Immunizations

       I just got back from taking some of the babies in to get their immunizations. We took six children with us, but only three or four got shots, the other ones were too early to get their shots, so we have to take them in again. All the babies are very well behaved; I mean they cry when their hungry of course, but other than that they really don’t cry much. Now I have to admit they did cry when they got shots, but who wouldn’t when you get poke by something sharp! It was a fun and exciting adventure!!

       I had Paul on the way there and he fell asleep before even left and then stayed asleep practically the whole time! He was one that gets to go back to get his shots, so that is probably why he never got upset, but he is still a cutie that enjoys sleep! Right after Peter’s shot I did get traded and got to hold him. He was very upset and not happy whatsoever. However, after he got a bottle in his mouth, he was much happier! After that he really didn’t cry much at all until we were back in the van, then he did start crying again. I think he is teething, or getting ready to, because he did get the rest of his milk he hadn’t finished, but then he didn’t want to give up the bottle, so Kerri and I determined he needs a pacifier or something!!

Tutoring

       My days have been very boring lately. As I said earlier, I think, nothing can happen in the clinic until shelves get built which won’t happen until the wood is cured which takes a month. So because of that I have not had much to do and you can only measure so many children before you have to do something different or go crazy! lol

       As Chantel and Lauren are getting the hang of teaching, they are noticing which children are a little slower. Now honestly being a little slow in school is not a bad thing, but when you are at the end of the school year, you shouldn’t be super far behind. They are in school practically all year I think. They start the school year in January and end in the beginning of December with the rest of it off. Because the afternoons are practically free for us, we decided to start tutoring those that need it. I will be helping, we are tutoring children in English (mainly reading) and math. Bangla we could try, but I think we would be more of a hindrance than a help!! lol I am honestly looking forward to working more with the children! I really didn’t want to teach as a Student Missionary, but seeing Chantel and Lauren make plans and hearing them ask questions of Mrs. Waid, has honestly made me kind of wish I was teaching and so now I will get my fill by tutoring!!

Eid

       Eid is an interesting holiday. It is an Islam holiday that consists of killing a lot of cows! It started Monday and lasts like two weeks. There are actually two Eids that the Islam’s celebrate, the Eid that is during this time is known as the Festival of Sacrifices. This is commemorating when God asked Abraham to sacrifice his only son and then provided a lamb I guess, well that’s what the internet said! But then it also said when Abraham was asked to sacrifice Ishmael, so ajn (ami jonny nah-idk)! Whatever it is for it is a holiday that consists of killing a lot of cows!!

       It may be an Islam celebrated holiday, but Bengali’s are willing to take anyone’s holiday and call it a day off work/school, so Monday was a day off school which was interesting since their school week here starts on Sunday and goes until Thursday.

       To celebrate Eid (I think) we were invited to a native’s house for dinner yesterday, but because of transportation we postponed until today. It was definitely an interesting experience. We were the only guests invited, we went and then sat in the front room but the host was not there, so we didn’t talk to him at all and entertained ourselves for about half hour to forty-five minutes. Then we were called in to the table where the family all stood around and watched us eat. The food was very good; I do think I enjoy Bengali food as long as it’s not too spicy! While it was a little difficult to fully enjoy with the family watching over my shoulder. I am glad I was not on the other side of the table where I would be able to see them watching us eat!

       Since we were having a Bengali meal at a Bengali house, Chantel, Lauren, and I decided to try and be Bengali and eat with our hands. It is definitely an art, although I have to say I think we did pretty well and only got one hand messy! They were prepared for us or something and had tissues on the table that we used to clean our hands between the meal and dessert. The meal consisted of rice (of course!), a dhal or curry (not sure which, it was more curry than dhal though), cucumbers, pomegranates and oranges, some type of squash thing, and these delicious patty things that I don’t know the name of! Dessert was also really good. They had ice cream (which their ice cream here is actually very very good!), a rice custard, and a rice and milk thing, it was all delicious!

       After we were done eating we left. As we were leaving we found out that the family ate after us. This was definitely something we had to experience, although it was a little awkward!

Roommates

One thing with roommates, you are never thankful for how they are until things change.

       The chairman of Bangla Hope and his family came to visit us here this weekend! He has a seventeen-year-old daughter who stayed with us in the guest rooms, what we like to call our home! She speaks very good English, she knows how to put sentences together very well and although every once in awhile she may pronounce a word differently, for example this morning at breakfast she pronounced dessert as desert, she sounds like an American. Her and her brother are almost more Americanized than I am!! They watch American TV shows, he keeps up with the NBA, she is lost without phone service, and he is addicted to facebook! Listening to them and observing them put a whole new view of privileged Bengali’s in my mind. I mean when I think of Bangladesh, I think of villages, like where we are, but those that live in the city and are privileged are just like any other teenager!

       Anyway Naomi (that’s her name) and their house worker stayed up here with us. They are nice and pretty considerate, their ways are just different than our ways. They keep the bathroom door shut at all times, so Lauren, Chantel, and I were not always sure if someone was in there or not, we also got walked in on a couple times, because we figured out, they don’t know how to knock. If the door is locked someone’s in there and if it’s not, it must not be in use, that seemed to be their thought process. Then they also seemed to be consistently in the bathroom, take really long showers, and kind of leave the bathroom a mess.

