Part 9: Home to Khulna

April 16, 2022 Choyghoria, Batiaghata,

District Khulna, Bangladesh

Dhaka wasn’t as bad as I thought it would be. It’s a nice place full of activity and strange city music: beeping horns, the constant babble of people, rumbling airplanes. But, it’s nothing like home. On our last night in Dhaka, I stood in the dokan across from our building, chatting with the guy who works there. I told him we were leaving tomorrow, and he wondered how I had liked my stay in Dhaka. I told him it was good, but I preferred the village. He didn’t want to believe me. Nobody prefers the village. But, as we left the concrete jungle and headed south, my eyes feasted on the green fields and tall, bright trees once again. The cha I drank on the ferry was better than ever, because it was “going-home cha.” My heart did leaps and bounds as we turned down our road, and my eyes scanned left and right for familiar faces. The small welcome party at our gate consisted of 2 neighbors, our new guard, and a very happy dog.

Upon our arrival, my dog promptly got into a fight with his arch-enemies, Jontu and Roki. I know better than to get between the hate of two dogs, but I wasn’t going to let these dogs eat my dog for supper: not in front of me anyway. To make a long story short, I got involved.

To make a short story long, I ran to the pile of dogs, who all had a death-grip on one another, and started kicking anyone I could. Sumon, a nice dada who always wears the same purple shirt, saw me in my distress and came to my aid. He took hold of Jontu, and I of Toby, and we successfully separated them. The reprieve didn’t last long. The dogs jumped out of our arms and started at it again. Somehow, in the fray, my hand got between the dogs, and I got myself bit. (I didn’t tell Sumon, because he is a Bengali and a Bengali would freak out at such a thing. Maybe even an American would have.) At this point, Sumon looked at me and said “Teacher, just come with me.” He picked up a stick and we devised a plan. I’m not sure what became of the plan, because I saw that my neighbors had a new puppy and got distracted. When I saw Sumon a minute later, he told me that the dogs were separated and in different directions. I found Toby, picked him up, and carried him home.

While putting Toby inside and giving him a sound scolding, I spotted some of my old badminton friends. They were playing football in the field where boys do such things as play football, cricket, and fly kites. Of course, I had missed them terribly. I got distracted again and headed out to have a reunion. I forgot all about the blood streaming down my hand. I sat on the brick wall as we watched football and told Brandi and Whitney everyone’s names. Someone brought their kite to fly in the breeze. We chatted about how they missed Travis’ family and if they had bought their kite or had made it. And then it happened: they saw my dog bite.

I was told in adamance that I would surely get rabies, my hand would fall off, or any other horrible thing they could think of. One person told me I had to get a shot, and another told me I needed an injection in my stomach. I ended up wrapping it for several days, successfully

avoiding rabies and the loss of a limb. I now take great joy in showing my healing scars to everyone.

Toby is fine. His scars are healing quite nicely, too, thanks to some purple spray that he abhors. For some reason, the people weren’t as worried for him as they were for me. I think he deserved better.

*(I also might add that Jontu’s human is one of my best friends. Jontu the dog is also one of my best friends. He knows my voice, and always greets me with a bear hug. I was not worried about him biting me, because he is a dog I know very well. My friend was horrified when he saw what his dog had done to me. I harbor no ill feelings towards Sudipto or his dog.)

I decided to take a long walk around the village. It was so good to come back home. I didn’t stop smiling the whole time. In the wake of Travis’ family leaving, I felt like I had been here my whole life. I had just spent the last six months hiding behind Travis’ family; barely talking when I was out with them because there was always someone with me who could speak better. But now, I was suddenly not the “new” person. I found I could understand people’s words better than I had thought!

We went to Shanto and Shati’s on the second day back and had a grand time. Of course, I had missed them all terribly. Antor and I combined powers and tried our best to bridge the language gap between Shanto’s and Trevors. At one point, Lisa was trying to say her hair was going gray, but missed. She ended up saying something I will not write in this letter. I have never seen Antor laugh so hard in my whole life, and I had tears streaming down my face. She didn’t realize what she had said, and everyone was very confused at the scene we were causing in the corner. When I told Lisa on the way home, she did not take it quietly.

The days are hot again, and the land is dry. The people look up for signs of rain. Some are out of fresh water, so they bring their pots and jugs to our house to use our well. My friends and I look to the sky and call for the rain to come down. “বৃষ্টি, তুমি কোথায়? তুমি কখন আসবে?" ("Rain, where are you? When will you come?”) I don’t think the rain is hearing us.

Trevor’s are taking to this place like it was made for them. The kids are making friends at lightning speed, and they spend every afternoon playing with them. Sometimes, the little kids come to play football in front of our house. If they beg hard enough, they may even get me to play with them. We walked to our neighbor’s house to see his forest of fruit trees and tall flowers. The new family has drunk cha in nearly every dokan in the bazaar. The village people are loving them, too. Every time I go out, they tell me: “If the new people continue to go around like they do, they will learn our language very fast. If the children continue to play with our children, soon, they will know all Bangla.”

American sports are thriving in Bangladesh. I taught the little boys how to throw football in front of our house, in exchange for them teaching me how to play cricket. Our guard even joined, and threw a perfect spiral on his first try. I was very proud. In Gopalgonj, Miss Trish and I gathered all the fallen mangoes and found a baseball bat. I pitched mangoes and she hit, demonstrating her enormous strength at the plate. Of course, the mangoes usually burst on impact, and I, being in the splash zone, enjoyed a shower of unripened fruit.

This month has been an interesting one. It is Ramadan, the month in which followers of Islam fast from sunup to sundown. They do not even drink water. After the sundown prayer call, the muslims all head home to break their fast. The other 10 percent, the Hindus, have just finished up their Saraswati Puja. I was talking with one of my Hindu friends last night, and he said he had been fasting over the puja time, eating nothing but fruit. In our house, we are skipping supper, but it has nothing to do with religion.

Our church is invited to Gopalgonj for Easter. We will all crowd into our beautiful brown van and drive an hour to Kelly’s house for an Easter service. Including our family, I think there will be 15 going from Khulna.

I’m not sure what else I’m supposed to write. I feel like these last two months have been very topsy-turvy and not organized at all; moving to Dhaka for a month, switching families, changing students and curiculems 3⁄4 the way through the year, a CSI meeting, getting used to a new pace of life, ect. It's all been good though.I feel very lucky to have had two awesome mission families. It’s been really, really hard to see Papa Trav’s go, and I’ve cried more than once, but at least I’m still surrounded by good people. Last night while sitting in a cha dokan talking with the village people, I felt so at home. The people have accepted me as one of their own, and it makes me feel bad for some of the attitudes I’ve felt towards foreigners. If you ever get the chance to help a foreigner feel welcome, take it. When you are on the receiving end, it means more than you may ever know.

Ok bye now. Come see me.

-Kalli