Invading the South

Handy craft ladies

Our adventure started bright and early. Well, actually before bright, 5:30 to be exact. Mrs. Waid, Ruth, Candy, Ponwell, Joseph and I were heading south to visit some Adventist schools and to pick up a baby. The kids came out of say goodbye. They were all shivering and huddling around for warmth. I thought it was quite pleasant. For once it wasn’t hot! We say our goodbyes and headed on our way. The ride from Banglahope to KMMS, the school we would spend the night at, was about 9 to 10 hours. On the way the van sounded funny so we took it in to get looked at, the air conditioning broke, and I used my first squat pot. It was surprisingly clean. Before we went to KMMS we stopped to see the ladies that do the cross-stitch. They were all so grateful for the job and very happy to see us. KMMS is the first Seventh-day Adventist school in Bangladesh. Other than some chipped paint the campus looked lovely. We ate dinner with the principal at his house. Oh, the food was so good, but my lips were on fire!

 

In the morning I saw my first cockroach and took a shower with it. After another wonderful meal we headed out to one of the day schools, Ramshil, that was sponsored by Banglahope. The country of Bangladesh is fascinating. There is always something new and interesting around the corner. Plus it is so green and gorgeous! Due to bumpy roads and a fast driver I could not picture all the beauty that is Bangladesh but that is probably for the better because at the rate I wanted to take pictures we would never get to Ramshil. On the way we experienced the bamboo bridges, the car kept losing power, we took a boat across a river, and walked a mile, but we made it. It was worth it to see the kids faces light up when we gave them their little goodies. When we got back to the van it wouldn’t start. Oh, no! So we sat out in the sun, tried and tried, and prayed and prayed. Finally after about 30 minutes it started! But it wasn’t as fast or powerful as before. It was like a put-put. At least it was working.

Now we were heading to Suragram, another day school sponsored by Banglahope. We made it about 20 minutes away when the van died again. So the plan was to take an easy power the rest of the way to Suragram and Joseph would get the van towed to Gopalconj, the third school we would go to, and get it fixed. While we were deciding what to do people started to crowd around the car. A man was yelling through the window, “Taka! Taka!” He wanted money. The easy power showed up. As we were transferring to it, the man was getting more demanding. He was especially after Ruth. Ponwell chewed him out, but he still kept coming. We were all grateful to get on our way. At Suragram, after handing out the goodies, they fed us a late lunch. I got to eat quail eggs, water lilies, and a delicious coconut treat. So good! Everywhere we went the schools greeted us warmly and with joy.

Kids at Suragram

Then we took a rented van to Gopalconj, another boarding school and the head quarters of the Southern Bangladesh SDA conference. As I was handing out barrettes to the girls they started to get out of line, crowd around me, and they weren’t satisfied with the colors I gave them. This was so much different than the other schools. With all the pushing and shoving, I felt like our gifts were wasted on greedy kids. Granted it was only the older kids. Then the mosquitoes came. More like swarmed. And the strange thing was that they were only biting people with light skin, especially Mrs. Waid and Ruth. Ponwell was hilarious, swatting Mrs. Waids feet with a rag trying to keep the mosquitoes away. We were waiting for the van to get fixed. They kept saying one more hour, the hour would pass and they would say one more hour. We got tired of waiting and tired of getting eaten. So we took another rented van back to KMMS for the night and Joseph would come later when it was fixed. That driver was fast and good. Thankfully he didn’t use the horn as much; instead he would flash his lights. When we got back to KMMS there was an unwanted visitor waiting in our room. It was a spider bigger than my hand. Oh that thing was creepy! We called Ponwell to come save us and he chassed it out the window which we immediately latched shut. I didn’t sleep very well that night.

Precious Jewel

The next day was baby day. We woke up and saw the van outside. Hallelujah! The van was fixed! After an early breakfast we drove to a village an hour away. We walked through the village until we reached a river and took a boat across. On the other side we road a rickshaw van up the road 10 minutes. Once we reached a bridge we hopped off. There the local SDA pastor was waiting for us to take us to the baby’s house. We walked through the trees on a small path by some ponds and over some bridges. One was a bamboo bridge. We finally got to the right house. The baby and the whole family were waiting. We sat down and got the story: The baby is around 18 months old. The father is 70 years old and sick. He lives with his son from his first marriage. The son would “beat” the mother and baby. So she left to live with her stepbrother but he would do the same thing. We got the impression that she would wander around the village seeking a place to stay and the baby probably got passed around a lot. The mother also had a bad cough. The best chance for the baby to survive was to give it up. You could see the distress in the mother’s eyes. She wanted so badly to stay with her baby but she also wanted to give her baby a better life. Mrs. Waid had her cut the black cord off the baby, give her a bath and dress her in the new dress we brought. As we were about to leave the mother was overcome with emotion and started to cry. We had her come with us back to the van, carrying the baby over the bamboo bridge, on the rickshaw van, and on the boat. When we got to the car we made the exchange quickly and drove away so we would not make a scene.

