My San Antonio family is a case. Upon arriving my first day, my introduction to them was warnings about what I might expect there. I don't remember which exactly came first, the "I'm a terrible cook and you'll be eating terribly…everyone complains" warning or the "The kids arn't here this weekend, take advantage of it cause you'll wish for death when they show up" warning but suffice to say, taken in tandem it made me warm to them immediately. I chalk it up in retrospect to the fact that Dan is obviously a psychic and doesn't take into account anything we might say (like me asking not to be put in a family with small children) but in fact puts us in the place that we've been secretly wanting the whole time.
It was a rocky start, mainly because I was suffering a pretty severe brand of homesickness mixed with a healthy dose of why am i here(???) and topped with the fact that the kids for the first three days after their prophesied arrival were utterly terrified of me. I mean, i know i'm bigger than them, but thats hardly an encouraging start to two years of working with small kids to realize within the first week that i'm as good as the boogyman to my target population.
An introduction to each family member:
Judith (age 26): Is terrified of natural disasters in a totally awesome way. Right after my arrival it seemed like the whole world was simultaneously being hit by an earthquake which she naturally took to mean that god was angry and the end of the world was coming. One of my best moments in country was an earthquake that hit us around midnight one night roughly a week after showing up, which caused my host-mom to bolt out of bed and yell at the top of her voice "Se acabo!!!" (which I can only assume refers to the world). An interesting side note: she also argues in her sleep. My first night with my family I was woken up in the early hours of the morning by her yelling "NO KARI!! YOU CAN'T DO THAT!"
Ritchie (age 23): Is, in case you didn't notice, the same age as me. The SAME age. With two kids and a house. A good reference to what my life would be like had I gotten married in or right after high school. Which in all honesty doesn't seem like such a bad life looking at him, especially if my kids were like Kevin's host brothers who I maintain are totally evil but totally darling. But however evil and endearing my imaginary kids would be, three months of both of them warning me with as serious as a face as they could put on that I should learn from their example and NEVER have kids has quenched that dream. Additionally, Ritchie's claim to fame within our house and around the local area is that he seems to have been born playing bass guitar and from there evolved to playing a whole one mans band worth of instruments.
Josue (age 2): Is basically Ritchie's doppleganger. With a vocabulary seemingly limited to "Hola Kari," "Mis tennis," and "No hay payasos" (the last one I find a very interesting window into his worldview), he finds expression both in the way he constantly looks depressed with his head hung down to his chest as he runs in circles around the house, and the fact that he's very likely to be a musical virtuoso. Not only does he play the drums, but when music videos play on tv, he takes his plastic guitar and plays and dances along with the song.
Noe (age 5): As much as Josue takes after Ritchie, Noe takes after Judith. Not only do they have arguments like a well tuned Abbott and Costello, they can both get amazingly distracted when the tvs on (him with Curious George and her with Troy, her weakness). Noe can be accurately described by the words "Monster Jam" which is what he lives and breaths. (If you don't crush small cars or turn wheelies, you might as well be dead to him.) That said, I have done these things with him, along with allowing him to school me in soccer, basketball (in full view of the mechanics shop next door), fort building and board games so we're cool.
A few more notes about my life that month:
-My family is evangelical. This makes two host families i've stayed with in Catholic countries. This particular church, located at the end of our street features kids who come to church dressed up as batman, Richie on bass guitar in the church band, a constant stream of people fainting and talking in tongues, miracles (as i'll talk about later) and religious movies whose openings are covered by local news (making this the second time i've been on tv in the last year and the 6th time overall).
-My family has drama. My first time having coffee with my extended host family happened to fall on the same day my host aunt got fired from her job.
-Police here have a file on me. During one of our first spanish classes, we had to walk around the neighborhood introducing ourselves to local business owners. We went to the police station, and after a brief interview with a far too concerned police officer, our presence is filed in San Antonio's police log.
-Along with directions ala Tica (which anyone whose seen my mailing address here has a taste of) mail can apparently also be sent to any old post office in country and for a small fee we can go pick up letters from the room in the back, assuming they're addressed to us
-I went to the hospital once, and almost went back on several occasions since apparently my body when I cross streets is a magnet for moving vehicles
-I have four "husbands" here, three have jobs related to providing security. I guess opposites attract?
Can I move in? Sounds fantastic!!
ReplyDelete