Isolation

 We made it!! We are back in NZ. We touched down, taxied and then received the announcement that after 27 hrs of flying we were going to be put on a bus to Rotorua. To be honest though, the trip down to Rotorua was lovely. It was great to see the NZ countryside again. It was a bit rainy but by the time we arrived in Rotorua the sun was out. We had to sit on the bus for another 20mins to half an hour for processing but we were in luck, they were taking families with children first, woohoo, I knew we had children for a reason!

Our Isolation hotel (The Ibis) has been great. The staff are friendly, the food is plentiful and the outdoor area is open 24/7. Here's an arial view of our walking area.

There's a small patch of grass that up to 15 people are allowed on. It's amazing how that patch of grass is so nice to sit on. The kids were all given bubbles, chalk, skipping rope and a foam fitness dodecahedron. We used the dodecahedron to play our invented game of hand ball/squash/volleyball in a small area of the carpark. The area had three sides so the dodecahedron could bounce off the sides and got incorporated into the game. It was great fun until I lost the dodecahedron on the roof! The sad thing is that we are on the top level of the hotel and can see it sitting on the roof of a lower adjacent building. It's on the roof of the building just jutting into view on the bottom right of the photo.

We've had one negative covid test on day three and had another test yesterday. We are still awaiting the results of this test as this will determine whether or not we will be home for Christmas!

Temperatures, the final hurdle

 The time had finally come, our flight was confirmed and we checked in online. We had our negative covid tests, our isolation was booked in NZ. Everything was set to go but we knew we needed to have a temperature check before we could even enter the airport. I had a bit of a cold that was almost cleared up but the rest of us were all feeling well. We were dropped to the airport and joined the line to enter the airport.

I was at the head of the line and DC brought up the rear. Once we got to the top of the line and they checked our papers, the man took out 5 forms for health checks. He wrote down random temperatures on each of the forms with out even checking our temps. He then pointed a digital thermal thermometer at my forehead and waved me through. I went passed him and turned around to watch the others getting checked. It was hilarious, the thermometer was not even on! 

There was quite a bit of rigmarole in the airport of needing to get copies made of covid test results and different desks all over the place. There was also a bit of a problem with our stop over in Brisbane (possibly because we were Kiwi's without a visa) We don't really know the issue but they got it sorted after some long phone calls. That being said, once we were through customs we were ready to board the plane. We were all given face shields that we would need to keep on for the next 27hrs of our journey home. The boys did so well and no one complained about the masks and shields. It was just one of those things you had to do. We were really well fed and we all managed to get a bit of sleep along the way.

 

Final meal

 We were down to our last days in Dhaka. I got some last shopping done to take back for Christmas presents. All going well, we'll be out of Isolation on the 24th December!

We bumped into some friends of ours who invited us for lunch on our final day before we headed to the airport. Two are Chinese and one from Brazil. We were served delicious home made dumplings and enjoyed a trip to their roof top for one final look over the smokey city of Dhaka. These friends were very cautious with Covid so we felt very safe visiting them.

Off to Dhaka and farewells

The time came where we had to say our final farewells to the staff/friends of Chandpur. We love them so much!! And we also needed to say goodbye to the puppies born right outside our dining window. It was so great for the boys to see these puppies grow in the last few weeks before we left.

To leave Bangladesh, both the government and the airline require a negative covid test. We have already been to the testing hospital in Dhaka twice, once with our eldest son and once with another Kiwi friend.

If you are ever going to catch covid, this is the place. There are crowds of people crammed into a waiting hall where social distancing is pretty difficult. 

It was a long wait for our results to come through and it was just one more barrier to get over before we could fly. Most peoples results had come through within 24 hours but ours were taking a bit longer. As the  hours passed family were also anxiously awaiting the results but finally at about 2pm we all came back covid negative.

A bit of a fright

It was a normal day waking to the sound of roosters, chickens, turkeys, dogs, geckos (tikatiki). The hostel boys were starting their morning singing where their amazing voices filled the air accompanied by drums that played their own beat not resembling the song being sung.

For the last few weeks I would roll over, grab my phone and check our airline app. We were now only 5 days our from our return home but we knew that anything can happen with the current state of travel with Covid still around the world. On this morning I grabbed my phone to the heart dropping viewing that our flight to Doha was cancelled. Our flight from Doha to Auckland was still confirmed but that wasn't very helpful if we couldn't get to Doha. I grabbed my computer and logged into our managed booking to see who we could contact but strangely, the flight was not marked as cancelled on there. DC called the airline and was on hold for nearly an hour. I found their facebook page and sent a private message hoping that someone could confirm the status of our flight. Both of us received the same information
that the flight was still confirmed. The mobile app continued to say the flight was cancelled even after our departure.

