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Adam's BlogOn my recent visit to Bangladesh to film Splish Splash Flush, I kept a blog of my travels. Here are my best bits... Day oneWe arrive at Dhaka airport early in the morning, to steamy warmth. In the city there is trouble because of political unrest; we have to take a long route to our hotel to avoid road blocks. Under cover of darkness we are whisked away by back roads to the Village Education Resources Centre, where we have a cup of strong tea and go to bed in their guest house, which remind me of a set of prison cells: four locks to undo before I get into my room, shared concrete shower, and spectacular cockroaches!
Despite the creepy-crawlies, we all sleep well. The food is simple but delicious. Breakfast = small chapattis, vegetable mash, and a fried egg - difficult to eat with the chapatti, but excellent. Lunch and dinner = rice, dhal, and various vegetable dishes, some of them gently spicy. Day twoAt 7.30am we set off for the countryside - a couple of miles by rickshaw, which is rather scary over pot-holed roads, with big trucks thundering past - across a large river on a wobbly flat ferry, up a small creek on an even smaller boat, driven by one man with a single paddle, and then a couple of miles walking over paddy fields. The fields are all low-lying, and flood with water in the rainy season. The houses are built on mounds two metres above the fields, and the paths we walked on are about 30 cm above the fields, so that they remain passable in mild flooding.
The people grow two or even three crops a year here, and we see rice everywhere - some being planted and some golden and ready for harvesting. Eventually we come to our first village, Mollahpara, 10 miles west of Dhaka. The village has about 20 corrugated-iron houses, mostly of just one room, separated by trees and shrubs - the entire country is full of greenery. Inside each house there are a couple of wide beds, a few bamboo shelves, and a few clothes hanging up. Cooking is done in a separate shack. We see a few old men with beards, lots of friendly women in bright saris, and teenage girls like 13-year-old Suraiya Akhter Shumi, the 'star' of Splish Splash Flush.
We spend the day filming Suraiya (left) waking up, washing her face, cleaning her teeth, coming out of her house with the water pot, walking through the village and the country, going to the pond, collecting water, and bringing it back. She is very patient, learning that filming is not all glamorous! We also film 12-year-old Morad Hossan Mehedi (right), showing us his family latrine. Day three
A similar journey to another village, Ford Nagar, where we see a disgusting hanging latrine, with a pile of poo underneath and chickens pecking away - no doubt carrying muck around the village. Flies are everywhere. On to the local primary school, filled with the noise of children. Into one class, where the fascinated kids are learning the names of the local fruit, shouting out the names in Bangla, and then writing them down. We film a piece of action with a few of the kids pumping water; a tube well 50 ft deep leads to a handpump beside the school building. This is clean safe drinkable water, and because it is close to the school and their houses, the kids don't have to spend half the day fetching it. With a bunch of kids we play the 'blue hand game' - passing round a football covered in blue chalk, like piggie-in-the-middle. After a few minutes, everyone's hands are bright blue! This shows how easily germs are spread if you don't wash your hands after going to the toilet. Day four and fiveWe visit slums in Dhaka. Of the 10 million people living in the capital, more than three million are in slums. People live in tiny shacks, with narrow alleys between blocks. Most of the slums are only a few feet above the water table, and close to waterways; so digging a shallow well is an easy way to get water, but it is horribly polluted. WaterAid and their partners are trying to bring in clean water and are also building main drains that run right through the slum. They are also encouraging people to get together into groups of 10 to 30 households, and then share the cost of building proper latrines. The health of people in the community improves: they no longer get diarrhoea, and the kids can get to school more; they do not get skin infections, and they don't have to waste money on medicines.
Bangladesh is a noisy, lively, vibrant country, full of energy and promise. There are big problems and the people are threatened by global warming, since much of the country is so low-lying. Nevertheless, WaterAid is clearly doing a tremendous job in helping the poorest people to help themselves.
>> Back to the Splish Splash Flush page >> Find out more about Bangladesh
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