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Our attempt at Apu's delicious dhal (served with home-made pomegranate and caramelised red onion couscous, hummus and tzatziki; for that authentic Bangladeshi flavour).

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Saturday 8th June

On Saturday we awake to the sound of heavy rainfall- the monsoon is really getting into its stride. Our coach back to Dhaka is booked for 11am, and we had grand ideas of fitting in a swim before we leave, but we decide instead to try out the Jacuzzi in our bathroom (to floody effect), and  take a leisurely breakfast in the Hilltop Restaurant.

Breakfast is a similar affair to yesterdays, with chicken liver dhal, fresh watermelon, and luchis (little puffed breads made with fine maida flour and a spoonful of ghee). Throwing all hopes of not seeming like massive tourists out the window, we request poached eggs, which are dutifully cooked by the waiters and brought to our table. As we sit eating, we look apprehensively at the watery landscape outside, and decide to get a car back to the coach station; the little open-sided CNGs seem much less appealing in torrential rain.

We make the six-hour journey back to Dhaka. It is fascinating watching the villages and fields roll by in its new, water-logged form. The bustling market towns are slightly quieter- a few shoppers shuffle around with umbrellas or makeshift rain hats- plastic bags on their heads.

A few hours in, the rain peters out, and the countryside is again bathed in bright sunlight. We whizz past fields where garmets dyed in bright pinks, yellows, blues and turquoises are laid out to dry in the sun. We see women batik-ing shirts and hanging them out on washing lines to flap in the gentle breeze.

We see girls in school uniform- bright blue salwaar kamez with white shawls, and their hair tied in long sleek black plaits. Nigella points out that we haven’t seen a single girl with hair shorter than Sharmine’s (a few inches below shoulder length) in Bangladesh.

We become acutely aware of how ridiculous we must look, with our brightly coloured harem pants and floral skirts bought in East London vintage shops, mis-matching scarves, and our hair piled up in buns on top our heads to keep our necks cool. Although it’s tedious to wrap a shawl around your shoulders in 32 degree heat, we learn that we get treated much less like tourists (ie quoted tourist prices) when we dress according to the crowds. The staring we receive- from predominantly men, but also women- is completely non-threatening. In Bangladesh, even if people hassle you by asking questions or making comments, they do not invade your ‘personal space’.

Before the trip, we were warned about being on our guard to ensure we don’t get ‘bumped’ (pick-pocketed), but we haven’t experienced anything of this nature, even in the crowded market of Gauzia. We exercise caution, as we would on the streets of London, but in fact- as you might expect- find that people on the streets of Dhaka are just minding their own business. If anything, the street sellers and hawkers have been incredibly friendly snapping photos of us on their mobile phones as we have sat, clinging on to rickshaws in the afternoon traffic. They ‘sister!’ and ‘madam!’ as we pass their shops, inviting us in to peruse their wares.                                        

We finally arrive back in Dhaka, and Yusuf is at the coach station to meet us, dressed in a grey suit and white collared shirt.

“Guys” he says, “Are you up for a wedding?”.

Excited, we all pile into the red Nissan, and head back to the apartment. Sharmine helps us pick out saris- extremely long reems of brightly coloured silk. We put on cotton crop tops and underskirts, and Sharmine wraps the saris around our hips, gathering the bulk of it in 4 of 5 pleats at the front, which are tucked into the underskirt, and then the remainder goes over our chests, and is either thrown over one shoulder, or draped over a shoulder and held in the crook of an arm. Sharmine’s sari is a bright turquoise with pale beige stitching, Nigella’s is green with gold details, and mine is a jewel blue-green with hot pink trim.

We bundle back into the car, scooping up our skirts so they don’t get trapped in the car door, and Yusuf asks Hanif to take us to Shaheen Hall. As we drive up to the hall, we see that there is a huge wedding reception being conducted inside. Yusuf reveals that he has no idea who is getting married, and has no relation or connection to either the bride or groom. We are wedding-crashing.

