Weird Work

So I've realised that I haven't written very much about work. I've been approaching it as so similar to work at home, that I haven't been noting those strange occurrences that I've noticed since being here. My time at the Asia Foundation is over half over and a meeting today really made me think about it. It was a meeting with the US Ambassador to Bangladesh and two men from USAID. The meeting was concerning the Leaders of Influence program, so there were 8 Imams there in their little hats (kufi's). I was the only woman in the room and just had a moment sitting across from these 8 men. It was just kind of surreal, when at home would that happen? What was fantastic was the energy that these Imams have for influencing their communities in a positive way - to facilitate dialogue with NGOs, to dispel misconceptions, to emphasize the importance of governance, rights and women's empowerment. It was one of those moment that you can see hope. Bangladesh is in this fantastic position of being majority muslim, but living in harmony with other religious groups and allowing their values to grow and progress. (I am being all young and idealistic)

Ok, my other little blurb that I got from a meeting with the Election Working Group yesterday (it was a very frustrating meeting) - this is not a culture of getting things done, it is a culture of let's have a cup of cha. This is totally true as every meeting seems to go in circles and is so freaking repetitive. I also have to laugh at people's manners over here (answering mobiles whenever, taking pictures with you mobile during a meeting, interrupting, burping). 

Anyways, really the thing is there is so much possibility in this country in so many things, someone just needs to facilitate the communication to get the ball rolling (although, that probably won't be me).

Get me out of Dhaka - thanks.

(That is Elham, our resident Bangadeshi child who teaches me the name of animals in Bangla) So I had a frustrating week at work, culminating in not getting to go on a trip to the Southern Region of Chittagong for a Buddhist Monk training session with the Leaders of Influence Program. I've been pretty bitter and probably not all that pleasant to deal with. John took off on the trip this morning. I ended up going with Russell (one of our colleagues), his wife and their friends on a boat trip north of Dhaka. It was amazing how in a very short distance, life is so different, and somewhat more pleasant. We got on the boat which is owned by a number of ex-pats. There were cushions and such on the floor and it was just a lovely relaxing trip up the river. Anne (Russell's wife) brought some great food including quiche, lovely cheese, French bread and some fantastic brownies. Wine and beer for all. It was pretty fantastic and may have eased my bitterness a bit. (Although the weather was getting a little threatening, but turned out fine)It also helped when John sent a text to say that the whole bloody country looks exactly the same (7 hours from Dhaka). But the best part of today may have been wearing shorts and a tank top in public for numerous hours. Nice. Anyways, I am chilling tonight, watching some of the movies I have picked up for 120 taka (2 dollars) - oh piracy. They are perfect quality, but it gives me something to do. Anyways, I will speak to you all soon. 

Oh, Jaylyn, Karbati maybe the stupidest national sport ever. It is a mix of red rover and tag while yelling karbati, karbati, karbati. Unfortunately I haven't seen anyone playing it, but if I did I would ask to join in just to say I had played. 

The British have the best parties

So, another week at work and such. The City Corporation elections have been set for August 4. I was hoping for a little earlier making a trip to Nepal easier, but who knows. Anyways, Thursday night we had a work dinner. We headed to the Baton Rouge for a buffet (a little dicey to have a buffet in Bangladesh in my opinion). Anyways, it was a retirement dinner for a former employee who had been with TAF for 21 years. I hadn't met him until that night, but whatever. So it was a decent dinner and fun to get to chat with everyone. Remembered to bring my camera, so I got pictures of a few people, but here is one of Sukla and I. She was the first person I met at the office and is pretty wonderful in helping John and I out, especially when it comes to rickshaw prices and Bangla words. (John cut off a bit of my head) Yesterday was a pretty lazy day. I hung out at the pool for awhile and just about finished another book. Last evening, John and I headed over to Andy's flat. He is the head of British Security in Bangladesh. He's a ton of fun and always has a full beer fridge. After a drink there, we headed over to the second British club (the Bagha Club) for their Summer Solstice party. We met Derrick there (who I had met at the Casino night - he taught me to play Black Jack). It was a great night of drinks and dancing. I have to say, watching a collection of people from all over the world dance is one of the most entertaining things ever. There was one guy who danced like a penguin, another woman who was out of control (almost like the mom jeans lady). They were just pretty funny. Then there was the Bangladeshi movie star. He was on the hunt for a western girl, it was between Sarah from the UK and I, neither of whom had much interest in the guy, but he tried, oh did he try. He asked me where I was from - Canada - where in Canada - Alberta - Oh, I've been to New York - Umm, ok (awkward moment as I tried to decide whether a) he thought NY was part of Canada b) he thought Canada was part of the States or c) he was just stupid). Anyways, Derrick and Andy did there jobs and protected Sarah and I. Our rickshaw ride home was amusing as Andy, John and I shared one back. Now, John and I always complain that we barely fit in one, so I'm not sure how great of an idea it was to have 3 of us. It was late though, so we didn't really need to worry about traffic. 

