Intense Impressions (Anne Jiao)

I’ll do my best in communicating to you all the vivid sights that I’ve seen so far in Bangladesh. The weather is hot and sticky, if you stay out all day long in the fields like the numerous hardworking laborers here, you may feel like you are melting like the wicked witch of the east. The day is always cloudy, whether from smog or just from the dampness of the region, and it always thunderstorms at least once or twice in a day. Buildings of all colors and contours are jam packed together and surrounded by spreads of lush greenery. The water is green filled with algae and tangled hyacinth. The water is sometimes so filled with plants that boats actually look like they are floating on land rather than water. The traffic is absolutely crazy—drivers dive in an out of the lanes, between rickshaws, and pedestrians—cars are so close to each other, you could reach out the window and touch another’s face. Men cling onto the doors of buses, squeezing like sardines, and for some who can’t afford a train or bus ride, they hitch a ride on top of the vehicle instead.

Women are dressed in brilliant and patterned colors—fuschia, indigo, saffron, limes, and tangerine. They walked so elegantly—some with heavy baskets of rice on their heads, some gathering in familiar groups gossiping while waiting for the bus. In more rural areas, mangoes, coconuts, and jackfruits, hung ripe and heavy on trees. Through the window of a rickety ride I saw everything from large stacks of hay (from rice) to water buffalos pulling carts, from young children playing in the dirt to toothless elderly women walking hunchback in the busy streets.

When we finally arrived to our rooms, the conditions were not as bad as I had originally envisioned, although they were still far from the comforts of home. There was one real plug that we could use and no internet, we take cold showers, and there were a variety of different live species of insects in our bathroom. We do have air-conditioning and I am so unbelievably thankful for that.

The food is generally spicy—but definitely not as spicy as Sichuan food, which makes me sort of disappointed. There’s soft paratha with spicy potatoes, all sorts of curry mixed with fluffy white rice—chicken, fish—and even spicy salad. I’ve wanted to try the street food—deep fried, crispy dough wrapped around a mix of meat and vegetables—but even our friend, Galiba, who is from Bangladesh tells us that it’s quite unsanitary.

In other news, I saw a bus explode, and yesterday there was a dead man lying on the side of the street—who was hit by a car. Pushipita, our translator told us that there was a tradition where if there was a hit and run, all the men around who saw the accident would chase after the car until they caught the driver. They would then proceed to pull him out of the car and beat him (sometimes to death).

There are so many sights that I’ve never seen in my life. The environment is so different from my home—they really are eye-opening and mind-opening. I know that when I return home, these experiences will make me more thankful for what I do have and affect the way that I live.