into the KLCC gardens. From there we took the photos she was trying to take for her dad, a civil engineer. She had made a sign that said “HI DAD” and posed with it in front of the buildings, a favorite of civil engineers worldwide. (pics: myself in the backside of the towers in the KLCC gardens, kids and couples dating by the wading pool in the KLCC gardens)

We then walked back to the Times Square Mall. It really didn’t take that long to walk across basically 2/3 of the city. The city isn’t as big as I thought it’d be from looking at the map. We passed through parts of the Golden Triangle again, and I liked seeing how the monorail swept through this fancy part of the city.

We arrived at the mall for the movie. We were early so we killed some time in Border’s. When it was time, we bought movie snacks. They only had caramel popcorn, no regular popcorn. I’d never seen that before, and I don't believe caramel popcorn can replace movie popcorn.
The movie was incredible, and I was blown away by the IMAX. It met all my expectations. When we initially walked in we were the only ones inside. By the time it “filled up” there were about 15 people there. Assigned seating. (pics: myself in front of the Dark Knight signs and you can see the joy in my eyes, caramel popcorn BLEH for a movie, Amy in our assigned seats in the empty IMAX theater)

After the movie we had lunch in the food court. It had all varieties of Malaysian, Thai, Indian, and Chinese food, with one western and Italian store. I got some seafood noodles, I’m soaking up every chance I have to eat the cuisine. It was a bit fancy food court, but still cheap, and reminded me of the setup I saw in the Bangkok bus terminal.

We took the monorail back to our hotel’s part of the city and walked to the National Mosque. It was prayer time when we arrived, so non-Muslim tourists were not allowed inside. Either way, neither of us was dressed appropriately, so we sat out front for a bit and rested and took pictures. (pics: inside Kuala Lumpur's monorail, Malaysia's national mosque, myself sitting in the front of the national mosque)

I had wanted to check out the Islamic art museum, and since we were nearby, we checked to see if it was open. It was, for 50 minutes more. Amy had no desire to pay to see it for such a short time, but I was real excited to check it out. She said she didn’t mind waiting in the courtyard to journal and read.
I rushed through as many exhibits as I could trying to read as much as possible. My focus was on the section about Islamic architecture which had models of the world’s most popular mosques. They were very well done. I took photos of all of them. Another neat thing was a live map of the world’s prayer times. It was cool to see how “lines” of prayer times crossed the earth. The rest of the museum was great too, with artifacts of Arabic texts and Islamic crafts. Could’ve stayed longer to read but didn’t have time. (pics: model of mosques in the Islamic Art musuem (this one of longtime favorite mosques the Masjed-e-Emam in Iran), lines depicting prayer times cross the globe, display on the different scripts of Arabic, Amy kindly patiently waiting for me in the courtyard of the museum)

After heading back in the rain, some dinner, and checking our email, we headed for the city’s main train station. We sat and waited, I finished the book The Void. I had picked up a new book at the Malaysian hostel, in exchange for A Brief History of Time, entitled was A Good Man in Africa. Wasn’t sure if it’d be good or not, but it was the only English book on the shelf, all the rest were German.

The train was a little late, but nothing bad. Inside it was super nice, and our beds were great. Little curtains to close us off from the train car. Was excited to be on my way to Singapore. Train wasn’t full, but it was still a good thing we had booked our train tickets online when we were in Vietnam. (pic: Amy in her bed pod on the train to Singapore)

Week 57: "Vietnam! Vietnam!" and the Plain of Jars (or "Don't worry the driver is drinking milk.")

noreply@blogger.com (Donny) — Sat, 20 Dec 2008 15:26:00 +0000

57th-1st in Phonosavan 10/1

The bus did not take 10 hours. Or even the 12 hours that one guide book said. It took 16, meaning even without the breakdown last night we would’ve only made it there in 14. It was much longer than we ever thought. The bus stopped several times to let people out to urinate. The first of the morning was in the middle of the mountains. Really, the most beautiful pee stops ever. (pics: first stop in the mountains in the morning to pee, third stop out of the mountains in a rolling plain)

As we wound through the mountains, we saw villages hanging off the sides of the road, the hills dropping off below them. (pics: villages on the ridge line in the mountains, each time the bus stop to drop someone off in these villages a crowd gathered)

We arrived at the Phonosavan bus station, which sat it the middle of a large plain; all around the plain were hills. This was the location of the Plain of Jars. We bought a ticket for the bus back. We would have only six hours here. Meaning we’d be busing 28+ hours just for 6 hours of activity. We didn’t care. We can’t care. It was the only way to make this trip with the distances being so long. We knew Laos would be tough and we were glad to have our most difficult times at the front end of our trip. It also occurred to us that we would be spending 4 nights in a row sleeping on transportation. We quickly accepted it.

Nearby the bus station was a guesthouse. Amy went in and looked into having a tour of the Plain of Jars. They said they would do it, but we only had to time to visit Site 1. It was the closest, with the next two much farther away. Although the Jars are elsewhere, there are many land mines still scattered across the landscape, and at these three sites only have the land mines been removed. We agreed to go, bargained the price a bit. They took us to their tour office in the tiny downtown to register us as visitors and then drove 20 minutes outside of town to the site of the Jars. The parking lot was empty. We saw only four other people there, and two of them were teenage girls doing a “fashion shoot” amongst the jars. They had brought a wide array of clothing to model. (pics: girls doing a fashion shoot amongst the jars, a close up of the models)

The Jars themselves were scattered all across the area at random. Some were broken, and some were filled with water. No one really knows why they are here, or what they were used for. Of course there are many theories. This area used to me a major trading crossroads between China and India. Many events in history have thus taken place here, but now its quiet and forgotten. We took lots of photos; saw a cave that borders the site. Our guide went back to the car, and we took our “lunch” of random foods we’d acquired and ate it at a pavilion on the site. It started to drizzle a bit. We went out again anyway and took more pictures of us with the Jars. It’s cool how some are from 2000 BC. I wished to see the other sites but really didn’t have time to go out there. (pics: the warning sign about land mines outside the jars site, the jars sprawled across the field, Amy walking amongst the jars in Site 1, myself next to the largest jar at the site)

Despite the rain, we went “hiking” around the site. We stuck to the trail because that was guaranteed to be free of land mines. At the top of a hill, with still plenty of time and nowhere but back to the car to go, we played shollo guti in the rain. From the top of the hill we could say straight out over all the plains. Our driver was antsy to go, but we had booked them for several hours, and paid plenty, so we were in no rush to appease him. (pic: Amy on our "hike" and the plain stretched out beyond)

At some point we had to go back. They took us back to the bus station and quickly they were gone. We then sat at the bus station for three hours. (pics: touts for hotels waiting for more buses to arrive, Amy sitting in the cold open air bus station)

I was talking to some tourist touts at the bus station who were waiting for buses to show up to bring people to hotels. One guy told me I could get sparrow to eat at the nearby food stall. He said people like to catch sparrows and sell them. Then they barbecue and eat them. Usually they sell them four per skewer. I went over to the restaurant, but they were out they said. Dang. They did offer me their choice: rat. I declined.

We had dinner at the station. All the bus stations we find on this trip have expensive toilets to use. Always coughing up 1000-2000 kips for each time we have to pee. We thought we had time before the bus was leaving, but all of a sudden we saw everyone on board. We thought it would leave without us. We scrapped buying more snacks, and got on board. The bus sat there though until 8, when it was supposed to leave, a half hour later. Oh well. How were we to know?

57th-2nd in Vientiane 10/2

In the middle of the night our bus made a food stop. Apparently our tickets doubled as a bus food coupon. You could exchange it for rice and curry, or a bowl of noodles. So Amy and I enjoyed our midnight noodle snack.
We had pretty bathroom stops again on the way back, but I haven’t really drank any water, so I just got out to stretch my legs.

We got back to town, and we hoped to get a hotel near the city bus stand for the day, before we left at night for Vietnam. It didn’t really work out that way. Nothing was nearby except one expensive place. So we trekked into town and got a hotel room half price for 8 hours. Amy just wanted a real bed to sleep in. Despite the buses I somehow was feeling okay. So I went back out to see the city again.

On my to-do list was to find a bookshop to buy a new book, as I was almost done with A Brief History of Time. All the shops I found selling used books, however, were too expensive; at least what I thought a used book in Laos should cost (which I felt should be on par with the new books I bought I Bangladesh, less than a dollar.) I saw lots of delicious restaurants as I walked, and I restrained myself from indulging in any of them. I need to save the money I have. I read in Vientiane’s central square, not really a major place, but quiet with a tree to give shade. I bought a postcard and then wrote it out to a friend and spent an hour finding a place to get a stamp and ultimately walked to the national post office.

I walked into the city’s mall, and found a concert happening. A rap concert in fact, except everyone was lip synching to the English lyrics. (pic: lip-synching concert happening inside a mall in Vientiane)

I hoped to find sparrow again but no luck. I did find a place that had tiny skewered poultry, but this just turned out to be chicken wings. I played make believe.

I went back to get Amy from the hotel, and together we walked to the riverfront again to get dinner. We had really liked eating along the Mekong River. We ate at a place right next to where we ate last time. (pic: dining along the Mekong River)

When we had booked the ticket to Vietnam, we were very unsure how long the bus would take. We had asked the woman the duration, and she had said we would arrive at 12am. Well that meant he trip would be 30 hours long, or 6. We were confused. I think she meant 12pm, and that would put us at 18 hours. But we still arrived unsure. We found our bus, and a helpful bus worker got our bags on and we took some seats on board. We bought French loaves for the trip, as we both didn’t want to have upset stomachs. Just something to fill us.
We sat with the other passengers in the parking lot in front of the bus. Then all of a sudden we were leaving. Everyone scrambled on board, including us. We sat in our seats. Some pushy scary woman came up to us and started yelling. We didn’t know what to do. She was speaking Vietnamese. We finally realized she wanted us to change seats, but we didn’t know where to go to. The helpful bus worker came up and motioned for us to sit two rows back, and cleared the luggage someone had placed there. It was a pretty dramatic scene. (pic: our bus to Vietnam is on the right and the helpful bus worker is sitting with the baseball cap in front)

I enjoyed watching the helpful bus worker’s activity. He would jump off the bus while it was moving, sprint to somewhere on the side of the street. Drop something off, then sprint back to the bus and jump back on. This happened several times.

We stopped for a dinner break after 3 hours or so. Everyone got off, but Amy and I just nibbled bread. I saw inside that everyone was drinking. I mentioned it to Amy, “Amy, everyone inside is drinking a beer.” Then I noticed the one person not, “Wait almost everyone. You’ll be glad to know the driver’s drinking milk.” We laughed at that the rest of the trip.

57th-3rd in Hue 10/3

We got through the central part of Laos faster than I thought we would. We knew we’d arrive at the border in the morning, and we did, before it opened. It was about 3 AM. The whole bus was told to get off and sit in a restaurant. The owner of the place collected all our passports, and had the foreigners sit by him as he went through them. We found it difficult to keep our eyes on our passports like we wanted to. They put them in a plastic bag, just like they did at the Bangladesh-India border, and kept them themselves. We now had to wait 2.5 hours until the Laos side of the border opened.

The helpful bus worker had our passports, and he made sure to get the foreign ones processed first. He gave them back to us and had us fill out the Vietnamese immigration form. Then took back our passports. He seemed to like to hold onto them. It had us worried a bit. All this time Amy and I are both fretting about getting into Vietnam. I have the two visas because of the mishap with them giving me the wrong month initially, and hers wasn’t in her passport, but had been one mailed to her.

Then the time came. The Vietnam border opened and the helpful bus worker came running at us visibly excited. He shoved our passports in our hands, and started gesturing for us to run to the border yelling “Vietnam! Vietnam!” He was pointing vividly, shouting, very animated. So we power walked it to the elaborate gorgeous gates marking the entry into each country. Amy and I were the third and fourth people to cross that morning. We realized he wanted the foreigners to get across quickly so we could be processed first, as we likely would take longer. His wild antics definitely spurred us to action. This became the second quote of the trip “Vietnam! Vietnam!”

We were on our way. The ride to Hue from the border was about 4 hours. We were unsure of where to get off, and almost got off north of town. Got off in the middle of town and walked to find a hotel. We found a nice place and asked to see rooms. The guy bargained down the price and the rooms were huge, so we gladly took it. Honestly, we think we were the first people every to stay there. They seemed so unsure how to handle us as guests. We were glad to have full size beds, each! Nicest place we stayed at on our whole trip.

We took motorcycles to go to the train station. A persistent man on his motorcycle had been following us all morning trying to get us to go with him. They function as taxis here. Well I was hesitant as I’ve only been on a motorcycle once before with Nafisa’s uncle in Khulna. We decided to go for it. The guy grabbed another motorcycle taxi, and Amy and I each hopped on the back, putting on our helmets. (pics: myself on the back of my motorcycle taxi, Amy on the back of her motorcycle taxi, Amy's driver/Amy show directly displaying their level of comfort on the bike)

It was a blast. Not nearly as scary as I though it’d be. The guys drove safely, and were pointing out things to us (trying to win future business.) They were polite and friendly. We were just two of the many bikes roaming the streets. Vietnam really is a motorbike based transportation system. They were everywhere. Everyone has one. (pic: bikes and motorcycles are the primary mode of transport all over Vietnam like seen her in Hue)

We got to the train station and we bought tickets for tomorrow morning down to Ho Chi Minh City.

We took the motorcycle taxis to a restaurant they suggested. We would realize later it was one of the cheapest ones around, yet still delicious. We declined their offers to have a day tour, we really didn’t want one. Still they waited until we were done eating and followed us back to our hotel.

From our hotel we walked to the Old Imperial city. Hue was the capital of Vietnam during its last dynasty. As well, it got destroyed during the Vietnam War as it was the closest city to the demilitarized zone. The place was worth exploring and see all the architecture. This is my first time seeing true Chinese-inspired buildings.
A huge Vietnamese flag flew over the old wall of the city. The place is being heavily restored after the damage done from the war. (pics: myself underneath the huge Vietnamese flag flying over the Citadel's wall, Amy and the Imperial City, inside the Imperial City which was mostly destroyed in the Vietnam War, the ornamental gardens and buildings in the Imperial City)

We stopped in to see a cultural show. There were two classes of seats, normal and deluxe. The deluxe got served imperial tea and biscuits during the half hour show. Normal got a bottle of water. We chose normal. And so did everyone else. The reserved deluxe front two rows remained empty! A bit awkward to sit and watch the show from so far back and have two empty rows in front of us.
I liked the show as I never really go to see cultural programs. They did several dances and musical numbers. However the performers were a bit uninspired and looked like they wanted to leave. That was dampening. (pic: the cultural show)

Showered tonight and had a nice bed. Realized it had been 5 days since I last had one, and in that time I’d seen 3 countries as well.

57th-4th on train to Ho Chi Minh City 10/4

Today we took the Reunification Train 23 hours south to Ho Chi Minh City.

Breakfast for me was bread, cheese, egg, and tomato. I also got black coffee and green tea. That’s what EVERYONE was having. They all mixed their green tea and coffee too. So I also tried it. The black coffee was served on ice. It was amazing to me how each person was having the exact same thing. I was embarrassed to order anything else. (pics: the outdoor breakfast joint at which everyone was enjoying the same thing, the green tea and black coffee that everyone was drinking!)

We were sharing our cabin with a young couple with a baby, and luckily it didn’t cry. However when it was sleeping we tried to leave the cabin. We played an epic round of Shed, the game Ben taught me in May. We decided to play until someone won 10 times, and went all 19 possible matches to get a winner. Amy won. (pics: Amy waiting as the train arrives, Amy playing Shed on the train)

The train was really nice. Clean and had good toilets. There was a dining cabin on the opposite end of the train from us, and I enjoyed walking through the train to get there. The train tracks followed the ocean and mountains for awhile until the land flatted out. It was a long distance south, and mostly we were several miles from the coast except for the one that part where we were hugging cliffs. (pics: an island on the Vietnamese coast that the train passed, myself and the rocky coastline, the train passing through fields at the edge of the hills, homes and fields stretching out from the train to the hills)

Besides playing lots of cards, we worked on planning the next part of our trip in Ho Chi Minh and a bit into Cambodia. We even discussed what beach to go to in Thailand, and how exactly we’d schedule all this. This whole trip we were always planning off the cuff.

Lunch and dinner both could’ve been eaten in the cabin, but we enjoyed going down to the dining car. It had only six tables, and never were they all filled. The food was great for a train, and I wolfed it down. At night after dinner we sat with Cokes and played cards until they closed the car.

57th-5th in Ho Chi Minh City 10/5

The train arrived one hour late, but that was okay, as it was better for moving about in the daylight. We got to the tourist area and set about finding a hotel. We found one with a good price quickly. We got some breakfast: fruit shakes and some French bread sandwiches. Then we booked our bus to Cambodia; we’ll leave in two mornings on a bus direct to Siem Reap. Then we went and checked our email. All of this before 9 AM.

We meandered over to Ho Chi Minh City’s central market. It was crowded, but much more organized than what we had in Dhaka. Someone woman grabbed Amy’s arm though and wouldn’t let it go. I had to step in and tell her hands off. We made sure to pass by the Reunification Palace where the North Vietnamese officially ended the war. We found our way to the War Remnants Museum but decided we’d visit it later as they close for lunch, and it was almost time. (pics: Amy in front of the Reunification Palace, everywhere we went in the city we saw people taking wedding photos, the predominant motorcycle traffic mix in Ho Chi Minh City)

In the meantime we walked quite a ways to visit the Emperor Jade Pagoda. This place came highly recommended, but it was a bit difficult to find for us. It was a Chinese style pagoda, and was central to the Cantonese community living in Ho Chi Minh City. Inside the many incense sticks and the dark interior made it look smoky. It smelled good though. People were milling around praying at their own pace. Foreigners snapped photos in between, no restrictions at all. The place was smaller than I thought it would be. (pics: ceiling and lintel in the Jade Emperor Pagoda, myself/Amy on the pagoda's roof, one of the shrines and offerings in the Jade Emperor Pagoda, the smoky interior and the sun rays coming in)

Instead of heading straight back to the museum, we detoured into the center part of the city, and went past the famous Catholic Church. We went searching for a place for lunch, and it began to rain. We got under my umbrella and just chose the first place we could find, next to our museum.

The War Remnants Museum was very powerful. I learned so much about the Vietnam War that I had never known before. The images and stories left me speechless. I had not known the atrocities thar had been committed while in Vietnam. Apparently I also had not understood the war in general very well. The displays had so much information, you can’t leave feeling you didn’t learn something. (pics: inside the War Remnants Museum)

Back in the tourist area we went online and bought a plane ticket from Phuket to Kuala Lumpur and a train ticket from Kuala Lumpur to Singapore. We had spent a lot of time discussing which in Thailand to go to, and how we’d schedule our time. We realized at some point we’d have to take a plane flight, and the leg we booked made the most sense, beating out Siem Reap to Bangkok and Bangkok to Phukhet. We chose Phuket basically because it had an airport, even thought we knew it’d be tourist crazy. The train was the perfect way to travel from KL to Singapore. We accepted we only had time to see one city in Malaysia.

