The Uncultured Project

Today, on campus at Notre Dame, is the start of the 78th annual Bengal Bouts tournament. Even though I’m thousands of miles away from the ring, I’m as close to the action as you can get.

The Bengal Bouts are a series of charity boxing matches where the proceeds from those matches come right here to Bangladesh. Ever since I’ve landed in Bangladesh, nine months ago, I’ve been trying to find out where that money goes. It’s been a long journey – literally and figuratively, I feel like I’ve gone through hell and high water to get to this point. Floods, riots, curfews, Cyclone Sidr, food poisoning, hospitalization of a family member, dealing with corrupt officials, dealing with a water crisis – jeez, it feels like the list never ends. Each time some new problem came up, my Bengal Bouts journey took a back seat.

I guess it’s just sheer luck that, when I was finally able to embark upon my journey to see where some of the Bengal Bouts money is being spent, it happened to coincide with the beginning of this school year’s tournament. My trip to Jalchatra (where I got to meet the tribal people known as The Garo) is but one of seven locations in this country that receive funding from the Bengal Bouts. It really seems like Bengal Bouts money goes to every corner of this country. I’d love to track it all and show what happens at each of the seven locations. Unfortunately, my outside-of-Dhaka travel resources are fairly limited (especially since I carry around all this camera and computer equipment wherever I go). For now, it’s my hope the few days I spent in Jalchatra can help shed a light for my friends back home about the good they are doing in this country.

It’s a good feeling to know that, while I am here trying to fight poverty on the ground, there are 185 of my fellow Irishmen back at Notre Dame fighting alongside with me. Fortunately, for me, my way doesn’t involve that many bruises.

Since my last posting, I’ve switched to a new location in rural Bangladesh. I’m currently in Jalchatra. It’s a small village near Modhipur. A local indigenous tribe called The Garo live here.

It’s a bit difficult to post blog updates here because, unlike the other locations I’ve visited, the power grid is really unstable. You never know when the power will go out and how long it will take for it to come back. I’ve been trying to conserve my battery power and keep to basic tasks.

I have tons to share and write-up on. I fully intend to do so when things become a little more reliable!

Before (read my original article here):

Five Months Later:

What’s Different?

• Clothes – no more walking around shiverring and shirtless! (clothes provided by my aunt)
• Schooling – the eldest son just graduated from Grade One! (school costs paid for by my mom, dad, and I)
• No more insects and insect-bites! The PermaNet  I donated to them got rid of the cockroaches that used to crawl around their bed at night. It’s also protected them from being feasted upon by mosquitoes while they slept. (PermaNet donated to this project courtesy of Vestergaard Frandsen – they rock)
• Can Study in the Dark – that windup flashlight I gave them still works and the eldest son uses it to study. My dad was worried that a five dollar camping flashlight from Wal-Mart wouldn’t be useful as long-term light source in the third world. Five months on, it’s still going on strong. LEDs and hand-cranked rechargable batteries rule!
• Hungry no more! Malnutrition is a big problem here. And, that doesn’t mean that people aren’t eating meals. Rather, it means that people aren’t eating a lot of the proper stuff – because they can’t afford it. Protein and iron deficieines are all too common here. I found out that most of the poorer locals can’t afford beef or other foods high in protein. There are apparently two kinds of salt sold here. The “poor mans” salt is basically old and low in iron. The good stuff – the kind most reading this have on their dinner tables – is high in iron. Not only did we give them money for food but also, whenever my grandmother is in town, she invites them over for a meal full of all the stuff they normally can’t afford like beef and the “good” kind of salt. I was able to share such a meal with them earlier today.

Here’s a photo I took shortly after eating along with them:

One of the things I remember Dr. Jeffrey Sachs talking about was how the poor know what they need but just cannot afford to buy it. Now that I knew the basics (protection from insect bites, funds for school, helping with food, etc) were taken care of – I could finally ask them: what do they need? I could tell no one ever asked the mother this question because it kind of took her aback. After some hesitation, the mother turned to the eldest son and quietly talked to him for a bit. She then turned to me and said it would really help if I could buy them a desk and a couple of chairs. They can’t afford it and, because of it, the son needs to study on the bed (as you can see in episode one).

Since Ikea hasn’t opened up a shop yet in rural Bangladesh, I was kind of worried that this would cost a bit of money. Afterall, all the furniture here is hand-made. And when was the last time anything hand-made was cheap, right? I went to the local bazar with my grandmother and we scouted out a couple of good hand-made chairs and a hand-made table to go along with it – not unlike the table and chair I’m using right now. Turns out the whole thing cost eight bucks. Eight bucks. Wow. Let me put it this way: There is a vending machine on the ground floor of the Hesburgh Library back at Notre Dame that has stolen more than eight bucks from me.

If I was looking for a pat on the back about my work – I’d end this article here. But, no good deed goes unpunished and nothing good comes without trouble. So click the jump to hear more…

Continue reading ‘One Difference at a Time – The Follow-Up’

“I’m writing now from a rural village in Bangladesh (called Madhupur). There is no electricity, no running water, and the diesel generator that was powering a ceiling fan and light bulb died earlier this night.”