Inside, we take in the breath-taking scenery. String of fairy lights and gathered in the centre of the room, making a huge canopy. Round tables with crisp white table-cloths are set out cabaret style, and up on the stage, the wedding party are standing against a decorated backdrop of drapes and flowers, and are surrounded by photographers. We walk through the hall. Our motley crew attracts a few confused glances, so we shuffle to the edge of the room. Our camp is divided on tactic- Sharmine thinks we should stay seated and try and blend in, but Yusuf wants to seize the bull by the horns, walk up on to the stage, and get photos with the bride and groom.

“We’ll just tell them!”

He says,

“We’ll just tell them that we were walking past, and then wedding looked so beautiful that you guys wanted to come in and take a look!”

Sharmine looks sceptical, but Yusuf has convinced himself, and I take my camera and follow him up onto the stage, snapping photos of Sharmine’s exasperated expressions as we mount the steps.

Up on the stage, we linger behind the photographers, and Yusuf, who happens to be a photographer, gets passed a camera, and begins taking photos of the bride. In a brief hiatus of the flashing cameras, Yusuf steps forward, and in Bangla introduces himself to the bride and groom, and begins to spin our story. The couple smile and laugh, and warmly invite us not only to stay at the wedding, but want photos with us, and insist that we also stay for dinner. We file up, and stand with the bride and groom for a few photographs.

As we descend from the stage, victorious in Yusuf’s wedding crashing abilities, the brides sisters and cousins approach us and ask for photos with us. Later, we wonder if, when they look back at the wedding photos in a few week’s time, they will have any idea who we were.

We sit down at one of the tables, and waiters buzz around us, bringing plates of kacchi biryani (kacchi meaning ‘raw’, as the raw meat and rice are cooked together), chicken, and spicy white yoghurt drinks in jugs called borhani, a sweet saffron dessert rice dish called zarda, topped with candied fruit and gulab jamun, and decorated boxes of paan leaves to freshen our breath.

After embarking upon this second dinner- when in Rome- we head back out to the parking lot, where Hanif has been waiting with the car. Jubilant, around 11.30pm we head to Movenpick, the final stop on our food crawl, and eat maple and walnut, white chocolate, and apricot ice-cream. As we sit eating, Yusuf ducks downstairs, and comes back with strings of white jasmine flowers he has bought for us off a street seller. They are incredibly fragrant, and we pin them into our hair.

Back at the house we begin the unpinning and un-tucking process of taking off the saris. We hang our strings of tiny buds around the room, over mirrors and bed posts, and soon the air is full with the delicate scent of jasmine.                              

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Friday 7th June

On Friday morning, we arrive at breakfast to find ourselves, again, to be the only guests occupying the large restaurant. Six waiters stand around watching us eat, and I half-expect them to urge “have more! Have more!” like Apu does the second we lay our forks on an empty plate. For breakfast we eat potato bhaji and chicken dhal with hot fried parathas and grilled tomatoes.

Having eaten enough to fuel a hike up the Chittagong Hills, we then spend a lazy morning sunbathing on the balcony and watching children playing in the fields below.

Around midday, seemingly monsoon season begins. The rain begins deceptively delicately; tiny warm drops splish about non-committally, and we sit out of its reach, with our legs stretched out hoping to still tan through the clouds. As grey clouds gather, and this activity begins to feel a little futile, we retire inside and order room service. We appease Sharmine’s nostalgia for Western food with breaded mozzarella and grilled vegetable sandwiches.

After lunch, we head up to the pool, and to the amusement of the attendants, bob around in rubber rings holding umbrellas. The air is still very warm and humid, so the rain isn’t unpleasant. Even though the sky is covered in grey cloud, it is still incredibly bright.

It is fascinating to watch the landscape change through the monsoon; the large open tea fields are transformed into lakes which men and children wade through with fishing nets. In the short time that we have been in Sylhet, we have seen such extremities of weather: conditions which farmers who have far more resources than Sylhetis at their disposal would struggle to respond to.

