Turning into a cultural Muslim while still being extremely foreign in Dhaka....

So far I am fitting into the culture pretty well here I would say. My day of Ramadan fasting was a success, well I managed it I can't say it was an experience I would repeat. It is doable until about 2pm then you get hungry and for the last hour before 6.45pm is it basically torture as not only are you hungry but so thirsty. It was someone's birthday and the Pizza Hut in Dhaka was having an Iftar all you can eat special so I broke fast there. The food is all plated up in advance so everyone can eat at exactly the point it hits 6.45pm so for about 15 minutes the temptation is incredible. Then when you can break fast you eat so much food that you feel as ill as you did befor! So basically the whole experience is sort of pointless. I have thus decided not to fast any more but just have the Iftar feast instead. A cultural Muslim some might say!

In the same way though that not all Christians go to church every Sunday not all Muslims fast so those who don't want to keep their identity secret so cannot eat openly on the street. So instead all these little market stalls open up covered by material so people can sit behind them and eat in secret. An advantage of being a foreigner for me is that I can just crack upon the coke on the street, very cruel I know.
For one Iftar I was able to go with one of my friend's to a political event as her Mum is a politician here. Which meant dressing up like a Bengali and being the only white person in a very Muslim room. My Bengali attire however confused the mainly male room quite a lot and I was asked several times if I was now Muslim, the fact I am not even Christian is a pretty shocking admission here! But I was introduced, thanks to Mariam's Mum, to the former Prime Minister of Bangladesh and very likely next Prime Minister. I am mingling with the Bengali elite it would seem!

The other amusing thing about living in Dhaka is that its illegal for residents to drink and buy alcohol but again not for foreigners. Restaurants here even have signs on the menu saying locals will not be served. So if you want alcohol you either pay ridiculous prices in hotels, buy it from certain ex-pat shops, or do a dodgy deal with a friend of a friend that involves brown bags, dark alleys, and very shifty old bearded guys. And all you get after all that effort is very cheap over-priced whiskey that has a very suspiciously sounding Scottish name! All the cool kids therefore hang out in Shisha bars that look just like UK bars but close at 11pm and everyone is drinking Red Bull... Some of them are even marketed as 'juice bars' serving an array of fruit juice - can't see this concept of late night juice drinking catching on back home somehow. As ex-pats we are also able to take part in the Bi-Annual H & M clothing sale of faulty pieces from the Bangladeshi factories. Which means an absolute riot as everyone foreign in Dhaka turns out to fight for very cheap clothing: the shock of seeing so many non-bengalis in one places causes everyone in the room to have very unsubtle staring contests with one another as you fight for the good non-holey pieces.

I also decided, after the success of my 50p Bosnian fringe cut, to make use of the equally low beauty prices here (a personal favourite is the 3 pound facial) and get a 90p fringe cut. Huge mistake as I swear they just found this woman off the street as she had no clue what scissors even were and stood in front of me hacking off my hair until I was left with a very squint, very straight, and very short fringe. Responses to it so far have been:
'Oh'
'You had your fringe cut!'
And
'No HONESTLY I like it!'
An utter failure, I even grabbed the scissors of her in an attempt to fix the mess. Photos will not follow.

So now I am escaping Dhaka with 4 other interns for the bright lights of Bangkok where I have been promised a Topshop, Starbucks, McDonalds, and a plethora of Thai delicacies. For the boys this also involves the lure of the infamous Ping Ping Shows (google it if you have a strong disposition), lady boys, and strip shows. We have even watched the Hangover II for inspiration... Just getting away from Dhaka's traffic, pollution, and absolute mayhem will be something of a delight...

The journey's the hardest bit when attempting to get to Dhaka...

Before leaving there were several things I was particularly nervous about. Firstly whether I had actually booked a flight or not, you see in my endeavour to find the cheapest deal I had booked my flight off an online phone company from a man who spoke bad english and refused to send me a confirmation letter. Secondly I was scared that if my flight was real what kind of airline I had found, again I had been looking up reviews online the night before and they were not good to say the least; I was convinced I was going to end up in a battered old aeroplane with no leg room, broken toilets, and food that would make me very sick. And finally I was terrified of spending the night in Mumbai airport which I imagined to be similar to a Brazilian slum.

So as to quell my nerves and ease me into a new culture I had spent the last two days before at a hippy music festival with my dad and brother. My dad revels at the change to show off his new bracelets, ever growing hair, and share his plans to couch surf around the world. While my brother likes to believe he is way too cool for this hippy malark stubbornly wearing skinny jeans and sitting with his IPod touch out the whole time. One thing we do all agree on is the comedy stage where this year particular highlights included a very naked man, a very lewd guitar player, and a female comedienne who told us of her brilliant new invention whereby if girls wear their pants inside out they have a handy minge pocket. GENIUS. Even news of this couldn't quite quell those nerves though...

Practising for his hippy days...

My mother clearly just as worried told me to text her as soon as I arrived in Mumbai Airport, I reminded her that this was also the earliest I could possibly phone her. 'Well you could text me on the plane...'. 'No I couldn't.' To which SHE (Miss Worryer of the Century) replied: 'oh don't be silly it doesn't matter anymore. ' Even going as far as to take it as personal insult that I wasn't prepared to do this.

