So many little things that make a difference

First, I‘m really more than OK here in Rangpur. People are friendly, the weather is warm, the food is tasty and the work is interesting because I often visit the projects. 

My idea is to write my small texts about some typical and frequent things/situations happening around me focussing on differences between Germany and Bangladesh. All these texts have a little subtitle so that you always have a little overview. 

I also request you to tell me if you are interested in one special topic. I might write again about it with more details. 

The same about the photographies. I‘d like to get some new challenges. Tell me to take a photo of whatever you want and you‘ll probably see it soon at this page or at least in Facebook. My big Photo-album with subtitles is in Facebook but I‘ll try to upload some photos here, too.

My work:

Das Bürogebäude von JCF inklusive Trainingsräumen und Schlafplätzen

Every morning the office starts at 9 o‘ clock and ends at around 5 o‘ clock.

After coming to the office I decided with my Mentor what to do today. Mostly school-visits where I make notes and give feedback etc. But I also take a lot of Photographies. These school-visits are the most interesting part so far. One day I even participated at a parents morning (Elternabend). 

Soon I‘ll get some more theoretical work like writing reports or case studies. 

Gelegentlich arbeite ich hier...

Sometimes I sit in the office and learn Bangla. 

...oder hier

The teacher-trainings are a big thing for JCF and I participate as much as possible. Especially the english-part is interesting for me and I can accompany the trainer.

Teacher training: All these persons work as a teacher in a school build by sheet (Wellblech).
They have one class and they teach this class for 4 years until the children finish their primary education.  The teachers come from the area where they teach. Their efforts could be considered as social volunteer work with a little money bonus.

The children in the school are sitting disciplined with a hill of books in front of them.

The food:

A typical meal: Rice, Dal, Vegetables and chicken

The bangladeshi food is really nice. The woman take a lot of time to prepare the food. It tastes mostly hot. Actually the people eat two or sometimes even three times a day cooked rice with some additional stuff such as „Dal“, vegetables, sauces and of course meat. I‘ve never eaten so often meat in my life before. The meat is mostly cooked with the bones, the fat etc. together. In Germany we throw away a lot, but here they use almost everything that you can eat and it takes sooo good. 

An average family in Bangladesh eats dinner at 10 pm. That‘s too late for me and I really don‘t want to become fat here, so I avoid eating in the night.

Eye-contact:

I remember several situations in Germany when people asked me if I have a problem just because I looked into their eyes for a few seconds. My experiences here a totally different. People are likely to get eye-contact with me, boys or girls, it doesn‘t really matter. That‘s really comfortable for me because I started to do the same. The people are so interesting and I want to see their faces and their colorful clothes. 

Motorcycle-tours to the field:

The office is close to my home but quite far away from the projects. My colleagues often go to the field and they always use motorcycles. I often join these tours and then I sit in the back of the motorcycle for one hour and see the landscape. 

Up to 5 person on a motorcycle

These tours are like „cinema“ for me. I just sit in the back of the motorcycle (wearing an helmet) and watch people and landscape. Bangladesh is soooooo green. Almost all space is in use. Every little place is used for some houses, for some fruit-trees, but mostly for rice-fields. 

These rice-fields are responsible for the green color everywhere. The fields are not that big as in Germany, they are often subdivided, but there are plenty of them. 

A community school with a flag.

It is such a wonderful feeling of liberty to drive trough this landscape by motorcycle. And as everyone knows it‘s also interesting to watch other people working.

The Weather: 

Since I arrived I like the current weather here. The temperature is always agreeable. I can go out with long trousers and a shirt and I feel very comfortable. Sometimes I am sweating in the sun but as I drive motorcycle a lot it‘s very windy. My skin-color has changed a bit. I am happy about it. 

Green, green, green everywhere.

The sad thing about the weather is that it is going to be very cold here. Not as cold as in Germany but the houses have no heater and the windows are not with double or triple glasses. My colleagues warned me regarding the winter. 

The language Bangla:

Bangla is the sixth most spoken language in the world but as unknown as the country, Bangladesh. The people in East Bengal, Bangladesh, and in West Bengal, a part of India, speak bangla. 

