Khakran Village

            This morning we took our first trip to Khakran, a small village outside of Dhaka. The trip took us about an hour by van and then another 30 minutes by boat. From the second we arrived until we climbed back into the boat several hours later, a large group of children followed our every move. Our first destination was the small bamboo shack that was used for Grameen center activities. Villagers gathered around the open windows to watch the meeting and a group of teenage girls giggled as I turned around to say “Hello.” This is where the borrowers meet each week to pay back their monthly installments and make deposits to their savings and pension accounts. I got to observe the basic weekly meeting and ask the borrowers questions about their businesses. For example, one woman named Shuchitra borrowed money from the Grameen Bank to buy a truck for her husband to drive. Her husband had been driving a truck for a company before the bank came to her village and was only allowed to keep a small percentage of his daily earnings. The rest he had to pay to the owner of the truck. Shuchitra’s loan from Grameen allowed her to purchase a truck so her husband could keep all of his daily earnings. Shuchitra now owns 2 trucks and deposits 100 taka per week into her savings account. 

            After the meeting, we walked around to visit individual borrowers to see their businesses. Most of the people of Khakran made pottery but we visited one home that specialized in making cow dung bricks to use as coal. They asked us if we wanted to see the place where they made the bricks and of course we said yes…. 5 minutes later I am standing inside an open area of someone’s home with a large cow tied to the wall waiting for the coal to drop. Eww!

            As I was leaving the village I got separated from the group and the center chief motioned for me to follow her. She took me into her small house, which consisted of one room with dirt floor. She wanted me to sit on her bed and admire the beautiful things she had collected. You could tell from the way she pointed out the embroidery on her bed sheet and the baskets she had collected that she had been working and saving for a long time.