After sitting for three days in either a plane, airport, or car we finally arrived at the Bangla Hope orphanage. We arrived in Dhaka last night around 8:40 and were taken to a Hotel that was about 5 min from the Dental clinic that the orphanage owns in the city. The hotel room was kind of sketchy and the bathroom was worse. There was no shower curtain around the bath tub so when you took a shower the water splashed all over the whole entire bathroom. They also have pink toilet paper here (I thought it was so cool and then Mrs. Waid informed me that it isn’t good for the women here to use it because of the pink dye). Although the room wasn’t the most beautiful thing I was just excited to have a place to lay down and sleep for the first time in days.
We woke up at 5:30 to beat the Dhaka traffic (which apparently is horrible if you go any later than 7). I sat in the van closest to the door because I was afraid I would be too claustrophobic anywhere else. However, this meant that I didn’t have a seat belt, which is extremely scary in third world countries. But after the first hour I calmed down and just looked out the window. It was so amazing to see the Bangladesh culture flash by.
Three hours into our drive (it was a total of a 7 hour drive) we stopped at this restaurant that makes naan bread. They would take the naan and flatten it out and then throw is around the inside of a dome oven and the bread would puff up like a balloon. It tasted AMAZING. They served it with a fried egg(I’m not a big egg person but these were delicious) and they had these tiny onion, extremely hot peppers, and limes to go with it. They tried to give us ice cream but I wasn’t sure I wanted that for breakfast, plus there was no room left in my tummy.
We continued on the road and as we got closer the countryside began to change and become more farm lands (mainly bananas and rice fields). At one point we stopped to get gas and the venders came out to try to sell us food. There was this one boy who was trying to sell these rotten grape looking snacks and everytime he looked at me I just burst into laughter because I had no clue how to interact with him. He thought this was hilarious so he would get his friends together and then try to get my attention by mimicking my laugh. There was another vender there who was making chanicha, which is a mixture of mustard oil, puffed rice, hot peppers, onions, and other unknown substances. Mrs. Waid stuck her hand out the window and used a paper to make the mix herself because the man’s hands were so dirty. The poor Bangladesh people had no clue what she was doing but I thought it was hysterical. After waiting about 25 min for gas we finally were back on the road leaving our new “friends” behind laughing at there strange encounter with the weird white people.
Finally we arrived at the orphanage. And the caregivers and children had a welcome dance and song for us. The children were to shy to really come up to us at first so we didn’t really get to meet them until after dinner. Heather, Lauren, and I were talking to Mrs. Waid when all of a sudden a little hand was holding mine. He looked at me and exclaimed, “my name is Luke, I am going to give you a kiss!” He then reached for my face and gave me a kiss on the cheek and as I began to turn away he grabbed my face again and twisted it so he could kiss my other cheek. Luke speaks a lot of English so he gave me a tour of the campus and introduced me to the other kids. There was a group of girls who followed me around and kept yelling “KELSEY” (the girl who worked here last year) and then they would laugh and run away. There was another girl named Disha and she would yell at them “This is not Kelsey this is Chantel.”
After we met with the kids it wasn’t hard to be there friends. Now my hand is constantly being held and children are always around me when I go down to the court yard. So far I love it here but it is already tough and I have a feeling it isn’t going to always be fun but I am still staying rather optimistic. Bangladesh is an amazing place and it is fun to learn their culture. For example: Men wear skirts called Lungi (Lune-gee), If men here are wealthy they bleach their hair and beards so they turn this nasty orange color, they like their curry extremely HOT, and they throw their gods into the river every once in a while. There is so much more to learn!
We woke up at 5:30 to beat the Dhaka traffic (which apparently is horrible if you go any later than 7). I sat in the van closest to the door because I was afraid I would be too claustrophobic anywhere else. However, this meant that I didn’t have a seat belt, which is extremely scary in third world countries. But after the first hour I calmed down and just looked out the window. It was so amazing to see the Bangladesh culture flash by.
Three hours into our drive (it was a total of a 7 hour drive) we stopped at this restaurant that makes naan bread. They would take the naan and flatten it out and then throw is around the inside of a dome oven and the bread would puff up like a balloon. It tasted AMAZING. They served it with a fried egg(I’m not a big egg person but these were delicious) and they had these tiny onion, extremely hot peppers, and limes to go with it. They tried to give us ice cream but I wasn’t sure I wanted that for breakfast, plus there was no room left in my tummy.
We continued on the road and as we got closer the countryside began to change and become more farm lands (mainly bananas and rice fields). At one point we stopped to get gas and the venders came out to try to sell us food. There was this one boy who was trying to sell these rotten grape looking snacks and everytime he looked at me I just burst into laughter because I had no clue how to interact with him. He thought this was hilarious so he would get his friends together and then try to get my attention by mimicking my laugh. There was another vender there who was making chanicha, which is a mixture of mustard oil, puffed rice, hot peppers, onions, and other unknown substances. Mrs. Waid stuck her hand out the window and used a paper to make the mix herself because the man’s hands were so dirty. The poor Bangladesh people had no clue what she was doing but I thought it was hysterical. After waiting about 25 min for gas we finally were back on the road leaving our new “friends” behind laughing at there strange encounter with the weird white people.
Finally we arrived at the orphanage. And the caregivers and children had a welcome dance and song for us. The children were to shy to really come up to us at first so we didn’t really get to meet them until after dinner. Heather, Lauren, and I were talking to Mrs. Waid when all of a sudden a little hand was holding mine. He looked at me and exclaimed, “my name is Luke, I am going to give you a kiss!” He then reached for my face and gave me a kiss on the cheek and as I began to turn away he grabbed my face again and twisted it so he could kiss my other cheek. Luke speaks a lot of English so he gave me a tour of the campus and introduced me to the other kids. There was a group of girls who followed me around and kept yelling “KELSEY” (the girl who worked here last year) and then they would laugh and run away. There was another girl named Disha and she would yell at them “This is not Kelsey this is Chantel.”
After we met with the kids it wasn’t hard to be there friends. Now my hand is constantly being held and children are always around me when I go down to the court yard. So far I love it here but it is already tough and I have a feeling it isn’t going to always be fun but I am still staying rather optimistic. Bangladesh is an amazing place and it is fun to learn their culture. For example: Men wear skirts called Lungi (Lune-gee), If men here are wealthy they bleach their hair and beards so they turn this nasty orange color, they like their curry extremely HOT, and they throw their gods into the river every once in a while. There is so much more to learn!
Aww, the kids sound so sweet! You are going to impact their lives in such a big way! Next year they'll be following around the new SM and calling her Chantel. =)
ReplyDeleteby the way, this is Hannah B. I didn't realize it wouldn't show my name lol.
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