The Joys of Life Overseas

Being associated with an embassy, we have access to both American groceries and moderate access to the US postal system.  Sadly, these things don't always work exactly the way they are supposed to.  First, I will share a recent message we received from the commissary.  Second, a message from our postal clerk.
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Dear Commissary members,

This is just to let you know that next week we are expecting to receive a 40’ FCL containing dry mixed consumables carrying products like select cereals, dish washing liquids, spaghetti/pasta, dry and wet cat and dog food products etc. This particular shipment is from California and was originally scheduled to arrive at Chittagong on April 23, 2013.

On this note, please also be advised that the reason for our late receiving of the above shipment is that we initially placed dry orders (containing the above products that are currently experiencing run outs) with our lead vendor Ramstein CMY and after nearly 4 weeks of our closing the bid, we were informed by Ramstein that they are temporarily not processing any orders as they are upgrading their software. We then immediately went to our secondary and commercial vendors in the US and organized the above mentioned 40’ FCL shipment in addition to ordering of air shipments for select products to meet up products gaps. You will be happy to note that we have 2 full 40’ FCL shipments lined up to arrive Chittagong after May 24^th carrying dry mixed and freeze cargo.

As always, we thank you for your kind understanding, patience and support to the Commissary!

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Just a quick note on this message above - Ramstein CMY is the military commissary at Ramstein Air Force Base in Germany.  It's always nice to see government efficiency at all levels...  Meanwhile, the commissary has been out of Multi-grain cheerios (yes, I realize we're usually pretty spoiled) and sandwich bread for weeks.  Not that we need things like bread when I make sandwiches for a school-bound kid every day for lunch.  I guess I should clarify.  The commissary isn't OUT of sandwich bread, but the bread they have is all over $5 per loaf.  We routinely get a variety of brands when items come in, and the bread I buy is usually about $3.50 per loaf.  So... I'm just not going to pay over $5.  I just won't. 

And now for our update from the post office:

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Hello All,

Mailroom has received some mailbags with obvious smoke damage. You may notice smoke odor in your packages. We are inquiring for further information from Singapore about the incident.

We are also asking DPO how, if possible, you could claim for damage from USPS.

In one package, from WalMart, a jar of pickles was broken. The breakage is attributable to insufficient packaging by the shipper. The goods are protected by mere one layer of twisted manila paper around the inside of the box. All other boxes and packages in the same bag may have the smell of pickles.

We are sorry but these incidents are beyond our control.

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As a side note, I can not recall any time that the commissary has ever been sold out of pickles.  Additionally, we are not authorized to ship liquid items (or items that contain liquids) in excess of 16 oz, so I'm not really sure what anyone was doing ordering them in the first place.  

 

And that's the news from Dhaka. 

14 Months in to our 12 Month Tour

Strange?  Yes.  But if you're going to do something, you might as well live it up.  Traditionally, In Region Training (IRT) is just a 12 month tour.  Unfortunately for families with children, the Bangladeshi staff college begins in April and ends in February.  This doesn't really match up with school dates for the kids - one of the main reasons that the staff college has an elementary school at Mirpur that runs from April to February :)  Again, unfortunately, this school is not accredited by American standards, so it would not have really done us much good to send B there for the year.

Once we were getting closer to the end of our tour, we asked if we could stay for a few extra months to allow B to finish out his school year which ends in June.  I believe the official response was something along the lines of "we currently see no reason why you can't do this, but we remain free to change our minds at any point in time." 

And so here we are.  The up side of this is that staff college attendance is pretty involved, and doesn't necessarily allow for a lot of embassy time or a lot of travel.  Josh is now (for the most part) fully integrated in DAO and will also have an opportunity to do some additional India travel before we leave.  Naturally, I will stay in Dhaka and hang out with the kids :) 

So what is life like post-staff college?  The kids and I get to eat breakfast with Josh every morning, he works a standard 8/9ish to 5ish schedule, and he's both close to home and semi-reachable by phone.  He's taken a few small trips within the country, but hasn't been gone for more than a few days at a time, which the kids seem pretty okay with.  All in all, a fairly relaxed atmosphere.  It's strange to me that so many people who participate in IRT ONLY experience this part.  The staff college really forced both Josh and I to get out and get involved in Bangladeshi military culture; we both view this as a good thing.  I know every experience is different, but I can't imagine having such an up-close and personal look without staff college.  Then again, we were also very busy, and had mandatory evening events almost every week, sometimes multiple times per week.  Up sides and down sides...

