I'm normally quite stressed out at the therapy centre. I enjoy it, but it's just hard trying to communicate when the majority of my patients don't speak English. My Bangla is getting better all the time, but not good enough to get a decent history or provide any meaningful education to my patients. So that's a bit stressful, combined with the fact that hardly any patients show up til 12pm, and the therapy centre is supposed to close at 1pm. It doesn't bother me to stay longer, but there is pressure to just churn through the patients to get them all seen by 1pm (even if that means 5 or 10 minutes each) so everyone can have lunch. I'd rather spend a good 20 minutes with each patient, even if it means they have to wait a bit longer (they should arrive earlier!) and I don't get lunch til later.
Also, the Bangladeshi approach to illness and disability is quite different to mine. People really get into the "sick" role here - I've seen patients who are perfectly capable of doing everything for themselves but don't because they expect their family members to wait on them hand and foot. Why? Because they're "sick"! From birth to death there's a general habit to do things for the person - if a little kid is a bit messy eating or drawing or whatever, the parents will just do the activity for them. It gives me the shits! So at the therapy centre, I'm forever slapping peoples' hands away so the patients can have an opportunity to practice and do things for themselves. But then at other times, when I'm struggling with a dead weight of a patient falling to the floor or using all my arms and legs to keep a person in a good position and trying to ask another person to pass a ball or a toy or move an object... does anyone step in and help? No! I've had up to 6 people sitting watching me struggle with someone on the floor, before yelling in frustration, "Can someone bloody help me?!" Anger management issues? Who, me?
So poor Minoti is often on the receiving end of my frustrations at the communication and cultural differences that I face. I wouldn't be surprised if she thinks I'm the biggest bitch in the world, cos I'm generally a bit grumpy after a frustrating morning of what often feels like useless therapy.
It was lovely, then, for her to invite me to her house today for a cooking lesson. She'd made some coconut sweet things that I loved and asked if I wanted to come to her house to learn how to make them during the Eid break.
Her house is just on the other side of the railway line (but there's no such thing as "the wrong side of the tracks" here - it's busier on my side, but more beautiful on her side), near a creek, and surrounded by trees. There's no electricity to her house, meaning she doesn't have the bloody TV on all the time! It was so quiet and beautiful... I couldn't hear the highway noise from here and the only interruption to the peace and quiet were the infrequent trains.
I'd asked Minoti about her husband before, and she'd told me he was in Chittagong. I'd presumed he was there for work, as quite a few couples here live separately during the week and the husband will come to the family house on weekends. So when I asked Minoti if her husband was coming back to Sitakund for Durga Puja, she told me he's never coming back. As in, he's left her. Bastard! So Minoti supports herself and her 2 sons on a wage that's less than $50 a month.
Her younger son, Mitu (11 years old), was keen to help and hang out with me (who wouldn't want to hang out with me?). Minoti said he's very naughty, but he seemed absolutely delightful to me. He was so good, helping her out by fetching water from the tube-well and various things from inside.
The "kitchen" was in a separate bamboo hut with a tin roof and mud floor. It had a fire-place built into the floor (i.e. it was made of mud) and there were 2 more outside. This was the first time I'd really been present when someone was cooking on a fire, rather than a gas stove. Bloody hell, it was smoky at times and the fumes sometimes causing coughing fits in all present (not just me with my uninitiated lungs). But Minoti was oblivious to the "hardship" that I saw - she just got on with the cooking.
We made shondesh which were like coconut toffee things - desiccated fresh coconut cooked in shitloads of goor (a different refinement of sugar, bought in solid form) and oil. Pretty bloody unhealthy but, like all bad foods, really tasty! Then we made pitha which were like sweet pasties with the same coconut mix (but cooked a bit less, so it wasn't so solid) in the middle. She had special pitha moulds, which made them into beautiful sea-shell shaped pastries. This was Mitu's favourite bit, assembling the pitha. These were then deep-fried for about 20 seconds, making yet another healthy (!) but super delicious treat.
It was great to spend a few hours with Minoti in a much more relaxed environment than the therapy centre and to see her house and environment in which she lives. Despite the many hardships life has dealt her, she is happy and her boys seem happy and are really good to their mum. Another day where I was glad to be living in "the Shit" and felt really lucky to be able to share in the lives of these "real" Bangladeshis.
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