Meet Me In The Middle of the Town
Ali is in a mad hurry to see all there is to see in Bangladesh before she leaves. Many of the traditional tourist attractions I have yet to see, she must fit a few short months. This Saturday we set off to see the ancient capital of East Bengal, Sonargon. Though nothing remains of the original buildings, the site has continued to be habited by the wealthy right up until The Partition in 1947 when the Hindu's fled the country.
Here is the palace of the area. It has been restored a la pink palace (for those of you who have had the pleasure/misfortune of being introduced.) Pleasure because it is neat to be in palaces, misfortune because both palaces are poorly restored and house incredibly tacky museums.
A bit further away we found a street that was the rich neighborhood 100 years ago. The brick mansions were decaying from neglect and the tropical weather. These houses were overflowing with poor Muslims, squatters who took over when the Hindu's left. Some are so poor as to sell the bricks from their home (these ancient mansions) to break for gravel.
The third story of this mansion looked entirely overgrown with trees. I asked the woman holding her baby if we could go up to the roof, and she obliged. The stairway was falling apart, the bricks forming the steps often missing or crumbled.
The third story turned out to be a facade. The roof was wide open. Parts of the roof had fallen into the rooms below, but that didn't stop us from poking around the edges to look in. The woman we were with refused to have her picture taken, something about Islam's injunction against images of animals or people. She told us about the 5 families, 25 people, who lived in this building. She showed us her rooms, where her sister and brother-in-law had set up 2 sewing machines and made 1000 tupees (Muslim prayer hats) a day. We were invited back to her little boy's 3rd birthday, July 22nd. We refused, explaining that Ali was returning to her country, but promised to send the pictures she let us take of her child.
We returned to the street and poked our heads into the dilapidated mansion across the street where we were surprised to see a popular Bengali band filming a music video.
Another mansion housed a poultry farm. Our friend who showed us her house told us about the rumor of eviction going around. Apparently the government is going to restore the old buildings to make Shonargon a better tourist attraction. I have mixed feelings about that - part of the awe of visiting here is the ramshackle-ness, the decaying splendor. However, if preservation efforts are not made in a few years it will all be gone. Too bad government-restored things always turn out so tacky.
On the way back we seen a sari loom. Ali had not seen one of these before so we stopped the taxi to get a closer look. Up close we realized that it was not sari's being woven but metal netting instead. The set up was exactly the same as for sari's, but must be much harder to work with. Can you imagine how bad the weaver's hands must hurt after weaving fences all day?
Here is the palace of the area. It has been restored a la pink palace (for those of you who have had the pleasure/misfortune of being introduced.) Pleasure because it is neat to be in palaces, misfortune because both palaces are poorly restored and house incredibly tacky museums.
A bit further away we found a street that was the rich neighborhood 100 years ago. The brick mansions were decaying from neglect and the tropical weather. These houses were overflowing with poor Muslims, squatters who took over when the Hindu's left. Some are so poor as to sell the bricks from their home (these ancient mansions) to break for gravel.
The third story of this mansion looked entirely overgrown with trees. I asked the woman holding her baby if we could go up to the roof, and she obliged. The stairway was falling apart, the bricks forming the steps often missing or crumbled. 
The third story turned out to be a facade. The roof was wide open. Parts of the roof had fallen into the rooms below, but that didn't stop us from poking around the edges to look in. The woman we were with refused to have her picture taken, something about Islam's injunction against images of animals or people. She told us about the 5 families, 25 people, who lived in this building. She showed us her rooms, where her sister and brother-in-law had set up 2 sewing machines and made 1000 tupees (Muslim prayer hats) a day. We were invited back to her little boy's 3rd birthday, July 22nd. We refused, explaining that Ali was returning to her country, but promised to send the pictures she let us take of her child.
We returned to the street and poked our heads into the dilapidated mansion across the street where we were surprised to see a popular Bengali band filming a music video.
Another mansion housed a poultry farm. Our friend who showed us her house told us about the rumor of eviction going around. Apparently the government is going to restore the old buildings to make Shonargon a better tourist attraction. I have mixed feelings about that - part of the awe of visiting here is the ramshackle-ness, the decaying splendor. However, if preservation efforts are not made in a few years it will all be gone. Too bad government-restored things always turn out so tacky.
On the way back we seen a sari loom. Ali had not seen one of these before so we stopped the taxi to get a closer look. Up close we realized that it was not sari's being woven but metal netting instead. The set up was exactly the same as for sari's, but must be much harder to work with. Can you imagine how bad the weaver's hands must hurt after weaving fences all day?
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