       Okay enough of my complaining, now the reason for this blog! Having them here showed me how grateful I am for the roommates I have! I cannot think of one thing to complain about them or their habits! We are all pretty clean! I have to say, I’m proud of myself and how neat I have kept my area to be for the most part. Before we had guests we had spread through all three of our rooms and so now the table in our one room is kind of covered with stuff, but that will change soon enough.

Lauren and Chantel you guys are awesome roommates and I just want you to know that!!

I'm not ready to go yet!!

       I’ve only been here a month, and I feel like I’ve been here forever! I’ve fallen in love with so many of these children, when I leave I know I will definitely be leaving a part of my heart here. I don’t want to think about leaving, but every once in a while the kids remind me. They ask me when I am leaving. This happened last night when I was telling the older girls good night. One of them asked me when I was leaving and I said April. Bristy, the sweetheart she is, was like “don’t leave until April 10, because my birthday is April 9.” I almost started crying right then, because I know I’m not going to be here for it. It’s like I told the boys once when they asked, I want to until they are all grown up and ready to go out on their own. I already knew this, but this experience is confirming my wishes, I want to spend part/most of my life in the mission field.
Thank you G'ma & G'pa for this passion!! I'm not sure if it would be there with out all the stories I heard growing up!! Love you guys!

New Greeting

       I forgot to mention something about town yesterday. On the way back we had to stop and pay for the next month of internet. While Lauren and I were waiting on the putt-putt (that is what we call the vehicle that takes us to town a lot, it’s a tractor type thing that has a flatbed behind the driver where we all sit) a couple Bengali guys came up and  were wanting to talk. Their greeting still causes me to smile. What they said was, “May we introduce with you?” I just ignored them and Lauren answered saying no. That caused a few to leave, but the one that had spoken came back and tried again repeating his, “May we introduce with you?” I was trying not to laugh in his face, but I was also trying to figure out if he meant, ‘may we converse with you?’ or ‘may we introduce ourselves?’ We didn’t answer again, but when we were on our way again, I told Banni and Chantel and we all had a good laugh!

Stories

       Today was a fun day! It was a school ‘picnic’ and so there were no classes and the kids got to play games and watch a Bengali cartoon. They had tons of fun. While they were eating lunch, the three of us had come back to our room and were just waiting around until 2pm when Banni said she would take us into town, we needed to pick up our outfits and wanted to look for a couple more before Eid (a Islam holiday that lasts like two weeks, that involves killing a lot of cows!). Shopping is always fun and Banni is just a fun person, so shopping with her is always an experience! I found a couple more shari’s and Chantel found another shalwar which was what she really wanted, and Lauren found something as well, so we all came back happy.

       Tonight for chapel Mrs. Waid took the class 3 children and had a special chapel in her house like she does sometimes. This special chapel’s focus was choices. She talked a little bit about baptism and then told them that they were old enough to be told why they were here. She asked which child would like to hear their story first, no one raised their hand for a bit and then Caleb did. After him again no one raised their hand for a bit and then someone did. After that they all raised their hand and wanted their stories told. All of their stories are so sad and heartbreaking. It was interesting to watch the child’s face as their story was told. Mrs. Waid had one of the teachers translate to make sure they understood what they were hearing. I really liked how she wrapped it up, she said that they all had a choice, to either feel sorry for themselves that they don’t have a mother and father or be grateful that they are here and being taken care of well. All the children looked like they would more likely follow the be happy advice, but we’ll see if anything changes as the days go on.

Check-ups

       The last couple days we have done check-ups on all the children. We are still not done, but we got quite a few done. This check-up is not exactly what I remember from my check-ups in elementary. Parts are similar: pulse, ear check, throat check, and pupil check; but I don’t ever remember getting my belly, arm, and head measured! This whole task of doing check-ups on the kids is an interesting experience, majority of them are honestly scared of the ‘doctor.’ Today Kerri went to Joypurhut with Mrs. Waid and so since I knew what we needed, she said I could check the older children. As I was going I realized that most were a little nervous about getting checked. The thing they seemed to be most nervous about getting their pulse taken. I think the reason was because, they had to stick their finger in the clip thing with a flashing light. When it was Joseph’s turn, I could tell he was nervous, but for the most part he did fine, until it was time to take his pulse. The way I had been doing the checks is while their finger was in the pulse reader I would check their throat and teeth, just looking for anything out of the ordinary. Well Joseph hesitantly put his finger in and I leaned over him to grab my pen or something and the stethoscope that was around my neck slipped and landed on the table near his finger. Well that did it, he was really traumatized. He jerked his finger out and started to cry a little bit. I got him to complete the rest of the check up, but he would NOT put his finger back in the pulse reader. So I decided to just leave well enough alone and let Kerri take his pulse when she got back.

       A couple of the girls wouldn’t open their mouth for me to look at their throat. The only way I got them to finally open was to threaten them saying if I didn’t look then either Nurse Kerri or Banni (a Bengali orphanage worker who is helping with the clinic) would have to look. I asked them if they would rather have me or one of them and they said me and then opened up, well as much as they could. One of the girls has a pretty bad overbite and has lockjaw because of it, she can’t open her mouth very much at all.

        The measuring of the abdomen was another difficulty when it came to the older girls. I was supposed to measure around their belly button, but most of the girls would not lift their skirts so I could measure. Well when this first happened, I convinced them to let me measure them but I wouldn’t lift their skirts or look, they just had to show me where their belly button was so I would know where to put the measuring tape. Well in order to read the tape, I did have to lift their skirts a little, but they were okay with that little bit, go figure! Their ideas of modesty here are definitely interesting!