This morning my nephew, Levi, threw up at the breakfast table, just moments before I made my morning debut in the dining room. His good-natured vomit session, one in which he puked twice but never whined loudly enough to wake us in the next room, seems characteristic of the wee lad. Nothing much phases him--not even early morning puking.
Levi's joyful acceptance of all things contrasts sharply to attitudes around us here sometimes as we go through what used to be our daily life here in Vermont--Brattleboro Co-op visits, downtown rambles, bike rides, swim hole adventures, cooking, and runs up and down country roads. If it weren't for the fact that there are so few jobs to be had here, and so many taxes to pay, we would move back in a heartbeat. If only.
Yesterday we terminated an epic bike ride at a swim hole, right where the tinier Rock River's flow joins with the warmer waters of the West River. It is a river that Tony and I, in our childless days, used to strip down and visit often during the late spring and summer months, and one that now seems much more popular with families than it once was. We used to be hard-pressed to see children there but now they are everywhere, and they are ALL WEARING SWIMSUITS! AS ARE THEIR PARENTS! AGH!
Apparently further up the shaded, chilly Rock River there are holes that are still naked friendly, but the spot we happened to choose yesterday was peopled with a group of loud, swimsuit-clad tweens who were less than impressed with our failure to bring along swim togs. Levi, with his sleek, nude, two-year-old physique, elicited no comment at all--just embarrassed, averted glances, as did Tehva. Silas, who is the very essence of modesty, brings his swimsuit along at all times, just in case, so he was set. And Tian, who has decided that, because she is nearly eleven, she must be close enough to physical development to be construed physically developed, also manages to bring her swimsuit and have it present at all times. Those of us over the age of ten, however, do not travel well-prepared and so we were dropping various items of clothing.
And that elicited the trauma-drama from the group of tweens already in the water.
"Ewww, Lady! Ewwww....I can see her bra! Ewwww! Ew, Lady! Oh, and That Guy! He is swimming in his underwear. Ew! And that Lady, Ew!" Out of respect for their potential trauma, I stripped no further than the skivvies. After all, every child blanched, balked, and squirmed uncomfortably when I offered to take it all off.
Either I am old and flabby or that was a group of children who need to work on their respectful voices, even when they are around old and flabby adults at what was once a naked swim hole. As I am old and flabby I was quick to comfort myself by recognizing the hypocritical nature of their comments: their mothers were robed in nothing more than skimpy black bikinis and the girls in said party were wearing bathing suits that barely stretched over their baby fat.
Yes, that did make me feel a little bit better as I paddled around the cool, clear waters in my bra and skivvies, feeling the sweat melt away and wash downstream.
Tuesday, August 2, 2011
Monday, July 25, 2011
The Value of Full Body Scans
"Tehva swallowed a marble." My mother's voice is shakey and hesitant as she announces this over the phone. Her voice sounds like what I would imagine a first confession would sound like...reluctant, tripping, frightened.
After she comes out with this, I can't believe my mother is calling me about a marble. For starters, there is nothing I can do about it, as I am off doing a good deed and am a 30-minute drive away. But really my disbelief stems from this: my mother is the woman who raised three children of her own without ever panicking once, not even that one time when my brother set the toilet on fire while cleaning his bike with gasoline. Swallowed marbles are small game compared to combustibles in the plumbing.
Thinking there must be more to this than just a marble, I search for clarification. "She swallowed a marble? Is she still breathing?"
She pauses, perhaps to check, and then returns to our conversation and, I suspect, tries to justify the call. "Yes. Well, I had seen her playing with this BIG marble earlier, putting it in and out of her mouth. Anyhow, I THINK it was a metal marble. And I THINK it was BIG." The marble in my imagination goes from being an innocuous round glass thingy to a gigantic elephant marble. "Actually, it may have been one of the small ones. I'm not sure. Anyhow, Tehva told me it was big." The elephant marble shrinks back down to a little glass marble. "And she thinks it was metal. She said it didn't feel good as it went down so it must have been big." I didn't remind my mother at this point about Tehva's penchant toward high drama, but I should have. "Well, what should I do? Should I take her to the emergency room?"
Take her to the emergency room? I am fairly certain that our catastrophic health insurance does not cover removal of swallowed marbles. What's more, I am POSTIVE that marble extraction is NOT a cheap venture if placed in the hands of doctors. Treatment quite likely entails an x-ray, a laxative, a warning to keep marbles out of our mouths in the future, and a bill for $950. Really, this sounds like a job for Dr. Internet.
I consult with Dr. Internet as soon as I get home. Basically, Dr. Internet advises a disgusting course of treatment with two equally distasteful options.
