It was a 15-hour flight from Chicago to Abu Dhabi, followed by a two-hour layover and yet another five-hour flight to Dhaka, Bangladesh. I was greeted with a custom form inquiring, “Do you belong to your father or your husband?” Yes, it did.
Practically the instant I stepped off the plane in Abu Dhabi, I felt the incessant stares of men and women - moreso if they were in a larger group. I wrapped myself in my scarf, put my sunglasses on and bowed my head down trying to draw as little attention to myself as possible (A little bit of a challenge being the fair skinned blond I am). This proved incredibly difficult for me: I am a friendly, confident, self assured American businesswoman, not used to bowing my head down and attempting to render myself invisible. I was angry, but I also wanted to be culturally sensitivity. I walked past young women dressed in full burkas, some with a small eye slit; other had their eyes covered as well.
I couldn’t help but feel a pull at my heart as I wondered, “Did these women agree to this or was it forced on them? Did they have any choice in the matter?” I was a guest in their country, but I felt great empathy for the girls and women live in this region of the world. I wandered the gift shop for a souvenir for my girls and was excited to see a Barbie collection. I thought it would be interesting to bring back an Abu Dhabi Barbie for the girls but all I could find was Nightclub Barbie.
Disappointed I made my way to the gate, passing a glass room not more than 5 ft x 5 ft filled with smoking middle eastern men. I thought to myself, “Don’t make eye contact, don’t make eye contact” followed by, “Guess they didn’t see Christy’s PSA”.
I landed in Bangladesh at 4am and was welcomed by four men holding up signs reading, “JULIE SMOLYANSKY.” Boy…they really know how to welcome a gal to Bangladesh! Christy had made sure there were people on the ground ready to greet me and move me through customs in the most smoothest way possible. I arrived at my hotel safely; two hours later, I joined Christy, Erin Thornton, Executive Director for Every Mother Counts and Heather Armstrong, aka “Dooce”…the famous mommy blogger. Also in our group: Photographer Josh Estey and Dina Hussin, the producer for Christy’s No Woman No Cry documentary. In route to our first destination, a rural village outside of Dhaka they briefed me on what I had missed the first day, as well as the state of affairs for woman and children in Bangladesh. Most promising is the fact that the programs that have been in place for a decade or more are really starting to make an impact in maternal and infant health including the fact that there is a wider understanding of rights, the influence of traditional media, economic opportunities such as microcredit and community involvement.
Bangladesh is half the population of the United States -160 million people - but the size of Iowa. Per capita, it is one of the most densely populated countries in the world. Most of its citizens survive on less than two dollars a day. Ninety percent of the population is Islamic, seven percent Hindu, and the rest, Christian and Buddhist. Undoubtedly, women and children suffer the most here. The average age of marriage is 15 years old and most girls never finish secondary school.
As we made our way through legendary Dhaka traffic, I was greeted with cows and goats walking along the road, side by side with cars and endless colorful rickshaws. Small shops and street vendors lined every inch of the road.
Honking the horn seemed to be the country’s pastime. Woman and men carried baskets of fruit on their head dressed in colorful saris and ethnic cotton tunics, respectively. My senses were in absolute overdrive. We arrived at our first stop, a CARE project (CARE is a leading humanitarian organization fighting global poverty with special focus on working alongside poor women) in a rural village in Narshingdhi, where a trained community health worker was sitting on the floor of a straw hut surrounded by a pregnant woman and her family.
Since it is difficult to reach a clinic or a hospital- if all is going well, the women deliver at home, hopefully with a skilled attendant by her side. However, it is important to educate the entire group of decision makers (mother in law, husband, sisters ,etc) about how to best care for the woman during her pregnancy and what the possible signs of complications might be so that she can seek additional care as needed. The village had suffered several maternal deaths and they were grateful to receive this training.
About a mile down the road, another meeting was taking place outside in the center of the village. This time it was a group of community health workers, sitting on the ground in a circle and discussing different cases of pregnant woman in the village. They mapped out the village on a poster, plotting out all the pregnancies by hand.
Using this map, health workers are able to visit expectant mothers month to month to monitor their health and vital signs. Another interesting development since Christy filmed two and a half years ago was the use of mobile technology: A handful of village people own mobile phones; health and development workers are able to send text messages to disseminate health information to the public using this advancement. MAMA (Mobile Alliance for Maternal Action) an initiative which was recently launched by Hillary Clinton will scale up the use of mobile technology to reach more women in this manner. The goal is to reach 500,000 women in three years with health information across the country. Such technology has led to a decrease in maternal death; I can only imagine how the community and country could benefit from internet and smart phone applications.
We headed down to the hospital where there was a long line of mostly mothers and babies, waiting for their vouchers that provide money for the extremely poor families of infants.
We entered the room where c-sections are conducted and it suddenly became very apparent why women in the villages were afraid to come to the hospital for their delivery.
Most shocking: This hospital had just underwent a renovation just two years ago - yet it looked like in belonged in another century. I again thought back to my own delivery. I was terrified in even one of the most sterile, technologically advanced hospital rooms in the world…this was downright frightening. I think I too would rather risk death by staying at home then come to this place to delivery my baby.
Coming up: Bangladesh Slums
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