Countdown is on

Let's back track a bit

Here we were in Bangladesh enjoying a roof top lunch with our friends and counting down the days until we started our long journey home. I kept busy continuing to do accounts, cleaning up the house and making sure the boys bags were packed. Dad was recovering well and seemed to be back on his feet and walking 40 minute walks around the neighbourhood. It was a strange time that went very slowly, the excitement of being home in NZ with family and friends was exciting but I also enjoyed the slowness that time seemed to be going so we could really savour our last weeks here in Bangladesh.

Here's a little confession: This was the easiest pack up ever! All we had to do was sort our personal stuff and then each day I would put items on our table that were free for staff to take. The rest of our household items had been supplied to us from the mission and we are just so grateful to everything they have done for us to make this time here amazing. And here's the biggest confession, we just walk away and someone else cleans the house for us (we did pay them of course!) I absolutely love the staff here on the compound and they really did become like family. Saying goodbye to everyone was a sad moment as goodbyes always are but we know we will return one day (maybe for shorter stints). Our ties and roots with Bangladesh are certainly not over.

Off to ICU

Dad's op has gone well and he's now being transferred to ICU.

A long way away but we're OK.

 It's been a while since I did any updates and so much has happened. I'm not going to fill in any gaps just yet but I will bring things up to speed. Much has happened very quickly that has changed our plans.

In a nut shell, my Dad is prepped and ready for open heart surgery as I write. About a week ago and totally out of the blue, he had a heart attack while out walking. He managed to get home, call his doctor who said call 111 and the rest is history. Dad has shown no signs of heart issues. His BP is great, he's been keeping active as usual so it was quite a shock to get a call on messenger to see my Dad in a hospital bed. Apparently he has a 100% blockage on the right side of his heart and the left has severe blockages.

It's 3:55am as I write and although I am not sleeping I am also not fretting. I know God's got it all under control. We just pray that the surgery goes without a hitch and that recovery is quick and without complications.

In saying all this, our plans have changed. We had decided to stay on for another year in Bangladesh. We applied for a 1 year visa extension but were only given a 3 month extension until the end of December. We did think we would apply again for a further extension after December but decided not to after the news of my Dad. It feels the right thing to come home. I want to be there with my parents now as I'm the only child. I feel a sense of responsibility to be there as my parents age and although they are not your typical oldies and I certainly don't need to coddle them, I feel the need to be closer.

We have tickets booked to depart on the 8th December. It's an interesting time to fly with Covid so prevalent in the world right now. Flights are not easy to get back to NZ unless you have copious amounts of money and even then, flights are limited. I feel so blessed to get the booking we did because a few weeks ago it would have been really hard to find a booking. The double blessing is that all going to plan, we will be out of our 14 day isolation on the 24th Dec. Our eldest daughter is also coming over from Aussie so we will be together as a family and so for that, I'm extremely grateful.

So what about Bangladesh? We still want to be a part of what's going on here and we can do some things from a distance. Once Covid has settled we will look at options of shorter visits back and forth. Bangladesh is not finished fo us, it just looks a bit different.

Mangos, mangos and more mangos

I love mangos! I love mangos even more when they are growing outside your front door. I also love Jackfruit and you guessed it, we also have that growing outside our front door.

Harvesting the mangos has been great fun but not for everyone (I'll get to that later) The people in the video all live on our compound.

What we have since learned is that two of the boys have an allergy to the sap and skins of the mangos and have rashes, spots and swelling. The joy of mangos is a bit tainted for them now but locals tell us they will still be able to eat the flesh as long as someone peels the mango for them. We wont try that just yet though.

Pandemic update

Things here are not too different in terms of the pandemic. We are still staying on the compound and only going out for food. Our boys have to stay on the compound so they have not left since March 10th apart from once for Levi and Caleb to help with shopping. We still wear our masks and wash well when we return. The cases of covid-19 have been rising day by day and the government are just putting into action a colour zoning system. They are trialing it in Dhaka first. If you are red zoned then your area gets shut down completely. You can't leave your house, even for food. Apparently food will come around on carts to buy at the gate. Currently there are 71,675 confirmed cases with 1000 deaths and that will not be accurate as testing rates are not enough to capture the true magnitude of the situationL locked down areas  get blocked off like this one in the  picture. We have not heard about our area yet.

