Yoga, pinky toe and sarcasm.

This place couldn't be a more perfect setting to try out some meditation and yoga. The ocean, crashing against the rocks. The choir of birds serenading (or the cacophony of birds screeching..take your pick). The perfectly temperate weather. The zillions of trees shrouding you away from the rest of the world, except, of course, for the window to the ocean. Then there's Strider - the resort dog that comes to every yoga class and stretches out on a yoga mat while you get your downward dog on. And the food here is so healthy and delicious. Even if it wasn't - the fact that my yoga teachers are usually around when I'm eating is enough to make me pick the muesli and yogurt over the pancakes (and even those are stuffed with bananas, yogurt, dates and palm sugar syrup). Except I didn't care who was watching when I had coconut & palm sugar crepes with ice cream for dessert.

So - to fill you in, I'm spending my first week in Sri Lanka at a yoga retreat, at the southern tip of the island. Every day, it's a 6:30 hour-long meditation session followed by a 1.5-2hr yoga class. Then, a bit of delicious breakfast. A leisurely walk on the beach. Read a bit. Grab a light lunch. Read. Take a nap. Go for a dip (ocean or pool, your choice). Then go for another 1.5-2hr yoga session. Write. Eat dinner. Fiddle around with a stray guitar. Read. Ward of mosquitoes. Sleep. Repeat.

It's kind of ridiculous to be spending all this time and energy on just me. Particularly when you've just spent the summer seeing extreme poverty on a daily basis, and tried, in a very small way, to put your two hands into helping mitigate the affects of it. Yea, no - it is ridiculous - I recognize it. Lavishing so much time, energy and money on myself. So, I'm acknowledging it, and recognizing that I am so incredibly blessed to have the privilege of - even having the option - to invest in something that I think is important for my wellbeing. And the abundance of papayas is just an added bonus.

So far, I'm doing okay with this whole mind, body, spirituality thing. I'm really trying to keep an open mind about this, and trying to go beyond the physicality that is yoga. I mean, sure, during meditation exercises when my instructor tells me to breathe into every part of my body and awaken my cells, in my head I'm saying "hellllooooooooo! How's it going mr. pinky toe? Helloooo ms kidney, looking fine this AM!". I know, I'm a dork even inside my head. And you thought it was just for show.

But overall, even through all the mushy squishy 'feel like water, move your body with the flow of your breath, use your inner eye like a torchlight in your body'…I sort of get it. I doubt that I am fully realizing the exercises my yoga teachers are imparting on me just yet, but at the end of the class, and each day, I feel more centered. I feel more content. I feel more connected and aware of my body. I feel like there's just a bit more of me that I understand and like. I definitley feel more trippy and spacey after each class. As my wonderful yoga teacher said when I told her this, in her lilting, hypnotic voice…"yea..just go with it".

Don't worry people - my sarcasm inner eye is still intact and functioning. And it's looking right at you.

Dip in Dhaka

The week that I left Porto, after a wonderful six-month experience, I remember it rained trucks full of buckets. A friend told me jokingly that the city was crying because I was leaving. But I had such an extraordinary time there - growing, making new friends, learning about myself, flexing my strength in discovering things on my own - that I wanted to believe that maybe, just maybe, the city would miss me just a smidge. Years later, I don't want to go back for a visit, because the city has such wonderful memories for me, and I don't want to ruin them with older and perhaps less romantic eyes.

 

This past week in Dhaka - the last few days of my 2.5 month stint in B'desh - it's just been a constant torrential deluge...but I know this city is not crying for me. Dhaka is an intriguing city. It's not that it's a hard city like New York or Delhi. Nor is it a warm city like Vancouver or Cape Town. The Lonely Planet describes Dhaka as a "giant whirlpool that sucks in anything and anyone foolish enough to come within its furious grasp". But I don't think it's that either. Dhaka is a city with a big hearty, betel-paan stained smile. If you can look past the bad dental work, you can plainly see that it's a beaming, genuine smile. It might be laughing at you, or with you, or a bit of both, but at least it's heartfelt. And for a city that has been fighting an uphill battle against poverty, over population and climate change for decades, you got to have respect for the resilience of that smile.

 

So, alas, Dhaka isn't crying for me…it's just giving itself a good rinse in preparation for the next migrant that might dip her toe in the waters.

 

How to get out of Dhaka

Step 1: Flag down a CNG, bargain, and cross your fingers that they understood that you want to go to the airport train station, not airport. At 6am on a Friday morning, you might have a to wait a while.

Step 2: Arrive at the airport train station, and wait eagerly in the area you think your cart will be. Surely this will be incorrect. Politely ignore the man who asks for money repeatedly but in such a comical fashion that you suspect he is on repeat mode more for his amusement than for the money.

Step 3: When a train pulls in around the time your train is supposed to leave, and the announcer calls out the name of your train and destination you are hoping to go to, assume that the train that just pulled in (the only one in the station) is in fact the right train for you. This is a false assumption.

Step 4: Because people told you that the train would only stay at the station for a few minutes, jump onto the first cart you see, and ask people to help direct you to your seat.

Step 5: Listen to the 4-6 people you show your ticket to, and tell you that you have to keep moving a few more carts up to get to your seat. Bash people with your big backpack as you attempt to squeeze past the mash of people filled in the train carts.

Step 6: 3 or 4 carts down, show your ticket to a couple more people and then listen to their advice when they say, no, your seats are a couple carts back down the other way - where you just came from.

Step 7: Show your ticket again to someone on the train, after when you've retraced your steps a few carts down (and re-pissed off the people you squeezed past again). Bear in mind that at this point the train has already been on the move for the past 10 minutes. Process the next few words a kind stranger tells you when he looks at your ticket. "You're on the wrong train".

Step 8: Ask a few other kind strangers if in fact you are on the wrong train, and surrender to your tourist badge of shame. Kind strangers explain that the next stop is not for another 2 hours, and that you'll have to then catch a train back to Dhaka and then maybe from there, you can catch another train to your destination.

Step 9: Politely answer questions from kind strangers (all this is Bangla of course), particularly when 2 men offer you their seats. I am from Canada, she is from USA. Yes, my parents are originally from Kolkata. Yes, I do look Bangladeshi. Yes, West and East Bengal was all one region at one point. Yes, I understand Bangla a bit, but I'm not good at speaking it. No, she is not Chinese. Her family is originally from Korea. You want my number?

