Glove Love

Got any single gloves?

Glove Love is a green initiative that pairs single gloves with brand new glove lovers.

Great for that eco-friendly recycled Christmas gift!

Rupsa

I spent the day yesterday with the staff of a local NGO who work on labour issues in the shrimp/prawn processing industry. 80% of all workers in the shrimp proessing industry are women and there are 25 000 in the Khulna area. Most live on the other side of the river from Khulna in a slum called Rupsa (pronounced: Rupshaw), close to the processing factories. Many are migrants from poorer coastal areas and with a 40% unemployment rate in Bangladesh, these workers are lucky to have a job.

To cross the river I have always been driven in a car over the Rupsa bridge, even to get to processing factories in Rupsa. My Bangladeshi colleague told me that while HE can take the boat, it is not safe for me and I should hire a car. So I was delighted when the NGO-staff treated me as one of their own and the 4 of us bundled into an auto-rickshaw and drove to the port. Ports here are not like ports at home. This was total chaos with wooden flat-bottomed boats weaving in and out of each other, with the driver holding the rudder on the highest point of the stern, frequently using other boats as bumper cars to help change direction in the current. The newest arrival would draw alongside the pier just long enough for passengers to leap on to the pier before it continued moving forward in order to allow new passengers to jump on. Jump on we did and stayed standing as we chugged across the river where the same thing happened on the other side and we streamed up the gang plank into the slum. We hired a bike with a flat trailer (a 'van'), the 4 of us sat on it with our legs dangling over the side, and we rode into the heart of Rupsa.

I missed out on some good photo opportunities, mostly because I was trying to keep my balance standing on the boat. But I caught one of the boat in front of us heading to the other side.

In 2006, a Labour Law was introduced in Bangladesh, which gives certain rights to permanent workers in processing plants. The rights included stipulations such as the provision of a work contract, an ID card, payment of overtime, leave (1 day a week) and maternity leave, and a minimum wage of 2 645 TK per month or around £23 (27 EUR). In peak season, they work around 12 hours a day and in the lean season, around 3-4 hours. Trade Unions, the Right to Collective Association, the Right to Strike and the Freedom of Association are barely recognised in the law, however, so it's far from perfect.

The benefits of the law are partly undermined by the fact that only 30% of workers in factories are actually permanent employees; the rest are called contract workers i.e. they work one day at a time. Permanent employees tend to be those who know someone in the factory and get a foot in the door so to speak. Contract workers are hired by the day but can remain under the temporary contract indefinitely. Contract workers are paid by piece-rate - so for each shrimp they peel or whatever - and may work 16-17 hours a day in peak season, for which one woman I spoke to earned 200 TK a day, or £1.75. Many forgo eating in order to keep working and earn more money. The woman I spoke to misses out on other benefits too - such as she does not get a day off. While it is the responsibility of the contractor to provide protective clothing in the case of contract workers, many do not and the women I spoke to do not mind as it enables them to work faster, even though their hands will be in water all day long. When an inspector or foreign buyer comes, the factory is cleaned, contract workers are asked not to come to work and permanent employees are asked to wear new clothes*.  

Corrupt government officials are in many instances preventing the enforcement of laws where they do exist. One woman told me that when the government inspector comes, he gets a couple of crates of shrimp and 3 000-5 0000 TK and goes on his way. 

It is difficult to be told that you are now the nth person they have told their story to, and nothing has changed, knowing that I won't be able to do anything more than report on it. It is the conundrum of development workers I think: to know how to live in light of the circumstances of the people you are working with and trying to help - how to live wisely, guilt-free and with compartively great wealth in the face of such great poverty and desperation. And knowing that YOU need your fan, washing machine, electricity, flush toilet, German bread and other things to stay sane, while they have so little. I think that you still need to be a contented person when you work alongside the ultra-poor, perhaps more so in these circumstances if you are going to be any use at all, and to be content and happy, most of us feel we need basic things. The 'basics' for us are utterly unattainable for those we work with and living with this tension is something we have to learn to do and accept.

