Madhabpur Lake, in Srimongal.

After our jungle treck in the Lawachara rain forest (see my post yesterday), and a vaguely Indian lunch in a Srimongal restaurant (the Nan had the fluffy thickness of brioche, very different from Indian Nan, but the dal was just the way I love it, with lots of coriander, not too dry, and not too liquid either), our guide took us to a tribal village, and then to Madhabpur Lake.

Apparently, people indigenous to the states of Bihar, Orissa and Assam were brought to this area by the British to work in the tea gardens, and pineapple, rubber, and lemon plantations. These ethnic minorities seem to live in isolated communities ; most practice Hinduism, some are Christians, and their prospects are very limited. We saw a young woman at a weaving loom (picture below) : the cloth they produce is for Aarong, a fair trade organization established by the BRAC NGO and a well-known and beautifully supplied shop in Dhaka, and most cities around Bangladesh.

Our children had an absolute ball playing with the village goats. I'm not sure the goats enjoyed their visit quite as much.

After the village, we headed for Madhabpur Lake, the short journey offering a few more photo opportunities.

Tea shop, one of many. Just as in India, rare is a corner without a small shack selling tea - usually served in a glass.

Nothing had prepared me for the sight of the lake and its surroundings. Carpets of purple lotus flowers hem the borders of a lake with multiple arms, so wide we could not see the whole expanse of it. A very short hike takes you to the top of the low hills planted with tea bushes, and from there, the view is simply breathtaking. We were there just before dusk, and watched the sun go down, its reddening disk reflected in the water below. As we waited for some of our companions still taking pictures, I joined our guide, a very tall young student from the area, who was sitting by the lake. He told me that a few weeks earlier, he had taken his girlfriend to this very spot, declared his love, and asked her to marry him. Which is why he sat there.

The following day, as we were walking through tea gardens, I asked him about his fiancée. She’s a student like him and they met at university. Of course, I had to ask him about arranged marriage in Hindu communities. He told me this was no longer compulsory.

Next post, we’ll go back to Srimongal for a bit of boating in the Baikka Beel (Wetlands), and for the children (to their immense delight and their parents’ dismay) a fully clothed dip in the river running at the foot of the Red Hill, after going through a tea garden and a rubber plantation.

Srimongal, Bangladesh – A walk in the Rain Forest

Before I continue with my recollections of Cambodia, I need to share my enthusiasm about an area of Bangladesh I discovered this past week-end. My posts about our life here have been rather gloomy, overall, so I’m immensely pleased that I finally found something positive to say. This was not unexpected. I have often heard people state that Dhaka is one thing, and the rest of Bangladesh another one entirely. But I had yet to experience it.

Srimongal (it can also be written Sreemongal) is the tea capital of Bangladesh, with dozens of tea gardens, a national park, wetlands attracting rare species of migrating birds, and a gorgeous lake with carpets of purple lotus flowers. It is quiet, the air is clean, and the pace, leisurely.

So, let’s begin with the bad stuff, so we can quickly forget about it. We drove six and half hours to get there, and another seven hours to come back. This would be bad enough, but I also need to mention the way people drive in this country, particularly bus drivers. Either they think they’re blessed with several lives, and loosing this one in a road accident is no big deal, or they all drive under influence (even though Bangladesh is officially a dry country) and have no clue as to the risks they take (and force upon the poor souls trapped inside these deathly cans on wheels.) I shut my  eyes an awful lot, and we all let out some loud expletives as huge buses overtook us madly, in a cacophony of horns, or as we narrowly missed another one driving straight at us.

It is possible to reach Srimongal by train, but the tickets were sold out. Plus, trains don’t necessarily leave on time,and the trip can take anywhere from five to seven hours, anyway. One last option is to fly to Sylhet, and then drive a couple of hours to Srimongal. Not necessarily shorter, and more complicated, logistically. More expensive, too.

All this for just a day and half of fun and beauty. But it was totally worth it.

The first morning, we hiked a jungle trail.

I like that sign (picture below) at the entrance of the National Park. At first, I wondered if it was the kind of “shooting” done while hunting, but it’s the shooting pictures variety. We had five kids with us from the ages of 7 until 11, so avoiding loud noises was not a realistic option.

We saw the widest bamboos I’d ever set eyes upon.

We just missed Eric Carle’s famous caterpillar.

Here is the gang of junior explorers!

And their parents.

A signpost, lest you loose your way in the jungle.

We saw some poisonous (and very pretty) spiders, but no snake, thank goodness. Apparently, they come out during the rainy season. Not sure where they go the rest of the time, and I don’t want to know.

