Mumbai Wedding

Kabir, my great friend Zia from Oz’s cousin was married while we were in Mumbai. He met his wife on shadi.com an indian dating website. Zia, Shane and her parents came to India for the wedding. It was a glitzy affair. The biggest wedding I have ever been to. We went along to 3 ceremonies. There were 2 ceremonies in Mumbai and 1 in Pune. We had lots of fun indeed.

Mumbai Movie Stars
On our first morning in Mumbai Simon and I were scouted for our obvious talent as actors. We were chaperoned by our scout to film city about 90 minutes away from our hotel. We thought we were going to star in a film but it turned out to be a Bollywood soap opera called “ Kya Hoga Nimmo Ka” about a young married girl who in our scene went psycho and stole some jewels. Our scout presented us to the producers with a “will they do?“. Luckily we did do and we were given our characters' costumes (see photo of us on set above) and then our lines. Simon was acting as Richard and I was Delegate 2. My one line, my 2 seconds of fame was “wonderful designs!”.

Simon Bhai Visits Dhaka

Shortly after mum left Dhaka Simon came to visit. The little and big kids loved Simon bhai (older brother). We visited the children centres, introduced the younger ones to paint (they had never used paint before!), played cricket with the boys, had a ride on a wooden hand pushed merry go round, went to Mirzapur where my friends were very excited and held a private party with our bottle of vodka, went shopping for rickshaw art in old Dhaka and much more. Thanks Simon for coming to see my world and all your lovely pressies from Oz.

Aloongi after his eye operation yesterday

Spare change saves an eye!
Aloongi, a beautiful child motivator at my NGO needed to have an operation to remove a tumour from his eye socket. Aloongi receives a token amount for his help with our childrens' non formal education classes and is the only income earner in his large family. Essential health services are not free here. Mum left her spare bangladeshi taka behind when she left and what would hardly cover a movie and popcorn in Sydney paid for Aloongi's operation and saved his left eye. Thanks mum.

A day at the cricket...
Last weekend I scored some free tickets to the cricket, Bangladesh Vs Zimbabwe. So 14 boys from one of the drop in centres and I had a day out. They loved the cricket and were eager to participate in the many mexican waves. I had my face painted on the way in which made me stand out in the crowd even more than my gender. There was not a female in sight in general admission or a female toilet. An official tried to get me to walk into the mens urinal to use the poo box but I snuck into the VIP toilets instead. At the end of the match, after Bangladesh had won, there were thousands of men trying to exit the stadium through one tiny door. It was mayhem. It was comparable if not worse to/than my most horrific moshpit experience. My boys were very protective though and created a circle around me to stop all the butt pinches that were coming my way. It sure is a man's world at the cricket in Bangladesh.

Mum's village visit
On mum's last weekend in Bangladesh I took her to my favourite village. She was overcome with the Bangladeshi hospitality . My friends family cooked many traditional dishes. We got to hang out with the boys at their favourite tea stall, visit the local schools, teach the kids how to play uno and mum even battled her fear of heights and crossed this treacherous bridge...not!
Mum is back in OZ now probably missing the crazy chaotic life of Dhaka. It was great to spend time with her and show her around my temporary new home. My best mate Simon is coming in a few days...bring on the visitors!

The Kids love Koala's
On mum's last visit to my work we gave one of the many classes some books, pencils and clip on koalas. They were estatic. They loved the koala's. Despite me showing them photos of a koala in a tree they still insisted on calling the koala a doll not an animal. I guess you just have to see some animals in the flesh. My camera is out of order at the moment, so thanks to tam who found my old one, and mum who brought it here as now i have a backup, as the kids would be heartbroken without a camera around.