week forty - Bollobhpur

as we’re split up and are rotating each week this week i was at our ‘home base’ located at Bollobhpur hospital. the week went by pretty slow monday being our day off was spent literally doing nothing and just resting! so nice! then tuesday me and Liz had early shift which meant being at the hospital from 7am-1pm. we got their, listened to the night reading and then went to chapel with the girls which lasts only 20-30mins. things at the hospital we’re really slow this week.

spending most of our shifts crocheting hats, hanging out with the nursing students and new moms with their babies. the dedication that these girls have to their schooling is incredible. we learnt that they are not allowed to be in a relationship (dating), they are not allowed cell phones and they are also not allowed to cook for themselves but have to eat what is prepared when its prepared. it seems like a very strict program, and its four years long! i have given up only a year for the BAS and i can’t imagine not having the limitations that these girls have. but they do have lots of fun together and they are incredibly hospitable to us. although some can be quite cheeky and forward, but all in good fun! one girl tried to feed me an unripe mango by shoving it into my pursed lips. she pushed so hard that my lips were sore after. i did not want it. i told her ‘i do not like’ and she mocked me and laughed, i then told her ‘ i do not like...’ and i pushed my fingers into her lips just as hard as she had to me. i think she got the hint because then she gave me the ‘thumbs up’ which here is equivalent to the middle finger back home! her and the girls around her laughed as i made a ‘shocked’ face. i started laughing with them... whatcha gonna do? they are slowly understanding us a little more and we are them. they tend to come over a lot and at any time. they stand at our open door and yell ‘i come in?’ and then proceed to walk right in! the other day i was awoken from a nap with a girl knocking on my bedroom door i peered out to see her grandmother, mother, aunty and nephew just chilling in our living room! its quite comical but can also become annoying if you let it get to ya.

as for hospital work... there wasn’t much to do. me and liz did two mornings at an antenatal clinic and checked over seventy women in total. it wasn’t till saturday that four women were in labour! i decided to continue monitoring ‘my mom’ into the night doing hourly check ups and hanging out with her through her contractions. at midnight i had to go home and eat something to stay awake then went back, Celia gave me her cell number and told me to call when she started pushing, Bek did too. around one thirty am and lots of walking laps around the hospital (small building) the nurse looked at me and said ‘okay’ i assumed she meant ‘fully dilated and ready to push’ she did. i called Celia, who tried to wake up Bek but failed. so Celia came and helped me out. it was a good delivery, the mom did amazing, baby cried right away! beautiful little boy again! and 3.1kg! usually the bangla babies are around 2.5kg so he was quite a chunker to their standards! born at 2:05am! got to bed around 3:30am and took awhile to fall asleep as you usually are on a little of an adrenaline rush after a delivery!

the other not so exciting news of the week, there is a rat in our bathroom... its started around wednesday when me and liz gave our house a deep clean, we noticed a few droppings on the floor. then friday we had droppings in the sink with chew and claw marks on the soap... by sunday a small handful of droppings sat in the sink with more soap scrapes and also claw marks on the wall where he attempts to get home. i’m hoping we can get some poison, those of you who know me know how terrified i am of those critters. luckily we have two bathrooms and i know use the other. we also have many large spiders but i’m not too worried about those! we also have a birds nest in the wall of our room, their are these vents all over the house and the birds have chosen the one in our room to build a nest! not a fan of being woken up to the chitter chatter of them so we attempted to get rid of the nest... failed. so we jammed sticks into the holes...failed. so we tried sound blocking by shoving toilet paper into the holes to try and diminish the sound... sorta worked!

one more story about animals... the monkeys. terrifying!!! the other day we wanted to go to the hospital to check on the mom’s we delivered the day before and when we walked outside the monkeys were guarding the wall around the gate out. we walked slowly and carefully but once we got near they hissed at us and barred their teeth, which sent us running back. i picked up a rock thinking i could scare them off. no such luck. we waited until something must have scared them off and they took off running. i was first one to check it out and got through the gate only to find the tree nearby held a dozen monkeys all chattering at me! the girls all made it through the gate and we ran for it making it safely away without being attacked! monkey’s are not nice creatures, we’ve seen them get mean and heard stories of attacks! hence the caution we took!

its funny sometimes i feel like i’m living in the olden days, cooking over the fire and having to pump water outside to have a cold bucket shower! (when the power goes off it doesn’t take long before the water stops inside the house) when me and liz decided to clean the house we washed floors with a bucket and rags. deciding to make it more fun we put the rags on our feet and skated around wiping the floor as we went. some of the nursing students dropped by and stared at for a food few minuets before leaving. i’m sure they think we’re strange for the things we do and how we dress around our house wearing shorts and tank tops! so scandalous! (when we go out we have to wear shawl kameez (long shirt, baggy pants and a scarf))

we also have a night time guard named Beboo... he’s a funny man who doesn’t speak a word of english and thinks we understand his bangla perfectly... we nod and say our ‘hei’ and ‘nei’s’ at appropriate times and he laughs and its all good! he basically says the same thing each night wanting to make sure our door is locked and the outside light on. he loves Bed and often brings her a handful of nuts. probably cuz she’s the one who talks to him the most! but he hands her the nuts through the fence around our outside hallway and makes us feel somewhat like a caged monkey in the zoo!

i’ve been making friends and having a lot of fun! craving cheese, something i haven’t had in a while! the girls found kit kat bars at the big market and that was my first chocolate in three weeks! (record for me!) doing well and looking forward to head to Karpasdanga again next week. although its my first week not with Naomi! thanks for your prayers!

till next time...