Back in the West

It's been two weeks today since I left Dhaka and made the long journey home. My first stop back in the Western World was in Athens, Greece which oddly enough was essentially the birthplace of Western Civilization. The Ancient Greeks were the first to demonstrate a deep appreciation for music, art, theater, philosophy, architecture, and democracy. The Athenians were one of the first groups of people that decided that public opinion mattered and should be taken into account when making any kind of decision that affected the whole community. We owe a lot of our current Western Standard of living and culture to the innovations of the Ancient Greeks.

It's fascinating to think that these structures were built over a thousand years ago and they still stand today! Well pieces of them, but that's mainly due to intentional destruction because of various empires that have overtaken Athens as opposed to natural factors. The pillars are in sections with an iron rod that goes through the middle so that when there is an earthquake, the sections move, but the pillar stays put. Even modern architecture has been destroyed by recent earthquakes in Athens, but these pillars remain.

It was only a few short days but already I fell in love with Greece. From the moment I stepped off the plane, I met a Canadian couple taking the same metro who invited me to follow them. Once off the metro, I was greeted in Monastiraki Square by an older Greek man who could tell I was lost and showed me the way to my hostel. I'd begun to forget that strangers can be kind, this was a really nice reminder.

Dinner outdoors with a friend I made at my hostel and an old friend from Dhaka.

I ate a ton of delicious Greek food including souvlaki, gyros, tzatziki sauce, lamb stew, baklava, Greek frozen yogurt (which is way better), and homemade gelato. I roamed the ancient ruins including the acropolis, the ancient agora, the olympic stadium, and the temple of Zeus. I took a one day tour of islands around Athens and swam in the beautiful blue Aegean Sea. I also had the opportunity to sit in the ancient theater of Dionysus and watch a 1920's Charlie Chaplin film accompanied by a live orchestra. That was incredible.

But what I loved most about Greece was the clean air, bright blue sky, warm sun (without humidity!), friendly strangers, and the freedom to come and go as I pleased and wear whatever I wanted to and never once feel the uncomfortable glare of hundreds of Bengali men. That was priceless.

Landing in Toronto I was met with a shocking $60 cab ride...WHAT?! I don't think I'm going to like paying Canadian prices for things again. Why wouldn't the cab driver accept my 100 taka? I feel like that was more than generous!

I was also met with a slobbery kisses from my brother's friendly dog who's part husky part German Sheppard. We took him for a walk and had a picnic in the park with some friends and I said, this is what I've missed. We can walk down the nice, clean sidewalk to a nice, clean park filled with trees and grass and it's so quiet. No horns honking, no guys trying to sell bananas at the top of their lungs with one note, no spitting, no peeing in the open sewers, no power lines frayed and dangling over your face as you cross the street. Just calm and orderly streets with free and beautiful parks to play in.

I made it home in time for my dear friend's wedding and Canada Day. I've never been more thankful to be Canadian. Our government is by no means perfect, but we have a lot of really great things going for us like our adherence to protecting human rights, our health care and education system, and so many others. Being a young woman in Canada is so much more freeing than so many other places in the world. I am truly thankful for that.

Not to mention, I get to do things like eat the last portion of the world's largest poutine!

So I guess you could say that I'm glad to be home, but I feel like that would be the understatement of the year.

The Challenge

Last week one of my best friend's challenged me to record a day in my life here in Dhaka. So here it goes:

Wake up at 6:30 a.m. and hit snooze several times until I realize that I am probably going to be late, quick shower, dressed and ready for the school van at 7:25 a.m. to take us from the teacher apartments to school.

This van is dented because we have one crazy driver who likes to drive to fast and crash into things and he looks about 14 years old.

Didn't have time for breakfast so make some toast with PB and J that my room mate and I have cleverly purchased and left at school for such days, I have a solid 45 minutes before class starts, lots of time for prep work and breakfast.

First class is English with Grade 7, my favorite class of the year. For the last month, Mrs, Charlebois and I have combined our Grade 7 and 8 English classes once a week to do drama, this has been a blast!