Today was also good. The four of us met up at the other British Club for brunch. I hung out with Derrick at the pool while John and Andy went to the German butcher for good food choices. It was a beautiful day finally with nice sunshine and I have to say the British Club is way better than the Canadian Club - there are actually people there. Anyways, I am now taking it easy as we have a busy week of meetings now that we actually know when the elections are going to be held. Hope you all have a great weekend. 

Feeling Re-energized!

Ok, so today I have totally been re-energized and am ready to do this election thing again. Somehow, I had become very skeptical in the last month. And because of that, kinda losing interest in why I'm here. But today, we had a meeting with a representative from Britain (Michael Meadowcroft). He totally made me excited about it all again. He was an MP in the UK for a number of years and now runs the Electoral Reform Society. Anyways, just what he was talking about and the questions he had about our program were really interesting and got me thinking again. The thing I think that was most important in what he said is that elections are the result of democracy, not the cause. Something all of us back home should maybe think a little more about, how it's the activities that go on between elections and our civic engagement that allow elections to be of the importance that they are. Anyways, I thought I would let you all know that I am being positive again and excited again about my work. Oh, and tomorrow the Bangladesh Electoral Committee is supposed to be announcing when City Corporation Elections are to be held. Really hoping that it happens the last week of July, then I will be here for them, and still be able to head to Nepal for the first week of August before going to Beijing. 

Oh, other happiness - Russell, one of the guys we work with, had us over for dinner two nights ago. We had real North American cheese burgers and apple pie and ice cream for dessert - I was happy. Speak to you soon!

A little more Dhaka...

So yesterday at work we convinced Bulbul, who works in accounting, to take us on another tour of Dhaka today. We told him where we had been, and he planned a route for us and would be our tour guide. So after picking Bulbul up at his house, we headed off to the National Assembly. Unfortunately we couldn't get very close. Apparently the building is pretty much shut down because there are no elected officials (thanks to the lack of elections). So we could only get in front of the grounds and into the park dedicated to Zia, the second president of Bangladesh. 

We then headed over to Dhaka University to take a look at a bunch of monuments (to the language movement, the student movement and the national martyrs). 

We also stopped at the science faculty which has a beautiful building that was named for the British Viscount who had been in charge of all of the sub-continent (can't remember his name though). 

Lunch at a really strange Thai restaurant names Voot, which means ghost, but it was good. 

We then headed back to Old Dhaka to see a few things that we had missed the first time through. Went to the main Hindu temple (weird shrine) and then to Lalbagh Fort (another important pink building). The fort was pretty cool as it is pretty much a park for locals, beautiful grounds to escape the rickshaws, and kids are playing, people are picnicing, and generally a nice place. 

So yeah, that was about it. Had dinner at our favourite pizza place around the corner and watching some of the Euro Cup now. 

Things I learned today 1) having a yellow license plate in Bangladesh signals foreigner and means you get to do whatever you want and people won't question it. 2) Being a foreigner means you are subject to price discrimination, both when it comes to bargaining as well as more blatantly (foreigners pay 100 taka to get into Fort Lalbagh, locals pay 10 taka). 3) Bangladesh politics is really messed up (this has been coming all along but was even more obvious today). The first president was assassinated by the army, along with most of his family. One daughter survived, went on to become PM and is now in jail on corruption charges (actually, she was just granted leave to Canada to seek medical treatment - we don't want her). The second president was also assassinated by the army, his wife went on to become PM and is now in jail on corruption charges (she has been offered leave to the US to seek medical treatment). See a pattern here? Apparently the first two guys were wonderful and not corrupt and believed in Bangladesh, their families not so much. 

