Village people

Here are a few pictures of my Village trip:

This is a "rich" person's house. It has tin walls and a tin roof, and a solid wood door.

Kids and Moms hanging out outside a we come for the center meeting.

The scenery in the village.

Nice road view from the village. Palm trees and greenery everywhere.

At a center meeting with the ladies.

Everywhere we went, crowds of people, especially little kids, followed us around.

The shacks in the village. Not so rich villagers have houses made of hay.

One of the borrowers and ALL of her neighbors who came to see and hear the strange- looking foreigners talk.

My five- day village trip was quite a contrast from Dhaka.

The villages are quiet, serene, and the air is fresh and the space vast. The people out in the villages never see foreigners,so we always had quite the gathering around us at all times. It was like we were rock stars. Now I know what Hollywood people feel like. It's flattering, except for the fact that I generally hate being the center of attention. Especially when I was sick. The whole village knew I was having er... traveler's problems... and the little kids would come by my window and stare at me through the window while I was looking and feeling like crap. It got to the point where I had to go to the bathroom to hide for 20 minutes until they gave up and ran away.

Meeting the borrowers was the best part, to hear and listen to them talk about how their loan from Grameen has helped them prosper. These women are grateful and loyal to Grameen because Grameen provided them with capital to better care for their family. Even though by Western terms, the borrowers of Grameen are still living in "shacks", the successful ones had shacks with concrete floors, a Western toilet, a tv and a fridge. While they are still poor and still mostly illiterate, the economic stability that Grameen's loans provided proved to be the catalyst necessary for the borrowers' continual effort to try to improve their lives.

The sad thing about it all is that, at least in my village, the people are at the mercy of Mother Nature. Flooding devastates crops, causes river erosion, and destroys homes that the people painstakingly built EVERY YEAR. And the government has not made any efforts to try to mitigate the effects of flooding in the poor areas. Bangladesh is so corrupt that even if there was money earmarked for that type of a project, it most likely wouldn't get there anyways. When you're already poor, and then have to deal with Mother Nature kicking you in the butt all the time, life REALLY sucks.

I Have Bad Luck

Just my luck.
Right as I take out my camera to take photos of us all dressed up in our beautiful three piece Bangladeshi outfits, the lens decides to break. I knew all that sand from the Philippines would catch up with me sometime,but I was just praying that my camera would last me through time in Bangladesh!
Therefore, I have NO pictures of the Bangladeshi wedding I went to. But, I can pilfer them from the others....

Dear Lord, why do you hate me so?

Random thoughts.

So I am two weeks late in starting my blog, and it feels like a lifetime since I have been here. I don't even know where to begin.

Dhaka is like nowhere I have ever been. People people people are everywhere. I thought people were kidding when they said Dhaka was crowded. Think Tokyo subway, but everywhere on the streets. The city's inadequate waste disposal infrastructure and transportation infrastructure results in the worst traffic jams imaginable and some pretty nasty smells of excrement in the air.

Everytime I get into a CNG (compressed natural gas vehicle), which is like a golf cart with doors, I feel like I am going to die. Like literally, get smooshed between two gigantic buses. However, I have to say that if you can drive in Dhaka, you can drive anywhere. I took a video of a ride in a CNG, will post later. Also, using your horn in Dhaka is the way driver's communicate to eachother. Rather than being rude, it's expected. If you don't honk every five seconds, you shouldn't be on the road.

AND, I have to be SOBER while trying to survive this city. It's illegal for Bangladeshi citizens to be in possession of alcoholic beverages (that really sucks) and it's not readily available for alcoholic foreigners like myself to get our hands on the good stuff. Sad that it felt SOO good when I finally had a beer and a glass of wine at the Nordic Club while watching World Cup soccer with a bunch of other "heathen" foreigners who were happily enjoying our little escape from the chaos outside.

Bangladeshis, like the Spanish, like to take two hour siestas for lunch. Everyday we get a lunch break from 1-3 PM. Good thing too, since the only restaurant the Grameen interns go eat at takes about 1 hour to serve us, and another 30 minutes to bring us the bill. Everything runs on Bangladeshi time, which is basically whenever they feel like it. For those of you who know me, my personality and my past life as a consultant has made me very impatient. This country drives me insane sometimes, but it's good for me, to chillax a bit and just go with the flow.

I met Yunus two days ago, he's the nicest old man. We celebrated his 70th birthday at a Social Venture conference in Dhaka, and I got my picture taken and my books signed! LEt me know if anyone wants any of his books, I can get them here for cheap.

Going to a Bangladeshi wedding tonight, will post pics later. The interns and I bought three piece suits to wear to the wedding. Exciting!

Alright, peacing out for now.