How to get from A to B

We were taken recently to a slum project run not too far away from where we are currently living. It was a memorable trip for many reasons, (beautiful kids, amazing work being done, 5 people crammed in an auto-rickshaw!) but the main one was the various modes of transport we took to get there and back. I will probably talk a lot about modes of transportation in the coming months as every different way of travelling is different and seems like an adventure (someone said to me the other day that their rickshaw ride that day was like a ride at Disneyland, except real!) and there is always a story to be told!

Every morning and afternoon we take a rickshaw to school, in the mornings the traffic is not too bad so it’s generally fairly tame, although fairly bumpy as the road surfaces are pretty bad. But the journey home is often a bit mad; a rickshaw is essentially a bike with a trailer and you sit perched precariously on a seat that is frequently on a lean and the rickshaw wallah weaves his way through traffic, cars, motorbikes, trucks, buses (with men hanging out the doors yelling at the rickshaws to get out of their way-at least I think that’s what they are saying, my bangla isn’t great!) other rickshaws, auto-rickshaws, people, produce! I am a little more relaxed about it now but the first few trips had me clinging to the seat for dear life! The trip to the slum project was a bumpy auto-rickshaw ride with 5 girls crushed in the back-jolting over every bump in the road, of which there were many.

The ride home was a rickshaw through a rabbit warren of tiny streets which was the bumpiest ride I’ve had yet, my legs were sore from bracing myself and we got rear-ended a couple of times from making abrupt stops for cars, not to mention the potholes in the roads!

I seem to have gotten off-topic. What I am trying to say is…getting from A to B in this country is not easy, it is an adventure every day that at the moment seems exciting but I can imagine that in a few months I may find extremely frustrating! Every mode of transport has different pros and cons, and at the moment it’s a matter of trying to figure them all out and use the best one for where you are going! All very confusing-there is no jumping in the car and going from A to B here, it all depends on where you are going and who with and whether or not they will give you a good price!

I have a feeling that I’ll be so used to it by the time I get home that New Zealand roads will seem very boring, but at the moment when I’m about to get crushed by a bus while teetering on a rickshaw, I do miss the well-ordered streets of home!

But life is an adventure right? 

Lots of Rickshaws merging with buses and trucks!

The view from the back of a cng or tuk tuk.

First Impressions...

Noise. Lots and lots of noise. This is a city that is teeming with people, the roads are full of cars, rickshaws, livestock, carts heaped high with all sorts of goods and pulled by people, buses, trucks and people walking everywhere. Sitting in front of the van that picked us up from the airport, I could see all the seemingly near misses with trucks and rickshaws as we wove our way through the mayhem and was glad that I was so tired after the 31 hour journey that the near death calls didn’t faze me. It amazes me that it looks like such a crazy mess, yet there is some kind of order and the drivers seem to know exactly where every other car on the road is, their reflexes are super fast also! It is a sensory overload just going down the road, sounds, smells, and sights, colours- it’s very difficult to describe.

I had kinda expected all this as it is very similar to India but this country is also very different in many ways that I am beginning to discover. At the moment I feel quite helpless as my Bangla is terrible, so it is very difficult to go anywhere without someone who knows the language. Thankfully there are lots of people willing to help, take us shopping etc, which is great. I’ll be starting language classes soon hopefully and have already learnt a few useful phrases.

I start work on Sunday (the weeks here go from Sunday to Thursday, as Friday is the muslim day of worship) and will be working with some of the younger students, which will be a new experience for me! My job is more to work with the teachers instead of actual teaching so it should be interesting…I went into the school on Thursday just to meet everyone and the kids are beautiful and seen very eager to learn-education is a gift here, not a chore! I look forward to starting work and beginning to feel more like I know what I’m doing, at the moment its all very new and slightly terrifying (and exciting) just walking out the door.

I shall write more soon, these photos are of the view out my window where we are currently staying, a ten-minute rickshaw ride away from school. 

Leaving New Zealand

I thought it would be a good idea to start a blog to let you all know what I'm up to as I depart on my next big adventure.
As I say goodbye to everyone I'm starting to realize that I'm actually leaving and it's all becoming very real!
I have one week until I leave and I'm busy sorting out what I'm taking, saying goodbye to very special people, and hanging out with friends and whanau. I'm pretty excited/terrified about what awaits me in Bangladesh and look forward to sharing about all my adventures!

Goodbye until I arrive in Dhaka....