Salah

5 times daily the adhan flows out from loud speakers around the city summoning Muslims to formal prayer. I can't help but think that the regularity and discipline of this prayer culture must have a powerfully transformative effect on those participating in it.

I know how quickly my moods, desires and thought patterns veer off the course I want them to be on and how quickly I can rediscover God's presence when I become aware of that veering and have enough strength of will to let go and receive God's grace. But that awareness is not automatic and it can be hours, days or weeks before I realise where I am and have been. 

It seems to me that disciplined regular centering/meditative/prayer practices could be at the very least powerfully fruitful in the journey of one intent on living in a particular direction and perhaps even more than that. I am beginning to wonder whether consistent fruit is possible without them. Does a successful farmer tend his crop when he feels like it? When it is convenient to him? When he happens to remember? Or at regular intervals when it is needed?

Another facet of Islamic prayer which has caught my attention is how Muslims use their whole bodies in prayer, moving through different postural positions in a disciplined manner. With modern science (completely unreferenced) showing how powerfully bodily posture can influence the mind, I think this disciplined use of the body is another area worth exploring.

Chris

Old Dhaka

Drinking coconut water on Hindu Street

We spent a really interesting couple of days visiting Old Dhaka last weekend. Its the original part of the city that runs next to the Buriganga river, where there has been a settlement since the 7th century. I was really interested to see some of the old buildings and archeological evidence of British rule from the time when this area was still part of India, and I wasn't disappointed! Some of you may know that I have a mild fascination with old buildings that have a story to tell. For instance, I can't help but stare at the old Loughborough hospital that is a purpose built Victorian building that is lying derelict in the middle of Loughborough now, I always imagine the old patients being wheeled out to the conservatory that you can still see at the very top of the building at the back. People have broken in and taken some really cool photos of all the old hospital fixtures and fittings that are still inside, its so interesting and a bit creepy!! Anyway, this is about Dhaka. Well, we saw some really cool buildings.

Curzon Hall building

The first stop was Curzon Hall, which is now Dhaka University science Campus but was originally built as a provincial headquarters by Lord Curzon when India was under British rule. The building really is a mix of Indian and Victorian English design, it looks really regal and you can imagine students in the 1920s walking round. They have a massive square pool in the middle of the campus with steps down to it, where students can still bathe and swim now. It just is how I imagined British India would have been.

Tagore - The first Asian Nobel Laureate

The pond at Curzon Hall

It was also and still is where a lot of political action takes place. We read about Curzon Hall as one of the locations in a novel about the liberation war in 1971 so it was really interesting to go and see it for real, there was also an article in the newspaper only the other day here about student political clashes at the hall. The book we read is a novel about the war here and I'd really recommend it. http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2007/apr/22/fiction.features

We then went to Hindu Street which is right in the heart of the old winding streets of Old Dhaka, this one you can't even get a rickshaw down it I don't think, it's so narrow. So we got dropped off from our AC van at one end and started to walk down to the other end. It was an unforgettable experience, there was so much to see! I just wanted to stop every couple of seconds and look at something else. There were amazing old buildings that were obviously archaeological treasures but that were just being used as normal buildings, stalls selling jewellery and garlands of flowers and Hindu statues. The street is called Hindu street because it is a gathering place for the small minority of Hindus in Dhaka and a place to buy anything to do with the Hindu faith.

Selling fish in Hindu Street

There was just colour everywhere, even the old boxes that are used to put the teapots in are like works of art to me! And the people are just so colourful too, everyone wears brightly coloured and brightly patterned clothes it really is just so pretty and cheerful, and there is always a line of saris or bright t shirts hanging out to dry to add to the picture.

 

The shops were tiny too, some only a metre squared maybe but with the goods really carefully laid out and probably two or three people ready to sell you them! It's a really social way of doing business, people stop and chat for ages and you have a cup of tea together, no hasty decisions made about what to buy.

Next stop was the riverfront which we had been told has to be seen if you are in Dhaka. It was a really busy area, although thankfully a little quieter because we were there on a Friday (Holy Day here). The thing that strikes you most about this place is the smell of the water, it really is putrid. I can't describe it, just a horrible toxic, stagnant smell. The river is the main sewage outlet for the city i think and i imagine there are plenty of chemicals from the garment industry that find their way here too. There are hundreds of little boats going back and forth across the river and then there are loads of massive steamers too that take people all over the country on the vast river network.

We went aboard one to have a look around and had to walk over a very rickety gang plank which i did not enjoy with the sight of the toxic black sludge beneath me! The boat was huge with just massive open spaces for everyone to cram into. The most shocking thing was seeing children swimming in the water, happily ducking and diving and sucking the water in and out of their mouths. The cholera doctors we were with were amazed at how strong their resistance to disease must have become, as we westerners would have instantly caught dysentery if we had gone anywhere near the water. I was glad to leave the water front after about 20 minutes as the smell was getting quite overpowering.