Nevertheless, we can all get back to socially responsible 'basics' in another sense...via these cool 'Pants to Poverty' underwear - a marketing arm of the UK's 'Make Poverty History' campaign (http://www.pantstopoverty.com/pages/about-us).

* If you want to find out more, please read Solidarity Centre's 'The True Cost of Shrimp', easily available by googling it on the internet.

Pop Culture

In your country, it is so cold that things don't grow very fast. That is why you have a low birth rate.

I could hardly make out what my host-for-the-day was saying as his mouth was stuffed full of 'paan', betel leaf with areca nut and slaked lime paste. It's a totally disgusting tradition that stains the chewers lips and teeth red, as well as pavements, because they insist on spitting it all over the place here. It is mostly chewed as a palate cleanser and breath freshner, but unfortuntely, areca nut is also a known carcinogen...another reason to hate the red sticky sludge at my feet.

It reminded me of what a fellow whitie said to me recently. He received significant amounts of training on cultural assimilation but commented on that fact that noone in his host organisation had. So while every effort has been made to help him culturally adapt, his colleagues have not been told basic things that would help him feel more comfortable too, like not spitting paan in his office, not standing around staring at him trying to work and so on.

Another whitie from a well-known international development organisation just told me that she has given up. As you spotted, this whitie is a 'she' and it might have made the difference between going and staying. She says that she simply can't work anymore in this society where the people she encounters aren't interested in helping themselves, where her own staff work to an incredibly long and drawn out timetable and where her every movement is constantly scrutinised from the tea-boy to her driver to her cleaner to the people on the street. She lived in the war zone that is Darfur for two years, so I think it says more about the culture than her.

Below, paan-chewing countries:

www.fairfood.org

Cold Contact

Back home, it's really quite a big deal if you get someone's number.

Here though, I hand it out willy-nilly (wonder where that expression came from).

It's my email address that I am really protective about, even though back home I often use that as the first point of contact and work up to the phone number.

Handing out my email address feels very personal here in a land where everyone, even the poorest of the poor, has a mobile phone. So knowing that my contact with those who call will naturally expire when I leave the country, it means that I pretty much hand out my number to anyone who asks.

I don't know what else it makes me, but it certainly makes me contactable.

Another Scot and a telephone (of sorts):

A Call To Prayer

The Adhan or Azaan in Arabic is the Muslim call to prayer, recited by the muezzin at prescribed times of the day. The root of the word means 'to permit' or 'ear'.

Adhan is called out in the mosque five times a day, traditionally from a minaret and nowadays often with loudspeakers, summoning Muslims for mandatory (fard) prayers (salah). A second call known as iqama (set up) then summons Muslims to line up for the beginning of the prayers. The main purpose for the multiple announcements in every mosque is to make available to everyone an easily intelligble summary of Islamic belief. It is intended to bring to the mind, or at least the ears, of every believer - and every non-believer in its vicinity - the substance of Islamic beliefs, loudly.

The Adhan* sums up the Shahada, the statement of faith and the first of the five pillars of Islam:

There is no God but God [Allah] and Mohammed is his Prophet

Here in Bangladesh, the Adhan goes out five times a day (and then add the lesser calls) from the large and well-amplified mosque opposite.....and also from another four mosques in the vicinity, which I can hear. But I guess they didn't all set their watches at the same time, so sometimes they all start up just a few seconds apart leading to quite a cacophony of wailing, or sometimes the calls seem to ripple across the town.

You can almost set your watch by it, except that the times always change with the light, so you can't. But nevertheless, there is some beauty in the arabic words, the haunting melody, the warbling trills. The only times the sound changes is when one of them gets a break and the stand-in sings a bit faster or slower or with somewhat more/less embellishment.

Initally, when I heard the 'whoooo' of the microphone test, the split-second pause and then the start of the call, I used to be annoyed at its disturbance of my sleep or work. But there's also something comforting about the routine of it, the call to take a moment's pause, to think of something beyond ourselves. I just wish that it translated into a little bit more respect for foreign women, you know?

