Bangladesh's Expatriot MCCers

On September 29, Rebecca and Philip had their baby, Hannah Adaleet, at the Lamb Hospital in northern Bangladesh. Hannah is blonde with blue eyes and was 8 lbs. 3 oz. Rebecca was quite brave and did not take any medication or anesthesia during the birth. They are adjusting and recovering and will soon fly to Dhaka to finish up some work before they move to a village near Modipur, which is about 45 minutes from my house in Muktagatcha.

Ethel and Jerry went to Dinajpor to see Rebecca and Philip the day after Hannah was born. The new country representatives had to have some meetings with Rebecca before they left for Thailand. Jerry and Ethel went to Thailand on Monday for an MCC country representative meeting. They will return next weekend – about the same time as Carolyn, another Salter from Canada, is due to arrive. Patrick and I are hoping that we will get to go to Dhaka as everyone else will be there.

Patrick and I went to the MCC Muktagatcha office twice this week. We went first on Monday to get money. What would have been an hour trip in North America turned into a four hour trip. It was a rainy day and we became somewhat stuck at the MCC office. The street right outside the gate doesn’t drain well and as a result the street becomes a river when it rains. As we sat in the office waiting for the rain to stop, we saw ducks swim down the road. The office staff told us to wait until it stopped raining and served us lots of tea – I think I had 5 cups that day. Finally we decided that we would spend the night at the office if we didn’t leave immediately. So we waded through the water in the street to find a rickshaw. The water was only ankle-deep, but we could only imagine what was in the water.

While we were at the office, Arun, office supervisor, invited us to lunch at the office the next day. The occasion was that Arun’s daughter had passed her exam to graduate from college. College in Bangladesh is like 12th grade in the U.S., and you must take a test to pass. Last week the results for the entire nation were released. Education is very important in Bangladesh and so when a student successfully passes their exams there is a lot of celebration. I ate a lot of mishty (very sweet sweets – literally dripping with sugar) given to me by successful students.

I was excited to receive mail on Thursday - letters from Maria, Bridget, Sharon, Grandma Wingert, and my parents!