Shishur Sevay

For those who have followed this saga, you know what an achievement this is, and what a relief!!!!  And guess what, I’m not so tired!!!!

As for stuff wearing me down, the laptop could not be fixed, so I’m using an older back up one for now, and I was able to take the hard drive out of the broken one and keep the data.  The printer, after many false starts, finally went to the printer hospital, where I learned that mice had eaten the ink tubes, and that’s why ink spilled out all over.  This was not covered by warranty, of course.

The audit is done!  This was another major achievement.  Now we are apreparing for our Annual General Meeting.  Creating the society, registering it, keeping up with the records needed– all takes time, energy, and always new learnings for me.  In my next posting I’ll write about the actual NGO we formed.

Typepad regularly sends out apologies for technical difficulties, but it remains cumbersome and slow, and I recommend it to no one.  But i’m here so I stay with it.  The apologies, made in the name of improved composing of blog entries, are as if that is only a minor part of blogging.  But the word processing or non-processing is a real obstacle.

The girls are fine, as usual.  They talk more and more about their pasts as their English and my Bengali improve.  My current staff really engages with them — as the aunties i’d hoped for.  We have started English classes for the massis each day.

We kept alive a baby crow who had fallen from the nest.  It was doing so well, developed feathers, began to recognize us, and then died last night.  We just had a little funeral for it.  I dug a hole in the garden, near the back wall, and we stood and cried.  The girls had never seen me cry before.  I was quite close to Paki, as I called the bird.  Paki is Bengali for bird.  I have buried so many pets in back yards and gardens — dogs I’ve loved, cats, gerbils, guinea pigs — with monuments and prayers for safe journeys, and hopes that no one ever digs them up.  Paki is along the back wall, beneath two trees, where it is unlikely anyone will dig.  The girls want to plant flowers around the grave.  We will.  In some ways, life is the same everywhere, and so are children with their pets.