*In Arabic the words are:

Allahu Akbar

Ash-had an la ilaha illa Ilah

Ash-hadu anna Muhammadan rasulullah

Hayya 'ala-salatt

Hayya 'ala I-falah

Al-salatu khayru min an-nawm

Allahu akbar

La ilaha illalah

And in English:

God is greater than any description

I testify that there is no deity except for God

I testify that Muhammad is a messenger of God

The time for prayer has come

The time for worship has come

Prayer is better than sleep

God is greater than any description

There is no deity except for God

The Four Seasons

I don't think I would like to live long-term somewhere without seasons...even when I know that so many of you are already living in Freezing February in October. The annual variation in length of day is only 1 hour and 32 minutes at this latitude, so the only nod I've had to Autumn here is a shortening of the day to 11 hours and 22 minutes and a 'drop' in temperatures to 31 degrees.

Q&A

Q. The key to Great Leadership?

A. A Deputy who does all the work.

Phew!

Source: Herb Brammeier, Jr.

Fiddler on the Roof

Yesterday, I took my computer and a bottle of water, and ventured on to the roof to continue the report  I am writing. I just needed a change of scenery, and fiddling about on my computer while watching the rooftops and the setting-sun was a welcome break. I also provided a bit of a change of scenery for the office workers in the block beside the house who were watching me, but still, it was nice to get out the house, so to speak.

Back to Skool...

My most-needed Bangla terms, which is basically essential Rickshaw vocabulary:

Yes - Ji
No - Ney
Right - Dayne
Left - Bame
Stop - Tamun
Stop here - Tamun ekhane
Straight ahead - Soja
How much? - koto taka?
Thank you - Donobad
Twenty - bish
Two - duy

I'm sure you get from the above that most rickshaw drivers don't have a clue where they are going!

What a Dump

China has been called 'the factory of the world' and I know Thailand is trying to market itself as 'the kitchen of the world', but the only label I have found so far for Bangladesh is 'the bin of the world'.

Apparently, with Bangaldesh's enormous and growing population (currently 164 million) and its small and decreasing/sinking land, the country provides a welcome market for products that no-one else wants. Such as out-of-date food, milk from cows that graze near a Ukranian nuclear hot-spot, and, well, I could go on.

Apparently the up-and-coming classes in Bangladesh spend more time looking at food labels than the average Westerner, and for pretty good reasons it would appear.

Well, maybe that's all old news. After all, Ringo Starr sang 'It Don't Come Easy' for this album:

Refresh

I was starting to feel really feverish. But in this heat, it's hard to know if you really do have a fever, or if you are simply overheating. It hasn't helped that it's been so hot lately and last week we were conducting interviews on a verandah, all squashed together with our chilli-eating colleagues, with no air, and trying to understand some particular point about this particular survey. Literally, the sweat was rolling down me.

And then getting home from the field either results in the use of local auto-rickshaws where dirt and pollution sticks to skin and fills lungs. Or enter a blast freezer of a mini-van for the 2-hour trip home. Either way, it was a recipe for a tight chest, wheezy cough, feverish head and a very gravelly voice.

It is very difficult to actually take a break here. For one, there is too much work. Second, there's nowhere to go and in any case, nowhere to go to and no-one to go with. I can't do much by myself. I even debated about walking to the stall at the end of the road yesterday and picking up a fizzy drink, but really, it's not worth the hassle I get whenever I step outside.

In fact, I recently made contact with an NGO based in Dhaka for an interview. One of their workers, a VSO-volunteer from Holland is coming to Khulna this weekend for his own work, and is happy to chat with me. He wrote to me just yesterday to ask how I was getting on and said:

Sure as hell is hard working and living in Bangladesh. For a woman it's far more difficult. It was amazing for me walking down the streets in Khulna with Lesa. Sorry for the expression, but they look at her like horny dogs. Yugh. They will stare @ me as well, but in a different way. Not sexually (I pressume ;-) I really respect foreign women working and living in Bangladesh. Quite an ordeal!

