world is on fire

I had a North American day today. It began at 9:30 this morning when Alana and I met up with a whole bunch of people at the football field the USA owns (it has a ten-foot wall around it so you can play sports in regular clothes (shorts/t-shirts/tanktops) and we played Ultimate Frisbee. I should correct that…I took pictures while a bunch of crazy Americans and Brits ran around in ridiculous heat chasing a plastic disc. And to those of you who are writing this off as just a symptom of my distaste for participating in group athletics…I challenge you to come out here and play a competitive game of UF in this heat and humidity! Ha.
Anyways, afterwards, Alana and I headed off to Banani area where she sat at Gelato Club (this amazing little gelato place! SO good! But ‘expensive’ in the Bangladesh sort of way: one scoop = $1.15). Anyways, she sat and worked on her laptop at Gelato Club while I walked and rickshawed around Banani and bought some clothes and managed on my own just fine, so it was fun. Then Toby called us and we met him at the American club (where he is a member and signed us in as guests) and we had hamburgers and fries with French’s mustard – and coincidentally, you can have a nice beer there too – and went in the pool and sat around and had a good time. Alana had a lot of work to do and ended up lounging around the poolside with her laptop, so Toby and I floated around in the pool playing Marco Polo with the kids etc. It was so much fun to be in water! I realized it had been over a year since I had last been swimming so I ended up in the pool for about 2 hours straight! (and didn’t drown believe it or not!)
Well, tomorrow Alana leaves for a week and I’m on my own out here, and though I’ve gotten to know a few expatriates in the city, they live rather far away. So hopefully I will be able to manage without freaking myself out too much or getting too lonely.
With that being said…by the time you read this, I will have been out to visit the slums I will be documenting. Wish me luck and please think about me this week while I’m left to my own devices armed only with a map and a camera!