Anyways, those are my lessons for today. 

Rajshahi and Mangoes

So John and I finally got out into the field for 3 days this week. We went to Rajshahi with Najmul and Aziz from Data International. DI does the survey work for The Asia Foundation. The current survey is regarding people's perceptions of the hopefully upcoming City Corporation elections. So we started off from Dhaka at 7:00am. It took forever to travel the 300 kms and we arrived in Rajshahi around 2:00pm. Oh, how I love developing countries and their roads. In addition to iffy roads, I will once again say, people are crazy drivers here, particularly bus drivers. They weave in and out of traffic and sometimes it looks like they are going to tip over. On a side note, we saw 3 accidents on the drive back yesterday. Anyways, once we got to Rajshahi, we checked in at our hotel. I had to laugh as my bathroom looked like a prison cell, and I was definitely putting down the mosquito net over the bed. So we went out into the city to meet up with some of the surveyors. I went with Aziz and we met up with Naser, a university student from Dhaka. He was conducting surveys in the slum area. It was really interesting to get to go along, and Aziz translated a bit for me. We stayed for three interviews, two men and one woman. It was still amazing how much interest in the community I brought about. A white girl in the slums is probably not all that common. One woman thought I was a medical person and was trying to find out what was wrong with her granddaughter (she had bumps on her skin). Anyways, I took some pictures to make the kids and women happy, but tried to figure out what was going on with the interviews too. Some interesting things that were said, the woman was upset because she liked the old mayor, he put a park into their neighbourhood, but now he's in jail facing corruption charges. Another man had said that he didn't know how to decide who to vote for, because they are all upper class people and he doesn't know anything about them, or who isn't corrupt, whereas the old politicians, he knew what to expect even if it was corruption(the devil you know, the devil you don't). He also commented that he wanted the City Corporation to put more money into things like parks, which he thinks are really important, especially for the poor - a place where they could escape their world for awhile. Very interesting. Anyways, Aziz and I went back to meet John and Najmul who were taking awhile, so we picked up a bunch of fruit in the market, their version of blackberries, coconuts, bananas, litchis and of course mangoes. Once John and Najmul arrived, we headed down to silk street - beautiful saris everywhere. I didn't buy one, as I really don't know what I would do with a sari (I would get very tangled if I tried to wear one). Anyways, we headed back to the hotel and then tried to go see the Padma river (the Ganges from India), unfortunately, thanks to Indian dams, there is a severe lack of water and from the view points, you can barely make out the water. So Tuesday was mango day. Najmul was bringing back a truck load of mangoes to Dhaka. Rajshahi is mango country in Bangladesh. We went and met some of his family in a mango orchard and watched them pick mangoes and then throw them down to the children who had jute sacks to break the fall. I was impressed. If I had to do that, I would be hit in the head so many times. We also got to eat a fair number of fresh mangoes there. We also attracted a fair amount of attention from the local kids. 

White people here is a rarity, especially in the more rural areas. 

After the mango grove, we headed into the town to see the mango market, there were mangoes everywhere, it was crazy! The town was on the border with India, so we went to the border crossing which has a really cool old wall as the barrier. The bord

er guards were also curious and asked if we were from Nepal, or Afghanistan. We have been asked if we are from a lot of places, China, Sweden, really take your pick, just not India and Bangladesh. 

We tried to stop at this one mosque, but it was raining way too hard to get out of the van, so back to Rajshahi. 

Yesterday was pretty much just a driving day. Again, saw the three accidents, and then got stuck in Dhaka traffic. Finally, around 4:00pm we arrived at home. I waited around and prayed for electricity and a good internet connection to register for my classes at 7. Everything went well and I got all my classes. Anyways, I should get back to work... 

