Deferral lifted!
My medical clearance has been lifted!! I sent in my appeal files last week, and it finally got to my medical officer yesterday. He looked it over together with a specialist there, and they were able to lift the deferral without the need to take my case all the way to the appeals board. I can't even express how relieved and happy I am about this! I feel like this huge weight has been lifted off my shoulders, and I am free again.
I still have a couple of things to do to get medical clearance, but you can bet as soon as I found out the deferral was lifted, I was on the phone making appointments to get everything taken care of! I haven't been able to get ahold of my placement officer yet to see what my options are exactly about getting into a program soon. I suspect though, that it might be September for the region I'd most like to go (Eastern Europe). Who knows though? At least I don't have that two year deferral though! I'm just on Cloud 9 right now, if you couldn't tell. :-)
Bangladeshi clothing
I thought it would be fun to post some photos having to do with the different types of clothes worn in Bangladesh. You can only describe things so much, but you know what they say about pictures. :)
Sarah, Kate, Francie, Meghan, and Marie in their saris for the swearing in ceremony. A sari (pronounced "shari") is made up of three pieces: a petticoat (or underskirt), a tight fitting blouse, and the long decorative fabric that is wrapped around the body. This is how Bangladeshi women typically wrapped their saris, though these are formal occasion saris. You would wear a simple cotton sari for everyday use. Some of the older Bangladeshi women wore saris everyday, and most of the very poor women as well. Most women wore shalwar kameezes though.
This is how the language teachers wrapped my sari for the swearing in ceremony. This isn't how Bangladeshi women wore their saris every day. This is the way they wrap it for weddings though, and apparently this style is more common in India.
This is Zeke showing off his incredibly fashionable lungi. A lungi is a single piece of fabric sewn into a tube. You tie it in the front to hold the whole thing up. Lower class men such as rickshaw wallahs wore these all the time, but upper class men would not go out in public in them. You can bet that as soon as any man is in the privacy of his own home though, he immediately changes into a lungi. I hear they are incredibly comfortable. Interestingly, some of the girls in my training group brought floor length skirts but found when they wore them out in public, they would get strange looks. They looked like lungis and of course only men wear lungis!
Unfortunately this photo doesn't show the full length, but Mike and Zeke here are wearing panjabis. They are about the same length as women's shalwar kameezes. The men usually wore panjabis to go to the mosque or formal events such as weddings, or to just look nice. Plus, and I am by far the only one to think this, they're kind hot!
This is my host sister at site. Isn't she beautiful? I told my family I wanted to take some pictures of them so she changed into this and got all decked out. It takes skill and practice to wrap a sari by yourself, and she can do it with ease and grace.
I loved this outfit because it was shorter (and therefore not as much incredibly hot fabric!) It was fine for me to wear at the city where we had training, but once I moved out to site, that city was a lot more conservative. My host family thought this kameez was way too short (just above the knee), so I ended up only wearing it in the house. Notice also the Chaco sandals - unoffical shoes of the Peace Corps and THE most comfortable shoes ever - and the Peace Corps hat.
This is Rose and me. I'm wearing a more appropriate length shalwar kameez (although I shouldn't have let the wind blow it like that!). Rose is actually wearing a top and bottom she brought from the US, but they passed wonderfully as a modern shalwar kameez. Just normal light-weight loose cotton pants and a long tunic-like top I think she got at H&M. The scarves we are wearing, actually called ornas, can be worn like we are in this picture, but usually are draped around the other way so that there is a loop of fabric completely covering the chest area.
This is Maya and me. This was the day we were taking group pictures at our training site so everyone dressed in their nice shalwar kameezes. We're being nice and conservative here; Maya especially so with the way her orna is draped.
This is Rose, Lisa, Medhan, and TJ. The girls are all wearing shalwar kameezes and TJ is wearing plain old everyday western clothes. This is what middle class Bangladeshi men wore as well - slacks and button-down shirts. Funny how men can get away with that!
This is John and Lisa. John is sporting a traditional Bangladeshi shirt called a fotua. Not a whole of guys wore it, but I thought it was cute!
My host family and their friends. This was taken in the "winter," so my host mom and sister are wrapped up in wool shawls and my host sister is actually wearing jeans under her kameez! The man in the center is wearing the typical "poor man's" outfit: a tank and lungi.