Step 10: Hark! 10 minutes later the train starts to slow down. One kind stranger shouts to the people on the other train and you find out that the other train is on its way to Dhaka. Kind stranger tells you that the train will only stop for a few moments, and to quickly jump off and jump on to the train going in the opposite direction.

Step 11: Like Indiana Jones, gracefully dismount from your train, ask the guys on the other train to confirm its destination is Dhaka, and squeeze yourself in to the other train. Repeat Step 9.

Step 12: Once back in Dhaka, take a rickshaw to the nearest bus ticket counters, track down a carrier that has room for you. As luck would have it, the third one has seats available and it's a luxury bus line.

Step 13: 14hours later, arrive at your destination. Reward yourself with mango juice and a paratha (or soup if you're Miji).

*My next post will have stories of our lovely visit to the Hill Tracts and visits with some of the Indigenous groups in Bangladesh - one of the highlights for my time here in B'desh for sure. Stay tuned! Oh, and I promise to include photos!

Fear factor, comic genius, cats, and other related topics

It's amazing how dull my internal panic button has become here. I know my mom will read this and get mad at me and say I should be more cautious - and then my dad will tell me to stop using rickshaws and wear a hardhat at all times, but the fact of the matter is that you have to numb your fear senses to be able to circumnavigate this city. Traffic lights, for example, are an endangered technology, and I'm not sure if there is a 'right of way'. I think the only "right" belongs to the biggest vehicle on the road. And this is no different than most megacities in the global south. When you turn on to a major road for example, the rickshaw driver doesn't really slow down, but just plows through and stares down the oncoming vehicle. And rings his bell. Yes, because that's how you get the SUV heading straight at you to slow down. If riding at night, the only vehicles on the road with headlights are motorized vehicles, but remember, there are a whole lot of un-motorized, passenger-carrying contraptions out on the road (namely, the one I'm riding on). I'm banking on the fact that the bigger vehicle that's headed toward me has lights, so they can see me. Good logic right? And vehicles that back-up on a major road, they may or may not check to see if they might run over a pedestrian or oncoming rickshaw. It's just assumed that everyone is alert and will give way if they have to.

And so, when my rickshaw makes a quick turn onto oncoming traffic, I no longer take in a sharp breath and clutch my seat. When a car makes a quick turn into the path I'm walking along, I don't scream in shock. So although I numb my knee jerk reaction to near-misses, I certainly have amped up my sense to dodge, and when appropriate, shout at the oncoming swerving car to slow down a touch. I have climbed over rickshaw wheels as necessary and smacked a CNG or two. Constant vigilance people. (And yes, I finally finished re-reading Harry Potter. I'm so ready for the last movie).

There is this one particular road in this one particular neighbourhood (on the way to Niketon off of Mohakali…) - it has the most remarkably porous path. No, porous doesn't do it justice - you'd think you were traversing the moon's surface. But on a rickshaw, and with a very acute awareness of gravity. I am convinced every time I'm on that road, particularly after an afternoon deluge, that my rickshaw will in fact, topple over or throw me out at the point where 2 out of the 3 wheels are launched mid-air at 45 degree converse angles. It hasn't happened yet, but I've got another 2-3 weeks here.

So, I know this blog post is not particularly well-thought out, but perhaps entertaining, with shades of snarky sarcasm. Interestingly, a friend just sent me an email: "wow. no sarcasm in that e-mail at all...you feeling ok?". And that's the thing - sarcasm does not translate well here, so I've had to really keep it on the down low. Or even my sparkling wit. The other day, I was taking photos of a friend's football/soccer team - all B-deshis+ an American. For the team photo, instead of saying to the guys, "1, 2, 3…cheese!" I said: "1, 2, 3…paneer!!". Get it? Get it? I got it. They did not, in fact, get it.

My comic genius is stifled.

But I'm not complaining. I must say, Dhaka has grown on me. There are little gold nuggets I'm discovering in the city and its people. And the many worlds that are smashed up together in this city. So allow me to go on one last tangential path. One of my favourite Margaret Atwood novels is Cat's Eye, mostly because of her prologue (and because it's not really about cats..):

But I began then to think of time as having a shape, something you could see, like a series of liquid transparencies, one laid on top of another. You don't look back along time but down through it, like water. Sometimes this comes to the surface, sometimes that, sometimes nothing. Nothing goes away.

The many worlds that live in parallel or on top of each other are amplified in a city like Dhaka. My Dhaka is so very different from the Dhaka of a Program Officer from a large international NGO, or my rickshaw driver, or the middle/upper-class young Bangladeshi, or the woman who lives in the neighbouring slum. And in a city where everyone and everything is so densely packed, it's easy to put on blinders to the world that is brushing past your shoulders. But on occasion (if I may be so bold to borrow Ms Atwood's beautiful analogy of time) the different worlds bubble up and if you're lucky or if you choose to take off your blinders, you can catch a glimpse of another world.

On traffic, tea, and where to get your snuggle on

More random thoughts - I know, I've been reduced to bullet points…once a consultant, always a consultant.