And then there is this caveat at the bottom of one of the pages: If the marble is made of metal, or is larger than a small marble, be sure to contact your family health practitioner immediately. There is some confusing explanation afterward about small electrical charges and blocked intestines.
I consider this carefully and wonder how much wiggle room I have on this one. Okay, so the marble in question was probably metal AND was perhaps larger than a small marble. Tehva is not, as far as I can tell, emitting electrical charges. Nor is she complaining of stomach pains, making odd wheezing sounds, or refusing food and water so I decide to play the odds on this one and write her off as okay.
My mom advises her that she should wait 24 hours and, after that amount of time, the marble will come out in her poo. She is fascinated and begins to count the hours immediately.
The next morning Tehva comes out of the bathroom looking relieved. "I pooped," she announces. "And I remembered to flush!"
"Oh, good." So much for poo checking. "Did your marble come out?"
"Yes, it was very clean. It came out. It made a big splash. It was 24 hours."
"Really, did you see it?"
"No, I didn't," Tehva looks at me like I have lost my mind. "I said it was 24 hours. Murmur said it would come out in 24 hours and it has been 24 hours. I know that it came out though because it has been 24 hours."
While I lamented the fact that we may never know whether the marble made it through, Tony pointed out that we will know for sure in six weeks. "We can just put her through the full body scan at the airport. If she sets of the alarms, then we will know that it is still there." I knew those body scans would eventually come in handy for something.
After she comes out with this, I can't believe my mother is calling me about a marble. For starters, there is nothing I can do about it, as I am off doing a good deed and am a 30-minute drive away. But really my disbelief stems from this: my mother is the woman who raised three children of her own without ever panicking once, not even that one time when my brother set the toilet on fire while cleaning his bike with gasoline. Swallowed marbles are small game compared to combustibles in the plumbing.
Thinking there must be more to this than just a marble, I search for clarification. "She swallowed a marble? Is she still breathing?"
She pauses, perhaps to check, and then returns to our conversation and, I suspect, tries to justify the call. "Yes. Well, I had seen her playing with this BIG marble earlier, putting it in and out of her mouth. Anyhow, I THINK it was a metal marble. And I THINK it was BIG." The marble in my imagination goes from being an innocuous round glass thingy to a gigantic elephant marble. "Actually, it may have been one of the small ones. I'm not sure. Anyhow, Tehva told me it was big." The elephant marble shrinks back down to a little glass marble. "And she thinks it was metal. She said it didn't feel good as it went down so it must have been big." I didn't remind my mother at this point about Tehva's penchant toward high drama, but I should have. "Well, what should I do? Should I take her to the emergency room?"
Take her to the emergency room? I am fairly certain that our catastrophic health insurance does not cover removal of swallowed marbles. What's more, I am POSTIVE that marble extraction is NOT a cheap venture if placed in the hands of doctors. Treatment quite likely entails an x-ray, a laxative, a warning to keep marbles out of our mouths in the future, and a bill for $950. Really, this sounds like a job for Dr. Internet.
I consult with Dr. Internet as soon as I get home. Basically, Dr. Internet advises a disgusting course of treatment with two equally distasteful options.
- Option 1: Feed swallower a high-fiber diet and wait. Ensure the marble has been passed by collecting the swallower's stools in a collander and then rinsing with warm water to eventually reveal the marble. You may have to repeat this process over the course of UP TO FOUR DAYS.
- Option 2: Once again, feed swallower a high-fiber diet and wait. Ensure the marble has been passed by collecting the swallower's stools in a bowl and then, while wearing a plastic bag on your hand, squish up the stuff until you find the marble. As before, you may have to repeat this process over the course of UP TO FOUR DAYS.
And then there is this caveat at the bottom of one of the pages: If the marble is made of metal, or is larger than a small marble, be sure to contact your family health practitioner immediately. There is some confusing explanation afterward about small electrical charges and blocked intestines.
I consider this carefully and wonder how much wiggle room I have on this one. Okay, so the marble in question was probably metal AND was perhaps larger than a small marble. Tehva is not, as far as I can tell, emitting electrical charges. Nor is she complaining of stomach pains, making odd wheezing sounds, or refusing food and water so I decide to play the odds on this one and write her off as okay.
My mom advises her that she should wait 24 hours and, after that amount of time, the marble will come out in her poo. She is fascinated and begins to count the hours immediately.
The next morning Tehva comes out of the bathroom looking relieved. "I pooped," she announces. "And I remembered to flush!"
"Oh, good." So much for poo checking. "Did your marble come out?"
"Yes, it was very clean. It came out. It made a big splash. It was 24 hours."
"Really, did you see it?"
