Some action shots of Neko from last week’s egg hunt. We arrived exactly on time, which turned out to be about 5 minutes too late (there were some avid hunters!), but several of the other kids gave Neko a chance to pick up some eggs by laying them out around her. We went to another hunt the next day, which was more like wading through a pool of eggs, so she got a chance to pick up some there too. She’s also played with them all week. None of the innards were toddler appropriate, but we can save the stickers for next year and eat the candy ourselves. (shhh!)
This generous little boy gave Neko half of his eggs. She gave some back, but kept a good number.
Admission to the Gyeongbok Palace was free on Lunar New Years, and we’d heard that many of the locals will dress up in traditional clothing to celebrate the holiday. While it seemed way too cold for many of them to celebrate that way, a few brave souls did venture out in the silk Hanbok dresses, complete with wolly undergarments and quilted coats. The palace itself was rebuilt after the wars, so it feels a little manufactured rather than historic, and the gardens weren’t all that exciting in early February, but we did wander into the neighboring museum grounds and were surprised by a festival, complete with drumming, kites and food samples (which we missed by a hair).
Gyeongbok Palace, SeoulGyeongbok Palace, SeoulThe pine trees in Asia look just like they do in Chinese calligraphic art. I thought it was just a stylization until I moved here, but they really are wispy and slanty. And, this photo shows how not exciting the gardens are in February.The slightly prettier inner gardens near the King’s quarters and the concubine’s rooms.Traditional Drumming performance. I took this photo by reaching over the heads of the crowd.My actual view of the drumming performance.The changing of the guard at the Gyeongbok Palace.They do things more colorfully here than at Buckingham Palace.
We’ve had a couple of sari wearing days recently. The first sari above is a local cotton, loosely woven but heavily starched with rice water. It’s rather difficult to wear because of all the starch. The second sari is also somewhat difficult to drape, because it’s embroidered, appliqued, and has sequin trim. I guess I know how to pick ’em.
Another difficulty here is that the Bangladeshi way of draping sari is different than the western Indian way I’d learned before, and requires a lot of pins to get it right it seems. At least 2 are required. Because I’m inept, I go to the local salon to get draped. The wedding sari took 30 minutes to put on (just adding to the fun of the evening, yessirree).
We arrived at post in October of last year, and our belongings arrived just before Christmas. We had stocked up on some Xmas essentials before we left the states, but there is always room for more, especially when you’re in a non-Christmas country. There’s no Christmas station, no overwhelming store displays and constant sales-pushing here. Of course, that means finding Christmas items can be difficult. But… not impossible!
In 2011, I’ve already seen Christmas gear at 4 places in the expat area of Dhaka. Folk International (Near the Gulshan 2 Cricket field) began it’s Christmas item season on October 1st, and they’ll sell it until it runs out. As the season progresses, they’ll have fewer items. There a great source of ornaments, especially painted papier mache and laquer ones. They also have tree skirts and fabulous quilted wall hangings. (I saw one in someone’s house last year and was terribly jealous of it, who knew they’d bought it right here in Dhaka?). They also have some glittering table mats and runners to jazz up your holiday table. I saw them in red, green and blue, but they were almost out of the blue. They also sell gift bags in all sizes, from teeny jewelry bags to giant bags (about 30” and round) that look like Santa’s sack. There are also UNICEF cards here.
Sally Ann’s (Lane 6, House 365/2, Baridhara DOHS), a fair-trade branch of the Salvation Army’s retail mission, usually carries a lot of baskets, embroidered goods, napkin rings, and (strangely) wooden letters that you’d paint and hang in a nursery. For the next few months, they’ve also got a bunch of Christmas items. Last night, I saw Christmas trees made out of yarn, shiny wire or fabric. They also had three different kinds of wall-hanging advent calendars, one with large pockets to hide treats, ornaments or notes, one with little loops for ornaments. They also had a bunch of embroidered items (including tree skirts, tablecloths, napkins, etc.) with holly or other Christmas themes. Their tree skirts were made for table-top trees. They also had an impressive array of embroidered and sewn ornaments. (On a side note, if you’re looking for children’s furniture, they have some cute basket/wood dressers and cheerful table and chairs sets that they’ll sell off the floor or do custom for you.) They also sell coffee and waffles, but I’ve never had one.
