Bangladeshi Consumers Have To Be Sharp

I've been meaning to put this on the blog for a while just because I think it is so funny (and scary), sort of like those dumb horror movies.

I wanted something to keep in my office to heat up water to make tea or instant coffee (the only kind of coffee you can buy outside of the big cities). So, I found this nifty gadget in a shop in the market of Gaibandha. It works great and does just what I wanted it to do, which is heat a small amount of water quickly. How it does that trick is the interesting part.

As you can see in this next picture, the whole contraption is basically just a plug that goes into a power socket, and two bare electrodes that stretch into the water. That means that it is just running an electric current right through the water in order to heat it up. If you were to touch the water while it was doing this, in addition to getting a burn from the boiling water, you would also get electrocuted. And, not even a warning sticker on that thing... [there was a small note on the box, now thrown away, that users should not touch the water while heating].

[For Engineers Only] If you notice, there is also a different in the corrosion between the two electrodes. I could ask you which is the anode and which is the cathode as there is obviously some difference in oxidation and deposition going on between the two, but it is a 220V AC line, so what it really means is that there is a DC bias in the power supply, and that I normally plug in the heater in the same way each time. Oh, and yes you can clearly see the hydrogen and oxygen bubbles from the electrolysis of the water when you first plug it in, before it gets hot enough for the steam bubbles to obscure everything else. It is also funny to think that this thing won't work with distilled water as it is an insulator (unless you leave it sitting there long enough for some iron ions to work their way into it), luckily for this thing, the water in Gaibandha is loaded with iron and other minerals.

Then, it gets even funnier. The "Lipton" logo label is not real, the company that made it, Dhaka Plastic, is not associated with the Lipton tea company at all, they just put that on there so people think about having tea and needing this little contraption. How many more water heaters they sell because of that I don't know.

So, you can get all kinds of things here, even stuff that would be outlawed in the U.S., meaning that you can make good use of your money, if you are also smart enough to not get killed by the things you buy.

On The River

Seeing as most of Bangladesh is a river delta, much of the romantic and nostalgic images that Bangladeshis have about their own country are associated in some way with the river or water in general.

Fish and rice are considered the traditional foods. Canals and ponds for irrigation, transportation, and drainage of flood waters are everywhere. The least expensive way to travel from town to town is still by ferries going up and down the major rivers waterways. The smallest fishing boats are still row boats. Sails used to power the larger and heavier boats, although they are almost totally gone now, replaced by gasoline or diesel engines. Traditional folk songs in Bangladesh often speak of fish and boats and life on or near the river.

Recently, as part of my job, I had the opportunity to travel on a boat up the river to another village outside of our project area and visit a few sites along the way. You might find some of these pictures interesting.

This is a mobile hospital boat visiting a village along the river. A few of these are around in different places in Bangladesh, and as you can probably imagine, are more useful during floods and and other disasters when reaching people in need of care is difficult.


Re-boarding our boat after a visit to a "char", an island in the middle of the river that is constantly being eroded and shifted by the river's movement and floods.


These nets are common all around Bangladesh, even in ponds and canals far from the rivers. They include a net and a long bamboo lever system for moving the net around, either placing it on the bottom and raising it up, or pulling it through the water to catch seafood. Often, they are fishing for minnows and other small fish that they will eat in a spicy curry sauce (extremely nutritious, but not exactly my thing). But, they can also use them to catch larger fish and other tasty things crawling along the bottom.


This is a small traditional fishing boat used on the rivers of Bangladesh.


Our ship had a young capitan, but luckily the chief accountant for our project could help him steer the boat out of the dock.


At a stop along the side of a river, we walked a short distance to visit a flood shelter, passing through this jute field along the way. Jute is a plant grown for its fiber, which is often used in rope and carpets (like hemp). You can also eat the leaves like mustard greens when it is young and tender.


This is a larger boat, similar to the one that we were riding, but used for cargo. In this case, it is carrying a load of straw (dried rice stalks) used as animal feed.


This is a picture of a village along the side of the river, with their fruit trees, crops, fishing boats, and hay piles for their animals all visible.

At The Office

Alison and I spend most of our work time in the office, probably about 65% for her, and 95% for me. It isn't exactly the same as your office in the U.S., but there are more similarities than differences. If you are curious, we thought you'd like to see a couple photos of the office where we work in Gaibandha.

This is the exterior of the building. By American counting, Alison's office is on the second floor on the left side, while mine is on the third floor on the right side (they count the European way where the 1st floor is the floor above the ground floor).

Here is Alison hard at work on Sunday morning. The work week here runs from Sunday through Thursday.

Here is my office, a corner office with a private bathroom. If you forget about the air conditioner not really working, and the power dropping for a minute every 3 hours while the generator starts up, its the nicest office I've had so far in my career.

Chocolate Awakening

As the saying goes, "better late than never," so I am posting a few pictures of Ezra's 2nd 1 year-old birthday party. We were in Dhaka at the American Club and our friends Becky and Scott graciously hosted the party and got Ezra a giant chocolate cake (well, giant from a baby's perspective). Ezra also got a chocolate cake for his 1st party at our house, and he liked it but was pretty tame about eating it. As you can see below, he wasn't holding back the second time. He literally dove straight in and Jeremy and I could hardly hold him back. He was a happy boy!