So my luxury get-away-from-it-all weekend equivalent here was to go to bed, turn on the aircon for the first time as my luxury treat, and turn off my alarm clock.

12 solid hours of sleep later and I feel a lot more refreshed.

In the hot seat

I am in charge.

I'm really not quite sure how it happened. The first thing I found out was that the Bangladesh team leader - who had accompanied the fish-belly white Stirling University posse on their recent visit to Khulna - would not be staying behind after their departure to supervise the start of the now-infamous 400-farm survey. I found this slightly odd as this is his primary responsibility on the project, but he also has a full-time job and term has started. The next thing I found out was that there are a series of ethnic, hierarchical (age, experience) and personality divisions within the team of 10 hired to conduct the survey, that means that choosing any one of them as the interim project leader would heighten already sensitive boundary lines.

And then there's me. I've been here for 5.5 weeks (and counting!) so am familiar with Bangladesh, the field, and some of the ethnic, hierarchical and personality divisions being referred to. And as a foreigner, not only do I automatically get authority points, but I can walk right over all those divisions with a breezy 'because I said so'.

Well, that is what the Stirling Uni team and the Bangladeshi team leader are hopingfor. But in reality, it's a lot of work. It's already been a lot of work. The past 5 days have been unusually hot and humid for October, when normally it should start to get cooler. No rain has resulted in extra dust and although the pollution in general brings about some gorgeous sunsets, it's less fun when the fans are whipping it into your face, with all that chilli-BO, in an enclosed office space. And it's been exceptionally fatiguing for a number of other reasons, such as the length of time it takes some of my colleagues to 'get' things (see earlier posts), the amount of effort required to stop paperwork from blowing off tables, and the wait until 3pm for lunch. 

I, of course, have my own work priorities, which have nothing to do with this survey. But the team here really, really needs leadership, and, well, there's no-one else. So for the next two weeks at least, I'll be juggling these competing pressures, not to mention the intense desire I have to make it back home in time for 'Abendbrot',  my delicious evening German bread.

You could say, I'm in a bit of a funk*

* this is an in-joke and may not be appreciated by all my readers.  


The sign below isn't a joke though..!

World Poverty Day

 

Wherever men and women are condemned to live in extreme poverty, human rights are violated. 

To come together to ensure that these rights be respected is our solemn duty.

Surveying the Survey

The survey work is really, really slow. It's taking around 3 hours to conduct the survey in the field, 3 hours to 'clean the data' i.e. change the answers to the pre-determined codes, and around the same time to then enter the data into the database.

It's been really interesting to watch and learn the reasons for this. The 9-man/1-woman team that are doing most of the hard-work are all very intelligent and all have a masters degree in aquaculture. But things that we take for granted are brand new to them.

Such as filling in an answer to a question in the box beside the question. Instead, in the field they keep trying to squeeze the answer into the same box as the question. They just don't fill in forms like we do. I mean, by the time we've filled in insurane forms, application forms, gym membership forms and whatnot, we know how to fill in forms. But they never do that kind of thing here. They simply don't know how to fill in a form and we have to go right back to basics and teach them. 

Same with data entry. If an answer to something is unknown, then the code is 888. So when we hear the answer from the respondent in the field, the scribe looked blankly at me. I patiently explained that as the respondent said 'I don't know', we enter 888 into the box. So he said,

888?

Yes, said I.

Where?

In the box.

888 in the box?

Yes.

This box?

Yes, that box.

888 in this box?

Yes.

8......

888 in the box.

Another 88?

Yes, 888 in the box.

888 in the box.

Perfect.

This happens for practically every question and practically every question when we clean the data too. But there's no point me doing it. It would be faster, but they have to learn. It's capacity building - hopefully this is a skill that is going to make them much more useful somewhere else later.

But right now, it makes my days very, very long.

