Catching up in Tala, Sathkira

It’s been tough to sit down and have enough time and mental energy to blog again. This will be long but it’ll include more personal thoughts and reactions (mental, emotional and physical) to the past week.

We spent three nights at the Millenium Hotel in Kulna. This was a high class hotel which Uttaran arranged for us (and ended up paying for despite my protests). The complimentary breakfasts and hot showers were a big plus, but we felt rather trapped during our time there. Every morning we would meet our Uttaran contacts at their training center in Kulna and then drive an hour and a half to see and learn about one of Uttaran’s programs in Tala (the area where Uttaran started). Information about each of their programs is below. WE’d drive back around 5pm, get into the hotel at 7pm and then meet them again at the training center for dinner around 9:30pm, though we usually didn’t eat until after 10pm.

Bangladesh food is good and nutrishous. Every meal includes rice, dal (lentils) a vegetable dish, a meat or fish dish, tea and a sweet dessert. I have eaten this kind of food many times before in travels and at home but for some reason I am having a hard time with it here. I am constantly nauseas. I can only eat very small portions at a time because I get so full on the rice. We eat with our right hand, so before and after every meal we wash our hands as is their custom. The fish, which is very fresh and very well prepared here, is usually served whole or at least with the bones in it. I have not been able to eat the intestines and head yet. Aaron has been brave and eaten everything except the head. Bangladeshis always eat everything on their place, I mean EVERYTHING, not a single grain of rice or piece of dal is left, so I feel particularly crappy and very wasteful when I still have small piles of food on my plate when I am finished.

The staff at the hotel was very polite and friendly. However, a funny pattern started with a couple of the young men. A bell boy would help us with our stuff to our room or unlock the door for us and then come in and close the door behind him. He would tell us he is a student, is very poor and wants to practice English with us. Then after a few other lines he asks us for a dollar bill, “It is my dream to have an American dollar.” We comply. After all one US dollar is 69 taka, the local currency, and that can be several meals, clothes, a book, who knows what else.
We were grateful to get away from Kulhna’s busy streets and the hotel when we were finally brought to Uttaran’s main training center/headquarters in Tala upzila, Sathkira district. This is like saying Narberth, Lower Merion district.

The center is beautiful and quiet except for the all-day construction of the ‘hotel’ part where we are staying. One floor is mostly finished, the second floor is being wired and built into rooms, the third floor is yet to be born. Mintu, the hotel manager brings us hot water in the morning to use for bathing (you dump it into another bucket and then pour it over yourself in cupfuls, it’s really nice actually). Mintu also knocks on our door to let us know it’s breakfast time, to tell us something is ready and he is coaching us in Bangla. Aaron’s picking up the words and phrases pretty well. I’m slower but I have about three phrases down which I use constantly so they think I am making an effort… Oh and a fun side-note, Aaron got an authentic Bangladeshi haircut and straight razor shave- photos to come!

As far as being a woman here, it’s seems very manageable. We have been escorted everywhere by Uttaran reps and most think Aaron is my husband (there is no accepted concept of man-woman relations besides siblings or marriage). I get stared at but it’s not aggressive. Most people are just fascinated by us and want to know where we are from, if we like Bangladesh… The women like to take my hand and talk to me though I have no idea what they are saying. They invite me to their homes and want us to visit again. I usually get asked if I have any children.

It’s ok that we wear our western clothes, we’re already total freaks here so a non-traditional shirt or shoes doesn’t matter, but I have to be careful on how I present myself. We got a stern look from Mintu just a few minutes ago because I was drying my underwear on a wood rack outside our room (on a small back porch). That’s a no-no I guess. But it wasn’t drying inside… what to do…

Our Uttaran friends from Kulna and Dhaka had to go back to work the other day so now we are in the hands of Sogar, our new friend and translator. Sogar is a really nice, smiley, short Bangaldeshi who works at one of the Uttaran founded schools for the ultra poor children and outcastes. Sogar grew up ultra poor and an outcaste so his story is quite remarkable. Forbidden to attend any of the public/government run schools because of his status, Sagor was facing a life of endless poverty. Shahidul Islam reached out to him. He enrolled Sagor into the school he had just founded and continued to be his paternal mentor. Sagor had a full education and became a teacher, a very good job that he could not have attained without schooling and without Shahidul’s help.

Our other main contact here is Shadona, the manager of the Tala center. Shadona was in the original documentary. At that time she was a field worker who had been stripped and beaten for reaching out to villagers and trying to help women become aware of their self-worth. She was promoted over the years and encouraged to get a higher education degree by Shahidul. She is definitely the boss here, in a maternal way, keeping all of the mostly male staff in line.

Here is a quick run-down of Uttaran’d various programs and social initiatives that we have visited and begun to document in video and photos.

Women’s Groups
Uttaran has helped form groups of 10-30 women all over the area, teaching them about their rights and capacity of leaving their homes without their husband, on education for their children, or not marrying off their daughters before they turn 18 (girls are still forced to marry as young as 12 sometimes), health and sanitation, and their political power. We met with two of the groups to hear their stories on how Uttaran’s help has improved their lives. As a group, they have exercised their political influence by collectively going to local authorities to report problems.

Schools
While he was still studying in University, Shahidul Islam purchased land (I think under his father’s name) and then gave it back to the community to build a school specifically for children too poor to attend other schools or banned from them. There is now a lower and upper school (primary and college) founded by Shahidul and serving over 700 children.

Waterlogging
Due to environmental damage, natural and man-made, the flooding in this area has gotten worse every year over the past 10 years. Now from about June through October, much of the land in the rural areas is completely waterlogged. People have to use boats to get anywhere. Schools and businesses shut down. Getting food and drinking water becomes much more difficult. This issue involves the water/damn system that India has put into place in recent years to supply more water to its inhabitants, shutting down the water supply to Bangladesh. However, as Zakir, another Uttaran staff member, informed us, Bangladesh is doing a similar thing in the water ways in Nepal. We have some amazing footage about this issue. The problem is growing and no real solution to combat it has arisen.

Landrights
In the Bangladesh constitution the landless people are guaranteed land. The government is responsible for buying unused or abandoned land and then redistributing it to those who have nothing. Having no land denotes the lowest level of poverty, they have no assets and are often evicted or taken advantage of by others. At times, the government has held true to this principle, but without proper enforcement, the land has been brutally taken away by rich people from the landless who received it legally. Uttaran is now focusing its main work on this issue. This is deeply intertwined in local and federal political groups and has been a very tough challenge. While Uttaran has helped the landless receive legal help to claim or reclaim their land, they have paid a huge price. In January 2007, Shahidul Islam was arrested and tortured in connection to this work. His charges were made up (military charged him with terrorist activity and harboring weapons) and he was imprisoned for 7 months. It’s incredible how the organization rallied together and sought out help from outside forces to save him and the NGO. This is no ordinary group of people.

Thanks for bearing with me. More photos coming, as soon as I can download them! (it’s trickey cuz the power and connection go in and out and sometimes get ridiculously slow I just have to shut it all down).

Happy almost inauguration of Obama!