Carlotta House, a convent in Bashundara, spends all year embroidering elegant tablecloths and accessories to sell for the holidays (they also make altar cloths and fancy work for churches in Europe). You can call them up and make an appointment to view their little shop, or find them at the DAWC’s Christmas Bazaar, usually held in November at the American School. DIT 1, the sorta-mall, sorta-open air market, just southwest of Gulshan 1 circle is also a Boro Din (Christmas in Bangla, the local language) paradise. You can find 6 foot tall plastic, light-up Santas, strings of 220v fairy-lights (aka Christmas lights), cheesy trees made out of tinsel, actual tinsel, and everything else tacky you can imagine. It’s also a great place to buy cheap toys, and disposable dollar-store-esque items. They’ll also be very excited to see you. Unlike the others mentioned, DIT is all about bartering, no fixed prices.
Last, all the embassies, clubs, and service organizations hold holiday fairs. The DAWC’s is the largest. In 2010 it was held at the American school, on the field. Last year it was an incredibly hot day, but there were vendors of all sorts there. They sold clothing (kurtas, salwar kameez, childrens ruffle-cake dresses, giftable items), PEBBLE products, pearls, ornaments, holiday cards, gift bags, art (rickshaw, fine and folk), embroidered items, scarves, jewelry, vintage ship-salvage, brass, wooden chests… you name it. Bring a LOT of cash. There are food vendors, raffles and music acts to keep you entertained and nourished while you browse. The clubs also had smaller fairs, each with a good mix of stuff, including some that didn’t make it to the DAWC fair.
Over the long weekend, we took yet another little vacation out of Dhaka (didn’t I mention that “hardship pay” before?) and headed out to Chiang Mai, in northern Thailand. Thailand is a popular destination from Dhaka, though most people head to the beach resorts. The flights are moderately annoying—you either fly over night (and the long flight’s only 2 hours, so you’re not really well rested), or you fly all day (leaves here around lunch, etc.)—and that’s held us back from visiting there in the past. But… Chiang Mai was totally worth it!
All the temples had dragon guardians outside
SO much to do… nice and compact old town… access to shopping if you need it… etc.
We arrived late Thursday evening and checked into the Tamarind Village Resort after a quick dinner at Burger King (yes, we are fast food deprived). The Tamarind is highly recommended by me, especially because of the shower. Wow. It was awesome. A rain shower (which I usually hate) with the drenching force of an ocean wave… The ginger-scented bath products sealed it. I showered a whole lot more than I normally do, just to enjoy the shower. It’s a good thing there’s been a lot of rain there recently, or I might have drained the country dry.
Besides the shower, our room was lovely. It was the room featured on their in-room channel, so we felt pretty special, but it was really just a base rate room that we booked on hotels.com. Their base rate rooms were just perfect for the two of us, but when there are three, we’ll probably need something a little bigger. Their breakfasts were very filling and had enough diversity to keep me happy every day. There were Thai options, an egg-station, meats, fruits, breads, juices, etc. Tasty.
Wind Chimes to keep the birds away? or to make a constant prayer? (sources differ) Our hotel had them, so did all the temples.
On Friday, we (more-or-less) followed the Lonely Planet’s recommended temple walking tour. It was a little warm, and we got lost in the beginning as old town Chiang Mai doesn’t seem to have many street signs, but we saw the major temples and sights. At Wat Phra Singh, we even saw a huge crowd of novice monks (all between 12 and 16 years old, and a common thing to do as a post-elementary schooling option, even for those who will never be professed monks) who were visiting the royal temple on a 4 day retreat. They were all very cute and excited to be there.
