Sat. May 10 Field Trip/Yr End Play Day

8:30 we loaded up with Jared’s and headed to the Dhaka Zoo. 

Definitely not American style, but exhibits none the less! 

Started off with Spotted Deer… looked like full grown Bambi’s.

Monkeys, with all the cute antics that they specialize in.

Emus that made a most unique sound, white pea fowl, the most beautiful tigers, Asian black bears, lots of bird exhibits- a L a r g e pen of shore type birds and other pens of kites, humongous vultures, more pea fowl, lots of snakes but every sign was labeled India Rock Python(those must be the easiest to come by🤷🏼‍♀️), the most visible hippo- we nearly missed because he looked like a large pile of mud-the others were just bits of a hump out in the water or a snout coming up for air occasionally, a rhino, at a very noisy cage of gibbons we took a break and snacks and drinks, the vervet monkeys were right next, many pens of horses often with one donkey, beautiful zebras, Asian elephants(no rides going on today😏), and the last exhibit was otters…. While we stood there, they all sudden made a beeline to one end, up a “ladder” and stood in a line on the concrete wall against the fence chattering away, a zoo attendant came out of a little shed with a bucket of fish and they followed him along the wall till he started tossing the fish in and they all slipped into the pool of water catching the fish😊.

On the way out we got hung up with Bengali children trying to sell their wares… Annslie on her trike received a big balloon on a stick, then a package with a bubble blower and solution.. of course the daddy was expected to pay for the treats😉 on our way back to the van where the rest already were we met a young girl running with her big bunch of balloons and she was full of smiles (she had just made a successful sell with the rest of our crew🤗) 

And we survived the day!! 102* F. with a real feel of 112* 🥵 the zoo trails were mostly shaded and we brought plenty of drink along. And guess what, we were not the only crazy visitors there that day either!!?!

We cooled off on the drive to Herfy’s and enjoyed crispy chicken wraps, hamburgers, crispy fried chicken, nuggets, fries, strawberry and mango milkshakes and blueberry fizzes😁.

Naton said he was gonna come around 4:00 or 4:30.. he did eventually show up around 6:30 or later, just when the cookies were coming out of the oven, then stayed till 11:00! S e v e r a l rounds of Blokus were played. Maddie took my place while I mixed up a batch of summer sausage. Then we pulled out the questions for discovering your fashion style and also “if you were a flavor, what flavor would you be?” Naton was intrigued and took pictures of the questions saying it would be fun to ask his friends!😅

BTW, these pages of questions are in a kid’s activity book that Lydia Bender sent along for the girls, but I think the parents have had just as much fun with it🤩

Friday May 9 Day of Worship

 Last worship service at the clinic as Pink City residents. Naton, our interpreter, wasn’t feeling well so we didn’t leave till 10:30. We sang a few extra songs, Jared brought his prepared thoughts that he had taken the time to interpret, then Miss Shana got up with the school children and they gave their little End of yr school program. 

Jared’s and us were invited to our language teacher’s house for lunch,  John and Paninna’s. We walked over there since they live close to the clinic. Their abode is on the 5th floor of an apartment building. No A.C. Paninna’s sister was there also. We sat in the living room and visited till John and her daughter came around. It was so special to finally meet her children! Laura is 22 and has 2 more years of medical school, studying to be a doctor. Songlap is 17 and is also deep into his studies. Laura’s bedroom has a large wooden table(larger than their dining room table!)in it for her studies! Songlap was quieter and more reserved but Laura is a bubbly, friendly, sweet younger version of her mom🥰

Paninna served us rice, pork curry, fried fish steaks,(boiled) egg curry, and then for dessert, flan! And then pulled out icecream bars yet too! Oh, and can’t forget! She’d made us cold sweet tea also!🤗 We really enjoy that paired with Bangla food! And then Paninna took it as a real compliment when Brianna asked her if I’d brought it! Cause she was not feeling real confident about the outcome, but it was perfect! And by the way, us Americans can get in such a rut about “things we gotta have”! Paninna proved to us you can make sweet tea in a large rectangle plastic box with a lid and serve it up to your “Sunday dinner” guests out of 2 liter coke bottles! I asked her where she’d learned to make flan, she said one of her Japanese students had taught her that one! 

We opted to not shop right after lunch since it was a little later and the littles were needing a nap. And decided we’d each take our own rides then.

After we got home, our family decided to go for groceries right away, after all, to hopefully beat the evening traffic and an easy way to get Annslie  asleep for her nap. We ended up going to 2 UniMarts when the 1st one didn’t have some imperative items. It was pretty hilarious, we were just pulling out of our parking spot at the 1st UniMart when Jared’s were pulling in and they were able to use our convenient spot and then just as we were turning into the last upstream stretch of the expressway we discovered we were right behind Jared’s following them into Pink City!

Thurs. May 8 Last Day Of School!

 Hmm.. guess nothing else got recorded for this day..

