So I made it! I have been to Dhaka once before, a decade ago. One of my most vivid memories from then, was repeated today with the absolute sea of faces pressed up against the outer windows of the arrivals area at the airport. It is a stark reminder of the density of Bangladesh’s population. Bangladeshis have a different attitude to personal space!

Having made the stupid, habitual, mistake of trying to put a seat belt on, only to discover that it doesn’t work (of course), we set off down the road in from the airport. You are quickly left in no doubt that poverty still challenges Bangladesh. Maybe it’s the random direction of the rickshaws and put-puts (motorised rickshaws), or the beggars that approach the car every time you slow down. Maybe it’s the vendors who risk life and limb weaving in and out of the traffic, or the kids riding on the roofs of the train. Maybe it’s the towering garment factories which line the airport road – which look almost derelict, but which are undoubtedly home to a hive of workers. Probably it’s a combination of all these things, but by the time you reach the Practical Action office, you already have a sense of the scale of the problem

Then you have to remind your self that the vendors and the garment factory workers can be the relatively lucky ones as they, at least, have an income. Later in the week I know we will be seeing people in rural areas who have less and are isolated from all possible opportunities. Just time today for a brief visit to the office and sit in on their monthly reporting meetings – as ever I remain staggered by the quantity and variety of work that we are involved with. Just strengthens my resolve that we need to be better at communicating it!

This entry was posted on Monday, November 9th, 2009 at 12:51 pm and is filed under Bangladesh, Field reports. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.