Progress

At the end of today’s meeting, Dr. S stood up and asked the only woman senior officer, Kum, to wrap up the meeting because “the meeting had not heard from a woman.”

I stood up and clapped.

Cabin Fever

I’m getting eaten by mosquitoes and the ants don’t want to play. My kindle is broken, my friends have nothing to say. I’m sick of TV I’m sick of computer games. Every day around here is exactly the same. My eyes will bleed if I read another paper, doing more work is no safer. My lungs hurt from harmonica, my arm hurts from crosswords. Staying in Gaibandha is for the birds.

My patience is climbing and I’m sick of rhyming.

Please give me an idea of what to do because I do not have a clue.

Turtle Training Session

Today I held a training session. I made and printed out packets, made a schedule neatly organized into time segments and had all of my notes. Last night I couldn’t sleep. I’m not a teacher. How am I going to stand in front of these men and women, who are all over 30, and have them listen to this big haired 22 year old just out of grad school? That’s bad enough, now add the huge communication barrier. Is all they’re going to hear “waa waa waa waa turtle”?

I woke up in the morning dizzy from lack of sleep. Laid out all the packets, cleared off the white boards for fresh notes, tied my curls back into a serious bun, and waited for my team. I arranged for us to have tea and biscuits at 11am, lunch at 1pm and more tea and biscuits brought to us at 3pm. I brought my miniature French press with me to the meeting. I made everyone some precious American coffee as gesture of peace and bribery. They all sipped the bitter delicious drink and I’m sure all their lips puckered at the difference from their sweet and milky cha tea.

But let me tell you. Once I started, I started. It began by me slowly pacing and asking questions to the audience. Then it accelerated. Soon I was a cup of coffee short from jumping on the table having them ripping out pages from their textbook and having them call me Captain. I was on fire. At one point I was on the floor acting out what it would be like for a little child to drown in a bucket.

A little kid came in and we demonstrated what the turtle is like on him. He liked it so much he kept trying to steal it back when we took it off!

And the best part was they were really learning! They were answering all of my questions correctly! So rewarding. At one point, I swear to you, I almost started crying. I was so happy that I was good at this and this was really happening. Fuck yes I can do this! I AM doing this!

At the end of the meeting at around 3pm, I held a session wrap up and quizzed everyone from the meeting on topics we went over. They got almost everything right.

As soon as the Bangladesh IRB has approved this project, we got this.

Asalam Walaikum,

Chelsea

Durga Puja

Tonight was Durga Puja. The hindu celebration of the 10 armed goddess Durga. Our cleaner’s name is Lovely and she invited Muzi and I to celebrate the festival at her house. I think Lovely is my favorite person in Bangladesh. She is always smiling and hugging us telling us that we are her sisters. An amazing woman. Her house was simple with tin walls and a bamboo roof. It was colorful and warm. All of the women in the nearby households were related to Lovely and we all piled onto the bed to braid one another’s hair and talk our women talk (it needs no translation.) Lovely set out a table and chairs for us and a beautiful meal of fish, chicken, rice, cucumbers and vegetables. We ate and ate and then stretched out on the bed and watched the younger girls practice dancing like the Bollywood stars on TV. They were a rambunctious lot and it made me miss my sister and her friends.

At night we walked to the nearby temple which was adorned in Christmas lights and puja offerings of flowers. It seemed like the entire town was there and they all gathered around us clapping their hands for us to dance. A hot drum beat started and a large circle formed around us. I could only demurely refuse their clapping twice before I jumped into the circle

letting my hips sway and hands feather about. I didn’t care about the men watching or the women cheering or the heat or being so far away from my friends and family. The drum beat was fresh and my feet were stomping. My hair came out of its bun and I let go.

Nomoshkar,
Chelsea

A day in photos

Woke up in the morning feeling like P-Diddy. Went downstairs for breakfast of some super fly peanut butter on toast. Then Muzi decided she was going to cook today! So we asked Jahangir (the cook) to bring us to the market so she could pick out her needed items.

