Amongst the Unwashed

I wrote this several days ago, before several new plagues were upon us. Tania got some flu-like demon virus, and Kamran's parisitic skin plague (which may or may not be scabies) spread. Dad was in charge of running the family while Mom slept, so I've been moving cribs hither and dither to juggle babies, smearing ointment over crying babies, and trying to keep people from waking Tania up. I will update things later today after getting this posted and spending some me time today. Tania is feeling better and took the kids to her Aunt's to give me the day off. This post is only 3-4 days old but seems ancient.

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The last week featured a bunch of rough patches and strained, poor parenting from yours truly. The boys were sick for three days after immunizations and Maya was having issues that, unfortunately, could have been avoided if I had my wits. A couple nights back, we were in bed sometime after 9 PM, she was watching her DVD player, basically refusing to sleep, and being louder than I wanted her to be. After refusing to quiet down, I took her DVD player, turned it off, looked up, and got smacked in the face. There was yelling, fear, and crying. I can only say “we don’t hit in this family, ever” using the velvet vocal tones of a psychologist so many times before it gets ugly. Luckily, this was a turning point. I made a conscious refusal not to be in those sorts of confrontations anymore, and she’s made an unconscious decision not to make her Dad a terrifying, crazy, screaming freak. I put her back on her old, regular bedtime schedule of dinner, bath, story, sleep, and we have resumed our father-daughter love fest. She remains my favorite person, and I feel for her situation. She misses everything familiar to her and chafes against the new restraints.

Today, I am in a café called “Cuppa Coffee Club.” Last week, Pial and I went on a quest to find me a place to work while Maya is in school. Originally, that was supposed to be the American Club, a private, walled compound where Americans can lounge amongst the bougainvillea and drink liquor or coffee, swim, play tennis, and basketball, watch armed forces TV and generally act like bourgeois colonialists. All the place is missing is a lawn jockey and a vending machine that craps bibles and cans of mint julep. Last time we were here, I wanted to see the UM-Notre Dame game, so we went and joined. Unfortunately, they had a rule that a current member had to sponsor you in order to join. So, Tania and I went around begging people on the grounds, beseeching those to respect all that is holy: a need to eat pizza that tastes like pizza and celebrate the greatest college football rivalry of all time. Having been members, we thought joining would be simple; we could refer ourselves. However, they changed the rules, such that you now have to be sponsored by a member of the American diplomatic corp. Thus, we would have to go beg at the Embassy.

My feeling about this? F*** you. The only thing worse than an exclusive club is an exclusive club that won’t let you join. I can only guess that someone got in last time who didn’t believe in creationism, and one of the Bush appointees got pissed and made sure that if you didn’t graduate from Bob Jones University with a major in xenophobia that you wouldn’t get in. To make it worse, the apostate American Club member was probably a naturalized American, brown of skin, and fluent in Bengali. Heathen.

I can do without Starbucks coffee and the $80 membership fee. I’ll Empire-build elsewhere.

So, Pial and I went out and he took me to this place, a fancy café with an altogether different technique to keep out the riff-raff: they charge US prices for drinks. They’re doing a damn good job, too. The first time we came in, there were about four people here, most Westerners. The last two times, I’ve been the only customer. It’s been me and their staff of like five guys. Service, as you might expect is great. No one speaks much English, but they’re anxious and ready to misinterpret my every need. There’s air conditioning, internet, power plugs for laptops, fancy furniture, pleasant photography, and peace if not quiet. The only drawback is that someone here likes Euro-style dance club music, piped in via satellite. I’m much happier giving these guys my money, although it’s too bad Maya won’t get to go swimming while here.

There are now two Bengali couples in here. I just killed two mosquitos, both with an ugly splat of blood. (It is at this point that I must tell you how much I enjoyed life before Dengue Fever.) Now one of the guys is walking around with a bug zapper that looks exactly like a children’s tennis racquet. He swings it through the air, and I’m guessing anything that passes through dies a horrible death. I must have one, and I must wield it at lab meetings.

As for the adoption, it goes very well. I have a dream, a delicious dream, that tastes of tryptophan and involves a couch and the Lions losing to whomever. Our scheduled flight from here leaves on Nov 24th, and I plan, hope, and pray (inshallah) to be on that flight.

Triplets!

Nah. Just kidding. However, we don't think that Kamran and Kalil are identical. They just look a lot alike. Here are some pictures, although it's less obvious in pictures. The boys had their tetanus immunization three days ago and have been sick as dogs. Fever, irritability, diarrhea. Very unpleasant. Plus, Maya has been having her own issues with listening. I don't have the patience this require. Hence a few rough days.

