Internal Struggles vs. Cultural Experience

I’ve been in this country for about 25 days and I think I’m cracking. I am slightly losing it. It’s not the food or the traffic. I haven’t been gone long enough to become homesick (sorry friends). I’ve enjoyed every bit about this trip except for one thing—the freaking gender divide.

I have never been immersed in a culture where my second-class citizenship was so blatant. I bitch about it all the time in the states, which now seems glorious by comparison although it’s not nearly as bad here as some countries have it, I know. But I’m a point right now where the sole thing I miss is my freaking autonomy.

We’re traveling in a group of six women and two men. If we go anywhere, we have to be accompanied by men because it’s the safe and chivalrous thing to do. When we pay for things, we hand the money to a man who then pays even if the dude receiving the cash is standing right in front of us. When we meet people for the first time, no one shakes our hands; they skip right over us and shake the men’s hands. When we order at restaurants, no matter what Bengali woman is ordering, the server always defaults to the men in our group for the final answer.

I know the men in my group feel this unspoken role of “protect and serve” the sacred females and while both of them are delightful, I sometimes want to scream, “Let me do it myself!!” I’m also sick and tired of hearing it’s too dangerous for you; the “you” being women. And heaven forbid someone actually say “You can’t do that”…I’m at a point where those words might make me explode. Thanks, mom.

While I’ve followed suit and culture pretty well, I have been pretty vocal (anyone shocked?) about the inequities when I witness them, which humors the men in my group. I interpret this as nervous laughter because deep down I’d like to believe they think I have a point.

My final tipping point (because for a little bit I was honestly enjoying having everything done for me without asking, tricksy men) was the other night when we went to see a popular theater show in a rural village in Rangpur. Popular Theater is BRAC’s way of disseminating information to the masses about important social issues like the environment, healthy parenting, hygienic practices, and my favorite gender-based violence. It’s composed of about nine women and men who perform skits to get their point across. Last night’s production was on what Bangladesh calls “Eve- teasing”. Eve-teasing is a euphemistic way of saying sexual harassment. It’s boys giving unwanted attention to girls.

Before I offer up my critique (because I always have one), I do want to say that it is absolutely wonderful that they are covering all these topics with rural villagers who often don’t have the access to this information. They tackled the topic beautifully; covering what Eve-teasing looks like and what you can do about it as the victim, bystander and parents. They also covered the repercussions should you get caught and in the ending scene of the skit, I think they organized a rally or a community group to raise awareness on Eve-teasing. SO cool. I had no idea stuff like this existed and it seemed to be pretty effective for planting awareness seeds in the village people’s (YMCA!) minds. There were over a hundred women, men and children attending the show. Talk about cost effective too.

I understand that when you operate in a culture such as this one where the gender roles are pretty defined that you have to pick and choose your battles. Being the feminist that I am, I appreciate that they were tackling sexual harassment. However, two things bothered me (enter my western feminist perspective): 1. Calling it a name like teasing takes away from the severity of sexual harassment and totally downplays the issue. 2. Incorporating “Eve” as in Adam and Eve into the title makes us assume that teasing only happens to girls. I tried to find further insight to this reasoning behind the name and the only answer I got was “Oh well teasing among boys isn’t that big of a problem in South Asian countries.” When I probed further, no one really understood my questions about boys picking on other boys. You cannot tell me that it doesn't happen. I don’t care what part of the world you’re in, some smaller, weaker, different boy is getting picked on and no one is doing anything about it. Maybe it’s because this act is supposed to turn him into a man, a socially acceptable cultural norm in many countries…Ok I get that. I don’t like it, but I can work with this. I’m well aware that some of my thoughts tend to be progressive even for my own country.

I get the argument that it’s difficult to take your western perspective of women’s empowerment and apply it to another culture without first understanding their own cultural beliefs on the position of women. This does not mean however, that I can’t vent about my complete discomfort being a woman here, especially since I have to play ball with those same gender role restrictions. Granted, my foreigner status offers me a little more flexibility but I am becoming increasingly frustrated every time someone defers to the male next to me when I am giving him the answer to the question. It’s not something I can easily ignore.