1. You know that sound? That sound of someone trying to cough up a hairball? It's those moments in my day, when, hark! a man makes a loud hawking noise..and I await with tense apprehension for when and where he will expectorate…but he doesn't…and the suspense is excruciating...at least, in the time it takes me to awkwardly dodge around him. So…where does it go? I leave that for you to mull over and digest. Hmm..poor choice of words perhaps.
2. Random, but interesting point of note…a commercial for Glee here, advertises it as: "Hollywood's Bollywood" - love it.
3. I think I have to give up my need to setup meetings with people I want to meet with. I keep trying to push for a time to meet, and I get back, oh yea, let's meet on Saturday. When? On Saturday. What time on Saturday? Let's say in the afternoon. But when in the…oh nevermind. Okay, sounds good. It's all about stalking people, or hovering...to meet with people. It's not that there isn't a sense of urgency or importance - far from it. It's more that it's just the culture for things to run late, so why bother setting a specific time? And in a city that gets so much traffic, strikes, and heavy rainfall that can delay a city of millions, I can see the reason for not setting a time, since chances are, you'll be late no matter what time you said you'd be there. As one of my friends in Tanzania recently posted, her language teacher said something along the lines of: Punctuality is a luxury that developed countries have.
4. Also, I think I've handed out more business cards in the past 3 weeks than I have in my entire career. And that includes all the cards I've given to my mom. Everyone introduces themselves with a business card..it's the professional thing to do. That said, I'm not sure how I can look professional when I'm sitting at a meeting and getting bitten by mosquitoes…somehow I don't think I can pull off scratching my leg against a chair and make it look graceful.
5. Another great thing? Cups of tea at every meeting. And at breakfast and at 9:30 and 2:30 every day. Glorious.
6. Just to get from A to B in the city, is an incredible achievement - the sweaty hot mess that you are feels like a job well done if you manage to get to your destination in one-piece. The traffic, the pre-requisite haggling with the rickshaw driver - or, if you walked, the giant mud lakes you circumnavigated - the sweet sweet layer of condensation that has formed all over your torso and face, making you wonder if its pointless to take a shower anymore…the victory is in the simple fact that you arrived. I often wonder, when I've arrived at my destination, why there is no applause and cold mango juice waiting to congratulate me on such an accomplishment.
7. Description of the restaurant I went to one night..." In keeping with its eponymous theme, the restaurant’s walls are decorated with posters of such jazz icons as Jimi Hendrix, Marilyn Monroe, and Elvis; " really?
8. Saw a woman dressed elegantly in a sari and heels. I was waiting to cross a major intersection along with a throng of men, waiting for the traffic to slow a tad (usually there are a few brave souls who run across, but not this time..the traffic was flying past). This beautiful woman just started walking, elegantly put her hand out to command the oncoming traffic to brake a little while she glided (not ran) through the intersection. She crossed successfully, not a hair out of place. If you ever see me in a sari and heels, I can assure you, that even if I were walking across an empty room, I'd find a way to stumble. Wait, that would happen even if I was in jeans and flats (and a number of you have witnessed that).
9. What is interesting, is to see people practice their religion so freely. Well, in all fairness, it is one particular religion -Islam is the main religion here. But I could be in the office or in a coffee shop, and it's not unusual for someone to step aside, and pull a prayer rug out and start praying - right there. No need to go to somewhere private, just as long as you're praying towards Mecca. Granted, yet again, I only see men pray in public, I'm guessing women pray in private? Not sure, will have to ask. But many women do use their dupattas to cover their hair during prayer call. And there's not odd looks if you don't. It's kind of nice to see such an openness about making time to pray - and no apparent judgment if you're not.
10. On my way to work one day, amidst a slew of rickshaws, CNGs (autorickshaws ), cars and other scrappy vehicles, I saw a chicken crossing the road. I did not question why the chicken was crossing the road, but more importantly, how on earth did the chicken cross the road with all its feathers in tact?
11. Where do middle-class teens go in Dhaka to get their snuggle on? Coffee shops. Where do young adults go to get their snuggle on? Parks, preferably close to a large body of water (even if there are questionable items floating around).
12. All random thoughts and jokes aside, I think I've found a few favourite spots in Dhaka. My #1 right now is Banani bridge, around 5:30/6pm when the sun starts to set, a scattering of boats launch lazily across the river, taking people home, underneath a slew of cars and rickshaws that crawl over on the bridge.

The Vigilance of Complacency

My walk/ride (depending on how hot it is) to and from work takes me right through a small slum. In the mornings you can small the strong stench of the effects of the lack of a sewage system combined with the shouts of parents calling after their kids.

 

I don't know if I'll get used to seeing extreme poverty on a daily basis. I hope I won't grow complacent to the old man with no hands or legs on the side of the street, or the naked toddler covered in dirt, scratching his bloated little tummy (bloated because of the lack of nutritious food). Whether I'm walking through the slum, or riding through it on a rickshaw, my heart and stomach lurches and my head revolts when I see the man reach out to me, or the toddler cry alone in the mud. Not out of disgust for them of course, but out of disgust of myself. What am I doing? Why aren't I doing anything right this very second to help him..whatever I can? Part of my brain reasons that I'm not doing anything at this second because the "solution" is - I'd like to believe- a long-term sustained and vigilant effort that addresses a multitude of factors, not a quick hand out that will make me feel better more than help anyone.  And of course the other part is probably that I'm afraid to help. I  feel a twinge of guilt for my good fortune to have been born into this life without the multitude of obstacles that face these kids that are not heart and stomach-lurching for them, but simply a part of every day life.

 

Perhaps I will grow complacent over time - I suppose it's how we cope. I remember a few months after 9/11, one of the first movies I saw in the theatre was some Lethal Weapon part 322nd movie (not my choice, I can assure you). There was a scene where a mid-rise building was blown up and I can recall cringing and shrinking in my seat, shaken by the reality that we had all witnessed just months before. Probably a year later I was watching another wham-bam movie (again, not my choice)…and walking out of the theatre, I realized I didn't cringe or even give a second thought to all the violence that had just entertained my senses. Not that violence on TV is comparable with the effects of extreme and utter poverty literally calling out to you, but I became numb, and I'm still numb to the images we call entertainment.

 

Perhaps that's why I've changed the course of my career path - so that I won't become complacent and be a small part of that long-term sustained vigilant effort. Perhaps.

 

But I'll try to end on a lighter note. Speaking of vigilance. Walking through the streets of Dhaka is an exercise of constant vigilance (yes..I'm heeding Mad-Eye Mooney's advice…and yes, I am re-reading Harry Potter thank you very much). Not only am I looking at the ground for the next big mud puddle to avoid, but I'm looking to my sides for dangerously close rickshaws, CNGs and cars, and I'm also looking above so I don't run into any of the hanging severed electrical wires. Constant vigilance people. Whether walking around in Dhaka, or trying to tackle the monstrous elephant that is poverty.

I am a giant. And other random thoughts.

 

I know I have a problem with heights..in the sense that I think I'm taller than I actually am. As in, I think I'm at least 5 inches taller than I am. So much so, that when there's a somewhat low hanging branch that I'm walking under, I will actually stoop to avoid it…even though there's still a good 5 or 6 inches of space, even if I were standing on my tiptoes. I fully recognize it as a problem, and many of my friends have no problem pointing this out with mocking grins and evil laughter (you know who you are).