Jewel and her mother

The baby at first sat there stunned not really knowing what just happened. About five minutes down the road she started to cry, then she started to scream. She looked terrified and you couldn’t blame her. She cried herself to sleep. Mrs. Maid had me name her. I had two names in mind. Lilly, after one of my favorite bible verses in Luke 12 or Jewel, off my nickname Jules. Mrs. Waid liked Jewel better. So she is precious Jewel. As she slept I got to hold her. She woke up in my arms and just calmly looked around. She was content at the moment.

We were on our way to Dhaka to drop Candy and Ruth off because they were flying out in the morning. However, it took longer to get Jewel than we expected. So we decided to spend the night in Dhaka then travel to Banglahope in the morning. To get to Dhaka we crossed the Gangue River on a ferry. Jewel tried some mango juice and loved it. Then we got stuck in bad traffic. When we got to Dhaka it was already dark, good thing we weren’t going all the way to Banglahope. Ponwell took me to get the other SM’s and my money exchanged (it’s a better rate in Dhaka). Then we took a real rickshaw to the shopping mall to get Ruth a map. Because of a holiday most of the shops were closed. We ended up finding an atlas that look pretty neat. Then we walked to the Dental clinic where we were spending the night. It was so crowded! I stayed right on Ponwell’s heel. He kept turning around in a slight panic saying, “Where are you?!”. “Right behind you.” I would say back. I was not going to let him out of my sight.

We got back to the clinic and Mrs. Waid handed me Jewel. She had been crying. I took her into the other room and sang to her. There was a mirror in the room and as I sang I would play peekaboo with the mirror. She loved it! I even got her to giggle, the cutest giggle I ever heard. Then we fed her rice and dal. Yummy! That night she formed an attachment to Candy and when Candy put her down to go to bed she screamed. It was like she was getting abandoned all over again. She cried and cried, but once the light was turned off she was silent, cuddled up to Mrs. Waid and slept. She slept through the entire night.

Candy and Ruth left around 4:30am for the airport; Mrs. Waid, Joseph, Jewel and I left around 6:00am for home, and Ponwell was staying in Dhaka for some meetings. As soon as Jewel got into the car she started to cry. Mrs. Waid gave her to me and I had her face the window so she could look out. She stopped crying. This baby loves to observe. She is constantly looking around, dissecting every detail from scenery to a piece of cloth. She didn’t cry the whole way home in the car. I couldn’t help but notice she wants to be independent. Every time I would feed her by the bottle she would push my hands off because she wanted to do it herself. However, she couldn’t lift it. When she realized she needed help or she wouldn’t get any food, she grabbed my hand and put it on the bottle. For a baby who can’t talk she can communicate fairly well. By the end of the trip Mrs. Waid and I got to her to smile and even laugh. As we pulled into Banglahope I kissed her head and softly said, “Welcome home Jewel.”

Sabbath Adventures

10/12/14

Sabbath morning Katie, Nicole and I woke up early to go on a walk lead by Mr. Waid but we didn't get up early enough and got left behind. But that was okay because the older girls immediately found us, took us to their room and did our hair. They also dressed us in saris for church. It was fun to wear the traditional clothing, but it was HOT. All the SMs went to the older kids Sabbath school. We sang lots of songs. They wanted us to teach them new songs but they knew them all. Then we went to Church in the cafeteria. Some girls sang “It only takes a spark” for special music, it was lovely.

After lunch the SMs went on a hike with the older Pathfinders to SAMS, the Seventh-day Adventist boarding school about 5 miles away. We started out walking through the rice fields. Green everywhere! It was so pretty! Then we got to a road and walked/ran through several villages until we got to SAMS. Everywhere we went the villagers would stare at us. One lady asked, “How are you doing?” in English, I responded in English. You could tell that she was very proud that I could understand her. SAMS is a big campus surrounded by a wall. They also have security guards. However, it is not as clean as Banglahope. Once the kids reach class 7 they have to go to SAMS for school. We got to meet some of the kids at SAMS that went to Banglahope, and we’ll get to see them again during Christmas break when they come home for a month.

