Kasia putting her thumbprint on the official-government-paper document (as a witness).


Anders signing the document (also as a witness).


Shazeda, a member of the Vegetable and Fish Cooperative, signing her name.


Sufia, a member of the Tailoring Cooperative, getting ready to put down her thumbprint (with some help from Khala).


Sonaban, a member of the Vegetable and Fish Cooperative, signing her name.


Khala signing her name (as a witness).


Joygun, another member of the Vegetable and Fish Cooperative, signing her name.

Bela, a member of the Vegetable and Fish Cooperative, receiving her certificate from Kasia.

The Vegetable and Fish Shop Cooperative (from left): Bela, Shazeda, Sonaban, Khala (not a member), Kasia (also not a member), Hasina, Joygun, and Renu.

The Tailoring Cooperative. From left: Nasima, Rina, Lipi, Khala (project staff, not part of the tailoring cooperative), Kasia (also of course not a member of the cooperative), Nazma, and Shufia. Only Johura is missing (she had to take her son to school).

This woman sells fish in a stall next to Hasina's. This is how fish is typically sold in Dhaka. She lives in the same neighborhood as the women we're working with, but she's not participating in the project. Don't look too closely at her product: the good thing about Bangladeshi cuisine is that everything is stewed for hours, and so by the time these fish are eaten, whatever that weird brown stuff is will probably be long gone.


Another woman selling a different kind of fish (tiny minnows that are eaten whole, this is the cheapest kind of fish available here) near Hasina's vegetable shop.

Hanging out in Rina's house (from left: Bina, Kasia, Rina, and Johura).


Johura with her mother, her son, and her daughter (and Bina taking care of business in the background).


Johura's son, Rashen, with Belal (our incredible driver) in Johura's house. 

A pathway between some of the women's houses.


A crowd in front of Nazma's house.


This one was too cute - we just had to include it. This is Nazma's son squeezing between everyone's legs to have his picture taken. 

In Lipi's house. You can tell that she is somewhat successful because she has her own sewing machine.


In between the women's houses in East Rampura.


Sonarban (which means "golden forrest" in Bangla), one of the women participating in the project. 

Johura, Kasia, and Hasina walking between houses.




This woman sells fish in a stall next to Hasina's. This is how fish is typically sold in Dhaka. She lives in the same neighborhood as the women we're working with, but she's not participating in the project. Don't look too closely at her product: the good thing about Bangladeshi cuisine is that everything is stewed for hours, and so by the time these fish are eaten, whatever that weird brown stuff is will probably be long gone. 

One of the Women for Women trainers, Rasheda Akhtar Khanam, teaching the business class.


The other Women for Women trainer, Darianoor Begum, teaching the business class.


Another picture of Darianoor with the business class 

It's hard to get a picture of Bina in East Rampura that isn't extremely serious. Despite this (and how it might look), it's clear that Bina has already established an extraordinarily comfortable raport with these women, and they have accepted her as one of their own. She's a very talented researcher, and she has picked up a lot of things in these conversations that we would have missed entirely.


Bina talking to Johura in her house


Bina is taking notes while the rest of us sit around talking in Shazeda's house (that's Shazeda in the right corner) 

Bina talking to Renu in her house


Bina getting serious in Nazma's house (incidentally, Nazma's house is one of the nicer ones - with cement floor and walls and a pretty good-looking TV). 

These workers are sewing polar fleece sweaters for J.C. Penney (perhaps, we think, on time for back-to-school shopping in America).

 

Workers inspecting J.C. Penney polar fleece pants for quality standards 

This is a picture of the labor rights posted on the wall in the factory. The interesting thing you might notice about this is that they are written in English. They are posted more for the benefit of the inspectors who come to investigate factory conditions than they are for the workers themselves. We did see some small computer print-outs on the wall with labor rights written in Bangla, but even with our limited knowledge of written Bangla, we could tell that what was written in Bangla was different than what was written in English. For example, the English version says the workers’ minimum age is 18, but the Bangla version said it was 14. 

Did you know that they actually put the clothes on the hangers in the factory before they even ship them to us in America? We had no idea! This was such an odd scene, of Bangladeshi men putting little girls' outfits on hangers to be shippped off to J.C. Penney stores all over the United States.

Our visit to East Rampura: the women who are participating in the microcredit project

This is a picture of Joygun, one of the cooperative women, weighing some cucumbers at her small vegetable stand. After she sold them, I saw her stash the money she made in a burlap sack she was sitting on top of. One of the things the women told me they wanted to learn about most was bookkeeping.

This is Nazma. She is a force of nature. As the owner of a very small tailoring shop, she is clearly the leader of the group. They respect her because even though she doesn't own a large business, she knows a lot about business - or at least she knows what she needs to learn in order to be more successful.

This is Rena. Her shop is only as big as what you see - about the size of a closet. However, she runs it herself and is very proud of it.