That’s what I wrote exactly five months and a week ago. Now here I am, back in the same rural village, in the same house, at the same desk, and in more or less the same situation. I’m kinda feeling a bit nostalgic right about now..

Five months and a week ago, I wasn’t sure anyone outside of my family was reading my blogs. I didn’t have a single YouTube video up and I had very little to show on my Flickr page. It was only after I wrote that article here in Madhupur that I learned I actually had an audience. Mikey Leung was one of my first readers. I later found out he was actually another crazy Canadian who was trying to help the poor here in Bangladesh. I had an audience – and I wasn’t alone in what I was doing. That article also got picked up by Rezwan of The Third World View. I had never heard of that blog before, but now I read it religiously.

I was also extremely disheartened back then. I had already been in the country for three months, and had very little to show for it. I had so much to give away but nothing major had been done so far. Instead, my project got detoured as my mother (who came here to help me with translation) got hospitalized for Dengue Fever. I was about ready to pack up and quit. That previous trip to Madhupur was a turning point for me. In that trip, I was able to give away over fifty mosquito nets. The footage I gathered here helped me make my first episode on YouTube. I was also able to help hands on with one family in particular. Those who’ve been reading this blog for a while will know about the single mother of two who I gave a net, a windup flashlight, and some money for school for her eldest son. That son just graduated Grade One and is now in Grade Two.

I had to re-read that last sentence. Wow. This was a mother who, according to the locals, was seriously considering dumping her two children in an orphanage and abandoning them. She couldn’t afford to keep a roof over their heads. Heck, she couldn’t even afford clothes for these kids. Now, thanks to my family and I, one of her kids just finished one school level, the kids have clothes on their backs, food in their belly, and a loving mother who isn’t forced to abandon them. You want to know what is the most surprising? This only cost me a few bucks. The windup flashlight cost me $5, the mosquito net was courtesy of Vestergaard-Frandsen, and the school and other costs added up to about $10 USD. Yes. Ten bucks. You know those ads where they say “just for the price of a cup of coffee”? They aren’t kidding apparently. Why aren’t more people doing this?

Here’s a photo of them when I first met them. I’ll try and visit their house and have a follow-up photo later on….

After my latest video got featured on the YouTube homepage, there were so many people leaving comments about how fat I was, how I talked, or just leaving racial epithets, that I was resigned to the fact that my message had been lost among all the hateful messages. Then, something really amazing happened. A group of well-spoken, intelligent, and considerate group of commenters appeared. And, for the first time since being featured, a real conversation emerged.

Of course, as with any discussion, we didn’t all end up agreeing. But at least we addressed some important issues. Here is a summary of some of the topics that were touched upon:

Continue reading ‘A REAL Conversation about Poverty’

Since being featured on the YouTube hompage, the biggest difference in the responses to my video have been the change in comments: quality has been replaced by quantity, and positivity has been replaced by negativity. There are tons of videos and websites devoted to how to get featured on YouTube. But what happens after you get featured? How do you handle that?

Here are a few videos that had some pearls of wisdom.

Bernard Smith is this YouTuber who plays a character called Cornelius Blow. When one of his videos got featured, he quickly made a follow-up video where he talked about how to deal with all these new comments (many of which were negative):

Not everyone who gets featured is a professional like Bernard though. Steven and Kelly (aka SteAndKel) are two young YouTubers from the UK who got featured on their very first video. With over one million video views, they have gathered their share of fans (I’m one of them) – but they’ve also gathered their share of haters. Instead of getting sad about it – they brushed it off…. using song and dance. Check it out:

When your video gets posted to the front page of YouTube – thousands upon thousands of people will be able to see your video. That’s exactly what happened with my latest video. There are a LOT of comments. Over 500 of them and counting. A lot of it was hateful (e.g. racial slurs), personal (e.g. off-color remarks about my family) , and poorly written (e.g. lots of swearing). This is to be expected whenever anyone gets a video featured on YouTube. But, admittedly, this video got a bit more flak than other featured videos.

I think the reason for that is because I touched upon a nerve. I have tried to make all my videos as non-partisan as possible, but in this video I tried to address the issue of some politicians using the Bible selectively to support their policies. Some politicians will quote the Bible verbatim to justify policies in stem cell research, gay marriage, and abortions. But what about fighting poverty?

What about 1 John 3:17? In it says: “If anyone has material possessions and sees his brother in need but has no pity on him, how can the love of God be in him?”. Or what about Ezekiel 16:49? In that it says: “Now this was the sin of your sister Sodom: She and her daughters were arrogant, overfed and unconcerned; they did not help the poor and needy.” Or how about Proverbs 14:31? Where it says: “He who oppresses the poor shows contempt for their Maker, but whoever is kind to the needy honors God.”

I’m not saying that religion should or should not enter politics. That’s for a democracy to decide. But, if religion is going to enter politics – which it often does – than it shouldn’t be used selectively or cherry-picked.