We went out to dinner with her friend Rachel who she had worked with in Taiwan. Rachel now teaches English in Ho Chi Minh City, and came across town to pick us up on her motorcycle. We got a second motorcycle taxi to take me, and Amy jumped behind her. Rachel took us to one restaurant but she didn’t know it would be closed. She then got lost bringing us to the restaurant where her boyfriend was. She had us going in circles around the city. Ho Chi Minh City is packed with motorbikes. It’s very crazy driving around, worse when you’re lost. My driver said we went the wrong way on some streets and made some other moving violations…uhoh.

We arrived at the restaurant her boyfriend was at. It was an Irish Pub. As far as I can remember, it was the most expensive place Amy and I ate during our whole trip. The food was delicious, especially the nachos, so it was clearly worth it. Her boyfriend and his friends, all from England, were great to spend the evening with. On the way back we zipped through traffic on our bikes again, and I took some video of it.(video: Amy and Rachel driving through the madhouse of motorcycle traffic in Ho Chi Minh City)

We went to a local drinking hole, which had plastic small tables and stools. Lots of African guys were watching soccer. Beer was cheap. We were sitting right on the street side. Next to us was a guy hawking dried fish if I remember right.(pics: Rachel/Amy parking Rachel's motorcycle, Rachel/Amy at the local drinking hole)

57th-6th in Ho Chi Minh City 10/6

Today was our tour of the Cu Chi Tunnels and the Cao Dai temple. I woke up feeling tired. They gathered us for the tour from the place we booked it at and took us to the bus. There were about 12 of us on the tour.

The first stop was a crafts store, which was not advertised as part of the agenda, but magically became part of it. After showing us how the hardworking people make the crafts, they showed us the gallery, with lots of things to buy overly priced. The only people I saw fall for it were three young Australian dudes. Unannounced stops for you to be “expected” to buy stuff are never really a hit with me or anyone else I’ve met. (pics: making the crafts, selling the crafts at high prices)

Finally we were on our way. The first real stop was the Cao Dai temple. It is an indigenous religion to Vietnam that combines Christianity, Buddhism, Taoism, Confuscism, and Islam. The three middle ones are the primary contributors. But the temple looked a lot like a basilica form church. We got to walk around the perimeter of their temple, and then go up to the balcony to see a service. They pray four times a day. They each had different color robes on, and I guessed to Amy that that meant what part of the religion they follow. Guide told us later, and it turned out I was right. (pics: interior of Cao Dai temple, main altar at Cao Dai temple, prayer service beginning, exterior of Cao Dai temple)

The Cu Chi tunnels were pretty neat, although I wish we had gotten to spend more time inside the tunnels, and seen more of them. We went through a 40 meter stretch of one, and it ended too quickly for me. Although for Amy it was more than plenty! Incredible to think people spent their lives down there as they got bombed by the Americans. (pics: tour guide entering one of the Cu Chi tunnels, guide in front of me in the tunnel, myself in the tunnel, Amy happy to be leaving the claustrophobic tunnels)

The tour started off with an Anti-American troops propaganda video. They then showed us all the neat ways they used the tunnels, the secret doors, the ways they used to fight American troops despite not having major equipment, and a captured American tank. The tactics and tunnels are so incredible because it all worked! They won! (pics: our tour guide telling us about the Cu Chi tunnels, one of the tunnel entrances we were allowed to test out, Amy/myself on a captured US tank)

A neat part was a shooting range they had. I read that you can shoot whatever gun you want, at 15,000 Dong per bullet. Well I was not told that it was a minimum of 10 bullets. I did not have that much dong to do that. I took that as a sign that I shouldn’t be shooting an AK-47 for fun. (pic: pay to shoot)

Traffic was bad on the way back, but nothing close to what I got used to in Dhaka.

We headed back to the market, and Amy bought some things. I considered buying some artwork, but decided against it, one because I didn’t have enough money. I told myself if I saw an HSBC ATM, it’d be a sign, and I should buy something. I walked 3 blocks past the market looking for that sign, but it didn’t appear. So I didn’t buy. (pic: night market in Ho Chi Minh City)

We shared dinner with Rachel again tonight. It was great to meet up with a friendly face midway through our trip. She gave us lots of advice on what to do in Cambodia and southern Thailand as well.

57th-7th on bus to Siem Reap 10/7

We woke up to leave; our hotel’s front door was closed. Had to have them open it for us. Then the place we booked our tickets was closed too! I started getting nervous. What if we missed our bus? We banged on the door until Worker McSleeps-a-lot woke up inside. He opened it and called the bus company to tell them we were here. They walked over and took us to the bus pickup. Only one bus a day goes to Siem Reap, and I was really worried we would miss it.

The service was incredible. This was Amy’s favorite bus. Amy had been nervous about being in Cambodia, and the bus’s comfort helped ease her worries. We passed through endless rural areas in the Mekong Delta. (pics: a man I saw rowing a boat with his feet saw me as well and waved back, Amy hugging her favorite bus company)

We crossed the Mekong by ferry, and I got out to look around. Reminded me of all my ferry crossings in BD. (pics: people crossing the Mekong by ferry, all the vehicles packed onto the ferry)

We stopped over for a few minutes in Phnom Penh to drop off and and pick up passengers, and it looked really nice from the streets we saw. Reminded us of Vientiane. I did notice that the city seems to be growing very quick. Saw new skyscrapers going up, and lots of suburban sprawl. (pics: new skyscraper going up in Phnom Penh, suburban sprawl outside the city)

Another stop was for food on the way to Siem Reap. There we got the first taste of Cambodian children selling us stuff. They surrounded us and showed us all the things we could buy from them. I bought some hard boiled eggs and mango. One delicacy I noticed they had were cooked tarantulas. I couldn't stop looking at them. A woman selling them took out a live one to show me…and it bit her!! She said simply, “Ow. It bit me” and threw it back in the bucket…no thanks. (pic: tarantulas for a snack)

Houses in rural Cambodia are all on stilts. They each have an ornamented roof center line. It has the year it was built printed on it. I was amazed to see the consistency of it all. It was neat that even with little money, evident by the choices of materials for the roof and walls, they still invest enough to ornament this part of their homes. (pics: Cambodian rural houses built on stilts, each home had an ornamented roof center line)

The land we passed through was incredibly flat and had very few trees. It made it seem much flatter than Bangladesh. (pic: flat plains of Cambodia at sunset)

We liked the bus service so much that when we arrived in Siem Reap we booked all our Cambodian needs through their office. We arrived after 12 hours, and booked a bus to Bangkok. They also recommended a hotel which we went with too. Lastly the guy they gave us to take us to the hotel offered to give us a tour tomorrow, and decided to go with him as well.

In Cambodia, things are more expensive than surrounding countries. This is mainly because they only want US dollars. Meaning the minimum anything could cost was one dollar because they don’t have the nickels and dimes to go along with the bills. If you’re lucky you can get two or three for $1.

I realized that chapter 9 is missing from my book A Brief History of Time…how can I understand the universe??? Maybe it really is there though, but since I’m observing it, its not….

Week 56: Arrive at the border on time and ensure you are still driving on the correct side of the road (but I departed Bangladesh by plane!)

noreply@blogger.com (Donny) — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 20:19:00 +0000

56th-1st from Jaipur to Kolkata to Bangladesh 9/24

The autorickshaw I had arranged to pick me up didn’t show. I waited for him for about 10 minutes after he was supposed to be there, and then went looking for another. Found one quickly and they agreed to go to the airport, same price. While waiting, I texted the bus company in Kolkata that I was leaving Jaipur and would be there by 1 PM, just in case. (pic: sun rising as I headed to the Jaipur airport)

Although I was mad at them for scrapping my original flight and throwing me into this mess, I have to admit that Indigo has nice planes and friendly staff.

After landing, and getting my bag, I got a taxi to headed back into town. There was an incredible jam on the way, and I feared of missing my bus. To make it worse, my driver decided to stop for tea when we were a kilometer from the bus stand. I was so irritated; at least he offered me a cigarette…but I don’t smoke. I was excited to see all the signs for Durga Puja, the largest Hindu festival in Bengal, up around town. It’s coming up soon. (pic: sign in Kolkata during Durga Puja with the goddess' image)

The bus company had understood the call from yesterday and even got the text this morning. They told me not to worry, that I had a seat on the 1 PM bus. I went and grabbed snacks for the ride.

On the bus I was sitting next to a little kid, quite a brat. There wasn’t really much of a jam leaving the city. But disaster struck 2 hours outside of the city. There were people rioting in the highway, and our bus stood still for 40 minutes. People started worrying we wouldn’t make the border crossing in time. Of course I was fretting as well. The rioters were angry about load shedding happening too often in their area.

We didn’t make it to the border in time. We arrived just after 6 PM and it closes at 6 PM. They hurried us all to the customs gate, through immigration, but customs wouldn’t open for us. We would have to spend the night in India. It was a bit more traumatic for me. Because I am a foreigner, they kept me in immigration to get “interviewed”. I worried they would let the rest of my bus through and not me if the “interviewer” didn’t show up. A guy from the bus company was in the room with me, and he told me not to worry. I trusted him. After sitting there for a half hour, the rest of the passengers consented that they wouldn’t be leaving tonight. It was frustrating for us all.
We sat in the bus company’s office for awhile, complaining, and then the bus took us all a few kilometers back down the road to a hotel for the night. Food and lodging all paid for by the company. During this period I befriended a young guy from Bangladesh. He was a cricket player for the under-19 team named Pana. It was really cool to meet a national level player. He showed me his passport full of foreign stamps from his team’s tours. I smiled at the fact that his occupation simply says “Player”. (pic: Pana's passport with his profession as "PLAYER.")

He and I roomed together in the hotel. We watched some TV and showered. Dinner was served late and all the bus passengers quickly ate up some rice, vegetables, and egg curry.

Obviously I was super frustrated. Instead of having 3 full days in Bangladesh, I would now essentially have 2, with a lot to get done. Annoyed on how it all played out. I was glad though that Pana was there, it helped so much to have a friend.

Not sure if I ever mentioned it, but everyone in south Asia compliments or comments on me being left handed.

56th-2nd in Dhaka 9/25

We woke up early at the hotel, still in India. I should be home already, and its frustrating to think about that. The bus was slow to leave, so we didn’t arrive at the time we wanted to when it opened at 6 AM. We didn’t arrive at the border until 6:45, and already it was pretty busy. (pics: my other busmates waiting for the bus to take us to the borer, the bus finally coming out of the parking lot in a small town in India near the border with Bangladesh)

Again I was sat down to be ‘interviewed” and this made my whole bus have to wait outside customs until I was done. No one seemed angry at me. The border itself was pure craziness. People running everywhere, lines every which way. Long waits. In between the two borders lots of people stood waiting to cross. Porters tried to carry your things and demand tips. The Indian and the Bangladeshi sides were equally confusing. Except the Indian side had most things in one building. For Bangladesh you had to keep crossing back and forth across the road to hit each place. But I got stamped out fine, bought the onward ticket for the bus, and we were on our way again.

The ride back was uneventful. There wasn’t even a line at the Padma River to cross. We got on quickly and easily. As we neared Dhaka, our bus was going to go up and around through Uttara, so I got off to take a more direct city bus in. Pana came with me as he lives nearby in Mohammedpur. (pics: two launches hit while crossing the Padma River, the Padma River filled with small sailboats)

After picking up my laptop from Diya’s and having Iftar there, I went home and quickly threw my stuff down and dropped in to see the guys downstairs about the furniture. Apparently Mehedi had skipped town and would not be buying my things. I was annoyed. But Mansur said he would buy it all, or a friend would, and not to worry. Of course I would, but I had no other choice but to go with it. I asked if they had all the money, and he said he did, all ready to go. I told him I’d be spending the night in Gulshan, and I’d be back at noon tomorrow.

I then headed across town to Naira’s. She had invited me over for dinner with her father. Her mom was out of town. We chatted, had dinner with her dad and many other people who were over to eat that night, including her brother and his friends. Dinner was great as always, and everyone was talking the entire time. After dinner, her cousin and cousin’s husband, Naira, and I went to the Westin. This was actually my first time going there to hang out, now in my last few nights of Dhaka. We met some people there, two of which I knew from the wedding last December. We had cake and hung out talking for over an hour.

56th-3rd in Dhaka 9/26

I ate breakfast at Naira’s. I had said goodbye the night before because I knew I had to leave early. I talked to one of her other cousins who stays there before I left.

I went to grab the final _FC pictures I needed of RFC, KFC, and FFC, and then headed to the Best Air office to confirm my luggage allowance for the flight. I had to go to the head office, and finding it was a bit hard. There, the woman at the booking desk told me not to worry, everyone in the company knows students can take an extra 10kg. I felt content.

I went home and told Mansur I was back to sell my stuff. He came up along with the guy he said would buy most of my things, his name was Mahib. Turns out, Mansur would only be buying my fridge, and Mahib was buying everything else. They asked for the price again, and I tallied it up at Tk15,000. Then they started bargaining, which had not happened yet, but I was afraid would come. He said he would buy for Tk10,000, and he wouldn’t budge when I said my lowest price was Tk12000. He knew I had no other choice, so I finally consented because some money is better than none. We settled on what was going to be included, and I showed them a pile of stuff they could take for free. I said I only wanted to keep the kitchen stuff to give to my boua.
They went to get the money and I started taking apart my bed. Mansur and him came back and Mansur started begging me to give him a lower price on the fridge. He said he didn’t have enough money and I asked what happened to the plenty of funds he had last night. Apparently not. I wouldn’t budge. I knew the landlady would buy it if he didn’t take it. He knew that too. He ended up giving only 3% less than what was agreed upon.

So we started packing up, no issues arising. I was helping them bring things downstairs. Then Mahib asked about my speakers. I had asked him earlier if he wanted them, and he said he didn’t so I did not include them in the price. However, apparently he didn’t recall this interaction and insisted the speakers were part of the deal and that he was taking them. I said no way unless he gave an extra Tk 1500, they were expensive. He threatened that if I didn’t give them to him included in the price, he wouldn’t take anything at all and asked for his Tk10,000 back.
I was shocked and appalled. I couldn’t believe he was really doing this. I said again that we had not said the speakers were part of it, and Mahib just rebutted asking me to give him his money back. I looked at all the other guys who were there as well, four in all, one being Mansur’s roommate and one being the guy’s brother. No one looked to be on my side. If anything they just shrugged. I was upset. I felt I was getting ganged up on, cheated, in the most unfair of situations. I didn’t’ know what to do. Where to turn.
Then I broke down. I couldn’t help it. All the emotions of my last days here, having to say goodbye, the stress, and now this, it just added up and all started coming out. I started crying and couldn’t stop. It was then they realized they’d gone too far. I was telling them how I wasn’t trying to cheat anyone, wasn’t trying to screw them, just trying to sell the things. I had already cut the price two thirds, feeling I’d done what they wanted. Then things took a turn. Realizing what they’d done, and feeling bad about it, they started hugging me. They tried comforting me and telling me it was all right, just a misunderstanding. Slowly I calmed down. I apologized for opening up all of a sudden, but they apologized as well for going too far in the whole situation.
That whole mess over, we went back to bringing all the furniture downstairs. They apologized again and again, and didn’t raise any more issues.
One of my friends told me later that it is not uncommon for Bangladeshis to see how far they can push someone in a business transaction. Other Bangladeshis know how to handle this technique, and will rebut appropriately, until an agreement is reached. But in this case, I wasn’t prepared, and they weren’t prepared for my response. My friend said that when they saw me display emotion in the transaction, something they wouldn’t have expected, they knew to back down. In a way my friend said, it’s all a façade of being tough, and they don’t really mean it full and through. (pics: my room getting packed up, Mansur/Mahib and the others moving things out of my room, Mahib/Mansur helping to take apart my bed)

After they’d left and my room was empty, Ragini came by. I was still packing some things. She brought fuchka and some other snacks from a place that was actually open during Ramadan, and we shared those and told each other stories of our travels in India.

Tonight for Iftar I was meeting up with Karen and Erin at Nando’s. The Iftar fare was decent. I shouldn’t have ordered the medium flavor and just gone with mild. I was in no mood for super spicy right now. But Nando’s did a good Iftar spread, however I’ll still say Pizza Hut is the best Iftar offer in Dhaka. We talked about where I’d been, and touched on the various things we’ve all been up to.
I rushed home in the now pouring rain. I got soaked. From head to toe. My boua was supposed to come by tonight to wash clothes, as I had worked out with her. But she didn’t. With the rain and the flooded streets, which even I had a hard time going through, I knew she wasn’t showing up. So it was time to wash my clothes myself. I grabbed the bucket and the clothes I knew would take the longest to dry and set to work. I assumed she would come tomorrow morning, as by then the rain would’ve hopefully stopped and dried. If not, I’d be washing the quicker drying stuff myself again tomorrow morning.

I spent the rest of the night packing and looking online. Hadn’t really had a time to go on since getting back from India. I worked on my Fulbright Final Report trying to get it done and out of the way before I leave Bangladesh. My room is now empty except for a mattress I asked to keep for my last two nights. The guy who bought it would come by to get it on my last morning. As well, I had retaken the fan from the guys downstairs before the all went back for Eid. They told me to just leave it with the landlady when I moved out.

56th-4th in Dhaka 9/27

Today is my last full day in Bangladesh. I leave tomorrow morning. It feels a bit odd. Especially the array of activities I plan to do. It was really a typical day of errands for me. It could’ve been any other day during my stay.

In the morning my boua came and washed the rest of my clothes. She then took everything I had saved for her. The kitchen stuff, odds and ends I wasn’t taking home, including shoes, shirts, pants, etc. Meanwhile I packed little by little. She left with a big bag of stuff, and good sized thank you tip for her time working for me, as well as a photo I printed out of the two of us that Emily had take on her visit. (pic: my boua with all the odds and ends I gave her)

I had breakfast at a hotel one last time. It was Ramadan and so I felt a bit scandalous, but lots of others were there too. I dropped off my mini backpack to a tailor and asked them if they could fix the few holes and tears which had developed through India. They didn’t want to, but I begged and said they cold do it, needed it done by tonight. They obliged.

After this I went to BUET to see Dr. Rahman one last time. I was dropping off a copy of the paper that had been published by us, for his records. He also took it to make a formal scan. I thanked him one last time, and was on my way.

I had taken the bus there and back and it was fitting that it was really crowded. I was hanging out the door for a bit on the way out, one last time. I got to push through everyone one last time. I even got to sit in an annoying traffic jam one last time.

I got a final haircut. Wanted to make sure I felt clean before heading to Southeast Asia. Thus it was nice to get one final complimentary head massage.
I really didn’t eat lunch apart for a few biscuits. Wasn't very hungry I guess. I sat at home in my lungi and finished the Fulbright final report. Felt good to submit it. At one point Karen came by, she was buying my speakers from me.

In the evening I gave my gifts to the store owner in front of my house and Hamid. I gave Hamid a pack of baseball cards that I had brought from the US. I think at first he was confused about them, and also asked me some questions about baseball. He liked them though, the evidence being that he showed them off to all the customers who came by afterwards. Both of them liked the frame I gave them, including the framed dollar bill. I know they’ll enjoy showing that off. They hung it on the wall immediately, and pointed it out as well to all the customers who came by.

