Blogladesh... Behind the scenes at the BMB web chat

We were a bit rowdy due to the fact that we'd been able to take our first semi normal shower in three days but this is us  - as we were talking to you all courtesy of my CyberMummy partners Susanna and Jen of British Mummy Bloggers.
Don't know about you but I think their web chats are a million times better than mumsnet.

The government hospital facility

Thanks for your comments on yesterday's post. Yes it is the government hospital. If you thought those images were shocking, perhaps you shouldn't watch this film.

Eva speaks to Dr Abdullah al Baki.



Visit Eva's blog for her view on what we saw.

Day 2 - Barisal

This morning we took a sea plane to Babugani in the Barisal province of Bangladesh. We landed into a rain storm but were met by a dozen or so children jumping around in the river with excitement at our arrival. It set the tone for the day.
We were visiting some of the successful projects implemented by Save the Children and what we saw today was truly inspirational.

It's all about education here. About teaching families how to properly care for their children. How to offer a balanced diet and the importance of regular growth monitoring in order to catch health problems early.

Save the Children has 1616 health volunteers across this district. These women are astounding. The support they offer to the community is second to none.

We met Afia Afroze who has been a health worker for six years. She's responsible for around 200 households in her area.

She has an amazing blog on the Save the Children site where you can follow her work and stay up to date with the mums and babies that she is assisting. You can even see how many steps she walks each day as she visits the children in her care.

Our next stop was to meet Mr Mamun and his family. He's something of a rarity here in Bangladesh as he shares the care of his three children with his wife. He bathes them, plays with them, feeds them and helps his wife out in their home. He's what we would call a new man. There are not many new men in Bangladesh.

He has three beautiful children, his girls pictured below aged six and two months. His baby liked me, she was cooing away and giggling. She stole my heart.

When we arrived back at the field office we were all dishevelled but full of admiration for Save the Children and the community health workers they have trained. What they are doing out here really does make a difference to the children whose lives they touch.

Seeing those close knit families living without electricity and sleeping on hard wooden beds has made me homesick tonight especially as the sporadic web connection has robbed me of a skype call to my supportive family back home. 

I'm perched on top of the fridge in my room, it's the only place my dongle has a connection. I'm hot, unable to sleep and uncomfortable with my own need to fill my life with material objects. I want to be in my husbands arms after a steaming hot bath to wash the mud from my feet and the sweat and dirt from my body. It's so wrong that we have so much in our lives when so many people in the world have little more than a roof over their heads.

Please do sign the Press for Change petition.

Don't forget you can follow our trip from three perspectives; Josie's blog is Sleepisfortheweak and Eva's is NixdMin

Blogladesh

If you follow me on Twitter you will probably have seen my stream kick in with mentions of #Blogladesh this afternoon. But what's it all about?

Along with two other bloggers Eva (@nixdminx) and Josie (@porridgebrain) I will be travelling to Bangladesh with Save the Children Fund to highlight the work they are doing in line with the United Nations Millennium Development Goals.

In Bangladesh, 36% of the population live on less than US$1 (64p) a day and 83% live on less than US$2 (£1.28) a day. Extremely poor households are often dependent on income from their young children and around 7.4 million children are engaged in child labour.

These children miss out on the basics that we couldn't imagine not being a part of our own lives, such as food, education, access to medicine and security.

Almost 50% of Bangladeshi children under five years old are underweight or too small for their age. Approximately 2.4 million children aged 6-10, are not enrolled in primary school and the number of street children is estimated to be over 7, 00,000.

Every year around 250,000 children die in Bangladesh before reaching their fifth birthday. They die from things that can be easily prevented or treated like diarrhea, pneumonia and infections and from lack of proper maternity care. Things we take for granted.

We are going to be reporting from the field, tears and all and all we ask of you is to get behind us. Follow us all so that you can feel our trip from every angle. We are all very different bloggers and we will all have a different take on things. RT using our #Blogladesh hashtag, follow our pics on our Flickr stream (details to follow) and make as much noise as possible - because you know what? We can make a difference.

I already linked at the start of this post but if you are not already following Josie and Eva, here is where you can find them.

Josie, Sleep is for the Weak or on twitter @porridgebrain

Eva, Nixdminx or on twitter @nixdminx

If you really, really want to show your support please do use our badge on your site. Your can get the code here.

I will be sure to follow everyone who follows, RT's or shows support for this amazing project and if you do mention our trip on your blog please do add it to the Linky below.