FlyerTalk Forums - View Single Post - Bangladesh, Burma and Beijing the Long Way (with stops in Laos, Singapore and Tokyo)
Old May 27, 2018, 2:23 pm
  #9  
swingaling
 
Join Date: Apr 2017
Location: PVD, BOS
Programs: AA EXP
Posts: 1,664
Dhaka, Bangladesh

Dhaka, Bangladesh
City Tour from ToursByLocals.com

I booked a tour guide and private car to take me around Dhaka for the afternoon. We'd planned to see the Lalbagh Fort, Ahsan Manzil (Pink Palace) and the Parliament building. What I hadn't taken into consideration was that I was arriving in Dhaka on the second day of Ramadan. Unfortunately, that threw a wrench in the works, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

We set off from the hotel shortly after 1PM. Our first stop was Ahsan Manzil, the Pink Palace. Located in the Old City, it was roughly 20km from my hotel to the palace. Being a Saturday, traffic was lighter than usual, but it still took a bit over two hours to get to the palace. The traffic was simply horrible.

There were all manner of vehicle sharing the roads: cars, enormous buses, rickshaws, bicycles, mopeds, horse-drawn carriages, and two-wheeled carts pulled by men were all common sights. On top of that, the vast majority of traffic lights did not work whatsoever, and the police directing traffic were generally ineffective and inefficient. It was a disorganized mess.

Lots of abandoned, partially built structures filled with squatters.


Monument to harpists, probably.


Air Force Monument to birds and MiGs

A tree and a building


Colorful rickshaw


One of many stray dogs


Typical roadside garbage monument





Guys playing hopscotch in the street


Typical road scene in Dhaka. Traffic at a standstill, people walking every which way. Man in blue is sleepwalking.


Pineapple vending in the street


These buses are a menace and are absolutely scratched beyond belief. On closer inspection, they are completely covered in bondo.



This street was (allegedly) under construction and was very difficult to get through.






A typical intersection.



Tourists admiring the insanity.




See the traffic light? It's just for show. It doesn't actually work.






I think these buses are completely made from Bondo.


How many different means of transport can you spot in this photo?




Huge dumpsters placed right on the street. At least the strays get something out of it?



After much ado, we finally made it to the Pink Palace at 3:30PM. Unfortunately, they decided to close at 3:30, with the last admission at 3:00. Their posted hours show a 5PM closing time, but they simply decided to close early without giving anyone prior notice about it. Presumably the early closing was due to the fact that it was the second day of Ramadan. However, they didn't close early on the first day of Ramadan.


It's a lovely building and I would have loved to see the inside. Unfortunately, it wasn't meant to be this time around.


Walking back to the car from the Pink Palace. Typical scene in Old Town Dhaka.


Riverfront


Back in the car, more traffic on the way to Lalbagh Fort.







Naturally, the Lalbagh Fort was also closed. It closed 30min before we arrived. Its new Ramadan schedule unannounced, of course.


The grounds were beautifully maintained.






Heading to the Parliament Building. More roadside dumpsters.




Parliament Building. While it's possible for tourists to gain entry to the building, the entry fee is nearly $100 US, which hardly seems worth it. In any event, I believe it needed to be arranged in advance and I had not burning desire to go inside.




Presidential Palace on the way back to the hotel.


The ride back to the hotel was much quicker and I was back in my room in no time. I had some dinner at the rooftop hotel restaurant and then napped for a couple hours. Dinner was quite tasty and pricing was reasonable, by international standards (certainly not by Dhaka standards). I got up around 9PM, showered and then caught the hotel shuttle back to the airport for my red-eye to Singapore.




Overall, I enjoyed my time in Bangladesh, and definitely would like to see more of the country in the future. Everyone I met was very nice and they clearly wanted more tourists to visit. The infrastructure for tourism is there (somewhat), but it's not the easiest place to travel. Not difficult, but everything takes a lot of time.

Last edited by swingaling; May 27, 2018 at 2:35 pm
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