Bangladesh, lately

The other night a group of us went to Ideas Manzil to welcome a new colleague. It's really nice--it feels homey and unique to Bangladesh, but has great food and service (hint: not a frequent feature in Bangladeshi restaurants). Charlotte looks surprised, James looks thoughtful:


And speaking of great service, look! A Four Seasons has opened in Bangladesh:


The other night, I went with James and my German friend, Celine, to the Alliance Francaise for a concert. I like how they have a cute cafe--and no metal detectors. I know it's to keep us safe, but sometimes I wish the American Center could dispense with some security in the interest of feeling more welcoming. Here's Celine, having tea:


So today I had a long day of wrangling with HR forms. Fun. I kind of wanted to gouge my eyeballs out by the end of it. I got home feeling pretty frustrated, but thankfully I had a new West Elm catalogue, so I could just melt away into a soothing world of natural fibers, neutral tones, and lots of white laquered wood. That and a margarita, and all is well again.

I read smart books, sleep.

Blargh. We hit our download limit for the month (despite not actually downloading things, but just using the internet normally), and so it's now really slow, with a stupid screen constantly popping up and telling us to wait one minute as punishment.

I feel somewhat unsettled this weekend--I'm in the middle of too many things, maybe. Thursday evening the Ambassador hosted a reception for all the outgoing Fulbrighters and Humphrey fellows, which was great--they are all doing such interesting things and have so much enthusiasm. Then I came home and crashed. And I've been mostly crashing all weekend. I did hit Kamranga, my favorite stuff-from-Bangladesh store, today, plus the new organic produce store (Southwest Gardens, on Road 99) and the Westin for lunch. Tonight we're going to Ideas Manzil, one of my favorite places here, for dinner.

Random musing: people at home keep asking if I can get used to driving on the left side of the road. After so many months, the answer is, yes, absolutely. When I went home for R&R, I would sit in my mother's car with her and have moments of sheer terror when I would instinctively believe that we were on the wrong side of the road and about to hit an oncoming car head on. Though maybe it doesn't take much to terrify me in New Jersey--maybe it was just the fear that I can never shake of somehow ending up there and getting stuck driving on whichever side of the road through a lifetime of suburban non-existence.

I finished A Case of Exploding Mangoes, and it was sheer fabulousness. Five thumbs up. Now I am reading Joseph Nye's Soft Power, which is perhaps fabulous in a different way. Did I ever tell you about the time I danced with Joseph Nye? Another time, perhaps.

I interview you, you interview me, we're even

Today I participated in a webchat with students around Bangladesh who use the internet courtesy of State Dept.-funded Internet Learning Centers, part of the Global Connections and Exchange program. The topic was political parties in the U.S. I didn't have much profound to say, but the glory of webchats is that you can be on Google at the same time looking up answers to tough questions. I mean, um, haha, just kidding. Of course a wise diplomat like myself would know how many people are in the House of Representatives.

I also conducted interviews for the Teaching Excellence and Achievement program, an exchange for secondary school teachers. And I spent some quality time writing my portion of my evaluation--commonly referred to as the "suicide box." Fun times. Walking the line between tactful self-promotion and obnoxious toolishness is always a good challenge.

I wish James would come back from Mumbai. That will happen tomorrow, which means I'll probably go back to being a bad blogger but a happy person. One thing cheering me up: A Case of Exploding Mangoes keeps getting funnier and better. I seriously laughed out loud for a whole straight chapter. It contains probably the funniest description of the life of someone in public affairs/press relations ever written. You can find the "first chapter" here, but actually it's not the first chapter, and while it gives you a sense of the book's tone, it gets way funnier.

History: It's boring.

Today I spoke at the pre-departure orientation for students going on a State Dept. exchange program. They are all high school students who will spend one year in the U.S. I LOVE that group--they are so much fun, have so much energy, and ask all sorts of zany questions. I also love the alumni of the program, who presented to the younger students and critiqued the practice presentations they gave about Bangladesh.

Best line of the day: when one alum was critiquing a presentation, she explained that history is really boring and should be kept to a minimum. She explained that it would be boring for them, of course, if American students talked too much about their history, "like the Spanish Armada and stuff." Exactly.

Wanted

A friend/relative/nice person intrepid enough to visit us in Dhaka.

Our guest room has some new touches, like my first piece of Bangladeshi art, a drawing of a water buffalo by the artist Shomiron with which I am mildly obsessed. You can see it here:


Plus, think how exotic and glamorous it is to sleep under mosquito netting! I am not joking about this; many people seem to think it's really cool. Hey, whatever floats your boat/keeps the vicious dengue-carrying mosquitoes away.

As long as I'm uploading photos, I must say that despite still not getting my act together to get slipcovers made or to paint, I am much more pleased with the arrangement of the knick-knacks in my living room:

Never mind the bars in the window...

College roommates--hooray! Plus, a small fraction of James's collection of Soviet studies materials, stripped of their jackets to make them look far more attractive.

And one more photo, because I actually cooked the other night for the first time in eons. We bought homemade ravioli from the French bakery (no, not French, but the French seem to be not totally incompetent in the pasta-making arena either), and I made a huge vat of sauce using one of the 106-oz. cans of San Marzano tomatoes I bought at Costco before I left. I was scared they had grown botulism or something over the last year, but no, they were delicious. Yum:

Blah blah blah

So I'm feeling kind of blah. There are many reasons for this. First, work has been insane lately. This means I have no time to socialize or to think about setting up social gatherings. Which means, come the weekend, I don't have enough planned to keep my extroverted self happy, and James is off frolicking in Mumbai this weekend, meaning I'm totally on my own. Which means I feel blah. Shockingly, eating a whole bunch of ice cream this afternoon didn't actually help like I thought it would.