Later that day, after a dinner of vegetable noodles, potato bhorta, and paneer, we take a walk down the little track which connects the resort to the main road which runs through Sylhet. At night the air is thick with chirping crickets, and the calls and shrieks of other unidentified animals.

The sun has set, and there are no street lights and very little light pollution out here in the countryside. We have to listen out for the signature sounds of creaking wheels and flapping canvas against wood, as rickshaws with no lights veer out of the darkness giving us only a few seconds to jump off the edge of the road. There are absolutely no women walking around at this time in the evening, and we begin to wonder whether our vision of an informative night-walk is going to end like the slasher film we envisaged.

We get to the main stretch. It is populated by four or five little shops and a barbers, in which a man sits with his face covered in a mask of white foam; a barber deftly swiping at his face with a cut-throat razor. We walk a little way up the road into pitch darkness, and clamber up and down the roadside as CNGs and trucks whizz past, beeping wildly. Men pass us along the road, staring at us; we are not exactly inconspicuous in our brightly-coloured scarves and harem pants.

We cross the road, dodging yet more vehicles in the dark, and walk up to a little snack shop to buy the lightly-spiced green-packeted potato crackers which we have seen being sold from literally every food stall in the city, and in the tiny villages we passed through on the way to Sylhet. As Sharmine counts out taka notes, I take a few photos of the shop, which is warmly lit by Kupi (Kerosene) lamps, in stark contrast to the impenetrable darkness of the night.  A small crowd gathers behind me, peering over my shoulder at the little digital screen which betrays me by exposing the faux-arty pictures of packaged cakes hanging from the stall which I am trying to take. Understandably, as is a recurrent theme of the trip, they find me ridiculous. It is the equivalent of someone taking photos of packets of Walkers crisps at a service station.

We head back to the resort, back down the dark track. A few times, I nearly stumble into men who are silently squatting at the edge of the road, much to Nigella’s amusement. Our journey is dogged by a steady stream of men, seemingly in a relay, who tag onto our group, and ask Sharmine where we are staying, what she does, and where she is from. Sharmine diplomatically deflects their questioning, whilst Nigella and I unhelpfully make jokey asides, and under cover of darkness, proceed to supportively film Sharmine’s comical attempts to shake off the unwanted attention.

We return unscathed from our, in retrospect, foolish expedition, and fall into our beds after a taxing day of sunbathing and eating.

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Thursday 6th June - cont'd

We arrive in Sylhet at around 6pm, and get a CNG to the resort where we are staying. Although CNGs appear like a safer, more robust option in comparison to rickshaws, I find them far more unpleasant, as our position close to the ground means that we are subject to the fumes of the cars and buses which seem on a constant mission to bump us off the road.

Nazimgarh Resort is incredibly beautiful; our spacious room looks over lush green fields, and the area is an oasis of tranquillity, far from the bustle and noise of Dhaka. We stand on the balcony taking the obligatory 600 photographs as the sky turn orange and violet as the sun sets, and then head out to explore the grounds. We discover that Nazimgarh has two restaurants, a pool, a gym, a television room with a well-stocked library of pirate DVDs, a snack shop, and the open-plan lobby areas has swinging benches, so guests can while the day away watching the indoor waterfall which cascades down from the 3rd floor swimming pool into a fountain on the ground floor.

As night falls, we take inspiration from the insects who are beginning to eat us alive, and step into the ‘Hilltop Restaurant’. The menu is extraordinary; dishes range from Paneer curry, to Pad Thai noodles, to Gnocchi. Being the only guests in the restaurant at 10pm, we are well-attended, and tuck in to freshly-made spinach ravioli and fish cooked in a coconut sauce.

After dinner we buy Masala crisps and Jalapeno flavoured Pringles, and watch DVDs in the film room. We still haven’t seen any other guests, and smother our increasing apprehension by joking that our set up is like the opening premise to a slasher film haha! Ha.