Bengali word for man

The language has one significant difference regarding german or english. The object stands before the verb. The sentence „I love you“ is „I you love“ in Bangla, „Ami tomake bhalobashi“.

To be honest it is not very easy for me to learn Bangla. The word‘s sound is mostly so different to any known word structure. So I learn vocabularies as I did in school. That‘s the only possibility for me to learn effectively. Just „listening and trying“ is not possible for me. Rarely I understand some words because they have been imported from english. 

Bengali word for woman

Sometimes I will understand if someone talks about a well-known topic such as my reasons to come to Bangladesh or the volunteer-service in general.

I have some typical sentences that I repeat fluently to introduce myself, but when people start to answer and ask question I‘m mostly over-challenged. 

The written language is impossible to read for me, it‘s like Chinese. 

Public Transport:

Rikshaw: It‘s the typical easy way to go to another place, but also quite „expensive“ for bangladeshi conditions. The bg advantage is that you have something like a coordinator. I just say the name of the place and I‘ll arrive there after some time. Rikshaw is medium comfortable.

"Auto"with (unlimited) space for people

Autorikshaw (short „Auto“): Is a three wheels vehicle with space for 6 passengers and a driver. You can also enter this „Auto“ with 8 passengers. The price is very low and they are always at the places where you need them. Mostly I pay five to ten Taka (Taka = Euro-Cent) for a normal distance in Rangpur. „Autos“ are not existing in Dhaka because they drive by electricity.

Bad quality of the photo and the bus

Bus: Local busses are existing in Dhaka but they are not needed in Rangpur. Almost every bus is totally overcrowded.

Regional and national busses are most dangerous in this country. The driving-style is horrible and they use their extremely (!) loud horns everywhere. They are the fastest on the highways and the overtake as they wish. But they are cheap. Around 6 Euro costs a ticket from Dhaka to Rangpur (380 km). 

The places on the top of the busses are much cheaper.

How much?:

I made the experience that people ask me very often about the prices for some pruducts. It doesn‘t matter if it is my MacBook, my Camera, my clothes from Germany or the stuff I bought in Bangladesh. 

The question is „Kóto Taka?“. Often I‘m ashamed to tell teh rice because it is often quite a lot in bangladeshi relation. 

The definition of work: 

I hope no one will misunderstand me regarding this topic and I don‘t want to build up an opinion. It‘s just that I realized that the work in an office is mostly a bit more relaxed than in Germany. I can‘t generalize this but I feel a difference. You have a lot of time to chat with your colleagues while drinking „Cha“. That‘s mostly very nice, but sometimes also exhausting because I‘m often interrupted when I do something. 

My Colleagues:

The colleagues at Jagorani Chakra Foundation (JCF) in Rangpur are very nice and very friendly and very open minded. I really like them a lot. I can ask them for any kind of help and they are really flexible. They see me as a colleague who has no fixed work except from getting involved into the various working areas. So they ask me if I want to go with them to the field. They want to show me a lot.

It is mostly possible to discuss everything in in English because everyone understands and speaks english more or less. 

My Mentor: 

Mizan in action explaining the children
in the primary school how to do it right.

I have a very good relation to my mentor in Rangpur. He is actually called „technical advisor“ but his name is Mizan. I‘m mostly going to the field with him because he is responsible for me. But he is also the responsible person for the non-government primary schools. He has around 120 schools which have one classroom and one teacher.

Apart from work we meet a lot in the evening. We sit together with his/our friends drink tea and talk. And at the end he brings me home by motorcycle. 

Boys and boys:

Sometimes, iI can see girls holding hands on the streets in Germany, but I rarely see boys like this. 

That‘s very different here in Bangladesh. I often see boys holding hands as well as girls. I think it is a sign of friendship but definitively no sign of homosexuality. Homosexuality is forbidden in Bangladesh.

There are various situations when people take my hand or place their hands on my knee. For example when we cross a street or sit together in an „auto“. Sometimes it‘s a little bit strange for me but I get used to these situations. 

People in Bangladesh are not that starched (steif) as they are in Germany and so it is always no problem to have body-contact with your known people and friends. 

More and more I start to like it very much because it is a strong gesture of friendship and it makes me very proud when my colleagues take me in their arms etc.

