Bangladesh: Riverboat Songs, ADP Visits and Eating with Your Hands

World Vision’s Director of Public Engagement, Mathew Neville, is currently out in the field on a visit to our Nawabgonj Area Development Programme (ADP) in Bangladesh. In the first of his (hopefully) daily diaries (subject to internet connection!), Mathew shares the emotions of visiting an ADP that has seen real growth and success.

Here’s Mathew:

By Mathew Neville, Director of Public Engagement, World Vision UK
Nawabgonj: Day 1
Monday 12th November, 2012

I’ve just got off the phone with Sylvia, one of our amazing supporters who sponsors a child here in Bangladesh. I was visiting a remote village that can only be reached by boat or motorcycle and two girls came out holding birthday cards that they had been sent from England. After calling the office to get some details I was able to put a call through to Sylvia and tell her all about the difference that her donations are making to this community and the life of her sponsored child. It was great to speak to her and thank her for supporting in such a powerful way.

I am in Nawabgonj ADP to west of Dhakar, the immensely crowded capital city of Bangladesh. The countryside here is beautiful; very green with a lot of rivers and ponds everywhere, but it’s led to a lot of flooding problems over the years and that’s what first brought World Vision to work here 13 years ago.

We had a fantastic trip this morning, taking a small canoe up one of the rivers to meet a Hindu community where we have been working. The boatman sang a song as we went along then asked me to sing an English song – I couldn’t think of anything apart from ‘Can’t Stand Me Now’ by The Libertines, but it didn’t seem appropriate. I ended up singing The Lord’s My Shepherd – they seemed to like it but I must admit I felt very self-conscious. I’m not sure anyone understood it, but never mind!

The strangest thing to get used to has been eating with my hands. It sounds like such a simple thing but it is not just with your fingers – your entire hand! Every meal we have had so far has been fish curry with rice and dahl – not that easy to eat with your hands but I am getting used to it and actually beginning to really enjoy it. The idea is take a big handful of rice and mix it in with the curry and dahl to increase the flavour.

I am staying in the local village with two Bangladeshi Catholic priests – Father Milton and Father Bryan. Father Milton told me last night that he was helped by World Vision when he was a child as he came from a very poor village and his family could not afford any education for him – I guess that he now wants to give something back.

My room is pretty basic but actually a very restful place. Last night as I showered under the cold tap in my room I could hear the priests singing and praying and at the same time heard the call to prayer from the local mosque – there was something really beautiful about it.

In one of the villages today we met the women’s WASH committee (Water, Sanitation And Health). There were 20 women in the committee waiting for me and they talked me through everything they were doing in their village.

I asked them what difference World Vision had made in their community and whether they felt things were better for it. One after another they listed all of the things that we had worked with them to achieve – new latrines, new roads, new water pumps, education for the children and training for the women on business ideas such as poultry.

World Vision aims to leave a community after 15 years as we believe that it is right to move on to the next community and not create a long term dependence. This means that we are in the final two year transition phase here in Nawabgonj.

The leader of the women’s group plucked up the courage after a little while to ask me if World Vision could stay another two years longer as there was more they wanted to achieve. To be honest, this was very difficult. There was such a large part of me that wanted to say yes we could and that we could help them to achieve even more.

I thought about it for a while and asked them if World Vision had made a real difference in their community that would last and they said we had.

I asked them if they felt stronger now than before and they said they did.

I asked them if they felt that there were communities that were not as strong as theirs and they agreed that there were.

We ended up all applauding what we had achieved together; it was actually a very moving moment – I feel emotional just sitting writing about it now – and one where I realised what an amazing difference people can make when they are empowered by an organisation like World Vision, funded by amazing people like Sylvia.

So, on behalf of the people of Nawabgonj, thank you to all of you Sylvias whose sponsorship and support makes these remarkable achievements possible.

It sounds like an amazing experience Mathew’s having out there and we’re keen to hear what you make of it. Leave us a comment here on the blog, or head over to our Facebook page and join the conversation.

Continue reading about Mathew’s trip with Day 2 here.