Maya's preschool. It's very nice, with fun toys and projects inside and beautiful scenery outside. Maya is playing in the sandbox with Maleeha.

In a fair percentage of his photos, Kalil makes this face. This is by far the funniest one, though. Tania thought I should tell you that Kalil says "Hey you." However, it sounds more like "hey-000."

Maya comforts her brother. Kamran, I think.

There’s been good news and bad news on the adoption front. The good news is that we are now the legal guardians of Kamran and Kalil. On Monday, we went down to the family courts in Old Dhaka. I find it interesting here that power and importance here don’t necessarily equate to nice offices; the judges chambers were in a small building with a tin roof and a thatch ceiling and ages old, horribly worn furniture. It was like having a court proceding in a garage. Tania met with the judge, ensured her that the boys would remain Muslim, as they were by birth, and that was that. The next steps with the Bangladesh government are to get the No Objection Certificate (NOC) that allows them to leave the country with us and then their Bangladeshi passport. Once that’s done, we will apply for their US Visa. We hope that the NOC and the passport can be done in three weeks and the Visa in one. If so, we’re home by Thanskgiving (!!).

The bad news is just the size of the boys. I looked on a height and weight chart for them online, and they are very, very small. Like 5th percentile small on height and weight. I also looked at their discharge slips from the hospital, and it shows that they were premature. How much premature we don’t know. They went for immunizations today, and the pediatrician confirmed that they were underweight, and prescribed a vitamin supplement. If you looked at Kamran, you wouldn’t judge him unhealthy, but his height brings his weight way down. Kalil looks skinny, though. So, hopefully they’ll grow well from here on out, but these boys may just be very, very short. They are definitely behind where Maya was, but she was an Stewie-esque uber-genius, already plotting world domination at 3-months, so who knows.

Luckily, we brought a crate of formula, so hopefully that will help them catch up. The milk powder madness continues here and is of greater importance here than in the US. Fresh milk is not the norm here due to refrigeration issues; most people get their milk from powder. So, the government and one major university here have been testing the milk powders for melamine. That sounds good, but the two parties don’t agree. The Gov. says the powder is fine; the U. says many brands have melamine. Because the Gov. here is normally deemed corrupt and bribable, Tania’s uncle Panna doesn’t believe them. Meanwhile, Nestle and other baby formula makers are running ads in the papers to proclaim their milk safe. The boys had a combination of breast milk and Nestle’s Lactogen. They are now on Costco’s version of Lipil, and we can only hope that doesn’t have some Chinese poison in it of any sort.

Everyone else is doing well. Tania’s eye infection has cleared up, and Maya is in good health and enjoying her preschool here. It's quite nice. It allows her to most of the things she loves (swings, sandbox, slides, and painting) and keeps her away from TV for a short period in the day. She’s been watching a lot of They Might Be Giants, Here Comes the ABCs, though, which I fully support.

I’ll post new pictures soon. Pray for a safe, speedy return.

First Week Observations

Before leaving for the trip, I thought the best comparison for my experience was going to be H.I. McDonough in Raising Arizona, tortured by the Arizona quintuplets. In reality, the experience has been more Reznik in the Machinist. My first four nights in Bangladesh were mostly spent with my mind racing or staring at the ceiling with absolutely no desire to sleep. Things probably would have been easier if it had just been Tania and I in the room, but if you’re feeling anxious, and there are three kids in the room tossing, turning, coughing, and crying then you have no chance of sleep. Some nights, I could squeeze out two hours of sleep, some none. As a consequence, I spent my days feeling sick and didn’t eat much. Hence, the skeletal Reznik. The problem was the Mefloquine. Looking at info online, about 4% of people have anxiety problems on it, and I am one. It also seems to halt any adjustment to time change. I never ceased to be alert at night and groggy during the day here. The problem is that it’s a weekly tablet with a long half-life, so it’s going to fade slowly. I didn’t take my does this Wed and slept pretty well last night. However, it’s 3 AM and here I am again.

