wining and dinning

Oh the life of a diplomat is rough. We have been busy with the wine and dine circuit amongst the various embassies. There are many farewell parties, when You have been in a country for four years your network of friends get pretty wide ranging.

I will be heading to China for a weeks works at the embassy. I will get a chance to visit the great wall and the forbidden city. unfortunately Karen and Erin will be staying behind.

We have been busy planning our summer trip we will be dropping in to London England for a 3 days prior to embarking on our return journey to Bangladesh.

I will make it home for Erin's talent show she is playing a piano ensemble from a Russian composer
The monsoon season will soon be on us and the thunderstorm are quite impressive - Mark

mother's day

Dhaka

It's mothers day in Dhaka. At school i have got to make mothers day card. and i got to make a nice bracelet for my mom.there is a talent show at school,me and my friends. And were doing a russian song called little cricket. I am playing piano. erin

lazy friday

well today it was 42 C with 99% humidity. The best way to describe the Bangladeshi climate is there are two seasons in Bangladesh, dry underwear season and wet underwear season. we are now in the wet underwear season. This was a photo was taken 50 ft from our Mission in 2005 when I first arrived here in Bangladesh

The monsoon season is coming and the heat is creating a burden on an already crippled power grid. We have alternating power cuts every hours and sometimes we are with out 3 to 4 hours and sometime as long as 8 hrs. We have a generator which supplies partial power to our apartment.

Bangladesh is the size of new Brunswick but with the population of 150 million people and Dhaka has 15 million people with very little infrastructure (Roads, water, sewer etc,,) coupled by the mass migration of the rural population to the city which is constantly increasing This place will be in trouble when global warming starts sinking this country and it doesn't help that past and current governments have been so corrupt.

Mark

explorers

Erin class has been working on explorers. They had the usual suspects Columbus, Marco polo, Magellan etc..

Erin chose an obscure anthropologist by the name of Sue Hendrickson. She discovered the most complete skeleton of a T Rex while excavating in North Dakota

Erin had to give a presentation to her parents and then to her classmates and other teachers

She did a wonderful job. - Mark

the long journey home

Karen and Erin ordered some clothes from sears. Well the diplomatic bag arrived last week and most of the clothes Erin purchased on line at sears were manufactured here in Dhaka.

There is a huge garment industry. Clothes are very cheap if you don't mind the ambiance of buying them on the open market.

Mark

TV IN BANGLADESH

TV in Bangladesh is somethings that is worth writing about. When I got here 4 years ago there were very few alternatives for watching TV. Now TV has stoop to a new low. We get shows like different strokes (now we are dating ourselves), murder she wrote,season one of Seinfeld( I hated Seinfeld back in civilized world, I despise it even more) 24 hrs cricket (snooze!!!!!!) - Mark

SIGNS SIGNS EVERYWHERE A SIGN

These are a couple of signs hung near our apartment. We thought they were pretty funny. I am not sure what audience they are trying to target. We come across these things on a regular basis, but rarely have the camera with us at the time.

Karen

cows, cows everywhere a cow

every day in Bangladesh, there are always surprises.

lately, outside our apartment a couple of cows have been finding there way by the entrance to our parking lot. The bedroom is located above the vehicle entrance. so now we are serenaded by cows everyday and at night.

The local rich people that live in our neighbourhood always have parties. Normally 3 day before the party or wedding a petting zoo (yes the kids of the rich visit the animal) is set up and all you hear for 3 days is goats, chickens, roster and cows. Later as macabre as this sound the petting zoo is turned into the buffet line. - Mark

We are safely back in Dhaka. Actually we arrived on Saturday but it has taken this long to find a few minutes to update. Our trip to Bangkok was a whirlwind. We had Erin's cardiology check up. Not much has changed. She still has a leak (PDA) not enough to bother doing anything about it. The risk of further surgery out weighs the chance of infection from leaving it as is. She also has a valve that requires a follow up later on. Overall she is good for another 10thousand miles! The stay in Bangkok was the most exciting. A little fresh air, shopping and lots of good food. Since we were a little out of season it was not too busy. We did not have any time for anything touristy.
Erin's school spring break starts at the end of next week. We will not go anywhere just to the club and relax by the pool. I actually like being here during holidays. It is so nice and quiet. You would never think that there were so many expats here until a holiday comes. It becomes a virtual ghost town.
I have not officially started the count down until summer vacation, but we leave Dhaka on the 15 of June, I think. Well it is time to chase Erin off to bed. She is dancing to some music.
Oh, one bit of news. We had our first real rain in 5 months last night. It was a true Nor'easter with hail and everything. It sounded like we were under fire. Lots of lightning and thunder too. I had Mark call the new arrivals to let them know that the we were not in fact under fire. This is a bizzare place so you never know what will happen next.
Bye for now, K

a day in the park in bangkok

I am standing next to a soft sheld-turtle. We had fun in the park in bangkok. Daddyand I went to the park because mommy was sick - erin

houston we have toilet paper

Well after travelling to happy places I call Kinshasa, Kigali, port au Prince, Beirut, Bujumbura, Former Yugoslavia etc ... Place you only hear about on CNN if you are lucky. there are certain things you do in these countries like travel with toilet paper. Bangladesh is no different.

After 4 years in Bangladesh, It was the first time I went to the public washroom at the airport and there was a roll of the crisp white parchment on a roll. Prior to my entrance to the washroom I asked Karen for the TP which is standard Operating procedures in 3rd world countries. It was big news and blog worthy

The airport in Dhaka as improved over the years there was a poster "come to Bangladesh before the tourist do" and a poster of a hangman's noose which was "death to drug traffickers". Erin is standing infront of the new poster at the airport

spagetti jazz and parcel day

Today we received a care package from Susan. Erin was extremely happy. She had tried on all the clothes and ate 4 Peeps within 15 min of getting home. I managed to stash some of the Easter treats for the actual day.

We had dinner out with Friends Zoe and Mom Kerri. Zoe attends a different school and her mom Kerri is a nurse at another clinic. We had a wonderful time at one of our favourite restaurants and one of the only kid friendly spots in Dhaka.

A very exciting day overall. Only one more day and we are off to Bangkok for 4 days. A much needed break for all three of us. Couldn't wait for spring break over Easter.

PROJECT RESCUE MORE PHOTOS

these are more pictures from our neighbour Anil. He is a professional photographer. She is a very serious performer

up and operating

Well we have finally started a blog site to tell everyone about our travels and life in Asia

project rescue

3 March - Mark is now the dean of the diplomatic security services in Dhaka. The dean means the person with the most time in country. We had several going away functions for my British and American counterparts. We have all been here since 2005 and seen political violence, cyclones, coups, curfew, floods etc.. I was quite busy with the Border guard mutiny lat week. The chaos was a great going away gift for Matt (US) and Andy (UK)

____________________________________________________________________________________________

19 and 20 March 09 - Erin was involved in a play called project rescue save the planet. Erin was dressed up as a chipmunk. She practiced 4 hrs a week after school. It was a very nice performance. It is a bit of a wake up call when your kids are telling you the planet is dying. She had one of her friends Zoe (British friend) come as a spectator as she goes to the British international school

20 March - The High Commission hosted the Francophonie which is a an assembly of french speaking countries that have representation in Bangladesh