Mango pie

Christy, another Fulbrighter, and I made mango pie the other day. I have not even thought about pie in the last six months, but as it is fruit season (and rainy season), there is an abundance of mangoes. The recipe Christy has is actually from a cookbook that some Peace Corps volunteers in Guinea made to pass along recipes using local ingredients. The pie came out delicious, and tastes a bit like apple pie, but a little juicier, tangier and sweeter - America meets Guinea meets Bangladesh! Next time you have some extra mangoes, try out this recipe!

Savar Shipyard

Last Friday I went out to Savar, about a 30 minute bus ride from Dhaka, to visit two French friends who work at a boat yard on various floating solutions for Bangladesh. Some of the innovative projects currently going on in Savar include refurbishing a floating hospital to reach remote island chars, building fiber glass fishing and transport boats, and preserving traditional Bengali wooden boat designs and craftsmanship (Friendship). I had the pleasure of going out to the yard to hang out with friends, explore the floating hospital, climb aboard some of the large wooden tourist boats and sail around the Vagolpur river.

Floating hospital undergoing renovations (background) and a
fiberglass transport boat (foreground).

Sailing the newest wooden sailboat.

Personalized Rickshaw A

For Zach's birthday, I had the famous rickshaw artist Ahmed paint a seat cover with us in a classic bollywood scene.  I am in the center dancing on a floating lotus flower, with a tiger on the left about to pounce and Zach to the right ready to attack with his 3 barreled gun. Overall, it came out perfectly, slightly absurd and over the top!

Fresh Air

Dhaka is a great city for exploring, and I still have lots more on my list to check out, but after being cooped up in Dhaka for a few months for language school, I have really been enjoying the flexibility of my new schedule, which allows me to travel around the beautiful country of Bangladesh. To make my recent travels even more enjoyable, I had my first visitor in Bangladesh, Zach! Zach and I left Dhaka for a 10 day trip down to Cox's Bazaar, Bandarban and Rangamati. 

We arrived at Cox's Bazaar with the rain and spent two days there dodging rain drops and exploring the world's longest natural unbroken beach. There are a few qualifiers in that last statement, but when you include them all, it is true; Bangladesh is home to a 120km long beach that is entirely natural (as opposed to man-made). Since it is the low season and there was a storm coming, Cox's Bazaar was nearly vacant, and Zach and I barely had to share the entire 120km stretch with anyone! Zach played in the waves as I watched from the shore (I did not want to brave the water in my Salwar Kameez since an actual bathing suit would be wildly inappropriate) and we explored all the little shops selling dried fish, sea shells and even tourist T-shirts! On our second day we went to town and explored a Buddhist monastary, where Zach managed to impress the locals with his cricket skills. Then, as the storm left Cox's Bazaar, we boarded the bus to visit the Chittagong Hill Tracts.

Zach playing in the waves at Cox's Bazaar.