At night all my friends came over to say goodbye. I was really glad that Tamzid dropped by as well. He said it was really good to see me one last time. We all sat in my room and talked about nothingness for awhile. They gave me one more gift. I gave Farhan the postcards I had written to mail to everyone, and I gave Ayon all the books for Samantha. When they all left, they each gave me a personal goodbye. It was a bit sad. We all were going to miss each other. (pics: Farhan at my flat on my last night, Auvi/Saquib/Nipu/Annita/Ayon at my house hanging out in my empty flat on my final night in Dhaka)

Just as they were leaving, Toma, who had said she wasn’t able to come by because she was busy showed up. She had gone straight to my house to surprise me, but I had walked the guys to the street. She called and found me in the streets just as I was saying goodbye to my friends. She and I then went by rickshaw to get dinner. Only I ate. I went to my favorite hotel one last time. I shook the hand of the waiter who usually served me and said goodbye. She gave me a gift of three shirts from the Aziz Super market. I hadn’t had the time to go pick them up myself, and she knew I wanted some. I was impressed, all the designs were ones I really liked.

Went to bed one last time in Bangladesh.

56th-5th from Dhaka to Bangkok 9/28

Last morning. Mahib, the guy taking my mattress came by at 4:45 AM as we had planned. I had to open the gate for him. He came in, and I was exhausted. I plopped down, and he did next to me. Now remember, this is the guy who got me really upset just two days ago. Now he was acting like my best friend. We ended up talking for over one hour this morning. We chatted, even thought it was early, I wasn’t being picked up by Auvi for 3 more hours. The highlight thought was when he told me he is the head of the Bangladesh Nationalist Party student arm at Dhaka College. I asked that they didn’t they have a riot about a month ago that burned a bus. He said “Yeah, it was great!” I inquired if, as the head of the student group, had organized it personally. Yes he had. I asked further how he decides to have a riot, and he told me how a high up in the Bangladesh Nationalist Party calls him in the morning and tells him they want a riot to happen so X and Y get done. In this case, they wanted Khaleda Zia out of jail. So he then texts all his friends, or sees them throughout the day, and they all plan to riot at the gates at 2 PM or whatever. I was so amazed to find out hwo all tha it works! Couldn’t believe I was talking to a guy who starts riots for fun!

I dropped off the fan to my landlord but did not ask for my deposit back. Nor did I offer to pay the October rent. I feel we’re all even.

Auvi picked me up at home earlier than I thought he would. I would have plenty of time at the airport. When we got there early, we figured why not go get some breakfast. His driver and I got some biscuits and bananas and tea at a tea stall. Auvi was fasting and didn’t eat. But it was good to spend a few more moments with a good friend before I left.

When it was time, we drove back across the street to the airport. He brought me to the departures area and helped me bring my bags to the door. I hugged him goodbye and went inside, the last personal contact I had in Bangladesh with a friend. I was sad. I didn’t cry. I guess I was ready for it. I couldn’t believe it was all really happening after spending so much time here. I didn’t have the feeling of just arriving, or that time had flied, just amazed that this point had come.

My reflection was disrupted by having to deal with Best Air. It sucked. I ended up paying lots of money at the counter, much more than I anticipated. First, they didn’t “know” I could take extra bags on board, despite what the head office had claimed. I called the head office, and put them on the phone with the counter workers. Luckily it was explained that students can take 10 anextra kg. So that was in the clear. My bags were 12kg over the limit. Not so bad. But then they told me my carry-on was too big. I insisted that I carry it on every flight I go. They forced me to weigh it, and then they put it in the stupid little metal “on board possible space” bin. Was too big for both they claimed. 7kg over the carry-on limit. I was annoyed. They were now forcing me to pay for 24kg! that was a lot of money. I was very unhappy. I guess I could’ve done a lot of rearranging then and there, but didn’t think about that at the time.
On the plus side, I felt it was a testament to my Bengali that I’ve learned that I was able to fight about the weight of my bag to the counter person, and explain the situation over the phone to a representative.
While waiting for the plane, I felt I saw lots of people who had bags bigger than that one carry-on, and that looked heavier too. I steamed about this all the way to Bangkok.

There was free internet at the airport. So for all of Dhaka’s airport’s downsides, this was a major up! My friends texted and called me while I was in the airport. Ayon and Toma both called, and Farhan Nipu, Oyon, and Saquib all texted me.

The plane itself to Bangkok was rickety, and a bit scary. In fact I’d never been so nervous on a plane for as long as I can remember.
We landed in Bangkok, I was reflecting on my last trip here with Megan in February. Our plane got to the gate…but it didn’t. Apparently there was some issue that it wasn’t physically possible for us to connect to the gate. We sat there for 30 minutes. I thought we’d have to go to another gate. I didn’t understand why this problem would arise, was this their first time ever trying to go to a gate? Well after 30 minute, the plane moved forward about 3 feet, literally, and all of a sudden we were able to connect. Nothing else I could tell changed. Ridiculous.

I got my bags and found Amy at the airport. She’d been waiting all day, several hours for me to arrive. It’s been a very long time since I’ve seen her. Last time would’ve been at the Knecht Cup, a regatta in Camden, New Jersey, during my junior year of college. It was so nice to see a familiar face again. I was excited for our upcoming 2.5 weeks.

We got a taxi from the taxi stand at the airport.. The driver however got lost trying to get where we needed to go. He though we’d said something different. Luckily I sort of knew my way around, and told him again where we needed to go and where I thought it was from where we were. We ended up finding it just fine after that.

Amy liked the hostel I had arranged for us to stay at, the Sukhumvit On Nut Guesthouse. It was the same one I had been to with Megan on our first night in Bangkok. The staff is friendly and helpful, it’s not too far from the airport, and really clean. After checking in, we repacked our bags for our journey starting tomorrow. I gave my two big bags to store downstairs. They’d be left under the steps for 2.5 weeks. (pic: Amy in our hostel in Bangkok repacking her bags)

Amy and I grabbed our guidebooks and headed out to the night market I’d eaten at with Megan on our first night. We sought out some noodles and ate and planned out our trip as best we could. We knew we’d be doing a lot of this trip off the cuff, but we worked out what we thought things could go like as best we can. It’s a hard trip to plan. We decided to take a train tomorrow morning out northeast, heading to Laos. We are skipping northern Thailand as we aren’t as psyched about that as we are about other places, and we are admittedly crunched for time. We realized we’ll be spending a lot of nights on buses and trains, but we said that we could deal.

Amy gave me the things she wasn’t taking on this first leg of the trip, and I put it in my carry-on bag. In there I put my laptop. Brought it downstairs to store for the next 10 days until we come back. The manager asked me if a laptop was inside. I wasn't sure if I should say yes or not. Didn’t want to admit it. He told me if there was he’d keep it locked in my office. So I whispered back “yes.”

At night at the hostel I couldn’t fall asleep. I was thinking about the upcoming trip. But sadly also the big payment I had to shell out earlier for my bags.

56th-6th in Pak Chong 9/29

We were up early at the hostel, and off on the skytrain, then to the subway, then to the train station. There was no issue quickly booking our tickets, but we would have to sit in the Bangkok rail station for the rest of the morning. We went and got breakfast nearby, some rice and curry. I also got a pastry and some fruit for the train ride. (pic: waiting inside the Bangkok train station for a few hours)

The train was a comfortable ride. We had chosen to stop over at Pak Chong for the day because there was no way we could reach the Thailand/Laos border today. And we figured why not take a night train this evening to get there the next morning and spend this day somewhere outside of Bangkok. So Pak Chong, 3-4 hours outside of Bangkok seemed perfect. We might even go to the national park there, Thailand’s first.
When we arrived, it was quickly evident how much of a small town it was. Streets seemed dead. We went and got lunch at a small restaurant near the station, and asked if we could leave our bags there for the day, promising we’d come back and eat dinner. We went and found the songthaews which were heading to the national park. We read that they stop running at 5 PM, so we could have 3 hours there at the park before having to come back. (pic: inside our songthaew to Khao Yai National Park)

When we got to the park’s gate we got a different story. The trails at the park were all 7km or so from the gate. No easy way to get inside without a car. So there was nothing we could do from where we were. The gate worker also informed us that the last songthaew was the one we had came on. Whether all of this was true or not, we weren’t going to mess around. The gate worker told us we could hail a car leaving the park to take us back. She helped us do that, and we hopped in the back of a guy’s pickup truck. He and his friends were all heading home. The guy was real nice to us, and although he couldn’t take us the whole way, he helped us find a small songthaew to take us back from the farthest point he would take us. I haven’t “hitchhiked” since I was in South Africa. (pics: the view of the gate to Khao Yai National Park as we sped away in the bed of some guy's truck, Amy in the bed of the truck we hitchhiked with back to Pak Chong)

Back in town, with not much else to do. Amy and I grabbed some dessert items. We roamed around, tried to find shops to look at. Essentially we were finding ways to waste about 4 hours or so until dinner. We roamed across the rail tracks and sat down at an open air restaurant. Took out the cards and started playing Shed. I had taught her how to play at the train station this morning. (pics: fairly empty street in Pak Chong, Amy walking through the stalls at an evening market in Pak Chong, wandering across the tracks in the town, a Wat on the top of a hill that we could see from where we sat and played cards)

We had dinner at the same place. Our bags luckily were still there. We waited at the train station for about an hour and a half for our night train to the Laos border. Amy slept while I read. There were a lot of mosquitoes. (pic: Amy asleep on a bench while we wait for our train at the Pak Chong train station)

Boarding the train, it was freezing cold inside. It was hard to sleep with it so cold, I was only in shorts and t-shirt. I wrapped my lungi around my upper body and used the provided blanket on my legs. Either way, didn’t sleep well, and nor did Amy.

56th-7th in Vientiane 9/30

We arrived at the final city on the rail line in Thailand in the early morning. From there we could take a tuk-tuk the short distance to the Laos border crossing. We shared with another foreign couple, and overpaid for the short ride. I think I was the only one who was willing to bargain at that early hour.

The Thai side was easy. Soon after arriving the border opened and we checked through. A bus was there to take all the people across the Mekong River to Laos. There we were able to get a visa on arrival, which took time. The most exciting thing was seeing the point in the road where the bus had to switch sides. Thailand drives on the left, and Laos on the right. The roads crisscrossed itself, and had stop signs for drivers to ensure they would not hit anyone in the crossing procedure. Then it was a half hour tuk-tuk ride to Vientiane, the capital of Laos. (pic: where the switch happens at the border because Thailand drives on the left and Laos on the right)

We had asked the driver to take us to the international bus station, but after getting off, we would find out we were merely at the city bus station. It was frustrating. We asked around for how to get where we wanted to go, and it felt like we were running in circles. At this point both of us felt frantic. No one spoke English well enough to help us find how to get where we were going. Well luckily someone did, and we took a local bus to what they refer to as the Southern Bus Station. There we were able to buy our bus ticket for 2 days from now to Hue, Vietnam. For breakfast, we had French bread with a variety of mystery meats inside. Previously a French colony, the influence of the French was all over the country, including the French breads. (pic: Amy and the many French loaves available in Southeast Asia that we'd enjoy for many breakfasts)

We then had to take another tuk-tuk across town again to the Northern Bus Station. This is the third and last bus station in town. So our morning consisted of seeing all the bus stations in Vientiane. Here we booked our ticket for the evening to go to Phonosavan, home of the Plain of Jars, our main goal in Laos. We left our bags there for the day at the insistence of the ticket seller.

Again we grabbed a tuk-tuk to the town center. Despite it being the capital and largest city in the country, it is really a medium sized town. We were excited after all the ticket buying to finally roam and see some of the exciting parts of the city. There was a nice streetscape on Vientiane’s main drag, and lots of Buddhist monks were walking this way and that. (pics: Tuk-tuks in the main street of Vientiane, Amy walking through the streets of Vientiane, the Laos President's house, a cat on the bust of a lion at a Wat(cute and fitting don't you think?))

After some pizza for lunch we made our way to Patuxay, what is essentially Vientiane’s Arc de Triomphe. We climbed up inside and looked out over Vientiane. All the interior floors were ripe with gift-sellers. The city looked a lot bigger from the top. At the other end of what is essentially Vientiane’s Champs-Elysees, was the President’s house. (pics: myself in front of Patuxay, inside the many floors of Patuxay that are now big gift shops, Amy looking out from the top of Patuxay, looking down Lan Xang Boulevard towards the President's House and most of Vientiane)

We then went to Wat Si Saket, the most famous Wat in Vientiane. Portions of its wooden construction for some reason really stood out to me. It started to rain a bit before, and neither of us minded sitting there a bit longer. (pics: Amy walking around Wat Si Saket, an image of the Buddha at Wat Si Saket, some of the wooden post and lintels at the temple, myself at Wat Si Saket)

After lunch and heading to an internet café, we walked over to the river, just to see it. It was neat to be seeing one of the great rivers of the world, the Mekong. Very special to look upon it. It was flowing very fast as the monsoon season was just ending. A few weeks ago it had flooded its banks, flowing into Vientiane. The sandbags were still piled up everywhere from that time.
We had our dinner on the riverside at a “fancy” place where you sat on pillows. We were essentially hanging right over the river on a bamboo shelter. The kitchen was up by the street and they brought food down to us. (pics: sandbags remaining from when the Mekong River flooded into Vientiane during the monsoon, the small riverside restaurants we dined at, Amy at the restaurant we ate at along the Mekong River, myself at the same restauarant)

We took a tuk-tuk back to the bus station. There we showered in the bathrooms. You had to pay the bathroom fee, but we could use the buckets in the toilet stalls to dump water on ourselves. I have to say it is the oddest shower I’ve taken, and I had some weird ones in Bangladesh. I was dumping water from the basin which holds the toilet flushing water. My belongings precariously were hanging from the bits of door frame I could hang them on. It wasn’t so bad though. We both felt really refreshed when we were done.

We got on the bus for our ride to Phonosavan. It was supposed to be around 12 hours overnight. It was a double story bus, but people only sat on top, below was all our stuff. And people had A LOT of stuff. It seemed like they had come into the city for a few days, picked up what they needed for their entire village, and were brining it back. Three hours into our trip the bus broke down. Despite it being a nicer VIP bus, the roads are pretty bad outside the capital. Two hours later two other buses came by, one full of people and with AC, and one not full and not with AC. They had everyone on the first bus fill the second, and then our passengers took the first. Our original bus was left behind. We were back on our way to Phonosavan.

Week 55: Should I take a bus, train, or camel to the Blue City?

noreply@blogger.com (Donny) — Sun, 07 Dec 2008 21:27:00 +0000

55th-1st in Mumbai 9/17

One thing I’ve noticed in traveling India is that Indians always ask me for my email address, while Bangladeshis always ask for my phone number. Perhaps this is an effect of India seeing more tourists, and thus aware that a tourist wouldn’t likely be around long enough to chat on the phone in a few weeks. Or Bangladeshis realize quickly that by my speaking Bengali, I probably am in Bangladesh for some sort of longer stay.

Today I headed out to see the actual sights of Mumbai. I walked down to the Gate of India which I’d seen many times before in Saket’s photos. It was under construction when I arrived. Next to it was the famous Taj Hotel in Mumbai, which Saket had told me about as well. Took some photos and got hassled by a few people trying to sell me big balloons or little plastic marbles that grow if you put them in water. I bought a ticket for a boat trip to Elephanta Island, an hour out into the Mumbai Harbor. The water was rocking the boat pretty well, and I feared a bit for our safety. Although decent, not the safest looking craft. From the boat, as it went far across the water, I could see all of Mumbai stretching before me on its peninsula. It was very very long. Seemed to go on forever in high rises. It looked like NYC stretching along Manhattan Island. Couldn’t believe I was looking at one of the largest city in the world. I felt that Mumbai is the most “New York” of all the Indian cities. (pics: walking along the seawall with the Taj Hotel and Gate of India at the end, Gate of India under construction, Gate of India and Taj Hotel from the boat out to Elephanta Island, myself on the boat with the skyline of Mumbai behind)

Elephanta Island was covered in jungle. The national park is established there because of the rock cut temples, which are famous in this region. These are the most accessible from Mumbai. The boat ride provides a complimentary tour guide, but when you arrive touts still try to convince you to come with them.
The temples were cut directly into the cliffs stretching in about 50 yards. The carvings of the gods large and detailed. They weren’t weathered as they are sheltered, but some have had vandalism from when the area wasn’t protected. Glad to have a tour guide for a bit who could tell us about all the carvings. Further on the path from this temple are a few more temples, but only this main temple was ever completed, and thus requires the most time. Monkeys were roaming everywhere, but not excessively playful. I didn’t fear they would steal anything. (pics: the main temple on Elephanta Island and the only fully completed one, myself inside the first temple, myself standing amongst the temple's columns, one of the many sculpted rock images of the Gods)

After the last temple was a sign telling you to walk up to Cannon Hill. The climb took about 8 minutes, but at the top one could look out over the island to the harbor, from an World War 2 era huge cannon,. A second and third cannon were around the other side of the hill, and from there you could see the Port of Mumbai nestled amongst the islands. Really cool. On the way down I had lunch at a “tourist trap” restaurant, one of the many places lining the stairs up to the temples. (pics: the last temple that one sees on Elephanta Island, the World War 2 era cannon on the top of Cannon Hill)

To sit upstairs on the boat for the ride back you have to pay Rs 10, wasn’t the case on the way out. I refused. It was worth it only one on the way out, when it was free. Sat downstairs.

I headed over to Chowpatty Beach on the western side of the peninsula. There you can watch the sunset over Malabar Hill, a richer area of Mumbai, and see the Queen’s Necklace (the name given to Marine Drive’s string of streetlights lining the highway going along the western part of Mumbai.) Tons of people strolling or hanging out on the sea walls. Water looks disgusting below, some people mining for garbage along the rocks. One guy sleeping. I sat at the sandy beach area for a bit and watched little kids “ride” the four wheelers or little motorbikes, actually getting pushed by a paid hand. People were hanging out eating snacks. Sunset was pretty, and after I got some “lunch/dinner” at a beachside stall, which gave me some rolls and tomato sauce with paneer. The Queen’s Necklace really was gorgeous lit up at night. (pics: man asleep on the edge of the sea wall's wave breakers, Chowpatty Beach a bit before sunset, child being pushed around on an electric 4 wheeler that doesn't work by a beach worker, Queen's Necklace and pedestrians at night)

Back at the hotel, Uri and went out and got dinner, roaming the streets again. We ended up getting an omelet on the street. Afterwards, we went to a juice stall, and I tried out carrot juice…eh.

55th-2nd on bus to Udaipur 9/18

I woke up, had breakfast in the room and headed out to the train station to take the suburban train to the bus stop. This was my first time really booking a bus outside of Bangladesh or Nepal. In those places, the bus ticket we got gave us assigned seats. This one did not, I was worried.
Walking to the train I got sweaty carrying my bag. Didn’t take a taxi or a bus, should’ve. Arrived at the bus counter, and waited for a bus with the guy who sold me a ticket. Where was the bus? It was coming he said. Just a tad late. Finally it arrived and they determined where I’d sit, my “assigned seat.” I had asked to be by a window, but I was given an aisle seat. Little did I know this was a blessing.
This bus had sleeper bunks for people, but I had one of the twelve seats in back, which were nestled underneath some bunks. The people above us got sick from the bus jolting, and vomited out the window. Luckily most people closed their windows in time when they saw the vomit coming, but if I had been there I doubt I would’ve seen, so luckily I was on the aisle.
The bathroom was horrible. I wished it wasn’t even installed on the bus. It smelled, and sitting near the back, it was really bad. Every time someone opened the door to go in, the stench crept out. I finally went back at some point to pee, and I saw why it was so bad. For all I could tell, there was no outlet for the pee to be dispensed. You just seemed to pee on the floor, it was not clear whether there was a small hole for it to go out. Felt like I was standing in a pool of urine. I used it anyway, and got out and disgustedly walked back to my seat. The man next to me did not smell to great either, so I was trapped between that smell and the bathroom smell.