Last time in Bangladesh, we took malarone for malaria resistance but found that it caused/enhanced GI problems. Malarone lit says that it’s not supposed to cause GI problems unless taken in massive doses, but I’m guessing those lab studies were done for a relatively short term, with normal food, and a low bacterial load in the food. Taking it for several weeks with spicy food full of fun, new organisms was problematic. The problem was slight until we got food poisoning, and then it became unbearable nag. Our GI tract just couldn’t recover fully while on the stuff. Hence the mefloquine this time. In any case, last time we were here, people asked us why we were taking it and told us that there was very little malaria in Dhaka, which made us more comfortable in not taking it. There is much to say, positive and negative, about travel clinics and the western view of Bangladesh and India. One thing that unfortunate but without a good solution is that they prescribe based on country. So, if I'm in Dhaka, and concrete city of 15 million, I get the same advice as if I was going to the Sunderban, a jungle filled river delta. I will have to play this by ear and do the unfortunate calculus of balancing sleep and anti-malarials. One should not forget that there are plenty of bugs to catch out here (Tania is currently winning a battle against an ugly infection in her eye), and if my immune system is compromised fighting one specific one, that’s not a good plan. Once I’m sleeping through the night, I’ll reassess.

Enough about me.

The boys are doing well overall. Kamran, the older and larger, has proven to be a very low maintainance baby. He cries very little and does so only when he really, really needs food or changing. He seems very content. He’s a sleep warrior, and when he dreams, he’s a Viking. When Kalil dreams, unfortunately, he’s Joe Cocker. Kalil’s a bit twitchy and nervous. If I could hazard a guess, I think that either through necessity or design, his biological mother kept him close at all times. Very close. At the teat close. He is not happy if he is not pressed up against you, and cries when put down. We do our best to swaddle, but he is facing a lot of crying therapy when we return home. He will have to toughen up. I already had a moment when I was feeding Kamran, Kalil started crying, and after failing to verbally comfort him (something that works ok with Kamran), I just let him cry until Kamran and I were completely done. Tania sleeps with him in bed as a consequence, while Kamran is in the crib.

Maya and I sleep on the floor on a mattress, with the bed on one side, and the crib on the other. Last night, I twice caught Maya crawling under the bed and had to drag her back out. All in all, she is doing very well and being a good big sister. She has adjusted to the time change well, is eating well, and is behaving well for the most part. She misses her home, her dogs, her friends, and her time in the park, but this hasn’t caused too many problems. We’ve been meaning to get her to the American Club to do some swimming and play but it hasn’t worked out well for transportation/sleep/twins reasons. One Monday, most likely, she will enroll in a preschool here where Tania’s Aunt Berry works. I think this will help her and us. We can focus on the twins and sleep a bit more, she can get some exercise and interaction with kids. She may even learn some Bangla.

(Tonight we ate at Bangladeshi Fried Chicken, and she actually ate a drumstick, which was great. She usually won’t eat any meat unless its pureed and mixed in something. This is a testament to BFC, which is spicy and good. I think its run by a guy who worked at KFC in the US and came back here and did his Bangla version.)

I hesitate to say this as well, but a few good things. One, our court date to receive legal guardianship of the boys is Sunday. If this gets done on Sunday, it is possible that we will be home by Thanksgiving. Highly possible. I think that would be great. I enjoy seeing everyone here, but I like being home more than anything in the world. Two, we haven’t had any major GI problems. Some of this is just not eating out, some may be that we’re adjusting better this time around, and some may be taking mefloquine rather than malarone. Three, they had a really nice birthday party for me last night. Great food (the chicken tikka and the beef kabobs were the best, great with naan). I would post a picture of the two cakes but it’s on Salman’s camera. It said “Happy Birthday to Keith, with ‘Desi Love.” They were blueberry cakes with cheesecake layers, purchased by Pial, Tania’s cousin. Very yummy.

We Have the Boys!

Too much to do to write now. Here's a few pics. I'll write soon when we renew our acquaintance with sleep.

Dubai

I wrote this a few days ago but wasn't able to post.

We spent the last couple days in transit or wandering, fatigued, around Dubai. We didn’t get out much there, but managed to have a couple meals. I didn’t learn too much about the way people live in Dubai, but I did learn that it’s much more embarrassing when your daughter has a tantrum on the streets of a foreign city than it is at home. Oh, and I enjoy date milk. Not all was negative. We all slept about 12 hours the first night there and had our one real meal of the day around 4 in an Indo-Chinese restaurant named “Stand View.” For whatever reason, everyone who went in that place ordered hamburgers. The Indian Chinese was good, but I’m left wondering how good those hamburgers were. Maya spent the meal playing with two girls (Haya and Hala) from a nice Muslim, Northern Sudanese couple and their kids. I’m very shoe and foot conscious when I am in Muslim nations because their views on these things are so far from the Western view (don’t show the bottoms of your feet to people as not to insult them, the shoe is a dirty, dirty thing). Thus, I found it very surprising that this family allowed their kids to eat their whole meals while sitting on the tables, shoes and all. In any case, Maya built a lasting peace and understanding between our nations. Darfur was not discussed.


