hoop dreams (VAL)

Matt plays for the US Embassy basketball team, which is part of a charity league founded as a way to a) bring more basketball opportunities to Bangladeshi teens, and b) raise money for causes like shoes for children in the slums. Awesome program, awesome people involved, awesome awesome *awesome*, but alas, this post is not going in such a positive direction.

Through this league, Matt and I have had the chance to get to know many middle-class basketball-loving Bangladeshi teens. One night after a pickup game, Matt got to talking with them about future hopes and dreams and career goals (one of the boys was 18 and about to graduate from high school). The resounding answer was "I want to play for the NBA someday."

I've heard this sentiment far too often as a teacher in Harlem. It slips so easily off the tongues of my students who are 5'4", out of shape, klutzy, completely devoid of work ethic, and--perhaps most importantly--NOT ON ANY SORT OF BASKETBALL TEAM. There is such a disconnect between the steps they take in their daily lives and their goals for the future. Yes, it's considered cute and ambitious when a kindergartener says she wants to be an astronaut, and it would be ridiculous to either squash a 5 year old's dream by citing statistics on admittance to NASA, or enroll her immediately into a first-grade science magnet program with "Dick and Jane do astrophysics" books. But when students are 17 years old and still have starry-eyed dreams about their future without any sort of action plan for getting there, I feel extremely frustrated that no one has connected the dots of how such goals are accomplished: hard work, patience, persistence, and luck. Daily. For many many years.

At least I can say that these Bangladeshi teens are on a basketball team. Still, it hurts to realize that my students--the aforementioned 5'4" lazy klutzes--would still probably beat the Bangladeshis at least half of the time. Most of the kids here just picked up a basketball a couple years ago; they can only dribble with their dominant hand, they forget how to shoot with someone in their face, and they're quick to foul on even the slightest head fake. I admire their newfound passion for the sport, but I have to admit that I was extremely disappointed to learn that the “miracle” mentality extended beyond the U.S. I had figured this was a byproduct of the entitlement generation, my spoiled students with their $200 sneakers and fancy iPhones and daily doses of ESPN and MTV constantly shoving images of “heroes” in their faces. I know my students face many hardships growing up in Harlem and Washington Heights and the South Bronx, but somehow I thought the much starker realities of growing up in Bangladesh would infuse teens here with a sense of responsibility, of maturity, of what it really means to work for something.

After Matt told me about this conversation with the Bangladeshi basketball players, I replied that they were lucky I wasn’t around to give them an earful about their vague NBA dreams. But now, I hope I do get the chance to talk with them before I head back to the states to resume educating my own troupe of NBA hopefuls. Perhaps we can all lose a little of our innocence: theirs about the ease of making it into the NBA, and mine about the realistic goals and futures of teenagers around the world.

toilet tip of the day, revisited (VAL)

Some of you may remember my previous encounter with a fancy hotel toilet (if not, read here). Well, I recently revisited the same washroom, and am happy to report that after spending a good 5 minutes with my legs crossed, trying not to pee my pants while I studied the very detailed instructions (luckily in English and with accompanying visuals, airplane-manual style) on the back of the toilet lid, I successfully operated the bidet-flush-combo-thing without completely soaking myself. Of course I took so long in the bathroom that Matt wondered if I had fallen in, but at least this time it didn't look like I had fallen in.

bangkok in 2 scenes (VAL)

Matt and I went to Bangkok for the weekend and were struck by the many contradictions the city presents: the cleanest and most orderly subways and skytrains we've been in that deposited us onto crowded alleyway markets and trash-strewn streets of back-to-back strip clubs; the intricacies of an ornate gold-and-tile Hindu shrine built against a giant concrete-and-glass mall; the westernized, modern culture of chain restaurants and shops with very uncultured men hawking trinkets, taxi rides, sex shows, and prostitutes right outside.

Here's a taste of two sides of the city.

The upscale super-mall:


And the muay thai boxing arena:

fishing (VAL)

Matt & I are taking a Bangla script class every morning for 2 hours. I will post later about the struggle of walking into an advanced script class on my second day in a completely foreign country, and how it's shaping my perspective on learning/reading challenges and frustration in school and teaching my own students back in Harlem and educational philosophy blah blah blah . . . but for today, I have some lighter fare to share.

Our classmates are a Korean girl named Kyung-Ai whose husband is working 100+ hours a week to jump-start his garment business; an absolutely hilarious Tamil Sri Lankan refugee named Alegs who is working on his PhD in Philosophy; and two Burmese refugees whose names I cannot even attempt to pronounce or spell and who shall therefore be known as Smiley and Serious for the purpose of this story.