Next class is either a prep, 7/8 Music, or Pre-K music-this is obviously my favorite because they are so cute! This is where all of the songs I learned working at the daycare have definitely come in handy!

Third class is a prep, 5/6, or Social Studies-this being my favorite because I get to teach my students about Empowerment and most recently we watched "The Boy in the Striped Pajamas" because they wanted to learn more about World War 2. We had an incredible discussion afterwards and I forgot what it's like to hear about the events of the holocaust for the first time. I've stopped reacting to it, but when I saw their faces at the end of the movie and their reaction when I told them that stuff like that really happened, I remembered how I felt when I first learned about it. That's how we should react, like how in the world is it possible for humans to do that to each other? How is it possible to hate one group of people that much? I don't have an answer for them, because there isn't one. It just shouldn't happen.

Lunch time is only 30 minutes. I forgot to pack something, so I could purchase cafeteria food and risk Dhaka belly for the rest of the afternoon, or I can snack on the pack of cookies in my backpack from my friend's cookie factory (what a lifesaver those cookies have been all year!).

After lunch I teach music to K-4 (On different days) and this is when the power is usually out. No power means no air conditioning in 40 degree heat with humidity which means me and 20 little bodies dripping with sweat and wanting nothing more but to lie on the ground and whine about how hot we are. But I must teach! So with sweat stinging in my eyes we learn about quarter notes and sing about raindrops being gumdrops and itsy bitsy spiders.

My "Music" Room

By last period the power is back on! Finally! This is when I teach the big kids, Grade 9 and 10. Yikes!

Then it's home room time with my Grade 7's and we are doing the 100 days of happiness challenge! So every day we have to write at least one happy thought!

I decide to walk home after school and this is what I see:

This is the rickshaw wallah I usually take home, he's very trustworthy and friendly

I usually walk on the street because the sidewalk is full of random things like...rocks and sand?

Some power lines

Open sewers...don't fall in!!!

Construction zone...safety first?

Plug your nose, try and hold your breath around this corner

Watch out for the live wires on the ground

Carpet wash in the slum by the main road

In the background a man cleans up his "barber shop"

Specific advertising much?

Oh, don't mind the random pile of bricks on the sidewalk

Or the refuse...

Or the broken tiles with sewage below

See all those children in that cart? That's how they get to school.

Banani "Mall" close to my apartment

My apartment, first floor, there's the school van pulling up, I made it alive...this time. 

I'm coming home, coming home, tell the world I'm coming home!

Here it is, the extensive list of all the things I miss the most about home and the most exciting thing is that I know that all of them will be waiting for me upon my return and I absolutely cannot wait.

1. Waffles with fresh fruit and the Mennonite white sauce...if you don't know what I'm talking about, you're missing out in life.
2. Sunday brunch (at 1 pm) at Condo Villa
3. Appetizer and games night
4. Ice Cream in bed with J Cam and talking about life and all things important
5. Making desserts with K Cam like crisp, pie, pav, cookies, cupcakes, everything!
6. Sitting on my roof watching fireworks
7. Harry Potter with my sister
8. Late night discussions with father
9. My mom’s cooking: Meatloaf, scalloped potatoes (the cheesy ones), honey garlic ribs, roasted potatoes and vegetables, lasagna, desserts, roast ham, just everything she makes is delicious
10. My brother’s rants
11. Taking Charlie for walks
12. Snuggling with Charlie
13. Impromptu dinner parties, pool parties, poutine and cupcake parties, and general hangouts whenever, wherever, with my favorite people in the entire world, and now I can literally say, in the ENTIRE world.
14. Sing alongs in my living room or around a bon fire with so many talented musical friends
15. Telephone Pictionary with my parents and Paul; definitely with Paul Buhler
16. Working in my garden
17. Hanging out with Chantel, laughing, doing crafts, coloring, eating ice cream, swimming, running around the parks, making me a kid again. :)
18. Star gazing
19. Dancing in thunderstorms
20. Clean streets and sidewalks
21. Green things
22. Open spaces
23. Friendly people I can communicate with
24. Having a piano in my living room and a home theater in the basement and a comfortable bed and a normal shower and a fridge that’s always full of food and convenient grocery stores
25. A deck and a BBQ!!
26. Mosquitoes that have the decency to stay outside! And only come around two months of the year!
27. My car and the freedom to go anywhere I want whenever I want
28. My bicycle and the fact that I won’t die in traffic (Well...the average person won't...)
29. Doing yard work...am I actually saying this? I miss doing physical labor outside, just being active and able to go for a walk or mow the lawn in the sunshine, without pollution, will be so great.
30. Iced Tea-Dad, have a pitcher ready for me!
31. Libraries and book stores
32. My Church Community
33. Live music and theatre: I missed that part of me so much here! Watching the movie “Frozen” was the next best thing!
34. Hugs from so many people, big and small!
35. Feeling totally and completely at home, comfortable, and loved. There is so much love in Brandon, Manitoba. I can feel it all the way out here.  

