We made it home and got all the bags packed up - 8 checked bags, 1 bag of checked strollers, 5 carry-ons, a purse, and 2 pillow pets - after doing quite a bit of bag rearranging. We left out at 9:45 pm which is clearly well past the kids' bedtimes, but they were only interested in watching movies as soon as they got on board. Couple that with the fact that the airline wanted to serve us a meal as soon as we were at altitude, and we were in for a seriously delayed bedtime. The kids were pleasant enough for a time, but all good things come to an end... B slept nicely, but K has a requirement to completely stretch out her body in order to sleep - not something that comes easily in an airplane seat. So what did I do? I put her on the floor. The gross, yucky floor where who knows what is ground into the carpet. And you know what? She slept. That is, until one of the flight attendants saw her and told me in no uncertain terms that she could not be there. Oh well. So that made the rest of that particular flight a lot of fun. She eventually passed out for about an hour or two before our last meal.
Arrival at Doha was relatively smooth, but we ran into a small problem when we tried to get off the plane. While we had very smartly chosen luggage that stacked and rolled allowing us to carry as much as possible, the Doha airport does not have air bridges to their planes. All passengers have to disembark down a long stairway, board a bus, ride about 20 minutes to the transfer terminal, and then return to the land of ramps and elevators. We ran into the same issue on our way back out further complicated by the fact that we had to wake both kids and convince them to proceed through check-in. Neither one of them wanted to walk, and K - being a bit of a screamer - was indulged. Upon boarding our connecting flight (which departed at 1:35 am local time), we were served another meal. The food was excellent on all of our flights (even the "traditional" chicken meatloaf that I was originally a bit suspicious of), but the turbulence following meal service on this second flight significantly delayed the pick-up of trays requiring the lights to stay on for the first hour and a half of the flight. Naturally, K did not want to sleep with the lights on, so instead, she was cranky. Not that B was a model traveler by any means, but he certainly looked great when compared to his sister ;)
Our flight into Dhaka was otherwise good. We arrived shortly after 9 am local time, waited only about 45 minutes for our bags to arrive, and only had one person (that I saw) whip out their cell phone camera to immortalize my children. We were driven to our temporary quarters (a 3 bedroom apartment) and then Josh promptly left to begin his in-processing. Jet lag hit hard in the early afternoon, and I succumbed sleeping until dinner time. The incumbent IRT family had us over to their house (which is ginormous by the way) for dinner that first night which was a huge relief since I hadn't even really given much thought to how and what I was going to cook.
Thursday was eaten up by unpacking, and by Friday, illnesses had already begun. B woke with a 102 fever and vomiting while K just had a runny nose, but it made it much easier to encourage lots of sleep. Unfortunately, the kids and I missed a BBQ in our "honor" that evening, as I was home tending them, but I'm sure Josh represented us well. All of that cleared up relatively quickly however, and while stomachs are a bit tender all around, we're managing to get out and do a bit of exploring.
My initial impression is actually pretty good. The people here are friendly, our housing is decent (although I am looking forward to having somewhere permanent to live even after only a few days), and while shopping seems to be expensive, I'm a bit oblivious to how much I'm spending since I can't really do that sort of advanced math in my head. We've had great interaction so far with our sponsors, and look forward to getting more involved in the local community. We're also looking forward to hearing that the pool at the American club is refurbished, as it is currently closed and I know the heat is quickly approaching here.
One last note before I sign off - sleeping under a mosquito net (and successfully navigating out to go the bathroom during the night) is really much more difficult than one might think. Okay, two last notes. We had our first noticeable power outage this morning. Naturally, I was using the bathroom when it occurred. We now have a small flashlight in our bathroom. So the next time you're showering, be happy and thankful for continuous, reliable power.
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