Rajshahi and the Eid moon

Our first exciting trip for the year was to Rajshahi for Eid (the Muslim version of Christmas) at the end of October. It taught us a lot about Bangladesh (and ourselves), including:
- patience is required in Bangladesh: the Eid holiday was not confirmed until the night before Eid, when the moon-sighting commitee convened to search for the moon. This caused much confusion for the entire population, who were all heading back to their villages for the holiday. The moon-sighting commitee didn't see the moon until a day after the predicted date, throwing everything into dissaray...
- it is all about managing expectations: we went to Rajshahi to visit an AYAD friend who lives with her boss, a conservative Muslim man, and his family. As a result, all hopes of a week of intense sightseeing, village visiting, roadside cha stalls and boating on the Ganges were dashed, as we were prevented from leaving the house without a male escort...
We did, however, manage to see the Ganges (it is called the Padma on the Bangladesh side of the river) and catch sight of india across the other side...
We visited a silk factory, full of saris and ornas and ties. We didn't get to see any silk worms - they all went back to their villages for the Eid holidays...






We even caught sight of the famous Eid moon that the official government moon-sighting commitee (complete with official moon-sighting aircraft, which is very controversial) was waiting for.... beautiful! They were worried about missing it because of the smog in Dhaka, so were were lucky to be in the country to see it!




Despite the delay, our Eid day turned out to be great. We all dressed up in our Eid-day finery, and went to Svet's boss's brother's house for a sumptuous Bangladeshi meal, in which we all sat around a big table, and the family watched us eat and pressed more and more and more food on us... Then we were treated to mehendi (henna painting) on our hands... good fun!









Our last day was great - we managed to sneak out for a coconut water and chat with the locals, and visit a sleepy little market.On our way back to Dhaka, we stopped at
a Hindu ruin in a nearby town. The peaceful setting of the temple was contrasted with a nearby music promotion stand, playing modern Bangla pop... very strange, but exellent, of course!
Back in Dhaka, we were confronted with burning buses and riots as the protests against the caretaker government began! Oh for more village life!