"No, I didn't," Tehva looks at me like I have lost my mind. "I said it was 24 hours. Murmur said it would come out in 24 hours and it has been 24 hours. I know that it came out though because it has been 24 hours."
While I lamented the fact that we may never know whether the marble made it through, Tony pointed out that we will know for sure in six weeks. "We can just put her through the full body scan at the airport. If she sets of the alarms, then we will know that it is still there." I knew those body scans would eventually come in handy for something.
Thursday, June 30, 2011
Nothing Says Summer Like...
Nothing says summer in the USA like the smell of skunk, freshly discharged, wafting on the warm breeze. In Oman, we occasionally enjoyed the musk of fox, but it was always faint and could only be enjoyed while hiking in the mountains. To experience it required an intentional jaunt out into the hills. In the USA, though, skunkiness requires no effort. It simply comes, lingers, and moves on...most times.
My parents have an unloved black and white cat who is so despised that she has never even been given a proper name; she is just LK, short for Little Kitty. She drools, cries, eats, and poops--that is the grand sum of her existence, or was until tonight when she ran into the house, having recently angered a skunk enough to cause it to spray. Her. Directly. Unfortunately, the awareness that she had been sprayed didn't come until the cat had not only entered the house and run upstairs, but had also enjoyed a brief cuddle at the hands of my mother who is, as all know, a soft touch (and now a smelly one as well).
Between the cat and my mother (who was now covered in skunk goo, too) the house is eye-wateringly acrid. We put a pan of vinegar and cinamon on the stove to boil, which made the house smell of rotten Easter eggs, tried a boiling a pot of coffee, which merely added to the spoiled Easter breakfast effect, and then gave up, turning our collective attention on the cat.
Looking on the internet at http://www.ohmygodmycatstinks.com/ revealed that this sprayed cat phenomenon is fairly rare, since most cats are smart enough to avoid being sprayed, but when it does happen to the rare idiot you should douse your cat in something acidic, let it soak for five minutes, rinse, and repeat as necessary. We mixed a paste of baking soda, vinegar, and dish soap and smeared it on the cat, let her soak and--she still stank. Attempt number two: tomato juice.
VIDEO SOON TO FOLLOW HERE
This also required a soak, but the reality of inflicting this upon a cat does not allow for a soak cycle and so she went right to the rinse cycle. Really tomato juice wasn't too successful either.
OTHER VIDEO SOON TO FOLLOW HERE AS WELL
My parents have an unloved black and white cat who is so despised that she has never even been given a proper name; she is just LK, short for Little Kitty. She drools, cries, eats, and poops--that is the grand sum of her existence, or was until tonight when she ran into the house, having recently angered a skunk enough to cause it to spray. Her. Directly. Unfortunately, the awareness that she had been sprayed didn't come until the cat had not only entered the house and run upstairs, but had also enjoyed a brief cuddle at the hands of my mother who is, as all know, a soft touch (and now a smelly one as well).
Between the cat and my mother (who was now covered in skunk goo, too) the house is eye-wateringly acrid. We put a pan of vinegar and cinamon on the stove to boil, which made the house smell of rotten Easter eggs, tried a boiling a pot of coffee, which merely added to the spoiled Easter breakfast effect, and then gave up, turning our collective attention on the cat.
Looking on the internet at http://www.ohmygodmycatstinks.com/ revealed that this sprayed cat phenomenon is fairly rare, since most cats are smart enough to avoid being sprayed, but when it does happen to the rare idiot you should douse your cat in something acidic, let it soak for five minutes, rinse, and repeat as necessary. We mixed a paste of baking soda, vinegar, and dish soap and smeared it on the cat, let her soak and--she still stank. Attempt number two: tomato juice.
VIDEO SOON TO FOLLOW HERE
This also required a soak, but the reality of inflicting this upon a cat does not allow for a soak cycle and so she went right to the rinse cycle. Really tomato juice wasn't too successful either.
OTHER VIDEO SOON TO FOLLOW HERE AS WELL
If you happen to run into us within the next week, please be kind, especially to my poor mother who must cook a church supper, supervise entering teachers, be seen at soccer camp with the kids, and attend a professional conference within the next week, all while smelling strongly of skunk. Yes, she would be the one who is covered in a dusting of perfumed powder with a strong overlay of skunky. She is already a little bit sensitive about the odor issue so just smile, nod, tell her you didn't notice anything at all and then move on.
And would anyone like a black and white cat?
Thursday, June 16, 2011
Travel Layers and the Loss Thereof
Travellers journey with layers of protection, undetectable to the naked eye, but there nonetheless. They are there to protect from the unknown and unpredictable and, like hair, they thin and recede with age. My layers used to be so thick that I could ride for 14 hours on a frigid bus, and then sleep in a 50 cent hotel on a straw mattress. I would happily awake the next morning, drink a cup of bitter tea for breakfast, and, not even changing my underwear, hike out of town to a remote location, thumb a ride, and carry on with my journey in the back of a truck piled high with freshly slaughtered pigs.