Muzi found a fish in the fish market larger than her head! Please examine for proof.

The fish market smelled awful. The floor was slick with blood and scales making a thick mud. Men squatted with their fish selection and butchered the fish right there for you. The fish was fresh, fresh, fresh.

A man bent over scaling a fish with a blunt, rusty hatchet. I found scales in my hair when I took a shower later.

The chicken section. Men sat on cages of clucking packed chicken. You pointed to your clucker in the cage and a man reached his hand into the hole and brought out your chicken to be weighed. You can see our lunch on the scale. I nearly fainted in here. The smell was overwhelming and we were surrounded by men ripping off chicken skin feathers and all. The thought of lying in the blood and feathers kept me standing.

Meat section! We only bought chicken so we didn't linger. It was delightfully horrific to walk through there and see de-skinned goat and cow faces staring at you upside down.

Muzi making a delicious delicious meal of heavenly mushrooms (she brought them dried from china) with our fresh chicken, chili, ginger, soy sauce, and mushroom broth. And another dish with more mushrooms (from China), sauteed cucumber, garlic and egg.

After our long week we really really wanted a beer. So we cracked open a $3 bottle of dusty 0% alcohol beer and enjoyed the sunset.

Asalam Walaikum,

Chelsea

Escaping Inwardly

I used to dread the trip to Rangpur on the weekends. An hour and a half of unpaved roads, butt clenching close calls with speeding trucks, arm to arm, leg to leg with 11 other people in this Landcruiser. No kidding 11. The back is converted to have seats face inward for maximum person stuffage. Needless to say I tend to get brutally car sick.

Now I have found a way to actively look forward to these trips. The trick is to save all my most delicious thoughts all week for the car ride. Then I turn on my music, look out the windows, hold back the throw up and day dream.

My favorite day dream is to put on some hot dance number and imagine I am in the center of some club breaking down my sweet dance moves. Everyone goes “Who is that girl? Where did she learn to move like that? I want to meet her! How could ANYONE be that cool?!”

I like to imagine I’m lying in bed on a rainy Sunday morning, fingers sleepily tracing the body next to me, feeling like I would be happy to stay in bed forever. Luxuriating in happiness, warmth and love.

If all that fails, I put on an audio book. I’m currently working on Holidays on Ice by David Sedaris. Sometimes I crack up so suddenly that I wake everyone in the car.

The BMRC (Bangladesh IRB) application has become a monty python skit of stupid minute nit picky problems. It deserves its own soundtrack of prat falls.

Did the application but it was the old format so sent back to me changed it to the new format and it’s missing a signature so it was sent back to me but now our guy in Dhaka who is handling all these is in Gaibandha and we have to wait a week to re send it and then we can get the signature and send it in and then wait.

I’m thinking about going to Dhaka to handcuff myself to the office until they read and accept my application.

Asalam Walaikum,
Chelsea

Where Have I Learned to Learn?

Johns Hopkins Institutional Review Board has approved my project!!! Now I just have to wait for the Bangladesh review board to approve it…

In more important and relevant news:

I have embraced the ants. Ants on my skin? Little exfoliators. Ants in my hair? Make my hair seem alive. Ants in my teeth? One less trip to the dentist. I have mastered the gentle hand swipe of clearing ants off a surface without killing them.

A friend who is starting her MPH at Hopkins asked me what classes I found the most relevant now that I am in a public health job. I would have to say community trials. Because…this is a community trial and also because my PI taught the class. So it was more than relevant. Also, Water and Sanitation is so prevalent here. Completely useful information. The rest couldn’t be taught in school.

No one could teach me how to sit in a management meeting trying to foresee every single problem that we may encounter in the field. Or how to motivate a coworker to share a passion in a project. No one taught me how to breathe deeply and make a pretty hair tie out of the red tape thrown at me. In that respect, I appreciate that Hopkins had such a long internship period and rushed academic period. This is really where the learning is. The lectures just give you the language to understand it.

Asalam Walaikum,
Chelsea