And the tiniest papaya in the world, said our guide. See the small brown grape-looking fruit ?

One of the soothing highlights of this short trip, for me, was how peaceful it is, over there : the town of Srimongal is busy, for sure, but the countryside is all nature, a few people walking or cycling along the roads, some cars, and that’s about it. Coming from crowded, noisy, overly congested Dhaka, it felt like luxury. Which doesn’t mean we didn’t see anybody. Once out of the jungle trail, in fact, there were quite a few families enjoying their week-end at the Lawachara National Park, many women among them wearing shimmering saris.

I loved how these scattered, skinny trees seem to tower over the carpet of tea bushes. In the mist (it was quite cold) the scenery had an eery quality.

More to come about Srimongal. It will help me tap into the reserves of positive energy I brought back with me – along with some tea.

Pnom Penh, back in 1993, and at the turn of 2012.

In March 1993, I was in Bangkok, about half-way through a backpacking tour of South East Asia, when I met some travelers headed for Cambodia. At the time, the mention of Cambodia brought forth thoughts of civil war, mass killings, and land mines ; Pol Pot was still alive, and the Khmer Rouge actively blowing up trains and generally trying to disrupt the fragile peace accord signed in 1991, along with the incoming UN-administered elections. Opinions in the Bangkok guest-house were divided : some thought the situation too volatile to risk going there, while the rest was inclined to override such concern and just go, ’cause, hey! what an adventure!

I was crazy (or wise) enough to belong to the second category, and so, boarded an old Russian plane from Kampuchea Airlines and landed (after being thoroughly shaken, stirred and smothered in thick white fumes) in Pnom Penh’s dust and heat. I have unearthed my journal, and translated some excerpts. On a side note, this was before the digital age, so the number of pictures is limited, as is the quality, I’m afraid. I regret that, and it’s made me realize, more than ever, how much easier and convenient things have become for travelers, nowadays. We can carry hundreds of pictures on a card the size of a thumbnail, as opposed to loading film rolls, having to protect them from rain and dust and sand by storing them in Ziplock pouches, etc. Not to mention the comfort of being able to take a picture, check if it’s any good, and simply delete and start again when it isn’t. But let’s return to Cambodia, in the spring of 1993.

“Pnom Penh is a vast pile of ruins with, here and there, an old, crumbling colonial mansion emerging from the rubbles, a glimpse of splendors past. 

The streets are mostly dirt tracks with some paved avenues and lots of two or three-wheel-vehicles sputtering along as they carry as many passengers and merchandises as possible: strange bicycles fitted with a second saddle lower than the first one, side-cars, cyclo-pousses, and motorcycles. In fact, when we want to go somewhere, we just stand on the side of the street or the road and within seconds, someone stops and offers to take us wherever we want to – for a little money, of course. Moto-taxis. Sometimes, communication is easy, as when our young driver spoke English and explained to us that his parents had been killed by the Pol Pot regime and he’d had to interrupt his studies in Mathematics. Other times, they don’t understand us any more than we understand them, and we have to rely on body language and lots of finger-pointing, as we try to find our destination : no small feat when, like me, the orientation fairy forgot to show up at your cradle. But we always end up where we meant to, if not by the most direct route.

I don’t believe there’s more than two or three traffic lights in the whole of Pnom Penh. People just launch themselves onto the road, and the strongest or fastest wins. To this sputtering chaos, we must add hundreds of ubiquitous white Land Cruisers and trucks with the painted black UN logo on their sides. They’re everywhere. [...]

It is brutally hot, dusty, and a rats’ playground. Lots of signs in French, and lots of French restaurants I cannot afford. BUT there is the baguette – without salt, alas! which renders it rather tasteless. With some Vache qui rit (my food staple, here, along with heavenly mangoes, as the food in the streets is rather unpalatable and boring – I love noodle soup, but to a point), it works fine. [...]

What is striking is how young people are. You don’t see many old men or women around. Children. Women. And young men. [...]

There is a feeling of excitement in the air laced with an undercurrent of fear, as if we’re sitting on a volcano, with no way of knowing whether it is extinct or might erupt at any moment. Hope is strong, almost palpable, and yet shadowed with uncertainty… at the elections, reports of Khmer Rouge bombings here an there, the situation with Vietnam.” [...]

“People are extraordinarily nice. They smile constantly. Children run to or after us, laughing and shouting “Hello!”.”