We have welcomed in the newest American staff college attendee - a non FAO -  and I believe he's settling in.  We're working on re-homing our staff and also selling on car, but this is complicated by having no idea when we're supposed to leave.  With the current budget issues, all decisions for graduate school (our likely next step) are on hold.  This means we are in a bit of limbo.  We could get orders next week, or we could still be sitting here in August waiting.  I'm really hoping for more of the first and less of the second.  I'm looking at housing, but we don't know where we're going for sure, nor do we know when we will be there, so other than keeping an eye on the market, there's not much I can do.

Do I like to be this flexible?  Not really.  But this type of uncertainty just kind of comes with the territory sometimes.

To Write or not to write...

Isn't that the question?  I chose to take a break for a while - mainly because I feel like my writing quality tends to suffer when I force myself to write, and as I'm not exactly a master of words as is, I have to wait for my peak writing periods :)

Dhaka continues to be a source of never-ending emotions.  Sometimes we're overwhelmed with wonder, sometimes frustration, but we're always feeling "somthing" here.  The past few weeks, we've been making the international news with the results of the war crimes tribunals being announced.  It's been a bit turbulent, but not a lot of disturbances near where we live.  We've also been fortunate to host a guest for the past few weeks - a visiting South Asia FAO.  Life here gets to be very routine, so we've appreciated the opportunity to talk to another adult on a regular basis (okay, so really, I've appreciated this more than my other half since he gets to talk to grown-ups all the time...).

Life overseas presents great opportunities.  Probably the best of those is the school that B gets to attend.  Where else could you get someone to pay for your kids to go to a top rated private school?  Certainly not anywhere in the US, at least not anywhere we've been yet.  But at the same time, there are challenges.  Josh has been accepted to 2 grad school programs back in the US, which is likely to be our next stop.  All things being equal, we should be leaving here in 3 months to start that new adventure, but of course we don't know which school we're going to, we don't have orders, and we don't know when we might.  So the downside of this awesome life we lead is that we also learn to live with large amounts of uncertainty.  I tend to view our lifestyle in much the same way that I view my spiritual life - I accept that even when I don't understand the plan, I know there is one, and I just need to be patient and trusting.  Perhaps this trust is misplaced when it comes to the Army, but the thought brings me a small amount of peace, so I'm going to go with it.  Through all of the ups and downs, we've been well taken care of in our Army career, and I'm sure our next step will reveal itself in time.

On the note of other exciting opportunities we have experienced here in Bangladesh, Josh and I took a trip a few weeks ago to visit the Beximco plant just north of the city.  Beximco is the largest private sector corporation in the country, and they manufacture a range of goods from clothing to fine china.  Our plant tour took us through the factory where they were sewing multi-colored jeans ready to be exported to Wal-Mart as well as their "factory store" where they sell bone china at significantly reduced prices.  For those not aware, Beximco is the supplier for well-known name brand china companies such as Royal Doulton.  Since it's kind of the "thing to do" and we'd much prefer to leave our wedding china packaged up state-side when we're overseas, we decided to pick up some new bone china.  Our grand total for 12 place settings including serving pieces (and a full tea and coffee service with 24 cups and saucers) just was under $400.  That's right.  It pays to live at the source - even if only for a year or two.  And naturally, everything was delivered to my house free of charge.  Did it require many phone calls to "clarify" the order and actually confirm everything?  Sure.  But I consider that the price of doing business.  And in the end, I'm happy with what we got. 

