Wed Nov 11

 Warmer again today and the power was off long enough to run the battery backup out. So then we were on generator for a few hours. The WiFi spent some time out of commission also. After the power came back on it had a couple more times of being out for a few minutes.

Dipti fried fish for our lunch with rice and lentils and stir fried veggies.

2:00 Music class singing

At one point during day, I took note of a very blue sky and big white fluffy clouds, a rarity here seems like.

After school Jaira had bread making lesson. That was what she chose from our suggestion box paper that said, “choose a dish you want to learn to make this week”.

Leftover hot hamburger dip and chips for supper

Follow up school board mtg

8:00 outside, I visited with Tulshi a bit when I got Gentry from him so he could go home for the night. the frogs were singing and there was constant lightning in the sky.. like what we’d have called heat lightning back home

Jaira and I went up to the roof to hang a load of laundry. It felt cool! That is a wonderful feeling after m-o-o-o-nths of hot 😌

Tues. Nov 10 1st open window day of the season🤗

 Another nice little thunderstorm came thru during the night. Is This the last rain of the season???

And the day had a hint of cool to it with just a slight breeze…that perfectly comfortable weather🥰 We had the windows open all day. It was very motivating for me and I got the 2 main floor bedrooms fall cleaned and organized🧡

Dipti’s husband hauled a load of firewood in on his rickshaw van 

Tulshi’s been working on the lean to right outside our gate again in preparation for winter. Putting a framework of bamboo on 3 sides. And he’s got the palm leaves gathered also to cover the outside with. Lonnie wants to build another brick chimnea out there for this winter

Beef Chimichanga burritos for lunch with salad and applesauce

Miss Christina made poppyseed chicken and rice for supper😊

While the girls cleaned up the kitchen, Lonnie and I and the littles took a rickshaw van ride into Chakrakhali for a part for the main floor toilet.

Mon Nov 9 Dudjoy’s 18th birthday party

This morning I spent some time working on some sewing and sitting in on the classroom

Got a load of laundry on the line

A quick salad and butter fried chicken lunch

Jaira’s favorite place these days is on top of the wall that surrounds our house🙃 the wall is maybe 10” thick and 8 ft high? . She only plays on the back half, climbing trees to get up there,… I guess she’s enjoying the tail end of her childhood years before she hits teenager. After school today she did the last of her long division math homework up there..

Left the house shortly after 6:30, stopping by (night guard) Shunil’s place for the cakes that his daughter in law Shumi had baked and decorated. Then on to Kacchi Dine at Zero Point. https://maps.app.goo.gl/pRxt1aAvxVySfFYo8?g_st=ic I was so curious who his 10 chosen guests would be! They were his mom, aunt and 10-11 yr old son whose dad passed away earlier this year, Rajib and Chaity and Taritro(home of where we attend Chakrakhali S.S.) and then 2 other boys (relatives) Joy (another older S.S. boy) and another “cousin”. We just had no clue who he’d invite and when he asked for a plate of food to take home to his dad, I really wished we had done what we could to get his dad along also! His dad is in a wheelchair and runs a tea stall along the main highway thru Chakrakhali, There where all the rickshaw van drivers hang out, waiting for passengers…CSI supplied his dad’s wheelchair, back in the day, after his accident of falling from a tree and paralyzing from the waist down, is the story we were told.

Anyway, I asked Chaity for confirmation if we should have the cake 1st and yes. (That is their tradition) We put candles in only to have the waiters say no and something about the A.C. So we asked if they could just turn the AC off which they did but then said something about the glass.?. We wonder if maybe they thought we were gonna burn the candles all evening.???. We did end up taking the candles back out.  We sang Happy Birthday, then Dudjoy put a piece in our mouths and his mother gave him a bite, according to tradition. Then Taritro jumped in there and cut the rest of the cake and gave everybody a slice. We’d brought 2 cakes for our crowd of 18, just in case he’d over invited(which we were not gonna be surprised if that had happened) and wanted to have enough for everybody. We sent the extra cake home with him… then he opened his gift from us, a wallet. And Chaity gave him 500 Taka equal to a good days wage for the common laborer around here(just under $5 USD… when put in that perspective it’s a bit shocking again of how little these folks get by on OR how extravagantly much the Western world operates🤯)

Then we all enjoyed a plate of mutton biryani. A pile of spicy flavored rice with a couple pcs of bone in, very chewy goat meat and a chunk of potato.. mutton is their general term for goat or sheep meat and is a good option for non beef eating Hindus. 

