The Rat Race ... Literally

Creatures are aplenty in Bangladesh, even (or especially?) in the urban landscape of Dhaka. We’ve become very accustomed to the throngs of geckos everywhere. And we do mean everywhere. As Jennifer was brushing her hair in our bathroom the other day, one leapt from somewhere above – they like to hide in the lights in the bathroom for some reason, others have confirmed this is the case in their homes as well – right in front of her face to the bathroom doorway and then scooted into the bedroom. They also like to wake us up in the middle of the night with their chirping. Actually, we’ve gotten so used to hearing them that they usually don’t manage to wake us up unless they’re inside the mosquito net with us. So, we’ve got no problem with the geckos. They don’t gross us out (although others disagree) and they eat mosquitoes. The more the merrier, we say.

A couple of weeks ago we celebrated the birthday of one of Patrick’s colleagues with a garden brunch in her front yard. As we munched on crepes and slurped mango juice, the front gate bell rang. Our buddy Scott jumped up – “It’s the snake charmer!” He ushered in a lungi-and-turban-clad man with two large straw baskets. Two hundred taka changed hands, and the man situated himself on the grass. Out came a flute ... and out came the cobras. He had three of them, and each of them reluctantly “danced” for us, following the sway of the snake charmer’s knee as he squatted in front of them. (Apparently they were intrigued and distracted by the grass, so they didn’t stand up as tall as they normally do.) We’ve heard stories of people seeing cobras in their yards. Maybe it’s a good thing we don’t have a yard, ourselves.

Besides the cobras, there is one other creature we’d rather not get so used to. We’ve started jogging a couple of nights a week in a nearby park and discovered that life can be a rat race. Literally. One night, we dodged several Rodents of Unusual Size which happened to cross our path. Then, during our run just a few nights ago, Jennifer heard a loud squeak, followed by Patrick’s shuddering “Aaaauuuuh!” Yep. One poor creature did not make it across our path quickly enough and found itself under Patrick’s running shoe. “It was like stepping on one of Bhago’s inflatable toys!” Patrick said. We think it survived to run again another day.