So, in theory, our time here is growing short, although it's difficult to see the end when it's some nebulous thing off in the distance.  The kids are definitely anxious to see family back home, and ask on a routine basis when we can go ride on an airplane to see everyone.  But we're also determined to enjoy our time here to the fullest, and we're not in a rush to get home.  One breath at a time.

The Itch

I might not like to move, but I also don't really care for ... stagnating - for lack of a better word.  As I write this post, I have not left the city of Dhaka (and specifically a very small portion of that city) since July of this year.  I suppose that's not totally true.  I did just get to go on an all day picnic experience with the Staff College in the days before Christmas.  And to do that, I had to get up early, get the kids up early, ride a bus for 5 hours, and got sick from eating the contaminated (yes, contaminated) food they served us.  So ... that was the last time I left the city.  Might make you think I wasn't  anxious to do it again, but truly, TRULY I feel the need to go somewhere.

Here I was thinking our IRT year was going to be all about exciting travel, but really, all I get to do is stay home.  Part of this is my own doing of course since I spent a large portion of my fall - and plan to spend a large portion of my spring - working on my masters program.  Having an online program is great, but I definitely don't have the flexibility to take off for a week (or longer) when I'm supposed to be contributing 3-4 times per week to online forums.  Internet reliability in hotels in the region is questionable at best in some locations.  Additionally, B's school schedule doesn't really facilitate us going with Josh when he travels.  The other overseas families all live at Mirpur Cantonment, and there is a school there which exists solely for the kids of students attending the Staff College.  So the school year runs from April until February and the holidays match those of the Staff College.  Of course, this school is not accredited in any way, so it's really not an option for us even though it would be nice to have Josh's school breaks line up with B's.  And so with a very few exceptions, B and Josh are not home at the same times.  

We anticipate at this point that we'll be sticking around for a few months at the completion of Staff College to allow B to finish out his school year, and that would be a great time to travel since Josh won't be on a strictly defined schedule, except for the fact that, you know, B is in school.  And when he's on break (for Spring Break), I've got 2 classes going on.  So I'm about to pull my hair out realizing that I might never actually leave this city.  Ever.  Okay, now I'm just being dramatic.  Obviously I get to leave.  But I feel ridiculous thinking that in the 16 months we will live here, I will have left Dhaka to travel on only one occasion.  No India, no Nepal, no side trip just to relax somewhere.  Instead, the two week trip we took as soon as we arrived here, to Sri Lanka, will be the sum total of my overseas travel.  And that just makes me feel... itchy.  I mean, who comes all this way and doesn't at least get to see the Taj Mahal, right?

Groceries

Well, we've been in Dhaka for just shy of 10 months now, and we have recently found out that we will likely stay for another 6 months (taking us 4 months past our one year IRT tour) so that B can finish out the school year over here.  As I reflect on our lifestyle and start making notes for our next overseas tour (whenever that might be) one thing really stands out.  We need to make better use of our consumables allowance.  This isn't really something anyone can tell you ahead of time, because it's tough to visualize the sorts of foods you really want to ship (and know what things will be expensive) until after you've lived here for a while.  When you live with kids - who have ever-changing tastes - this is also tough.  I have three totally unopened large containers of oatmeal because my kids (and my husband) really, REALLY like oatmeal.  But strangely, they're not eating it here.  Instead, everyone seems to opt for blueberry pop-tarts.

I think the first big adjustment for me was having to buy all name-brand products.  I know some people shop this way all the time, but I don't.  I buy generic whenever I can and with the exception of Kirkland's macaroni and cheese (which is truly awful), I am generally very pleased by the quality.  Please, if you take one thing away from this post, never buy that macaroni and cheese.  This is actually one of the main reasons I don't generally shop at the commissary when we're stateside.  I just don't see the savings they promise because I don't normally buy name-brand items at the grocery store.  So really, if I was stateside and bought only name-brand items, I'm sure our grocery bill would be higher to begin with.  But add to that the fact that our overseas commissary (not actually affiliated with DeCA, but generally sourced from DeCA products) adds a significant surcharge on to commissary prices to cover the expense of shipping, and prices for food here can be a bit silly.  Take for instance peanut butter which is currently running over $8 for a 40 oz container, or Cheez-Its which run just shy of $4 per box.  Do I think I'm getting ripped off?  No, I'm sure the commissary is charging me a fair price relative to what they pay for these things, but it doesn't make it much easier to bear.

