of watercolours and Catholic leprosy centers

Yesterday brought another day of creative minds expressing themselves through the wonderful world of art (a world which never cared to grant me a visa lol). Initially, we were going to have them do simple watercolour pictures but then Elle had a moment of inspiration. We gave each kid a third of a piece of construction paper in four different colours. After painting each slip of paper, the kids will cut them into feather-shaped pieces and staple them to a headband. Happy American Thanksgiving everyone. Don't ask my when or why American Thanksgiving happens because I really don't know.

After a couple weeks of stretching the creative parts of the brain, the kids set to work almost immediately. However, watercolours are kinda hard to work with. You need lots of water to make the colours work and with 24 young children water is hard to have around. A couple masterpieces were ruined by one accidental move and sad faces followed. But for the most part, the kids had a great time and were excited for next week's followup :)

Right after art, Elliot and I dashed down to the kitchen to round up all the ingredients needed to make a cake. Our Bengali roommate Banni's birthday was yesterday and we wanted to throw a surprise birthday party for her. We had already painted a Happy Birthday banner for her, laminated it, and strung it up in the cafeteria. The Waid's took Banni to Panchbibi for a couple hours under the premise of buying a birthday present so that we could get things ready.

But making a cake in Bangladesh is harder than home for sure. For instance, at home, when you have butter straight out of the freezer, you pop it in the microwave for a couple seconds and you are good to go. Not so much in Bangladesh. We settled for putting it in the oven for a couple minutes but even that didn't work so well. Second, all we had to measure with was a third of a cup and a spoon from the dining table. So in all actuality, we guessed on most ingredients. AND, the only milk here is the kind you have to mix up from a powdery base... Ahh it was good times.

[Funny story. Elle and I went to Hili on Thursday with Banni hoping to find some icing sugar for her cake. We told her we wanted to make cupcakes with icing later next week so she wouldn't suspect anything. Banni took us to a local baker because SHE wanted to have a cake made for her birthday. We kept playing along, figuring that the cake she had made would just be shared with just close friends. At the bakers, we asked for icing sugar. The first package brought out was huge round chunks of sugar that looked like rock salt. No, we told him, not even close. The next package brought out looked more like icing sugar. Elle tried some and said it tasted funny--probably because the other side of the package said ASPARTAME in bold letters... good thing we didn't ice a whole cake with rat poison...! We finally got our icing sugar though... I had a good laugh about the aspartame though lol.]

so back to the birthday party. We made an icing from a ton of butter, vanilla, cocoa powder, powdered milk, and our icing sugar. They didn't grind the sugar very well so it was kinda gritty but overall pretty tasty :) We had doubled the cake recipe because we wanted to invite all the caretakers and office staff that Banni works with, but forgot to double the icing recipe. Ehh.. it all worked out in the end. We also bought a big candle for the cake in Hili so Banni had something to blow out. When they finally got back, she was so surprised seeing everyone in the cafe in front of our Birthday banner. Weird thing about Bengali's is that they really do just eat and go. We gave everyone a piece of cake and then they vanished. It's not the first time it's happened either--church potlucks are kind of a bummer when people eat at a hefty pace then up and leave. lol it's so weird...!

Which brings us to today :) Elle and I sang special music (How Great Thou Art) with a Bengali couple and the rest of church ran pretty smoothly. I came back up to the room because I was supposed to have a phone date with Mom but sadly she couldn't get through after trying *15* times. I don't know why it wouldn't work but I couldn't stick around to find out because I was being ushered out of our room, out of the building, and towards our [not-so-]trusty Hilux. The cab was full so six more of us piled into the bed of the truck where we were bounced around for 45min. We were going to see Shuniti (pronounced Shoo-nee-tee). Shuniti is a special case here at Bangla Hope. The Waid's were just leaving a village, after picking up more children that were being abandoned, when Shuniti's mother rushed over and begged the Waid's to take her baby. They did because they saw the need and it wasn't until a few days later that they realized she was paralyzed. Shuniti has been here at Bangla Hope ever since then until a couple months ago when the woman who was caring for her moved away. That's when they sent her to DLC.

DLC, stands for D(insert name of the village here) Leprosy Center, is a enormous Catholic mission which is home to a school, church, and hospital. We met an Italian man there (I think he was the residing bishop...) who had dedicated the last 40 years of his life to this mission and has even mastered the language. He told us that there is about 14,000 lepers in the area but the numbers have been decreasing in the last couple of years as less and less people contract this disease. He took us to where Shuniti lived with her caretaker. She is such a precious angel. She has been doing physiotherapy at the hospital and can now move her legs and arms and is even able to stand (with assistance) on her tip toes. She may need to have surgery before her leg muscles will allow her to put her foot fully on the ground. She definitely has strength in her arms because when she grabbed my hand she was NOT wanting to let go :)

Mrs.Waid also brought along new clothes to give Shuniti--two pretty Sabbath dresses and a cute pair of jammies. There was another little girl, maybe about seven or eight, standing in the doorway scowling at us. I didn't think too much of her until Litton translated that this girl had had the same condition as Shuniti but now could walk! When he called her over, she began to walk and though she had a noticeable limp, she could WALK! We all told her "bhalo, cou bhalo" [good, very good] and she got such a big smile on her face. I stuck out my arms and she walked over to and was stuck on me for the rest of our time there. I cuddled her on my lap as she explored my hands and watch.

Mrs.Waid wanted to see Shuniti walk in physio walker so we all headed over to the physio clinic. The little girl held my hand so tightly as we walked over. Her legs still don't stay straight when she walks and she was leaning so far to the left side that I had to use a good part of my weight to counterbalance her. She held on so tightly to me that I was afraid if the connection slipped she would fall straight down. When we got to the physio clinic, I sat down on a bench and plopped the little girl on my lap. We had sat in front of a mirror and I began to point to the mirror saying "shoonder may" [beautiful girl] and making funny faces. She laughed and laughed. We got to see Shuniti walk a couple feet strapped into her walker and it was so special to watch! It was such a great experience and an amazing way to spend Sabbath afternoon.

now what will you do with your Sabbath day...? :)
ami tomake bhalobashi