Tigers, Shooting Stars and the Bay of Bengal

It's Monday and I am back in Dhaka, feeling refreshed after a good night of sleep. I realized that I spent so much time staying up late on the boat, losing track of how many shooting stars I had seen that I was a bit sleep deprived. One night we slept on the bow of the boat, fell asleep to the stars and woke up to the sunrise, near the Bay of Bengal.

Another day, drifting down the river we stopped and went on a treck through the Mangrove forest. It was a-mazing. No people, no pollution. Only lots and lots of small sea crabs scattering with each step in the mud. The mud was thick, clayish and very very wet. I ended up going barefoot, as even my Chacos were not up for the battle of staying on my feet. We saw lots of animal prints, but none made me as excited as the TIGER paw prints. Fresh. There was a tiger watching us. And as much as I did really want to see a tiger, I did not want to meet it there. We had armed guards with us, and even they were getting a bit nervous, starting to make loud coughing noises and telling us to stay together. We smelled where the tiger had marked it's territory. The treck ended near a place where the British used to "harvest" salt. There were thousands of clay pots and pot pieces that were once used to collect the salt from the sea and would be sent other places to be sold.

Most days were spent lazily waking up, drinking cha, chatting with new friends, and relaxing as the boat went down the river towards the sea. I even had the luxury of starting and finishing "The Kite Runner." One morning we all woke up with the sun, and took a small boat down a channel, to see wildlife. I didn't see any wildlife, but it was a nice boat ride.

One of my favorite times was spent having a Hymn Sing. The funny part is that we only had one hymnal for 12 people, so the words came out jumbled at times. People lost interest, after a little while because of the lack of hymnals perhaps, or perhaps because the crew on board was looking at us a bit funny. So about 4 of us remained. We decided that we MUST learn a new hymn. "Love Came Down at Christmas" was selected somehow. We spent a loooong time, determined to learn all the parts, get the rhythm right (we even clapped it out) and sang until our voices were raspy. We now know the song perrrrfectly though. Nerdy? yes. Fun? yes.

One day we took a hike with the promise of it ending up with a swim at the Bay of Bengal. It was a hot late morning and as I looked around I realized that Tigers could be watching us. It's not everyday in NA that you take a hike and think about that. Once I heard the wooshing of the waves and saw the beach grass I got really excited. Then the view opened up and there in front of us was the Bay of Bengal. A wide, remote beach. No one else was around. Fan-tastic.
We swam and floated and played a shaky game of Marco Polo, becase I wanted to. We rode the waves, although they were pretty weak. Mmmmmm.....

Last night was a good good ending to our great week. Just our MCC group ate at a super nice Indian restaurant--all sorts of yummy food. We accidently ordered enough Naan to feed an army.

Now we are back, I am going to find an Eid gift for my host family. (Eid is sort of like our Christmas). Taking the bus back will be interesting. It has been compared to traveling on the day before Thanksgiving in the states. I am preparing to be squished in with sweaty men all around me--that way if it is not that way I will be pleasantly surprised.

I'll post some pictures later on.