To start each class, our Teacher asks us basic questions, like "how are you?" or "where do you live?" or "what did you do yesterday?" Today he asked Smiley the third query and Smiley began a tale, in Bangla, of what I'm guessing was a fishing adventure. The teacher then flipped the conversation to English and asked Smiley how people fish in Myanmar. Matt was absent due to work so he missed this and can't help me recreate the exchange, but here is my best attempt to paraphrase the conversation that followed:

TEACHER: How do you catch a fish in Myanmar?
SMILEY: With my hands.
TEACHER: That is only possible in shallow water. What about in rainy season?
SMILEY (with lots of gesturing): Well, then we put on water glasses and go swimming into the water and dive down and take an arrow, an aluminum arrow, and shoot the fish.
KYUNG-AI (looking super confused): How do you breathe under water? That is not possible.
TEACHER: You only go under for half-minute. We do this too, but without the spear. We use our hands. And we do not have any eye protection.
SMILEY: Sometimes we also use a net. Then you get lots of fish at once.
TEACHER: We use a bamboo hut to trap the fish in, that’s how we catch many at once. (to me) How do you Americans fish?
ME (with more authority than I should have, given my nonexistent experience): With a stick and a string and a hook.
TEACHER: And us too, but with three hooks and a float.
KYUNG-AI: What do you use to bait the hook?
TEACHER: We use bees, the ones that do not produce honey. We also use those things you find in the dirt (draws a squiggle on the board)
ME: Worms! That’s what we use! (notice the liberal use of “we”)
SERIOUS: In my country, I mean I have never done this, but I have seen it done, we sometimes take bombs and use that to hunt the fish.
KYUNG-AI: (laughs, then realizes he was serious, and throws a quizzical look)
SERIOUS: You know, throw a bomb into a lake and then scoop out lots of fish.
ALEGS: In my country, we would never waste a bomb on some fish. We save our bombs for people.

real housewives of dhaka (VAL)

Sunday July 5th was my first real day in Dhaka because a) I was recovered from jet lag and on normal hours, b) it was a weekday, and so c) Matt went to work and left me on my own. So what did I do?

Well, after Bangla class our driver took Matt to work, and I went along for the ride. On the way back, Amdad (the driver) took me to an office supply store, where he helped me negotiate on the price of some notebooks. He then drove me back home for lunch. By this point, Suchona (our housekeeper) had finished cleaning our apartment and doing our laundry, so I came home to a spotless place. I hadn't fully unpacked yet, and was planning on doing that while Matt was at work, but since Suchona took it upon herself to organize our closets (we have 5 spread between the 3 bedrooms), I now had an afternoon to kill.

So I summoned Amdad, who was waiting downstairs for as long as I wanted to stay in the apartment, hanging out with our team of 4+ full-time security guards behind the gated entrance to our building of 10 apartments. I asked him to take me to the beauty salon for a manicure and massage. 3 hours later, I emerged with my nails painted and neck considerably looser. I was even somehow able to relax amidst the stares of the entire spa staff and wealthy Bangladeshis getting pedicures.

Then Amdad went to pick up Matt from work, and when he came home we decided to head over to the American Club for some exercise. And by exercise, I mean talentlessly whacking tennis balls at each other while two ball boys chase after our missed shots and offer technique instruction. We then enlisted our favorite tennis pro to play doubles with us when Matt's friend came along. By the time we finished I was practically swimming in sweat – the humidity here, especially in monsoon season, is unbearable – so we headed up to the American Club pub for dinner and drinks while we watched the Federer-Roddick showdown. Dinner & drinks doesn’t sound extravagant, except when you’re eating a bacon cheeseburger and drinking margaritas in a Muslim country where all pork products and alcohol are strictly forbidden.

In summary: private car & driver, personal shopper, maid, gated home, security staff, beauty salon & spa, members-only country club, tennis, private restaurant with contraband menu. I realize this makes me sound extremely spoiled and snobby, and just for the record, I’ll concur that I’m the former but trying not to become the latter.

Now for some perspective:

This was one of my cheapest days I’ve spent anywhere, ever. The total cost of spa treatments was 600 taka, less than $10. We generously overpay both driver and housekeeper to the point of being told we’re fools, and they earn $4.30 and $7 a day respectively. Tennis court time is $1/hour. Food costs are so minimal that it’s silly to even add up the cents.

And secondly, if all Westerners were placed in 5 tiers (tier one being the most elite, and five being the base), Matt and I might fit into tier 3 or 4. Yes, the 18 year old Grameen interns live in hostels and travel by rickshaw, but there are also sprawling mansions near the American school that rival anything I’ve seen in Cherry Hills (the wealthy enclave of Denver). Most expats over 30 have their own compounds with personal security details, multiple drivers and maids, a cook, and imported furniture/art. Matt’s friend is house-sitting a place while the family is back in the States, and as I toured past the kid’s guitar collection, the secret wine cellar of rare vintages, the hand-painted family portraits, and the elaborate air conditioning system, I kept thinking what your world must become for this to be “home”.

All of this is to say that Bravo should consider piloting a “Real Housewives of Dhaka”.

independence day (VAL)

The image above is from a sign at the American Club, which was all decked out for 4th of July festivities.

This one is for Mom & Dad. Since moving to Colorado when I was 5 years old, our family tradition has always been to go down to the local swimming pool wearing all red, white, and blue and eat a pancake breakfast hosted by the neighborhood association. Well, here's a photo to show how differently we celebrate on the other side of the world ;)