The staff here treated us to some sweets in honor of Bengali New Year. We were served plates full of rice, sweet yogurt, 2 kinds of mishti (literally "sweet") and bananas.
And here is the Job Creation (known as JC) staff that we are privileged to work with! They are a great bunch and have done so much to help us feel at home here.
And here we are at the river again! We left the house early to enjoy as much of the cool breeze possible before it got really hot. The boys spent a couple hours in the water and are slowly making friends with some of the children from the area. Here you can see the Mymensingh town side of the river and below is a sample of the other side.
I sat on this side of the river and read a book while the others splashed away. The morning flew by and we made our trek back to the point where a boat would ferry us back to the other side. A different boat came to pick us up and this guy wanted 30 taka to take us across. Now we came in the morning, after some bargaining, for 10. But this guy had heard that we paid 30 a couple of weeks ago and wanted to get in on the same good deal. We finally agreed to 15, with the help of a local bystander. As we were pulling in at the other side, I could hear 2 guys on top of the bank discussing how much we paid. "Did they pay 10 taka?" The reply was, "No, they paid 30 taka." Earlier in the morning an elderly man in tattered clothes came by asking for money and Austin decided to give him some. Later, when we were leaving, a young girl asked, "Aunty, aren't you going to give me some money?" I just looked at her in shock and said, "Why should I give you money?" I'm beginning to realize we can't do anything in this town without everyone finding out about it! What is really strange is to wake up during a power cut at night and hearing people discussing you down on the street.
So, how did I get from celebrations to our lives being an open book? I guess its just all part of life here!
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