In Sylhet, away from the pollution of Dhaka we see lots of wildlife. Little geckos with padded toes skitter up the walls; tiny frogs hop in gutters, a spider with a body the size of a ping pong ball sits over the doorframe of our room, and I spend a fair portion of the evening chasing earwigs and huge beetles around the bathroom whilst Sharmine provides a helpful soundtrack of squealing.

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Thursday 6th June

I write this sitting on the balcony, back in Gulshan. The sound of birds tweeting merges with metallic clanging from the building being constructed behind the apartment block we are staying in. To catch up on the past few days spent out of Dhaka:

With Nigella well recovered (we road tested her stomach a few times with chocolate brownies from North End), we finally head out to Sylhet. After wading through barricades of traffic, our driver drops us at the coach station at 10.45, and we slump into faded leather chairs to wait for our bus. As has become usual on our trip, despite our modestly covered shoulders, arms and legs, men and women stare at us with something approximating curiosity (we hope). Outside the coach station, bare-footed children run amongst people queuing for coaches, asking for money: “One taka! One taka! I’m hungry!”.

Lots of children beg on the streets of Dhaka- we took a trip to a Korean bakery called Dumiok a few days ago, and two boys of around 8 or 9 followed us up the street asking for money. They were laughing and giggling, fully aware that grabbing at our skirts would annoy us not because they were asking for money, but purely because they were small boys grabbing at our skirts. It must have been a fairly comical sight- the three of us literally running up the busy street pursued by two small boys laughing and shouting at us. We passed a family; two Americans with their two children. They called out “Hi there!” to us; clearly we had failed at our attempts to blend into the Bangladeshi urban landscape. Seeing a much more fruitful target, the boys were easily palmed off onto the American family, and we (only slightly) guiltily slipped into the bakery, almost passing out after running two blocks in 31 degree heat.

We board the bus at 10.55. I’m not feeling particularly well, and I look up sceptically at the coach: every other window has large jagged cracks running all over it like a spider’s web. Sharmine tells us that this from the hatals- the strikes- where mobs have been vandalising any vehicles on the streets. Despite my apprehensions, it’s a relatively nice bus. The seats are all intact and have adjustable footrests; a man hands round bottles of water and ominous plastic bags for each passenger. We set out on the 7-hour journey to Sylhet; a tea-growing region in North-Eastern Bangladesh.

For three hours we drive through poor urban villages. We see markets where men sit cross-legged selling mangos from large shallow baskets. Pineapples are hung upside-down with string threaded through their bases; they hang in rows, looped over bamboo canes, like tropical handbags. Women stand behind large trestle tables covered in chickens and pigeons, who in turn sit patiently, waiting to be haggled over. I see a roadside butcher in a simple wooden shack; big pink joints of meat hang from hooks which puncture the corrugated iron roof, and a young man sits outside nonchalantly disembowelling a cow. The cows here are very skinny. Their skin is stretched across their barrel-shaped bodies so tightly that you can count every rib. They move slowly in the heat of the morning. I see a cow grazing in a field with a bird perched on his shoulders. The cow, irritated, flicks its tail and the bird flutters off, returning a few seconds later to perch again. I watch this happen a few times until the cow gives up, and returns to nibbling strands of grass as the bird hops jubilantly around on his back.

We pass steel workshops where bed-heads and coat-stands are stacked outside tiny dark shacks; in the timber yards, men dressed in vests and lunghis roll huge tree trunks into piles. A little while later we pass a huge steel construction being built; the builders are wearing flip flops and hard hats, and underneath its shadow a small market has evolved.

We stop at a petrol station, and step out of the air-conditioned coach into searing heat and suffocating humidity. The driver tells us that we have 20 minutes; Sharmine buys a chicken sandwich, and Nigella and I eat marmite sandwiches from the bag of snacks we have prepared for the journey. Irrespective of this time frame, the other families from our coach sit down in the café and begin ordering elaborate meals.