Still, the ride was pretty, mountains were green and lush. We drove out of the city for two hours before the high-rises disappeared. Really cool to see all Mumbai stretch on forever. (pics: northern parts of Mumbai, tall apartment buildings still can be seen two hours outside of the city center)

At a toll plaza, there was a bunch of cows blocking a toll lane.

Somewhere north of Mumbai, for a 2 mile stretch, our bus decided to drive on the other side of the divided highway. We had crossed the road to use a gas station, but it was out of gas. So because there was no convenient way to cross back through the concrete barrier, our bus drove down the opposite side. It was horrifying. I covered my eyes. Cars and trucks honked at us as they flew by in the other direction. No one expected us to be there. And we didn’t do it slow either, we were cruising. All other vehicles had to swerve quickly into the other lane of their two-land southbound highway. Finally there was a gap in the concrete barrier and we crossed back over to our side.

It started raining at times, and we had to close the windows, that did not help the smell one bit. A lot of the rain was dripping inside, splattering on those at the window seats, another good reason I had the aisle. Then the water coming inside started gathering and pooling throughout the bus. It was then that I picked up by small backpack and kept it on my lap the rest of the time. I’m glad my other bag is a dry bag.

We stopped for “dinner” and a bathroom break. I didn’t want to eat a real dinner as I was afraid of upsetting my stomach. Instead I got some biscuits and chips, and a bit more water. It was pouring, and everyone had to walk through muddy water to get to/from the bus. So inside the bus it became similar. But this did not stop the fifteen men who would board the bus at this stop to sit in the aisle! Now, despite all the water pooling, the smells, and the closed windows, we had fifteen guys sitting/sleeping in the aisle. For those near the front, it made it impossible to go to the back bathroom, perhaps a good thing. (pic: fifteen men who boarded the bus in the evening and spent the night in the aisle)

We are traveling on the new Indian superhighway system. But it’s still under construction at points, especially in places they are building flyovers. What our bus decided to do in one situation where traffic was horrendous, somewhere outside of Ahmedabad, was too try out the back roads of Gujarat. This wasn’t very successful at all. These double decker buses were not suited for those small lanes. In the rain, it was just an utter disaster. At some point our driver realized his shortcut idea had not worked. We had to make many U-Turns just to get out of it all, and it wasted about 1 hour of our time. I really can’t tell where we went, it was so dark. Somehow we got back to the highway, and then again, sat in the same traffic.

I slept with my backpack on my chest. In the middle of the night, as I wasn’t really ever fully sleeping, I saw a man suiting in the aisle drinking a bottle of water…my water! In my worst Hindi possible I told him that was my bottle…luckily he understood my fake Hindi (I was tired, I probably just spoke Bengali.) He put it down, but it was still ¼ empty.

55th-3rd in Udaipur 9/19

We arrived several hours later than we were supposed to thanks to our nighttime turnaround, and the rain. By the time the sun was up, we were in Rajasthan, and there was desert all around. The road was emptier here, and rolled through the hills gently.

One funny thing I saw was a man collecting the flowers off of the bushes in the middle of the highway. I assume he has called “dibbs” on those from the highway authority. (pic: man stealing the flowers on the bushes in the highway median barrier)

Arriving in Udaipur, I got off the bus and booked my ticket for that night to go to Jodhpur. That done, I got a hotel room for the day to shower and leave my things.
I started walking towards the city, ignoring the catcalls of the passing by autorickshaws. It was two kilometers into the city, not too bad for a walk. The streets got narrower as I got closer in. Alleys began shooting off here and there. (pic: alley in Udaipur shooting off from the main street)

I was looking to get inside the City Palace, but first take a ride on the lake in a boat. But the lake was very low, and someone I asked said it would not be possible to ride out unless I was going to the hotel in the middle.
I sat on the side of the lake in a worn out stone pagoda; I waved hello to the other guys hanging out in a pagoda nearby. I sat and read Angels and Demons. Soon two high school students were using my pagoda as well to have a post-school cigarette. They asked me not to tell their parents, I promised I wouldn’t. We chatted about their school and my travels. They left and soon it started to rain. I stayed underneath avoiding where the rain was coming in. It created a neat haze over the lake. (pics: Lake Palace in the middle of Udaipur's lake, myself reading in my pagoda with the Lake Palace in the background, two high school boys who used the pagoda I was in as an afterschool smoking spot, it started to rain and all the men in the pagoda next to me were huddled underneath)

I had lunch at a rooftop restaurant, and I picked a good one because it seemed to be the highest around. Could see the whole lake and nearby hills, some with palaces on top. Lunch was incredibly good; I wolfed down the curries they gave me. (pics: Udaipur and the hills beyond (some with palaces on top), the two palaces on the lake in Udaipur)

I had not realized the City Palace was going to close so soon and had to rush from lunch to even guarantee myself an hour inside. It is one of the largest palaces in India, and I didn’t want to miss it. I hired a tour guide as I felt I would not be able to appreciate the place as much without knowing its history. He was worth it. He explained stories of the royal family and how it related to the palace. We made it through the tour without staying too late. One of the kings who used to live there was paralyzed, so a lot of artifacts are from his era, with toilets and chairs built especially for him. It was neat to see pictures of the current maharaja’s family. (pic: myself in front of Udaipur's City Palace)

At sunset, I headed down to the lake to watch. The colors of the city as it set were glowing. Many others, locals and tourists, were there watching it too. Stayed until the Lake Palace lights came on, and then walked back into town. (pics: street heading down to the waterside at sunset, palaces on the lakes at sunset, sunset over Udaipur, Lake Palace lit up at night)

I stopped at a Hindu temple which was alive with noise from prayer, and was lit up. Sat and watched the activities. (pics: Hindu temple lit up at night from the street level, just outside the Hindu Temple's main entrance as it was lit up)

I walked back to the hotel, showered again. Got some snacks for the next bus. Got on the bus with no issues, and had a decent seat. Actually slept. Much better than the last ride.

55th-4th in Jodhpur 9/20

At some point at night we made a 15 minute stop for food. All I remember is that there was a music program on TV with a mustachioed cartoonish looking singer and his dancing girlfriend. They were acting out some drama. The song never ended, it had started before we arrived and was still going strong when I left. I can still picture the video weeks later.

I arrived very early in the morning, around 4:30am. The hotel owner had warned me not to let someone scam me when I arrived, apparent it’s really bad in Jodhpur. I found a taxi and told him to take me to the hotel, and prayed it would be the right one. Luckily, there was no silly business, and I arrived just fine. The owner came out to greet me. I showered, and went back to bed for a few hours.

After waking up, I went around and bought some soap I needed and detergent. I washed my clothes in the bathroom, and then prepared for my day.

My goal for the day was Mehrangarh Fort atop the hill, anything after that would just be a bonus. I climbed up through the city streets approaching the fort. They got very steep. The blue of the city was already apparent. I had been looking forward to seeing this a long time. I presented on cities of color in my junior year of college. As I climbed up the mountain, I kept looking back at the streets bustling below me, because I could see more and more of the city. (pics: narrow streets leading up to the fort, at times the fort was visible from the streets of the Blue City below)

I reached the entrance to the fort and went to pick up my ticket and the complimentary audio tour, which the guide books say is great. But they told me I needed a Rs2000 deposit to reserve one, or my license or passport. I had none of those. I was upset because I had just climbed all the way up. After a few minutes of begging they finally conceded to give me one for Rs1000 deposit. Kind of them.
The palace was beautiful, and the audio tour did help explain what I was looking at. I, however, liked the views of Jodhpur much more, and to finally see the blue color which gives the city its fame. I ate lunch there, and the food was actually decently priced. (pics: exterior of Mehrangarh Fort up close, myself in one of the many courtyards in the palace, the exterior of the fort was ornately carved, one of the many royal meeting rooms in the palace, the linealogy of the kings who have ruled in Jodhpur, the wide exterior wall that is walkable around most of the palace)

I sat on the edge of the fort and read my book, and took lots of photos looking out over the city below. (pics: the Blue City stretches out from the palace in all directions, myself looking out over the side of the fort's wall, looking directly on the network of streets below, myself and the Blue City)

After leaving the fort, I meandered the city streets aimlessly, just trying to see what I’d see. While on my walk, lots of kids came up to me to say “Hello”. (pics: man riding through the streets of Jodhpur with propane tanks strapped to his bike, one of many blue streets in Jodhpur)

I came upon a temple built atop a rock spire. I had seen it from the distance, and had wondered what it was. Some guys saw me looking at it, and asked if I wanted to go up. Of course I would. So two of them brought me to it, unlocked the gate, and we climbed up. The view over the city and towards the fort was nice, but they ruined it by asking for a donation of Rs 500, a ridiculous amount. At first I pretended I didn’t hear them, but they asked again a few minutes later, and this time I told them they were ridiculous. They really wanted US money, but I had none of that either. So beyond my Indian rupees I had only my Bangladeshi Taka. That didn’t suffice for them. I climbed down, and at the bottom they asked again for the money. I said sure I’ll give Rs10 and I’ll put it in the donation box. Nope they wanted it in their hands. I refused, and put in the box. This angered them and they went and locked the gate, saying they wouldn’t open it until I gave them more money. Fine I said, I’ll stay in here all day, I have nothing else to do. I finally raised my voice and yelled how they can’t expect Rs 500 from me for something they offered to do. When they realized I wasn’t budging, they settled that I should give them my Bangladeshi Taka. Sure I said, and handed them over the Tk5 and Tk1 coins I had. I don’t think they knew how little those were worth. (pics: temple on top of a rock spire, writing on the rock "Jai baba ri" spire midway up and the city in the back ground, the view from the top of the ladder to Jodhpur's fort, the two guys who insisted I pay them Rs 500 for seeing the temple on the rock spire's ladder)

I found the city gate and climbed onto the city wall. One guy said I couldn’t go up there, another insisted I could. I listened to second guy. I roamed some more and came upon the central square with the clocktower. I found a spice shop and was called in by the owner. Although I wasn’t going to buy anything, I sat down to talk anyway. I think they realized I wasn’t buying. I stayed for about an hour, and ended up talking politics. (pics: one of the city gates in the city wall, the fort seen from the top of the city wall, the clocktower in the middle of Jodhpur's Blue City)

I went to dinner at some hotel, and the hotel owner told me he had just opened the place. I asked why there were so many pictures of himself on the wall, and he said he just wrapped up his career as a model, and those were his many photos shoots. He had a big bushy mustache and looked like a stereotypical old Bollywood good guy actor. He did not lack in pride. Bad part of the restaurant was sitting down and two other guys leaving telling me “the pasta is not good” just after I’d ordered. (pic: view over a part of Jodhpur towards the fort from where I ate dinner in the evening)

55th-5th on train to Bikaner 9/21

Although I would’ve liked to have a night train to Bikaner, it just wasn’t possible. So I had booked a day train from Jodhpur to get me in to Bikaner by the afternoon. My camel safari was the next day, and I could use today to relax.

I got on the train and no one was on it. Everyone had seemed to get off at Jodhpur, despite the train continuing on another 6 hours. I sat down and had a whole compartment to myself.
The desert passing by was pretty incredible. It was the least dense I’d seen in India. On the train I finished Angels and Demons (pics: myself in the empty train cabin, the Rajasthan desert as our train drove past, our train passing through the desert, a little boy selling ice cream on an empty desert road)

Apparently on my train as well was the winner of a recent Indian Idol-like contest. He is from Bikaner. When we arrived, a huge crowd was waiting for him, and put garlands around his neck. They carried him on their shoulders and brought him to a waiting car. Huge crowds cheered him, and TV crews filmed his arrival. They drove off in song. That night on TV I saw the footage from his arrival. (pics: Bikaner welcoming home their superstar at the train station, footage on TV that evening)

Arriving at the guesthouse, I was welcomed by the Camel Man’s wife. She was very friendly, but was the deliverer of bad news that no one had signed up for my tour except me, meaning I have to pay an extra Rs 400 to go, to cover costs. I was upset that I would be alone, and that I’d have to pay money for that, but decided to go anyway, as I’d never have a chance at this again.

To use the internet at a store nearby, I had to give my passport. They said it is because they are worried about terrorists, due to recent terrorist attacks in India, and they are doing this region wide to curb terrorist activities.

55th-6th in Bikaner 9/22

Today was the camel ride and although I’d be going alone, I was very excited for it. After a breakfast where I even got to have pomegranate, I headed out by jeep to the camels. My guide was there, and he would be with me all day. He spoke limited English, so it ended up being quite quiet. But that was okay.

The desert itself was very quiet, not even any wind. I was surprised at the lack of noise. The silence at times was really deafening, I could hear it ringing in my ears. I realized that I should have worn long pants on the camel, as I got several ticks while riding on it and had to flick those off. We walked quietly through the desert. Stopped so the camel and the guide could get more water. Saw a peacock in a tree. (pics: my typical view from the top of the camel, myself on my camel during the tour, shadown of myself and the camel, camels grazing on the side of the path)

For lunch my guesthouse had prepared a lunch and put it in a metal stacked lunchbox, the typical system of South Asia, and my first time eating with one. It was tasty, but I surely couldn’t eat it all. My guide gave me some of his lunch, which was spicy lady’s fingers, but wasn’t as spicy as he claimed. We sat there under a tree in the heat of the day resting. Drank lots of water. We were quite a way away from the camel which he had let roam and eat, with a rope around its front legs so it can’t walk fast or far. Some cow herder came by and sat with us for awhile and chatted with my guide, not sure if they knew each other.
We napped there under the tree. I only realize now that he could’ve left me there napping in the middle of the desert.

When we awoke, he went off to get our camel. All of a sudden I see him running far far away. After a minute or so I realize he can’t find it. I see him going out into the distance, but I don’t see a thing. He’s looking back and forth. Uh oh. I went and helped look in the other direction, but didn’t see a thing. Finally I see him following a pack of camels, pelting one, ours, with stones. I could tell he was cursing at it, or at least I would be. Finally after he managed to get our camel away from the pack, he grabbed it by its rope and brought it back. He told me that the camel had found “some camel friends” and went to hang out. He seemed humorous but still pissed. Doesn’t happen every time he said. (pics: my guide (in the red circle) running off into the distance to find the camel, my guide and the camel after he recaptured it)

Overall I felt the camel walked slower than I thought it would. It was quite hot all day long, and in the silence I had lots of time to think. A storm approached later, and the wind picked up. Luckily it never rained.

I showered in the guesthouse’s owner’s shower, and waited until it was time to leave for the train. Talked to the wife again, she wanted me to buy dinner but I was out of money. At the train station I sought out some snacks on the nearby main road, and waited. Some young boy came to talk to me, about high school age. He spoke to me in Hindi and I did my best to understand. We looked at the train list and he pointed out there were other foreigners on the train. Low and behold, I was sharing a cabin with them. They were a group of Spaniards, and we talked for about an hour before finally settling into our bunks. I was off to my last stop of Jaipur

55th-7th in Jaipur 9/23

The train arrived at about 6 AM. We got off and us foreigners were hassled nonstop about hotels. I started walking out of the station area and into the city to find a hotel. Meanwhile the touts from the platform followed me. One tout asked where I come from, and I said Bangladesh. Doubting me, he said he was also from Bangladesh. But his demeanor changed when I believed him and excitedly in Bengali asked him from which district. We instantly started talking about Bangladesh, alienating all the Hindi speakers also trailing us. Because he was Bangladeshi, I felt a connection with him, and said I would go to the hotel he wanted to take me to (after bargaining about the price of course.)
The hotel was decent, and I really think that the touts aren’t always trying to scam you, just trying to get hotels not in guidebooks to have a tourist actually show up.

I had a train to catch to Delhi in the evening. I would arrive there, take a taxi to the airport, spend the night there for a few hours, and fly out early back to Kolkata.

After going out and unsuccessfully finding currency exchange, I ate breakfast and checked my email. Got some bad news, my flight from Delhi to Kolkata at 5 AM tomorrow on Indigo Airlines was cancelled, and they had put me on the evening flight. Didn’t know what to do. I would miss my bus back to Bangladesh in Kolkata by several hours!

I was very nervous that I may not get a ticket on another flight, but I decided my best option would be to buy a new ticket on another budget airline when I arrived at Delhi airport at night. I would have to deal with having to buying a second ticket and losing money. With that goal, I set out to exchange some money again and go see the city. This was not a good situation.

In my walk, I passed by all the airline booking offices. I saw the IndiGo one, so I went in and asked if my flight could be refunded because I can’t take it. The guy said they don’t handle Indigo anymore, just hadn’t taken the sign down yet. Oy vey. He refused to help or answer my questions.
Frustrated, I went downstairs to exchange, and the exchange guy informed me that he also sells plane tickets. I asked if he could help and he set to work trying to solve my situation. He called IndiGo for me, and found out I can be refunded because they caused the issue. Together we canceled it, and looked for a replacement flight which he could help book. We found a flight on JetLite, but he needed both my passport and cash to get it. I had neither on me as I had not intended to be doing this so quickly.
It took me 30 minutes to go back to my hotel, get these, and come back. He told me where I could find an ATM, but when I looked it wasn’t there. He sent his friend with me, and we found it. But it wouldn’t take my card. Had to find another. It worked. We went back to buy the ticket. He went to the website, and uh oh, the price had gone up 30% in those 40 minutes. I was stunned. I had had this all figured out, and was not going to lose any money on it all, and now in those 40 min since we had seen the ticket, the price had gone up. I was upset. Berated myself for not just buying the ticket online when I had gone back to my hotel. I had come back to him to buy because he’d been so nice before. I had to go out and get more money. But now that ATM was out of cash. Searched for another and it took two tries before I found one that took my card.
Now we tried booking with the more expensive price, but it didn’t work. JetLite was not functioning online.
We decided a change in plan was necessary. We scrapped the idea of going back to Delhi, and looked into direct flights from Jaipur to Kolkata. There was one the next morning for not too much more money. We went with it. We bought it. I would be missing my 10 AM bus in Kolkata, and would have to try and get a new ticket on the last bus of the day at 1 PM over the phone. As well I’d have to cancel my train ticket to Delhi or be out 700 rupees.
I was angry. My last day in India and all my plans had toppled horribly. In hindsight, I should not have gone back to his office, and just bought the ticket online. It could’ve been so much easier.

I grabbed an autorickshaw and went to go cancel the train ticket. My ticket said I had to arrive 4 hours beforehand to cancel, and I was going to make it by a few minutes. There was a roadblock for construction, so I had to get out and walk the rest of the way. Now I’d be late. At the station, they told me something different. I could only cancel after 4pm, and it was only 2 PM. Had to wait. It seemed I would never actually get to see Jaipur now. I tried one more option, the foreign tourist desk, but they only directed me back to the place that told me 4 o’ clock. In the meantime, I called the bus company in Kolkata and asked them change my ticket to the 1 PM bus for tomorrow. Whether they understood me or not I didn’t know. It was a big question mark. I would find out tomorrow for sure if they’d understood who I really was and if they’d changed it.
This whole time at the train station I was hassled by autorickshaw and taxi drivers. Frustrated, at 3:30 I went back to cancel the train ticket, and this time they let me. Different guy at the desk. Got 75% of my ticket price back.