The picture above was taken by the stadium, where families seemed to camp out on mats. And always, always, smiles and laughter.

And a view of the Royal Palace and the Silver Pagoda, from what was then called Lenin Boulevard.

We were allowed to see the gorgeous murals depicting scenes from the Reamker, which is the Khmer version of the Ramayana, inside the Silver Pagoda’s compound.

But in order to see the Silver Pagoda and the Emerald Buddha, an official authorization from the Ministry of Information and Culture was needed. My fellow travelers were much amused when I devoted the next two days to trying to get said authorization. I ended up having long conversations with government officials, usually in French, and they must have laughed a lot, as they sent me from one office to another, from one ministry to another (Department of conversation of monuments, Ministry of Information and Culture, and a few in between – that only was an adventure, as many of the signs for said ministries were written in Khmer), maybe knowing all the time that I would never get said authorization. I don’t know. I didn’t get to see the Silver Pagoda, but in spite of my disappointment, the quest was fun.

I finally entered the Silver Pagoda, this time around. The Emerald Buddha is gorgeous, but the famed solid silver tiles covering the floor are now entirely hidden under carpets. We lifted a corner and saw a few underneath. Oh well ! I’d waited eighteen years to see them, so the reality couldn’t possibly match what I had imagined all this time, anyway.

And now, a few pictures of Pnom Penh, this time in December 2011.

I loved the energy, in Pnom Penh. The city is very different from what I described in my journal. Except for the people smiling. Things work, the food is great, and I loved walking along the Tonle Sap river, on the Croisette, and seeing Cambodians enjoy the evening as they sit about, watch the world go by, exercise with a boom box or on the machines available to all, or buy offerings for the temples. Our stay there was ridiculously brief – about 36 hours, we spent much more time in Siem Reap – to be able to say much more, but it is the kind of place I could totally see myself settling in.

Next post, we’ll travel to Siem Reap, and again, back in time.

Zumba, my cure of choice against Dhaka blues

All the books on expatriation say it. When you find yourself in a “challenging duty station” (I like the diplomatic flavor of that), you need to find your niche, something to do that makes you feel good, whether it’s knitting, baking, volunteering with street children, spending all your time at your kids’ school or the spa, organizing coffee mornings, lunches, or afternoon teas, playing bridge or golf, whatever…

For me, filling my days with things to do is never an issue. I have novels to translate, stories to write, a blog… In fact, I’d need more hours in a day. The problem is that I work from home, which means my social life is basically nonexistent (my VIRTUAL social life, now, that one is thriving, but as retired but not forgotten expat guru Robin Pascoe might tell you, you gotta beware of having only a virtual social life – very unhealthy, that.)  Of course, I could never figure out whether my poor social life is a result of my working from home, of if I never really tried to work outside of home because I’m socially challenged. No matter. The bottom line is, when living in dump places like Dhaka (good-bye diplomacy), one needs to find things to do that make us feel good. In my case, it is imperative that said thing takes me out of my house.

Well, I found it : Zumba.

Nothing fancy, mind you. A handful of fanatics (OK, maybe I’m the only fanatic) get together and we all shake our bums (and everything else) in front of a TV screen blaring a fusion of musics. Yep ! No live instructor. But who needs one when you have those DVDs ?

A little backstory, because it’s the kind of story I love : according to the official website, Zumba is the baby of a Columbian Aerobics instructor, Alberto “Beto” Perez, who one day forgot his tapes and decided to use the latin music he had in his backpack to improvise a dancing work-out for his class – and they loved it ! A happy stroke of fate. In 1999, he took the concept to the US, and the rest is history. Today, Zumba is the largest dance fitness program in the world.

His last DVD series has music and dance styles that include cumbia, salsa, merengue, mambo, flamenco, reggaeton, soca, samba, belly dancing, bhangra, african, hip hop music and tango. The DVDs went from having him with two young women who did most of the talking, to a much more professional series with four different work-outs including a Zumba party that had about 6 to 8 people on stage, and what looked like a few hundred in the room, to the last one we were watching tonight. The Zumba Concert has a revolving double stage going up and down, giant screens, and what looks like thousands of people dancing along, every single one of them looking as if they’re in a kind of happy trance. Of course, in all of them, Beto is very much the Presence ! I mean, just looking at him dancing is enough to lift your mood. Picture a Latin version of Shahruck Khan – dark good looks, strong features, gorgeous body. Are you there ? And Goodness me, can he move.