After sitting down in a garden at the back of the temple, a 20-something monk who turned out to be one of the retreat chaperones asked if he could sit with us. Apparently it’s quite common for the young monks to want to practice their English skills and some temples have set up special chatting areas to encourage English speakers to both learn about Buddhism and the monk’s lifestyle while the monk learns new words and accents. This wasn’t one of those areas, but serendipity struck. We talked a bit about his home temple, and where Bangladesh was. He was most impressed that we, of very pale skin, were living in this kind of hot, tropical climate. I am not quite sure he understood that we were not ethnically Bangladeshi, but I was amused, particularly when he opined that he’d prefer lighter skin too. That’s not the kind of thing you hear every day from a monk!
After we left Wat Phra Singh, it began to rain. We’d been heading for the Cultural Center and Museum, and decided to have some lunch before we went in. We stopped at a roadside noodle joint, just as the deluge began in earnest. We were the only foreigners there, but it was pretty packed with locals and the turnover was quick. We had beef noodle soup, about half of a normal American sized portion, but still sufficient for lunch. For two bowls of soup, and two bottles of Fanta, we paid 84Bhat… about $2.50.
This guy guarded a little consecration temple at Wat Phra Singh
We left there with the rain still coming down in sheets and headed for the museum, and its promise of air conditioning. The museum was nice enough, particularly if you like dioramas with little tiny people working little tiny farms and machines. However, the textual explanations were a little tedious, and hard to read. It seemed like they focused almost entirely on listing the genealogy of the king related to the events depicted, and didn’t get enough into the actual excitement of the event. The building was lovely, and the dioramas and artifacts were really excellent, they just need someone to go in there and tidy up the ponderous explanations. The gift shop at the end of the museum was also really nice, though we didn’t get anything. They had good stuff we didn’t see anywhere else, including items related to their special collections and hill tribe art.
By the time we’d finished the museum, I was pretty worn out and swelling up like a southern sausage, so we headed back to the room for a little nap, dip in the pool and then a massage at Khulka, a small but welcoming spa that didn’t feel mercenary or skeezy, as some of the massage places seemed to. Their prices were slightly higher than the average, but it was made up for with private curtained treatment areas, soft lighting and cheerful service. I had a delightful foot and leg massage, and if I’d had more time would probably have gotten a pedicure too.
A fat Buddha. The story goes that he used to be a handsome man who desperately wanted enlightenment, but couldn't spend enough time meditating because all the young women were chasing him to ask him about the path to nirvana. So, he prayed that he'd be ugly and they'd leave him. It worked, and he became fat and bald, and none of the young women chased him any more. So he smiles, because he's happy.
We walked from there to the night markets to see what the fuss was all about. And the fuss was about crazy tourist shopping. It was the first market shopping I’d done since Guatemala’s Chichicastenango, and much more appealing to me than the pretend “artisan” shopping that is popular in Egypt and India. If I want to buy tourist crap, I’m going to buy it from a mad market, and feel like I got a good deal, rather than a tourist store that your guide brings you to under the premise that they will “teach” you something and then won’t let you leave until you buy something.
We took a tuktuk back from the night market, in the hopes of saving what was left of our tired feet for the next day’s adventures. Unfortunately, the act of getting in and out of that vehicle stretched something in my belly a little too much, and left me a little tearful. Thankfully, I had a chance to enjoy the in-room tea pot and hot shower to cure some of those ills.
On Saturday, we woke up early to get breakfast before our day tour to the hill tribes and other outlying sights. A high recommendation for the team at Wayfarers Travel. They were the only company we could find to offer a one day trek (One Day Trek – Hilltribe Trail(ref. CMT1D)) that did not involve visiting fake villages and sights. Our day hike visited three different hill tribe villages: Lamu, Karen and Palong. There were not many people in the villages, as they were mostly out working the harvest, but in the drier season, you apparently get to meet a lot of people. The Palong wore the most interesting woven outfits, and I would have liked to see them doing the actual weaving and embroidery work, but that takes place at a different season. Our particular visit was near the end of the rainy season, but it’s been a remarkable rainy season, and there was flooding in many parts of Thailand in the last few weeks. Our trek, which crossed several streams, was slightly more vigorous than it normally would be, because of the rains. We had to take off our shoes to cross rocky streams several times, and I wished I had my hiking sandals on instead of my hiking shoes. Our guide, in typical awesomeness, hiked the entire thing in flip flops.
