Weekend in Bangkok

As you all probably know we had a long weekend away in Bangkok to get away from the political demonstrations in Dhaka and to renew our visas.
We managed to get a few things we needed that we can't get here and enjoyed lazing by the pool, eating yummy food and generally doing it tough for the whole weekend.

Just down the road from our hotel was a mall called Terminal 21, absolutely massive and each floor was themed to a particular city of the world, with London, Paris, San Fransisco and Istanbul amongst others. Despite all the photos of food, we didn't just spend the whole weekend eating!!

A Place called BarBQ plaza, pretty self explanatory, you cook your own food on a mini barbecue.

It was a really cheap meal at approximately $12AUD including drinks.

The Paris themed floor of the mall.

A Japanese restaurant in the same mall,

The best cupcakes we have ever had, we had to go back a second time, just to make sure they were still as good two days later!

We went out to the Chatachuk weekend markets which are meant to be one of the biggest in the world. It was certainly easy to get lost in the maze of stalls, and we probably didn't even manage to get through half of it while we were there.

Yummy street food at the market.

Don't look too hard at the kitchen in the background.

 We ventured out to Chinatown, very interesting place, much like china towns in other parts of the world I imagine.

 And just to make you all super duper jealous, a photo of the awful pool we had to force ourselves to swim in!!

As far as weekends away go I'd have to rate it about a 12/10. Only ten days till we go to India (if you didn't know we are quite excited), won't be as nice as Bangkok I'm sure, but it will be a step up from Bangladesh for a while.

Grant

 

Ahsan Manzil Musuem

Some of the best phots would have been from inside this museum, but cameras not allowed inside.
The building is the former home of the Dhaka Nawab Family (long history, not sure on all the details, but am assured they were important) and was built in the 1860's, it has ben restored in part inside and rooms such as the ballroom and dining hall have been filled with exact replica furniture based on photographs from the era. The dining room, all set for a banquet is particularly impressive.

So no photos from the inside, but heres some of the outside of the building. It is set on the banks of the Buriganga river, in Old Dhaka.

 Will put up some photos from Bangkok soon, neither of us wanted to come back, but not long till we go to India so won't complain too much.

Old Dhaka

Old Dhaka is as the name might suggest the old part of the city. The streets are very narrow, there are millions of people and rickshaws everywhere and its just generally chaos. There are a large number of shops, markets and it is right on the river so a lot of ferries depart here.

Also managed to get a short video driving through the streets, a rather tame video actually, this was quite a quiet stretch of road.

Lalbagh Fort

 Lalbagh Fort was a bit of a mission in the car as it was in the middle of Old Dhaka.  The streets are incredibly narrow and full, to over-flowing with people, rickshaws, markets and more people.

We paid our 100tk ($1.20) to enter and we were pleasantly surprised by just how much land and the gardens were beautiful, in perspective of course being in Bangladesh where we are lucky to see any greenery!!!!

 The grounds were full of couples finding a quiet corner to canoodle with each other, paying their money to have some privacy.

While we were there we had numerous people come up to us and ask us where we were from, what we were doing in Dhaka and generally being noisy...however you get used to that as they hardly see people from around the world.

A LITTLE INFO ABOUT THE FORT!!!

Lalbagh Fort (also known as "Fort Aurangabad") is an incomplete Mughal palace fortress at the Buriganga River in the southwestern part of Dhaka, Bangladesh. Construction was commenced in 1678 by Prince Muhammad Azam during his 15-month long vice-royalty of Bengal, but before the work could complete, he was recalled by Aurangzeb. His successor, Shaista Khan, did not complete the work, though he stayed in Dhaka up to 1688. His daughter Iran Dukht nicknamed Pari Bibi (Fairy Lady) died here in 1684 and this led him to consider the fort to be ominous.

Lalbagh Fort is also the witness of the revolt of the native soldiers against the British during the Great Rebellion of 1857. As in the Red Fort in India, they were defeated by the force led by the East India Company. They and the soldiers who fled from Meerat were hanged to death at the Victoria Park. In 1858 the declaration of Queen Victoria of taking over the administrative control of India from the Company was read out at the Victoria park, latter renamed Bahadur Shah Park after the name of the last Mughal Emperor who led that greatest rebellion against then British empire.

It was an interesting sight.  To be honest we are not ones for buildings and architecture but doing something like this in Dhaka is a highlight.  At times it can feel like a small place, considering how many people and how big this city is.

More photos to come in the coming days...we have to pack our bags now to head off to Bangkok for the weekend.  Oh life is hard sometimes!!!!!!!!!

Jem

Aircon, Power and Beggars!

We finally had the airconditioning installed in our apartment. It was impossible to sleep at night, even with the ceiling fans on full so things are far more comfortable now. Although the airconditioning doesnt help much when the power goes out. This has been a regular occurence in the last few weeks and normally it goes out 6 or 7 times a day, usually for between 1/2 an hour and an hour. There is a generator in the basment of the building which should kick in when the power goes out, wouldn't that be nice. We've spoken to the building owner a few times and the people who organised the apartment at the school to no avail, it did take six weeks to get the washing machine and about eight weeks to get the aircon, so we live in hope. At least we have power sometimes, food on the table and a roof over our head, which is more than alot of the locals have. The hardest thing is seeing kids on the street begging, we have become slightly immune to the adults, not because we don't care, but because if you werent a little hard to it all, it would seriously mess with your head.

I think the hardest thing for me has been seeing kids going through piles of rubbish on the side of the road looking for food. It has certainly put life in perspective for me, at how utterly privileged we are being bought up in New Zealand. Some locals here say we shouldn't give money to beggars because it only encourages them, others have the opinion that it is our duty to help those less fortunate than ourselves. I am no humanitarian by any means, but I can't pass some of these people by, especially the kids and not do anything, if nothing else they at least get a little money to buy some food, and to see their little faces light up is an incredible feeling.

Grant

Jem Made the Paper in Bangladesh, well an advertisement anyway!

So weve been a bit busy the last few weeks and blog posts have been a little light, so stay tuned for a few in the next couple of days,

First off, Jemma made another appearance in the paper. The Daily Star which is the biggest English Language paper in Dhaka, you can see her down the bottom left hand corner, and I've blown up the add so you can read it too. Not too many people can say they made the front page of the paper with Barack Obama (top right), ok so that might be a little bit of a stretch, but gotta take all the fame you can.