As I was happily dancing, last evening, in a small school room, with a small TV screen, I was thinking how Beto didn’t only seize an opportunity, he also turned it into gold because he knew how to ride a global music and dance wave. Zumba is not only about exercising, and I’m tempted to say that’s precisely the reason it is such a huge success across the world. Call me French, but I could never understand people who sweat on machines. And I did try. Spinning ? You mean people actually do that without someone holding a gun to their heads ? Beats me. But Zumba ! Now we’re talking. I get to sweat and somewhat shape up and tone my drooping pre-menopause body, but those are secondary (if most welcome) side effects. Most of all, I get to dance to musics that lift my spirit, and connect me to Columbia, Mexico, the Caribbean, Puerto Rico, Cuba, India, and other countries around the world. I learn new moves and steps. Oh, and I get to watch Beto’s bare torso while I’m at it.

Is it any wonder I come out of each session feeling so light on my feet, and, yeah ! Happy ?!

Note to self: when feeling the blues in Dhaka, get out of the hole, and go Zumba !

Christmas, here or there, one way or another.

Christmas is coming. A friend was in Paris, recently, and mentioned shopping at the Galeries Lafayette. That brought back a flood of memories. As a child, my parents used to take me and my siblings to see the Christmas windows of the famous department store. We lived about half an hour away, and walked there, and back, something we did as a matter of course. To this day, I remember the excitement, the little clouds that came out of our mouths, the lights and colors all around, the smell of hot chestnuts being roasted over a fire burning in big oil drums. Approaching les Galeries Lafayette, we just couldn’t  wait to push past all the people until we stopped right in front of the first window, our cold noses touching the even colder glass, but who cared ? Inside was a magical world: animated scenes with animals and dolls moving, dancing, singing, riding electric trains…

Photo L'Internaute Magazine / Cécile Debise

My children have never seen that. The older one did see the Gigantic Christmas Tree at the Rockefeller Center when she was 5 months old, but of course, she doesn’t remember it.

I was in that nostalgic frame of mind, when I read an interesting article: What do you do when the kids think Colonel Sanders is Santa ?  The writer is from New Zealand, married to a Japanese, and they live in Japan. Her family has struggled to create a tradition they can call their own.

When we lived in Nigeria, spending Christmas in France, with family, was easy. Then, we moved to India, and after the first Christmas trip, I remember pushing the door of our house in Hyderabad, dropping my suitcase on the floor, and saying : No more !

It’s all right to go continent-hopping with two small kids in tow when you have at least one free month ahead of you. Otherwise, it’s just exhausting. Besides, we wanted to visit India. So, for a while, we just made it a point to be home for Christmas Eve and Christmas Day, and we took off on the 26th. But it made for really short vacations, as school started soon after the 1st of January, and my husband was due back at work. So, we changed again. Nowadays, Christmas means frantic, last-minute, separate shopping in Bangkok, taking turns keeping the kids busy, and for Christmas Eve, we might be found sending paper lanterns up in the sky, on a beach in Thailand, or trying an organic restaurant in Bali. This year, we’ll be in Siem Rep, and apart from the frantic shopping part in Bangkok, I have no idea what to expect.

But in the meantime, we will take our tree out (most likely this week-end), and deck it out with our international mix of decorations. Buddha and Ganesha will find their usual place in the nativity scene. And we’ll continue to work around our circumstances. Flexibility is the name of the game.

Dhaka, yesterday, and today.

I have been corresponding with the wife of one of my husband’s UNICEF colleagues, as their family prepares to move to Bangladesh. We Skype and exchange emails, and this morning, she sent me a message about an apartment she found on the Internet. As I have, myself, been contemplating another move, I thought I’d kill two birds with one stone and walked there to see the building, and the apartment. It overlooks the lake, and has the kind of view I dreamed of, when we were looking ourselves, last year. I still do, in fact. It’s the best view anyone can get in Dhaka. But this is not a post about apartments.

My correspondent mentioned Google Map and I went there, and found photos of the park I was mentioning in my last post. Here is one, dated 2006.

Well, here come my own pictures of the same spot, taken a few days ago, five years later.

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What happened to that little bridge ? I was under the impression it was still under construction, but apparently, it’s been there a while, needed to be repaired, and, well, who knows how long that might take ?

And here is another picture from Google Maps. No date on that one.

Where did all the water go ???