Alongside the trail, some of the Karen weavings.
We stopped for lunch and let our tour guides surprise us with lunch. They played it pretty safe, fried rice, noodles, chicken stir fry and lemongrass soup, and were shocked to see that we ate it all. Apparently the foreign tourists usually don’t eat much at the lunch stop. We loved it, and finished it all. After lunch, while discussing the history of Buddhism, one of our guides finally figured out that we were pregnant, when I asked if I could sit down in the shade to hear the information, rather than stand in the hot sun. They were both pretty surprised; I was surprised they didn’t notice. But, perhaps all American women are round balloons in their eyes. I feel pretty round right now.
After the hill trek, we stopped at the Chiang Dao caves, where a 1/3 km trail wends between stalactites and Buddha statues deep underground. It was a pretty cool cave, and there are options there to do actual spelunking, but, of course, you don’t do that kind of craziness while 7 months pregnant!
We rounded out the day with a tour to the Doi Suthep, a golden temple on the mountain overlooking Chiang Mai, and a quick walk out to a really lovely waterfall just off the road to Doi Suthep in the national park. If I’d had more time there, it looked like a great waterfall to play in, and it’s popular with locals as a picnic spot. Outside the park itself were a bunch of stalls catering to day visitors, selling everything from frog or duck satay to toasted silk worms. (The bamboo worms didn’t look bad, but the silk worms looked like something from a horror film).
Other than temples, we didn’t do the typical Chiang Mai visit, which appears to include an elephant ride through the forest, rafting on a bamboo float, the night and day zoos, the tiger and gibbon parks, the butterfly park, etc. There’s even a coin and a stamp museum for the collectors. We were really just thrilled to breathe some clean air, revel in a little mud (or a lot of mud at some points on the rainy trail!), and be away from the dense population of Dhaka. Chiang Mai’s whole population could live in the tiny neighborhood near the embassy here in Dhaka, and yet the locals bemoaned the traffic and pollution. Little do they know what it could be.
All in all, I’d go back, and think it’s a great place to visit. I’d recommend Chiang Mai to family and friends, with and without children. There’s everything: history, adventure, culture, animals, food….
It’s a quiet Saturday morning her in the Adventure house. Perhaps we have so much paper and cardboard lying around it’s like another layer of insulation has been added to our flat. And what does having a metric ton of cardboard and paper mean? It means our boat shipment (HHE) finally arrived, and along with it, everything we’ve been missing for the last three months is finally ours once again. Surprisingly, there was much less damage in the HHE than we expected, but I am missing somethings still. Hopefully they’ll turn up, there are some boxes that have yet to be opened.
Last week we went to a big dinner and party at the Ambassador’s house, which was topped off by a singalong around his giant Christmas tree. It was a week of embassy festivities. There was also a concert in the embassy itself, many of the performers were staffers, it was classic Christmas music, and accompanied by the occasional jig or two from an excited child. I also attended Mr. A’s section’s “Open House” in which staffers in other sections (or spouses) got a chance to tour his office area, and see what they do in there. There were some fun interactive activities, some presentations and a bunch of cookie displays to keep us well fed as we followed the tour.
I also picked up my first paycheck from subbing at the American School. It’s in the local currency, so I’ll have to take it to a local bank to cash it. However, it’s recommended that all bank visits take place via a car, rather than walking, so I’ll have to wait until next week. Why? Because our payment finally cleared on the car we bought (third time’s the charm), and we can pick it up early next week.
However, all of these events were overshadowed by the knowledge that our possessions were in the city and had cleared customs. For various reasons, they couldn’t be delivered until the end of the week, but what a day of fun that was!
The truck arrives
We had 4 crates of stuff. That wouldn’t be much if we’d shipped furniture, but that’s mostly “boxes.” A whole lotta boxes. The pile below is most of the kitchen stuff, but we found random kitchen things in lots of other boxes. For example, the box of utensils also had the Bocce set, but nothing else, and was labeled “Small boxes with photos.” Uh? What?
Just after the movers left, our smallest pile of boxes. There are about 3 times as many boxes in 2 other rooms, and a big pile mysteriously labeled "books" in the office.