Some lovely NZ people have transferred us funds to help out the people who have been affected by loss of job etc. It's such a privilege to be here on the ground and able to help people out first hand. Thanks so much to all of you who have contributed. 

Personally we are still so grateful to be on this amazing compound. The boys are certainly not bored and have so much space and freedom to swim and climb trees. Internet access is pretty good most of the time so they can also do their school work, play games and catch up with friends online too.

Surprise package

The other night DC picked his jeans up off the bedroom floor and then proceeded to stand on a snake. It fell out of his pants!  It was actually only a baby water snake which we often see swimming in the pond (Pukura) but we've never had one in the house. The picture is not the actual snake but one about the same size. Ours might have even been a bit smaller.

The water snakes are fascinating to watch swimming. You can spot them as they leave a 'V' shaped wake behind them and just their little heads poke out of the water.

They are scared of you so when the boys go swimming they are not a threat. 

Note: the pics are not the actual snakes in our pond so may be a different type of snake.

Crazy times

Since my last post the world has gone crazy. Lockdowns, social distancing, fighting over toilet paper, deaths, covid-19, fear, conspiracy, masks or no masks, hand washing, flights cancelled, borders shut. So much has happened in such a short time and yet a whole lot of nothing has also happened for a whole lot of people. My family and friends around the world are confined to their houses and coming up with various forms of entertainment.

So what does it look like here? Firstly, my family who were coming to visit could no longer come. We should have been having 3 lots of visits from family but alas they have had to adjust plans. This seems to melt into insignificance compared to those dealing with the loss of loved ones, a least we will see our family again. 

As a country we have seen changes that happened a little slower than NZ and they also look a bit different. No one is fighting over toilet paper! I was almost embarrassed to be a westerner and see toilet paper hoarding reported in local news papers here. It's a non essential item, wash your bottom with water like over half the world does you idiots! ahem, anyway back to what's happening here. At first there were news articles and people were told to wash hands, this was pretty stock standard practice around the world. Some countries started encouraging people to wear masks and a few started to be seen on the streets. I recall one particular day when DC and I walked to the market, this was in the early days of the virus, people started to cover their faces near us and pull their children aside. We realised they were fearful of foreigners. From that point on we started wearing masks to help alleviate the locals fears of us. This did make a difference and there began to be a camaraderie between mask wearers of placing your hand over your heart as you passed one another. It was like a thankful acknowledgement of thinking of others.

All public transport was cancelled early on apart from cycle rickshaws. Schools were closed down before NZ schools were. The roads are so clear and there is hardly any tooting of horns. It's very strange to have everything so quiet. There are no trains or launch horns sounding, it's incredibly peaceful. There is also less pollution and we can see the stars at night.

Currently we stay home unless getting food supplies from the markets. DC and I do all the shopping for everyone. Going to the market is not like going to the shops in NZ. Social distancing is encouraged here but near impossible to do. Markets have small alley ways you need to walk through and now that there is a curfew from 6pm to 6am, everyone needs to shop during the day time. We used to shop in the evenings when it was cooler but we now arrive back with masks full of sweat and our backs dripping wet. I don't want to complain though because we can afford food and food scarcity is not a problem. Unfortunately the poor are the real victims here, lockdown means they can not earn even the small amount they were previously, this then means they don't eat well and are more likely to get sick while living in close quarters with others. I fear there might be more deaths from poverty than from the virus itself. It also means that when you go out people are more likely to come touch you begging for money, how can you say no or brush them off for touching you? I can't turn a blind eye so we give where we can. We just make sure we wash well when we get home pray for God's protection.

This picture is on a very good day when the market was about to shut so very few people were around. It's very strange to see it so clear. This looks like ideal social distancing. This is who I buy our potato, onion, garlic and ginger from. 

We are also fortunate that we live in a smaller city. In the bigger city there is a much bigger presence of army and police. I think we have it pretty good where we are right now.

Teaching and playing

Our older boys have been heading to the school here in Chandpur three afternoons a week to help with English lessons and pronunciation in particular. It's so wonderful to see them so willingly helping out. 

Friends of the same sex tend to have far more physically contact than in the west. Boys and men will often walk the streets holding hands or arms around each other. It's taken a little adjustment for our boys to feel comfortable with this but they are doing ok :) DC has also had to adjust to a hand shake turning into a hand holding time which can be a little strange to start with.

