So, it appears the drains don't work that well in Dhaka

Wonder Woman! The joys of visiting Singapore when you are older...

The rainy season has started.  So has Ramadan.  The rainy season in the desh is full of contrasts - baking hot one moment, dust blowing everywhere and then ridiculously heavy rain and cooler temperatures the next!  The rain, when it comes, it quite special.  It comes down hard.  Not necessarily for that long but very hard.

Now you might be aware that the roads near where we live in Dhaka recently had some new 'storm drains' added.  They dug the holes in the road - by hand.  They moved the new drains into the ground - by hand.  They covered it over with some rubble - by hand.  Then it rained.  And the rubble all disappeared and massive holes appeared - which obviously you can't see when it's been raining and there are a few feet of water on the road!  Result - a number of cars driving into them and getting a little bit stuck.

So, next step in the process?  Covering the holes and rubble in the road with tarmac - by hand.  Picture the scene, old metal barrels on their side with a kind of metal tray on top. Underneath a fire made from burning old bits of cloth and rubbish.  On top, bits of stone and hot tar.  People all around adding to the fire or to the hot tar - and all in a pair of flip-flops and a longi (or a sari for the women). Payment for a days work on this - approximately 500 BDT per day (for the men - which is about 3 UK pounds) and less than that for the women.

So, the new road and the new drains, they should stand up to the rainfall yes?  Well, no.  The rain at the weekend flooded the road outside the British High Commission - approximately 1 - 2 feet of water after about 1 hours rain.  We now have more pot holes appearing - kindly marked out by a bit of tree so that drivers and rickshaw wallahs don't drive into it!

Meanwhile, down in Old Dhaka, markets were still under 1 - 2 feet of water the next day.  Why is this?  Now some will argue 'oh it's climate change' and yes, with climate change we can expect the rainfall patterns to change and intensify.  But this is a multi-layered problem.  It involves corruption, it involves lack of planning and budgeting, it involves land grabbing.  Oh the list goes on.

Moving onto more lighthearted issues, Isobel and I went to Singapore for a long weekend.  When I was young, Singapore was a little bit dull to be honest.  It was so clean and functional.  I wanted chaos and excitement.  Now when I went to Singapore from Dhaka I thought - oh my, this is paradise.  It functions, there are pavements, there is public transport, there is a cable car (with Wonder Woman no less), there is Ben and Jerrys.  It was a great visit.  And happily in the airport on the way home I found some Belgian chocolates....which tasted lovely with a bottle of Belgian beer back here in Dhaka!

Thinking of beer, one of the many conversations amongst expats here (apart from 'where can I buy food without formulin in it' and 'where is good to go for a weekend break from Dhaka and how long will it take?') is around which of the many expat clubs has the best beer.  Bangladesh is a dry country- so as an expat you can only get alcohol through diplomatic missions (if you are a diplomat), through a 'warehouse' (if you have what they call a passbook) or through some of the clubs.  We have the Dutch club (complete with little climbing wall and bitterballen), the German club (good pizza), the Nordic club (good cinnamon buns) and so on.  But the beer vote goes to......the American club.  What a range of beer! In fact as one colleague of mine said 'thats the fridge I long to sit outside'.

A selection of the beers at the American Club Dhaka

In addition to beer, the other industry which is growing in Dhaka is that related to bread and baking!  I love a good bake.  I'm looking forward to the next Great British Bake Off which I'll be watching thanks to modern technology.  An English guy has moved to Dhaka and is helping train up a group of bakers who are going to open a new bakery for all to enjoy.  Bread and baked products in Asia are often disappointing if what you are after is a croissant or western type product (obviously, Asian roti and other such breads are easily available and incredibly tasty!).  However, growing middle classes in many Asian countries are looking for these western baked goods.  And so Dhaka has now launched the Holey Artisan Bakery.  So far we've only tasted almond croissants, pain au chocolat, sourdough and fruit loaf but they were very very tasty!  Let's hope the Bangladeshi bakers can keep it up when they realise that most bakeries bake through the night and early morning to have bread ready for breakfast as opposed to 7pm at night! I'll be supporting them.

And whilst on the baking theme and before signing off for the day, I have still been baking!  This time, baked doughnuts with cinnamon sugar!  Baked! Yummy.  So much healthier I'm sure (if you ignore the sugar).  Did you know you can get a book just about doughnuts - it's good, look it up - by Rosie Reynolds.  It's small but full of lovely recipes!