Out of Grand Prince, into the Peace and Quiet

While my friend Ben is in the village enjoying the monster cockroaches and electricity outages, I moved to the ex-pat area today. It is so peaceful here, I can barely tell I am in Dhaka. I actually have a real bed, with a real mattress, and a real shower!! I had gotten used to sleeping on the hard, plastic mattresses at the Grand Prince that smelled like chemical bug spray. It's amazing how different my life could have been just 12 km (but 1-1.5 hour trip) away.



While I do enjoy the peace and quiet, I still can't go out at night by myself. It may be more dangerous for me to be out here by myself at night because it's so quiet. While in Mirpur there are too many people around, there are too few people outside in Banani. If something happened to me, no one would see and no one would know. So, I think I'll wait for Ben to come back from the village to go out at night and enjoy the area. This is why it's nice to have a driver.. dang it. I should have put driver costs into my ICF application. I wonder if Julie would have approved it. haha.



Last night, Ben and I had an interesting adventure trying to find a place with Korean bbq, soju, and beer. He didn't believe me when I told him how chaotic Dhaka was until our long, painful, and frustrating CNG ride last night. I don't think anyone actually understands what the city is like until they actually come here and get to experience it. And then it won't seem like I am complaining excessively :)



Ironically, I do kind of miss the hustle and bustle of Mirpur-1 and of being able to see all the interns just hanging around the hotel. Here I am a world away. I took a rickshaw by huge mansions and gated estates while i was on my way to the market to buy a new luggage. This is where all the money is in Dhaka. I saw a few Land Rovers and Lexuses maneuvering around the bumpy dirt roads. Hella Ballas! Maybe this is me discriminating against the rich, but a part of me suspects that many of the people in this area may be corrupt, and by hoarding money for themselves, are perpetuating the poverty of the millions of Bangladeshis that I spent the last eight weeks trying to help.