Fri. May 2 - Tues. May 6

 I got behind in my journaling here… so these days run together…

But Annslie had another medical issue that came up and we decided to go get it checked out. So after a supper of Jamaican Jerk Chicken over rice, we dropped the big girls off at Jared’s and took Annslie to the hospital… that’s where we go for anything of medical concern whereas at home we would just go to our local clinic. And then the only thing available at this hour was ER , of course. So, we got to experience the Dhaka Evercare ER without a real a emergency altho we wanted to check it out and make sure we weren’t dealing with a UTI. We did not have to wait a long time, they sent us home with sample cups and a bill of $35? Now, the trick of getting a urine sample from a toddler that is not potty trained and only a very small sample cup 🧐 we managed tho 🤪

And the next day after language class found us back at Evercare to see a pediatrician. At the end of the visit he wrote up a prescription. So we went to the pharmacy there and picked it up. Only cost around a $1 each for the 3 prescriptions. And they all were for her runny nose that he had noticed she had😂 a nasal saline, an antihistamine, and zinc!

Sometime Lonnie got the samples delivered to the proper place with instructions to come back at noon the next day to get the results.

The next day we took the whole family after school hours to pick up the results. We needed to see the pediatrician to have him explain the results. So back up to the pediatrician and wait till he got back from lunch break. And nothing really was detected in the samples and her symptoms disappeared the next day after the ER visit… it was an experience and we got familiar with the hospital, parking, and Annslie even let the Dr listen to her heart and look in her mouth the last visit… otherwise she mostly just covered her face with her hands🙈

One day the school children had a party for an incentive goal reached- water balloon fight on our roof and then walked to the dokan for treats- icecream, chips, and a drink🤗

One evening Sayd ali took our family in his rickshaw to Neela Market. Past the fair ground with all the rides and I don’t know where in America there would be as many places to eat, in the same amount of area, as this place!!?!! It would be interesting to know the count in this square mile or 2! We ended up getting some supper at a place called The Pink City Hotel ( not a hotel, just a restaurant) the whole evening we were never sure what Sayd Ali’s actual intent of this outing was!?! With our language barrier we could never get to the bottom of if we were just out for a ride or if we were s’pose to say if we wanted to stop somewhere? 😏

One day, we also decided that we would shoot for May 15th as a move to Khulna date..

We have throughly enjoyed our 3 months here in Dhaka and will miss it and the lifestyle and friends we’ve made! Beyond Jared and Brianna’s family and Miss Shana, there’s 3 times a week with the ladies at the clinic, Naton (interpreter), 

and then our Pink City friends… Saydali the rickshaw wala that comes by at least once a day in his signature blue plaid pajama style pants and T-shirt, red stained mouth from a chewing habit, a middle aged belly, and zero English. 

Then there’s Habib.. a younger man with a shy wife and 7 yr old autistic son.. he left his village because things were not good.. not enough jobs.. too much idleness. He works for Pink City as an electrician living in an abandoned house here a couple streets up that Pink City said he could live in while he’s working for them. It’s a concrete,2-story, house with no glass in the windows or doors- they’ve put pcs of metal and boards and hung up curtains for privacy. But Habib seems to be a very respectable young man, dresses nicely, good manners, has learned English, can’t get himself to charge us for the work he does for us… he says “ I just like to come here!” The other day he met Lonnie headed out to go for cha and he asked Lonnie if they could come to our house for tea instead! He likes our iced sweet tea😊 and, I imagine… the A.C. and the friendship😌 We’re definitely gonna miss him! He’s a fine fellow and I’m hoping life will prosper for him and his little family💙

There’s the Dumni pharmacy dokander “doctor” that likes to associate with us also. He wants us to come some evening between 6-9 before we leave yet. He speaks some English and says, “It doesn’t matter what the religion, a man’s a man.”

Oh yes, and the neighbor children Alishbah and Arab that you hardly ever see without the little sister Aleena on big sister’s hip or being pushed in the stroller.

Wed. May 7 Last Day of Language Class

 Today was also our language teacher’s birthday 🎂 when we asked her which birthday this was for her.. she would just say… I’m O l d! Twice your age!! But, in the end, we found out she is only 14 yrs older than Lonnie, 54 yrs.

Thursday May 1

 In the evening we tried out the Bamboo Story restaurant just outside the Pink City gates https://maps.app.goo.gl/AZxTExwUhkdP7yLLA?g_st=com.google.maps.preview.copy

We decided Annslie was making up for lost time (and she was eating her favorite foods 🙃) ate French fries till the pizza came out and then ate 2 pieces of pizza!!

Wed. April 30

 Maddie was feeling much better and able to go to school today😊

The antibiotics that most of us are on seem to be turning the tide for us!👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼👏🏼🥳🥳🥳🥳

Truly feels like a miracle.. Annslie was definitely hit the hardest, but is pulling thru☺️

After Paninna checked our tests she grilled each of us with 35 Bangla question sentences that we had to reply to in Bangla.🤯

Our homework was writing sentences with the question words. 

Left a little early (12:15) and went by the jute store 🛍️ ☺️

 Lunch at the clinic today was The Best!✨ Beef curry (tender chunks of beef) rice, potato-carrot stir fry, French fries,  and the dhal was especially good this time also- a wee bit thicker with a nice amount of cilantro, fresh squeezed lime juice over it.. fit for a king😉 I’d brought a pitcher of iced sweet tea along to go with it.

We finished our homework sentences.

Went for a walk around the canal circle again.

Picking up bananas on our way home. Didn’t have a small enough bill so he told us to catch it next time!

Lonnie went to Jared’s for some bookkeeping lessons.

The girls and I played Golf(card game)