Pure tourism
March 15th, 2006
A long day’s drive back to Dhaka from Rangpur, broken with scheduled tourist stops, and unscheduled roadside stops at roadside bazaars to experience the sights and sounds – and become an instant centre of attraction – lots of curiosity, no hostility, and an outbreak of smiles and waves as we left.
The Mahasthan Museum had a display of artifacts which didn’t really do justice to what must have been several thousand years of various civilisations and cultures occupying this highly fertile and productive part of the globe. A passing French archaeologist explained that Bangladesh was suffered from a well-organised illegal trade in artifacts, threatening to rob the country of its heritage even before it can be recorded.
The adjacent site at Govinda Bhita showed the remains of extensive city walls and temples developed from the 6th century AD onwards. The site is now infilled by soil, and this artificial hill offered the only vantage point of our tour for looking over the countryside.
After lunch at the stunning Naz Garden Hotel in Bogra – paradise for UKP 30 a night! – where the Kenyan cricket team were getting ready for a hammering by the home team – then into the coach again and back over the Jamuna Bridge. The Jamuna river splits Bangladesh into two, and the river crossing by ferry could cause delays of hours. Constructing this huge bridge (4.5km – the photograph doesn’t do it justice) across a river with massive variations in flow was a triumph of Japanese civil engineering.
Environmentalists claim it is a disaster, and has completely altered the river flow and disturbed a centuries old flood plain irrigation system. Critics also point out that repaying the massive cost of construction is a drain on the Bangladesh economy for years to come, paid from special ‘Jamuna taxes’. The bridge is also now in need of repairs. However, there is no denying it made our journey (and any west – east traffic) an awful lot more convenient.