My patience for Photography: 

Since I got my DSLR-Camera I started to like photography much more than before. But in Germany there are so little interesting things compared to Bangladesh. Here I have the possibility to take millions of photos what I unfortunately do - my Laptop‘s memory is full. 

If you have any wishes what you would like to see, just ask me. I‘m always interested to take a lot of photos and I like to get new inspiration. 

Soon I‘ll buy a new zoom-lens which is still missing in my repertoire. It offers me more possibilities for nice photos. 

The beautiful dresses of the women:

Although this photo has not been taken on the street,
it shows the various colors of the clothes.

The rice-fields give the countryside a wonderful green color which is accompanied by the green banana-trees, mango-trees, palm-trees etc. But inside the city it looks colorful, too. The women with their various „Saris“ and „Saloar Kamij“ are responsible for this effect. 

They wear all kinds of colors that you can imagine. Watching a group of women is a nice situation where you can see a wave of colors shining bright in the sun. 

The men don‘t really follow this trend. Sometimes the shirts are colorful but there is a big difference regarding the dressed up women with the bracelets and bangles (Armreif).

To be a „Bideshi“:

„Bideshi“ is the Bangla word for foreigner. 

I‘m living in Rangpur since 4 weeks and I saw two unknown foreigners here. Maybe there are some more but I can‘t identify them as not from Bangladesh.

Rangpur is a City like Bielefeld and the 3rd biggest City in Bangladesh. If Rangpur has even just a few „Bideshis“ you will be able to imagine how it is in the villages on the countryside. Some people there have never seen a foreigner before in their lives.

Just too much attention for "Bideshis"

I get a lot of attention here because I‘m a foreigner. Sometimes people see me, look at me and remain in this position for a long time. On the one hand it is uncomfortable because I am not an animal in a Zoo and I also need some privacy. But on the other side I get a lot of possibilities to talk to interesting people that are „so happy so see a Bideshi“ and „just want to talk to [me] for a while“. Besides this interest bangladeshis like to help me a lot because they understand that it is not easy for me to find the right way - I can‘t read the letters.

Until now I have never had a situation when I could say that there was something like xenophobia (Ausländerfeindlichkeit). This makes me feel comfortable because I feel really welcome in this country. Sometimes, I even have the situation that people thank me that I came to their country and „help“ here.

A "Dut Tsha", black tea with milk

Drink Tea, eat Sweets:

There are a lot of things that I like a lot here, but there are some that I like even more. This is for example the tradition to drink a lot of tea. We often make a short rest with the collegues. Then we sit in a tea-shop next to the road and drink a tea. The black tea with milk is served in a very small glas but the amount of sugar in enormous. The huge amount of sugar causes the nice taste but also some big bellies. 

Besides the sweet tea there are a lot of sweets here. The sweets are called „Misti“ and they are really dangerous. The taste is extremely nice but the sugar-part is so huge. It tastes like oily sugar with some ingredients to connect it and keep it in a form. 

There are different types of „Misties“. I like „Kalojam“ the most. 

Others:

I‘m often confronted with people who tell me that „Jarmanii is ä ritsh countrii.“

I get a lot more invitations here than in my own Country. I really like it because the food I get during the visits is the best. Sometimes it‘s also a bit strange because I‘m treated as a guest of honor, but I think this is the bengali hospitality.

I experienced that the word „Friendship“ has sometimes another meaning in Bangladesh. Some people call me friend although I met them 2 minutes ago. 

Some good news. I got hundreds of brothers and sister here. Everyone is calling me brother, „Bhai“ and the girls sister, „apa“. This is really nice but you should never take it serious if someone points at a persons and tells you that he is his brother. It‘s mostly a colleagues or a neighbor. If he is much older than he/she will be called „Uncle“ or „Aunti“

The selfi- and photo- addiction also came to Bangladesh and it is somehow really annoying if people always take photos just to upload them on Facebook to get some likes.

Besides the selfies the bangladeshis like to take photos with „bideshis“. As you know they are rare. Now you can imagine that I often have to be "the" Bideshi on everyone‘s photo. 

I got a bicycle so that I can explore the City by myself. I can stop wherever I want and stay as long as I wish. That‘s really nice. 

My new Bike. The break doesn't work well, but who cares. For safety reasons I installed a torch for the night.