Timeline: October 9 – October 11

Setting up the Khulna center was my last assignment from Relief International. I’ve been working for this international aid agency since May 2005, and I finally realised that it’s time to quit. I resigned last month, and September 31st was officially my last day at work. For last two weeks, I’ve been helping them out as a volunteer, and mentoring my assistant Alamgir whom I’ve nominated for my position.

My work at Khulna took only few hours, so I got a good chance to roam around the city. I visited the zero point, Khulna University campus, Khulna court, the “Jail Khana Ghaat” on the banks of Rupsa river, the New Market, Meena Bazar, and Daily Purbanchal office.

The Khulna Meena Bazar is almost the same size of the Dhaka one, but has one third of the products that our one has. I went there to buy Playboy deodorant for myself but couldn’t find it.

Overall, it was a good trip. I boarded at Hotel Royal as usual and I’m giving them 8.5 out 10 for their service. No beer this time since it’s Ramadan.

Timeline: July 11 – July 13

It was my first trip to Joypurhat, a North Bengal district 380 km from Dhaka. It was infact my first trip to North Bengal as well, the vast region on the other side of Jamuna river.

Since there isn’t any AC bus service available on this route, I had to travel by Hanif Paribahan. I listened to my crazy collection of trance music through out the journey, so I didn’t get too bored. More over, crossing the 4.8 km Jamuna bridge (which is 110 kilometers northwest of Dhaka) was exciting. To date, it’s the longest brigde in South Asia, and 11th longest in the world.

It took 8 long hours to reach Joypurhat. My destination was further 15 kilometers from the town, a village in Pachbibi upa-zila. Pachbibi is completely an under developed rural area, with rikshaw vans as the only means of transport. It was quite surprsing for me see only a handful of real rickshaws around. The Indian border and Hili land port was near to where I stayed, I was informed that a lot of villages are involved with smuggling.

There’s a good number of indigenous population in the area, making it a heaven for a lot of local and international NGOs. A Seventh-day Adventist (SDA) mission school is also in the area, and I was told by my guide that they receives a huge funding from USA. I was told that they have their own backup generators, water supply system, air-conditioned rooms, computers lab with 50+ PCs and so on. I wanted to visit them, but couldn’t manage the time to do so.

An interesting point to mention before I end. If you go to a tea stall in Joypurhat, then this is how they’ll serve your tea: they’ll fill two-third of the cup with milk, and then one-third with tea! Should we call it it tea with milk, or milk with tea, that remains the question.

Timeline: May 7 – May 8

The tiresome 2 day Technical Lead Teacher’s traning ended today. The TLTs got hands-on training on:

• Assembling Pentium 4 computers
• Installing OS (Windows XP and Mandriva Linux)
• Installing and updating application programs
• Securing a box
• Anti-virus and malware protection
• And more.

Timeline: March 27 – March 29

Stuffs that happened this time:

- Mr. Faruque was me
- We took Jack’s car (he’s in Australia now)
- Akram was fired due to his poor performance at work

I visited both our Comilla Internet Learning Centers today — Yusuf Multi Purpose High School and Chowara Girls High School.

Details later.

I’m here at Chittagong once again, and this time my job is to conduct a technical training for local high school teachers. Teachers from 14 public and private high schools are supposed to participate in the training program. The venue is Agrabad Kala Kakali High School, one of the core ILCs of Relief International.

Here’s what I’m going to talking about in the training:

• Overview of computer software and hardware:
  • Capability of computers
  • Hardware and peripheral devices
  • System and application software

• PC configuration and maintenance:
  • CMOS/BIOS setup
  • OS installation
  • Driver settings and installation
  • Tips and tricks to keep the machines running smoothly
  • Virus protection
  • Backup procedure

• Overview on networking
  • Advantages of a networked environment
  • Topologies, LAN, WAN, switching, routing, cables, sockets
  • Peer to peer networking concept
  • Security issues, firewall
  • Practical session
  • Connecting RJ-45 plugs
  • Hub/switch settings and installation
  • Connecting PCs with 10 base T cables
  • Sharing peripheral devices

• Overview on Internet:
  • WWW, e-mail, bulletin board, relay chat
  • Connection types
  • Netethics

I gotta sleep early tonight, the training starts at 10:00 tomorrow!