Dhaka Transportation Tips by mafi_moya Top 5 Page for this destination

The worst taxi drivers in the world!

The taxi drivers in Dhaka are possibly the worst in the world. No, forget possibly - they are! It's not that they try to rob you or deafen you with loud music. They're mostly friendly and fairly safe drivers, and few try to overcharge (it's on a meter anyway).

But not a single one of them - not one! - has the slightest clue where they're going!

Admittedly, Dhaka is a chaotic, sprawling city that doesn't follow any of the usual conventions of town planning, but these guys seem to get lost going round a corner! After a week in Dhaka I was giving them directions! The incredible traffic means that journeys take far longer than they might do elsewhere, but it doesn't help having to go round in circles for half an hour asking passers by for the way. Good drivers are like gold dust - I eventually found one, took his mobile number and then used him all the time. Otherwise you're probably better off walking.

Mode: AROUND

Type: Other

Rickshaws

There are about 350,000 of these things in Dhaka alone, and they're found at every street corner and junction - many drivers scraping a living off one fare a day. If you're a visitor here then you have to ride in one at least once. You're driven around by a man on a bike while sitting in a carriage attached to the back, which fortunately has a cover for when it chucks it down with rain.

Brightly painted in all kinds of colours and patterns they make for a far more aesthetically attractive and environmentally friendly form of transport than the tuk-tuks that dominate most other parts of Asia. Unfortunately they're also much slower (not a bad thing I suppose, if you're sightseeing) and extremely uncomfortable. One person is ok but two is pushing it a bit unless you're very small!

Mode: AROUND

Type: Other