Zac's Trip to Bangladesh and Bangkok

Where is Waldo this time?  Zac had the opportunity to travel to Bangladesh for a business conference.  He assures me that these foreign trips are awful because he spent almost 3-4 days on an airplane by the time the trip was done and traveled through so many time zones that he didn't know if he should be sleeping or awake, but when I see his travel pictures I do get a bit jealous.  I love to travel and see new places and it kills me when I can't be there with him.

For this trip, Zac decided to layover in Bangkok, Thailand for a day to break up the plane ride.  Here's a fun fact for you.  Though foreigners know the city as Bangkok, the actual name is: Krungthepmahanakhon Amonrattanakosin Mahinthara Yutthaya Mahadilok Phop Noppharat Ratchathani Burirom Udom Ratchaniwet Mahasathan Amonphiman Awatansathit Sakkathattiya Witsanukamprasit.  This roughly translates to:

City of angels, great city of immortals, magnificent city of the 9 gems, seat of the king, city of royal palaces, home of gods incarnate, erected by Visvakarman at Indra's behest.

The average temperature for this place is in the 80s year round and is considered the hottest city in the world!.  So I was definitely feeling jealous being left home in the cold.

And a lot a bit jealous when he sent pictures of all of these gorgeous temples, statues, idols, and architecture.

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If he can, Zac likes to locate a local congregation of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints and attend if he is gone over a Sunday and he found one here in Thailand!

The city is an industrious river city and Zac saw so many awesome boats.

He also saw monks!

They had these cool little motorized cars for getting around.

And while he was there he found this awesome local who agreed to make him a suit and ship it to America.  He even came to his hotel room to take measurements.

The last leg of his journey landed him in Bangladesh, which was so completely different than Bangkok and America that it was a bit of a culture shock.

Bangladesh is considered one of the poorest countries in the world and incredibly densely populated.  There is a population of 162 million people and is roughly the size of the state of Alabama (which has a population of 4.8 million people)... so it's crowded.  And the poverty rate is in the 30th percentile.

Traffic was horrible, I am told.

And there was garbage and stink everywhere.

Many of these poor dads make their living pedaling taxi carts around the city.  These little carts are handy for weaving in and out of the awful traffic.

Though Bangladesh wasn't his favorite place to visit, it is always very eye opening to the blessings that we enjoy here in America and especially in our beloved Idaho.  We are a very prosperous and blessed nation.  It also reminds us that there is so much humanitarian work that can be done in the world and where much is given, much is required.  We are so blessed.