 

Now, imagine putting that syndrome in a country where the average height is probably about 5'2"…and well, you have a giant on your hands. A 5'5" giant. So, as you can imagine, when there are electrical wires hanging everywhere…yep…cut hanging wires, some dragging on the ground..often in pools of water from the rains (I'm sure there is no electricity running through them, right?), when I'm in a rickshaw, I'm dodging wires left and right. But the thing is…I really think I'm tall enough to hit these ones…I swear…I am tall enough to get hit by them.  I'm a giant.

 

Other (serious) challenges I'm facing here: knowing when to shake someone's hand when I've been introduced to them. Most guidebooks on Bangladesh seem to say it from a male perspective - don't shake hands with a woman unless she offers its. But, I wonder if I should be offering to shake hands when I'm introduced to a man. Since it's a mostly Muslim country, and depending on how religious people might be, a man should not touch a woman whom he is not related to. Maybe I'm going overboard. I tend to be oversensitive since I grew up in Saudi Arabia.

 

Miji and I have set "goals" for each other - not constructive-this-will-make-you -a-better-person kind of goal. More like, a ridiculous set of goals for our own amusement. Such goals include: make friends with someone who has an AC car. Scream back "hoooonk" the next time a car/CNG/rickshaw needlessly honks just to say 'holla!' . And…play at an open mic in Dhaka. I thought that this last one would be easy…but upon inquiring at a venue that advertised open mic night and live music, I was surprised to hear that the Open Mic was not, in fact open. I have to contact the owner to see if he'll let me play. Wha?

 

And then there's water bottles. Let me rephrase that - filtered water at cafeterias that are served in liquor bottles. In a country where alcohol is not really allowed (mainly just high-end hotels and US/Canadian/British type clubs) it's great to see water served in bottles of Smirnoff and Jack Daniels. I'm pretty sure any self-respecting Jack drinker would cringe at the sight of water in a bottle of Jack.

 

Finally…a sad random challenge I face…it's been, what, 2.5 weeks…and I just started craving Starbucks? This is ridiculous. It's not like I even have Starbuck's that often…maybe once every couple of weeks. Oh wait. Then that makes sense.

 

Photos from Manoshi field visit

Visiting the Manoshi Project...in an urban slum

The Manoshi programme. It's a community driven MNCH - Maternal, Neonatal, and Child Health programme that recruits community health volunteers from that slum - called Shasthya Shebika (SS). There are about 150 to 200 people to a SS. The SS is trained to do monthly visits, identify possible pregnancies, and detect and manage basic illnesses. There are also trained community health workers called Shasthya Kormi (SK) that can provide antenatal and postnatal care. There are about 10 SS to every SK. The SK works with a traditional birth attendant (or as its known here, an Urban Birth Attendant) during delivery.

 

We first visited the BRAC birthing house in an urban slum and met a young woman, and which I presume to be her relative and child - they were waiting to be seen by the UBA and/or SK. Then we visited Roni's home. She is 3 months pregnant, 23 years old, expecting her first child and has such a beautiful smile! Her mother was with her while the SK performed her first visit. She used to work in the garment factory, but now that she is pregnant, she has stopped working. Her husband is a rickshaw driver, and was not present during our visit. 

 

But let's talk about this slum first. It was my first time visiting a slum - not just walking past it. We walked into this gated area, took a couple of turns down a few small alleys, and the path opened up to rows of tin shacks closely stacked next to each other - the alley between the homes were probably 2 shoulder-widths wide - not even. I didn't realize it till after, but the path I was walking on were just planks on boards - the entire slum is built atop a swamp..held up by chopstick bamboo. And some of the homes are 2/3 stories high. The fragility of these 'homes' is immense. Can you imagine trying to transport a woman in labour from a 3rd story of a 'building' made of tin and perched on chopsticks? No running water, a common "latrine" with no sewage facilities…its overwhelming when you begin to unravel all the challenges that face the 5000 slums in and around Dhaka alone.

 

We visited one expectant mother and she and her mom invited us in while she was getting a check up from the BRAC health worker. The room was small - enough for a double-size bed and a tiny cot. And some shelving along the side. It was tiny but tidy with a few items here and there. I can't recall how many people lived there - but I'd imagine at least 4. Despite her very humble setup, she paused half-way through the conversation, embarrassed that she had not offered any food or tea. And when the electricity went out, and the fan stopped, she grabbed a wicker hand fan and started twirling it around. I said, you're the pregnant lady, I should be doing that for you! She flashed me her beautiful smile and kept fanning.

 

Just outside Roni's home, I  caused a lot of giggles from some of the kids loitering around, probably because of my because of my big old camera and big old goofy smile. I would love to come back with small digital cameras and have the kids take photos from their perspective (what the producer of the documentary 'Born into Brothels' did). The kids were curious and adorable and my mangled bangla could make them laugh.

 

The project I'm going to be working on is an mHealth project - so using mobile phones for health...so we got to see how the SK registered Roni and asked her a series of antenatal questions via her mobile phone. She recorded everything on the 80 USD SMS based phone and sent the information to her programme officer. She did some basic health examinations to check for adema, anemia and blood pressure as well. She recorded some basic information on a check card and left it with the mom so she could keep track of her basic stats. On the wall I saw the BRAC maternal health poster - that had the number to the SS/SK and programme officer for when she goes into labour or has complications. Oh, and within the questionnaire, there were points where the SK took photos of the mom as well as voice recorded additional info as needed. The idea is that all this info will eventually feed to a doctor's web portal where they can review high-priority cases and text back the SK with additional, customized diagnosis.

 

It was pretty neat to see this pilot phase of the mHealth running. Of course there are bugs and improvements to be made, but its neat to see these types of projects in action. This small group of pilot users have adopted quite quickly to the technology (what they initially thought would be a 2 day training on the mobile phone application, turned out to be 4hrs), and apparently it has cut down their work load considerably. For those not on the mHealth project, the manually track all the information, which then gets manually aggregated at the SK level, then again at the programme officer level..and then at some point the manually calculated aggregates get input into a database for regional and eventually national information. So the need for digital recording for reporting reason alone is obvious.

 

Food for thought...

