The Boxing Day Test*
Friday, December 26th, 2008*Bangladesh version
While it wasn’t quite the Melbourne Cricket Ground the day after Christmas, it was still a Boxing Day Test match all the same. This morning I dragged Wendy kicking and screaming to the first day of the first cricket Test between Bangladesh and Sri Lanka in Dhaka, half-fulfilling one of my remaining travel ‘goals’ of attending an international cricket match on the subcontinent. (I say only half-fulfilling because what I really want to see is India v Pakistan, in either country, and because Bangladesh are a pretty ordinary cricket team.)
Needless to say, there was the odd difference between watching international cricket at the Shere Bangla National Stadium and the cricket venue I’m more accustomed to attending, the Sydney Cricket Ground. Namely, that in Australia:
– Homeless people don’t live on the outer concourse of the stadium.
– There aren’t any furniture shops within the stadium.
– You don’t get made to wait outside the gate after the scheduled start time because “we are not ready”.
– Temporary grandstands and ticket box office barricades are not constructed with bamboo.
As for the actual cricket, Bangladesh did pretty well and took the honours on the first day against what should be a far superior team, so it was nice to see them do well. Wendy’s impressions of her first live cricket match were not so positive, though; she slept through much of the second session and then declared sometime around tea time that “the whole thing is pretty silly.”
So, after more than a week in Dhaka, including a lovely Christmas Day breakfast yesterday morning with Julie, we are moving on tomorrow night by catching the ‘Rocket’ boat south to Kulna before heading back to India in five or six days.
It has been a bit of a strange existence for us in the Bangladeshi capital these past few days. We spend our days exploring the old city and acting much as ... 
Nick