After we toured the campus, we had a small worship, said our goodbyes and headed out. It was starting to get dark so the pathfinder leader, Litton, found us some rickshaws to ride to the nearest town in. We couldn't all fit in one so we split up in three. Litton was in the back; Nathan, Caleb and Nicole where in the middle, and Katie and I were in the front with kids sprinkled in between. It was fun riding with the kids, bouncing up and down as we went down the road. Our vehicle was motorized while the others were pedal driven, so we got to the town way before the others did. As we sat in the rickshaw waiting for the others to come, the villagers were getting closer and asking the kids lots of questions. They were curious to see two white girls with a bunch of Bengali children. They asked the kids if we were their mothers. We had three boys with us and they stood guard to protect us. They were so cute. Finally the others showed up. Litton didn't have change to pay the driver so we all took the kids to a side road to wait for him to figure things out. As we waited the villagers kept crowding us. I could tell the kids were getting nervous. They had us stand in the middle of the group. I had my hands on two of the girls and kept tabs on all the kids. One man came to my side and starting talking to Jenny. It made me uncomfortable, so I slowly reached out my hand and graded her arm. No one was going to take these kids. Litton finally came and we hurried out of there. These are situations that I dread for but I felt very calm and confident that I could handle the situation. We still had a long ways to walk. The kids were tired and it was getting dark. With some brute force we made it back.

As soon as we got back the kids that weren't on the hike wanted to play. I was overwhelmed with the amount of bodies grabbing me. It is so hard to say no to those precious faces but I was exhausted. So I mustered up my remaining energy, played with them for at least an hour, and then went home and crashed. Sabbath was a good day.

Mom and Dad

10/09/14
Traveling really takes it out of you. I have been crashing in the evenings around 8pm and then waking up around 3am. So here I am at 5am, sitting in my apartment in the quite of the morning, writing to you.

I met up with Katie, Nicole and Nathan in Chicago and we all flew to Istanbul where we were going to meet the Waids and fly to Dhaka together. However, the Waids’ plane from New York had to land in Ireland for some sick passengers. So they ended up missing the flight. We went on without them. Once we arrived in Dhaka we got through customs easily, grabbed our bags, and then realized we didn't know how we were going to be picked up. Luckily Katie had the phone number of Simpson who lived at the dental clinic; we just needed to find a phone to use. After about a half hour of searching we found a cell phone to barrow, and were picked up 30 minutes later. Caleb was already at the dental clinic. We got to take showers and ate a wonderful breakfast. Because there was already a van waiting to take us to the orphanage we went on without the Waids. Driving in Bangladesh is crazy! Cars technically drive on the left side of the road but really you drive wherever, pass as many cars as you can and use your horn to tell others you are coming. Every time I was about to drift off to sleep the horn would jolt me awake.

After many hours/days of traveling we finally made it. The kids were all lined up to meet us with their big smiles. It was precious to see. However, you could tell they were disappointed that mom and dad, the Waids, were not there. The next day we helped decorate for when the Waids would get here. It was fun. We got to talk with the ladies who worked at Banglahope. The whole day the kids would ask, “When are mommy and daddy going to get here?” or say, “Did you know mom and dad are coming today?” It was so sweet. Once the Waids got here the big celebration began. The kids were beaming with joy. Mom and dad were home.

Everyone needs a mom and dad, someone to look up to, someone that loves them unconditionally. God had many names, but my favorite is Father.

Packed and ready... well as ready as one can be.

Luggage! Over half of the
stuff is not for me.

"Nothing in life is worthwhile unless you take risks." -Denzel Washington

Tomorrow, around 1:00 pm, I will be getting on a plane, flying across the world, and starting a new adventure. To be honest, I am equally excited and terrified. It is interesting how these two emotions are often connected. I believe that is what drives people to get on roller coasters, swim with sharks, and jump out of planes. There is something about terrifying situations that excite us.

This summer I hiked the Lost Coast with my friends Andrea, Kindra, and Sera. Some parts of the trail are impassable at high tide, however they really are only passable at low tide. Needless to say we got stuck between the tide and a rocky cliff. As we scurried around a rock face the waves were crashing on us. For the first time I physically felt the power of water and it was intense! With each passing wave I would feel it slam me onto the rock and then pull me back out to sea. I'm not going to lie, once I made it to the other side, I was pumped on adrenaline and was ready to tackle the next obstacle. I was both terrified and excited. Luckily we had made it to our campsite.

The rock face we scurried around

Right now I am not scared in the sense of a threat to life but in traveling to the unknown. I have never been to Bangladesh or anywhere near there. I have never managed or taught a classroom. I have never been exposed to that much poverty. This trip is way out of my comfort zone. It would be easier to forget about it, stay home and work for a year. But what kind of a life is that? Never pushing the limits of comfort, never growing. 

I believe God has called me to go and He has opened the doors to get me this far. Sure, I don't know entirely what I am getting into, but I do know God will be with me every step of the way. Whenever I get nervous about going I picture the kids and their smiling faces. I can't wait to see them in person and to give them all big hugs! I may not be an expert teacher but God has given me a big heart to love those kids. I am taking this risk and expecting it to be worthwhile.