Plus, going into work on the weekends is just not a recipe for fun or enjoyment. Nope.

We had the Assistant Secretary of State for South and Central Asia visiting early last week, and since the Information Officer is away, I got to try my hand at press work. I didn't feel like I added much value to it, not really knowing what I was doing, but I hope that next time I can do better.

I have also been really busy with pre-departure orientations for all our various exchange programs. This means I keep being asked to give talks on American culture and values. That seems like a funny thing to talk about, really. My talks basically boil down to: be on time for things, expect Americans to say "no" if they mean no, and tell people in advance if you have dietary restrictions. Crap, now I gave away the magic formula to my highly-sought-after presentations :)

I'm going to the gym in a half-hour to try to snap out of my malaise. Let's hope it works.

Lately

Things I am loving:

Recipe: Fried Mac and Cheese Balls. Must try this for my next party.

Humor: Andy Borovitz in the New Yorker.

Novel: A Case of Exploding Mangoes by Mohammed Hanif.

As for the latter, it's pretty funny--so far I think it may be better than The White Tiger, but it's too early to tell for sure. And you know it must be good if I'm recommending a book centering on a plane crash.

Um, Katie needs

For its 80th anniversary, Faber & Faber released special editions of the selected works of six poets, designed by Miriam Rosenbloom. Prrrrrrrrreeeeetttttttttyyyyyyyy...

Now you see me...

Back to blogging, but not long, as the crazy storm raging outside encourages me to unplug everything before it gets fried. I have had enough of that, and guess what, I'm not going back again.

Today was a lazy day--sleep until 10, late breakfast, reading on the couch, the gym, leftovers in the fridge for dinner. The kind of day I really, really needed.

Okay, storm, you win.

Reporting from the borderland between exhaustion and madness

Okay, I'm exaggerating a little... just a little. I've not been much of a blogger lately. The less than two weeks since getting back from vacation have been insane. While I feel like I'm having a lot of Foreign Service milestones lately, it's pretty hectic.

I hosted my first reception last night--I think it was a success, even though my cook decided to top the deviled eggs with cherries (???) and serve deep-fried chicken salad sandwiches. Um...

I'm also doing significant press work for the first time--related to my first time as Acting Public Affairs Officer. I am pretty shocked that I am acting PAO, even for a day, less than a year into my first tour. I am also completely overwhelmed. But I like that in this job I sometimes get thrown into things that seem overwhelming and have to sink or swim--I hated the coddling of my old job.

On a related note, how many letters do you think I can get out in one day signed as Acting Director of the American Center? Maybe I can send one to my mom just for fun :)

Money shot

So on the way back from R&R, we stopped in Delhi with the sole purpose of making sure we see the Taj Mahal before my two years in South Asia are over--and with the nature of the Foreign Service, how could I be sure I'd be back?

And see it we did, even changing our tickets once we figured out that the one day we had planned for this adventure fell on a Friday, the day when, conveniently, the Taj is closed.

And it was worth it. Okay, I won't lie, between the Taj and the Pyramids, I am still a Pyramids girl. They are just so huge in person! But this was pretty goshdarned cool. James and I enlisted a lone Welshman to take our picture:


So there we are. We could have just called it a day, but the train didn't leave for another ten hours, so we hit up the very fort-like Agra Fort:


And Fatehpur Sikri, but by that point we were so hot and tired and generally in danger of passing out from heat stroke that we didn't really focus on photography.

And then we sat in the beautiful Oberoi Amarvilas hotel and drank cocktails with a view of the Taj. And let me tell you, that hotel had better be beautiful--our guidebook said it starts at $1100/night--I know it's low season, but maybe that was part of why it was TOTALLY empty all day (we also stopped there for lunch because, um, I'm spoiled and it's amazing).

Good-busy

Crazy week to get back from vacation. I was SO BUSY with the speech to end all speeches, exchange program interviews, our Independence Day reception, not to mention digging myself out of the email hole I ended up in after three weeks away...

The longest I sat still at work this week was probably to watch the speech--and a glorious 50-minute break of wonderful oratory it was. I watched it with about thirty Bangladeshis, and it was a delightful moment of all being swept up together. I love the brilliance and intelligence and sheer glamor of our President, and it's clear that people around the world are just as enthused.

And he mentioned Bangladesh. That was about all he needed to do to win 150 million hearts here.

My day with the SecState

We had a moment, you know. Don't you see her? I know she was looking right at me, her trusty Foreign Service minion:


Can't pick her out? Okay, it wasn't exactly intimate. The jumbo screens helped us connect a bit better:


And that night, James and I went out to Daniel to celebrate an academic career put to rest :) Here we are looking fancy--a self-portrait:

Going back over R&R: The photographic journey

So now that my photos are on my computer, we can redo all the R&R postings, except with pictures this time. Yippee!!!!!!!!

First off, the Mother's Day expedition to Kykuit, the Rockefeller family estate. We actually had to go first to the Hudson Valley Visitors Center, housed at Philipsburg Manor, a working old-timey farm. James and I posed on the bridge...


But after we tried crossing it, we were told by a guy in a wig that we had to go back over since we didn't have a ticket for the farm.

The Rockefeller house was pretty nice, but the grounds and the spectacular view of the Hudson were the best parts. Here's James looking like he owns the place:


And us in front of the river view:


Somehow, I didn't get any photos with Mom for Mother's Day... oops. As if you needed more evidence of me being a bad daughter other than having moved 8,000 miles away from home...