One of the gentleman with me on this site visit was a country officer for certain African country for a certain NGO (this is me being ambiguous for privacy sake). He and I had an interesting conversation on our way back to the office. We were discussing why BRAC was successful in so many of its interventions, and he said it came down to the fact that it's a "Global South" led initiative. "The North comes in with their money and fancy tools, and the South comes in with their hands and stomach". He made the point that because the South lives and breathes this kind of extreme poverty, they are most apt to come up with low cost interventions that are effective. He didn't deny that North-led initiatives weren't effective, but just that they are often very expensive, and so therefore not scalable or sustainable. He  seemed especially frustrated with the 'experts' from the North with their fancy degrees and one year of experience in India and how that qualified them to be heads of projects and influence policy.

 

I asked him, that if he didn't think the folks from the North should be involved in implementing services for the poor, where would the North be effective. According to him, the North has the power when it comes to advocacy and influence in the world. I suggested that perhaps also the North is most useful when it comes to raising funds, and he surprised me with saying that, he didn't think there was too little or too much or just enough aid available…it was more important to see that low-cost solutions are being implemented.

 

This conversation, not surprisingly, has got me thinking. Where do I belong exactly? Is it selfish of me to butt in just because I'm interested in this field?

Ramblings and an intro to BRAC

I think I have become one with the rickshaw. I no longer need to cling to the edge of the rickshaw as we bump and gyrate over the swiss cheese roads. I think its all in the legs…stabilizing with your quads. Miji doesn't seem to have this problem however, so this could just be me.

 

What I can't seem to do well though - is keep my dupatta balanced on my shoulders. I'm pretty sure I have defective shoulders - that's why I have to always use a cross bag - when I keep a bag on one shoulder, it always slips off. I'm okay with a scarf..because its smaller..but the dupatta just doesn't gracefully straddle my shoulders like it does for every other woman in this country.

 

I haven't figured out whey I get so many stares. You should see Miji's impression of people craning their necks to take a look at us as we bound through the streets on a rickshaw. We'll try to capture it on video…You'd think that I'd blend in - even when I'm wearing an salawar kameeze (even if the dupatta is awkwardly perched on my shoulders).

 

Anyways…

 

About BRAC

 

So - let's talk about BRAC - the reason why I'm here. BRAC is the world's largest NGO (in terms of size, not in terms of money) and I believe it's the first "Global South" NGO to go international. Started in the 1970s to combat the challenges that face the extreme poor in rural Bangladesh, it has since expanded to cover virtually all of Bangladesh, and it has also gone on to spread its insane ideas of low-cost community-based interventions across other countries in South Asia, Africa, and now Haiti.

 

The machine that is BRAC is even more impressive in person. BRAC is everywhere in B'desh. BRAC Bank, BRAC Fisheries, BRAC Poultry, etc. BRAC Poultry is so huge that it provides the chicken for most restaurants, including KFC. You know how iPhone's tag line is "we've got an app for that"? I think BRAC should go with "we have a BRAC for that" as its tag line.

 

 When you look at a map of Bangladesh, you'll see that there is some sort of BRAC service in every part of the country - its ubiquitous prevalence is quite remarkable.  Its social enterprise and micro-finance ventures are the main reasons why BRAC is 70-75% self-funded – which is impressive for an NGO – particularly of this size. It is evident that its success is based on two aspects: community reach and trust. It is because of these two elements BRAC has been able to build the infrastructure throughout the country to have the muscle to build partnerships and advocate at the national level, and it has branded itself at the poor and ultra-poor level as a trustworthy organization that has worked with communities to help.

Welcome to Dhaka

So folks...this travel blog is back up and running. Greetings from Dhaka, Bangladesh! I'll be here all summer for my internship working with BRAC. I'll write more about what I'm doing here in a future post. For now...just a run down of my first few days...

Dhaka: A city of chaos, filth, energy, colour, smiles and passion - swaddled in a blanket of constant cacophony. Like any major urban city in the Subcontinent, Dhaka can be overwhelming with the traffic, noise and contrast of extreme wealth and poverty living side by side, and on top of one another like a stacked jenga puzzle. In that sense, Dhaka, just from what I've seen in my first week in the city, has been what I expected. I am sure there will be many things that surprise me as I start to explore the city, and it is those surprises that I most look forward to.

The rise in humidity, however is not one that I welcome with open arms - although the unruliness of my hair may lead you to think otherwise. The monsoon season here seems to mean, at least one good solid rainfall every day. Although it appears to be a nice wave of cool from the excessive heat, it is met with more traffic and wet clothes. My first foray into the downpour was met with a ineffective bargain for a CNG (an auto-rickshaw), a graceful jump over a puddle, followed by a less-than graceful step on a slippery set of stairs that led to my ultimate fall while trying to go up.Right now, it's pouring down buckets. Trucks full of buckets.

Choice of clothing therefore, to combat the heat and rain, all the while respecting the local culture, is a challenging task at hand. I would estimate that 80% of the clothes that I brought with me are inappropriate for this country, and shopping for traditional salwar-kameezes is an even bigger challenge. Every article of clothing is drenched with extraordinary pattern, embroidery, sequence and colour. I've always been one for pattern and colour in my wardrobe (you know, to , balance my quiet personality) but there's only so much glitz and glamour I can handle. There have been several futile attempts to explain to shopkeepers that I'm looking for something simple and plain, but invariably they bring me something with gold sequence, pink polka dots and green swirls paired with orange checkered pants. Okay, so I'm exaggerating...but would not be surprised if there exists such a salawar...Eventually, I will give in and embrace the colour and pattern clash culture. The thing is, honestly, many of the women I see wearing these combinations look amazing - they can really pull it off. I, on the other hand, with my frizzy super short, super curly hair, teva shoes, purple cross-bag and wide-eyed confused Bangla-tourist face, can't seem to pull of the look.

That said, I'm trying to blend in with long flowy tunic tops I've collected over the years, and a summer scarf that I'm hoping is passing for a traditional dupatta. The dupatta is a long scarf that women always wear draped around their neck and/or shoulders. It seems superfluous to an outsider since many women do not use it to cover their hair, but just to hang around your neck- especially in this heat, but it is a very much necessary article of clothing to display a sense of modesty. I'm just paranoid about it getting stuck in the wheel when I'm taking a rickshaw.