Despite my internal philosophical battles, I am learning a great deal on how different women’s empowerment appears in other countries which is great because that’s kind of why I came. Moral of the story—I’m frustrated because my gender role expectations are a little too progressive for this country, but naturally I’ll live. It’s all the about the cultural experience and hey, I can say that I’ve definitely developed a newfound appreciation for the liberties I have as a woman in my own country. Aw, Cori, you’re growing…

I’ve also already devised a plan of action for when I come home. The first thing I’m gonna do is take Travis out to dinner. I’m driving to the establishment, I’m ordering for us, I’m paying (even though this trip broke me) and I’ll probably dominate the conversation because I tend to do that anyway. Silly, I know, but I am dying to feel autonomous again.

Rickshawty what's your price?

It's obvious the transportation methods are blowing my mind in this country. The way things work around here are entertaining and provide a pretty well rounded cultural experience. One phenomenon that I have recently become acquainted with are rickshaw rides. Rickshaws is basically a third world country pedi-cabs only on single speed bikes from the early 80s and a carriage that's actually attached to the bike which holds its passengers. They're pretty ornate and their bells harmonize with then incessant honking. I'm sure you'll know what I'm talking about if you've ever watched the travel channel or Indiana Jones: Temple of Doom (that rickshaw might have been pulled by a dude, but the concept and sweet Dr. Jones reference are still there). Taking a rickshaw is an easy and cheap way to travel short distances around the city. A five to ten minute rickshaw ride costs less than $1. It's absurd considering I know some pedi-cabbers in Austin that had some $50 rides during South By.

The rickshaw drivers (peddlers?) are some of the skinniest men I've ever seen in my life. They're not emaciated, just muscular from working out all day. I don't think female rickshaw drivers exist. They might, I've never seen one and I think it's highly unlikely. The presence of men in Dhaka is just greater than women in general... but I digress. We can cover that topic later on.

Internship day one, myself and two other interns decide that we are going to take a rickshaw to BRAC. No one speaks Bangla, the language of the land, but somehow we manage to get across our need to get to BRAC. Being that no one in our threesome had ever been on a rickshaw, we didn't fully understand exactly how we were going to fit three people on one. The carriages can comfortably fit two if you're cool with eliminating your own personal space bubble. So we did what any family does with an extra person; you put that person on someone else's lap. And guess who got to be the Nancy sitting pretty on top...yours truly.

Ultimately that would have been fine if Dhaka's roads were in better condition and the rickshaw driver didn't have to weave through traffic. I was precariously placed on the lap of one of the interns, nearly falling off at every bump or sharp turn. Needless to say, I became instantly close with the two other interns I had just met within the previous 24 hours. Eventually we made it to BRAC University which is a block or two from BRAC Center(where we needed to be) so we counted it as a mild success, got off and paid more than we should have. I felt okay paying a little more just because it had been three of us and I really wanted to focus on the small victory of just getting there without falling off.

The next day, we took another rickshaw. When I handed the guy his money, he demanded more. We danced back and forth between his price and my price. During this short duet, other rickshaws were gathering around interested in the debate. I don't know if the rickshaw dude finally gave in or if I gave in because I was not having the band of rickshaw brothers coming after me, so we met in the middle. I still paid more than I should have according to my Bengali homies.

Naturally there's no fixed fee for these rides. You're supposed to negotiate beforehand so that you and the driver agree on a price for the service. What I've experienced is that there's a tax for being a foreigner and they love taking advantage of little ol' me. I typically ask the Bengali interns how much a ride should cost between the two locations I'm going before I begin traveling. Most of the rides, they say, should be around 30 Taka which is like forty cents. The several times I've attempted to negotiate the price, I've been relatively "successful". Meaning I managed to negotiate a lower price but they're still getting a good deal out of me. Some rickshaws want to take you places because they know you can pay them more more than they'd make otherwise. I think rickshaws benefit from the sympathy card once people really understand how little they're working for. This results in an excessive payment for a short ride and the foreigner walking away feeling better about her/himself for having improved someone's life by a dollar. In reality, all we've taught the rickshaw guy to do is overcharge the shit out of foreigners. What's cool is that some rickshaws refuse to take foreigners altogether because they don't want to deal with you. So they get to decide who, when and how they do their thing. Oh the autonomy and struggles that come with owning a small business. Can I even call it that?

The Bengali people I've met always tell me I've paid too much when I'm just trying to count the small victory of surviving the ride over. They say it's part of the culture and that I just need to do it. I get it, culture, I'm happy to follow suit. However, sometimes it just feels wrong to argue over a ten cent difference with a man who works ten hours days for change. I'd rather just pay the extra ten cents to not get into it with the dude. But then I'm just perpetuating the "foreigner tax" model. This clearly is not the worst catch 22 anyone's ever been in.