Another interesting day of insights

Ok, so today's post stems from our evening out at the Canada Club last night. The club was hosting a Mexican Fiesta, complete with margaritas, so John and I decided we would be sure to find the elusive young people there. So we headed over, collected out margaritas and soon realised, we were wrong. The young people were not there. So we hung out with the older crowd. Actually, I shouldn't say that, there were a bunch of young people, like 12 or so. No, there was also some people our age-ish. Problem - they were US soldiers from PACOM, not my idea of fun. Anyways, here are my insights from hangout with the ex-pats last night. Being an expat in a poor country has it's high points. I mean really you can afford a life style here that you couldn't even imagine at home (see the fact that John and I - both students - belong to a 'club'). It has it's downsides though too, and the most prominent one last night was the total loss of fashion sense. There were socks pulled right up with shorts, there were way too high cut pants (on both men and women), there were fanny packs, there were weird hats, too many mom jeans to count and the kicker was the knee length sarong with cowboy boots. It was hot. So if you want to be an expat here in Bangladesh, you must lose all sense of fashion in order to fit in. 

So yes, that was last night. This morning, we got up and went to church (I know) with Sukla, one of the women that we work with. I was curious what a Christian church would be like here. Well, it was interesting to say the least, and way too hot. It was in this little community hall, not a real 'church' and there was a lot of singing, and such. I couldn't follow much, it was in English and Bengla and a little Benglish, but I got bored (and there was no gobble gobble to entertain me). The amazing thing is how young the congregation was. I mean like all under 35. Very different from back home. Anyways, now that I have doubled my church attendance for the year, I am going to go back to being a non-church goer. 

So that's it. Speak to you soon. 

PS I want to tell you why there are no pictures of all these goings on at the Canada Club. Cameras are not allowed. I have been trying to decide why this is. It probably has something to do with security, but I also have a theory that it is that they don't want pictures to get out so that they don't let the Canadian tax payer know that they are paying for things like this (although I actually have no idea who pays for it). Anyways, that is why there is a lack of pictures from my many many hours spent at the Canada Club. 

My mom said...

So after my last ranting post, I got an email from my mom. She was laughing at me, and suggested that I be a little more positive in the next post and include what I like so far about Dhaka (she said I only had to list two things). So here it goes...

1. I like the grilled cheese sandwiches at the Canadian Club, they remind me of the ones Urs used to make for me at the cafeteria in high school. Unfortunately there are no smiley face cookies to finish off the meal. 

2. I am having to think hard about this one...

2. I like that I work with a woman that reminds me of Radhika (who would have thought I would ever say that?) As Pete once said, "is part of the reason we think she's so smart because of her accent?" 

ok, and I will give you a few more things

3. I like having snacks delivered to my desk, although it's no Tim Horton's, but tea, and mangoes and something I don't know how to pronounce that is yummy are enjoyable.

4. I like samosa's

Most of all, I am glad that I can laugh about it all and brush it off, even when I am super annoyed. 

This makes it sound like I hate it here, which I don't. The work is super interesting, although we are on a bit of a lull right now. Next week we are heading up north to the border of India to tag along while some survey work is being done for the upcoming city elections. We are getting introduced to a lot of really interesting people and it is amazing to see that if you want to do something, or are interested in some cause, it is totally possible to get involved and make a difference (ah, mushy). But yeah, work is interesting. And I am probably in better shape now then I have been in ages, spending a lot of time at the gym (it is air conditioned, so I like it there). 

Anyways, there mom, is that good? Am I done yet?

Speak to you all soon.

The City that Always Sleeps

Well, for a city with so many people and so much appearing to go on, there is a serious lack of things going on. I have been in a kind of rotten mood recently and kinda annoyed with Dhaka. Things are just so different here, and little things are getting on my nerves. So here's my list

1. People staring. Stop staring please, and the camera phones are getting a bit annoying. 

2. Spitting. I find the sound disgusting, not the spitting sound, that sound before hand, the one from the throat, it has only a few places that it is acceptable (hockey benches and hiking) and even then I hate the sound. It is not appropriate.

3. Horns honking. Seriously, we know you are there and a horn is not going to make traffic move any faster.

4. Bugs. They don't generally bother me, but ants in my bed, are you kidding? 

5. Burping. I know here it is a compliment, and this is coming from one of the most un-lady like women ever, but seriously, in a business meeting?

6. Shorts. I miss them. I miss tank tops. It is very hot and I would appreciate being able to wear less clothes. 

7. Rickshaw drivers. Enough said.

Ok, I think that is my rant. I will have more I am sure, those were just the ones I thought of on the rickshaw ride to work this morning. On another note, yesterday we were introduced to a Dhaka rain, wow. It was crazy and the drainage here is horrible, we were watching cars outside our office as they went through the big puddles, even better was the rickshaws.