Britt and Gramps worked on painting the cross with glow-in-the-dark paint today. It needs another coat and then we'll photograph the glowing cross on the hill and post it tomorrow night. Below you'll see my super-duper long table. In the past when teams come we either push two tables together or we use two tables separately in the dining room. Now the tables we had can be used in the two apartments. The table is 89% done. We still need to paint and varnish the pieces of support that were added to the legs. The chairs in the photo will go back to Tim and Amie's future house once we get ours. We are having a guy on our road make chairs a lot like the one photographed at the end of this post. We are having him leave the wood and we'll paint it this distressed green to match the table. After getting the table up here we think it will seat 16. Yay for Dad and his skills.
Dad's main observation after working around here for two days. "Boy, doesn't Troy get tired of having an audience. That would drive me nuts."Yes. Troy has missed having alone time. A lot. I think we all have. Except maybe Paige. The constant togetherness with everyone who works here can be a bit much. Sometimes I wish I could go for a run and no one would look at me or speak to me.
The guys that are on-property and watching while projects happen are very good guys, just wanting to learn and help. We don't fault them.
It's just that thing where Americans like a little space, a little alone time, a little room to do a few things privately. As Troy pointed out to Dad, there really is no concept of privacy. If someone has a fight, the whole village hears. If someone needs a bath they head to the canal for public bathing. The restroom is not even private. I suppose it's a little tough to get alone when your house is 12 by 12 and you have six kids living there with you. Getting alone to clear your head is an idea of our culture, not this one.
We do miss the opportunity for solitude though. In MN Troy used to go out at night and hang in the garage (male crisis center) just to decompress and tinker around. If he did that here someone would come up within three minutes to "help." We have never figured out a way to politely say "please leave - I need to be alone" when someone is just there to be kind and help.
On a positive note. Every time you go to the bathroom, you get alone time. Maybe that explains why Troy goes so often. ;-)
Noah's birthday is coming up soon, we're calling tomorrow his family beach day - because we won't be going next Monday on his actual B-day. (The beach is a birthday guarantee in Haiti.) We'll get some work done here in the morning first. After we're done working we'll let Dad/Gramps get totally ripped off at the beach. No matter how many times I work it - I cannot figure out how rice, noodles, bread, and some cruddy chicken equals a $25 meal/admission price.
Luckily, Grandpa not only comes looking his best, but he comes with a credit card.
Before I close, I have a random question for all parents adopting from Haiti. I am really hoping I can get a consensus ... and not six answers from six people ... but it is Haiti so I am not kidding myself too much.
If you are adopting from here, how do you/your agency understand the law about bio kids? I have heard 2 - 3 -4 and that it does not matter. That is so not helpful to me. How many bio kids can you have or does that portion of the law get totally ignored?
