Dhaka Happenings

I know that it’s been a while since I’ve posted, but there hasn’t been anything especially news worthy happening in the Desh recently. The most exciting thing for me is that I am currently counting down the days until my R&R and around the world trip (9 days!). I’m a little shesh with the desh right now, and am looking forward to a break.

One of the funniest things that has happened recently was a surprise birthday party for my German friend at Pyongyang, the restaurant that is attached to the North Korean Embassy here (or as they call it the Embassy of Korea). It’s part of their PR campaign to the region, and they also have a medical clinic attached for low cost wholistic medical care. I, of course, was fascinated. All of the waitresses, hostess and singers all come from North Korea. When you come with a group, you get your own room, complete with a karaoke machine, and a personal show by the singers. It is also one of the few places in Dhaka that lets you bring in alcohol to the restaurant, and the only place where there are female staff, and their skirts are the shortest around town (which isn’t saying much). So there’s one point for the North Koreans. The show was amazing. The singers came in all in matching dresses, wearing their North Korean flag pins, and started off playing their national anthem for the group. They then went into a surprising medley of country music songs, who knew the North Korean’s liked country music so much? Their president may hate the US, but let me tell you every performer and waitress in that place knew the words to Country Roads and sang their hearts out. (Perhaps a new form of democracy that we should embrace?)

Besides the thinking about vacation and karaoke the issue that has been most talked about among expats recently is the shortage of alcohol in the country. Most foreign expats are only able to by alcohol at “diplomatic wear houses” or expat clubs. (It is illegal for Bagladeshi’s to buy or sell alcohol, that doesn’t mean that they don’t get around it, but the sale is illegal) The expat clubs had whats called passbooks (everyone has a specific limit each month that they are able to buy) to supply the members at the clubs. Well the country has been limiting imports into the country, and due to some unexplained problems at the ports, it has been extremely hard to get imported goods in, which includes alcohol. So some of the expat clubs lost their diplomatic passbooks and are no longer allowed to buy alcohol from the wear houses, which are running dry,. (It previously wasn’t a problem for Americans who have commissary access to by booze, such as myself, but even we are running low now!!) You would think that it was a crisis happening the way that people have reacted to this lack of booze. Almost all of the expat clubs have taken to closing early to avoid running out of booze, so last call is now at 11:30pm instead of 1:30. You try kicking the Germans out of a bar at 11:30 on a weekend night… it’s not a pretty sight. I seriously think this might be the straw that breaks the camels backs with a lot of foreigners here. We may start calling our own hartals to protest. It already was kind of a high school scene (who has a bottle of booze that we can drink!) and now it’s like going back to a “hey mister” time. I thought I would never see those day again!

Last weekend another NGO friend and I went and visited a street school/orphanage that is run by a French non profit here. There is an amazing French couple that run and live at the center. They currently have 65 students that live at the orphanage and around 40 that just come for classes. Students range in age from 6-17, and are either street kids with no families, or come from poor families that aren’t able to care from them. My friend and I were set up to work with the older kids on translation of their newsletter. Later we got to sit in on the younger kids song practice for an up coming performance. The school was doing amazing work, and this couple are really doing God’s work. Some of the stories that the kids shared with us of how they got to the orphanage was heart breaking. One girl told us that when she was 8 that she, her mother and 2 year old sister all came to Dhaka 3 years ago from southern Bangladesh. A week later her mother died of TB, and she was left to care for her younger sister. They then lived in a train station for a month until they were approached by a person who scouts to find homeless kids. She said she was so happy to be there and I do think that it was a life changing experience for her. The center has a vocational training program for older kids in IT and sewing/needle work so they can be employable after they age out of the center, which was very impressive. The kids were so sweet and welcoming, and even had fun poking fun at my arm hair for the afternoon. (I never thought I had that much arm hair, but almost all Bangladeshi women wax their arms, so they were shocked to see mine) I can’t wait to go back and visit the kids again when I return to Dhaka.

In other news, after a 5 week break of traveling in the country because of the hartals, I am back on the road again. I am headed back to Sylhet and Gazipour for mayoral elections and campaign training for female candidates. Will post pictures and updates soon.

In the mean time, 9 more days until I’m back stateside!! I am looking forward to seeing friends and family!