Remember the view out of my window? Well, this is not very common. Usually, even in the best areas in Dhaka, your view looks like this
BANG-BANG! ladesh
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Trip to Tangail
Another trip outside Dhaka this weekend was a trip to Tangail, or to be more precise, a village nearby. This time Google was almost right, but this was probably because we left at 6.30am!
OOn the way there we saw a JP Morgan marathon finisher deepfrying some samosas or other dough-wrapped something
We were traveling with a person who owns the land in the village and recently planted the garden there. So first things first — we are picking up peppers! And the whole village behind the fence is watching us!
The newly built house from inside looks like this. If it not a mud house, it is made of this material
The owner of the land is resolving a dispute
Then we went on a tour in the village. Tangail area is famous for its hand-sewn sarees and in this particural village there were plenty of houses where sarees are being sewn. One of the men offered me to try it myself and of course I agreed! At first it was a bit confusing -both hands and both feet are involved and things should be done in a particular sequence. So in the beginning I totally sucked, but after quite a few unsuccessful attempts I slowly made a few stiches that were sort of okay. It is a very labour intensive work and therefore it is usually men who are doing it. And it is very very loud.
What do women do would you ask? They manually cut off all the extra threads with a pair of scissors
Just like this. On the ground, anywhere in the village.
So you see all the kids everywhere? They were following us everywhere
There are also machines for sewing sarees. And many kids who would like to be in the pictures
One hand or mashine sewn saree in the village costs about 700 taka, which is 8,5 euros.
And some random picture. For example, how bananas grow
How pomelos grow
Tiny little mangoes on a soon-to-be big mango tree
Below is the grave of the inviting family’s ancestors. They were the first to bring islan in this area. As the legend goes, when they arrived from India and maybe some places in Middle East, the local hindu king’s daughter was dead and people were about to burry her. The ancestors were not just muslim, but spiritual people as well and told the king that she was not sick, brought a burning hot stick to her body, she woke up and as a gratiture the king gave a very big piece of land to these ancestors and allowed them to spread islam.
After the village we were invited to their home in Dhaka. I have never seen so many books here (this is just one of many shelfes). So many books I will never be able to read
The father of the family used to be very interested in communism and such when he was young. In fact, the overall concept was very popular here, especially before the Liberation War in 1971. He still has some of the book, for example, to the right from the Lenin’s books is Engels in Bangla
Here is a photo with a mother and a father of the family
And a beutiful picture at the end taken not by me!
Funny fruit
Here is a funny fruit. Tastes like nothing. Literary.
Trip to Comilla
This weekend we went to Comilla, a small town that is here
As usual, Google is very optimistic and it took us almost 4 hours to get there.
Comilla is famous for Salban Vihara, which is place where the ruins were found and also that in the nearby there is a village where our maid lives 🙂
Once we got there, first we visited the museum and got a few pictures (even though it is of course prohibited) with some ancient statues
Visited the ruins of what people used to think was king’s palace but it was in fact a buddhist monastery
Watched guys posing with a bush
And how dates are growing
And took a picture of the guys following us
In the park next to it I became friends with a goat sitting alone on the bench
At first I was very shy
But then I decided to test the limits
And in the end — a selfie!!
After we went to visit my maid in her village. Her son (23) lives there with his family
The girl is about 18 now and the little boy about 8 months old. I didn’t take many pictures in the village, because it just didn’t feel right, but basically the family of three people lives in a little room, where they have a bed, a fridge and some shelves. They eat and sleep on the bed (although I was told that they eat usually on the floor and it was only for the guests that we were eating on the bed).
Sometimes the streets of the village are covered in pants
That is for the rainy season to soak up the water.
The kid was afraid of me, which everybody found funny
And here is the final picture
Pink people’s masks
Remember pink people on rickshaws? Like here
Well, those are actors from Bengali movies. On Bengali New Years these pink faces participate in the parade or you can just buy them in the store. Together with the rickshaw bench 😉
Russians everywhere
Guess what I found visiting one of the malls? Russian famous antivirus! in Dhaka! wow!
Old Dhaka. Again x3
So far we covered hinduism and islam. Didn’t I say before that Old Dhaka is amazing? Well, they even have an Armenian church here. There used to be a big group of Armenians living here, but there aren’t any anymore. There is still a church and usually it is closed to visitors, but not when you have a local guide and a few takas.
The wall by the church and the view from the ou
And here we are inside
This is a henna tree
There are plenty of mango trees in the church garden. The season comes in about 2 weeks, but we tried a small one (a different kind than on the picture) and to me it was super ready!
The man who is looking after the church asked us where we were from and when I said that I was Russian he got very excited! Apparently, there is an Armenian man working at the Russian embassy (from what I understood) and he comes to the church every Friday when he is in Dhaka (not that Friday). He was so nice, so sweet and offered us some drinks and snacks, gave mangos and invited to come and visit him anytime. It was one of those rare cases, when being Russian actually helped 😉 I am definitely going back to visit him and chill at the church garden with mangos! And this is the interior and my new friend!
As we were three girls, we agreed that going to the fabric market is very important and inevitable 🙂 This pictures shows a tiny little fraction of fabrics you can find there (and it is on the weekend, so many places were closed!!)
I bought some souvenirs. 3 piece is the most common women’s wear (pants, dress and scarf) and they sell it usually like on the picture and then a lady should take it to the tailor and get it fitted. Beautiful, isn’t it?
And the last stop of our tour — the main Dhaka attraction — the Pink Palace
Inside there is a museum in a sad condition. Apparently you cannot take pictures there (and fairly speaking, there is not much to take pictures of), but before I was told this I took the pictures of how the books are stored
How the locals enjoy the paintings
And a couple of portraits. It was hard to choose which one of them had the most different right and left sides of the face.
Leaving the palace I saw these friend posing in front of the bush one after another. Could only take a picture of one guy, was too busy laughing when I saw it!
At the end of the tour it started to rain. A lot!
We got soaked, caught a CNG and drove to our part of Dhaka. CNG died a few times before we finally got home, I managed to take a picture of the flooded street (which totally reminded me of the everlasting puddle I had in front of our first apartment)
And then there were a thunderstorm, heavy rain and lightenings for the next few hours. Very refreshing!