The first 48 hours!

Sorry for the delay in posting, but I've made it!  It's actually really odd to think that I've been here for 18 days already!  A lot has happened!  So let me start from the beginning.....

The weeks leading up to my flight out were SO BUSY!  During the entire month of July, I was working in UVA's remedial reading clinic as my final project/class for my Reading Education Masters!  Mostly days consisted of work on grounds 8am-3pm, plus planning lessons for my group of readers, reading research articles, writing papers, studying for my final comprehensive exam... not to mention, packing, moving, and trying to visit lots of people before leaving the country!  I was doing all this until I got in the car to go to the airport that day!  WHEW!  The moment I sat down at my gate in Charlottesville was the first time in a long time that I remember not having at least 10 things to do at once!  What a weird feeling that was...

My flight to DC was quick and uneventful as usual.  When I landed in DC, I found a pub right across from my gate, bought some overpriced food and beer, and texted my future roommates!  Kajori hadn't arrived, but Konrad had, so he found me.  We met there and talked for awhile until Kajori's flight finally landed.  It was nice to sit and talk to them!  It's always nice to have traveling buddies!  Getting in line for the flight, we met at least two families that were going to AISD too!  I picked out a few more on the plane too!

The flight to Doha, Qatar was about 12.5-13 hours.  It was pretty uneventful too.  Watched bad movies, ate food (pretty yummy QatarAirways food!) and slept on and off.  Arriving in Doha was a little nostalgic :)  The three of us went to the bathroom to change clothes and refresh ourselves a bit (it was almost 10pm there).  Oh, and we all bought some duty free booze!  There are only a few places to get it in Dhaka, so we stocked up!  We met a few other families/couples at the gate and on the next flight we went!  This one was about 6 hours.  Watched Water for Elephants which was decent and slept some.

When we arrived in Dhaka, we were met by our Superintendent, Rich, and we just all hung out and talked while the airport people worked on all our visas (for an hour and a half!!).  Although we were all feeling pretty good despite the jet-lag and what not, that's when we all started to get pretty tired.

Between all of us, there was SO much luggage.  Maybe 25-30 new employees x 3 or 4 bags each!

We finally got our luggage and hopped on buses!  They took us straight to our new apartments and dropped us off to unpack/nap for a few hours.  Misti, our bearer (we pay her to cook, clean, and do our laundry), was already waiting for us!  She is so sweet and so far a great cook!!  She helped us unpack a little too. 

Then we decided to get out of the apartment for a while and took a rickshaw to get iced lattes at a new coffee shop!  WHOA traffic is INSANE here!  I can't even describe the amount of swerving, honking, and maneuvering that occurs here.  Drivers drive within 6 inches of each other.  I swear I could have reached into the bus next to us and put my arm around the guy in the window seat!  I don't have any pictures of this event because I was holding on for dear life!  Hahaha But it was SO much fun!  One of the first things they told us at school was "Don't ride rickshaws!"  We were like, "Um.... what if we already took one on the main road?...."   Their response was something like, "Oh geez, the interns would!"  Which seems to be a popular phrase.  Apparently, we're always the fun ones :)