Now with the headaches over, I was ready to finally see Jaipur. Having limited time, I made a goal to just see Jantar Mantar, ancient observatory in Jaipur. Thought it was completely unique to the city. Guide book said it looked like you were in Alice in Wonderland. The authors were right.
This observatory is from the Mughal period, built in the 1700s. It has the largest sundial in the world. It was incredible how big the place was, and the size of the equipment too. I was blown away. The work they performed there involved such complex calculations and measurements of the heavens. Really made me appreciate what was possible with trigonometry and a strong grasp of math. Oh, and an a strong love of astrology.
I had a guide give me the 30 minute tour. I couldn’t imagine seeing the place without it. Nothing would make sense. He was incredibly knowledgeable about the whole place, and was able to explain the tough concepts, and answer my detailed questions. Many times I had him repeat his explanations so I could understand.
Apparently I also had come to Jantar Mantar on the autumn solstice. What that meant is that some of the equipment, which act differently on the solstice, were doing as such. One piece of equipment is oriented in such a way that amongst other information it tells the angle of the sun, but today both sides were in shadow because the sun is between the two hemispheres. 363 days a year the equipment can be used, but today, the dual sided instrument was completely in shadow, the sun’s rays perfectly missing it. I felt pretty lucky to come here on this rare day. I felt my friend Saket should come here, he would love it. (pics: one of the many astronomical devices at Jaipur's Jantar Mantar, myself in front of the largest sundial in the world, Jantar Mantar's many astronoical devices look like a fantasy land, this one did not work on the day I was there as the sun does not shine on either side during the solstice...the day I went)

I was hoping to catch good views of Jaipur, famous for being the Pink City (Also from my junior year of college report) but there was no place to really see it like there was in Jodhpur. I tried a nice rooftop restaurant for a good view, and to treat myself to a late lunch. No views, you could tell it was pink, but couldn’t appreciate it. I also couldn’t decide between the Mughlai biryani and the pizza, so I got both. (pics: after the stressful I treated myself to a good meal, the Pink City of Jaipur...but I could not find a good place to view pink color at its best)

I rode a local bus back to my part of town. It was difficult riding because I couldn’t speak Hindi to the conductor. Stuffed from the late lunch, I ate only a small dinner. Before going to bed I arranged for an autorickshaw to come pick me up in the morning.

Week 54: Showing off Bangladesh in Chennai (seeing the three biggest cities not named New Delhi)

noreply@blogger.com (Donny) — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 00:54:00 +0000

54th-1st in Kolkata 9/10

Last night was not so much fun, I was having stomach issues. This led to me not eating very much during the day. Despite still being queasy this morning, I still headed out to see the Victoria Memorial. I had seen it last night lit up, but it was much more spectacular when I saw it in the daylight today.

The memorial was gorgeous, startling. Inside I felt queasy and had to sit down several times. Light headed and sick. But I enjoyed the exhibits very much, a very well done museum. One of my favorite parts of the museum was the initiatives the British made to learn Bengali. They wrote the first Bengali-English dictionary. (pics: Victoria Memoria and the reflecting pool, Victoria Memorial in Kolkata)

A great surprise was to meet the family again from the ticket booking office. I saw them outside the museum, and we had a photo session on the steps, and then down at the bench in the gardens. The little girl stole my camera, and her father’s camera, and tested both out while I chatted with her dad. (pics: myself and my friend, the girl and her father, the girl took this photo of her father and I, stealing her father's camera)

On the way to the airport, there was a major jam, and the hot taxi did not make me feel any better. While waiting for the airplane, I started feeling increasing nausea. Got on the plane, and then just as we left the gate, and came to the end of the runway, I threw up. I had to use two airplane bags. It was the worst moment of all my time in Asia. I had never felt so horrible. However the place it ended up happening was quite good for storytelling. I had a schedule to keep though, and I was not stalling in Kolkata by recovering. It needed to plow through, and just deal with it. Its times like these that I thank my rowing career, as I feel it taught me to feel uncomfortable all the time in all types of situations. So this was just one more thing to get through.
I had asked the steward earlier if I could have a blanket, but as this was Spice Air, a budget airline (one of the many in India), they had none. Well after I threw up, I held the airplane bags in front of me until the plane had reached altitude, and I could unbuckle and carry the bags to the bathroom and dump them out. The stewardess back there saw me, shivering and carrying my bags. She offered me one of the sportcoats that the stewardesses wear as part of their uniform. I sat in the back row of the airplane, as it was a bit warmer from the front, and shivered. She then brought me another sportcoat of her coworker, and I wrapped that over my head. She brought me hot tea which she delivered under a napkin. Explained that they don’t offer hot beverages on the plane although they can still make them, and she had made it secretly. Lastly she brought me a tomato sandwich for free which would typically have to be bought. So there I sat, huddled under bright red Spice Jet women’s sportcoats, nibbling a sandwich and sipping a tea. I didn’t throw up again, but I still felt sick.

Arriving in Chennai, as our plane had left a bit late, I was worried I might miss my train, leaving in the nighttime to Tiruchirappalli. When I landed, despite my sickness, I hurried to baggage claim, and went to the prepaid taxi counter. They said the train station was 45 minutes away, and I still had time to make it. Got in the taxi, we were off, almost across all of Chennai to the train station on the north side of the city.
I got there in time luckily, and found my train car, and got into my seat. The man next to me however told me that the seat I was in was also his, and I had to move. I showed the guy my ticket with the seat number printed on it. He then showed me his with my seat number written in pen on the back of his ticket. I felt I trumped his scribble with my actual ticket, and refused to move. He left the train, and came back insisting again I was in his seat, but I insisted this was my seat. He didn’t speak much English, and I spoke zero Tamil, so we left it at that.
We all arranged our beds just as the train started, unhooking the bunks from the ceiling, and went to bed. As this my first time riding in a train in India, and the lowest class at that, I was nervous about my luggage. The guy across from me sensed this and urged me through hand signals to use my big bag as a pillow. I had already wrapped my backpack around my legs.
Later that night, about an hour into the trip, I was woken up by a train conductor. Standing around him were several other passengers. He had a passenger list in hand, and asked for my ticket. He then told me I was in the wrong bed, and had to move. I was in bed 63, and I was supposed to be in bed 79. Tiredly, and still sick, I moved to a bed a bit down the train, and resettled in. From what I could tell, everyone was getting shifted, but in my tiredness, I might not have realized that it was probably just me. (Postscript: I realized on later trains that they post a passenger list outside of each cabin before the train leaves. On this, any changes in your seat or bed are listed. Thus, I was likely shifted and hadn’t known to check the list beforehand. On a later trip I had also been shifted and checked and then had this epiphany.) (pics: train arriving at the platform in Chennai, three-tiered bunks in second class)

54th-2nd in Tiruchirappalli 9/11

I arrived in Tiruchirappalli just after the sun rose. The train had arrived an hour later than it was supposed to. I had booked a hotel near the train station, and was able to walk there when I arrived. Although a bit expensive, I couldn’t find any other open rooms in the cheaper hotels. When I got in the room I slept for 3 more hours. I ate a banana before going to bed, my first real food since being sick. The later arrival by train had worked out well, because the hotel had a strict 24 hour checkout policy. So by checking in later, I got to check out later the next morning, and avoid paying for an entire second day if I slept past sunrise.

I tried to find some simple lunch to fill my empty stomach. Rice would be perfect. I found a restaurant serving typical South Indian lunches. They brought a variety of small dishes and curries, some spicy and some not, as well as rice and chapatis. I nibbled on what I could, filling up as much as possible. I felt better. (pic: first meal after being sick)

The South Indian languages are intimidating. They are completely different from anything I have encountered as they are not a member Indo-European family of languages. The script as well is unique. I can’t attempt conversation like I do with Hindi or Nepali. Thus it was only English, and some interactions took time.

Finding a bus to go visit the temples was easy, I asked a young guy, and he was waiting for the same bus. We sat next to each other and chatted on the way. I got off first and thanked him.
The Rock Temple was pretty neat, towering over the city on its rock outcropping. Inside there were numerous shrines as you climbed. It was a hard going up, but provided great views of the surrounding city of around a million people. At the top it was very windy. I sat there and watched families play, and one guy came up to me and talked for awhile. We went up together to see the main temple.(pics: looking out over Tiruchirappalli, myself at the top of the Rock Temple, the man who befriended me at the top of the Rock Temple, the peak of the Rock Temple, inside the stairwell of the Rock Temple, a temple on the way to the summit)

I saw one of the funniest things I have seen written on a sign. This one said that said the rock the temple was built atop was 3500 billion years old, which makes it orders of magnitudes older than the universe. (pic: I found something older than the universe!)

From the Rock Temple I headed to Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple, the largest temple in India! I was very excited to see the South Indian Hindu temples after learning about them in my architecture classes in college. Their many walls that have giant gopurams, which are the gates located in the center of the walls, are gorgeously decorated and usually decrease in size as you reach the center. I remember seeing photos of them lined up in my textbooks. The temple has seven walls, and a total of 21 gopurams. It was built in the 12th century. I noticed that some of its sandstone walls are eroding. I spent a lot of time here, taking it all in slowly, and sitting down and observing the activities.
You’re allowed to go on the roof of one of the walls for a small price, I went up, and was accompanied by the worker who was to escort you. He gave some information, and I asked some questions while I stood and took photos. He offered to give me a tour of the inner areas as you cannot go inside without a tour guide. I declined; it cost 300 Rupees. But he still followed me when I went downstairs again. And kept trying to show me things. Finally I asked if I needed him around to see the temple, beside the inside. He said “no” but insisted the inside was the best part, and you need a guide. Well I explained how I had no interest to go into the middle of the temple for a price. He was shocked that I had no interest, and looked appalled. He stormed off, then stormed back demanding that I give him some money for “leading him on.” I told him I never led him on, that he followed me, and I told him I didn’t want a tour. Still he stuck his hand out, so I put in 5 Rupees, as a small tip for “wasting his time on me.” He got angry, ran over to a beggar, and put it in the beggar’s hand and yelled to me “I am not a beggar, this is a beggar’s wage!” I have to say I didn’t enjoy his attempt at a tour anyway. He only wanted to show off all the sexual artwork on the temple, and I was turned off by his assumption that this was all I would be interested in.
Walking around for awhile was fun. I even ran into an elephant at one point. Felt I almost got trampled. (pics: largest gopuram at Sri Ranganathaswamy Temple, gopuram on second inner wall and the shops that make up the space in between the walls of the temple, closeup of a colorful gopuram, gopurams lined up in a row as seen from the top of the third wall, almost getting trampled by an elephant as it turned a corner, the elephant in front of the only white gopuram, myself within the fifth wall of the temple)

I still wasn’t feeling 100%, but got some popcorn as a snack and an apple juice.

I took the bus back, and tried looking around for an internet café. Then someone shouted to me. I couldn’t believe it. It was the Bangladeshi guys from the train and cell phone store doing business in India for a week. This is the third time we’ve seen each other, and now hundreds of miles from Kolkata where we got off the train. It was incredible. We chatted for an hour or more, and had tea. Then we headed for a light dinner. They wanted light food as they had a bus back to Chennai, and I was still a bit sick. It was great to see them. Made me feel much better. (pic: myself and the Bangladeshi men who I ran into many times all over India)

In the evening at my hotel I spent some time practicing my presentation that I have to deliver in two days at the conference.

54th-3rd in Chennai 9/12

I felt a lot better this morning, and had a breakfast of toast and eggs at the hotel after checking out after my 24 hours were up. I walked to the train station, and boarded for my trip to Chennai. On the five hour ride, I practiced my speech every twenty minutes, and worked on how to explain all my ideas. After arriving in Chennai, I took a CNG to the IIT-Madras campus gate. From there I was able to catch a bus to where the conference was. The campus was enormous, and it is a good thing the bus was there, it would have been way too far to walk. I realized later how fortunate I was to get the bus (crowded) because it ran so sporadically.
I had some lunch at a coffee shop chain on campus near the bookstore, and then marveled at the monkeys running around. The wooded campus used to be part of the nearby national park, and it certainly still maintains that look. (pics: IIT-Madras's campus used to be part of a national park, IIT-Madras and its dense foilage)

I was here for the International Conference on Best Practices to Relieve Congestion on Urban Streets in Developing Countries, which was sponsored both by Fulbright (because a Fulbright Senior Scholar was hosting it at IIT-Madras) and the World Bank. I had submitted a paper to it at the advice of my former professor Dr. Stone.

I checked in at the guesthouse and then was received by undergraduate students (older than me) to bring me to the academic building we would have the conference at. I checked in there as well, and joined a room full of presenters conversing. I was introduced by the conference organizer who I had emailed with over the past two months. He publicly commented to the group how loose my pants looked due to the amount of weight I’ve lost. (pic: the hall my conference was held in at IIT-Madras)

I talked with two Bangladeshi women who had done studies on women riders of buses in Dhaka. Most of the Bangladesh presenters are talking about buses! I also met a young lecturer from Hyderabad, and he remained a close acquaintance all weekend; we shared a few meals together. I didn’t eat tonight much as my stomach is still readjusting.
While waiting to check my gmail later, I got to talk to a representative from Ghana. He knew NC State because we send students to his campus for study abroad.

I called my Dad to wish him a happy birthday.

Later that night, I unexpectedly gained a roommate. I was not aware I was sharing my room, and apparently neither was he. But we were both okay with it. He was a civil engineer from Kolkata, so it was fun to talk about Bengal with him.

54th-4th in Chennai 9/13

Today was the real first day of the conference. And the day I would give my presentation. I was nervous and excited all day. Hard to focus on the presentations before me because of that, but I was still attentive. (pic: main lecture hall of the conference)

I’d give my presentation at B-. I felt I might’ve talked too quick. But mostly it was because the moderator told us all we had 5 minutes less each to present, because he wanted more time for comments. Well we’d all find out that that meant 5 more minutes for him personally to comment on each of our presentations while everyone was forced to listen. One audience member told me later that this moderator is always “like this.” (pic: myself getting introduced before presenting my research)

Even given short notice on the time restriction, I felt I cut out the necessary things, and gave a good 15 minute presentation. I chose the best parts to focus on.
In the future I think I’d scope my slides a bit more. My future papers and presentations will be better, and this was a good start. I was happy with my talk, I spoke with confidence and excitement.

I enjoyed the conference, but I wish that some of the presenters were not reading straight from their slides! I also found a lot of them overlapped, ending up seeming a bit similar. Topics such as pedestrians and congestion mitigation seemed to find a spot in each talk. As well, many folks gave the same background information. There were a few IIT-Madras students, but mostly graduate level, so I believe I was the youngest person at the conference. Most folks are also here from Chennai or India. This is what international delegates must feel when they come to TRB in Washington DC.

The meals are all buffet style with the best of South Indian cuisine. We all conversed while sitting at tiny tables. Only problem is that the same tablecloths were used for all the meals, so they got very dirty, and became gross to eat on them. Some pretty intense discussions over many transportation topics resulted regardless while we ate. (pic: dining area at the conference)

Before bed, my roommate and I had a long discussion about West Bengal and the current political situation there. As well we touched on the political issues facing India in general, and how the states vote on party lines.

I washed some clothing in the bathroom of my guesthouse. I bought some detergent from a campus store and used the bucket provided.

54th-5th in Chennai 9/14

Today was similar to yesterday, except that I was relaxed without having to give a presentation. I did get to see the moderator who pushed us off the stage yesterday give his own presentation. He had over 100 slides for his presentation today, in just a 20 minute presentation. He was clearly going way over time, and had to get told to hurry up and get off the stage. He became flustered, annoyed, and started skipping 6-7 slides at a time, and kept getting interrupted by his moderator. Then during others presentation, when he asked bizarre questions, he was told to be quiet by the moderators. Another professor said he is always like that.

The last presentation of the day was great and I was glad to have caught it. After this there was a panel discussion. However it did not flow like I was used to. After each member of the panel gave their opening remarks, the whole crowd was invited to give their commentary. People one by one took their turn at the podium and expressed whatever was on their mind. The panel simply sat and watched. At the end, two members of the panel gave closing comments. So, not really a panel discussion, more like an opportunity for everyone to express themselves one more time.

In the afternoon, I saw my two-day-roommate off in his taxi. After the conference was over, and after a final dinner I was back to the hotel. The final dinner was a good chance to give our goodbyes to the people we had met over the weekend. I spent the rest of the night checking internet, or in my room watching TV.

54th-6th on train to Mumbai 9/15

Breakfast was at the guesthouse’s mess hall. Two older couples and I were eating there. Standard South Asian breakfast fare that I can’t recall, just that it was what I’d eaten the last two days.

I was afraid I would miss the train. I had gone out to get the campus bus to the front gate so I could catch an autorickshaw, but the bus did not seem to be coming. A women from the conference recognized me, and told me that it might not come for a long while. My other hope was to get an autorickshaw from here but I had to hope one would come by. I was worried. I can’t miss my train! We saw an autorickshaw pass, and they assured it would have to come back our way. It did but with someone in it. We hailed it anyway, and begged him to take me to the train station after dropping the other guy off. Both the driver and guy agreed, and luckily I was on my way.

I met Shuman, Ayon’s brother-in-law, at the station, with still plenty of time to spare. He is in Chennai working for Standard Chartered bank for three months. We got to stand and chat for about 20 minutes before my train came. He walked me all the way to the train car before saying goodbye, and mine was all the way at the end. It was good to see him for even just a short time. He is the one friend I knew in India at the time. (pics: mix of traffic waiting on the streets of Chennai, Chennai Central train station, Shuman/myself at the train station, Shuman taking photos at the Chennai Central train station)

The train was the nicest I’d booked for myself, as I’d be on it for 27 hours across India. I had a double bunked cabin. Across from me was a married couple, and atop a young guy who never came off his bunk except to use the toilet. Across from me was an Israeli guy, and we chatted for a bit a bit into the ride. We shared a tea, ad he told me about how he was the head of an organization which could be called Adam LeAdam, something he related me as the Israeli Peace Corps. He was the first foreigner I’d talked to on my trip. His top bunk guy was also nice, but didn’t talk to us until the following morning.

Lunch and dinner were pretty much the same on the train. Vegetarian South Indian food. The rotis were cold and uninspiring. I spent the day reading the magazines and books I’d brought form Bangladesh. One was Angel and Demons, the other Stephen Hawking’s A Brief History of Time.

It’s not really possible to roam the Indian trains. The cars are separated as to not allow mixing of the different train classes. I could walk to the end of the AC cars, and that was it. Mostly if I left my bunk I hung out in the doorway of the train and watched the state of Andhra Pradesh fly by. The Eastern Ghats were great to see, as they rose up from the coastline, but the AC windows didn’t allow for good photos, so I had to go to the door and hope it was open for a good shot. (pics: myself hanging out the door of the train, dried up river bed in Andhra Pradesh, train station sign at the surrounding empty landscape, the early hills of the Eastern Ghats)

A man kept coming by our bunks and sitting and talking to me and the husband across. It was quite annoying. Didn’t seem to pick up how no one wanted to chat with him. Yet he told us his life story as we patiently listened.

The bed was comfy, and I slept well.