So that's all for now. More stories, photos and videos to come!! I'll leave you with this: I am reminded here, how far a genuine smile can get you. With my mangled Bangla and a heartfelt smile, most people are willing to help out and come down in price (to a certain extent of course). Hoping the power doesn't go out during this down pour.

Curiosity, Race, Abortion, and Young People. Neh?

I wrote two questions in my notebook this morning.
1) How do you drive curiosity?
2) How do you inspire drive?

Last week I delivered, which will probably be the most significant achievement I will have made in my volunteering experience here: Microsoft Word and Excel training. Although I've been spending most of my time trying to come up with alternative funding strategies, and developing a new tool/process to track HIV/AIDS service organizations in Namibia - ie: high-level stuff, the thing that seems to be the most valuable here, is support on basic technical assistance.

Two things (of note) struck me while I was conducting the training:

1) There's a thirst for this type of knowledge. My colleagues see the immediate benefit of creating a graph in excel, or using ctrl+x or ctrl+v, and once they've been shown it, they adopt to it very quickly.
2) This thirst of knowledge does not lend it self to an innate sense of curiosity. So much of learning is driven by your willingness to play around till you figure it out yourself. I found that several times during training, if someone couldn't complete the exercise, they would just sit there till I came around and helped them. I couldn't find that sense of desire to explore and just try for the sake of trying.

So..where does it stem from? A so-so education system? An incredibly low pay scale - why go the extra mile if you're only paid about $3-4000 USD a year? A segregated colonial past that reprimanded black Namibians who excelled and were natural leaders? But that's the older generation - I would like to think I shouldn't see that from the younger generation - but perhaps that urge/desire to self-help and initiate is not passed on to the younger generation as much. And of course, I'm talking on broad/general terms - I've come across quite a few very bright young Namibians.

But these two observations is what prompted my first question - how do you drive curiosity. And let me clarify - education is very much a priority here - for all Namibians it seems. I think everyone I met, no matter if their 22 or 62, they're all in school part time pursuing a Master's or a PHD or something (makes me feel quite inadequate with my lonely bachelor's degree) - but its that sense of 'wait, let me try to figure this out first, before i ask for help', that I haven't seen so much. Self-help? I dunno.

And, I know, I'm only here for 2 months so far, so granted, my observations are based on limited scope, but this is what I've gathered from my experience and from what I've learned/heard from others. I was talking to a lady at the grassroots organization I'm working with, and she was telling me that her number one challenge, wasn't finding funding, but was finding good resources. She and her husband are both expats, and recognize that in order to make their org a truly sustainable org, they need to build up local Namibians to take the reigns. But the second they find someone good, and build them up and train them, the employee leaves to get a higher paying job. And why wouldn't they? In a country with only 2million people, the few that are really good will of course go to the high paying jobs. So for everyone else, what's holding you to a skills-building office job that pays the same as selling soap in a local store?

Some folks I've discussed this with, have said they have found its a sense of entitlement...I don't think its that. Perhaps its complacency? I don't know - this blog might come off a tad controversial and politically incorrect, especially if I'm not explaining myself correctly.

I'm blabbering I know..but this is all a first for me. The multi-dimensional challenges of development. And, given that my job as a consultant has pampered me even more - when I fly in, my clients are ready to hit the ground running - meetings are setup, and that's that. Getting everyone to come to a meeting here...my goodness its painstaking. First off, everyone's always travelling, going for field visits (that's because their Per Diem is more than their salary). Secondly, getting people to make a decision...even more painstaking. And finding ownership - finding someone to take the reigns. It's a challenge. Oh..and apparently it's quite hard to fire someone here - lot of legal fees associated with it. So, as a result, you have a group of intelligent, highly educated individuals with great job security, but very low salaries, that are not challenged - so why initiate projects/ideas?

Let me transition to a slightly different topic: race. Wow. Never have I seen it so prominently highlighted. Blacks, Whites, Coloureds, Germans, Afrikaans, Hereros, Ovambos, Damaras, Basters. Yea...the girls in my office were talking about taking me out one night, and I said, oh, will it be safe for me (since they were talking about going to a not so nice area, and I thought I would stand out), and they were like, nah, you look like a Baster, so you'll be fine. Wha...she called me a whaaaa? Of course, in my ear, I added the 'd' at the end of the word so was very confused why these sweet girls were calling me such a thing. But no, they said I looked a Baster - the descendents of a group of immigrants from the Cape of mixed Afrikaans (ie: Dutch) and Khoikhoi (ie: African origins). The name 'Baster' comes from the Dutch word for 'basterd' or 'crossbreed'. While some consider it demeaning, the Basters have taken ownership of the term as part of their history. Wowzers, neh? (So another thing, Namibians use 'neh' like Canadians use 'eh' - so its quite an easy tranisition for me)...

Ok...another topic change: for a while now, I've been meaning to write about this wonderful group of young people I had the good fortune to meet a few weeks ago. My brother-in-law volunteers at this youth group called Young Achievers. It's a group of kids in Katatura (which in Herero, means: "The place where people do not live"), that get together every Saturday - its completley self-organized and self-run by the young kids who participate in it. There's no incentive to go there (no food, or anything) but about 20 or so kids get together to build each other up. There are a few adults that got there to help advise, but the youths mediate the entire session. Its so incredibly inspiring to see these young kids get together, open up the meeting with saying what their vision is and what they did this week and what they plan to do next week to get them to their vision. I came in to give a 'talk', and loved every second of it. The highlight was the debate they had. They picked the topic - the nomiated topic of debate: abortion. Yea, abortion. Not, Hannah Montana versus Jonas Brothers, but abortion. These kids run from ages...probably 8 or 9 to 22. I think it was the 13 year old who suggested the abortion topic.

