Crazy Women Drivers

You know those horror stories you always hear about teens who have accidents their first day on the road? When I worked for State Farm Insurance I received a call one day from a mother whose daughter had just hit 5 parked cars in the school parking lot her first day out. My story isn’t that bad, but I bet more people already know about it.

So if I haven’t mentioned it before the roads here are crazy. It feels something like it might if you set all the animals in a zoo free at once in a narrow area and them all going their separate ways. The roads are mostly very narrow, and laden with pot holes. Then you have all the rickshaws, bikes, motorbikes, mini-motorized rickshaws, cows, goats, chickens, various piles of things, a few cars, and huge over crowed buses. Oh, and all the people who stop on the road to stare at me. It didn’t take long for me to decide I never wanted to operate any kind of vehicle on these roads.

However, I am also against paying the exorbitant bideshi prices of 40 taka every time I go to work (more on that later). So yesterday I said forget it, and decided to take myself to work on my brother-in-law’s bike. My anxious feelings were compounded by the fact that very few women ever drive anything here. I have in fact never seen a woman on a bike since I have been here. All the same though, I think “hey it is just riding a bike, I can do this,” and I feel certain at least that today must fall in the beginners luck category, so that if I am going to have problems they will come later when I get cocky.

So without waiting to get too scared to go I wrap my orna around my head and set off. I use my acting skills to look confident, but I am scared to death and am repeating in my head over and over “I am going to die, I am going to die” as I go along. However, eventually I get out of the main part of the city to a less crowed area. I begin to feel a little confidence creeping into my consciousness (the kiss of death) and that is when it happens. As with most accidents, I truthfully could not tell you exactly what happened. All I know is that one second I was coming up to a small bridge thinking about how the rickshaws always slow down and move to the middle when they go over it, and the next second I had collided head on with one such rickshaw. I was completely stunned, but I think the rickshaw walla and passenger were even more so. I quickly said “I’m so sorry” in Bangla, and they just stared with mouths wide open.

Without thinking to check to see if the bike was alright or if I was injured, I jumped back on and started riding. I realized later I had a cut on my hand that was bleeding. As I rode away some man shouted something in Bangla to the effect of “you women shouldn’t be on the road!” All I could think to answer was “I know!”

Soon after that a boy whom I’m guessing was about 15 years old rode up beside me and began talking to me in Bangla-English.
Boy: "the road is very dangerous”
Me: “I know, do you think I will kill myself out here?”
Boy: “Oh yes.”
I didn’t though. And now I have gotten the bike back home and been informed that people run into rickshaws all the time, it is to be expected.

This is already too long but I have some catching up to do, so I’m plowing on.

The best news is that I have finally found a place to volunteer. It is this NGO called Gana Unnayan Kendra (GUK). I fell in love with it the first day I went to visit, and have gone almost everyday since. Their work is pretty varied but it can generally fall into the categories of disaster relief, human rights, and poverty reduction. I am still not sure exactly what I will be doing there, right now I am just learning about the organization, but it is so wonderful to be out on my own finally meeting people and feeling hopeful that I may be somewhat productive while in Bangladesh.

And now, a few funny moments on the job.

One day I got to go out to a small village where they were conducting a meeting with women to help them understand the resources and aid available to them. I wish I had a picture of this, because once again I felt like I was in the middle of a national geographic phote shoot, and yet, it felt at the same time so run-of-the-mill. I was made to stand up and introduce myself shortly after my arrival, then sit in the center of the circle throughout the talks. They did this to honor me, but I felt a little like I was in the “mush pot” and gave myself a headache trying to look like I was understanding the Bangla speeches. Afterward I was immediately surrounded by all of the women bombarding me with questions (which was actually kind of fun). When I answered negatively to the “biye hoyeche??” (are you married?) their excitement could not be contained, their were giggles and outburst of applause. I have a feeling next time I go to this village there will be eligible bachelors waiting.

Meeting people at the office has created an interesting social problem. Here is the issue: shaking hands. I am aware that on the whole in Bangladesh men and women never touch in public, so whenever I meet a male I simply bow my head a little. Now the issue is that the people at the office all have had higher education, so they know something of western culture and are aware of the fact that in the US shaking hands is a co-ed event. So this is how it goes down: 1) I am introduced to a male person 2) male moves his hand to shake mine 3) male realizes I have not moved my hand and starts to put his back down 4) at the same moment it registers with me that he wants to shake my hand so I bring it out 5) we both feel awkward.

Today I had this conversation with a man at the office who claims to have a masters in English literature (for purposes of anonymity I will call him Azad… and because I can’t remember his real name, but I do know a guy here named Azad).
Azad: Where are you from in Texas?
Me: Dallas (I am from Fort Worth and in the US it is a big deal to me to differentiate this from Dallas, but some people here have heard of Dallas, and for goodness sakes this is Bangladesh so I don’t think I have any call to be nitpicky).
Azad: Oh, Dallas is a very famous and great city.
Me: Thank you.
Azad: Dallas Dallas Dallas, yes, a fine city. Do you about the great American president Kennedy, JFK, who was, was he not, ass-nated, there?
Me: (trying to hold back the smile) Yes I do.
Azad: Yes he was ass-i-nated. And do you know about the tragedy about his wife Jacqueline?
Me: No, I do not.
Azad: After he was ass-i-nated, she married a Greek man!
Me: … (waiting for what the tragedy was)
Azad: Can you believe that? Oh women! Faithless!
Me: … (thinking about how it is acceptable here for men to have more than one wife at the same time)
Azad: Do you know about Ceasper?
Me: … I don’t think so.
Azad: Oh you must know, he was a very very famous poet in UK, Ceasper!
Me:… oh, Shakespeare!
Azad: Yes, Ceasper!
Me: Oh yes, I have actually performed in-
Azad: He wrote many many plays.
Me: Yes I-
Azad: One was Macbeth, very very famous, many many people know it.
Me: Yes like I was saying I-
Azad: and Hamlet, also very famous.
Me: yes.
Azad: In one of the plays Ceasper says “Frailty, thy name is woman!”
Me: (astounded) Yes he does.
Azad: I am not saying I agree, I am not saying that! But oh, the tragedy of Jaquiline!

And lastly I met a girl with some serious attitude named Asha. She is one of the few women I have met who seems to know exactly what she is about and not act nervous around me. I found out today her name means “hope” in Bangla. I think we are going to be good friends.

The End!