54th-7th in Mumbai 9/16

When the train passed through the Western Ghats it was morning. They were much more gorgeous than the Eastern. We emerged from the Deccan Plateau through a tunnel and all of a sudden were looking out over the hills as they swept toward the Arabian Sea. They were much greener, and I had my camera out taking tons of pictures. We went from tunnel to tunnel as we made our descent to the coast. At one point the train stopped for 10 minutes, so I jumped off the train, didn’t go far, just for the hell of it. Train made a stop at Pune and half the train left, and more people came on. The Israeli, Uri, and I decided to share the room I’d booked in Mumbai. (pics: train passing through a tunnel, the view as we emerged from a tunnel in the Western Ghats, myself as the train stopped in the Western Ghats, Uri standing beside our train, train passing through tunnels)

After arriving in Mumbai, we found our hotel via taxi, and checked in. The place looked empty. Took five minutes until a staff person even showed up. But the room and toilets were nice, good choice. (pics: Victoria Terminal in Mumbai, streets and traffic mix of downtown Mumbai)

After grabbing a streetside lunch, some sandwich with tons of veggies and cheese for toppings, we found Uri an internet café. I left after that to go explore myself.

I took the suburban trains in Mumbai to go up to Mumbai Central were you can buy bus tickets out of town. I was purchasing one for two days from now to go to Udaipur. The train got crowded, but not to the point I thought it’d be. You did have to expect which side of the train you would disembark as side the platform would was different for each station. I had to ask someone where my stop would be, luckily they knew. If you didn’t expect it, you’d be stuck on the wrong side when the train arrived, and would have to squeeze through the entire crowd before the train left…impossible. No one checked tickets on the train, so I realized I may or may not have to buy one. I did see a fight, some old guy fought a young guy when he felt he was in the way as he got on the train. (pics: packed train at a station on the Mumbai suburban train line, inside the crowded Mumbai trains)

I bought the bus ticket to Udaipur, worrying the whole time it could be a scam.
I then roamed the neighborhoods around the area, trying to see the fancy homes of the city and the rich areas. Saw a Porsche dealer. Lots of high rises, and I was taking pictures of those. I stopped by the home that Gandhi used to stay at when he came to Mumbai. It’s a museum now, with photos of his time there and dioramas of his life. Neat after I just finished reading all about him in the book Freedom at Midnight. (pics: Gandhi talking to Rabindranath Tagore...in diorama form, Gandhi's room in the house he stayed in Mumbai, finally found Gatorade and placed it amongst some of the Mumbai skyscrapers, flyover in Mumbai with new buildings going up in the background)

I was roaming around without any money, a tragedy in the nicest part of town (or a blessing?) I hadn’t exchanged more money yet, and couldn’t find an exchanger. It started to rain while I was still walking around. I had my umbrella, but already was soaked. Got lost going in a circle. Then thought I’d found a neat way out of it all, and ended going in a circle again! Three times I showed up at the same intersection. I was drenched. Looked for a bus to take me back, as the train station was far. Ended up taking a bus that someone said would take me back to a train station. Bus was jammed and everyone was wet. At the train, couldn’t buy a ticket on the platform, so just boarded, but again, no one checking tickets. (pics: Porsche dealer in Mumbai, it starts to rain at Kemps Corner in Mumbai while I'm walking, its starts to pour and I get soaked in one of the nicest part of Mumbai)

Uri and I went to dinner together. There he told me more about his program because I asked him lots of questions. Dinner was at a place which looked to be a Mumbai chain restaurant. We walked around town after that in the dark and Uri had a fun time joking with locals. Promised some food stall guy we’d come back for diner tomorrow.

Week 53: Fasting for Ramadan, heading to India, wrapping up in Bangladesh

noreply@blogger.com (Donny) — Fri, 07 Nov 2008 04:30:00 +0000

53rd-1st in Dhaka 9/3

Went by BUET today to drop off the bumper stickers to Dr. Ali, Shegufta, and Dr. Rahman. I had a final chat with Dr. Ali and thanked him profusely for helping me get here in the first place. Shegufta was ecstatic to get the bumper stickers, and I gave her enough to give to all her friends, including the three guys who helped me on the project. I showed Dr. Rahman my presentation and he gave comments on how to improve it for the conference. He had tips for me to prepare for the panel I might be on.After going to BUET I went to New Market to pick up some ties, some books for my upcoming trips (Angels & Demons and A Brief History of Time…two books I would realize later are slightly on the same topic), and to pick up my friend Amit’s tailored shirt which I had ordered, but it was not ready. I also bought some tuxedo shirt buttons, and overpaid for one set.

This evening I headed to Farhan’s for Iftar. It was great that a lot of our friends showed up, even Ishita, who had come to see me for the last time. We had a good time, played guitar and sang songs, and they laughed about their many fond school memories. I wore my new beach shirt tonight. However, here, no one would associate it with a beach shirt, but rather with going to mosque, as it’s made of material usually seen in panjabis that men wear to pray. During my time there, I talked to Ayon about my upcoming trip some more, and what thoughts I had about whether to stay in India longer, or Bangladesh, and how to move around. I think we’ve worked out what I’ll do. (pics: Nipu/Faisal at Farhan's Iftar, Iftar fare at Farhan's, Ayon/Saquib/Farhan, myself/Ishita)

After dinner, I left, and Nipu came with me. I headed toward Malibag, in an effort to take a picture of an “_FC” sign. Well after finding it, he took me by rickshaw to his home, insisting I stay for a bit. I was tired, but obliged, as his home is one of the few I have yet to visit, plus I made him go find the “_FC” sign with me. At his home he gave me some fruit and I talked to his uncle for a bit, and later his mother, before he took me home by his own car.

53rd-2nd in Dhaka 9/4

Today, packing commenced full steam. I had only gotten some done, but it was time to get all my bags, especially those that I won’t need for India and Southeast Asia packed up. This also included packing up a box to ship home via FedEx. My room is an utter mess. (pics: my house is a mess as I empty out the almirah, boxes with stuff to bring to FedEx to ship and a scale to weight them first)

Today I returned the almirah that I borrowed from Ashrafi. I had to arrange a van and a rickshaw to get it there. Was a bit tough as one guy said he would go, and then changed his mind just as I was ready to take down the almirah with him, saying he didn’t have enough time and things to do later in the day. So I found another rickshaw van driver, and he helped me out. I also found two other random rickshaw wallahs to help me out as well, as we needed four sets of hands to bring it down the two flights of stairs. They took over, and I just assisted as directions were spouted in Bengali. We finally got it down, and strapped it to the rickshaw van. The rickshaw wallahs said I could just sit on top, and there was no need for them. So I paid them, more than I’d liked to, and I was on my way with just the van driver and myself. Arriving at Ashrafi’s brother’s place of business, where the almirah would stay, I’d realized I’d left one of the keys for it at home, would have to come back again. But we unloaded quickly, and the van driver took me back home.

I had a fight with my landlord today over the rent. I had told her a month back that another Fulbright would take my spot in October, and thus the landlord didn’t arrange for anyone else to live there. Well recently that Fulbrighter told me she wouldn’t stay here, and when I told the landlord this, they told me I’d have to cover the month of rent they would not be able to get from her now. I was angered and refused, saying they still had one month to arrange a new tenant.

I set out to FedEx to ship my box. I got a rickshaw to bring me there, and watched as the FedEx employees repacked everything I had into an amount of space I didn’t think was possible. I used their special 25kg box which is a set price, and the best value for that weight.

I went to Annita’s for Iftar, and Ayon and Auvi were there too (this is now the 3rd Iftar in a row I’m having with Ayon.) The Iftar food was amazing, I really gulfed it down and would’ve taken more but we had a delicious dinner on the way. We spent the time before and after Iftar looking at photo albums of Annita's family, from her youngest days to the present.
Her grandfather was a great man to meet. I really enjoyed the short conversation we had before he went to mosque. He made me laugh and I enjoyed his insight. (pics: Annita/Ayon at Annita's for Iftar, Auvi/Annita during Iftar, myself/Hridoy/Auvi/Annita looking at pictures from Annita's childhood)

When I got home tonight, I dropped in to the flat of the guys’ downstairs. They offhandedly invited me to Sehri tomorrow morning, so I told them I’d come. Would give me a chance to finally to do a real fast for Ramadan. What had been holding me back up until now was that I didn’t have anywhere to eat for Sehri.

53rd-3rd in Dhaka 9/5

Today is one year in Bangladesh.

When I showed up downstairs this morning at 4 AM for Sehri, it was pretty clear the guys had not expected me to show up. They were surprised to say the least, and rushed to ready me a plate of rice, mashed potatoes, and fried potatoes. It was neat to see what they ate, on their limited student budgets, in order to last the day. No one seemed tired, and we talked even after we were done eating.

I finally decided how I was going to handle the end of my India trip, and I booked a plane ticket on Indigo from Delhi to Kolkata, early enough that I could still catch a bus back from Kolkata to Dhaka. It had gotten more expensive since last night when I had last looked at it, and figured I needed to commit.
I also figured out the final trains I will take in India, and made notes on their seating offers and costs, so I could book it all when I got to Kolkata.

I met up with Toma, and we headed out to get two photos of the “_FC” places I needed to capture, as well as drop off the keys to Ashrafi’s brothers. We had a good time on the buses we took, and chatted a lot. (pics: when your rickshaw is broken this is how you get it to the repair shop, one of the many _FC signs I've colleced and will post a mural later)

This afternoon I had a quick freakout. I thought that I had lost my passport. All day people have been coming in and out off my house to look at it, now that the landlord has put it on the market, and usually in groups of two and three. They’re always accompanied by the landlady or their son-in-law. Well one time I was discussing something with the son-in-law and didn’t watch the visitors. They left, and about an hour later I realized I couldn’t find my passport. Or my credit card! Freaked out. I thought it was gone, stolen by the visitors. Ran downstairs to my landlord and told them what I thought had happened. Ran back up, and soon my landlady arrived telling me to calm down, assuring me it’d be okay. We looked more, but couldn’t find it. I was upset, hysterical, knowing I had to leave the country in a few days…and both items were critical to that. I was shaking. She tried to comfort me. Meanwhile her whole family came in, and her grandson was playing with everything. I asked if they could leave, as it was just stressing me more. They left, and it was just her and I again. While I was frantic, she slowly looked around. She found it, all of a sudden, she found it. In my thrice over search of my room I had missed a pocket in my luggage, and she had found it and inside was both my credit card and my passport. I had hidden them earlier because of the visitors. I was just on the phone with the US embassy to report it stolen, and hung up. They called back later to ensure that I had actually found it. This evening, I bought my landlady and her family sweets to thank them for dealing with me.

After freaking out over the passport, I rushed to Pizza Hut for what was to be my goodbye dinner and Iftar. I had called Ayon and Farhan freaking out already, and they were relieved when I told them all was okay, and they could proceed to Pizza Hut worry free.
I got there early to reserve a table as the Iftar special days at Pizza Hut get packed. While I waited I filled out postcards to send back home.
Pizza hut was a blast. The all you can eat pizza was amazing, I had 8 slices, and some guys hit 9 and 10. Some people at other tables looked to top 20, but they usually leave the crusts behind. A nauseating, but fun, way to end my fast. I had kept the fast of Ramadan all day long, not eating or drinking a thing. It wasn’t so bad. But pizza is a hard way to fill your stomach after fasting. I will do it again tomorrow, same thing.
I gave gifts to all my friends, a small thing for each of them. Bangladeshi flag patches, BUET bumper stickers, books, and baseball and football cards. It was tough to say goodbye tonight, as I knew for some it’d be the literal last time I was seeing them. (pics: Saquib taking pictures of all the postcards I was writing, Nipu/myself upset at the amount of water we are served to break our fast, Faisal/Ayon and others eating the unlimited pizza at Pizza Hut's Iftar special, Auvi/Ayon/myself/Farhan/Hridoy/Saquib/Opu/Faisal/Nipu at Pizza Hut)

And if anyone is keeping count, this is the fourth night in a row that I’ve had Iftar with Ayon! I sure must like that guy.

53rd-4th in Dhaka 9/6

I got up early again for Sehri today. As the guys knew I was coming, they had made a slightly better meal, including some chicken. We had a great time laughing and joking around, taking photos of each other, and telling funny stories, before heading back to our respective beds. (pics: one of the guys living downstairs eating Sehri (he's the cook too), 4AM Sehri myself/Mehedi/Rabi, the guys who live downstairs during Sehri)

Today I fasted again for Ramadan, it was no harder than yesterday.

I finished my packing today, and everything is set for India and heading home a month later. I sent a second box via FedEx. Had to pay a bit more for the standard box as my stuff was too big for the special rate box. Then they made an error in calculating the price, and I will have to come back later for my refund. I tried to pay by credit card in the first place, and I should’ve known I was in for some trouble when they pulled the credit card machine out from some drawer, actually had to dust it off. Three of them then fumbled around with it, a bit confused on how to work it.

I went over to Farhanaz’s and Diya’s for Iftar. I dropped off the weight scale and my laptop for them to hold on to while I was in India. Don’t want to take any risks with it while I’m gone for so long. Oyon came by, and it was really cool to see him after such a long time. Took some photographs of Farhanaz and her daughter Zara. (pics: Farhanaz/Zara, myself/Farhanaz/Zara)

Sometime in the middle of the night, Mehedi came by and picked up my floor fan, It was really late at night, and I almost thought it was dream.

53rd-5th on train to India 9/7

This morning I set off for India, excited and full of anticipation. All of my planning was about to unfold. Even with a small stomach problem, the ride was fun, and I enjoyed watching the Bangladeshi scenery go by on a very nice train (Indian train in fact.) Because the trains travel twice a week, the Bangladeshi train would be returning today from India, while my train, the Indian one, which spent the night in Bangladesh, was heading back.

What was a highlight for the trip was crossing the Jamuna Bridge, my final time, and this time by train. It felt like we were hanging over the edge, as I could see straight down to the water. (pics: signboard on the Dhaka-Kolkata train, heading over the Jamuna Bridge, looking out over the Jamuna River from the open train door, the drop down to the water from the train door)

The train was pretty much empty, perhaps only 40% filled. I was surprised, and guessed maybe it was because of Ramadan. Talking to some of my fellow passengers, I was told that the train is usually this empty. As explained to me, it is because of the way Bangladeshis get visas for India. In order to travel to India, I was told that they have to enter and leave through the same border post, specified on the visa. So in order to take the train, which runs only Saturday and Sunday, one has to stay all week in India in order to comply with visa regulations. It makes it difficult to take the train, and for this reason ridership is low. But the rumor amongst the passengers is that they might add two more trains a week, making it easier to do this trip on a visa.

The border was kind of neat. The train stopped in these gated off stations, in which we disembarked, processed our visas, and boarded again. There were giant gates across the train tracks, that swung open when the train came up. We had to sit at these stations for a short time even after we finished, as the train is allotted enough time in the train schedule for a full load of passengers, but as we finish quickly, we had to sit and wait and leave on schedule.

I arrived in Kolkata at its new train station, the third largest in the city. A taxi brought me through the new streets by meter to get me to the backpackers area of Sudder Street. At dinner I got to reencounter how much more expensive India is to Bangladesh. I had a simple Bengali meal and it was 50% more than it would cost in Dhaka.

53rd-6th in Kolkata 9/8

The first goal of today was to buy my bus ticket back to Dhaka in 2.5 weeks, and buy all my train tickets for my international travels around the country. First up though was to get a SIM card. I dropped into a hole in the wall mobile store to get the SIM. While there, two guys dropped in and I recognized them from my train ride yesterday. They were Bangladeshi and we all started chatting how we like Dhaka better than Kolkata from what we’ve already seen/experienced (not much.) It was a great time, and since the mobile phone guy was so slow, we had a half hour of conversation. One of the guys was even coming to the US next year to visit his sister in Philadelphia. They had come to India to purchase some machinery for their textile business. (pics: handpulled rickshaws in Kolkata, yellow taxis of Kolkata)

I bought the bus ticket after shopping around three different operators running to Dhaka, all Bangladeshi owned companies. I bought a mid-morning bus at 10am on the 24th, so I could get back to Dhaka that night, and have three full days in Bangladesh. My flight from Delhi gets in at 8am, so I would have no problem making the bus.

I tried to buy my train tickets from an agent, but all the trains, except for the foreigner tickets, were filled. So I’d have to go to the train office to book them directly. I was nervous that the trains were entirely sold out, and I’d be stuck in places longer or shorter than I wanted, and causing havoc on my schedule
At the train ticket booking office, there was to be a counter only for foreigners, and sure enough, there were crowded lines for all other windows except the foreigner line. I was able to get all six of my train tickets, at that one counter, for all over the country at different times in the next 2.5 weeks. The only train ticket I had to get that I would not have preferred was for my first train trip, where I had to buy the lowest class sleeping cabin as that was all that was left. While there, a little girl and her father and mother were also getting tickets. They were Bangladeshi and the girl had a conversation with me while I bought my tickets.

I got some lunch streetside, and walked through several markets, one which apparently was the toy gun market. I circled through the governmental area. Absorbed being in Kolkata. (pics from my walk around Kolkata: the famous Eden Gardens cricket stadium, tea served in disposable clay cups, the toy gun portion of the market, looking south on BT Sarani, Kolkata buses all have matching color schemes, a man sleeps at the side of BBD Bagh)

I ended up walking along the riverfront park, which was broken up into three connected sections. Sat at spots, took photos of the Hooghly Bridge, and relaxed after a day spent running around.
I took my first Indian local bus. The buses are all running under a consistent coloring scheme, and have printed fares inside the bus. It is much more structured and cleaner than what can be found in Dhaka. I was able to find a bus by reading the outside, and knew how much to pay once inside. (pics: Hooghly Bridge, myself in front of the Hooghly River and bridge, commuters waiting to catch the ferry to Howrah Station, rush hour in Kolkata along Strand Road)

After dinner, I decided it was time to fix up an issue that’s been bugging me for over a year: a whole in my pocket! I’ve lost countless amounts of coins, and I decided I was done with that. I went to a tailor shop, and asked if I could repair it. They handed me some thread and threaded a needle for me, and I quickly laced up the hole with my shorts still on. Complete, I thanked them, offered a tip, they refused, and I went on my way.

I had to post this picture as well. It is an advertisement for GMG Airlines, the first private airline in Bangladesh, which provides excellent service. The sign clearly states that the airline travels to Dhaka, Chittagong, Kolkata, Delhi, Kathmandu, Bangkok, Kuala Lumpur, and Dubai. However the airplane is clearly pictured flying over New York City, which the airline does NOT fly to. So an educated passerby can certainly infer that GMG pilots get very lost on their routes...or the company has a sketchy marketing department (pic: read above paragraph)

53rd-7th in Kolkata 9/9

There was a long list of sites I had wanted to see in Kolkata before I even cracked open a tour book. This is because many of my friends had already spent time here, and I had learned a lot about the city from them.