Cereal generally starts at $5 per box and goes up from there; canned goods (vegetables, beans, etc) start at $1.50 per can.  I've honestly mostly stopped paying attention to the prices when I shop since we don't have any alternative.  As much as I hate to pay those prices, we have to eat something.  Some people ship in food in large quantities (www.amazon.com or buythecase.net), but I've often found that once I add in shipping - if required - the prices aren't that different than what I'm paying at the commissary.  So I've just essentially given up trying to save money on food.

And now for the (potentially) helpful portion of this.  We as a family need to make much better use of our consumables allowance the next time we go overseas.  While we can't make up for the ridiculous prices on things like meat, cheese, and yogurt, we can at least ship cases of cereal, lunch-box treats, crackers, canned goods, and spaghetti sauce.  With those items alone, I'd save quite a bit (since we go through them so quickly).  One member of our family - who shall remain nameless - made the executive decision that we didn't need to ship these items because "they are available at the commissary", but I really think next time I need to put my foot down.  There's a big difference between "available" and "reasonably priced".  I could be concerned with pesky things like expiration dates on all this food purchased in advance, but over half the items I purchase here are either expired, or close to it, so really, what's the difference.  I have cheddar cheese in my freezer downstairs that has a best buy date of sometime mid-2011.  I'm not kidding.  While I am thankful most days that these things ARE available, I feel a bit... annoyed that because the military gives us a consumables allowance, they feel no need to give us any sort of COLA that would be commensurate with the actual expenses we incur just shopping for groceries.

Sadly, I feel like this information might only be useful if we come back here to Dhaka, as each country has their own type of commissary.  For example, our friends in Sri Lanka do not have any refrigerated or frozen items available.  Then again, some other countries in our region tend to have more things available to them on the economy.  I feel like we have altered our diet while living here to make best use of the foods that are available, and I'm sure we would do the same in any new location.  Here's hoping we can continue to remain flexible and do our best to make use of the opportunities available to us.

One Year Later

One year ago, we had already started making preparations for our "big trip".  We spent the weekend in and around Sacramento (after a quick trip to the ER to remove popcorn kernels from B's ears).  It's strange that while that trip seems so familiar to me and I can recall many of the things we did, it was also a long, long time ago.  So many new things have happened!  We've been here in Dhaka for nine months now.  Sadly, I've had relatively few opportunities to travel even though we'd hoped to be able to travel together.  We're all very happy that B is in school now, but given his issues getting adjusted to that new schedule, we've been loathe to pull him out.  So, Josh has traveled alone most of the time.  I look back and I'm a bit jealous of our ability to just make hotel reservations and take off for the weekend.  With Josh's school, this is often totally impossible between social events, after-hours work, and "field trips".  So my primary job is keeping the kids on a schedule.

I've successfully completed my first semester of grad school and I'm happy to report that while my grades aren't officially posted, I'm pretty sure I got an A in both classes.  I've registered for my next set of classes and I only hope we're here in Dhaka through the end of the next semester so I can continue to focus on that instead of trying to squeeze class into the middle of an international move.

We celebrated K's third birthday on Friday - she's is such a big girl!  Josh took her out to pick out a cake and she was so excited about it that rather than waiting until lunch, we had cake in the middle of the morning followed by presents.  That evening, Josh and I attended the 237th birthday day of the United States Marine Corps.  At embassies, this is often one of the largest social functions of the year, and if our experience was any indication, I can see why.  If you've been to a few military balls before, I'm sure you remember the format:  mediocre dinner, so-so guest speaker, 5 minutes of grown-up dancing followed by...  Well, to spare my albeit limited audience, I'll just say we usually leave to avoid the embarrassing "dancing" of the younger crowd.  Anyway, this is clearly a different sort of group here.  I'm not sure I can really guess the average age of the people at our event, but we were definitely not the oldest or youngest.  And the dance floor was beyond crowded late into the evening.  I even got Josh to dance!  So add some free alcohol into the equation and you have a recipe for success.  Too bad Josh had to get up early the next morning to go on an all-day boat cruise for school.  

