Oh, the adventures to be had . . .

I am thankful I am traveling with someone who has traveled more than me. In certain situations--like border crossings--I wish I had more experience to lend wisdom in, but, alas, the only border crossings have been in the air, and compared to what we experienced yesterday, all my customs and immigration passings have been relatively painless up to this point.

The first thing to know is that most things about India appear on the surface to be exceedingly chaotic, but in the midst of the chaos, things get accomplished . . . somehow . . . sometimes . . . after much wandering and going from here to there with lots of activity and "Yes, okay, maam. No problem," and a bob of the head.

Melissa and I set out at 5 in the morning for the bus station. Our bus left at 6. There wasn't too much exciting about that part of the adventure. However, the excitement started at the border where everything that we are told not to do we did. For example, we had to hand over our passports that then got passed around a bit. This is very irksome. If there were signs where to go, they were hidden by all the other signs, so thankfully, we were herded to where we needed to go. So when we got to the exchange place, our passports were handed to an older man who put them in his pocket and then walked out, motioning for us to follow him. Our eyes were glued to that pocket.

We then went to immigration to get a stamp. It was an open room with three random chairs. "Sit down," we were told, and off our passports went to the men on the other side of the room behind the counter. The question on our minds was, where are our bags? We had been taken off the bus and told not to worry about our bags but not worrying about our bags is very difficult to do. Then we walked from one building to another amidst a very busy street. How on earth would our luggage make it to us? Oh, but somehow amidst the language barrier, we got our stamp and found our luggage outside this room, surrounded by men who wanted to carry our bags for us (because a tip is expected). At the customs counter, a gentleman asked where were from in the States. We proceeded to tell him, but when I said Ohio, he said very matter-of-factly, "In my country we call it Okio."

Huh? Just go with it.

Then we walked across the border, through the fence (we had our passports at this point). Confusion persisted with the tipping problem and not having small bills. Then off we were hustled through customs, where the man just waved us through. He didn't care about our bags or even our passports. Down the busy road filling with men and trucks and bicycles we walked and into a small room we led where someone again took our passports and filled out our immigration papers for us (he even put in an address to where we will be staying . . . I didn't even know this information). Then off we went, he with our passports and our bags once again left deserted in this small, crowded room. In immigration, we stood close to the wall that read, "Waiting corner." Before too long, we were motioned out of the room back to the small crowded room from whence we were then herded onto a van. Eventually, we saw our bags make it onto a cart, but when the van went down the road, our bags remained motionless on the cart.

All this to say, we and our bags made it onto the bus. Maybe an hour and a half total elapsed and then we were off--but only for a little bit. Too soon our bus came to a halt. We thought maybe it was just a jam. And it was, but it was a traffic jam to get onto the ferry, and this traffic jam lasted 7 hours. We were expected to make it to Dhaka by 7 in the evening. We arrived at 2 in the morning.

Through it all, though, we were taken care of. Melissa was able to call ahead and let our friend know we would be very late. For that reason, our drop-off point changed, but once arriving in Dhaka, it changed again because the bus driver intelligently ran over a cement median that scraped the bottom of the bus bringing it to a very quick halt. I saw a median. Melissa saw a median. What did he see?

At two in the morning when Melissa and I were sitting atop our luggage on a bicycle rickshaw, I had to smile at this bit of the adventure. I can't say I want to relive any of it, but we made it.

All this to say, I am very thankful for Melissa.