Back on the coach, or journey takes us into the country-side. Beautiful scenes of lush bamboo groves are interrupted only by the man across the aisle from me hacking and spitting into his plastic bag: something he continues to do for the entirety of the journey. Spitting is a frequent hazard for pedestrians in Dhaka; we learn fairly early on not to walk under the windows of buses.

We pass fields and streams. Here, little groups of houses are built amongst the trees, and children play in the ponds and lakes. We watch a group of small boys and girls joining hands in a circle; they shriek and laugh as they jump about, splashing an unhappy-looking boy who is trapped in the centre.

The poverty here is evident, and insatiable, and on this journey we observe scenes of people truly eking out an existence. Young girls walk barefoot on rubbish tips and rake through the waste to find scraps to sell. Plastic can be recycled, and the foil from medicine pill packets has a small value as it can be melted down and re-used. Sharmine tells us that NGOs have begun to help these children. For families where the parents work on rubbish tips, schools have been set up to take children away from this hazardous work.

And yet, all of life is here, in its vibrancy. To the people living in these small villages between Dhaka and Sylhet, life is not a lesser version of an ideal. Here there is still laughter, and there is leisure. Men sit around on benches drinking tea, and crowd around TV screens in small snack shops, where brightly-coloured foil packets of crisps and sweets hang like bunting.

Certainly these people are victims of relentless structural violence- the grossly uneven circulation and distribution of nutritious food worldwide can in part be attributed to the forces of capitalism and greed. The lack of access to adequate healthcare, schooling, and labour rights perpetuates cycles of poverty as, for example, the children of rubbish-tip rakers automatically learn the work of their parents.

Mobile technology has in some part begun to connect these areas to services the rest of us have at our fingertips, especially banking. As we drive through Sylhet at the end of our journey, Sharmine points out the brightly-coloured houses with balconies and mirrored windows. Sylhet has become one of the wealthiest cities in the country, and is a prime example of the impact of remittances sent from relatives abroad- many of whom live on our door step on Brick Lane, in East London.

TBC- ashi!

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...and then we crashed a wedding at Shaheen Hall.

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A fragrant string of jasmine flowers; Yusuf bought these for us from a street seller outside Movenpick in Gulshan.

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breakfast at Nazimgarh: chicken dhal, potato bhaji, scrambled eggs, fried tomatoes and paratha.

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Banani Bridge; connecting the neighbourhoods of Banani and Gulshan, where Sharmine lives.

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Apu's incredible cooking; even after inhaling three servings she is disappointed at how little we eat.

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Wednesday 5th June

After five fairly incident-free days, Nigella is the first of our party to be struck down with dysentery, and spends 36 hours writhing in bed. Sharmine and I return to Kalabagan to postpone our Sylhet coach tickets, and spend a day tottering around Dhaka on rickshaws and exploring the local neighbourhoods.

We take a rickshaw over Banani bridge where men hang out, talk on mobile phones and generally heckle any women who pass over it. The bridge connects the neighbourhoods of Banani and Gulshan, and gives panoramic views over the huge lake; a rare spot of open space in the hectic built-up city. The bridge sweeps on an incline up and over the river, and many rickshaw-drivers have to get off their bikes and push their heavy burdens up the slope. Our driver is pretty gutsy: on the way up the bridge he swerves haphazardously around the seemingly bottomless potholes which plague the city’s roads, without losing pace, and speeds over the bridge, over-taking many other rickshaws ahead of us.

Armed with bagfuls of fabric from Gauzia, Hanif drives us to the commercial centre of Banani, and we climb three floors, past shops where men crowd around computers and printers, to Sharmine’s tailors. I am measured for three salwaar kameez, and Apu helps to to describe the necklines I want, and in what direction I want the prints of the fabic to lie on the tops and trousers. The tailor is extremely patient, and is amused when I ask for the tops to be shorter- just above the knee- in contradiction to the current longer fashion. We drop off some of Nigella’s clothes for the tailor to make copies in the fabric she bought. He flips through his calendar, and says he can have all of the pieces ready for us to collect on Monday- the day before we return back to London.