And today, Veterans Day, B is at school, K is on a playdate, Josh is at school, and I'm enjoying the Masterchef Australia/How I Met Your Mother marathon and thinking about all of my friends, past and present, who have served this fine country in any capacity.  

Have I got a deal for you!

After two repairs, it appears the motherboard on our two year old laptop is completely shot.  Maybe it's just me, but I really think they should last longer than that...  We thought we were still going to be okay and just have our local trusty repair shop take care of replacing the motherboard, but when I called to get an estimate of when they thought it would be ready, they said it would take 6 weeks to get the new motherboard in.  6 WEEKS! 

Since I'm taking online classes and we have our country brief to Josh's classmates coming up, it wasn't terribly realistic to think we could go that long without the laptop working.  And so, I made several trips to the ATM to withdraw enough cash to go purchase a new laptop.

My early inquiries about prices were met with the standard party line of a randomly high price (less than the price tag, but still high) followed by several lower offers.  But since each store in the mall sells the same products, they know they're competing against eachother essentially and whoever is willing to quote the lowest price gets the sale. 

Funny thing about laptops here in Bangladesh.  They don't come with software.  Like any software.  We're talking no operating system here.  So while I could purchase a fairly decent computer, if I wanted to actually use it, I was told to purchase pirated software (pirated Windows 7 and Microsoft Office were available for a small fee).  Do I have anything against using pirated software?  No.  Not really.  But we went through all that when we built computers while living in Korea where pirated software is also very common.  It worked fine for a while, and then we started getting all kids of messages from Microsoft about how they "thought" we "might" be using an unofficial copy and eventually it stopped working altogether.  If we just stayed in Korea, it probably wouldn't have been a problem.  We just would have stopped by our local computer software store and picked up a new copy of the pirated software and all would have been fine.  But since we eventually had to return to the states, we decided it would just be easier in the long run to purchase a real copy of an operating system (at the time, Windows XP) and be done with it.  Considering that same computer (built 8 years ago) is still my backup computer and sitting upstairs in my office right now, I consider it a good investment. 

Regardless, no one seemed to understand why I would object to having a pirated copy of software.  It's apparently just the way it's done here.  They sell you essentially a blank computer, and you load whatever you want.  And strangely, it you go to the Toshiba-Asia website, they even show that each model of computer can be purchased without software if you so desire.  I was starting to be concerned that buying a new laptop would not actually solve any of our problems.

But then, I remembered that I was still carrying around the hard drive from my old computer (which worked just fine) because I needed to pick up my computer from the repair shop as we were not getting it fixed.  Once I produced this hard drive that had an authentic copy of Windows 7 on it, there was much excited discussion after which they told me that "of course" they could just copy the operating system from my old hard drive and put it on my new one.

So, then the guy from the store walked me downstairs to another store (this one appeared to actually be a Toshiba outlet of some sort) and left me there telling me to call him when I was ready to go.  The Toshiba people loaded the drivers I needed onto the laptop, but essentially just left my old hard drive in my new laptop rather than copying anything.  I guess it's a long and involved process (kind of like buying a computer?) and as I'd already been wandering around the computer mall for over 2 hours, I was ready to just let it go.  He told me to come back another day if I wanted them to transfer everything to the new hard drive and then the new laptop would be much faster since my old hard drive is over half full.

As business over here is all about relationships, I have no doubt that I could walk in some time next week and they would remember me and know why I was there.  So, after 3 hours, I left the computer market with a brand new laptop with my old hard drive and the promise of maybe having something more.  At least we have what we need to make it through the next few weeks.

If I was in the US, I could have a better laptop fully loaded with software (and an operating system...) for less than I paid, but considering where I live, and considering that USPS still has their lithium battery shipping issue, I'll be happy enough with our outcome.