I'm back in Dhaka after getting the train up from Chittagong. Bangladesh trains are much more functional than ours: you can get good cheap food - at any time of the day or night, get your shoes polished, even buy a book, 'oh and when you get closer to Dhaka on over bridges they allow people to jump down and get a free ride to the capital.

The shipbreaking yards was an experience - the workers had been on strike for 12 days and the day I got in was their first day back so my guide was twitchy and we only got in for an hour.

They were on strike for more money - their now on 40 pounds a month.

Like a deft croupier dealing out a hand of cards in a casino huge green excavators with magnets on the end pick up giant pieces of cut up bulkheads and stack them like deck of cards.

Taking the ships apart reminded me of a toy Mecanno set when you've lost the fiddly spanner to take it apart again.

Guys with only sledge hammers and blow torches clamber all over the 10 to 12 storey oil tankers, bulk carriers, container ships and other juggernauts starting off by getting the rear of the ship open and taking out the engines at same time burning off the propellor lest someone steals one of the goliaths in the middle of the night.

At low tide in the thick mud the workers pull out thick hawsers which are then attached to the cut up subsections then pulled up above high tide to be further cut up. Some of these sections are as big as a block of flats.

To be continued.