As Friendship continues its Friends and Heroes campaign highlighting everyday heroes who work silently at the frontlines of the global challenges that shape our world today, we’d like to introduce you to some of them: Ambition speaks for itself Dipti Rani had a lot of...
Voices from the field
Faces of Friendship
The Covid-19 pandemic has highlighted inequalities in our world today, where communities are left unaddressed due to lack of access to vital services, extreme poverty and vulnerability to the climate crisis. It has also shown our connectedness, highlighting the fact...
Unheard Voices from the Climate Frontier
On October 10, 2020, Friendship hosted a roundtable conference which gave a national platform to grassroots organisations working at the forefront of the struggle against the climate crisis. Fifty-three grassroots organisations battling climate disasters in some of...
Friendship’s “Covid Warriors” Fighting the Coronavirus Pandemic
by Raeed Abd-Allah Chowdhury The Coronavirus has ground economies to a halt and has put immense strain healthcare systems, especially in underdeveloped countries. A shortage in staff, supplies and berths for patients is a factor even in the most developed of...
Crisis Reveals Character
Friendship’s community leaders stand by villagers facing Covid-19 lockdown If you’re reading this on a device connected to the Internet, in a space with adequate lighting and sound roofing, staying home is easy. For Lavli, whose home is a one-room corrugated iron hut...
Silent Catastrophe
The terrors the Rohingya people fled are well known to the world. But in their new reality, many continue to suffer from psychosocial conditions. by MALIHA KHANMarch 12, 2020 Nurun Nahar must return home to her children. Half an hour stolen between feeding her family...
Sadia: Linguist, Volunteer, Diagnostician
Narrated by: Bipasha Khatun, Friendship Medical Assistant at Balukhali 1 at the Forcibly Displaced Myanmar National (FDMN) camps in Ukhiya: I came across a little girl who was helping the medical assistants usher in patients. Named Sadia, this 7-year-old was also...
Momota: Matriarch
Momota has been married for over 10 years, and lives with her husband and two sons on a riverine island (char) called Khockhali in Gaibandha district. Even though it has been quite some time, Momota has yet to receive her mehr (dower), a mandatory payment from the...
Josna Rani: A Queen in Her Own Right
Rani, meaning queen in Bangla, lives up to her namesake. She was the oldest among her siblings in the remote village of Radhabalabh, 28 km from the nearest district town. At the age of 15, Josna Rani’s family married her off to a day labourer; being forced to do so...
Jobeda Khatun: Rising Against All Odds
For several years, Jobeda remained in abject poverty. Her first child was born to every financial disadvantage, seeing as there were no options available to him. His father, a day labourer, could not add much to the household, and Jobeda, uneducated and married as a...
Phulmoti: Guardian of the Seeds
In the rural regions of Bangladesh, such as the hard-to-reach chars in the north of the country, women are seen as the guardians of seeds. Women play the primary role in the preservation of seeds from the time they are harvested and stored until they are planted...
Chandra Banu: Never Too Late
When Chandra was a girl, she lived in a char (riverine island) so remote that she did not have any access to education. In her village there were no schools, or even opportunities to learn in an informal setting. She lived most of her life without even knowing how to...