First up, I had heard about a famous Chinese streetside breakfast served up at a morning market in Kolkata, first come first serve until its gone, every morning. I asked a taxi driver if he knew about it, and we both decided to head to Chinatown to find it, but it wasn’t there. Chinatown was just five Chinese restaurants in a row, all closed up as it was morning. His next guess was the Chinese Market, and as we arrived I spotted a few “stands” of Chinese dumplings and soups. I got some dumplings, ate them on the street, and they were good. But I had had a stomach ache since waking up, so soon I was feeling nausea. That was a bummer to the day a bit. (pic: Chinese breakfasts being served at the Chinese Market where I ate this morning)

I headed over to the next place I had wanted to check out. The Indian Coffee House, which was famous to me because of a popular song that we had listened to for homework in my Bengali classes. Megan had taken photos of it when she visited last year, so I knew that it was an unimposing place, with a tiny sign, hidden on a streetscape. Took me about fifteen minutes to find it, and was very impressed when I walked inside. Despite the misleading exterior sign, the inside looks as big as a movie theater with high ceilings and the floor dotted with tables. I ordered a cold coffee drink and enjoyed it while I watched the place slowly fill up, I had arrived just 10 minutes after opening. Soon it was filled with young students talking. It earned its fame, and the song, as it was the meeting place for the greats of Kolkata’s cultural elite, intellectuals, artists, and revolutionaries. It was neat be within its walls. I hummed the song to myself. (pics: Indian Coffee House's tame exterior, Indian Coffee House's glamorous interior)

Next, I headed over to Rabindranath Tagore’s birthplace, a house just north of the center of the city. It’s more of a mansion, sprawling over a large area, and has been turned into a museum about the famous Bengali poet and writer, and his family who also had an incredible array of accomplishments in many fields. I wasn’t allowed to take my camera inside, but that’s okay, as the place is gorgeous from the outside and not really photogenic inside. The exhibits weren’t laid out in any way that made sense to me, and I roamed about, slightly confused. I had been looking forward to seeing this a lot, however, and I did feel I understood the famous Nobel Prize winner much better after the visit. (pics: exterior of Rabindranath Tagore's home with the inset showing a closeup of the statue of him in front, myself in front of the Tagore house)

One of the highlights of my day was getting to ride the Kolkata subway. I’d read about it, as its construction, in a place where the water table is very high, is a bit of a marvel. Plus it was dug out entirely by human labor! It only has one line north to south, but I saw signs for a new east-west line advertised around town! The subway’s fares were easily understood and purchased, and I boarded the fairly crowded subway. Upon getting off, I took some photographs of the subway pulling away, and some of the signage. Well I was caught. A security guard came over to me while I was standing waiting to take some pictures of the next train, and told me to come with him. He brashly escorted me out through the turnstile, and asked me to read to him what a sign said. I read aloud “No Photography.” He stood by my side and watched me to delete all the photos I had just taken, one by one. Then he told me to leave the station. I obliged. I was afraid I was going to get arrested.

I found this neat, first world looking, café for lunch, and was excited to see items such as avocado and turkey on the menu. I was excited to give in my order. Well about 5 minutes later a server came out to me and told me that avocado and turkey were not available. So, just like in Bangladesh, I was eating a chicken sandwich with the same old toppings.

I went back and took a nap. I was feeling a bit sick still, and exhausted from all my walking around. I headed over later by bus, which ended up being harder than I thought, to see the light show at the Victoria Memorial. I arrived finally, and tried to find where the show would be. The guards I asked however told me that tonight it won’t be playing because it rained today. Well I roamed the garden anyway, and found the musical fountains, and sat and watched two performances of that, which was free and really relaxing, despite my stomach problems. I walked home afterwards, through the posh part of Kolkata’s urban shopping areas. (pics: musical light fountains at the Victoria Memorial, Victoria Memorial at night)

I had a small, lighter dinner, as best as I could. I really felt nausea, and didn’t want to make it worse.

Week 52: I FINISH MY DATA COLLECTION, and some packing and goodbyes

noreply@blogger.com (Donny) — Sun, 02 Nov 2008 18:07:00 +0000

52nd-1st in Dhaka 8/27

I woke up early this morning to do my fantasy football draft. I was real excited to finally have the season start up again. I had been waiting for week. However, there turned out to be some problems. An unexpected issue on how we had organized the league turned up, an issue with how certain players were retained by our squads. Many of us left the draft with sour spirits, and felt they were cheated by the system. Others were ecstatic. Ultimately, enough complaints were made that I emailed ESPN.com who we run the league through, and they advised us we could reset the draft. So we did this, and set it up for a few days from now.

I did two data collections this afternoon, both on Bishwa Road in Rampura. After the first I headed to get lunch, and called up Farhan to come by and meet me. He agreed to come meet me at a hotel near where I collect my data. I had almost finished eating when he arrived, and it was raining, so we got some Sprites and a small snack and sat and chatted.
We then roamed the area for a bit before it was time to do my next data collection. To my surprise, he offered to help. He stood there with me the entire hour I was collecting data, helping me when buses came by too quickly that I couldn’t catch their names or times. All the ticket counter workers who know me well were excited to talk to him as well, and they got in some intense discussion about jobs and education in Bangladesh.

From there both of us took a bus down to Malibag. He got off first, and I stayed on a bit longer to get to Shiddeshwari. Tonight I was meeting Anwar and Sanjana at her home. Meeting them was great, as I’ve mentioned its been months that I’ve known them but had yet to have a real conversation. I had a great time talking about my experience, where they stay in California, graduate school, and a slew of other topics related to Bangladesh. I also gave her father some bumper stickers, as he is also a BUET Civil Engineering graduate. When they headed home, they offered to drop me, so we had another half hour at least of conversation in the car as we had lots of traffic to get through. It was a great time getting to know Anwar and Sanjana better. I promised them I’ll visit when I finally make my way to northern California.

52nd-2nd in Dhaka 8/28

In the morning I did a data collection at the Rampura bus stand. The ticket collectors on both sides of the road in Rampura are definitely the most friendly of all the ones I’ve gotten to work next to in Dhaka.

Today I did the #6 two-door Motijheel-Banani bus twice. Very hard. I saved this bus to the end of my research because of how hard I’d knew it be. It combines the challenges of a two-door bus, meaning counting two doors at once, and a local bus, which has people hopping on and off at all points of the route and long stops where people show up unpredictably. Very VERY hard. And it lived up to my daunting expectations. There were times were my head was spinning trying to keep track of everyone, and all that was happening. The bus has itty bitty seats, so I was cramped and uncomfortable too. Honestly, I chose the hardest way to finish my research, but the truth is I could not have handled this earlier on.

I had some great meals today in Gulshan at places I hadn’t eaten a meal at before. I had breakfast in Gulshan at Words n’ Pages. It was a two-story bookstore, but to my disbelief (and surely my librarian mother’s) they turned the second floor from a small café/additional bookspace into a full restaurant. So now it’s a one floor bookstore with a restaurant upstairs. Anyway, I went to see if they had anything I can eat for breakfast. And I ended up getting an egg and cheese and a tomato and cheese sandwich. Looking forward to a bagel though.
For lunch I tried out a new restaurant in Gulshan-2 called Tarbush. I was the only one there at 4pm, but the manager was at a nearby table, and he freely shared with me how he decided to make this restaurant, and what he’s been up to for his career. Also shared his thoughts with me on Dhaka’s problems. Good lunch conversation. But the food was incredible. The mango-banana smoothie was out of this world and was a large size for its price. The french fries and onion rings platter was delicious, and very cheap. And the sandwich, although a bit more expensive, was big, and was served on bread baked right at the restaurant. The best bread I’ve had in Dhaka. This place gets two huge thumbs up. Except for the “deck” overlooking Gulshan-2 though, the place looks pretty boring. But as long as you sit on the “deck” you have a good time, the seats and tables are “logs”.

On the way home from the last bus, some guy talked to me the whole time. At first it was nice, but then he began asking me to “take [him] to America” and was very insistent on it. No matter how times I told him he needs a visa, and that attaining one is difficult, he insisted I could just take him because I can just say he’s my friend when we arrive at the airport. These types of conversations never get resolved.

Tonight I talked to the guys downstairs about how we’ll handle the money for the things they are buying. They came up to my room later on my invitation, and we laid out how it would work. I hope they commit well.

52nd-3rd in Dhaka 8/29

With Friday off from work, I wanted to go and make the gifts for my tailor and the owner of the store out front of my apartment building. They were both very friendly and helpful for the tasks I asked of them during my stay, and I wanted to say thank you in a lasting way. I had managed to get photos of both through my time here, and so I wanted to bring them to a framer to give as gifts. I would write a thank you message in Bengali in black marker in the white space between photos. For my store owner and his nephew Hamid I was additionally going to include a one dollar bill inside, like you see hanging on the wall inside the stores of American small businesses.
I couldn’t find a frame at Rifles Square, and disappointed and I started walking back home. On my walk I inspected each shop closely to see if they had frames, and it was then that I noticed a framing store I’d never seen before. I went in, and they were glad to make it, and it was much less than what even the tiniest pre-made frames at Rifles Square cost. I asked them if they could turnaround the tailor’s frame in an hour (I wanted to give it today), and they said sure. So I gave the photos and they set to work doing what I described.
I went back to the framing store, where I had to write the message inside, and then they could finish the framing process. I brought it to my tailor on what was to be my last time seeing him. However, my friend Amit had also requested a summer beach shirt like Ben and I had got, so I knew I’d be seeing him at least once more, but probably when I was too stressed to deliver his gift. On arriving, I got my clothes, and tried on my last suit and my sportcoat. I gave him the order for Amit’s shirt, and he said he would get it done before I left for India. Then I gave him the frame. He smiled and thanked me, and I hope he hands it in his store. (pics: the framer in his shop preparing my gifts, the frame I got made for my tailor as a gift)

I dropped by Diya’s at some point and picked up a weighing scale that I would use to weigh all my boxes before I shipped them.

Ayon, Farhan, and Hridoy came over in the afternoon, and we hung out for awhile before heading over to Kozmo Lounge. Tonight, Dipto (Ishita’s brother) was performing a concert in promotion of his new album. We arrived at 6pm, as the lounge advertised this as the time. We knew he’d start later, but I just hoped it’d be before 8pm, when I had to leave for a dinner invite. The four of us were met also by Saquib, and the five of us had a fun time hanging out for two hours. All got some coffees and/or cake. Dipto showed up around 7pm, so I was hoping I’d get to see him play. But alas, as I was leaving at 8pm, he was just getting on stage. So I missed the entire performance despite waiting 2 hours to see it. Felt bad. (pics: inside Kozmo overlooking Dhanmondi Lake just after sun set, Ayon/Hridoy at Kozmo waiting for the show, Farhan/Saquib at Kozmo waiting for the show, Dipto doing a sound check for the show I missed because I had to leave for a dinner invitation)

I had been invited to Mohan’s home for dinner, my last time to see him. His wife prepared an excellent meal which I had several platefuls of. Mohan’s brother-in-law, who I visited once at his leathermaking college, was also there, and it was great to reunite. As well, Bapi, who used to live upstairs, was over, along with his wife and son, who I’d actually never gotten to meet as they were frequently at his village. Lastly, Shibly came by, and I got to see him one last time. A great evening. We enjoyed watching some Bangladeshi TV shows, as well some Mr. Bean episodes. I took some photos of Mohan and I, as well as his wife and her brother. Mohan and his wife spent the entire time trying to get her brother to spend the night, despite his insistence that he had to go back and study. (pics: Mohan with his son Rehan, Mohan/myself, Mohan's brother in law Mamun/Mohan's wife)

52nd-4th in Dhaka 8/30

This morning my boua became strongly insistent about my floor fan, saying she wanted it and would pay whatever the guys downstairs wanted to pay. Well I told her a promise was a promise, and I gave a promise to them first. One half hour after she left, she came back with Tk300 in her hand! She insisted I take it. I politely refused. Finally she took my hand, stuffed the cash inside, and left. The whole time she had a huge grin on her face. During and afterwards I could only grin too.

I dropped by Nando’s to ask about what they will be serving for their Iftar special starting in a few days, but they wouldn’t tell me. I tried guessing, but she wouldn’t budge on her stance of ignorance. Obviously they know it, but are keeping it a secret. Wily.

This afternoon I met up with Toma for lunch. She had suggested a restaurant on Road 27, inside this art museum. She had gone there for merely a snack before, but she said it was nice. Well it was nice inside, but the food and the service were horrible. Worst restaurant I’ve been to in Dhaka. For Tk120, we received just four small pieces of chicken inside way too much curry for the two of us. I was insulted. I made sure they had gotten the order correct…and they had. Four cubes for two people.
We then headed to Aarong, where I picked up some gifts for friends back home. The rickshaw wallah commented on the way over that I knew how to get around Dhaka better than Toma did. We stopped by the framing store after and I picked up the frame for my store owner and wrote the message inside before they sealed it up. (pic: the frame I got made for the store owner and Hamid in front of my home tailor as a gift)

I worked on getting ready to leave, packing up some of my stuff, and moving what I knew I would ship. The place is becoming quite messy with just a week to go.

I went over to Tamzid’s home for dinner. His mom served us dinner, even though his father hadn’t made it home yet. I couldn’t stay too long as I had to get a bus back. After dinner I waited to say goodbye to his father returning home, and meanwhile we watched The Daily Show, which I haven’t seen all year. They were reporting on the Democratic Convention, and it had me bent over in laughter.
I took the #3 bus home, and to my nice surprise, the bus conductors and driver were the ones I had ridden with recently for my research and had had lunch with. He recognized me quickly, although it took me a few seconds to place the faces. It was very cool to “know” the bus staff, I felt “in.”

52nd-5th in Dhaka 8/31

I did my last curbside collection this morning, in the blaring hot sun that had me sweating as it beat down on me.
I then swung back to Farhan’s home, where I would have breakfast this morning. I took a bus down to the Malibag railroad crossing, and decided I would try walking down the train tracks, just like most people do in Dhaka. Despite Farhan warning me not to do this, I figured there was nothing bad that could happen, except getting hit by a train. I knew the portion by his home was not cramped with squatters. Well it was difficult to walk on the rail sleepers as they were spaced oddly and I couldn’t take normal steps, only short ones as long ones were way too long. And I missed his street, as I had gotten into a rhythm of walking on the sleepers, so I had to backtrack (no pun intended.) Breakfast was delicious: parota, omelets, and cheese as well as some sweets left over from the last holiday. He showed me the video of him performing at his university last week. (pics: train passing by while I was walking on the train tracks with people riding on top with giant pots of food, people walking with me on the rail sleepers, train coming down the tracks near Farhan's home, train pasing by as I walk next to the tracks)

After this I left and rode the number 6 bus twice. It was hot, unbearably so. I felt horrible and did not want to be on the bus. I noticed my heartbeat was racing because of the heat. Plus there’s the bodily stress of having to lean out the window the entire time. It wears on me. Luckily this bus I rode twice wasn’t cramped for the seat I’m in. But the pain from leaning out the window was still bad.

The best part of the afternoon was having lunch with Toma at a restaurant in Mohakhali. She works nearby so we first went to Citycell to transfer over my wireless card account to her and her sister who will take it over. We reduced the amount of monthly data allowance as they won’t use it as much as me.
We then headed to the restaurant called “The Newsroom.” Its just east of BRAC University on the second floor. It was clean, modern, and had great decorations. The food was out of this world, with a lot of neat selections that I’ve never seen before in Dhaka. It’s neat to still be finding new great restaurants popping up. Apparently this owner is also the old owner of A&W, and he said A&W will reopen soon. (pics: the inside of the great new restaurant The Newsroom, the food there looks and tastes great...I really liked the place)

I spotted these boys flying kites in a field with construction materials. I’ve been trying to capture this very popular Bangladeshi pastime for awhile. (pic: boys flying kites in a field of construction materials)

I had dinner at Nafisa’s Aunt Sylvy’s home. I hung out with Ishfaq and Ishraq and her before dinner. She told me about Nafisa’s paternal uncle and his family and how they are faring in the US. It was good to hear an update on everyone. She informed me of Nafisa’s plans to return to Bangladesh, how her husband is, and the like. Dinner was delicious as usual, and she sent me home with some cake that she had made just for me.

Tonight I spotted a lizard eating one of the cockroaches in my house. I was so proud of it, I took its photo. (pic: lizard running away with a resident of the cockroach motel in my boot)

52nd-6th in Dhaka 9/1

Today I finished my work. And by that I mean I collected my last bit of data, a relief after all the time I’ve spent on it. I have what I feel is satisfactory to write a quality paper on the bus system and its overcrowded conditions in Dhaka! I had two bus rides left on the #6 bus, and today they weren’t nearly as bad as yesterday. I think because I was excited, I finished quickly and without feeling sick.

Besides that, today was also a great day. It started with my fantasy football league’s redo of the draft. And this time everything went okay. I think I have a great team and am excited for the season, even though I’ll have to play on my travels and find time to tweak my rosters. One of the best parts is my friends Greg and Will have joined the league to replace members we booted out for not playing regularly.

I spent some time this morning working on my presentation for the conference, just a bit of formatting and arranging of my thoughts, jotting notes on each slide…and deciding the color scheme. As well I had to write a conference biography that will be used to introduce me when I speak.

After posting my blog in the morning, my last time posting in Bangladesh, as I don’t’ have the time anymore to write in my journal, I headed up to Gulshan where I met Shaheen and Harvey for lunch, which doubled as a debriefing of my time here. There was also a new woman there, who has taken over Harvey’s responsibility that pertain to Fulbright. So meeting me was a transition experience for her, as she got to hear how my time went and ask questions. We went to a buffet, which allowed me to really fill up! I said my good byes to them. I really appreciated all they did for me while I was here. I felt I always had a friend at the American Center knowing they worked there.

I headed to Rampura to do my last data collection between bus routes. I said good bye to the counter workers who had been really cool every time I saw them. Then I did the second #6 bus. Everything worked out well.

After all my work, I went to Naira’s home. She had invited me out for dinner one last time. We headed to the new Cofi 11 in Banani. It’s much bigger than their old place, although it doesn’t have the cool outdoor patio (not like I used it anyway.) Still there is outside seating, and the food is just as good. It was a great way to end a great day. I took her back with a taxi and then took that taxi home myself.

52nd-7th in Dhaka 9/2

I spent all of day working on my presentation for the conference. There was some data I realized I needed to complete for the presentation, so I set to work on getting it processed. I had to bring it later to Ayon’s for Iftar to get it done by tonight, so I could use it tomorrow.
I went to Ayon’s home for Iftar, tonight is the first day of Ramadan. I was excited. This holiday really is a landmark for me, as I was here for all of Ramadan last year, and now I really have a market to gage how long it’s been.
One thing that’s different between last Ramadan and this one is that last year I really couldn’t pick out the differences between Bangladesh during or not during Ramadan. Obviously closed restaurants are easy to spot and understand, but how the schedule of daily life changes so drastically during this period is noticeable. It was too early for me to note anything last year. But now I see it all. I can tell that things are different. I notice which restaurants are not open when they usually are. I can tell when the streets are more or less busy with shoppers, and I can tell when the highways have more traffic. I notice how people shift when they go to the market and ride the bus (of course) As well, the general atmosphere in the air, it just feels different. (pic: temporary stand set up to sell the popular Iftar foods, a tea/snack stall covered with a blanket for those not fasting to eat during Ramadan and not disturb those fasting)

Anyway, Iftar. I really didn’t think the roads were that bad on the way over, not the stuff of Ramadan legend. I got to his side of town at least a half hour earlier than I intended to show up. So first I went to the bus offices at Arambag and inquired about their times for when they travel from Kolkata. To my dismay, they don’t have any night buses, as the border is closed at night, and Kolkata is very close to the border. So that throws a bit of a wrench in my plans. I discussed it all later with Ayon, and we made a matrix of options I have for my India trip, so that helped a lot.
It was fun, relaxing being there with Ayon’s family. Hridoy was now in town, and he talked to me a lot. We had Iftar on the floor of the drawing room, with lots of delicious Iftar goodies that I remember from last year spread out in front of us. I was excited to eat again all the familiar tastes from last year. (pic: at Ayon's for Iftar with his newphew)

After leaving Ayon’s, I had only minutes to catch the last bus home. As we got to Motijheel, I saw what I thought was the last Mega City bus home, so I ran after it yelling “Oy Mega Mega! Oy Mega!” just like the bus conductors do. Not sure if it was necessary, but I did make the bus. I spent the rest of the night at home working on my presentation, until 1 am.

