What hope feels like

Tuesday 31st August 2010

It was time to leave the city behind and head out into the more rural region of Barisal in South Bangladesh. MAF sea planes (Medical Alliance Foundation) provide vital support to communities by ferrying relief and aid workers to remote regions and this was to be our method of transport for the morning. Taking off in our tiny plane we were quickly above the clouds and able to get a sense of the huge diversity of this country: the vast, sprawling city, one of the most densely populated in the world, stretching out to the horizon making way to a patchwork of lush green and brown countryside. The overwhelming sense was one of richness and of water, many areas partially or fully submerged with snaking rivers winding their way through the rice paddies and great expanses of water hyacinths. From above it looked like one enormous, organic circuit board, the shadow of the plane on the clouds below with a ring of rainbow light something I will never, ever forget.

We landed in the pouring rain to be greeted by hoards of children splashing their way through the water to meet us, helping to secure the plane as we took speedboats to the shore. On land we quickly drew crowds, something we would quickly become used to here, the staring faces of the adults tempered by the children, excited and smiling to see us.

Here we met Dr Ayan Shankar Seal, a Save the Children doctor coordinating child health and nutrition projects in the area, the results of which we would see over the next few days. Although only operational in a handful of Bangladesh’s regions and districts, the ELL (Enhancing Life and Livelihood) initiatives carried out in this area are a benchmark for the kind of sustainable support that can be given to rural communities and the huge difference it makes. Dr Ayan is passionate and articulate about the work his team are doing and it was a honour to have him accompany us and share his experiences and knowledge, talking with us as we drove along the bumpy roads around the area as we travelled from village to village.

Projects are all run through a network of volunteer female Health Workers, trained by Save the Children to monitor and assess growth, support vaccination programmes, provide antenatal care, promote good nutrition and breastfeeding awareness, and to diagnose and treat childhood illnesses. It only costs 150 dollars to train a Health Worker to carry out this role, usually a member of the villages own community. The real message here was one of sustainable community-led health care – enabling communities to care for themselves.

Afia, aged 26, was one such Health Worker and we travelled with her as she visited families on her patch, checking children being treated for diarrhoea and pneumonia, and her quiet grace as she worked with the mothers and their children was both moving and inspirational. Younger than me and yet so obviously a huge pillar of her community, responsible for over two hundred households. Her story is shared here and is really worth a read if you get time.

The nutrition education session we visited at a local clinic was especially inspiring: here women came to learn about the best way to feed their babies. Breastfeeding is on the increase in the area and that alone is having a significant effect on the child health: a twenty percent increase in breastfeeding resulting in an equal drop in malnutrition rates. But although breastfeeding is encouraged for as long as possible, it is often once the child is weaned on to solid food at around six months of age that drops in children’s weight and health can occur. Low growth puts them at increased risk of illness and all too often children can spiral down into malnutrition. What was surprising was that it’s not just lack of food that is an issue, but lack of education.

We watched as groups of women sat on the floor around their health worker listening as she used a simple visual aid of different foods in a bowl supported by three bricks to illustrate the importance of covering all the food groups when preparing food for your baby. Take one brick away and the whole system is destabilised. It was delightful to watch, mother’s being encouraged to share their own experiences with each other as their babies wriggled and protested at being made to sit still. Such a stark contrast to the scenes in Allin hospital and so lovely to see healthy children of good weight and height.

What was slightly more of a culture-shock were the villages themselves, each quite different but very, very basic and primitive. Set off the road down lanes of thick mud, houses were built mostly of wood and corrugated iron with little or no electricity and no proper sanitation facilities. Rubbish lay piled high, with chickens running around and cattle living close by, their waste underfoot and near to where the children played. We walked precariously balancing on bricks and branches to try and keep from sinking. Everywhere there was water, thick and obviously dirty and often green, where the villages bathed and washed clothes and cooking utensils. It was not hard to see why the children were so often sick, and although the villages were beautiful in its own way, with bright clothes on washing lines, and green palm fronds against blue sky, it was impossible not to be shocked at the conditions these families were living in.

What was so wonderful about the day was the chance to talk to the mothers themselves through our translators, finding out their stories and cooing over their children. Many were Kai’s age and I showed off photos of my strong, blond boy to many admiring and appreciate crowds. There was a real sense of kinship with the women we met, such a perfect demonstration of the unifying experience that motherhood can be. One mother I interviewed for camera, Rashida, told me her favourite thing about being a mother was when her children called her “mama” and it made me ache for Kai back home.

It was good to come away from the day feeling such a sense of hope. I tweeted live from one of the village settlements that “I think I learnt today what hope feels like. And it is joyous and exciting. We need more and more of it”.

One hundred and fifty dollars to train a woman like Afia. That’s all. We need so little to change these people’s lives.

We can do this! We CAN actually changed things here.

And I was going to need to hold on to that hope the next day because it was going to be a tough.

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And MOST IMPORTANTLY make sure you come and sign our petition and Press for Change.

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