Back at the apartment, we sit with Apu and eat pumpkin, dhal, fish curry, and spinach for lunch. We check on Nigella, who is whimpering under mosquito nets, doing her best impression of the English Patient, and feed her rehydration solution. She perks up, and manages to nibble a cracker. After lunch, we leave Nigella with her bubbling stomach and the sound of Apu watching her Hindi serials in the next room for company. We meet Yusuf at the Bengal Gallery of Fine Arts, which is showing work by print-maker Rokeya Sultana. The pieces are large layered prints- described as ‘unique pressure prints’, in bright blues and yellows. Later, Yusuf drops us home; his driver sits in the passenger seat as Yusuf skilfully navigates the traffic. Yusuf tells us he’s been driving since he was 14 and doesn’t have a license. “Nobody buys a license here”, he tells us “You can bribe the police with 500 taka (about £4) to let you off; it works out cheaper to just pay up each time you get caught out!”.

 Nigella has progressed onto vegetable crackers, and we indulge Sharmine’s craving for Western food with spaghetti and imported pesto and parmesan. Apu plies us with snacks- nimki (little spicy crackers with onion seeds) and muri (puffs of rice, which are sold on the street, in cones), and we pack our bags for Sylhet. We decide that we won’t go via Bogra, a town in Northern Bangladesh, and will instead go straight to Sylhet, where many of the British Bangladeshi community in East London originate from.

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Tuesday 4th June

Sharmine works in Communications and Global Advocacy for Brac, an organisation which, “works with people whose lives are dominated by extreme poverty, illiteracy, disease and other handicaps”.

In the morning she takes us to Aarong- a large handicraft store selling clothes and locally-made homewares, which is the product of a fair-trade social enterprise created by Brac.

From the cool, cleanly-organised aisles of Aarong, we are driven to the south of the city, near Dhaka University, to sample the wares of Gauzia, a huge sprawling market in the Newmarket district. Gauzia is, frankly, an assault on the senses. It is hustle and bustle personified.

Stall after stall of brightly coloured and patterned fabrics jostle for space with food carts. As we walk through the stalls the sellers shout “Sister! Sister” and flap fabrics at us; for some reason, the sellers all seem to whip out fabrics in lurid shades of pink and purple whenever we pass.

When we stop to examine the stalls, we quickly learn two things: not to point at anything specific, because the sellers will pull out the whole ream and begin the hard sell with a barrage of “Very nice! Very nice! Good price!”; and not to smile or show interest in the fabrics, as they will quote us a much higher price if they think we will be an easy sell. Luckily we have Yusuf with us to beat down the ‘foreigner’ prices the sellers quote us; he jokingly laments that all the sellers are assuming that he is our ‘guide’. Nigella is haggling over 3 yards of beautiful pale green chiffon shot through with silver ribbon and splashes of red. She barters it down to 900 Taka (about £8), and Yusuf tell us to walk away. As we do- as Yusuf has predicted- the men shout after us “850? 800?”, and Nigella returns to make her purchase.

I’ve never been so hot in my entire life. Under my shirt and shawl, sweat streams down my back. Some of the shops have little fans, but the frequent powercuts mean that these are not always functioning.

Yusuf disappears off, and returns with four orange ice lollies in a paper bag. We step into an alley where young boys are washing plates and glasses for chai in plastic buckets, and take a welcome break from the extreme humidity of the indoor stalls with their low ceilings.

At about 8 o’clock, after picking up some bangles, and sets of fabric to make 3-piece salwaar kameez, we leave Gauzia, and drop by the Green Line coach office in Kalabangam. We are planning a two-day excursion to Sylhet, and buy coach tickets which will take us on the 6-hour journey out of Dhaka.

