Too Poor For Passports: Bangladesh - Dancing in ঢাকা

Oof. Don't get us wrong, we enjoy classical, but a whole day of that Greenland station was too much. Once 2:00pm rolled around, Pinky went back and listened to that Algerian station that we heard when he was in Tennessee.

Let's cut to the chase because Pinky's found an AWESOME station for today. We're off to

Bangladesh

!

Initially a weird satellite province of Pakistan called East Pakistan,

Bangladesh

fought and won their Independence in 1971 with the help from the Indians. Get this though: Bangladesh's secession was catalyzed by a cyclone that killed almost half a million people. The lackluster response from the government in

Pakistan

galvanized support for the independence movement that culminated in the Bangladesh Liberation War. It's one of the first times in modern history that a natural disaster incited a civil war. Wow! Maybe New Orleans should take note and leave our sorry butts for our lackluster response to Katrina.

With such a large population and such a relatively small land mass, Bangladesh is one of the most densely populated countries in the world (imagine half the population of America squashed into New York state). Their supporting their population will surly lead them to face problems in the future. But, they were marked by Goldman Sachs as one of the "Next Eleven", and are expected to be one of the fastest growing and largest economies of the 21st century.

Unfortunately, they face a SEVERE threat from global warming. If their economy does significantly expand, it will be interesting to see what a government with some economic sway will contribute to the climate change conversation. Ten years ago during an extreme flood, about 2/3 of the country was underwater. Imagine if that becomes a normalcy. It might look like millions of climate refugees pouring into

India

...

Isn't it weird talking about the economic promise of such a poverty-stricken and governmentally corrupt nation? We guess we were saying the same thing about

China

in the early 80's though. As

China

ages into their demographic time-bomb, we suppose manufacturing will begin to move elsewhere. With all those people in Bangladesh, labor would be super cheap and those jobs could lift millions out of poverty, and all those waterways would significantly reduce the need for building expensive transport infrastructure. Plus they'd be super close to

India

Indonesia

, and the

Philippines

, and those other burgeoning economies. Symbiosis y'all.

Anyway, after Independence,

Bangladesh

switched back and forth between parliamentary democracy and military dictatorships with coups occurring about every 10 years. Since 1990 they've been rocking the parliamentary democracy, and it looks good on them!

Be sure to check out some Bangladeshi cinema while we're here. King Kong and The Hulk!