So the kids put them selves randomly into two groups - a pro and a con, identified their points, and then one at a time, they would make their arguments. Granted, their facts and knowledge about abortion was skewed and limited (as a result, I think they're trying to find a MD as the next guest lecturer to give them some proper medical facts) but their arguments were so incredibly impassioned...There was one kid who was great - he was like a preacher-slash-lawyer...great charisma. It was just hilarious to see these kids go at each other's arguments. The fascinating thing for me, was to see that the argument for/against centred around religious values (not surprsing) and the impact on society (surprising). Essentially, the argument for 'for abortion' was that if this isn't an option for poverty stricken areas where children are not wanted, then the population will increase in poorer areas, and that will be a burden on the entire society. Interesting, neh? The argument in the Western world is typically more of an individualistic sense - this is MY right for MY body. It was refreshing to see these kids with a different perspective give such a passionate debate.

Anyways...these kids were very bright, and just were soaking up what ever advise I had to offer (which was why I was nervous about giving the talk beforehand...I mean, I haven't figured out what my vision is yet myself and i'm almost 29) - but I talked about the importance of education, taking whatever internship you can get your hands on to build up your skills, and that its okay to have multiple dreams. Well I sure hope it is.

Okay..that's all for now...Next week I'm hoping to head over to Cape Town, so hopefully I'll be back with travel stories and photos...but I hope you enjoyed my random cultural observations from my more daily activities. Got to be a good Namibian now and get me some Rooibos tea.

till next time, neh?

Are we still in Africa?

An overdue update on our journey to Swakopmund - a town on the coast of Namibia. Kirin, my nephew, kept asking in the 4-hr drive to Swakop, "are we still in Africa"? After about the 5th time, I had to break it to him, that, at least for the next 2 years, all his travel will still be in Africa. Don't think that sunk in. Last night, we went for a walk in the 'hood, and at the top of a hill, you get a beautiful view of the city...and he was like..."wow..is that Waterloo?" (as in Waterloo, Ontario, Canada). sigh.

But back to Swakop. It's almost like walking into a movie set (Pleasantville?) - felt like I was in an old european town - quiant little houses in nice organized rows, painted soft colours of yellow, peach, sky blue..white trim, big clean streets (seriously, some of the neigbourhood streets were as wide as a 4 lane highway). There were old German couples walking hand in hand, strolling through the streets, an old German dude with an old german-y kind of hat on an old school bike...I found myself wondering if I had packed my pair of leederhosen (I had not). And then I asked my sister, "So, are we still in Africa"?

My bro-in-law found us a goregous 3-bedroom aparment with a view of the ocean - the place was decked out, in that european/south african kinda chic. The food here echos the german colonial architecture...plain and bland. Sorry..not a fan of schnitzel anything. On our first night in Swakop my sister ordered some rendition of cordon bleu...and we decided it looked like coagulated vomit. Overall, my experience with food here has been extaordinarily bland (I'm so craving some vietnamese food with my beloved sriracha).



Anyways, the highlight of Swakop was actually what was just 10min outside of the city - the sand dunes! The dunes just extend off the Atlantic ocean - its quite incredible to see Ocean, beach, then piles and piles of sand dunes. There's something quite calming having your feet sunk in cold sand, and turning your head every which way to see mounds of beige sand. We went to Dune 7 - just outside of Walvis Bay (a port city just south of Swakop). Dune 7 is supposed to be one of the biggest dunes in the Namib desert (and of the highest in the world) ~over 1200ft tall . And believe me..it is hard to climb these things...the boys had not problem at all, but man...every step you take, you sink in to past your ankle..so your calves (and lungs) get quite a work out. But the view from the top is incredible. Just walking along a peak is amazing..and you can easily get vertigo since the peak is so narrow, but if you fall...where you going to go? You'll just sink in the sand on either side.


Apparently you can go four-wheeling and sand-boarding, but we didn't get a chance to. I don't know about 4-wheeling, but I'd like to try out sand-boarding the next time I'm out there. There's a bit of eco-controversy with the 4-wheeling and heavy trafficking of cars..I didn't know, but all the tracks cause great ecological dammage - something to do with Lichens sensitivity to all the track pressure. Who would have thought? I always assumed, its a dune..the wind will cover up the tracks afterwards.



By the way - it was unbelievably cold there. The Atlantic currents brought in quite the cold and foggy weather. So it was weird to be in the desert, but with a light sweater on. Oh..and so far, every river I've seen in Namibia has been dry. Dry dry dry. The running joke here: 'What do you do when you fall into a river in Namibia?...Get up and dust yourself off'.


Anywho..the second day in the desert was spent hunting for desert animals - snakes, gekos, spiders, oh my! this was obviously a highlight for my nephews...but made me think...why on earth did I spend all day yesterday barefoot walking in the dunes..

Sand Diving Lizard on my ear...latest fashion trend ladies...

Anyways...I think that's all for now about Swakop..stay tuned for more on my work and cultural observations...

ciao ciao!

Where to begin...

On the road back to Windhoek.

It's only week 2, but I'm exploding with stuff to share. No clue where to begin. I've been inundated with so much interesting information in the past few weeks, that I realize how ignorant I am of Southern African culture/history/etc. My brain is overflowing with stuff to share with you, so I'm going to break this down:

1) seeing lions and tigers and leopards oh my!
2) my first week working in Development
3) more stuff I didn't know...

1)Lions and Tigers and Leopards oh my!

Last weekend we headed up to the N/a'ankuse Lodge - a conservation reserve that cares for mostly orphaned and injured animals that cannot be released back into the wild. The lodge is stunning, all made from eco-friendly materials, and all its profits go back to their efforts for wildlife conservation. It's about an hour outside of Windhoek, and they give you a very up close and personal view of Baboons, Caracals (bigger and meaner version of a house-cat), Wild Dogs, Leopards, Cheetahs, and Lions...The Lions were the craziest, SO big...and menacing.

We get there, and the guide was like, so, if they growl at you, don't run, it'll just provoke them. So i thought, yea, they'll be kinda far back, behind a steel iron gate or something, no worries. Oh no. It's this thin little wire thing (of course it's all ridden with high-voltage electricity, so there's isn't any risk for us, and little harm to them...unless there's a power failure...). So we raise our camera to take a photo, and the lion lets out this menacing growl..and the guide is like, oh yea, i forgot to tell you, they don't like it when you point at them..so keep it close to your body. but dude, when you're standing less than 5 feet away from a massive lion, and he's so not trained, and growling at you, and kinda ready to leap at your throat, you kinda want to pee in your pants a little. just a little.

