On the Road to Chittagong

(This post describes the beginning of the second half of our October break, in which we travel from Dhaka to the Chittagong Hill Tracts)

We arrived late Monday night from the Sundarbans to a home tragically without power. I went over to the school to send some e-mails and check in on the world, then came back, crashed, and woke up in time for our 5:15 AM departure from Baridhara. We left at the break of dawn to avoid the tremendous traffic on the two lane (sometimes four) road connection Bangladesh's two largest cities.

The road is home to four different speeds of vehicles: rickshaw, autorickshaw, bus/truck, car but only two lanes. As a result, the passing practices are absolutely insane, and "too close for comforts" are frequent occurrence. We didn't really have any near misses, though seeing a bus passing a bus passing a baby taxi forcing our car into the shoulder (without slowing) got old, quickly. On our way back from the southeast of the country, it was raining and there were a couple rolled trucks. However we didn't see anything that bad on the way down, as the weather was dry and sunny. Still, these were by far the craziest roads I have ever seen, and, god willing, will ever see.

Not a few hours outside of Dhaka we stopped for a quick breakfast at a roadside restaurant called Times Square. Our driver had never heard of the Times Square in NYC, and there was a certain failure of language in our attempts to describe the enormity and spectacle of that place. There was really no way to communicate the intensity and scope of the square in relation to what our driver Kalam has seen in South Asia. After a quick (and super cheap) breakfast of eggs and parata, we hit the road again.

About an hour after breakfast, as I half dozed looking out the backseat window, I heard a thump! on the windshield and started in alarm. Quickly turning my head to see what we had whacked, through the back window I saw a black bird bouncing down the white line of the shoulder. No one spoke for a few seconds until our driver said, simply, "bird." We then all cracked up at his deadpan response, to which he claimed he couldn't do anything (he couldn't), the bird had flown right into us! He then offered that the bird was "flying" and "maybe injured," but I saw that thing bouncing, that was one dead bird. Having offered up a sacrifice to the gods of the road, we were able to drive some 30 hours over the course of the four days, never once having a problem of any kind.

The following posts are a chronicle of the trip, which included: hill climbing, goat killing, guru hugging, ship wrecking, pink sheets, bad food, a monkeyless monkey forest, villagers, cows, temples, shiva, Buddha, gold, rain, pineapple, turtle feeding and much much more...


Oops, no place to stick in the turtle feeding now (I tried to arrange these posts chronologically by writing them in reverse), so I'll just record it here.
We were exhausted. Bandarban-Rangamatti-Chittagong City all in one day, all in one car, all losing our minds. As night envelopes Chittagong, our driver suggests one last stop on our journey, a holy Muslim site. We wearily agree and brace for one last experience before some rest. As we turn off the main road down a narrow alley, our driver points out small snack shops on the side of the road... "these are for the.. ehhh..." "Birds? Beggars?" we guess, but he is unresponsive. As we park next to a small pond, we are instructed not to take pictures, and Sara puts on a scarf.
As we approach the pool we notice people crouched at the edge of the pool, holding slices of banana on the end of small sticks over the water. Just then I notice forms moving in the brackish water... Turtles! About 100 turtles floated around the muddied water, aparently as a symbol of a prophet who had once come to Chittagong bearing a turtle. The three foot turtles coasted towards the stone steps next to the pool and mouths slowly opened on the end of extending necks to welcome the snacks. Feeding the turtles is a part of praying for the people who visit the site, and one of the strangest sights I've ever seen.