A blonde moment

A final furtive glance in both directions to make sure that the coast was clear, one hand gripping the top of the gate post, the left foot lifted on to the steel padlock, and then the right foot pushed off the ground while the left hand reached for the wall and provided the balance needed to lift the right foot high up on top of the speared railing. Balancing, the right hand could now reach for the tree which propelled the left foot on to the top of the gate post where the other one could join it. Lift loose trousers and step carefully over the barbed wire, quickly but quietly, keep one hand on the gate post with the foot and grab a nearby tree branch with the other that thankfully gives under the weight, slows the jump down and cushions the landing on the other side of the locked gate.

An episode taken from my latest reading material?

No, that was me, about half an hour ago, when I got back to discover that the steel compound gate was locked and no-one was home. The house is NEVER empty. I was assured that. My host Michael told me there is ALWAYS someone home, before he left for a week in India. The Bengali family who live downstairs have so far always been there to open the gate when I come home. But this time they weren't. Night was coming in quickly, and mosquitoes and men spilling out of the mosque after prayers were quickly swarming around me.

I pretended that a locked gate was what I was totally expecting and that I was in control and calling someone to open the door, when in reality I was calling France and debating the merits of scaling the railing, barbed-wire wall and gate, and whether the tree would indeed break my fall, or wait for someone to show up, or try to find a rickshaw, bargain a price and go back to the office where we had been working. I had already called the Bengali family's son - the only number I had - but I think even my Bengali surpassed his English and all I could make out was 'mother below house', which she definitely was not.

So I stood stock-still, talking on the phone and eventually everyone got bored and moved away and I took my chance. As the road cleared I tried to keep my heart from hammering in my chest as I swung up, over and landed harder than I was expecting. I was shaking, but mighty proud of myself as I crossed the courtyard to the second locked gate that once open, allows entry to the ground floor of the house. I pulled out my keys and my mobile phone to act as a light, and tried to slow myself down as my panicking made me fumble to open the lock. 

Finally, I was in, I switched on the lights, climbed up to the first floor and unlocked the front door and...

Wait a minute...

You see, I unlocked the downstairs gate and the upstairs door.

I unlocked them.

I had keys.

I had just used two out of three of them.

I bet the third one...

And right as I realised what an idiot I'd been, poor Philip came rushing into the compound on his bike, having been told by his son that 'sista' was home and there was a problem. He'd biked home at top speed from Church, which I remember now he had told me in advance he would go to. As had Michael told me in advance what the third key was for.

Seems like blonde moments can happen anywhere.

Diwali

The festival of Diwali is the Hindu Festival of Lamps and signifies the triumph of good over evil.

Bangladesh has a Hindu minority - about 10%, but you would never have guessed it from the hoards on the streets this evening in glittering costumes, with glittering lights everywhere and particularly in passageways to temples, and the decibel-levels of accompanying music that leave you feeling a bit jittery.

Unfortunately, we were stuck piloting the latest version of the survey, even long after dark...and of course our poor target farmer was also stuck with us while his family and colleagues got the party started (cue the music).

My voice is hoarse after running through the 20-page survey, but not as hoarse as the revellers will be tomorrow after trying to make themselves heard above that din.

The peace and tranquility of a prawn pond...before the music shattered it.

And what you can't see of course is the small, staring crowd gathered on the OTHER side of the camera...

"all things to all people"

Different name, different place, same face.

I seem to change my name about as often as I am changing country at the moment. As you know, I resorted to 'Ella' after Chinese speakers in Penang kept swopping my 'r' for an 'l', the 'd' for an 's', both of the 'i' for 'ee' and just in general tried to avoid calling me anything.

So I switched to Ella - close enough to kELLing for me to remember that it was me they were referring to. Mostly it was used when making reservations, or whenever anyone asked my name and I didn't want to give my real one. I still find revealing my name quite a personal thing, and have resorted to Ella on more than one occasion when farmers, rickshaw drivers, car drivers and restaurant waiters have asked me what my name is, generally right before they ask whether I am married and have babies.

Today I was given another name. A Bengali name: Nomita. The honour was bestowed upon me by Philip and Maria (or rather Horen and Shovita) who live on the ground floor of the 2-storey building I am living in. They cook, clean and provide general security, and they are lovely, lovely people. This evening they revealed their real names to me and gave me my new one. I don't think it means anything except that Maria's sister is called Nomita. And they have been calling me 'sista' (i.e. 'sister') ever since I got here, so maybe that was a clue there were struggling with 'Ingrid'.

