Praise the Lord! I have made it through three weeks of teaching. I am not really sure where to begin. I suppose I should say that I have had a few moments where I have questioned my ability to function here as a teacher, and others where I have felt like I really could do this. It really is finding a balance somewhere in the middle that allows us to be human in it all!

The first day went well, I only went to the wrong classroom once, and the worst of the day was teaching my year 8’s my year 9 introductory lesson! The students here are quite forgiving though and I am therefore enjoying my time so far. As for quirks you will only find in Bangladesh…I have learned the hard way that you are never to leave your cup of tea unattended for even a moment! Even worse is your biscuits or bread that you planned on having…it may just have a cockroach in it when you go to take a second sip! Yes you learn the hard way around here to always SLAM the toilet seat before you sit on it, always shake the toaster before you put your toast in, and be sure to turn on the light in a room before you enter it, wait a moment, let the roaches hide, and then proceed to enter. I have only been violently ill once, and have managed to find my way around the city a bit more. Most of the time I walk home from school despite the constant heckling and people literally staring at me, (I mean they come up to your face, about 4 inches away and look at you, this is usually right before they take a photograph or run to tell their friends). Apparently here it is not rude to stare!

So around 3 weeks ago before school started, a group of the teachers headed out to explore the canals of Old Dhaka. We also visited the Armenian Church and the Lalbagh Fort. Since then, we had our first staff retreat out at the Hope Center, which I will tell you more about next time, and now I am finally able to say that I have survived a month!

Firstly, the fishing ports! Well, quite the experience really. We hired boat to ride up and down the main river and I got some wonderful pictures of how the people live by the water; washing their clothes with children playing, which was really a blessing. One rather interesting thing is that they did have a small motor on the boat that they would use from time to time, however, it was right in the center of the boat which allowed water to come in! So about every 20 minutes or so we would be asked to move off to the sides so they could scoop out the water!

The smell of garbage is definitely obvious, and the people still stop and stare, even from their boats! Poverty and pollution are everywhere juxtaposed rather seamlessly with well built “rich” apartment blocks and beautiful gardens. I have managed to capture a few pictures of this in my long walks through the city. I am enjoying my time here, and am getting surprisingly used to how things are.

The Armenian church is the oldest standing church in Bangladesh and was erected in 1781 by Orthodox American Christians who started entering the country for trading in the 12^th century. The church seats about 100 people as well as a choir in an old fashioned wooden choir loft. Within the walls of the church that there was a unique sense of tranquility, something that is a rare gem here. The church is still used today and has services on Sundays, which is rare here since the holy day is Friday.

The Lalbagh Fort was started by Prince Muhammad Azam during his 15 month reign in 1678. He was recalled to Aurangzeb and the Fort was left to Shaista Khan, who reigned until 1688, yet did not finish the Fort due to the death of his daughter Bibi in 1684. A tomb was made specifically for her.

We were not permitted to take photographs, yet the inside is beautifully covered in floral tablets and white marble. The Department of Agriculture has taken over the Fort as a historic site as they are still discovering many underground passageways and tunnels. It is uncertain where all of them lead. The mosque, the museum, and the gardens were well kept and housed beautiful flowers. It is interesting to see how many couples come here to sit in the gardens. You don’t usually see men and women holding hands in public, but in gardens and parks they do and it’s quite cute!

On the way home from the trip the roads were flooded! Not something that happens often in Canada but during monsoon season here it is a regular occurrence, and people just embrace it the same way they do a lot of things here that we would find to be quite appalling! Notice how the child is sitting on the corner of the back of the rickshaw, the man riding on top of the bus, and the child hanging out the window! Certainly different here!