In one day

I'm surprised how quickly I can go from loving being here to wanting to be back home nearer my girls and parents. I absolutely love Bangladesh, I love the community and liveliness, I love that we are useful and can contribute to a mission that has been here for 150 years, I love that we can use our skills to help others, I love that our boys also get to contribute and experience a different culture,  I love where we live and that it's beside a pond, I love that I can sit on the veranda and work on my laptop while looking at the birds and kids swimming in the pond, I love the people here and the friends that we have made, I love buying food at markets and that treats are treats that we need to make a 3hr launch trip to get so that we appreciate them. I love that we have no hot water and things are simple. The only problem is that our girls and  parents are not here. If I could bring all our friends and family to be here too then it would be perfect. I'm not sure everyone would share my love for being here or see the beauty in the things that I see but for me this is wonderful.

So in one day I can wake up one morning feeling like I could live here forever and then by lunch time I'm feeling guilty that I'm not home nearer our family and that we should only stay for our allotted one year visa. I guess that being a Mum has been what I have done for the last 23 years and I've not just been a typical Mum, I've been a homeschool Mum wth a pretty tight knit bunch of kids who are all very capable and independent but who still need their parents from time to time. I'm also aware that our parents are not getting any younger. I'm the only surviving sibling to be there for my parents and that is very important to me. They are still in good health and not needing me yet but I also don't want to miss out on their good years. So this is where the pull wrenches me at times. Our eldest Son is also going to be returning to NZ in May and so that's one more child not with us. I know that for us to be here it needs to be a very very clear call of God and for now, that's what we have. As the months pass quickly we will need to sort out what happens once our visa comes to an end.

Volleyball time

I love seeing our boys playing with the boys from the hostel. Our boys love playing volleyball the best. Badminton, soccer and cricket are also played but the hostel boys skills are pretty good with the other sports so our boys feel a bit behind the game.

The hostel boys also enjoy watching our boys play computer games, talk about no privacy haha... this is through our lounge windows..

Also some of the hostel boys enjoying a fire just outside our place. At least the smoke helps keep the mosquitos away.

Start up of school

I've started back Homeschooling our boys which is going quite well. I have been a bit distracted with trying to assist in the start up of the school here in Chandpur. Getting student numbers and aiding in making a budget has taken a bit of time. It takes time because I have to learn how the systems work here. Everything is much more paper based, it then gets transferred to digital and so it all takes time. I think that once I know how everything is set up and which books and spreadsheets are used then I'll start to get faster. Last night I was awake in bed and my mind was trying to work out how certain reconciliations were being done. Finally the penny dropped and I've realised I must be missing one book for cheque receipts. It's little things like that that can stump you but you are not always given what you need and it's only when you need it that you realise you need to ask for it. I've been so used to using an accounting programme where everything is one place and reconciled on a daily basis and this is the total opposite. You have to physically go to the bank to get a bank statement once a month, there's no online banking with automatic feeds into your accounting program and you can't just log in for an up to date bank balance. It's like it used to be in New Zealand when I was a teenager. All in all though, I'm enjoying the challenge.

DC is up and down to Dhaka working at the two schools. He's got a huge list of things to do in the schools and also for the BEST online learning. He's also going to be helping out in various hostels around Bangladesh which will require a bit of travel. I don't think he will have too much time to twiddle his thumbs.

We had a mother and daughter from NZ here for 3 weeks. They were great value and were very helpful as the school started up for the year. We really did appreciate their help, especially on book day when the parents came to purchase all the children's work books for the year. It was also nice to have a few Kiwis around for a bit.

In our house

We have now been in our new home for 2 weeks and are feeling settled with only a couple of things still to do around the place to make us completely Mozzie free.

I'm loving getting back to basics, we have no hot water so we need to boil up water in our big pots, put some in a bucket, add cold and then you can wash. There's nothing quite like a bucket bath, I love it! We also have to boil and filter all our drinking water so you need a regular routine to make sure you don't run out of water. The pots on the ground are what we use for boiling our drinking water and bathing water and the filter is on the right side.

DC bought PVC piping which he cut to use as posts on our beds to hang our Mosquito nets on. It works so well and it's nice not having ties going to the walls that you have to duck under.

The pond outside our place is used for fish farming and was recently harvested. They dragged a net and hauled in some huge fish. People came from the neighbouring houses and we were all able to purchase fresh fish at a very cheap price. It was delicious. They are bigger than they look in the photo although these are the dregs after the best fish had already been purchased. I was pleased to see small fish being thrown back.

Our older boys are enjoying playing Volleyball each day with the Hostel boys on our compound. The younger boys tend to play badminton. Unfortunately our two little guys are crook with fevers so they'll be resting up.