Then I had children and my layers thinned and sluffed away until I now question my ability to tolerate a lumpy mattress or a hotel without a pool. I have begun to suspect that I am one of THOSE travellers.
We left the steamy Middle East on a Thursday, steadily swimming our way through the humidity and heat of a 125 degree night, and boarded a British Airways Boeing 777 in the midst of a lecture from Silas on the assembly of this particular fleet member. "They drop the middle piece between the front and rear pieces and then glue them together!" Glue? Honestly, I could hardly hear what he was saying for the muddle-headedness that comes with the combination of high temperatures and lack of sleep. As we stumbled to the departure hall in Muscat, I also realized quite suddenly that I was grossly outnumbered, three to one. Good-bye travel layer one.
In spite of the staggering odds stacked against me, we not only made it onto British Air Flight 72, we also disembarked the plane in London without excessive whining, wet pants, or lost or misplaced items. Before exiting Heathrow Airport, I had acquired a map of the Tube, one of London bus routes, a pre-paid mass transit card, and NO extra children. Man, I was on a roll.
Here is where the travel layers really begin to crumble away in quick succession.
Travel layer two went when we encountered the Arctic air mass that surrounds England. Silas swore he was about to lose a limb to the chill the minute we stepped out of the warm confines of Heathrow. Tian unpredictably kicked off her sandals and began to prance about the sidewalk in front of the airport, shrieking, "Brrrr! Oh my gosh! It's freezing here!" Tehva saw this as her cue to also peel off her sneakers and try it out. I mostly just stood and stared off into the distance, pretending I did not know my own children while Silas tried to reenter the womb in an attempt to warm himself.
Travel layer three succumbed to our hotel situation. We had three small people, four enormous bags, and a hotel purported to be "a good bit of a distance away". The nice man at the airport information desk recommended using the 150 bus since not only is it free but "it will drop you right in front of the hotel." I lugged all four bags onboard and, in the calm of the Heathrow Station, marveled at the efficiency and convenience of public transport. The bus ride was pleasant, we enjoyed a private coach, and, just as the nice man had said, we were dropped right in front of the Sheraton Hotel. Unfortunately it was the wrong Sheraton Hotel.
As I digested this wrong hotel news, Tian pampered her bears, Tehva grabbed her crotch and danced, and Silas hung on my sleeve, looking frantic at this unexpected turn of events. The concierge eyed our four enormous bags and three relatively small children with an ill-concealed smile, and then commented, "I could call you cab but it will be quite expensive." He paused and then added, disbelievingly, "Did you really make it all the way to the hotel from the bus stop all by yourselves?" All that had required was crossing a car park, but he seemed impressed by this, so I nodded enthusiastically, hoping that feat would impress him enough that he would bundle us into his personal vehicle and transport us the unknown distance to our real hotel. This did not come to fruition and, instead, we found ourselves back out at the bus stop, waiting for a different bus.
Real hotel reached, travel layer four began to disintegrate as I received the surprising news that we would not be able to check in until much later in the day. However, the hotel magnanimously offered use of their public toilets so that we could "freshen up". Not so surprisingly, I could not find my tooth brush or deodorant to freshen up, Silas got frantically lost on the way to the toilet, and Tehva came rushing over to tell me, "I just peed in my pants a little."
Travel layer five, I am pleased to write, never left me because, after this, events took a turn for the better. My ability to navigate the Tube came back quicker than you can say, "Steak and kidney pie" and we were in Central London by mid-morning. We fought the crowds to see the changing of guard, the climbed on the lions in Trafalgar Square, played in St. James and Green Parks, walked down Pall Mall, heard Big Ben ring, and rode a "double checker bus" (thank you, Tehva).
We visited King Henry VIII at Hampton Court Palace, ate pub food, tested the temperature in the Thames, looked the wrong way when crossing the road, and ate Pringles and bread and butter sandwiches in front of the hotel TV. We got caught in a frigid rain, ate bad Indian food, visited the British Museum, removed Tehva from the British Museum when she threw a tantrum, visited the Tower of London, chatted with a costumed interpreter for an hour, threatened to lock Tehva in the Tower of London, and learned that London Bridge and Tower Bridge are NOT the same thing.
We oggled the Globe Theater, tried to sneak into a performance at the Globe Theater, hit too many gift shops, desperately searched for a toilet near Westminster Station, peed at the base of Big Ben, and fell asleep on the Tube. The kids petted every dog that happened across their path in the five days we were there and, had I taken a photo of every dog petting incident as Silas had wanted me to, I would have filled our digital camera's card on the first day.
