Today, I worked at home preparing lectures for my classes, so in late afternoon I decided to go out for a walk to buy some mangoes. I figured I would be out for 30 min or so. I texted my roommate, Corina, to see if she wanted to come. She did, so we planned to meet between school and our apartment...I'd walk, she'd walk, we'd meet in the middle...but that didn't work. But a couple of phone calls later we found each other, so it was all good. So we started walking to find mangoes.
The corner where we like to get mangoes had some for sale, but they were rotten. So no luck. So we kept walking. Then, walking along under a sunny blue sky, a small cloud appears and it starts to rain. So now we are walking and taking a shower at the same time and drawing a lot of stares as we walked in the rain. We had to walk further than we expected, because mango sellers were in short supply, but finally we got to a fruit and vegetable market. We found some mangoes, picked out a few that were okay, and asked the seller "How much?" He tells us, "120 taka per kg." Corina and I both react to this with, "What? No! Too much! 60 taka per kg!" (60 taka per kg is the foreigner price in mango season, and when mangoes are in shorter supply we pay 80 taka per kg.) He tried to convince us that he was charging everyone 120 per kg, so we gave him a couple of looks of displeasure and left. We wandered through the rest of the market (which was actually really interesting...think Granville Island market but a lot more dirty and with a leaky roof) but made it out to the other side without finding any more mangoes.
At that point, we were damp from the rain and still mango-less, so we decided to just go to the grocery store and buy them there (sometimes I really appreciate fixed-price stores, as they call them here...a little more expensive, but much less work to shop there!) So we got on a rickshaw, and then we realized a few minutes in that he was riding the wrong way. (Rickshaw drivers often nod and say yes like they know where you are going even though they didn't understand a word you said, so it's usually a good idea to have a general idea of where you are going before you get on one!) So we had a very nice neighborhood tour...saw some really nice apartment buildings, discovered a park and playground (where the local kids were out playing and the adults were all out getting their evening exercise by walking around the park), and finally made it to the grocery store. We bought mangoes for 80 taka per kg, a bunch of other stuff we needed (because we were there), ate an ice cream bar, and took a rickshaw home. So two hours later, we had some mangoes and a really interesting experience to go with it! I observed to Corina on the way home that you definitely have to be flexible in a country like this and just be able to enjoy the experiences you have, even if they are totally unplanned!
I am writing this post sitting the in dark because the power is out yet again, and I am hearing large cockroaches jumping/flying around my kitchen...kind of gross sounding, but oh well. Really, I should try and get on top of this cockroach issue...but I think I am just going to accept that in order to have a low stress life, I will have to peacefully coexist with them.
Power outages, cockroaches, and very long trips to find mangoes...it's all part of the experience of Bangladesh!
