Saturday: New Flat

On Saturday we spent the morning with Dave and his 2 kids (aged 6 and 3), which was great fun, especially for Andy, who was privileged enough to play on his son's train set and meet all the Thomas the Tank Engine characters.

After that we had a trip to the Bagha Club (the English ex pat club) for a swim and a bite to eat and did a bit of food shopping for the flat. After that we moved into our new flat in Mohammadpur, which is about 25 mins from Sandie's flat in Banani.

We met our housekeeper at the flat, who had got it beautfully clean ready for us to move in and also got a bit of water ready for us.

It was all a bit scary moving to a new area having just got our bearings in Banani. The area is a lot more Bangladeshi - there are less Westerners / ex pats around and the Muslims in Mohammadpur are more conservative. So, we should get a trully enriched experience living in Mohammadpur.

Jo (another member of the team) lives round the corner, so she took us on a walk round the local area so we could get our bearings. We discovered a sort of wholefoods store and found our local supermarket (Family World).

Our flat is on the top floor (5th), which is great for the views and it means that no one is looking directly into our windows. However, it does also mean that it is even hotter up there than normal. On the plus side we are reliably informed that we will get considerably less mosquitoes because they tend not to fly that high (I'm sincerely hoping the same applies to cockroaches!)

The only downside to a top floor flat is when the lift breaks down and you have to carry 2 32kg cases all the way upstairs in the Bangladeshi heat. Luckily a very friendly guard was happy to help us.

There is a park outside the flat where the local kids play football and cricket, which is pretty cool and a small store on the corner (by store I really mean a small shack type thing, which is teaming with emergency goods - bread, crisps etc). There is also a large mosque not far away, so you can very vividly hear the call to prayer. Although we have discovered that whereever you are, you're not far from a Call to Prayer.

In our flat you walk in the door (having taken your shoes off, as is the Bangladeshi way) and you walk immediately into the dining room. Opposite there is the small kitchen and Bangladeshi cloackroom next to that. To the left is our bedroom with small balcony and ensuite. to the right there is a spare room that will become our study and then in the right hand corner is the lounge, also with a small balcony.

We haven't got much furniture at the moment - only a bed, sofa set made out of cane (to include coffee table), ironing board, fridge and water purifer but we will get more in the next few days.

Most Bangladeshi flats only have cold water, so if you want hot water you have to buy a heater. At the moment we've resisted but I'm not sure how long we'll be able to do that. We're also testing the fans out to see whether we can get away without AC but again, we might treat ourselves to an AC unit.

The flat is small and basic but when we've got a few homely touches in it will definately start to feel like home.