Luckily I did value my life so my phone was switched off as soon as I boarded the plane and bloody hell was I relieved that A) I was on a flight and B) the aeroplane did not look like it was on its last legs (just yet) so now I could just enjoy the flight. I don't quite understand why people don't like flying - for 8 hours you get a lovely little seat with a blanket, pillow, and your own TV. Then, to make life even easier, air hostesses walk down the the aisles serving you food and drink. In fact, thanks to the fasten seat belt sign and general lack of space, you are dis-couraged from moving - I reckon in another year or two they will have built in toilets to your seats. I imagine this in a similar style to Eastern European trains whereby it just falls on to the platform - I do see the difficulty of emulating this on a plane obviously.

What I have described would of course not occur on your average Easyjet flight but believe me those pointless wet flannels they hand out at the start of the flight add some extra excitement and make you feel all posh (who knew it was so simple). And as for the food - since I was flying with an Indian airline it was all of course, well Indian. Which meant vegetable curry for breakfast, a curried veg wrap for lunch, then more curry and a weird potato thing for dinner ( throwing my digestive system in the deep end). Lovely as the curries were, I would argue it is a bad plane food selection for a group of people in an enclosed space with poor ventilation and only 8 toilets...

Although I did get funny looks for taking these, you can now play the which one is breakfast, lunch and dinner game!

Swiftly changing topics the plane also proved amazing for people watching. One Chinese girl (I say girl she was mid twenties) had invested in the full Hello Kitty sleeping range so roamed about in huge slippers and a neck rest potentially to show off her purchases - I wasn't impressed. While some very hippy Londoners with broad cockney accents were a random addition to the mainly Asian passengers.

Escaping the plane at 11pm local time only meant a 9 hour wait until my flight to Dhaka. Unfortunately the 'Slumper Lounge' provided was already full of the we-sleep-anywhere Chines contingency. Hours of playing scrabble on my IPod were inevitable, I had been playing with my brother before and so it was set up for 'pass and play' - a mode I initially couldn't get out of resulting in me playing several games against myself (advantage being I can't lose). And when I eventually did the first word the virtual player came up with was vodka - conveniently duty free were also giving out free samples.

Another highlight of endless travel is of course getting to test out whether 48 hour deodorant really lives up to its claim, don't worry I won't spoil the surprise! The toilets in the airport also confusingly have a conventional one and a squat one - this seems madness why would you choose to squat?! It is like being offered a free air conditioned taxi ride and going nah I will take the hot, over crowded bus instead!

Escaping Mumbai Airport meant my final flight to Dhaka, more curry, and a little more sleep (word of warning Bangladeshi men don't like you falling asleep on them in aeroplanes). My first glimpse of Dhaka was pretty exciting though, it is definitely a cultural change with grey high rise buildings and huge shanty slums.

lonesome travelling ENDS, mother ARRIVES...

Generally people are quite surprised when they see I am travelling alone and think I am a) brave and b) presume I must get very lonely. In fact I think its the complete opposite - no one bloody leaves me alone! ( and I mean this positively). In the Balkans if you're on your own people seem to assume you therefore need someone to talk to. Within minutes of leaving the German girls a posh Montenegran woman who now randomly lives in Zurich was telling me about her life and insisted I take two bananas. While waiting for a bus to Dubrovnik involved an encounter with a very odd man who from what I could make out learnt English out a book, worked in the train station during the week, and at weekends masquerades as a taxi driver at the bus station (he offered me a lift which I declined). He however insisted I take his number so that next year me and all my friends can go stay with him (he'll drive us anywhere). In the course of my painfully long 30 minutes with him he managed to plan out a full trip we could do which includes a trip to the local archeology museum. Somehow 'Duka' also managed to take a photo of me in between saying his favourite word (and a general favourite of Bosnians) 'super' a lot. My lasting memory of Duka was me getting on the bus while he stood at the window saying 'I can see you 'super'. Maybe his number is one to bin...

On a tour to Mostar from Dubrovnik I met two English couples who found me travelling alone particularly perplexing - I explained that I was staying mainly in Youth Hostels so was never really alone. Later I overheard them dicussing this - with one explaining to the others that things are different now and these things called Youth Hostels allow young people to mix! So as you can see travelling alone is not really being alone. The arrival of my mother though would soon sort that! You see wanting a holiday, and since I was in a sunny part of the world it made sense for my mum to join me for my final week in Croatia.

A lover of the package holidays though this presented obvious difficulties as she would have to get to the Croatian town of Split without the aid of a tour guide. The night before I was bombarded by text with questions such as 'do they speak English?', 'will they accept credit cards?', and 'what is the weather like?'. I honestly believe she thought I was secretly taking her to Afghanistan.

By some sort of miracle though she did make it from the airport to the centre of Split, of course ten texts were sent on the bus (I explained afterwards this was roughly a 2 pound interchange) asking more questions such as 'how do I know when to get off?' and again 'do they speak English?'. I told her to get off when everyone else does and speak German to them. The silly woman then spent the journey learning German phrases!

Our hotel was conveniently located near the bus station so a short walk and we were there. I had spent the previous night in the Split 'Booze and Snooze' hostel that actually involved a lot less boozing and more snoozing than you would imagine (probably due to the signs everywhere informing you if you went to the clubs 'YOU WILL GET ROBBED'. Nice city then! So I had already checked us into the hotel before I met my mother, the woman at reception asked where my colleague was (I LOLed). I even managed to get all my washing done for a mere ten pounds (tourist prices!). My Mum was fresh off seeing Glee in London the day before (by herself bless her and was high like a 15 year old girl!) When I brought my Mum to the hotel I think it was evident business associates we were not, my Mum offered the idea though I could be her toy girl...

It's going to be a long few days....