Back at the apartment, we have a makeshift dinner of leftovers, and Apu’s home-made mango kulfi. Nigella and I also eat Bangladeshi cream crackers with marmite and Apu’s mango chutney, much to Sharmine’s dismay.

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Monday 3rd June

I write this, sitting again on my bed, and listening to sounds which have now become familiar to me: the whirr of the overhead fan, the call to prayer wafting in through the door which opens out onto the balcony, and the sound of small boys splashing on the river.

Yesterday lunchtime, over chopped patal, spinach, potato and fried aubergine, Apu talked with us about her time as a student in Dhaka. She spoke of being around during the Language Movement, and how when shooting began, all the Universities had closed, and the students had spilled out onto the streets and began protesting.

“Weren’t you scared?”

Nigella asks, peeling another lychee, and popping its grape-like contents into her mouth.

“Scared? No!”

Apu replies,

“There were lots of people around. But the police; they rounded up the men and took them right out to the edges of the city. They took my brother; my mother, she was so scared . My brother had to walk back through the night, and this was a time when there was a curfew. He arrived home late, and tired.”

In Bangladesh, Language Movement Day on 21st February is now observed as a national holiday, to remember the Movement, and all those who died defending its cause.

After lunch, we head out to some nearby clothes shops. I take some three-piece salwar kameez into the ‘trial room’ to try on, and experience the first of the brief, daily powercuts which are commonplace in the city. With my glasses removed to pull tops over my head, in the darkness I am rendered blind, hopping around and groping for the door; harem pants tangled around my ankles.

We cross the road outside the shop. This is no mean feat. We stand, cautious, at the edge of four lanes of rushing, weaving traffic, and seek the opportune moment to fling ourselves in front of CNGs and rickshaws, jumping over potholes to reach the other side.

We seek solstice on the 3rd floor of a building, in a café called North End, an independent coffee house with air con circulating the gentle tang of roasting coffee beans and chocolate brownies. The interior feels like a million miles away from the roaring traffic and steelworks in the street below. We drink iced coffees, and chat with the baristas, who are all roughly our age.

From North End, we drive to meet Yusuf, and another friend of Sharmine’s, at a restaurant. We creep and jolt painstakingly through traffic, watching young boys move from car to car, selling strings of flowers, brightly coloured squares of towel, maps of Dhaka, and bags of limes. Well-primed to expect hold ups such as these, we share Alpen cereal bars with the driver, who is bemused at our constant ability to produce snacks.

We finally arrive at the restaurant, called Ojo, in Dhanmondi, another nearby popular neighbourhood where young people hang out, sit on plastic stools and drink tea. Ojo serves a curious fusion of Indian and pan-Asian food, with sundried tomato fettuccine thrown in for luck. We drink iced tea from tall jars and quiz Yusuf about his studies in Development Communications. Yusuf tells us about his 15 minutes of fame- providing the Bangla voice over for a Khan Academy YouTube tutorial in trigonometry.

We head back to the house, and flake out on Sharmine’s bed. Yusuf has borrowed a projector from the NGO he volunteers for, so we douse ourselves in insect repellent and fall asleep watching films projected on a white sheet on Sharmine’s wall.

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Sunday 2nd June

Nigella and I arrived in Bangladesh at 6am yesterday, and I am already peppered with mosquito bites. And my nail varnish is melting. Back in East London, I try to go running every morning, but in the intense heat of Bangladesh, I have decided to write instead, in order to not forget the sights, tastes, sounds, and inevitable smells of this country.

Apu- what we call Sharmine’s grandma- tells me to begin with “We are staying with Sharmine’s grandma. Don’t say anything about the Prime Minister”.

And so I write this, sitting on my bed in my Sharmine’s guest room; a Kantha (a beautiful, soft blanket made from old saris stitched together) draped over my knees. A large cumbersome fan whirrs overhead, and I can hear the tell-tale sounds of lunch being prepared in the kitchen- yesterday we had a big steaming dhal, white rice, fried aubergine, and fried patal, which look like little green peppers with big seeds.