That was true of many of our boxes. There were about 10 boxes labeled “books” which contained at most one book, and usually none. The books were labeled clothes, or games…. Shoes were labeled clothes, etc. However, it’s understandable, given that almost all of our stuff was holed up in a single little room in a giant pile of doom when the packers arrived.
Got Milk? Need glasses?
However, the priority for me was the Christmas tree. So, even though we hadn’t found the silverware, or even cleared a path to the door, we cleared a space in the perfect corner and set up our tree. It was harder to arrange than we thought a fake tree would be. It’s our first fake tree, though I’ve had some mini trees and decorated a few fake trees for work and such. However, we think the results are worth the effort, and thank our upstairs neighbors for coming down to help us put all the hundred or so ornaments on.
Your classic reflecting tree shot
So, in sum, we’ve had a week of festivities, opening boxes and big happiness, and it isn’t even Christmas yet. I hear that a lot of the folks back home are knee deep in snow, but we’re still enjoying the “chilly” high 70 and low 80 degree days. Brr, where’s my jacket?
“It’s beginning to look a lot like Christmas….” well, except for the lack of snow and Christmas decor while we await our big shipment (should be here next week!)
But, in good news:
1. We think we’ve bought a car. Of course, the last 2 cars completely fell through, but at this point we’ve had an inspection and handed over a check-to-be-cashed, so we’re pretty confident this one will work out. It’s a bit bigger than the MINI, but still no road monster. It’s called a Mazda Demio and looks a bit like this, but I really just borrowed this pic from an old used-car ad. Supposedly it’s got more room in the trunk than the MINI, and that second set of doors will come in handy when we’re trying to ride behind our future “driver.” So, I guess we’ll be adding to our household staff soon.
2. We received a present! It’s sitting under the 1.5′ tree we have until our stuff comes, next to a pinecone and a snowman, each about 2-3″ tall. It’s a tiny Christmas.
3. The weather is AWESOME. Generally clear, but not hot. The locals are bundled up in scarves and gloves, but I think it’s about 75 out?
4. I sent in my dissertation draft last week, the one which is supposed to be the last one. But, haven’t heard whether it is yet.
5. We’ve already been to two Xmas parties, and since we couldn’t get enough pie, I made a cherry one yesterday. YUM.
6. I’m applying for a job here at the embassy, so keep your hopes up for me. It seems right up my alley, and in line with my training and career experience. Someone else wondered to me whether there was any one here who could even fulfill the specified requirements and limitations, but I think I do… so here’s hoping! It would be my highest paid gig yet, if you don’t count the various perks of working as the faculty-in-residence including free housing.
So, once again, not a particularly substantive post, but a busy week of emailing, hoping, and applying, in relation to #4 and #6.
We live in one of the nicer neighborhoods in Dhaka, and our neighbors tend to ‘do it right’ when it comes to holidays and celebrations. And, doing it right in relation to the Eid of Sacrifice means buying the biggest most pristine bull available and sacrificing it in the street to the accompaniment of a small band in front of all your relatives smiling faces.
Yesterday I took a tour of a small part of our neighborhood and here are a few of the cows that will be dead by tonight. There also a few goats, and if you were in another area, you might get a sheep or camel.
Eid al-Adha comes at the end of the month of pilgrimage and is both a commemoration of Abraham’s sacrifice and a day of almsgiving, with 1/3 of the animal being given to the poor, 1/3 to the immediate family and 1/3 to relatives, neighbors and friends.
We’re not sharing in any of the feastings this weekend, however, nor did we buy our own goat. However, a neighbor a couple of streets away who also lives in an apartment bought a goat for themselves. Rather than let it eat the plants along the side of the road during the day, they put it up on their 3rd floor balcony, where it bleated piteously between eating their houseplants as I walked by.
While I’m not the best at following a gluten-free diet, I am certainly up there in fantasizing about tasty gluten free foods, and the NY Times had a food column today on having a GF Thanksgiving:
Yum! especially those cranberry muffins, which look very similar to some that my mom made for me once.
Neko and Panda's 