A lot of whining, and a little spark of beauty

Yes, it’s been a long silence. My workload is to blame, definitely. But not only. Mostly, my inability to blog for the past weeks, months, has to do with an overall sense of defeat as I watch my reserves of (positive?) energy slowly trickling out of me. I need to be parsimonious in the way I measure and distribute it. Work must be done (contracts have been signed and will be honored), and the demands of parenting cannot be ignored : homework, making sure my daughters attend their diverse activities, getting them bathed, feeding them dinner, and thank Goodness for all these mundane day-to-day tasks, and for my children’s laughter and needs, because even as they sometimes exhaust me, they also keep me from sinking into a state of stupor, and save me from self-destructive tendencies. By nine, most evenings, my whole body, mind and soul can think of one thing, and one thing only : crawl into bed with a book, and escape reality.

My mistake, and mine only, was to have agreed to move into a house that I knew could never be the kind of home that I need, wishfully (and fool-ly) thinking that the advantages it offered would supersede its major flaws :  it was a house with a small patch of garden, as opposed to an apartment, and it was located close to our youngest daughter’s school, and close to most everything – and knowing the reality of the Dhaka traffic, that argument weighed heavily in the balance. Also, the rent was cheaper, and the UN having upgraded Dhaka last year (since it is such a fantastic place to be !) the hardship money was suddenly slashed (with one home-leave every other year only, as if the option of spending the whole summer break here could even be considered!), sending all our budget calculations out the window. We no longer had enough to reach the end of the month (I know, amazing, but true) unless we cancelled our school-break trips outside the country (and that was not an option.) So, I ignored my misgivings about the house. I told myself I could do this.

I overestimated my levels of tolerance.

And we moved.

Into a house surrounded with dwarfing buildings that stand in the way of all natural light and force me to use electricity from morning till evening. That would be bad enough, but there is more. The plumbing started collapsing on us, and for the past weeks, the cave has also become a stinky sewage hole, with workers banging on the walls and pipes right outside my office, toilets condemned or we find ourselves literally walking through piles of shit, soiled water coming out of the showers, and our electric installation breaking down at the most frustrating times.

This morning, I decided to go for a walk in the park close to our house. Temperatures have dropped, and so have humidity levels. The air feels nice.

Now, don’t get excited. Said park would most likely be beautiful if only it were looked after. As it is, we have an enclosure fringed with garbage, and inside, two holes containing low levels of stagnant water, a small bridge under construction (seemingly interrupted) straddling it from one side to the other, dirty, uncared bushes everywhere, and a tiled path all around.

As I tried to alternate fast walking and jogging (I should also add that my depressed mood has been compounded by the fact that I’m developing a most unsightly roll of fat on my hips and waist. Call me vain, but I’m totally freaking out, because as someone approaching menopause, I simply do not want to start putting weight on), I tried to breathe in and out, and relax.

Tried to think positive thoughts. As in: come on, it’s not that bad, you can do this, it’s only five weeks and two days before the Christmas break, and then, the rest of the year will fly as it did last year, and then, it will only be one more year… Surely… Hopefully… It’s not so bad. There are people out there with many more problems than you have. Real problems. You’re incredibly privileged, and you know it. And bla bla bla, and bla bla bla. I could almost hear my parents forcing me to finish my plate and reminding me of starving children in Africa.

Of course, the internal pep talk (or those voices from the past) did nothing at all to improve my mood, or smooth out the frown on my face.

There weren’t that many people around me – Dhaka is, after all, one of the most densely populated cities in the world. One or two women wearing salwar kameez and chunky running shoes, casually walking and chatting. One lady in a black burka. Two groups of six to eight men walking together. One or two lone men stretching on the sides.

Suddenly, I saw a bright patch of colour,  a pink so radiant, so totally unexpected in this place where dust and grey seem to overshadow everything else, that it brought me to a halt.

Several gorgeous lotus flowers rose from the water, majestic, totally oblivious of all the dirt and neglect around them, their insolent beauty a welcome slap to my slushy train of thoughts.

People who get out of Dhaka, and actually see Bangladesh, say that it is a beautiful country. Unfortunately, I have not been outside the capital except for a day out on a boat, a few weeks after our arrival (and it was OK, but honestly, nothing to write home about either – maybe because we were still too close from Dhaka). My husband’s commute to the office and back means a minimum of two hours stuck in bumper to bumper traffic. That’s on the good days. He will not hear of spending two or three more hours in the car to get out of Dhaka on the week-ends, and I can’t say I blame him. Actually, I don’t want to spend two, three hours or more stuck in traffic, with the kids, on a Friday or Saturday morning either.

Vicious circle.

I guess I’m just going to have to take it one hour at a time. Day after day.

And remember these pink lotus flowers in the dirty, stagnant water.