So back into our AC van to make the short journey to an Armenian Church, nice old building and cemetery in the middle of lots of winding medieval type streets but neither of us were that overwhelmed by it! Then to the Dhakeshari Hindu Temple which is quite an old Hindu temple (don't say I'm not educating you here!) and last stop was Lalabagh Fort which was built in the 16th century by a rich person (again, i'm giving you valuable info here!) it was nice but not as interesting as the winding streets and crumbling buildings that we saw so much of. Unfortunately I don't think the government, perhaps understandably are spending enough time and money on maintaining some of the amazing sites we saw like Hindu street.

The next day we ventured down to Old Dhaka without our guide and AC van! We wanted to go to Bangshal Road or Bicycle Street as its known to some to buy some rickshaw art. This is a street a bit like Hindu street with really tall old buildings lining narrow windy streets, so it was quite a challenge to find this place. As is often the case here though, if you stand around for longer than a minute you will usually attract a crowd, amongst which there will be an English speaking Bangladeshi who can generally help you out. Our willing helper turned out to be Mr Sazzad who took us to a little stall where they were selling all of the brightly coloured bits you add on to a rickshaw that make it look so cool. They were very pleased to see us and started getting out loads of pieces of art to show us. IT was as tiny shop as they all are and one guy was permanently sat crouched on the table top, ready at any moment to leap into the loft space where they kept lots of their stock, Bangladeshis are so agile! We were offered coffee and they youngest boy went off to collect it with his thermos. So we spent a happy 20 minutes there choosing some really cool art on pieces of tin while drinking sweet coffee, a nice way to do business! Our friend then took us to a 'restaurant' that had been recommended to us, Hanif's Biriani. It wasn't really a restaurant, it had the feel more of a late night kebab house, but on the scale of things in the place we were it was pretty upmarket so we sat down with trepidation to eat. This was probably the closest to street food we had come so far so we were a bit scared about the consequences! The set up was that there was no menu, you just had what the cook had prepared in his big pot and today it was Beef Biriani. It was really tasty, and the restaurant was really busy which i think is a good sign. There was a little bit too much bone and gristle and other unrecognisable things in it though for my liking so i mainly ate the rice, but it was a bargain at about £1.50 for three meals!



I'm sure i had loads more observations on our visits to Old Dhaka but the pictures will have to tell the stories! I would also like to apologise to Dr Hardisty and my mother for the appalling spelling and grammar that are in this blog (and previous ones) no excuses, i'm just slap dash!

Chloe

Colour!

Various

Cockroaches: They are set to come out in force when the temperature really hots up but I have already more than I would like. They come out in the evening and you can bump in to them anywhere: the stairwell, bathroom, bedroom, street - they really are horrible little things. They scurry about with unnerving speed and are particularly detestable when they take off dart about the air.

Power cuts: These happen all the time here - several times a day at best through to power being off for all but a few hours a day at worst. Most buildings are set up for them and have generators or rechargeable battery systems for backup but it's not ideal; especially for Chloe who's laptop battery is completely shot!

Beggars: There are beggars everywhere you go here; children, elderly, male, female, abled, disabled. It's heartbreaking to see and even more so knowing that some of them are forced to beg by gang masters who take all of the money at the end of the day.

Strangers quickly becoming 'best friends': We are getting a glimpse into how celebrities must feel sometimes walking around in public. People stop and stare, point, take pictures but most annoyingly make real relationships very difficult because they want to be your best friend as soon as they've met you. Strangers may say hello and then quickly express their delight and excitement to have met you, ask for your mobile number and then expect you to contact them, meet up with them and very possibly financially support their business idea! It's frustrating because after several of these very awkward experiences we have become very wary about making any kind of contact with people we meet in the street.

Mosquito bites: Frequent and itchy.

Nakedness: Children running around half or fully naked is a fairly common sight but last week we saw a fully grown man walking down the side of a main road completely naked. It was a shocking image. I say image because the sight has been imprinted on my mind but of course it wasn't an image, it was a real person just like you or I and at the same time completely different to you or I because of his life experiences. Dignity felt absent and it was discomforting.

Children playing in poverty: Many children here seem to have so little; no shoes, clothes, nutritious food, clean water, 'fit for purpose' accommodation, gardens, 'parks' - many of the things we may consider so important for our children. But still many are smiley, playful, creative and cheerful. There is so little space here in Dhaka and construction is going on everywhere taking what little space there is left, so many children are left with only streets and construction sites for play grounds - so that is what they use. It is amazing to see cricket matches taking place on building sites with stacks of bricks for wickets, rubble for outfield grass, and bare feet for spikes. Dug foundation pits full of standing water become paddling pools, items of street-found litter become toys, polluted rivers become swimming pools. Children are constantly playing in situations we would never let our own anywhere near and yet these places are perhaps where they are at their happiest.