That trip done, I am happy to say that I retain one travel layer which I am saving for next summer's outward jaunt. Care to join us anyone?
Saturday, May 28, 2011
Hypermarketing
"Mom, what is a hypermarket?" asks Silas from the backseat of the car after our latest adventure at the Lulu. He has been gazing out the window at the garrishly lit front of the Lulu and probably noticed for the first time that it is not just "Lulu" up there in neon, but "Lulu Hypermarket".
What is a hypermarket? Do I tell him that it is a highly flammable, Indian-owned chain of stores found in the Middle East? No, the flammable thing would spawn a whole new set of questions. Do I tell him that it is just what it sounds like--a "hyper" market, like Tehva is a "hyper" child? No, no, best to go with honesty here.
"Silas, you have been in that store a million times since we moved here. You tell me what a hypermarket is. You've been there. You were just there." In response, Silas crumples into a whining heap since neither he nor I can very easily define hypermarket.
A hypermarket is, at all times, like a Super Wal-Mart on food stamp Friday, just before a massive hurricane is set to hit. Got that picture in your mind? Okay, now stack another Wal-Mart on top and put a stairless escalator in the middle of the store--that way you can get your cart (but at Lulu it's called a "trolley") up to the second floor. Done? Okay, now take away half of the registers and shrink all of the aisles so that only one and a half carts can fit. Finally, make it an absolute requirement that a gigantic motorized floor cleaner troll the aisles like a snow plow, rearranging the surge of humanity, especially during peak shopping hours.
That is a hypermarket, in a nutshell.
So yesterday, for some unknown reason, we decided we needed to go to Lulu Hypermarket on a weekend in the evening. This adds an extra element to the tranquil picture I have painted above--Omanis. Going to Lulu on a Friday means risking stepping on hems--both women's and men's, running down small Omani children who are playing catch between the shopping carts, and waiting at a register for a minimum of 20-30 minutes. It is like my above Wal-Mart scenario on crack cocaine. But we simply HAD to go, so off we went.
Tony and I decided to split up and attack the floors seperately. This means that the children naturally have to come with me since I am only half as mean as Tony, and all of them want to hold onto the sides of the cart, which defies the laws of physics since two items cannot occupy the same space at the same time. But they all jockey for the honor of holding onto the sides of the cart. We enter the spice aisle, Tehva and Silas kicking each other, which means that I have to search for spice satchets while all of the Indian subcontinent stares at the two of them.
Finally I seperate them, placing Tehva on one side of the cart and Silas on the other. However, I can no longer see Tehva for all of the people who have suddenly crowded in on my right (apparently everyone needs turmeric this week) and so I have to trust that she will behave properly during the five minutes I cannot see her. When the fray clears (thank goodness for the massive floor cleaner--whisked everybody out of my way) I see that Tehva has knocked over every box of dumpling mix and is working on slowly and methodically punching each box of Jello off the shelf as well.
Silas is, at this point, laying down in the middle of the aisle. I tell him to get up before he gets trampled. He responds that he is looking at the lights on the ceiling. The masses trip miraculously around him without harming him and, seemingly, without noticing him either. I kick Silas and he finally gets up, complaining that he is tired and hungry, and asking how much longer he will have to put up with this.
Tony appears and puts everyone in order. Tian asks why we are so crabby and harrumphs at the injustice of being grouped together with her siblings when it comes to misperceptions of behavior. Tehva is placed into the cart, and we head upstairs on the stairless escalator. This floor is the one that has the banks of televisions, electronics, appliances, clothing, toys, sports, and school supplies. A batallion of men stand in front of the TVs and oggle a commercial where a woman is showing her midriff and moving her hips like she has spiders in her panties. We find what we need and get in line, set for the long wait to be checked out.
Our cashier looks like a pastel-wrapped iceberg. If she were an American she would be cracking her gum. She is a mountain of a woman with gaudily painted nails, cakey make up, and a perennial sneer, who sits wrapped in yards of black abaya and an ungodly amount of colorful head scarf. She scowls at every single item that she has to scan as if it has been put in front of her namely to threaten her manicure. Her eyes scream her distaste for the latest Omanization Policy whereby all cashiering jobs must go to Omanis. I am completely entertained watching her work.
When we come to the front of the line and she begins to scan our purchases and we discover that somehow extra items have crept into our lot of groceries. Tony stops her and says, "That is not mine. I don't want that gum. It's not mine." She scowls at him and throws the gum toward the bagger. Whether or not we like it the gum is ours, as is the scarf we accidentally put in the cart. The risk of breaking a nail while pushing the "Void Item" button is too great for her to risk removing things from our order.