Sun Nov 8 Hindu festival of the goddess of light

November puja, celebrating light overcoming darkness and the triumph of goodness over evil. 

Also worshipping goddess Kali- the deity of strength and peace. If you ask AI for a picture of her you can see one of the gods our employees and neighbors worship 😢 she is often bright blue, with 6? arms, her tongue sticking out, wearing a wreath of skulls with one in her hand, etc

After a supper of hot hamburger dip and chips, mandarins, cucumber and bell peppers with ranch, we took a rickshaw van ride to see all the lights. Candles lining village paths and rooftops of the nicer concrete houses, some  “Christmas lights”, and fireworks. We rode out to Batiaghata. On top of a higher bridge we could get a good aerial view then down asking the river and thru the bazaar where we stopped for essentials for the Bud. Then back to Chakrakhali to the School grounds where there was goings on and back home.

Monthly school board mtg

Thurs Nov 5 The Prime Minister visits Khulna City

 I’m completely out of fruit and veggies so Lonnie took the littles and I into Khulna

The Prime minister is scheduled to arrive in Khulna at noon.

I Have Never seen Khulna City So tidied!!?! Wow. Now we know what Khulna City is capable of looking like!! 

The streets were So wide with no vendors lining the edges!

The locations along the streets where trash is dumped and the cows come to find what they can, was all cleaned up and planted to trees!😍 as well as the stretch in front of Best Buy that is usually quite a nice sized vegetable market, as well as other locations… all planted to trees for the occasion!?! It looked like anybody with a broom could have a job in Khulna City today with all the Street and sidewalk sweeping that was going! Truly impressive. We had wondered if it would be terrible traffic on the morning of the prime ministers arrival, But It was probably the least we’ve ever seen it! The road was all patched up and smooth approaching the Gollamari bridge where there has been Quite the potholes. All the concrete and rope dividers that divide the traffic on the Gollamari bridge were taken out and just 1 nice clean looking white line down the center of the highway! And we just sailed right thru that usually Very congested intersection and over the bridge. Truly an incredible feeling! I’m glad we had a need to go into Khulna today, so we could observe Khulna City ready for the Prime Minister🤩

Wed Nov 4

 Lonnie had a scheduled eye camp locally here in Batiaghata

Dipti made Bangla noodles for our lunch

Sat Nov 7 Aleigha’s family visits

 And we finally get to meet “our” (from neighboring post, Gopalgonj) dear Miss Aleigha’s family🤗 

They all came to Khulna in the morning and shopped fabric, etc at Boro Bazar then to our house for lunch. The afternoon passed Way too quickly! But it is So nice to get just a tiny bit acquainted with her mom and dad, Curtis and Christy Froese from Manitoba and younger sisters Aysia 16 and Gabrielle 11. We’d had fun preparing and making lunch for them in the morning. Sonora Sunset Chicken Salad (Down Home Southern Cookin), apple sauce, and cheesecake squares.

The mom and sisters went up to the roof with the teachers and school children to do their 1st Christmas program practice of the upcoming season.

Krystal and I shared the “joys and woes” of life on the field while the men visited. Then we all went for a little walk into the village showing them the church house and visiting with the villagers that were around. 

And then, with the days getting so short, the driver wanted to leave by 4:30 so they wouldn’t have to drive in the dark

We had 2 invites for 7:00 tonight.. Come to find out they were both memorials of deceased grandfather/father.. we went to Topu’s 1st where there were people in her yard doing their yearly Hindu rituals in honor of Topu’s grandfather who left this life 14? years ago, she took us over to her neighbor Attoy’s house and served us the typical fare of rice with several rounds of thin lentil soups and curries. And then meeshti balls. Then we all got in our van and went to Shanto’s. Gentry fell asleep on the way, slept thru the evening, and put him right in his bed when we got home, sleeping til morning!.. one for the books

At Shanto’s, maybe we’ll just say, we covet your prayers as we navigate Bangla? tradition and our native members…