Not as easy as I thought, not that I thought it was going to be easy at all.  Why is it that I think that I have something to offer?  What really is my motivation for doing this?
I met with a woman who runs an NGO in northern Bangladesh yesterday.  She must be in her 60's, about half my height, double my strength, and triple my intelligence.  She's been working in social work her whole life.  I wouldn't say she was entirely critical of my ideas, but there were certain points that I could tell that she was secretly rolling her eyes about when I brought them up.
Her NGO started a slum relocation program to help families move out of the slums of Dinajpur into their own houses.  They called the program Apon Thikana, which means, Own Address, because before now, none of the families had their own address.  Imagine living your entire life without being able to tell friends or family members where you live.
Her organization worked together with a German NGO called Shanti on this particular project.  I wasn't there during the process, but I've heard stories of the frustration on both sides.  People have been building out of mud for hundreds of years in this part of Bangladesh, and for the ecologically minded Germans, this was the perfect building material.  For Chhabi Apa, who'd lived through the floods of 1968 and seen entire villages made of mud houses wash away, this was a step backwards.  And it isn't even cheaper to build out of mud in this area, because the soil isn't suitable.
What makes me think I know better than the people who have lived there and worked there for generations?  What can I add to improve their quality of life?  I started thinking maybe I have this all wrong.  Maybe the point of my study is to learn from them.  Maybe we are the ones that are lacking.  Driving home from my in-laws I saw an old farmhouse being renovated with mud infill. The people we bought our RV in had a mud house.  Two other of my friends live in mud houses in Germany.  Maybe the point is for me to learn how the Bangladeshi's build and make creative use of their resources and bring the hundreds of years of knowledge back home instead of trying to find the latest technology from over there to upset their balance.