Woohoo we made it! - Stephanie

We made it safely to Dhaka! Thank goodness!
It was touch and go there for a moment in Bahrain.... when Tonya, Holly and I were sitting at the Irish Pub, our flight had showed as delayed by an hour, so we settled in quite comfortably with plan to go back and collect Meredith on our way over to our gate about 45 minutes before the new flight time, since she needed some quiet time to get some work done... All of a sudden our bartender is telling us they just called for final call for the Dhaka flight... so we had to throw money on the table and run full-tilt down the Bahrain airport, collecting Meredith by yelling at her as we ran past... so we finally reach gate 35, and guess what... final call means start lining up. So we had a long line ahead of us just to get into a holding area, and then we would be shuttled by bus straight to the plane. Well, the line wasn't really moving so Meredith and Holly decide to go to the bathroom. But when Holly came back, Meredith didn't. And all of a sudden the line is moving quickly and they are telling us we are loading the last bus immediately!!! And Meredith was nowhere to be found! Full panic, Holly and Dr. Tonya are running around like crazy trying to find her, while I'm checking with the flight attendant person to see if somehow she had slipped right past us... So long story short (I know, too late) eventually she came back and we were loaded up on the bus just to wait another hour or so on the tarmac... It was an adrenaline rush, and Dr. Tonya was thisclose to just pulling us from that flight and booking us another later one.
So Meredith has become our  new person to yell at about staying with the group. ;)
And since we didn't arrive in Bangladesh with visas, it became a superfun game of "how the heck do we get our visas?", and by superfun I mean just the opposite. BUT we were saved by a gentleman the local Rotary sent over to help us out... unfortunately I didn't catch his name, but he was a blessing.


We were greeted once we got past customs by the District Secretary, Assistant Governor, and District Governor and they are incredibly nice! They brought us beautiful bouquets and took pictures with us and gave us printed off trip itineraries and sim cards!  Then they took us to our individual hosts for Day 1=Rest. My host family has set me up very nicely in a spare bedroom, and although I have not met the patriarch of the family yet, Haseen and her daughters have been very kind. I was able to take a shower as soon as I set my stuff down, which was a wonder in itself, and her two daughters (Mashiwat & Rifaiyat) came home for lunch. Her youngest is home from Wellesley (which is where Rifaiyat went as well) for winter break, and Rifaiyat apparently works just around the corner, very convenient, when you consider the traffic... which brings me to the traffic
The traffic is everything I've heard and worse. It is intense. The lines on the road are decoration, not even a soft suggestion. Everyone does whatever crazy maneuver they want, as long as they have one hand on the horn, which I think is their favorite part of the car, aside from the brakes. So big buses and all sizes of personal vehicle are vying for space with Auto-rickshaws, regular rickshaws, motorcycles, bicycles, and people darting in and out of the road. I'll admit, I was a little stressed! I'm genuinely shocked that there are not more head-on collisions...
Anyways, I'm fading fast, Mashiwat offered to bring me to a little dinner party tonight, but they don't normally eat dinner until 9ish, and I can't guarantee I'd make it that late! I think I will just take an itty bitty nap, and then we'll see how I feel... I'm just so glad to finally be here!

SB