36. 

    Ringing in the start of the craziest year of my life!

    

    My sisters!

     

    

    My beautiful family!

    

    Games Night!

     

Inspiration: Watch it grow

Have you heard of TED Talks? They're anywhere from 10-30 minute videos of public speakers discussing a variety of topics from magic tricks to social justice to new inventions. One of the Grade 12 students at are school thought it would be a great idea to host our own series of "TED Talks" which we called "CTS Talks." She explained to the teachers that the students at our school don't have a lot of opportunities to work on public speaking skills in front of an audience bigger than their classroom (which at CTS is about 10 people). The English teachers from Grades 7-12 agreed that this was a great idea and made it part of our students English grade to create a TED Talk on any topic of their choice, whatever idea they wanted to spread to the entire middle and high school student body.

One of the CTS Talks was from a student in Grade 11 who was commenting on how, because of the heat and lack of access to clean drinking water, rickshaw wallahs were passing out in the streets. The student council decided that these words shouldn't fall on deaf ears, so they organized a campaign and within a few days, "Project H2O" had raised several thousand taka, bought several hundred water bottles, and together, a group of staff and students went out into the streets and handed out water bottles to anyone we saw who needed it. We were trying to target rickshaw wallahs, but if people asked, we gave. The students were so excited to be doing something that they organized to help their own community. Some of them have never walked in Dhaka their entire lives. Can you imagine? Their parents won't let them, they tell them it's not safe. This is the first time they've interacted with people living on the street and driving rickshaw's. This is the first time they've felt good about doing something solely for the benefit of someone else. This is only the beginning, but think how far they could go with this idea?

Ms. Matharoo and I invited some survivors from the Acid Survivors Foundation to join us for our final Girls Club meeting. Girls Club has been our once a week, after school activity in which we hang out with the middle school girls, discuss tough topics, build positive relationships, and just have fun being girls. The girls were so excited to meet the survivors and we got to hear some of their stories and have fun making jewelry together. One girl refused a marriage proposal at age 14 and had acid thrown on her, she is now 24 and continues to have reconstructive surgery with very visible scars on her face and arms. With ASF, they receive medical support and job training as well as psychological counselling and emotional support. Often times, these women have to return to the villages where they were attacked and live next to their perpetrators, sometimes their perpetrators are family members. The justice system here is so corrupt that there is no justice for these women, and very little protection from further abuse. One of our students was so moved by the visit that she went down to the organization the next week and signed up to volunteer. Since she speaks both Bangla and English, she has decided to take down stories from the survivors and translate them into English. This project serves as advocacy by informing others through personal stories about acid violence and also empowerment to the survivors by giving them a voice.

While I am horrified at the inhumanity of acid violence, I am amazed at the work that the people at ASF do, and I am honored that those brave women came to the school to share their stories with my students. And while I am so frustrated with world systems that keep people in poverty and withhold basic human rights like clean drinking water for all, I am inspired by my students who are willing to think of creative ways to make a difference. Who says you're too young to change the world?

