Despite all the fear, anxiety, and uncertainty leading up to the national election on February 12, it was largely peaceful and resulted in the Bangladesh Nationalist Party (BNP) coming to office^1,2. The country has been relatively stable since, and we continue to pray for the new government.

Our Programme department had a special week of birthdaysat the end of the month! Half of our team celebrated their birthday consecutively – 4 days after another – including Jahred’s birthday on the 27th 🙂

We started joining community ultimate frisbee on Saturday evenings – it has been a lot of fun playing with a mix of foreigners and nationals between the ages of 6-60!

We had a busy month trying to get our work all sorted out and taken care of before we left for our furlough. I spent a few days visiting one of our projects in Dinajpur (North Bengal) and later led two workshops regarding the mission of the Salvation Army and our community development work.

Jahred facilitated a 3-day team-building workshop with our department where we gained a better understanding of how to best support one another, and solidified positive ways of working between members.

March was our last month of Bangla classes – we decided that we would take a break from language lessons once we returned from our furlough in May so that we could re-evaluate what we wanted our schedules to look like. While it has been nice practicing our conversational Bangla with coworkers, shop-keepers and rickshaw drivers, I (Jessica) have been feeling the itch to return to more structured learning.

We had such a special 4 weeks being back in Toronto with friends, family, and our furry companions! I was excited to have Tim Hortons again 🙂 We were encouraged and so blessed by the love, care, and prayer support offered by our community – you know who you are. We even built in a week of ‘vacation from our vacation’ and went driving across Quebec to the beautiful peninsula of Gaspesie. We highly recommend it!

Our furlough flew by but the Lord really used that time to encourage us, and ultimately we left feeling prepared to return to Dhaka for another year of service.

Returning to Dhaka gave me a bit of deja vu. There were so many similarities to the first time we arrived last year: it was dark and past midnight, the airport was relatively empty, and as we stepped out into the parking lot it had just rained leaving the air feeling cooler than usual. And yet, a huge difference was the sense of familiarity as we got into the car to drive home, all of our belongings already set up, and with a clearer vision for the work ahead of us.

We were welcomed back with some photos on our door, and a special lunch with our department. What a gift to be appreciated by your team members! There was not a shortage of work to come back to; at the end of our first work week it felt like we had been back for 5 weeks rather than just 5 days… Praise the Lord who sustains us and renews our strength (Isaiah 40):

²⁸ Do you not know?
Have you not heard?
The Lord is the everlasting God,
the Creator of the ends of the earth.
He will not grow tired or weary,
and his understanding no one can fathom.
²⁹ He gives strength to the weary
and increases the power of the weak.
³⁰ Even youths grow tired and weary,
and young men stumble and fall;
³¹ but those who hope in the Lord
will renew their strength.
They will soar on wings like eagles;
they will run and not grow weary,
they will walk and not be faint.

We stayed in Dhaka during Eid ul-Azha (Jahr’s fave – iykyk). We dressed up and went to the Mirpur Zoo with our friends, and were surprised to see Mr. President…^{3, 4}.

June always feels like a significant month because it marks the half-way point through the year. For the development team, it means getting ready to submit mid-year reports to our donors. For Bangladesh, it’s the end of the national fiscal year. For the Salvation Army, we welcomed new leadership from the US Southern Territory and celebrated a significant milestone in closing a large backlog of projects in our international database.

We finally had the chance to visit the Liberation War Museum with some friends. Jahred says it’s one of the best museums we’ve been to yet. We gained a greater understanding and appreciation for how young the country is and insight to the experience of Bangladeshis. It’s heartbreaking to learn about all the suffering the country went through, and yet so beautiful and inspiring to see how the nation rose to independence.

During the summer we explored new ways to connect with community – Jahr and I have started serving on the music team at the international church, I joined the children’s ministry teaching team and also started singing with the international choir, Cantemus, on Sunday evenings. We continue to have fun with ultimate frisbee and board game nights on Saturdays.

These months also included a lot of travel for the both of us: Jahred had multiple trips to Jashore and North Bengal to support various church programs and trainings. I also travelled to Jashore (separately from Jahred) and spent a week in Hong Kong attending a zonal development program review with a steering committee I newly joined.