kaya's quotes

This is an email Sheela sent to family, I thought I would share it with you all since I find it quite comical. The world is so different when seen through the eyes of a young one!



Hello,

We are just about to go to bed after an evening at the American Club (yay for Thursday being the start of the weekend here!) but I had to share Kaya's top three quotes of the day:

1. Kaya and I were riding in a rickshaw and passed a boy who was holding supplies for shining shoes. Kaya asked what they were, and I explained that he had brushes and wipes and other things to make shoes look clean and new. Kaya looked around for a moment at the dust and trash around us and said, "He should do that to the street!"

2. The rickshaw had taken us to the doctor to have Kaya's medical forms signed for school. After the doctor gave him the most cursory examination in the history of medicine and then dismissed us from his office, Kaya bounded outside and asked, "Did he fix me?!"

3. Coming home from the doctor, the elevator was broken (again) so we were walking up to our 5th-floor apartment. On the 3rd floor landing, we passed a small table with burning incense. Kaya asked what it was, so I was explaining that people burn incense to make the air smell nice. He looked at me suspiciously and said, "What did you say?" I said, "It's incense. People burn it like candles, and it smells nice." Kaya said, "People burn insects??"

Maybe you had to be there, but each of these moments was pretty hilarious. It is great to have a kid's perspective on a place as different as Dhaka.

Hope you all have a wonderful weekend,
Sheela, Chris and Kaya

getting to dhaka..."i now walk into the wild"

chapel hill to nashville: 10 hours

nashville to omaha: 14 hours

omaha to houston: 3 hours

layover in houston: 5 hours

houston to dubai: 15 hours

layover in dubai: 7 hours

dubai to dhaka: 5 hours

59 total hours travel time!

"I now walk into the wild,” that’s what I text a few people as we boarded our flight to Dubai and eventually on to Bangladesh. For those of you that don’t know, it is a reference to one of my favorite books, Into the Wild. I got several responses that were quite amusing! “don’t eat any berries,” was my favorite.

I don’t know if our journey is as extreme as Alexander Supertramp’s, but it is an adventure nonetheless. As you can tell by the above it has been quite some journey thus far.

The flight over was not too bad actually. We left Houston in the evening so it was the right time for Kaya to go to sleep. I on the other hand didn’t sleep a whole lot. As you might be able to tell from the picture, space was quite limited. Not to mention some little spoiled brat had their seat reclined all the way back. I refused to inconvenience the people behind me like that so I suffered a bit. I also stayed awake because in his sleep Kaya kept kicking the people’s seat in front of us. (Karma at it’s finest!?) The other little spoiled brat didn’t appreciate it too much! I guess one of the main reasons I couldn’t sleep was because I had a lot on my mind.

I remember when I left for Peace Corps I had many thoughts all over the board. I questioned why I was leaving my family, wondered if it was the right thing to do and began to regret leaving. I found myself feeling similar emotions and thinking about those very moments. This time though, I questioned my judgment in taking my family so far away from “home.” With little room to move and so much space to roam in my mind I committed to watching movies! That took my mind off the issues at hand…..at least for a while. I watched, I am Legend, Iron Man and another more serious movie….oh what was it?! Oh well, can’t remember.

As we were arriving in Dubai, I made sure to look outside and sure enough I wasn’t let down. I had heard of these man made island and peninsula’s that made various shapes and had certain themes. Sure enough we caught a glimpse of the beginnings of a new set of islands. So much money…..so darn hot! The temperature in Dubai was 93 in the middle of the night!

We spent the next 6 or 7 hours entertaining Kaya and visiting the duty free shop. Our final flight was only 5 hours! Only…..can’t believe I would say that. It seemed short compared to what we had just endured both in flights and layovers. Kaya was a super trooper the entire time. Chalk up another two gold medals for both Sheela and Kaya on this trip!

When we arrived in Dhaka, we had no idea what to expect. This is a part I had been dreading for quite some while. We had six bags at 50 lbs each plus the max in carry-on luggage, with a car seat and a stroller (we thought we had a stroller). I was certain we would be paying a large sum of cash for duty. After standing in line at Immigration for what seemed like another couple hours we breezed through and found our luggage right away. A Bangladeshi was right there waiting to haul all 600-700 lbs of our luggage. I had no problem letting him push it along. I wasn’t so sure he could do it, but as we have come to find out…..these Bangladeshi people are quite resilient and surprisingly strong! He then demanded 30 US dollars for is efforts which I was not going to pay him. As we passed by customs I was nervous with all my forms ready to go and my explanations of all our luggage rehearsed. The guy looked at me, without even asking to see anything and said, “go, go.” I almost ruined it by stopping to ask him questions. I finally got my wits about me and realized I had better move on out before we had to pay.

The instant we passed the customs officer we were greeted by staff members from my school. I was so relieved and quite taken back by the welcoming committee. Instantly my worries left me. I again thought back to Peace Corps when I realized things were going to be alright.

The school driver and principal took us to our apartment, which was probably 20 minutes away. I was excited to finally see firsthand the environment we would be living in. My worst fears were that we would be able to breath the air because it would be so polluted and that traffic would be similar to that of Calcutta in India. Fortunately I have an overactive imagination and Dhaka, at least initially, far exceeded my expectations in some ways.