Just the other day I wrote my name down on a form and the guy reading it had a terrible time reciting it back to me. So Nomita it is!

Francis' Art

Yes this is a survey taking place on 400 farms and in 4 countries.

New-fangled technology

Am posting from an email. Can she do it?

Yesterday

..and then there were the ants that seem to like living in my computer and then emerge by the sides of the keys when the tapping gets a bit much (by which time their only future is to get seriously tapped by me).

Boys will be boys

Yesterday, I went with Michael, the German with whom I am staying, to the school for boys whose parents are too poor to keep them. At the moment there are around 50 boys there. I was shown around the compound where they keep livestock for milk and meat, a rice paddy, 4 prawn ponds, and the dormitories.

Interestingly enough, they actually sell excess prawns on the local market, so they are actually part of the prawn chain, even the main aim of production is for food and to teach the boys a life skill. Looks like I'll have to go back later for some interviews!

Before their evening meal I was invited to stand in front of them all and speak a little bit about myself and why I'm here, and then they were invited to ask questions. Here they are:

1. How old I am.

I asked them how old they thought I was (21, 25 and 28 were the answers) and just told them that I was 'older'.

2. What I earn 

(Michael told them in my culture it was very rude to ask that so he wouldn't be translating the question)

3. Whether I'm married

(I asked them why this was so important? They said it's cultural).

4. My favourite food.

5. Whether I have brothers and sisters.

zu Hause

Aside from the obvious, one of the other main advantages of belonging to a worldwide group such as the Church, is that you meet members all over the place.....and they generally feel obliged to help you ;-)

It's wonderful walking into even a community of strangers and feeling like you belong, and even more wonderful when they start handing you their contact list. Through one lovely and caring family in Dhaka, I found a hotel for my boss, the British club, a removals firm (more on that later), a shop selling local handicrafts (hence the need for the removal firm), a map, a guidebook to Bangladesh, and the current house in which I am living.

Well, they know the German couple who live in this house, who have a spare room, in which I will be living for the next 5 weeks. The house is like some little Alpine chalet, stuck in the middle of humid Khulna. It has wooden German trunks, little frilly checkered curtains, German patchwork bedspreads, a working electricty supply that he redid himself, a garage which he built, wooden shelves which he built, a pumped to the roof ground-water supply which he built. Basically, it's got all the mod-cons, German style. And with German bread. It's wonderful.

A Window of Opportunity

There's plenty to see; it's just how you look.

A Third Way...

You may remember that I previously wrote about the 'development dilemma': whether through your purchases to support an industry that locks people into dire poverty, or stop the purchasing, and potentially leave them to an even worse fate.

Well, the processor I spoke with yesterday offered 'a third way' that I have been looking for and which I am hearing increasingly.

It's all about you.

You, the consumer.

It's about what you buy. Because what you buy sends a signal. In other words it creates demand. And supply will rush to meet that demand (we could get all economicy and talk about price elasticities of demand but I'll leave that for the thesis).

So, what does that mean?

Well, at the supply end, my little processor has established trusted links with quality suppliers (i.e. farmers and the linked chain) who have gone through a rigorous certification process (taking over a year) to be able to prove that they farm organic shrimp and that it has a separate supply chain all the way to the supermarket.

The problem is that each farmer is doing a stunning job and producing, let's say, 10 kg a day. But the processor can only buy 2 kg a day from each farmer, because he can't sell any more than that becuase  European consumers (that's where they go) aren't buying more than that. He doesn't want to discourage organic shrimp farming so he keeps buying a little from a lot of good suppliers in the hope that demand will improve.

At the moment, the farmers are selling the rest of their high quality organic shrimp as normal shrimp, and at the normal shrimp price, on the local shrimp market. This price is about 50% lower than the price they get from the processor for their organic shrimp.

