Bangladesh- Reflection on It's People
Trip Start
Jul 01, 2005
1
4
18
Trip End
Oct 01, 2007
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Ram Chandrupur,
Bangladesh
Monday, November 21, 2005
Everywhere. Men driving the rickshaws, planting rice, fishing, just sitting around talking, bicycling, walking. Women less visible and quite covered when out and about. Some wear the burqa which covers all except the eyes. I notice few smiles.
Very slender, many look like they could eat a lot more than what they do. Lungies on men (single tub skirt knotted at the waist, tied up between the legs if wading in water), saris on women (bright colored single piece of light cloths wound around the body and head), pleasant children, occasional father and child combo, usually mothers and children.
Curious. Not hesitant to look and hold the stare. Especially in rural Bangladesh this is true whenever we go outside the house. Occasional comment, but usually just stare. And not just men. I see women also curious about Ethel's dress. I, on the other hand, can go out walking with a lot less notice. (Ethel wears the traditional Shalwar-Kameez, baggy pants with a long tunic top, always including the orna an extra piece of cloth that loops across the chest and hangs down the back. For some reason we see more saris here, maybe more are Hindu, although 90% of Bangladeshes are Muslim. I guess they don't see white faces in different dress very often. One day we went walking with Ethel in normal western pants and blouse. That drew more than stares from the women; more like sneers, so we didn't do that again.)
Always helpful in a jam. We've had so many complete strangers help us get to the right bus, come to our aid when we were being charged too high a price for something and often giving us choice seats., go out of their way to help us find a place we either don't know the name for or couldn't pronounce it the way they are use to hearing it pronounced.
From a Rickshaw
After a couple of weeks like we've just been through, you go our on a trip somewhere and know three things will be true of the trip. 1) it will be an adventure. 2) we will feel completely helpless and dumb often, and 3) we will always find our way back to our house on a farm in Ram Chandrupur with a sense of accomplishment. There is a level of confidence building one realizes from these experiences.Poor but not desperate. Their lives are very meager compared to what we are used to and they are indeed poor. Yet, there is well established sense of community, of family and of wellbeing that is clearly there once one looks beyond the lack of material things. We hear them singing and praying in the village at night, especially on weekends. I don't seem much I would want to copy, but that is my problem, not theirs.
Clean and resourceful. Yes, there is a lot of trash around, especially in the cities, but villages are swept clean, I do not notice body odor - and we do get very up close and personal on any form of transportation. (although I still don't know where or when rural folks bathe) And, there is almost no garbage. I've seen so many items that are made from the byproduct of something else, which in a less needy or creative society would be in landfills. Complete rickshaws, trucks and buses are rebuilt and repainted. I've seen parts of rickshaws made from re-bar, gravel for concrete broken up by hand (there is no gravel here so they use old brick as aggregate for concrete - yes with a hammer ), bamboo as scaffolding and ramps to second stories in construction sites, people cutting grass (could even be called lawns) by hand to feed cattle. I have yet to see a lawn mower or any other type of a mechanical grass cutting device. Rice patty small tractors used to haul heavy loads down the road, everything that can move being moved on a bicycle rickshaw, some of which are flat beds for this purpose. Road sides look like closely trimmed lawns, maintained by cows or goats carefully tended by their owners.
Food. I've never traveled anywhere that I found the diet so much the same. The difference between a good meal and a poor meal is the relative portions of rice to what else is on the plate. It is common to see a plate completely full of rice with a small chicken drumstick and that's it. Sometimes there is little aside from the rice. We were in town the other day and checked out a recommended restaurant. When asked about a menu we were told it is Bangladeshe, meaning that it was the same thing we've been eating for the past two weeks. The only choice was whether we wanted chicken or fish as the meat. We didn't have the nerve to walk out, so we--- had another Bangladeshe meal. It cost us about $US 4.00 for the two of us. The standard way of eating is with the fingers, right hand only, no utensils. We can eat that way too, but do so only if no fork is available.
Anyone have a pizza? I'd even gladly eat it with my fingers!
--and that's only after three weeks. I have a feeling I'll have different impressions to report after two years.
JERRY
Jerry
Late September, 2005