"Is this the world you want? Is this the world you want? You're making it. Everyday you're alive."-Switchfoot    

Top 12 Things I will miss the most

Perspective is an interesting thing. With only 5 weeks left in Dhaka, here it is, in no particular order, a top 12 list of all the things that I will actually miss when I leave:

1. Weekends lounging by the pool at the Canadian Club, American Club, or Chez Abhishek.

2. Living in teacher dorms, borrowing washing machines, tailors, food, and clothing from various apartments in the building. 

3. Apartment Zumba: An after school workout in the comfort of my air conditioned living room.

4. Ice cream, frozen yogurt, and gelato all within walking distance from my apartment!

5. Weekly affordable spa treatments. 

6. Tanveer Cookies delivered to my doorstep which have been a nutritional staple in our apartment.

7. Travelling to exotic places during holidays.

8. Watching my students grow academically, socially, and emotionally.

9. Carrot Cake from the ARA.

10. Delicious, affordable meals that I never have to cook myself!

11. Open Mic Night at the Canadian Club: So many good times jamming out with a great group of people.

12. Living, working and socializing with a great group of people who definitely became my family while living over here. 

Back to Dhaka

Power lines and traffic in my neighborhood

And I'm back...back to overcrowded streets and honking horns, back to overwhelming heat and humidity, back to power outages multiple times a day, back to rotting garbage seeping out of overflowing bins and heaped in piles on the street, back to air thickened with smog, back to cockroaches hiding behind shampoo bottles in my apartment, back to Dhaka.

Outside the vegetable market sits trash and livestock

Each and every time I leave Dhaka, it gets harder and harder to come back. Nepal was so serene and Dhaka is just chaos. But I only have 8 weeks left before I being the long journey home, and this time, I don't ever have to come back.

I've been thinking about this past year and all the things that I've learned from living in Dhaka. I've learned how to cross the street and navigate traffic, which my parents now understand is no easy task! I've learned to be assertive and stand up for myself, I've learned to kill a cockroach without screaming, I've learned how to change my lesson on the spot when the power goes out, I've learned that wearing a Salwar Kameez is actually the most comfortable thing to wear in the heat, I've learned that I actually like teaching big kids too.

I feel like after surviving Dhaka...I can conquer any task set before me if I set my mind to it.

Sunrise over the Annapurna Mountains in Nepal

A short story:
One of the ayas at the school came into my room at the end of the first day back from Spring break and asked, "Mother, Father, go?"
I said, "Yes, they are back home in Canada."
She asks, "You? Canada go?"
"Yes, in June, school finish, I go home to Canada"
"Return?"
"No, return no."
"Return no?!" She gives me the most disapproving look I have ever seen her give. Then proceeds to list the teachers that are also not returning who she will miss and I am now added to this list.
"Come to Canada!" I joke cheerfully.
"Taka nai" she says, making a money gesture with her hands.
"It's ok, you can come in my bag." I say, pointing to my backpack.
She laughs at this and says it's too small. I say, "No, I'll get a BORO bag" (Boro=big)
This is even more hilarious to her, and as another aya walks in she recounts our entire conversation to her and now they are both laughing and the new aya tells me in Bangla that I need 4 large bags because there are 4 ayas. I laugh too and nod emphatically.
And I can't help but think, how different our lives would be if we were born somewhere else in the world, and how lucky those of us are, who are born in Canada and have the resources to leave and return as we please.

Showing the ayas how to take a "selfie"

Namaste from Nepal

"You have to go to Nepal" is the answer I got from every backpacker I asked this summer on where to travel in Asia, and now I would have to agree. The Himalayas are a spectacular sight, resting behind what Canadians call mountains but Nepalis simply call hills. We trekked the "hills" of the Annapurna region for 3 days, the shortest trek one can do. It started with stone stairs, lots of them, about 2000 I believe on the first day, and it ended with stairs. If you think going downhill is easier than going up, think again, and see the wounds incurred by unsure footing on the way down.

My mother showing off her wounds from the trek

My father descending the many steps on the trek

Oh that's right, MY PARENTS CAME TO VISIT!

