2 Months in Dhaka: Reflections

Today, October 1, is the two month anniversary of my arrival in Dhaka. As with all large changes in life, it feels far longer and shorter than that. The time has evaporated since I began teaching, the rhythm of my life has made the pace more predictable and the experience more comfortable. Yet I also am aware of the sea changes that have occurred in my mind. Things that once shocked me are no longer worth note, my eyes no longer focus on the same aspects of my surroundings, no longer fascinated by the existence of rickshaws, now simply annoyed by their lack of mirrors and habits of sudden lane (loosely used) changes. I can look or not look at the kid's who crowd to the windows of our car at the stoplight of a busy intersection, I no longer feel a need to comment on the foul odors of the city, instead remarking at the absence as we walk past a flower-stand.
It is insane how quickly our minds wrap themselves around a new situation, retaining the same substance but assuming a new shape. The waves of new experience crash onto the shores of our consciousness, casting new wood and shells up and retrieving some part of the land. And yet when we view the beach it appears eternal, we do not first acknowledge it is in constant change, rather perceiving a "timelessness" to the relationship of sand and water. So the way I view my everyday life appears normal to me now self-evident, though a time lapse camera filming the last two months would apprehend a startling evolution.
To abandon this metaphor, I do not wish to imply that I no longer recognize myself. Rather, the most essential parts of me have been made more apparent by the choices I have made in what I will and will not let change around me. Living the life of an ex-patriot has allowed me to retain as much or as little of the pretenses of American life as I choose, and I would say that, on the whole, I do not forsake the luxuries of home when I truly desire them. On to...