As of the end of this week I have 2 weeks of work left at BRIF, with the VSO conference giving me a week off between them. I wouldn't go as far as to call it a holiday as there will be some working sessions, and I even agreed to facilitate a session called "Personal Styles". Most people who've seen the conference schedule think I'm doing 2-3 hours on fashion, but in reality it's actually about working styles and personality types. Well, I say that but I haven't actually seen any of the documents for the session as they've been prepared by another volunteer who hasn't yet briefed me… No no I'm sure it'll be fine. Just fine.

Inevitably then I'm spending my days finishing things. This week I handed the staff manual over to the project managers for them to debate and fine tune in Bangla, and with a bit of luck they'll soon finalise what is basically the organisation's HR policy. I've also finished defining our chart of accounts thanks to some detailed feedback from CARE. They also made it painfully clear that they would only accept reports in their own formats, so at some point I'd like to set up an Excel tool that will enable the Accounts Coordinator to export a report and automatically fill in the format required. To do that I need to see what exactly theses reports will look like with our accounts structure, but Plan are being quite vague about when they'll come and install it all, theoretically on the computer they also promised me. They keep saying they'll call me back in a few days, and I keep ringing them after 3 for some news. I figure that they'll give it sooner rather than later just to get rid of me, and by then it won't matter if I've pissed them off as I'll have left BRIF anyway!

So I've been slogging away all week really with not much fun to report. Jobar our caretaker appears to have adopted one of Lucy's puppies, and has even named it Tony. I'm told that this is not in honour of the British Prime Minister. While I'm glad he's looking after her and feeding her, I do worry about his rather depraved habit of rubbing her most private of regions. She seemed happy enough with a tummy rub to me, and I did get the feeling that it wasn't 100 per cent about the dog's happiness. Hmmm, moving swiftly on.

On my day off I did get out off the campus for a few hours to visit a school. Habib had asked me if I'd like to go, as well as our Education Coordinator Anal. It all seemed innocent enough until I started getting briefed on what to say about our education programme. It turned out that the guest of honour was the Deputy Commissioner (or DC for short) who is basically the highest civil servant in Dinajpur district. Just to break this down for you, administratively speaking Bangladesh is divided into 6 divisions, and each division is made up off several districts. A DC is hence very high up the bureaucratic food chain and a key man to know in a corrupt and nepotistic country like this one. The feeling was that as a foreigner I was more likely to be granted an audience with the man and hence spread the good word of our education projects. This wasn't entirely false as it turned out, as no sooner had we arrived than I was spotted, ushered to meet the DC by the school's founder and our host for the day, and given a nice seat just next to the VIP's! That was however the closest I got to the man.

Officially, the event we were invited to was the school's annual sports day. Now for me, this conjures up memories of children running around competing in different sorts of events for an afternoon, perhaps supported by a sprinkling of parents who found the time to come along. This was not what happened. First of all, nothing actually started until the DC arrived which was of course a full 25 minutes late. We had arrived only marginally before and were having a cold drink just outside when he rolled up in his big 4X4, so we just followed his entourage in. As I said before, I was spotted and brought to a seat much closer to the front and the VIP's than I really felt comfortable with. It's not that I don't like sitting with these people, it's just that I hate being dragged up in front of a bunch of strangers to give a speech just because I'm foreign. That may sound paranoid, but it keeps happening so before leaving I thoroughly briefed Anal that under no circumstances was I participating in any way, shape or form in whatever events the afternoon held. I was a mere visitor, end of story. Fortunately for me the DC was far more important than anyone else there so no suggestion of me speaking was ever made. I was however a little suspicious every time some of the organisers huddled together to discuss changes and happened to look in my direction.

Meanwhile, out on the field, all the children in their school uniform were assembled in little platoons. This military appearance to the proceedings was confirmed when the children then paraded, and I mean paraded, past the DC and the school's founder, complete with salute once the order was given by each platoon's little leader! If that wasn't scary enough, the school captain (one of the elder lads who looked like he might struggle to reach the intellectual minimum set for a sniffer dog) led the entire school in a series of physical movements. Imagine a Hitler Youth demonstration of knee bends, arm stretches etc. that changed after each whistle blow and they're pretty much there. Not having seen a school sports day here before I checked with Anal if this was the norm, and thankfully he admitted to be uncomfortable with it all too and said it was a very traditional school.

Then came the speeches, and here I understood nothing so relied on Anal for guidance. The crowd mostly just listened, but for certain speakers they broke into encouraging applause at regular intervals. Can you guess why? It was nothing more complicated than saying complimentary things about our old friend the DC, who during his own speech promised to give the school 20 tonnes of wheat and 10,000 taka! By this point he was already looking at his watch in a very unsubtle "Is that really the time? Well, I must be off soon" sort of way. The host took the hint, shortened the programme, and even savaged the awards ceremony where the children were rewarded for their hard work with books and other gifts. By the time the DC made his way to the VIP refreshment area less than a quarter of the children had received their prizes and were left to sit in the hot afternoon sun. Incidentally, I know he went to the VIP refreshment area as we tried leaving at the same time as he did and got ushered in too. We weren't of course allowed a place at the DC's table where business was apparently being discussed as quickly as possible.

Now call me old fashioned, but I thought sports days and prize giving ceremonies were for and about the kids. Not here. In actual fact one of the main areas our own education project addresses is making class rooms more child-friendly. To give you a simple example of what this means, try having teachers that don't bring large sticks to school and use them on the kids from time to time to discipline them. I bet you're all thinking how wonderful your school years sound now in comparison - I know I am. But then, our schools weren't founded by men as an unscrupulous way of making money were they?