They flew into Dhaka on April 9 and spent the evening touring my neighborhood, being followed by a crowd of beggars fascinated with my dad's height, experiencing their first rickshaw ride and near brush with death in Dhaka traffic, and finally enjoying a delightful dinner with some of my friends. The next day, they came to school with me and got to see the first ever CTS Talent show organized by myself and a few other teachers. It was a lot of fun and included such acts as several Grade 2 girls dressing in princess gowns and singing "Let it Go" from Disney's Frozen, Grade 4 boys accidentally breaking ceiling tiles with their soccer skills, and students singing songs by Bruno Mars and One Direction. Myself, Mr. Tam, and Ms. Matharoo decided to put on a little tribute to Boy Bands and choreographed a little dance to "I want it that Way" by the Backstreet Boys. The crowd went wild! And then we topped it off with "That's what makes you Beautiful" by One Direction which happens to be a CTS favorite. One moment I will never forget is when I said, "Everyone stand up and sing with us!" and the entire school, Kindergarten to Grade 12, jumped to their feet and sang and danced the entire song, even when our accompaniment cut out. It was incredible; we may be a small school, we may have ridiculous Dhaka problems that you would never come across anywhere else, but we are a family, we are a community, and that itself is also pretty hard to find.

In typical Dhaka fashion, our Biman Bangladesh Airlines flight was delayed 5 hours and we were 2 hours early for our flight...7 hours at the Dhaka airport is a little much. The next day we were delayed 3 hours for our Kathmandu to Pokhara flight due to weather. Not the greatest start to the trip but nonetheless, we made it in one piece.

The other draw that Nepal has going for it, other than the spectacular sights, are the people. Our trekking guide, Narayan, not only told us all about the country's geography, but also the culture, the religion, his family, his views, and all with his laid back sense of humor. After the trek, he invited us to his home in Kathmandu for supper. We were excited to meet his family and eat his wife's Dhal Bhat, sitting on the floor, "Nepali style" as Narayan called it. As with most of the country, electricity comes on in his building at 11 pm until about 7 or 8 am. There is one bathroom for the 6 families that live in the building and running water comes for a few hours every 10 days. It's one thing to say, yeah, I know I take running water and electricity for granted. It's a another thing to be completely humbled by someone who opens their home to you so hospitably...and how many times do we open our homes to people we've known for 3 days?

Meeting Narayan's wife and daughter looking after the water shop

Dinner time!

Trying out the self-timer to get a family picture with Narayan

What a change from Dhaka, everywhere I walk in Nepal, people smile, greet me with a "Namaste," and pay no attention to what I'm wearing. Even bartering in Nepal is friendly and calm and you usually get such a good deal to start with that there is no need to go any lower. The kids in the villages along the trek route would shout "Namaste" followed by "Give me sweets!" or "Give me chocolate!" but when I turned around and asked them to give me some sweets, they giggled and ran away. Can't blame them for trying, must have worked at some point, getting treats from the tourists that pass by.

Some stories are better told in person, so I will save the close encounter with the wild tigers and rhinos of Chitwan National Park for another time.

It's strange, as soon as I saw my parents, it felt just normal, like why wouldn't they be here? The whole trip I thought we would have so much to catch up on, and yet, we spent a lot of time just enjoying the moment. Whether it was the spectacular sunrise over the Himilayas, the stark white snow capped peaks contrasting against the star spangled night sky, canoeing around Fewa Lake, riding through the jungle on an elephant, listening to the guides at the hotel bring in the Nepali New Year with song and dance, or falling asleep most nights listening to an episode of "The Debaters" that my dad downloaded onto his iPad. The moment they left, that feeling of being at home and back in my comfort zone left too. I'm just so happy that they were able to come all the way out here and travel in a way they never have before. And while I can't go home with them now, I'll see them in two short months along with all my friends and family in Brandon. For now, I'm pretty excited for all my Dhaka friends to get back from their Spring Breaks and to see my students tomorrow.

Sarangot: Standing on a "hill" with the Himalayan backdrop

Life is strange, life is hard, life is beautiful, life is a gift, live it well.