I think back on all of this after Silas asks again, "But what is a hypermarket?" It is an experience, especially on a Friday.
What is a hypermarket? Do I tell him that it is a highly flammable, Indian-owned chain of stores found in the Middle East? No, the flammable thing would spawn a whole new set of questions. Do I tell him that it is just what it sounds like--a "hyper" market, like Tehva is a "hyper" child? No, no, best to go with honesty here.
"Silas, you have been in that store a million times since we moved here. You tell me what a hypermarket is. You've been there. You were just there." In response, Silas crumples into a whining heap since neither he nor I can very easily define hypermarket.
A hypermarket is, at all times, like a Super Wal-Mart on food stamp Friday, just before a massive hurricane is set to hit. Got that picture in your mind? Okay, now stack another Wal-Mart on top and put a stairless escalator in the middle of the store--that way you can get your cart (but at Lulu it's called a "trolley") up to the second floor. Done? Okay, now take away half of the registers and shrink all of the aisles so that only one and a half carts can fit. Finally, make it an absolute requirement that a gigantic motorized floor cleaner troll the aisles like a snow plow, rearranging the surge of humanity, especially during peak shopping hours.
That is a hypermarket, in a nutshell.
So yesterday, for some unknown reason, we decided we needed to go to Lulu Hypermarket on a weekend in the evening. This adds an extra element to the tranquil picture I have painted above--Omanis. Going to Lulu on a Friday means risking stepping on hems--both women's and men's, running down small Omani children who are playing catch between the shopping carts, and waiting at a register for a minimum of 20-30 minutes. It is like my above Wal-Mart scenario on crack cocaine. But we simply HAD to go, so off we went.
Tony and I decided to split up and attack the floors seperately. This means that the children naturally have to come with me since I am only half as mean as Tony, and all of them want to hold onto the sides of the cart, which defies the laws of physics since two items cannot occupy the same space at the same time. But they all jockey for the honor of holding onto the sides of the cart. We enter the spice aisle, Tehva and Silas kicking each other, which means that I have to search for spice satchets while all of the Indian subcontinent stares at the two of them.
Finally I seperate them, placing Tehva on one side of the cart and Silas on the other. However, I can no longer see Tehva for all of the people who have suddenly crowded in on my right (apparently everyone needs turmeric this week) and so I have to trust that she will behave properly during the five minutes I cannot see her. When the fray clears (thank goodness for the massive floor cleaner--whisked everybody out of my way) I see that Tehva has knocked over every box of dumpling mix and is working on slowly and methodically punching each box of Jello off the shelf as well.
Silas is, at this point, laying down in the middle of the aisle. I tell him to get up before he gets trampled. He responds that he is looking at the lights on the ceiling. The masses trip miraculously around him without harming him and, seemingly, without noticing him either. I kick Silas and he finally gets up, complaining that he is tired and hungry, and asking how much longer he will have to put up with this.
Tony appears and puts everyone in order. Tian asks why we are so crabby and harrumphs at the injustice of being grouped together with her siblings when it comes to misperceptions of behavior. Tehva is placed into the cart, and we head upstairs on the stairless escalator. This floor is the one that has the banks of televisions, electronics, appliances, clothing, toys, sports, and school supplies. A batallion of men stand in front of the TVs and oggle a commercial where a woman is showing her midriff and moving her hips like she has spiders in her panties. We find what we need and get in line, set for the long wait to be checked out.
Our cashier looks like a pastel-wrapped iceberg. If she were an American she would be cracking her gum. She is a mountain of a woman with gaudily painted nails, cakey make up, and a perennial sneer, who sits wrapped in yards of black abaya and an ungodly amount of colorful head scarf. She scowls at every single item that she has to scan as if it has been put in front of her namely to threaten her manicure. Her eyes scream her distaste for the latest Omanization Policy whereby all cashiering jobs must go to Omanis. I am completely entertained watching her work.
When we come to the front of the line and she begins to scan our purchases and we discover that somehow extra items have crept into our lot of groceries. Tony stops her and says, "That is not mine. I don't want that gum. It's not mine." She scowls at him and throws the gum toward the bagger. Whether or not we like it the gum is ours, as is the scarf we accidentally put in the cart. The risk of breaking a nail while pushing the "Void Item" button is too great for her to risk removing things from our order.
I think back on all of this after Silas asks again, "But what is a hypermarket?" It is an experience, especially on a Friday.
Sunday, May 8, 2011
Jesus Likes It When...
