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Saturday, February 25, 2012

glimpses of Bangladesh – people at work

bangladesh-square-4 This is the scene outside my hotel – a very people intensive building site with people loading and carrying all that gravel inside.  The two ‘supervisors’ sitting on their chairs make me laugh.

Many of the sights around town look like over staffing to my western eyes. But there are lots of people in Dhaka – over 16 million – and immense population density – Wikipedea says over 19 400 per square kilometer.  I’m guessing people are much cheaper than machines.

There are also lots of examples of people running small businesses on the street – sewing machines (photo bottom right), snacks such as doughnuts and fruit, and water or tea (top right).

bangladesh-square-3

Unfortunately the hygiene in these stalls mean it would not be sensible for me to try the wares. Yesterday from the car I saw a stall where they were selling prepared fruit and cucumber which looked very appealing on a hot day and the other intriguing looking snack is a cup full of rice sprinkled with various spices.  I will continue to use only my sense of sight to enjoy these aspects of Bangladesh life.

4 comments:

Deb @ PaperTurtle said...

It's so interesting to see these photos, Helena. I laughed when I saw the supervisors in that top photo. Haha! What a contrast. And where are the worker's hard hats? A US safety officer would have his work cut out for him at this job site!

Alison said...

The Health & Safety regs look even worse than they are here!
Alison xx

Melissa said...

Isn't it amazing how different things are throughout the world. I can't imagine that construction sight here in the States - where are the hard hats!

Maria Ontiveros said...

I love these - the world of work fascinates me, and I love seeing glimpses of it all over the world. Thanks so much for sharing them.
Rinda