Gridlock

I'd heard about the horrible traffic in Dhaka and upon asking a Bangladeshi friend if it was similar to Jakarta, he replied "Jakarta on crack."  I'm not sure what that looks like, but today I spent what felt like half of my waking hours traveling on the notorious Dhaka roads, and, yes, to say that it is bad really doesn't begin to describe the experience. 

We had a series of meetings with government officials and mostly due to traffic and partly due to the nature of visiting ministers, we shuttled back and forth between offices either hurrying up to wait, or just plain arriving late for each meeting.  And the traffic was phenomenal.  Apparently no one follows traffic rules, just complete mayhem, resulting in grid-lock and a survival of the most fearless.  It's a wonder there aren't continual collisions.   People speak about never knowing how long it will take to get somewhere.  Case in point, this evening the head of our office hosted a dinner at his house.  It took 1 1/2 hrs to get from the hotel to his house and 20 minutes to get back.   

I could not imagine facing the traffic on a daily basis, but for the short time I'm here, it is somewhat entertaining.  One thing I definitely noticed is the use of bicycles.  Bicycle rickshaws, bicyclists, bicycle garbage trucks, bicycles moving enormous construction materials - and the tiny, rail thin men/boys powering these vehicles is also quite something.