Sometime you just have to lighten it up, so just for fun:
Western life looks very different than village life (or city life)
in Ethiopia. Best perspective? Seeing this world through the eyes of my children just
introduced to these nuisances. For instance, central vac seems the easiest way to clean up post meal messes. The
first time I plugged her in, my three habesha gathered around trying to touch
what they thought to be our newest pet. Nick, our oldest, attempted to make
nice with our vacuum. He squealed, "Give her to me, mama. I feed her for
you. She hungry for my food." but when he went to 'feed' the vac, the
suction caught hold his hand, terrorized that poor boy, and he demanded she go
back to her cage (closet) until learning to eat nicely. He's still quite certain that is more animal than machine. And...
My habesha discovered the original orange pushups at a local feed
store (I know, right? Ice cream at a feed store. Alas.) In an attempt to eat
their ice cream, each child placed their plump lips on the pushup handle,
mistaking it for a straw, and sucked until blue in the face. Loud and sloppy sucking. I was giggling too
hard to clue them in right away. Oh, don't forget...
In the orphanages our children spent the last 2+ years of their
life, they were required to tell a caregiver prior to doing anything. May I say
ANYTHING again? ANYTHING! 2 am toilet visits means a child in your room yelling
"toilet", a runny nose requires the ongoing announcement of snot and
boogies, an itchy bottom... Well, you get the point. To that end, also remember
our language is in the development stage. Soooooo.... standing in the middle of
our church foyer at only 2 weeks home, Ty hollered (to insure a quick
response), "Shint! Mama, SHINT!" Now, I fully understood the Amharic
meaning of 'shint' as 'tee-tee', but many others standing within earshot, with
his volume I promise that would be anyone in a mile radius, only understood a
petit, brown-skinned boy with a snarky smile, holding himself seemed to be
yelling profanities loudly at his mama in the middle of a church. I'm glad I
can laugh. And the every popular...
We play a lot of cards at our house. Our kids are all fairly competitive.
The battle cry for Nick, Hewan, and Ty is, "I'm the wiener!"
Nope. Not a typo. If you can be a wiener who wants to be a winner?
#can'tcorrectwhatmakesthemthem
Nothing like sharing the memories! Great ones...
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