Chris

Street child/beggar at train station

Playground

Paddling pool / Building site

Paddling pool / Building site 2 - with raft - notice pool is full of bricks

Playing in toxic river 

City living has become quite normal

We've been here nearly 6 weeks now and life here has become quite normal. We are quite settled in our guest house where we get our meals cooked for us and our washing done for a very reasonable rate! The food is lovely, lots of familiar things like spaghetti bolognaise and pizza and always with really fresh and tasty salad. The stuff that is grown here like the tomatoes and cucumbers are really full of flavour. We are supplementing our meals with the occasional trip to an ice-cream parlour, which are really quite common where we live. The road that has become our main haunt has about 5 on it. A recent favourite was cheescake flavour icecream with twix bits in it. yum. There are quite a few things you can do here if you have the money, that give you a bit of a break from reality, i had a pedicure the other day at the Nordic Club which was heavenly and not what i thought i'd be doing as part of my trip to Bangladesh!

We're busy with work too, both of us have a lot to do before we come home and not much time left to do it in! A day at work is quite exhausting so we just potter around in the evenings, watching a dvd or reading or getting some extra work done.

We're planning a few trips over the next couple of weeks, one to the tea garden area in the east of the country where they have rain forests and lots of beautiful scenery apparently. We're also travelling all the way to the top of the country to Nilphamari to visit the bamboo coffin factory. we're going by train to both places which is a relief as i've not heard good things about the buses. We've also booked to come home via a week in Delhi and a trip to the Taj Mahal, it's going to be hot!

This is the view from our office balcony. It's the start of a colony of Pakistanis who have remained kind of stranded i think, since the war of independence in the 70's. Some very cute children play cricket on the street most days...

It rained for about an hour today and this was the side of the road on our way home! We were in a minibus thank goodness. Poor rickshaw wallah!

This is on the entrance of the road that our offices are on, just a bit of context really!

Man shining shoes on the main road near our offices. We sometime walk ten minutes down this road to get a KFC smoothie and sit in the air conditioned restaurant for a break from the office. There are loads more things i'd love to take photos of but we draw enough attention just walking down street, getting the camera out as well might be a bit much.

Watching one of the rainstorms from the safety of the balcony in the office. There is a t shirt printing factory over the road and some dye must have been left out, it was a river of purple.

Trying to cross the road.

More flooding

3 young chaps not bothered by the downpour

The storms are coming here and we have had a few corkers in the evenings and while we are at work. The road to and from work gets quite flooded as you can see in the photos, doesn't seem to bring anything to a standstill though! We're taking a tour of Old Dhaka this friday which is the heart of the old city, i can't wait to see all the old buildings and winding streets, we'll put some photos up to show you :)

Chloe

Sick

While it's been quiet on the Blogging front  Chloe and I have been suffering with our first major bout of sickness. I managed to do my vomiting tidily into a bucket while Chloe messily used the main road back from the office via the car window! 

Beyond the vomiting Chloe and I suffered quite different symptoms but neither's were pleasant. We were both down at the same and out for about a week, although fortunately each of our lowest points were at different times so we were able to offer each other some support during those hours.  

Living in Dhaka has been challenging but when weak with illness the challenges seemed almost intolerable and the familiarity, comfort, cleanliness and 'normal' food of home a painfully long way away.

On our way back to to strength we were both very grateful for the refuge of the british club serving baked beans on toast and other palatable delicacies. The thought of there not being a restaurant serving anything other than curry was not a good one for a while then.

We are back to our best now though I am pleased to say and enjoying discovering more of this fascinating city.

Chris

First Weeks in Dhaka

A cinnamon roll from a social business

We've come across quite a few social enterprises while we've been here. It's been really inspiring. Last weekend we hunted out a new coffee business here in Dhaka. It's called North End Roasters http://www.northendcoffee.com/ The aim of the business is to supply good quality coffee within Bangladesh, which is in short supply. This guy Rick is the only coffee roaster in the country. His aim is to train Bangladeshis to open their own businesses and to be able to serve really good quality coffee. There is also an area of the country called Chittagong where Rick is hoping to get some of his coffee from, which would be a great source of income for the people in that area. So basically he's investing in this country and stimulating creative business activity. It feels like this type of thing could be the answer to some of this Country's problems, building up the economy and providing meaningful, fair jobs for people.  So obviously Chris was very excited to visit this place and we had a tour of the premises which was really interesting. The highlight though was a freshly baked cinnamon roll. And i have just seen that they do baking lessons so i might sign up as my pastry skills could do with some work.

North End Coffee Shop

 I'm also working for a social business www.oasisbamboocoffins.com and i am loving being in the environment of a young business where ideas are everything, it's getting me thinking about what i could start up next!

Chloe