Greetings from Bangladesh – Day 8 and 9 (heading home)

Sorry, I was unable to write yesterday as we did not go into the Save the Children office and there is no internet access in the hotel we were in.

Yesterday was a really interesting day. We were in quite a remote area and had the chance to talk to parents about safe house programs and meet the girls who lead the groups. We talked to a couple of Mullah's who told us they were not too happy about girls getting together to talk and learn at first, but after they saw the program first hand they were converted. All the parents we met were excited to get their girls into the programs and they felt they were all helping them to learn more about health and social issues. It was also great to meet the field trainers and the peer leaders. This is truly the girl effect. The field trainers find the most talkative and outgoing girls in the villages and they recruit them to be peer leaders. After a few months of training, they start safe houses in their villages and recruit more girls to be part of the group. What they learn then gets disseminated down to their siblings and the rest of the community.

We explained (in a very basic way) the girl effect to one of the classes and got one of the girls to write it on the board. Unfortunately I was not able to film it, but I got some pictures.

After our trip to the field I had the best meal of the trip at the Barisol Chinese restaurant. I don't think there were actually any Chinese people working at the restaurant, but the food did vaguely resemble Chinese. I think the most important thing is that it was not rice and dhal. As I have said earlier, this seems to be the only thing people eat here. They are also very regimented in when they eat; if they don't get food at 8 a.m., 1 p.m. and 9 p.m., they get a little worried. Also, meals are for eating only. As soon as everyone is finished eating they all want to get up and leave. I usually tried to keep the conversation going after dinner, but I got a lot of blank and anxious stares.

Road signs you don't see in Portland:
- No Rickshaws - picture a sign with a rickshaw and a red line through it, and 50 rickshaws sitting right under it
- No Horns - this only makes people want to honk their horns louder
- Always Drive on the Left - unless you need to pass, or turn, or just don't feel like it, and the sign is in English

We started back for Dhaka at 6 a.m. this morning and the streets were quite and calm. There were still more people out and about than Portland in the middle of the day, but for Bangladesh it was quite and calm. I am sure I am going to miss all the noise and traffic when I get back, and I don't think I should drive a car for a while as I have a lot of road rage built up. My flight leaves at midnight tonight (Monday here) and I will be back in Portland on Tuesday afternoon, about 25 hours of travel time - Dhaka to Singapore to Tokyo to Seattle to Portland.