Vacationing in Singapore!

So we had spent just a couple weeks in Dhaka before departing on our first vacation. Several reasons for this. First, people say to get out pretty frequently, as Dhaka can be a little overwhelming. Second, it was a four day weekend, and those don't come around all the time (but three day weekends more or less do - US Embassy employees get all US holidays as well as all local holidays, up to a cap of 20 - so averaging more than 1.5 long weekends per month). Third, and most important, the cause of the four day weekend was Eid al-Adha. Celebration involves ritual slaughter of animals. The richer you are, the bigger an animal you slaughter. So in our relatively swanky neighborhood this means lots of cows being slaughtered and butchered in the streets. Not something Grace (a vegetarian) really wanted to hang around for.

Anyway, we took off on a Thursday evening. To give an idea of how bad traffic can get here, the 6km drive to the airport took right around an hour. Not so much fun, but at least we weren't the ones driving.

We had a red eye to Singapore, which was made a lot more pleasant by the fact that we were flying Singapore Airlines. Really enjoyable, and I the Dhaka-Singapore flight definitely doesn't use their fanciest plane. No $20,000 suite class here. But I did get to binge watch Fargo, which was almost as cool.

We arrived in Singapore around 6:00 AM local time. Not the most convenient for checking in to our hotel room, but it meant the airport was not very crowded. Singapore is a pretty absurd place (in a way that, subjectively, is really pleasant). To start with, both the immigration lines and the restrooms had little touch screens upon exiting where you could rate your experience on a scale of 1 to 5, represented by little smiley faces wearing appropriate expressions.

We felt a little too dimwitted after barely sleeping on the flight over to figure out the train system (turns out it's remarkably easy, no surprise there), so got a cab from the airport to our hotel. The cabbie was quite the character. We told him we arrived from Dhaka and he asked if Singapore was home. No? Then Beijing? Seoul? No, actually we live in Dhaka. He was pretty surprised, but slipped into tour guide mode quickly, giving us a little recent history of Singapore and extolling its virtues (often in particular comparison to Hong Kong - I imagine the two have a bit of a Asian city-state rivalry going on).

I don't think we could have picked more different place from Dhaka. Even the highway we took into town was well designed and obviously the product of a lot of thought and planning. The lanes were numbered (for clarity?) and the street itself was gorgeous - lined by trees for miles on end.

Somewhat unsurprisingly, we were unable to check in when we arrived at the hotel around 6:30 AM. They put us first on the list, though. We didn't feel like sitting in the lobby for four or more hours, so decided to adventure into the city.

Flying to (and arriving in) Bangladesh

Let's start this out by saying that I'm probably going to come off as ragging on Bangladesh a bit. That's not really my intention - most of the times I'm just trying to highlight differences from what I'm used to. Given that I tend to be more comfortable with what I'm used to, though, it might come out badly. Feel free to dismiss it as the bewildered out-of-touch snobbery and kvetching of the privileged that it most certainly is.

Our first real introduction to Bangladesh was waiting in line to check in to Biman Bangladesh (the national airline). There were about four groups ahead of us. I think it took us about 40 minutes to get through the line. Each group seemed to be a subset of a much larger group of around 20 to 30 Bangladeshis, some of whom would join the smaller group as it reached the counter. They'd add bags, remove bags, and generally confuse things. Most of the bags were not even really bags, but rather bundles wrapped in a blanket secured with rope or bungee cords. Apparently this is pretty common.

The plane itself was interesting (and by interesting I mean a bit terrifying). We managed to snag bulkhead seats so at least we had leg room. The general condition of the cabin was pretty poor, though. Hopefully mostly stains and well-worn shabbiness and not extant dirtiness. The plane also made some worrying noises taking off. I'm writing this now, though, so obviously things didn't go too badly. The in-flight meal both existed and was quite tasty (and hilariously accompanied by RC Cola), so they beat most American carriers there.

Immediately upon landing, pretty much every single Bangladeshi on the flight jumped out of their seats, grabbed their luggage, and started crowding into the aisle. The resigned flight attendant made not even a token effort at stopping this.

We traded a shabby plane for a shabby bus to take us to the terminal. Delightfully, we were met there by one of our social sponsors (M hereafter) and a local staffer (whose name I have embarrassingly forgotten). The social sponsors are provided to new employees (at all posts) to help them get adjusted to their new locale. The local staffer helps with the initial arrival by making sure things go smoothly with immigration and all that fun stuff. We were particularly fortunate in that the guy helping us out used to work at the airport, so knew all the ins and outs (and, by appearances, about half the employees).

Our luggage took quite some time to arrive (but arrive it did, and in good shape!). This was just as well, as we were able to barrage our greeters with a whole bunch of questions. We also had time to use the restrooms. Public restrooms are, perhaps unsurprisingly, an iffy proposition in Bangladesh. This was a good introduction. I'll just mention that there was a man washing his feet in the sink and leave it at that.

After collecting luggage, we breezed through security (apparently there are some benefits to this whole diplomat thing) and exited through the VIP exit (more benefits) where a driver in an armored car was waiting (!). The armored car is actually not standard operating procedure, but there was a hartal (local word for massive country-wide strike for political protest) earlier that day. The hartals occasionally turn a bit violent, so the Embassy takes extra precaution.

We were greeted by another fact of Dhaka life almost immediately upon leaving the airport: traffic. Lots of it. Private cars, rickshaws, overcrowded buses with telltale gashes along their sides, and CNGs (tiny little caged moped-like vehicles that run on converted natural gas) all vying for position. Horns are used liberally and to virtually no effect. All in all, a place where having a professional driver is a major boon (more on that later, most likely).

We stopped at a photo studio on the way to our apartment to get some passport pictures taken. The Embassy needed a whole bunch and they are used all the time locally (formally signing up for a SIM card needs one, for instance). Our apartment is in the diplomatic enclave, so as we got closer the traffic died down quite a bit, and we were able to arrive before it got too late. First impressions of our new home to follow.

New York to Tokyo to Bangkok to Taipei

Not a whole lot to say here. Lost of flying, overnight at a hotel in Bangkok (was actually quite nice), some more flying.

Delta's in-flight entertainment was pretty great. Got to watch the entire first season of Silicon Valley, which I really enjoyed. Also watched a couple movies, including Neighbors. Grace and I attempted to sync our movies, which was surprisingly difficult. Mine seemed to play back about 5% faster. Weird. Like old computer games that are tied directly to the processor speed and therefore completely flip out on new machines. Also got about halfway through The Grand Budapest Hotel (as per my sister's recommendation), but didn't get to finish it. Unfortunate, as I was really enjoying it.

No real impressions of Bangkok. Cab from airport to hotel, sleep, breakfast at hotel, cab from hotel to airport. I'm sure we'll be back.

We flew EVA Air (Taiwanese airline) to Taipei. Apparently they are rather strict with luggage allowance and with our four suitcases at 50 lbs each we were way over. The overage fees were $15/kg. We were more than 40kg over the limit. So, yeah, that wasn't going to happen. Luckily, the Bangkok airport has a place you can leave luggage for about $3 per suitcase per day. It seems to be well run and trustworthy. Would recommend.

We managed to snag Exit Row seats (thanks to Grace's dad for calling EVA on our behalf; they technically have English speaking agents, but it can be hit or miss), but the seats were still... Taiwan-sized. Not the most comfortable, but the flight from Bangkok wasn't too long.