Dear Members of the Rotary Clubs of Strathcona, Mayfield, Urban Spirits, Whyte Avenue, Grand Prairie and Hinton,
We hope you all are well. We are not very good as our life is going through many challenges after the covid crisis.
The season is changing, children are suffering in fever & cough. As still very few less than 3% people are infection by covid, we always advised people to go a doctor if the sickness is longer. However, we have a common problem for children in our slum like ‘pneumonia’ in every year. Often the local doctors prescribe antibiotic which is very much harmful for the growth of human body especially for children and we strongly suggest not to take antibiotic rather wait or take other precautions to cure from the cough and fever. Actually, we have learnt about the bad impact of ‘antibiotic’ from our teacher which she learnt from Gem Munro sir who came from Canada. In our slum and country people do not know about it. We know and share with other people of the slums about the good bacteria and bad, how it damages the natural immunity.
Our friend Rubi has been sick for couple of days. She has a different case caught by Dengue fever. Doctor gave some medicine for treatment of dengue. After taking medicine she feels well now. She told us, “2 years before I had caught by typhoid very badly. I was very sick and nobody was there to take care of me. Even I couldn’t take the medicine properly following the doctor’s prescription because that time I was illiterate. A neighbor who lived little far from my house helped me to understand the doctor’s advice. But now my friends around me, supporting me and I can take care of myself easily. Nowadays, I help other in their needs”. Rubi added that she is confident now and believes she can do many things on her own. Our education has given us such courage and all mothers of our school is like Rubi.
Another common disease in our country is ‘diabetic’. In our communities many people are suffering in diabetics even some of our mothers, their husbands and family members are suffering in this disease. Even many people do not know about their disease as they do not test their blood sugar. When they feel weak, health break they do test and very scared to know about it. In our school our teacher arranged a drama session to give us the massage of diabetic. We performed in the drama and other community observed our drama and got many messages about diabetic. Drama and role-play are always a good way to say something to others keeping their full interest till the end. But when we discuss or say something people loss interest in a few minutes. People enjoy, understand the messages well, enter into their heart when the presentations are interactive like drama or through images. We also aware people to take less carbohydrates although rice is our main food.
Our session covered;
- What is diabetic and why it attacks?
- Types of diabetics
- Symptoms of the disease
- What should do and shouldn’t for a diabetic patient
- Perfect food chart for a diabetic patient and such
Baby Begum and Molina of our friends in school were very attentive and interested in the session because they are suffering in diabetic. After getting information they keep control of foods, do exercise, eating more vegetables and do regular walking. A diabetic patient needs periodic checkup of blood sugar and by any reason if the sugar level goes high or very low should go to doctor for medicine. Our teacher also provides us the name and address of a government specialized diabetics hospital where we can meet specialized diabetic doctors and do blood test with very little cost as a token. We are grateful to her for the information. More interesting our friends Baby Begum and Molina are leading the team to share the message in the slums around that people become aware about ‘diabetics’.
We shared before about the days of Shorifa, now her baby is 8 months and she is giving him a compact meal with crashed rice, lentils and vegetable which she has learnt in ‘child food & nutrition training’ in Amarok School. She told us “When I play with him and talk to him. It seems to me that he understands my words. He is healthy and not suffering in any major disease as I take care of him very well because now, I know how to take care and feed at this age. After joining in Mother School there are lots of changes in my life and I am a happy person. But when I was new in school, I had many wrong believes about child development but after receiving many sessions now I am fully aware about child development and nutrition”. She is attending in school regularly with her little baby. We all love her baby very much. Our school is running well. Last week Shorifa conducted a session in our classroom on “caring newborn baby”. She smiled and conducted the session with confidently from her own experience.
Mina is enjoying her responsibility as the Librarian of Amarok library and focusing her goal to develop reading habit among children. She can see community people & children like to read story books more. If she can develop a large number readers including children, we will successful.
Now many of our friends do small street and mobile selling for earning as we all want economic empowerment. Fully depending on husband’s income is not safe and respectful, almost all mothers are experienced of that. We have realized the need of savings during the covid lockdown and joblessness. Our friend Jhinuk has started to sell inexpensive cloths, with her little savings. She went to ‘Islampur’ a wholesale market to buy cheaper ladies wear and child readymade dress with help of Rumi. Sheuli is very good at sewing work. Sometimes she buys old dresses and modify size. Jhinuk shared her initiative with her and got the business idea. After that she collected cloths and sells them by feet for 2 hours every day walking around. She also has started to go door to door for selling. Her husband is very happy as her earnings afoords the family to eat better and could save some to meet the future crisis. Her husnad sometimes goes with her and carries the goods. We want to change our lives by education, by educating all children of our slum and being independent in earnings.
We are not only learning in our school but also doing good for our community. Our friend Parul has a small deposit in a Cooperative which is in Satarkul a little far from our place. She goes there once in a month for deposit her saving. One day she examined her deposit book with the office ledger and became surprised to see the balance as they did not put entry all the amount. Immidiately she raised her voice and asked for a checking. The staff wanted to do it later but she said, “it has to be now, in front of me”. After the checking the errors found in the office ledger and possibly the corruption was done by the corrector intentionally. But the in-charge instantly corrected her book adding the amount she should get. Next day in our school she told us her story confidently and we all inspired. It happened to many of our lives when we were illiterate but now does not happen now.
With our love and respect to you,
Rubi, Sheuli, Baby, Jhinuk, Molina and Mina
(Mothers of Combined Rotary Mothers’ School, Dhaka, Bangladesh)