Apu  has gone to the shops. She is worried that we aren’t eating enough- a fairly hilarious concept- so has popped out to buy vegetables and fresh lychees, leaving instructions for us to eat lunch, and that there is lots of fresh spinach, from Manikganj, to be eaten.

Sharmine is sat on a chair between my bed, and Nigella’s bed. She is on the phone to her boyfriend Yusuf, who is on his way back from IUB (Independent University Bangladesh). I can hear the incessant beeping of car horns where Yusuf is: on the streets of Dhaka, cars sound their horns all their time, but it’s not (usually) the angry beeping of road-rage, it’s essentially to say “watch out!” before a vehicle pulls out without indicating, and cuts back in front of you.

Yesterday, we took a rickshaw to a shoe-shop in Gulshan, near where my friend lives. Gulshan is a fairly affluent neighbourhood- the South Kensington of Dhaka- but the disparity of wealth is still evident here. Beggars and hawkers line the streets, and everyone is using their resources and strategising to make money. We’ve seen boys weaving between four lines of busy traffic to sell newspapers through car windows; roadside shoe-cleaners and accountancy workshops, street food carts, and young children pulling huge carts full of waste. I imagine that this wealth gap will pursue us for the duration of our trip: on the steps of Pink City shopping centre, its windows showcasing gold necklaces and beautiful raw silks, a woman thrusts her baby into my arms.

We explore the four levels of the mall, making a note to return to buy scarves and printed fabrics. We step out into 32 degree heat and humidity, and nonetheless decide to walk to Dhali in Gulshan 2 Market, a local mini supermarket which stocks both Bangladeshi and imported produce. I have quickly realised that in this city you smell things before you see them- whether that be a pile of rubbish or a cart selling Fucska (a puffed ball of dough, filled with mashed chickpeas, chillis and sour sauce).

As we walk through the car park, we see a man with a large cage selling birds, rabbits and a small dog. We have also seen goats wandering around the streets, seemingly unphased by the roaring, beeping traffic and bustling crowds. The first time we saw a goat wandering around Gulshan, we couldn't subdue the latent tourist in us, and after laughing, and pointing- "A goat! A goat"- we took a photo. Sharmine told us that some men standing nearby had been, understandably, laughing at us and saying to each other in Bengali "They're taking a photo of a goat! They're taking a photo of a goat!". We are grateful to enter the air conditioned supermarket, and we are amused to find that it stocks Gochujang (Korena chilli paste), Korean crisps and Korean tinned tuna- snacks that we are used to buying in the Korean supermarkets back in New Malden in Surrey. There is a small Korean community in Bangladesh- we passed lots of Korean restaurants on our drive back from the airport. At the immigration desk at Dhaka airport, one of the officials spoke to Nigella in Korean- he had travelled in Korea, so knew phrases like “Hello” and “Quickly! Quickly!” which meant that conversation dried up fairly quickly…quickly.

Alongside Korean produce, at Dhali you can also buy ASDA Smart price chocolate, and M and S digestive biscuits, as well as Italian pesto, soya milk, and sugar-free custard creams. We take another rickshaw back to my friend’s apartment- all three of us wedge ourselves into the back, bracing ourselves and clinging onto our bags as the tiny bike and cart bounces over huge pot-holes.

Back at the house, lunch has been eaten many hours ago, but the leftovers are keeping warm in big metal pots with lids. Sharmine’s grandma also gives us fresh mango, from her sister’s garden, and Bakarkhani- flakey round savoury breads.

Nigella and I sleep early, but wake around 2am, re-apply insect repellent, and then sleep until midday the next day.

Apu has just come in to tell us that the gardener is coming to tend the plants on the balcony, hinting that we might want to put on something a bit more substantial than our pyjama shorts and vest tops. I should probably also shower before lunch, so I’ll leave it here for now.

Ashi!