No Posts for Awhile

noreply@blogger.com (Donny) — Mon, 01 Sep 2008 03:47:00 +0000

I'm in my last week in Bangladesh, and with nightly dinner invites, trying to pack, and the finishing of my work, I will not have time to post about my final time here until after I return to the United States. I arrive home on October 17 after trips to India and Southeast Asia.

Week 51: Chittagong, second city of Bangladesh...save the best for last

noreply@blogger.com (Donny) — Sat, 30 Aug 2008 05:46:00 +0000

51st-1st in Dhaka 8/20

Today was a stressing day. It started with me waiting for Moweena for 4 hours. I couldn’t go out to work as I needed to speak with her that I’ll be out of town for 4 days. But she didn’t show up, and now she’ll show up at some point in the next few days and find me not there, and get annoyed at me.

Talked to my landlord’s wife this morning about my moving out, and that a future Fulbright Tiffany will be moving in. Had to establish if I could leave all my stuff in the room if Tiffany is taking my place and buying my stuff. The landlord’s wife said she won’t get my place, but get the place the floor below next to the landlord’s. I also asked about the deposits and how I’ll get them back. Before leaving, the last thing she said was that she wants my fridge. I explained I promised it to the boys downstairs, and she said “No, you will give it to me” in her nice voice. Again I said it was promised, and then she said “I will talk to them, and then you will give to me” in her not so nice voice. Made me feel very uncomfortable. I just imagine her telling me if I don’t give her the fridge, then she won’t give me my deposit back.

After I finally got out of the house, I went to ride the Safety bus four times. Only two times would come of this. The first two buses got in big jams, and thus I knew I didn’t have time for a fourth before heading to my dinner invitation. So I boarded the third, glad to know I would at least get that one done. However this bus got a flat tire 2/3 of the way through the route, and that was the end of that. Had to scrap the route, and 1.5 hours wasted on it.

Headed to Shegufta’s home from there. I thought it was interesting that I took four modes of transportation to get there. First I took a tempo from where the bus had had a flat tire. I got off the tempo and walked from that point on the tempo’s route to Farmgate. There I got on a local bus to Bangla Motor, where I picked up a rickshaw to take to her home. I then proceeded to get lost and it took about 10 minutes to find her home. Oddly she lives in a really empty street, but it was the lack of businesses (that have addresses on their signs) made me get lost amongst the nothingness.
Dinner was great! But they stuffed me so full. So many delicious things, and her mother kept putting more on my plate. She had 20 items total for us that night. Her father knew a lot about the space programs of the world, a favorite for the retired mechanical engineer, and I enjoyed listening to what he had to say about that and other topics he has picked up in his numerous science magazines.

Random thing. While stuck in traffic tonight, our tempo conductor was chatting with the driver of someone’s SUV (the owner wasn’t inside.) The driver told him to hop in for a spin. So he did. He left us. Never came back.

51st-2nd in Chittagong 8/21

Auvi picked me up early to take me to the train station. Our train to Chittagong left at 7:40am. I was nausea this morning, and the train food options didn’t help. The only sanitary food on the train, according to Auvi, was the many bags of potato chips we ate. I did manage to buy some bananas and peanuts through the train window at a stop mid-route, and that was much more fulfilling.
The train itself was very clean. They had food servers coming down the aisle every few minutes serving sandwiches and chicken burgers (both which Auvi told me not to take), chips, cold drinks, and candy. The views out the window were great. It was neat to leave the city by the train, see its view of the traffic (which the train itself is causing.) Neat to pass by all the cities on the way to Chittagong. Its not a direct route, we first go north to go south because the Meghna River isn’t bridged on the most direct route. We stopped at about 15 stations along the way. At points we can see the hills of nearby India as we passed by the eastern border. The landscape as we got closer to Chittagong was of the hill tracts of Bangladesh, gorgeous. (pics: Dhaka's train station in the early morning, six ticket collectors came through the aisle at once swarming us checking our tickets and were out of the cabin before you realized what had happened (also a good shot of the inside of the train), our train sweeps through the Bangladesh countryside, someone else enjoying the view of the Chittagong Hill Tracts)

We arrived, and headed to where we were staying. Ayon was staying at his cousin’s home, while Auvi had arranged for him and I to stay with his older sister and her husband. These two places were about 30-40 minutes apart by rickshaw.
Auvi’s sister Shubha and her husband Asif have a cute son named Arham, and he called me “Donny Mama” (Donny Uncle) from the start, at the direction of his parents. It was cute, and it quickly made me feel at home. They were extremely welcoming from the start, and Shubha cooked amazing food. The attitude around the dinner table was light, and we had several great laughs across the time we were there. I enjoyed playing games with Arham over the whole weekend. (pics: Auvi relaxing with his nephew Arham, Arham/Spiderman)

Tonight, Auvi and I headed to what he called the Bashundara City of Chittagong. It was 6 floors high, but at least 10 times as small a floor plan for each level. Still, it is pretty nice and the best stores are there. A food court on the top floor had a small variety, and we got some fuchka covered in yogurt and then some ice cream. (pic: Sanmar Ocean City-Chittagong's Bashundara City says Auvi)

I’ve been plowing through Freedom at Midnight. Incredible book. Read it at all my free chances. For the first time understanding the birth of all the nations in the subcontinent, and not just Bangladesh. Incredible history.

51st-3rd in Chittagong 8/22

I keep getting a hard time from people about the US having less gold medals than China in these Olympics. Although I defend my country and say we have more total medals (and that’s how my newspaper back home had always ranked countries) they said only gold medals matter, and thus the US is second for once. Everyone is rejoicing over this.

We set out this morning to the Chittagong Shipyards. I have known about these for years, but read more about them when I got the Fulbright, and really wanted to see them when I came. Today was finally the time. Although much controversy surrounds them in terms of safe working conditions, child labor, and where the profits go to, I’ve been told and read online that it is possible to go inside. You just have to try a few entrances until someone lets you in.
Well we weren’t that lucky. A bunch of us went: Auvi, Asif, Ayon, Ayon’s cousins Hridoy and Protoy, Auvi’s cousin, and even Arham! Two CNGs full of guys interested in boats being taken apart. We’d heard it was easier to go on Friday when things were less busy, and thus more likely for someone to be let in. Well maybe the opposite is true. The guard wouldn’t let us in at any of the three gates we tried, and two said that we could have a chance if the supervisor was there to grant us permission (on a weekday.)
We could only peer through the fences. It was still very impressive. Some of the biggest boats on earth just cut in half, and it’s all by hand labor. The ships just sit on the beach, and in front of them are all the metal taken from their hulls and decks. The streets to the shipyards are filled with things taken from the boats such as life preservers, toilets, cabinets, and sinks.
I really wish we could’ve gone in. It was a big “want” for me in Bangladesh, and I’ll leave without ever gong inside and seeing this wonder up close. (pics: materials collected from the ships at the Chittagong Shipyards, a view of a large ship being taken apart and lots of scrap material from outside the fence)

We headed home, had lunch, and rested most of the rest of the day until we went to Foy’s Lake in the evening. From what I knew, Foy’s Lake sits amongst a few hills just next to Chittagong, and is a very beautiful area. Well apparently over time commercialism stepped in and now there’s an amusement park on the lakeside, as well as bungalow hotels. The natural beauty still exists, under concrete pathways, steps, rides, boats with ads pasted on them, etc. Oh well. Still a nice place to pass time with friends. The tickets were a bit expensive to get in. We went to the lake right away, and took a 20 minute boat ride on a small sized craft run by a loud engine. It putted us around the lake for awhile. (pics: Arham looking out on Foy's Lake, Shubha/Prottoy/Ayon on the boat ride around Foy's Lake)

From there we took a short stroll along the paths. A few of us started climbing up one of the hills to get a better view of the lake. On the other side of the hill you could see all of Chittagong. (pics: Ayon/Arham/myself posing at Foy's Lake's walkpaths, Auvi and others below climbing one of the hills that form the rim of Foy's Lake)

We rode some of the rides there. I got on the swinging pirate ship, the bumper cars, and the kids roller coaster. Arham loved the roller coaster, especially since it was the only one he was allowed on. He was crying when we rode the other rides without him. (pics: Auvi/Hridoy/Ayon thoroughly enjoying the swinging pirate ship, Prottoy/Hridoy/Auvi await the bumper cars in anticipation)

Auvi and I were up late tonight hanging out around the home, and we felt an earthquake!! I’d never felt one before, and neither had Auvi. I was sitting on the bed and I started to feel it wobble. I didn’t understand what was happening at first, and Auvi didn’t either. He was standing, and the cabinet he was standing next to had been rocking. We looked at each other and he was the fist one to say “earthquake.” It lasted for about 30 seconds. We were both a bit scared, not sure what to do. It wasn’t very strong, just a bit of wobble, but it was our firsts. If we had been sleeping we wouldn’t have felt it.
His sister said in the morning that Chittagong gets lots of earthquakes like this.

51st-4th in Chittagong 8/23

This morning Auvi’s dad arrived from Dhaka to stay at his sister’s home too. He had come for the wedding tomorrow that we’ll be going to in his village.

Auvi, myself, Ayon, and Prottoy headed by CNG with Asif to his factory. He is the executive director of a garments factory. It was my first time getting to see a place like this, despite the many in Dhaka and across Bangladesh. He was a great tour guide showing us each part of the process. The factory makes sweaters, and we saw how they are put through the looms by hundreds of workers, how many more then put the pieces of the sweaters together, then inspect them, wash them, iron them, do quality control, add buttons and tags and details, and then pack them up for shipping. The factory was very clean, and seemed very well run. My favorite part was seeing the small part where the designer makes all his samples to send overseas to gather orders. Once a design is chosen, his group then creates a guide on how to make the clothes for all the loom workers. The worksheets for this were pretty cool, long procedures to follow filled with complex codes. (pics: looms at the garment factory, showing the data sheet that a worker follows to make the sweaters, Asif explains to Ayon/Auvi/Prottoy how a garment is made and put together at his factory, the linking section putting the sleeves and body together, the designer's office, the shipping box proudly announcing where the clothes were made)

We later got a snack at a fried chicken restaurant, and then went to see the World War 2 cemetery. I saw a similar cemetery in Comilla in October, and found out here that there are eight total scattered across India, Bangladesh, and Myanmar from the Burmese front of the war against the Japanese. (pic: World War 2 cemetery in Chittagong)

In the afternoon Auvi and I went over to Ayon’s cousins home, and we all headed out to Patenga Beach. From there you can watch the sunset. Well Auvi and I had arrived too slow, so by the time we all got to the beach, the sun had set. But still the views of the ships out on the water waiting to go to port with all their lights lit was beautiful. The place was packed with people, and this was after we saw many leaving after sunset. There were shops to buy sea-themed gifts. We had fresh cooked crabs from some guy with a pot. (pics: Auvi/Hridoy/Prottoy/Ayon at Patenga Beach at night, boats waiting outside Chittagong port to deliver their goods, the pot of crabs we ate from, craftsman at the beach market)

51st-5th in Chittagong 8/24

We headed out to Auvi’s father’s village in the morning. We were to attend a wedding and see his family’s home. Ayon, Prottoy, Auvi, and I shared a CNG on the way out, and that meant Prottoy had to sit on Ayon’s lap the whole way. A bit squished.
We stayed in the village for about an hour, roaming around the old house, the nearby rice paddies, and just around in general. We got fed some snacks by his father’s brother's family, some juice, biscuits, samosas, and guava. From there it was to the wedding. What resulted there, or rather what didn’t, was far from what I expected. (pics: myself/Auvi/Ayon at Auvi's father's village, Prottoy/Auvi/Ayon on our visit with some of the oldest homes behind them)

We arrived, and already there were about 200 people there, about one quarter standing outside. The whole wedding was split between men and women to maintain purdah. The groom had his own stage on the men’s side, the woman had her stage on the woman’s side, and a giant wall was between them. We sat down immediately to eat, and that lasted about 15 minutes. We then stood inside for about 3 minutes, and outside for five. Then we left. In total, we were at the wedding for about 25 minutes maximum. I asked Auvi, why we had come all this way, just to eat and leave. He explained that the majority of the people who come to the wedding do just that. They are there to be treated by the hosts to a free meal, and never intend to stay for any part of the wedding. I asked if anyone stays to see the actual marriage between the bride and groom, and he said a handful. (pics: myself/Auvi outside the wedding, the groom sits on his stage)

We went back to Auvi’s place in the late afternoon, and were given snacks by his sister. This would be the first of five snacks that Auvi and I would enjoy this afternoon/evening. See below.
Before the line of homes we visited, we first headed to Battali Hills Park, which has an overlook over the city and out to the ocean. We arrived just after sunset, and thus only stayed for a bit. But the walk up the hill was neat as it was a gorgeous wooded park inside the hectic city. Dhaka’s parks do not have this feeling. The view from the top was spectacular. One forgets what views of Bangladesh are like as the whole country is mainly flat. (pics: Ayon and Prottoy climbing up Battali Hill, view of Chittagong out to the Bay of Bengal from the top of Battali Hill)

Then started the evening of visiting and eating. In succession we visited three homes of Ayon’s family. As Auvi is a new member of the family, marrying in, he wanted to visit them all as he was in town. At each we were given a cold drink and a variety of snacks. it is expected of us to eat a fair share of these snacks, or else you disappoint your host. By the third home, we were stuffed. It was admittedly hard to finish off our last bit of sweets. Then for Auvi and I we had to go over to see his mom’s sister. There we were given our final snacks for the night, and luckily they were understating on why we didn’t take very much. (pics: Ayon/Prottoy/Amiyo at one of their relatives homes, Auvi/Ayon's cousin Bilu/Shreya/Prottoy's mother/Poulomi/Bilu's wife/Auhona/Prottoy on our visit to their home)

At home, despite all our snacking on sweets and salty tings, we still had a small dinner his sister had prepared for us. The rice and dal were actually quite refreshing after eating so many sweet things for the last few hours.

51st-6th in Dhaka 8/25

We woke up early to catch the train back to Dhaka. It left at 7am. Five of us were going: Auvi, Ayon, and I and in addition Ayon’s cousin and his son Hridoy. Hridoy is starting university in Dhaka, so this was his trip to college.

The train was faster than the one we took to Chittagong. This particular one was considered express, and only stopped at a handful of stations. We got back in just 6 hours as compared to the 8 it took going out. It also had higher quality food, including better potato chips. Auvi approved of it being good, as opposed to the food on the way out. On the train I spent a lot of time drawing in Auvi’s notebook. I drew tons of maps, mostly of the US. I also drew my family tree as well as Ayon’s family tree. (pics: myself drawing maps and family trees/Chittagong Hill Tracts as seen from the Dhaka-Chittagong train)

Upon getting back, I headed home, and rushed around the afternoon getting ready for Altaf’s wedding reception tonight.
I had wanted to wear my new French cuffed shirt and cuff links tonight, but my tailor still wasn’t done with my stuff. I picked up my cuff links at the jeweler though, and I’m happy with them.
While out, I stopped to weigh myself at a streetside scale. I hopped on in anticipation: 143 lbs. I’ve lost a bit more from the last times I was weighing myself. In total now, about 25 pounds since arriving in Bangladesh.
Also bought a toothbrush from the street. Despite always being shown these on the bus and the street, I had yet to buy one from there. I can now say I’ve done that.
I also went to FedEx near my home and confirmed prices with them, the procedure for shipping, and got a box that I’ll start packing things into to bring back to them. For the box I want to use, I can’t take it from their office, so I have to pack my things in one box, bring it to their office, and repack it in another box.

I end up walking through the remnants of a political demonstration today, or perhaps a riot. Dhaka College students, near New Market, had taken to the streets in protest of actions by the government. I saw remnants of what looked to be a burned car, and there was broken glass all over the streets. The street itself was closed to vehicles, and I didn’t know why until I reached Dhaka college. All the buses and cars were being rerouted down Elephant Road, what a mess! A lot of the New Market stores had closed up shop, locked their doors in worry. The police presence was incredible, all in their riot gear. But still pedestrians were just walking by on their daily duties. Some groups of people still seemed to be in protesting mode, gathering in large groups to yell about something, but the police weren’t minding them too much. I did avoid the crowd just in case. The police, by the time I left, were less interested in what had happened and more interested in the hawkers selling hand towels, children’s masks, and guavas.
When I got home I saw I had received an email notice from the US Embassy to avoid this area, ooops.

Tonight was Altaf’s wedding reception. I was very excited as it was the first time I would meet his older brother Anwar (who is the reason I met so many people in Bangladesh) and his wife, Jayita’s older sister, Sanjana. The reception was at the Officer’s Club on Baily Road. I was wearing a suit, and because it was so hot, I decided to take an AC taxi to the wedding. Expensive, but as I only take buses, I’m felt I can splurge this one time (it is about 10 more times expensive to take that taxi than a bus.)
Upon walking in I immediately got to meet Sanjana, and no less than 2 minutes later Anwar came by to introduce himself. Finally met them. I talked to Sanjana a little bit as she was not as busy as Anwar. As the groom’s brother, he was running around saying hello to everyone and making sure they were happy. We chatted a little bit before I left, and I arranged to see him and his wife before they leave to go back to the US. (pics: myself/Ayon at Altaf's wedding, Ayon/Annita/Hridoy and other cousins at the wedding, the reception hall)

I went up on stage to take a photo with Altaf and his wife like everyone else. Congratualted him, and we had as long a chat as a wedding reception allows a groom to have…a few seconds.

51st-7th in Dhaka 8/26

Today I grabbed a photo of the recycling place that I had talked about last week. It is here where they will collect your trash and give you money for it. (pic: recycling center or the place they will pay you for your reusable trash)

I spent some time today packing up my cabinet’s drawers. Emptying out everything, and putting it into the box, to bring to FedEx next week. Choosing what to take and what not is tough. I’m trying to create a pile of junk, but also don’t want to miss out on things that meant a lot to me here.

Selling my furniture has been easier but at the same time more stressful than I imagined. Although I have buyers for everything pretty much, everyday I feel I’m getting hounded by people insisting I sell them something, as opposed to the people I’ve already promised it too. Everyone feels they deserve it more, and are stubborn when I tell them “no,” and they get a bit angry. And others feel I should give it to them for free using the foolproof argument “you very rich American, I so poor Bangladeshi.”

Headed out to ride the buses. I did the #1 bus from Gulistan to Mirpur-12, and then the Safety bus between Mirpur-12 and Azimpur twice. Jams were bad, but not hair pulling. I almost dosed off on the second route. I had lunch up in Mirpur at a place I’d been looking at for awhile, and it was less than impressive.

Been trying to capture photos of all the “_FC” restaurants in Dhaka and around Bangladesh. To my knowledge there is AFC, BFC, CFC, DFC, FFC, GFC, HFC, KFC, MFC, and TFC. I’ll try to post a collage of them if I can get them all.

At night I had to meet the DHL van in front of Dhanmondi 8/A, because they didn’t want to find my home. I also feel this was easier, and was glad to do it.