Bangladesh Become a Disney Travel Agent Near Me

Ibn Battuta, the 14th-century Moroccan traveler, wrote that the Bengalis referred to their homeland as "a hell crammed with blessings." Most travelers today would have to look hard to find the blessings. Nearly every year, Bangladesh, one of the most heavily populated countries in the world, is afflicted with catastrophes.

Famine and disease visit the land, but it is flooding that makes Bangladesh one of the most disaster-prone places on Earth. Storm clouds and hurricanes travel up the Bay of Bengal, hit the Himalaya along the nation's northern border and stop, pouring water on the land. When the rains come, villagers head for large concrete platforms scattered throughout the coastal areas to wait out the high waters. When the flooding recedes, villagers sometimes find that the local river has changed its course: It now flows around their bridge and through the center of town.

While you may not want to make a special trip to see the country, if you are visiting nearby countries (India or Southeast Asia), a visit to Bangladesh offers the opportunity to see a resilient people untouched by mass tourism and unconquered by nature. All the water makes Bangladesh a lush country with mangrove swamps and a large expanse of rain forest. It has two pleasant hilly areas—large expanses of rolling hills covered with verdant tea estates and tropical forests.

Geography

History

The country's recent history has been just as stormy as its weather. When the British decided to cease their colonial activities in the Indian subcontinent in 1947, they felt that the only way to avoid a bloodbath between the ethnic and religious factions was to divide the colony into separate Hindu and Islamic nations. The Islamic population centers lay on opposite sides of the subcontinent—the Punjab on the west and Bengal on the east—and were dissimilar linguistically and ethnically. Nonetheless, they were united in one political unit: East and West Pakistan. The eastern Muslims, in what is now Bangladesh, quickly felt exploited by the richer and larger western part of the country. Resentment finally boiled over into civil war (1971) and independence, with India backing the eastern Muslims. The West Pakistanis led a systematic slaughter of intellectuals and Hindus in Bangladesh. More than a million people were killed during the struggle, and 10 million more fled to India before the war ended in 1972.

A terrible famine the following year set the new country back even further, and martial law prevailed until army general Ziaur Rahman assumed the presidency and held parliamentary elections. Known as President Zia, Rahman was assassinated during a military coup in 1981, and martial law resumed.

In 1991, Khaleda Zia, widow of the late general, was elected president in Bangladesh's first democratic presidential election. In 1996, however, Zia stepped down and the opposition party, known as the Awami League, assumed control of a coalition government. Power has changed hands between the Awami League and the Bangladesh Nationalist Party several times since then. Hartals (protests that often become temporary boycotts or strikes) remain common regardless of who holds high office in Bangladesh.

Snapshot

Bengali culture, scenery, wildlife and friendly people are the foremost attractions of Bangladesh.

We recommend a stopover in Bangladesh only for adventurous, well-traveled people who are in the region. Don't expect deluxe accommodations or good service outside the capital city. Be prepared to be exposed to severe poverty and incredibly crowded cities.

Potpourri

Dhaka used to be one of the cleanest capital cities in Asia, but pollution, most notably from the tuk-tuks, or autorickshaws, is now so bad that visibility can drop to 450 ft/140 m during rush hour.

About 240,000 people known as "Biharis" live in refugee camps throughout Bangladesh. The Biharis remained loyal to Pakistan during Bangladesh's fight for independence from that country. After the war, Pakistani loyalists fled Bangladesh, but complicated political conflicts prevented many from leaving. The unfortunate Biharis who could not escape were placed in refugee camps, where they remain to this day.

Many Bangladeshis have made their homes on the temporary islands, called chars, that rise above the surface of the vast floodplain. People settle on them because there is nowhere else for them to live in such a densely populated country.

To get an idea of how crowded Bangladesh is, imagine this: If all the people in the entire world lived in the U.S., the U.S. would be as densely populated as Bangladesh.

Rampaging elephant herds have been responsible for killing scores of people in villages in the eastern part of the country. The elephant's native forest habitat is being rapidly converted to cropland by farmers, bringing villagers and the pachyderms into contact with each other.

Global-warming experts say that if trends continue, much of Bangladesh will be covered by water by the year 2030.

A local variety of rice, known as khama, is said to grow as much as 6 in/15 cm in 24 hours. This allows it to keep its head above flood waters.

Bangladeshi novelist and poet Taslima Nasrin was forced into exile in 1994 after fundamentalist Muslim groups pronounced a fatwa (death sentence) on her for questioning Islamic doctrine.

The government pays a bounty for the number of rat tails collected in the annual anti-rat campaign. Prizes (e.g., a color TV) are awarded to anyone who can kill more than 10,000 rats. The rodents destroy one-third of the country's rice crop each year.