And that's where you come in. By buying organic shrimp, demand rises, and the processor starts buying more organic shrimp. Farmers have an incentive to produce more, thereby earning more, and other producers have an incentive to seek certification, thereby improving the whole industry.

So when it comes to putting your money where your mouth is, it IS all about you.

Saying that, there is another way: 3b, perhaps. Without getting all technical, prawn and shrimp chains from Bangladesh are essentially controlled by powerful buyers (retailers and importers) in Europe. They dictate what they want, when they want it and how they want it. That means that these developed-country retailers and importers are vulnerable to public opinion (think Greenpeace on the roof of Asda, or previous campaigns such as labour conditions in Gap and Nike factories). By exerting the right pressure such as writing to ask your local supermarket what they are doing to make sure labour standards in their supply chains meet international requirements, or refusing to buy brands unless they come from a reputable source (Waitrose for example!) or simply donating to an NGO who works on these issues (BRAC, Solidarity Centre, FairTrade etc). There's lots of ways to start changing things, without much effort.

It just stars by starting to think.

Rain on my Parade

It always rains on tents. Rainstorms will travel thousands of miles, against prevailing winds for the opportunity to rain on a tent. Khulna has a lot of tents of the slum variety, and unfortunately, it has rained non-stop for 3 days. 

Weather patterns here are completely shot to pieces. The monsoon was meant to end on the 15th of September (quite how they decide on the exact date is beyond me), but farmers found themselves in a drought, when they should have been flooded by monsoon rains. Now they are flooded by monsoon rains when they should be planting their rice and preparing ponds for the next prawn season.

This is the rain in the city, lapping at the hotel ramp (bottom left-hand corner), but you can imagine how miserable it is in the field. I say 'field' because that's where I go when I do my fieldwork, but of course this is life to the villagers that live there, and life at the moment is very, very muddy.

We are lucky enough to be able cancel or postpone our plans, but for those who depend on seasonal variation patterns, all of this rain is very bad news indeed. It hasn't been helped by a high-tide which has raised the ground water level and prevented water on the streets from draining. I have already heard twice that this is a rising trend and that many believe climate change and rising sea levels will result in increased and continued flooding in these low-lying areas. These people are really living our climate changes.

Actually, I've spent the past few days interviewing other people in the value chain to work out what happens to shrimp and prawns once they leave the farmer, and where things might be going wrong. An NGO worker politely pointed out that I should write up what I had just found out about cheating and corruption and black money, but that I should write it up "carefully" as there are some '"very powerful people around". So how does one spot a Bangladeshi Mafia Don? All I know is that these poor farmers have more than the weather to worry about.

Dr Glam

Project Runway: Me all kitted out to visit a shrimp and prawn processor.

On a wing and a prayer...

So how happy would YOU feel travelling with an airline whose motto is:

Fly your own Airline

Back to Khulna...

 

 Restocked!

What is more valuable than a passport?

Well I hope you all chose 'an Australian degree' as the thing more important than a passport, as marketed by the advert below:

Life is Art

Me, in an art gallery, reflected in one of the works displayed:

White Girl in a Kameez, Reflected
 

And on the Seventh Day....

...well, God might have rested, but I haven't!

In Bangladesh (and many Muslim countries), the weekend falls on a Friday and Saturday, and Sunday is the first day of the working week. So you might be forgiven for thinking that Saturday becomes the default Sunday, but you'd be wrong.

Instead, Friday is the Muslim holy day and if places of business close (not all do), then it's a on a Friday that you'll have the difficulty of trying to book a hotel for your boss who arrives in less than 2 days. It also makes sense for Friday to be the holy day for other religions too. Thanks to a friend of a friend (hi Heather!), I was able to go to Church this morning (first time since I got here), meet lots of people from all walks of life, get crucial advice on reputable beauty salons in the area, have chocolate cake (chocolate cake! First time in 2 months! And proper ice cream!), get a clearer sense of where I live and what's around there and how to get between places, see how other people live, be recommended art galleries to visit, go shopping (shopping! First time in...etc etc)...