The leopards were beautiful, and the cheetahs, hah..well we saw two brothers that were very angry at each other for some reason. But when they growl at each other (very menacing) they don't look at each other head on - if they did, that means they're challenging each other to a fight - so you think they're growling at you. but as soon as they got food they stopped provoking each other. kinda like my nephews.

Oh yea, and the baboons were actually kinda cute. We saw the baby ones, and they were adorable playing around. Apparently, anyone can volunteer there and help care for the baboons and other animals. With the orphaned baby baboons, the volunteers need to give them 24hr care, holding them, feeding them, changing their nappies - because that's the kind of care their mother would have given them (minus the nappy changing), and its instrumental in their development. See...everyone needs love. (let's hear a collective, aawwwww).


2) Working in Development - my 101

So I don't want to disclose which non-profit I'm working with here (I want to be honest with what I say, and not give you a skewed positive/negative image of the organization), but it deals with HIV/AIDS services and coordination. Its a small organization, but is quite well developed. It amazes me to see the types of constraints they have to deal with- and these I'm sure, are applicable to most, if not all organizations in development) - like access to strong resources, funding, ethnic tribal conflicts, historical context that affects how things are run...it's all eye-opening for me. And, I've been fortunate enough to meet with people across development here, from UN and WHO physicians, to teachers in schools in slums, to social workers, to...the list goes on. There's a definite benefit, I think of using folks from the corporate world to work in development, but there's a sharp learning curve and a sensitivity to the context that applies in development.

It's only been a week, but I hear certain terms thrown around incessantly - sustainability and capacity building. And I think its easy for volunteers, expats, foreigners to wax poetic at a high level on how things can be improved, but its another thing entirely, to eloquently detail the specific steps to become more sustainable, and build capacity in an environment that is limited in resources, and still affected by it's somewhat recent unfortunate history. It's certainly a challenge, and I have to say, I'm really enjoying trying to figure out ways to make those steps. I know I'm bright-eyed and optimistic now in week 1, so stay tuned for a while down the road, to see how I'm feeling then.

This might not be eloquent, but whatever, I'll edit later.

All this ties in to my third topic:

3) Things I didn't know before...

I wasn't really aware of Namibia's history/culture/current events. Basically, I was/am ignorant. Some interesting things I've learned that are of note, and some stuff I knew, but figure would be good background information:

• Namibia was a German colony - as a result, Namibian laws/constitution are very well structured and organized (ahh..the Germans)
• Within this time frame, they conducted what is said to be the first genocide in the 20th century - against the Herero people. It was apparently the 'test run' with concentration camps and 'experiments that Nazis would later conduct in death camps in Auschwitz, etc
  
• Segregation seems to still affect today, as there are definite distinctions between Afrikaners, Blacks, and Coloureds (people of mixed European and Sub-Saharan background).
  
• Apparently, there's at least one store in Namibia that's very old school German - ie: still selling Third Reich paraphernalia
  
• Namibia was just classified as a High-Middle-Income country by the World Bank...but has a ~37% unemployment rate, with a really high poverty rate (apparently one of the highest gaps between rich/poor because of the natural resource mining..)

On a side note - I just finished a book called 'Blue Clay People' by William Powers about an Aid worker's experience in Liberia. Really interesting read. Nothing to do with Southern Africa, but good insight on development work, and on Liberia. I had no idea that Liberia was basically 'reclaimed' by Americans, where a colonization group supported the return of formerly enslaved African Americans to Africa. Apparently there was a lot of class cultural divide with this oddly American colonial presence in Liberia..but not..I'm not explaining it that well - but just read it. :D

oh one last thing. today i met a girl (maybe 7 or 8) with my name! I was visiting a school that is located in the 'Informal Settlement' (the slum area) for orphaned kids, or kids who's parents are disadvantaged, and it was so surreal to meet this young girl with my name. She thought it was so neat as well..such a cutie. And apparently there's this other girl, who's 13 who was adopted by one of my sister's colleagues, with my name as well. I'd like to think they were all named after me, but there' some former Miss Universe with my name that might have had something to do with it.

okay - that's all for now.

Week 1: Windhoek 101

In an effort to keep in touch with the world 'back home' I've succumbed to the masses, and have created a blog. Here is my contribution to this newfangled contraption called the world wide web. Oh Al Gore, look what you've done.

It's my first week in Windhoek, Namibia. The journey from the Windy City to Windhoek was a long one. Over the course of the 2 day trip (Chicago-DC-Jo'burg-Windhoek) I wished 3 things: that I had not mocked Dana for purchasing a snuggie for her trip, that the 10 year-old South African girl sitting next to me for the 17hr flight wasn't so talkative and in love with Hannah Montana and the Jonas Brothers, and that the "Proposal" wasn't such a bad movie. Ah Sandra Bullock, look what you've done.

Upon finally arriving in Windhoek, I was utterly shocked to see that all 3 bags that I had checked were waiting patiently for me on the conveyer belt. The 2 overweight bags and akwardly long box I checked were filled with hockey gear, bottles of body lotion, stacks of notebooks, children's books, and a hammock. But lugging all that gear was very much worth it, because I got the best hugs from my nephews who were waiting patiently for my arrival.

The first thing that struck me when flying over Windhoek, is how sparse it is...just massive spanses of land, with trees spottted around for a chang of colour. The roads from the airport had a few 'baboon' crossing signs which was great, especially when we came across a clan of 7 or 8 baboons crossing the road. My sister's place is great - such a nice home, and it reminds me so much of Saudi. There's a night guard in front of the house, walls and gates surrounding the house, with electric fencing around the top, etc. In fact, I didn't even notice it at first when I walked because I felt so at home (Saudi style).

There's a swimming pool and a great terrace, so its wonderful to sit out there for morning tea and meals. The boys are loving it, swimming two, sometimes three times a day. It's still too cold for me, but it should heat up soon.

This week I'm taking it easy, adjusting to the time zone, and trying to 'relax'. Of course, Day 3 hit and I found myself writing up a list of things I want to accomplish in my trip here. Go figure. Next week I start volunteering with NANASO, so I'm excited to start getting into the city.

Anyways - this weekend will probably hit up a safari lodge, so will hopefully have interesting things to say and photos to share. Tonight we're going to a portuguese/angolan restaurant - can't wait!

ciao ciao kids!