I will say this, and I promise to write more about it later, poverty is ever-present in all that is Dhaka. At each stop beggars knock on the windows asking for food or money or both. Still after a month I don’t know what to do or how to react. I can’t possibly give to all of them. What should I do!? My heart goes out to all of them. The naked kids, the mom’s that look way older than they probably are, the rickshaw drivers……everyone. It’s a bit depressing in many ways, quite educational and enlightening in others.

Our apartment is amazing! It really is 2500 square feet! When Kaya gets his tricycle he will be in heaven!! We have three bedrooms with three bathrooms attached, a kitchen, office, living room, dining room and since we are on the top floor we have easy access to the rooftop! It is an interesting view. I promise to post pics at some point. Needless to say, we were and are happy about he place.

Before we left and close to after we agreed to come to Dhaka we had decided to take on two people as our Maid and Nanny. Now I am sure you must be thinking, “wow, neocolonialism at its finest.” Yeah, that ‘s kind of what we thought at first too. After much thought and several conversations with people here. We decided that for only 112 US dollars a month each we would be more than happy to have help around the place and also provide two Bangladeshi women jobs to support their families. They would otherwise have to look elsewhere and may not find work…who knows?! We are very happy with the decision and Kaya has come to really enjoy both of them. Their names are: Kimboley and Merthika (not so sure on the spelling). Kimboley is the maid and she also cooks twice a week for us. Thank goodness for her, if she didn’t work for us we would most certainly have a problem with various bugs. Merthika is also very helpful with Kaya. He has grown quite fond of her kind heart and warm smile.

I would love to write more, but I have to go to sleep. Time is precious for me here. My job really does keep me very busy and thus the gap in postings….I will try and write more. I am excited to discuss life in Dhaka and what we encounter from day to day. It seems as if this will be another experience that will shape my life, my thoughts, my views on the world……poverty…..people……mankind. I am grateful for the struggles and the joy we find at each corner.

Next time…… School, what we see in the streets and some more pics…..I will have to write about Jalal….our rickshaw driver!

I really want to instead of just report......express.....the pain of Dhaka, the hope in my heart and the joy in being......until next time.....be safe.....bunte i really miss you buddy!

leaving the US

i have been wondering what i will miss the most about the states and i am not sure that i will miss anything (family and friends excluded, of course). i am not sure what this says about me. maybe that my desire for change is greater than my desire for stability. maybe change is my stability. whenever we told people that we were moving to bangladesh, the words that came up most often were courageous and sometimes crazy. maybe they are both accurate, maybe not. when we do something truly extraordinary, then you can call us courageous. until then, hold off on the praise.

our last few hours in chapel hill were a mix of emotions as we rushed to pack up the last of our things and move out of our house. our friends ed and nita were saviours! they brought over their pickup truck and helped us make those last few runs to store, sell, or trash our things. it was amazing how much "stuff" we had, for lack of a better word, even after selling so much of it. we estimated that we have about 50 boxes of belongings between all the things that are in storage, our shipment and our suitcases here.

when we were finally ready to go, just as we were about to get into the car, we heard a fierce rumbling of thunder. sheela and i just looked at each other. the timing was exact..... maybe someone or something saying goodbye?!

the first day, we drove from chapel hill to a small town outside of nashville to visit one of our good peace corps buddies..... none other than..... kevin lee! we stayed at his house for two nights. he drove us out to his family farm and told us about the history of the farmhouse as a civil war hospital and home to many generations of lees. he also told us about all the local characters, like the 80-something year old man named "muscles," who only just got electricity five years ago and still only has one lamp and not so much as a fan in his house. there are also the three brothers down the road.... rabbit, sugarfoot and jimmy..... who own a sawmill and only deal in cash. kevin says they all wear overalls and look exactly like the guys in the movie deliverance! kevin is also full of simple truths and sayings like, there are two things hard to find in the world: a homegrown tomato in wintertime and true love. he is a truly great guy.

after nashville, we set out again toward omaha, our last stop before dhaka. about ten minutes into our trip, we had to stop because i had left the doors to our trailer unlocked, a mistake i vowed never to make again. then, as we passed through st louis, i noticed in the rearview mirror that a car behind us was swerving wildly to avoid something in the road. sure enough, our trailer had come open again. now, there are two theories to explain this occurrence: 1. i am an idiot and made the same mistake twice, but the doors did not open until we had already been driving for about 7 hours, or 2. the roads of st louis are extremely bumpy (which they are) and the lock got bounced around so much that it opened on its own. i am stubborn and refuse to believe that i am an idiot, so i am going with #2. in the end, we lost two things, one of my 220$ hiking boots and my machete that i had brought all the way from belize. needless to say, i was bummed. the rest of the drive went smoothly and we were all relieved to arrive safely in omaha. all together, it was about 24 hours of driving.

when we arrived we realized that rain had leaked into the trailer along the way and our stuff had gotten wet, and some of it was ruined. we had to sort through our things and re-pack the boxes. we had been hoping for some relaxation time in omaha, but the next days were busy with packing, weighing and re-weighing our suitcases, trying to sell our car, opening bank accounts.... it was crazy. thankfully we have an awesome family and everyone chipped in to help out, not to mention throwing an awesome farewell fiesta. it was great to see everyone, including some friends who i hadn't seen in years. thanks to everyone for coming and thanks to our family for everything..... we really appreciate it!!

finally, after months of preparations, we were off.

*note, the original version of this post was accidentally deleted and this rendition is from sheela's memory. i am tired, cranky and have no time to rewrite what i had originally posted. more to come in the near future......