Home again

Well I'm back in good old Blighty yet again after a very challenging time in Bangladesh. There were good times and bad times and some very upsetting times but I am so glad that I went yet again to do some voluntary work.

It was very hot and humid, dirty,dusty, noisy and people everywhere all the time, and they all wanted to talk to you. To know why you were there, how long you were staying, why did my husband let me go there (!?!), What I thought of their country and they couldn't possibly understand that I was there and not being paid by anybody. The concept of volunteering totally flabergasted them!

There is no news of little Rashed's parents. CRP's social welfare team have made every effort to try and track them down with no success. So the poor little fellow will be at CRP for the rest of his days now. He will be fed, clothed, given all the correct medicine for his condition, educated and housed.

He will be surrounded by people who care deeply for him but he will have no past. He will not know his parents, siblings and village. He has been cast adrift and lucky for him has washed up at CRP, so much better than being abandoned on the streets.

CRP think that it will cost £50 per month for his upkeep, so I am trying very hard to raise a lot of money to help towards sponsoring him. An uphill battle - my husband reckons I will never be able to retire, I won't be able to afford to! Any donations are gratefully received. Please contact me wayne_sue@btinternet.com Thanks.

The evening before I left Bangladesh I was boiling some water to wash my hair (only cold water from the taps) and I was carrying the pot of water through to the bathroom and managed to spill it down my tummy.... Agh....... It was 8pm and I was leaving the following moring at 5.30am for the airport.

CRP's medical staff had gone home so I was stuck. I decided the best thing I could do was to stand under the cold shower for 20 minutes, it was very painful.

Fortunately I had 2 small Coke bottles full of water in the freezer that had frozen, so the following day on the way to the airport I had one of these tucked under my Shalwar Kameez trying to ease the pain and I managed to carry the second one on the plane so was able to rest it on the scalding until it defrosted!

Ever since I have been back home in Saltash I have been going daily to St. Barnabus hospital to have the scald dressed. After a week it has finally stopped hurting and is starting to look better. Thanks very much to the nursing staff at St Barnabus.

I find it very difficult to ease myself back into the ways of the Western world. To visit a supermarket and see such choice of fresh food, to see the orderly way which people drive on the roads without resorting to using their horns non stop and bashing each other in their cars and buses.

To not seeing beggars without limbs on the pavements. To being able to live in a house that isn't going to get flooded in the next rainy season, that has a proper floor, that has constant electricity and water.

HOW WERE WE SO LUCKY TO BE BORN IN SUCH AN AFFLUENT COUNTRY?

I am so pleased to have had the opportunity to visit Bangladesh twice now, I feel that I have learned so much as well as given so much.

The Bangladeshi's are a hospitable, proud and happy race. They might have next to nothing, but they are prepared to share that with you. Perhaps that is something that we can learn from them...

I'd like to think that I will return again next year. I have many friends there now who have asked me to go back. Who knows, maybe I will be able to.