Old Dhaka.

A layed mix of labyrinthine streets with connecting dark alleys set in between open front shops; a dreamland for wanderers and bibliophiles on vacation. It would be exaggerating to say that people here are untouched by a modern world, we all know ideas can travel faster than the technology and machinations they produce, but in a congenial spirit of curiosity and olden truths that shape their care for the traveler, this city creates a period of its own. While not yet spoken, there is a sanctity for the wanderer; welcoming cups of tea that I have not drank of anywhere else. These principles crash into your heart with a barrage of questions and opinions that reach your ear from fifteen directions, but the smiling faces from which these words emanate hold no threat.

"Take your time," Asia beckons. "Come, sit in my lap and watch the cusp of civilization embrace those who wait."

The reward is the process. A daily move into a past attached to the sinews of the present. Some fibers run stronger than others; some places have a history, a weight you can feel in conversation as a Bangladeshi man emboldens the mosque behind him with a spring in his words. I imagine there was a spring in his step as well, just at the moment he saw us.

I have never been such a curiosity. Kyle, a friend revisited in Bangladesh, and I have walked through streets with tiny shops and bicycle rickshaws that squeeze onto a narrow lane that has acted in spite of changing times -- holding the same relevance as it did centuries ago. The challenge is avoiding the scrapes of rickshaw bolts as our eyes flit to meet those that stare from their shopfronts. Metalworkers, sarong sellers, instrument builders, and tea makers; they all look to us.