bangladesh kohtai?

I just got back from spending two weeks in South Asia, visiting Lauren in Bangladesh for a week and then traveling on to India with her and Jess, another girl from Lauren's public health grad program. Most of the time I was in Bangladesh I was in Savar (about 45 minutes outside of Dhaka, the capital city), at BRAC University's campus, which is where Lauren's currently living. While I was there I was lying low, taking plenty of naps, and generally lazing about as Lauren frantically worked on a massive project. I tagged along on a trip into a nearby village for fieldwork, and also took myself on a bike ride down to the waterfront one day. I was mostly too timid to take pictures of people, except for some schoolkids; guess my career as a professional photographer will have to wait until I get bolder.








I also spent some time in Dhaka, which is one of the weirder cities I've ever been in. It looks sort of perpetually half-finished, partially abandoned, full of broken bricks and concrete, yet at the same time it's full of more people than I have ever seen in one place before. Bangladesh is arguably the most densely populated country in the world, so it makes sense that its capital would be teeming with people. It's also the most polluted city I've ever been in (which is something, after living just outside of Los Angeles for three years). I learned some basic Bangla:

Indian High Commission kohtai? / Where is the Indian High Commission?
Ekane! / Stop right here!
Kohto? / How much?
bane / left
dane / right
Jaben? / Will you go?

This, along with my approximately five euros' worth of taka and couple of salwar kameez outfits, will be immensely useful for my hypothetical return to Bangladesh. While I was there, I was plotting out possible Fulbright research projects -- rural cuisine? gay rights in Dhaka? -- but ultimately was right there with Lauren and Jess in breathing a huge sigh of relief upon arriving in India, the land of comparative sanity.

It's a fascinating place, though, Bangladesh. Sometimes it seemed weirder than any place I'd ever been (why are those women sitting on the side of the road breaking bricks with hammers? what in the world is going on with that guy carrying piles of trussed-up chickens in a basket on his head? why is this woman gesturing with her scarf and touching my sweaty forehead?) and then, a few minutes later, the things that struck me as bizarre would seem not that weird at all. It was easier, I think, to adopt a "just roll with it" attitude since I was around people who'd been living in Bangladesh for two months already -- and this ended up serving me very well all over South Asia.