(One other thing I saw there that I had never seen before: a cat eating a cockroach. Dubai is devoid of the animal life that you find on the street here in Dhaka but does appear to have a fair number of wild kittens).

Our airport experience coming into Dhaka was not so great. I’ll do my best to relay this story while remaining culturally sensitive. Dubai has a lot of itinerant workers. Whereas the US may have Mexican immigrants who come to work in agriculture or meat packing, Dubai appears to have a great number of Bangladeshi’s. So, when we arrived at our gate, just about 95% of the people there were 20-40 year old men, all of which a little rough around the edges. Men who had spent too long in the company of men alone and thus lost a bit of their civility. At the gate, Tania went to use the bathroom, and I sat there with Maya. Tania hadn’t been feeling so well and had been feeling nauseated. A few minutes go by and then I hear someone yelling; I look over toward the bathrooms and Tania is full out yelling at an Emirates Air staffer. There were men in the women’s bathroom smoking; when Tania went in they didn’t leave or apologize for being there. They made her wait for a stall. The flight was mostly sedate but with incidents of the same: people unwilling to follow regulations, smoking in the bathrooms, mad scrums to the door, etc. We later learned that a large number of men on the flight (all the men wearing white pyjama) had been deported from Dubai for overstaying their visas. When we got off our flight, all the men gathered around, as their belongings were sent down the baggage turnstile. All their belongings were bunched together and wrapped in one very large sheet. It was like a giant hobo bindle.

Arriving in Bangladesh this evening allowed us to exhale. The care we get here is immeasurable. At the airport, we were greeted by Tania’s Berry Phupu (Aunt) and Panna Phupa (Uncle) and cousin Salman. They were accompanied by several airline officials who did everything for us: they took our documents, had them checked, and we never saw a single line. The most I had to do was point out our luggage, and no one here let me lift a single thing. It’s very nice. We went back to their house, had a nice dinner, and went to bed. It’s hot and exceedingly humid but what is new. I just have to get used to sweating. Maya doesn’t seem to care, which is a relief.

Well, I’m up late because I had a mefloquine fueled dream. Mefloquine, our anti-malarial drug of choice for this trip, has “vivid dreams” as one of its side effects. My dream this evening was of thousands and thousands of strands of different colors and in some cases, flavors (some tasted of mango). What disturbed me about these strands is that they seemed to present some sort of choice for me, some fate perhaps, and all were associated with some probability. Probability of what? Who knows. My problem was that I was trying to solve these strands, pull them apart, make some sense of them and then choose a direction. Hence, I am awake at 5 AM. Tomorrow is a lax day. We get the boys on Saturday.

Three Days and Counting

Our living room is a mess. Three suitcases are splayed out across the floor with numerous mounds all over the floor and furniture. It looks like a Mormon family vacation just threw up in our living room. Clothes and toys and gifts and all things baby. A pile of stuff we’re not going to take. A pile of stuff we may take, if a pack mule is allowed on international flights. An octogenarian’s worth of pills to ameliorate a wee fraction of Bangladesh’s deadly diseases. One suitcase--the gigantic one--full of nothing more than gifts. Stuff you can't get in Bangladesh like Pop Rocks and bright orange customized Nike soccer cleats. One medium suitcase for the Kamran and Kalil’s stuff, nearly half-full of formula (I would like to send a giant shout out to the Chinese government for their latest practical joke. Europeans took over the world with gunpower and syphilis, you will do it with mercury and melamine). The last suitcase falls to Tania, Maya, and me: a mere three changes of clothes for two months.

Tania has done the vast majority of organization, but still I am exhausted. Every day has been a crazed rush to put things in place at work and do a few things of value here at home. I have succeeded in parts, failed in others. The only thing I have slowed down for is Maya. I’m very excited about the boys, but I will miss the one on one time with her. I gave her the thumbs up yesterday; she gave me the thumbs up back, touched her thumb to mine and said “team.” Let’s hope this attitude holds.

Time to relax. Three days until our flight. Next post, I hope, will be on what meds we’ll be taking while in Bangladesh and how they may or may not keep our colons from exploding. We will be taking so much Peptobismal, that we will all turn pink and smell forever of minty freshness.