If you have been following my blogs for years and years, you might remember the Sunday about five years ago when we told Silas to dress up for church. And you might remember that he came out of his bedroom wearing a tiger costume because, well, we told him to dress up. And you also might remember that that was the church where we met The Sunday School Teacher Who Channeled Jesus.
She was a wonderful person who knew all of Jesus's likes and dislikes: "Jesus likes it when we wear macaroni necklaces." And, "Don't peel that sticker off your shirt. Jesus likes it when we wear stickers with churches on them." Jesus also liked it when we finished our snack of Goldfish crackers, said "Excuse me" when we burped, and cleaned the paste off the chipped wooden tables. Outside of the New Testament, this woman was the most definitive authority on the persona of Jesus that I had ever met.
If The Sunday School Teacher can say with such authority that Jesus likes Goldfish, macaroni necklaces, and stickers, I can say without much doubt, that He must be a loose and easy kind of guy who also likes other things that make life worth living. Take, for example, pancit noodles. There is nothing finer than well-made pancit noodles. The Filipino community at the church here always serves pancit noodles after church on Fridays instead of donuts and cookies, and it is just GOOD, so I think it is pretty safe to assume that Jesus would like that.
The church here also runs with the idea that Jesus loves flag dances, as evidenced by the video at the bottom of this post.
She was a wonderful person who knew all of Jesus's likes and dislikes: "Jesus likes it when we wear macaroni necklaces." And, "Don't peel that sticker off your shirt. Jesus likes it when we wear stickers with churches on them." Jesus also liked it when we finished our snack of Goldfish crackers, said "Excuse me" when we burped, and cleaned the paste off the chipped wooden tables. Outside of the New Testament, this woman was the most definitive authority on the persona of Jesus that I had ever met.
If The Sunday School Teacher can say with such authority that Jesus likes Goldfish, macaroni necklaces, and stickers, I can say without much doubt, that He must be a loose and easy kind of guy who also likes other things that make life worth living. Take, for example, pancit noodles. There is nothing finer than well-made pancit noodles. The Filipino community at the church here always serves pancit noodles after church on Fridays instead of donuts and cookies, and it is just GOOD, so I think it is pretty safe to assume that Jesus would like that.
The church here also runs with the idea that Jesus loves flag dances, as evidenced by the video at the bottom of this post.
And on Good Friday, we learned that Jesus also likes storytelling on the beach, followed by a good sail out into the Gulf of Oman. We broke from the approved Protestant Church here to attend a more informal gathering on a small beach. The church building was a series of three EZ Ups strung together with grey duct tape, and was carpeted underneath with plastic beach mats. A motivated set of moms laded an eight foot stretch of table with freshly cut fruit, finger sandwiches, sausages, and **GASP** sliced pork roast! People traded their Easter bonnets and sundresses for bathing suits and floppy beach hats.
An enterprising mother buried an Easter egg hunt--she nestled chocolate eggs in the sand, only to have them melt, and another put jelly beans in ziploc baggies and buried them, too. Unfortunately only a third of the bags was found, but those that were found were much appreciated. An older couple gathered the children together before they all set off aboard kayaks, boogey boards, and sail boats, and told them the story of Good Friday. They read a little scripture, gasped over the crown of thorns, half-heartedly looked for the missing candy bags, and then sent the kids down to the surf to spend the rest of the morning in the ocean.
Jesus likes it when we sail, lose candy in the sand, and eat watermelon on the beach. I think it reminds him of the good old days.
Roaches
The seasons have changed. Our once benign, even pleasant, climate has turned convection oven on us and life without aircon has become unthinkable. Until suddenly, last week, it did become a reality. Really, though, there was no drama in the situation. The aircon in the girls' room went from their best friend to their worst enemy as it began to blow hot air instead of cold. We placed a work order with the housing department at the university and voila, a work crew came and replaced the coolant. Fixed.
The drama came in the work crew--all three of them were Omani. I will type that again for those of you who missed it--the entire work crew was Omani. For those who are not appreciating the shock value of this situation, I will place it into perspective. Imagine having your heat pump go out in the States and calling Blahblah Cooling and Heating Services. They agree to send some guys to fix it and said guys show up stark naked. Well of course you would have to look again and again to make sure that those workers were really naked. You would smile, you would giggle, you would call your friends and tell them that the guys who fixed the heat pump were naked. It would be unbelievable.
That is what it is like to have an all-Omani work crew fix your air conditioning unit. We stared and giggled and called friends to let them know that we had had a whole group of three Omanis fix our air conditioner. We acted like such absolute imbeciles because, until two months ago, there was no such thing as an all-Omani work crew; as a matter of fact, the words Omani and work very rarely went together because Indians did all the work here. That little incident you may have heard about in Sohar changed all that: we have effectively learned that burning a Lulu will get you a job. Those 9% of Americans who are now unemployed may want to consider torching a Wal-Mart to see where that gets them.
