One more stamp

Well, it appears that George Harrison and I will have something in common by the time I get back home, that being that we both will have been to Bangladesh! I’m going to try to work it so that I go there on my way back to Pakistan from Vietnam, to minimize the number of times that I’m on an airplane in rapid succession. This won’t add any time to my total time away, which is good, because I’m thinking that it would be nice to be home before Labor Day, but it will definitely be an interesting diversion. In any case, my boss approved the travel costs (since I’m not technically on the project here, the project can’t pay for me to take this trip, so my company has to), which I thought was very cool of him, so I e-mailed the guy at CARE Bangladesh back and said “So, how does July 13th work for you?” Clearly, I’ll pass along my convoluted-as-all-get-out itinerary as soon as someone can make sense of it. Amusingly enough, on all of the official documentation I read from Bangladesh concerning getting a visa, etc., the last line at the end of a long list of rules always read “Rules may change from time to time.” Good to know, I suppose.

The people at our travel office at home must hate me. I’m not one for doing things by crisis management – I like to have all my ducks in a row as far in advance as possible when it comes to things like this. Especially when there are visas required and logistics to be attended to. Doesn’t always work that way, though.

Kind of funny to think that I will have been to Pakistan and Bangladesh, both countries that used to be part of India, but I won’t have been to India. I guess I’m just skipping that bit at the moment. It certainly seems as though I could be back this way in the future. Like I’ve said before, I’m going to take advantage of all these opportunities while I have them, since I imagine that this phase of my life will, someday, draw to a close, and I’ll move on to something else. Not that I have a grand scheme, (or should I call it “a cunning plan…”?) complete with dates and times, for any of this. I don’t think I’ll ever lose my love of traveling and seeing new things and adventure and all that good stuff – but I know that the day will come where I’ll say “okay, time to be in the same country for more than a few months at a time”, and that will be cool, because it will be time for that. It’s a very “que sera, sera” approach, but it works for me. Most of the time. Besides, setting dates and schedules for things you can neither predict nor control is the fastest way to drive yourself insane or to end up settling for something that isn’t what you really want. Or both.

Today, it rained for the first time since I’ve been here. I suppose I hadn’t thought about the fact that it hadn’t rained until the skies opened up, but it’s true – not a drop since I’ve been here. Rain in an arid climate like this is a very strange thing. Unless you’re talking about an actual monsoon, and it is getting to be monsoon season, they tend to be very short and violent episodes. One minute the air was still and hot, and the next the wind was blowing palm tree branches against the house and rain was sheeting down the windows. Then ten minutes later, it’s done. It doesn’t do much to break the heat, it just seems to make it more humid. I don’t think it actually does, because I don’t think it’s actually possible, but the air is heavier.

One thing I discovered the other day that I found to be somewhat perplexing was Murree Beer. I know, you’re thinking “what’s perplexing about beer? Apart from knowing whether the cap is a twist-off or not, it’s kind of a no-brainer.” You’re not wrong about that, except for the fact that Murree Beer is brewed in Pakistan. Pakistan is an Islamic state that enacted prohibition many, many years ago. So, they’re not allowed to serve or consume alcohol, but they still produce it and sell it…? Although, as an aside, I think it’s a safe bet to say that a healthy number of people here have a private stash of some kind of alcohol. But Murree Beer is actually not half bad, which was a pleasant surprise, because it’s very light-colored stuff, and any of you who have been out with me know my opinion of any beer lighter than Sam Adams (mmm…Sam Adams…).

I’m going to guess that “quality assurance officer at Murree Brewing” is right up there with “lifeguard at the American School swimming pool” on the list of most fun/desirable jobs you can have as a local guy in Pakistan.

In any event, work has been keeping me busy this week, which is good. G-man’s successor is not yet in place, but I’m hopeful that we can get things arranged so that data gathering can take place while I’m away, and I can come back to piles of data to work with, to keep me busy for my last few weeks here. (Anything to pass the time, even if it is data entry and analysis.) Because, as nice as it would be in theory to spend my time here casually working on a report and mostly working on my tan, in reality, it would drive me nuts and make all this seem a little pointless. Given the stuff I know I’m missing out on by being here, I’d prefer not to feel like it was for nothing. The good thing is that I don’t think that will happen – good and bad, it’s been really interesting being here, and this whole thing is a unique experience. As I said, part of that “que sera, sera” philosophy is embracing those opportunities whenever they come along, so Bangladesh, here I come!