We visited Bangladesh as part of a group of five, our itinerary very efficiently organized by Bangladesh Ecotours.

Let's get the negatives out of the way first.

Dhaka's traffic is a disaster. It makes Jakarta's or Manila's look really fluid... Outside the capital, traffic moves, but you won't make fast progress (unless there's a strike happening). So factor in that travelling anywhere takes lots of time...



Also, Bangladesh is a country that is not yet very familiar with international tourism. Most of the time this feature is not a negative at all. It's a massive, refreshing plus. But it does have implications for things like choice of accommodation and general levels of infrastructure. So bear it in mind. And international travellers will most certainly attract attention... In fact, our arrival in many places was akin to the circus hitting town. Usually, this is just amusing, but it can be a little much, especially when all you want to do is go quietly to the toilet...



OK, so now on to the much more important positives:

1. The rickshaws. These are mobile works of art, pedalled with ferocious energy. They're fun to ride; no slower than any other vehicle in city traffic; environmentally friendly; and infinitely adaptable. And they create a quite unique soundscape on the crowded, uneven streets: ching, ching, rattle, clatter, ching ching...





2. The food. Special highlights, in random order: mustardy mashed potato; borhani (a yoghurt drink with mint and chillies); delicious desserts like firni or sandesh or egg pudding; Sundarbans wild honey; snacks, such as fuchka (little balls filled with a veggie mix, topped off with tamarind), or ball-shaped singaras (samosa-like, but much more substantial than the usual three-cornered things), or puris filled with lentils; delicious biryani and khichuri (rice with lentils); excellent chapatis and naan; delectably squidgy, squirty, cardamom-steeped Bengali sweets; etc, etc...







3. The colours. At this season, apart from the bright green of the new rice and the bright yellow of the mustard, the Bangladeshi natural backdrop is muted: fawns, greys, dusty greens. All the more noticeable, then, are the vibrant colours of the human players on this stage: rickshaws, tuktuks, and lorries are all brightly painted; women wear brilliantly coloured saris, shalwar-kameez, and shawls, and even the men's lungis come in attractively striped fabrics; older men henna their beards bright orange; the produce in the market is beautifully arranged, and zings with colour; the walls around properties are painted with adverts, and festooned with curly Bangla script; and so on...





4. The water. Just look at a map of Bangladesh to see why. Even the police camouflage clothes have blue in the design. So we boated quite a lot, much to Nigel's delight. We boated in Dhaka, to experience the busy life of the river. We boated just north of Dhaka to visit a village of pot-makers. And near the Indian border we boated a very scenic and tranquil stretch of river, a montage of sandy orange banks and green water. For yet more boating, read on.







5. The River Jamuna and the chars. This comes in a watery category all of its own, and is particularly close to my heart because it involves a very special and courageous form of nomadism. Chars are large sandbanks. They form, un-form, and re-form according to the will of the rains and the river. People occupy them because they offer relatively cheap, very fertile land. The farmers we visited live in very simple but tidy, well constructed houses, and assiduously grow a variety of crops. When the monsoon comes, they'll have to leave. And they'll have to survive on their savings till the water subsides. If their char is still there, they'll return. If it's not, well, they're on the move again...









6. The Sundarbans. This area comprises the world's largest mangrove forest, and a network of waterways large and small. So it's clearly another stand-out in the water department. We spent two days on a simple boat, royally looked after by a stalwart crew. One early morning we transferred to a rowing boat, sliding up a chilly channel where only a few brahmini kites and hardy crabbers were stirring. Later, disembarking at regular intervals, we walked shluppy low-tide mangrove mud, rippling grassland, and deserted beaches bordering the Bay of Bengal. And we saw spotted deer, crocodile, rhesus monkeys, kites, woodpeckers, and kingfishers. At night, the dark stretched for miles around.







... In the Sundarbans we also saw...

7. Paw prints. Of Bengal tigers. In the mud beneath the mangroves, and on the beach. Treading where tigers have only very recently trodden definitely adds a frisson to a sunny walk. And you understand why an armed ranger accompanied our every step.



8. Puthiya. I really wish we had had the opportunity to spend longer in this historic southern town. It's a magical place, every twist and turn offering vistas of rosy temples, crumbling palaces, limpid ponds, and whispering groves.









9. Brick and stone. The landscape of Bangladesh is punctuated by brickworks, all boasting important-looking chimneys and geometric arrangements of bricks in various stages of completion. Visiting one was a fascinating experience. Bricks and terracotta have long combined to make the loveliest mosques, temples, and monasteries (and in addition, there are wonderful terracotta artworks in the National Museum in Dhaka)...







... Stone, meanwhile, provides a living for hundreds of people up in Jaflong, on the Indian border. They bring it up from the river, sort it, load it, and transport it, all in an intricately interlocking sequence of activities. Alongside this hive of manual labour are stalls and restos catering to the Bangladeshi tourists who come to enjoy the nearby tea plantations and the unwontedly hilly scenery.





... Which brings us conveniently to...

10. Tea. As in India, little cups of hot sweet tea cheered many a journey. And the tea-growing area around Srimangal and Sylhet is very pretty indeed. Next door to the plantations you can find quiet forest parks housing bands of shy leaf-monkeys, and wetlands offering a tranquil sanctuary to birds with intriguing names like ferruginous pochard. Then there's the miraculous seven-layer tea... And for sheer decadence you can't beat a mint tea (local tea with the addition of a few mint leaves) on the terrace of the sumptuous Grand Sultan...





Postscript: One of my top ten was originally going to be "the people", but I decided it was just too patronizing to talk airily about "the people" of a country where you've only spent two weeks... What I can say is that some of my academic work looks at the ways in which unorganized individuals seeking opportunities (of many different kinds) inadvertently become drivers of transnational change. And in Bangladesh there is certainly no shortage of courageous, warm, curious, resilient, devout, hard-working people, doing their absolute utmost to seize the opportunities that come their way. May the change they create be to their benefit.