So after the Omani work crew restored the girls' air conditioning, the children and I began to speculate on the likelihood of having an all-Omani pest control unit come to our house to do something about the insects that are currently in season here. We survived fly season, mosquito season, and ant season, and now it is roach season.
Our roaches come in two flavors--large and lovely caramel, and dark but tiny chocolate--and have staged a coup and overtaken a corner of the kitchen. The dark tiny chocolate variety blends in smartly with the dappling on the granite counter top and know that if they do not move we will not see them. They are clever and still and only make a break for the trash bin when they know we are not looking.
The large and lovely caramel have a higher mortality rate as they stick out like sore thumbs and are, frankly, not very smart. They do dumb things like drop out of cupboards into our food, and crawl across cutting boards while we are cooking, making them easy targets. Additionally, the caramel roaches have recently endeavored to expand their territory by sending out tiny parties on reconnaissance missions to other areas of the house.
Last night Silas and Tehva stood still as statues staring at the tiling near the sofa. "Mom," whispered Silas. "There is a huge roach over here." When I demanded he kill it, he paused. "No, I'm watching it." I smashed it with my house slipper. Silas looked like I had crushed his science experiment.
The night before that Tian found a caramel roach crawling up the wall outside her bedroom. She was not so reverent as she screamed and jumped up and down, swatting at it with a fuzzy pink slipper and shrieking, "A roach! A roach! Ewww! Ewww!" The roach just sat there on the wall and waited for Tony to come kill it.
The count down has begun and in a mere 25 days the kids and I will head back to the US for the summer, leaving Tony to wage a solitary, six-week war with the roaches until he, too, leaves for a vacation in North America. And where does that leave the roaches? In control of the entire house for a whole month and a half. Time to start checking around for an all-Omani pesticide control unit.
The drama came in the work crew--all three of them were Omani. I will type that again for those of you who missed it--the entire work crew was Omani. For those who are not appreciating the shock value of this situation, I will place it into perspective. Imagine having your heat pump go out in the States and calling Blahblah Cooling and Heating Services. They agree to send some guys to fix it and said guys show up stark naked. Well of course you would have to look again and again to make sure that those workers were really naked. You would smile, you would giggle, you would call your friends and tell them that the guys who fixed the heat pump were naked. It would be unbelievable.
That is what it is like to have an all-Omani work crew fix your air conditioning unit. We stared and giggled and called friends to let them know that we had had a whole group of three Omanis fix our air conditioner. We acted like such absolute imbeciles because, until two months ago, there was no such thing as an all-Omani work crew; as a matter of fact, the words Omani and work very rarely went together because Indians did all the work here. That little incident you may have heard about in Sohar changed all that: we have effectively learned that burning a Lulu will get you a job. Those 9% of Americans who are now unemployed may want to consider torching a Wal-Mart to see where that gets them.
So after the Omani work crew restored the girls' air conditioning, the children and I began to speculate on the likelihood of having an all-Omani pest control unit come to our house to do something about the insects that are currently in season here. We survived fly season, mosquito season, and ant season, and now it is roach season.
Our roaches come in two flavors--large and lovely caramel, and dark but tiny chocolate--and have staged a coup and overtaken a corner of the kitchen. The dark tiny chocolate variety blends in smartly with the dappling on the granite counter top and know that if they do not move we will not see them. They are clever and still and only make a break for the trash bin when they know we are not looking.
The large and lovely caramel have a higher mortality rate as they stick out like sore thumbs and are, frankly, not very smart. They do dumb things like drop out of cupboards into our food, and crawl across cutting boards while we are cooking, making them easy targets. Additionally, the caramel roaches have recently endeavored to expand their territory by sending out tiny parties on reconnaissance missions to other areas of the house.
Last night Silas and Tehva stood still as statues staring at the tiling near the sofa. "Mom," whispered Silas. "There is a huge roach over here." When I demanded he kill it, he paused. "No, I'm watching it." I smashed it with my house slipper. Silas looked like I had crushed his science experiment.
The night before that Tian found a caramel roach crawling up the wall outside her bedroom. She was not so reverent as she screamed and jumped up and down, swatting at it with a fuzzy pink slipper and shrieking, "A roach! A roach! Ewww! Ewww!" The roach just sat there on the wall and waited for Tony to come kill it.
The count down has begun and in a mere 25 days the kids and I will head back to the US for the summer, leaving Tony to wage a solitary, six-week war with the roaches until he, too, leaves for a vacation in North America. And where does that leave the roaches? In control of the entire house for a whole month and a half. Time to start checking around for an all-Omani pesticide control unit.
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