Fateful words you never want to hear.
"We are going to build the brick wall......starting on Sunday."
Words coming from my landlord's mouth. Words I never wanted to hear. Oh dear.
Imagine some work needs to be done in your home and even with visual aid on Pinterest this remains a task not suited for DIY labeling. This task could include installing a sit down toilet after removing a squatty potty. You know that kind of task. Now imagine that the people you hired to do the task come deficient of tools, with the expectation that everything in your home can be used as a tool, and that they can smoke, spit paan, pee at will, and drink your chai at all hours. Jobs are paid based on how long they take so it is your task to remonstrate them to work every ten minutes, or five, or two.
Now this sounds terrible but I assure you it is quite true, except maybe the paan. Sometimes they just spit it in the sink as they are too polite to do it elsewhere. Or in wonderful cases of grace they don't chew or use kitchen cutlery in the cement mixing process.
As we leave our industrious city for the lengthy time of a whole year, we prepare to store our stuff where moth, monsoon, and cockroach will attempt to destroy. One can always hope that the homemade quilt and Christmas Nativity will survive but nothing is for sure. It remains stuff. And I remain hopeful that we will return. My little act of hope is leaving some of those sweet things that speak of home where my heart calls home.
In the midst of the hoping and goodbyes that tug at my very soul, as always this city throws a curve ball. Now I may seem dramatic but each and every one of us living here have a story. Take the Irish chick set upon by a troop of monkeys, or the lady who was greeted by a fresh pooper on the front stoop of her apartment house, or the dear friend with one of the most poisonous snakes in the world curled up in her kitchen (and then a cobra in the ungan within a week of the karait), or the family that came home after two weeks to a broken fridge, washing machine and water filter. A lady who no longer lives here co-wrote a book holding our city up as prime real estate for burnout (want a peek into our lives....kind of..... read it)
So back to our curve ball. A wall.
A brick wall.
Right down the middle of our "main room" (which is semi inclosed from the elements) a wall is going to be built that will take two....no four...no six days.
I shudder to think. I went into Momzilla mode.
No mixing cement in my living space.
No chewing paan.
No loud music via tinny cell phones.
No leaving the door open so my children can wander away into the gulley.
No leaving the door open so we get mice again, or rats.
No smoking in the house.
No crass jokes.
No pictures of my kids.
Just work, work, work!
I am hoping just to get away from the Crazy White Lady they will work fast. Real Fast.
"We are going to build the brick wall......starting on Sunday."
Words coming from my landlord's mouth. Words I never wanted to hear. Oh dear.
Imagine some work needs to be done in your home and even with visual aid on Pinterest this remains a task not suited for DIY labeling. This task could include installing a sit down toilet after removing a squatty potty. You know that kind of task. Now imagine that the people you hired to do the task come deficient of tools, with the expectation that everything in your home can be used as a tool, and that they can smoke, spit paan, pee at will, and drink your chai at all hours. Jobs are paid based on how long they take so it is your task to remonstrate them to work every ten minutes, or five, or two.
Now this sounds terrible but I assure you it is quite true, except maybe the paan. Sometimes they just spit it in the sink as they are too polite to do it elsewhere. Or in wonderful cases of grace they don't chew or use kitchen cutlery in the cement mixing process.
As we leave our industrious city for the lengthy time of a whole year, we prepare to store our stuff where moth, monsoon, and cockroach will attempt to destroy. One can always hope that the homemade quilt and Christmas Nativity will survive but nothing is for sure. It remains stuff. And I remain hopeful that we will return. My little act of hope is leaving some of those sweet things that speak of home where my heart calls home.
In the midst of the hoping and goodbyes that tug at my very soul, as always this city throws a curve ball. Now I may seem dramatic but each and every one of us living here have a story. Take the Irish chick set upon by a troop of monkeys, or the lady who was greeted by a fresh pooper on the front stoop of her apartment house, or the dear friend with one of the most poisonous snakes in the world curled up in her kitchen (and then a cobra in the ungan within a week of the karait), or the family that came home after two weeks to a broken fridge, washing machine and water filter. A lady who no longer lives here co-wrote a book holding our city up as prime real estate for burnout (want a peek into our lives....kind of..... read it)
So back to our curve ball. A wall.
A brick wall.
Right down the middle of our "main room" (which is semi inclosed from the elements) a wall is going to be built that will take two....no four...no six days.
I shudder to think. I went into Momzilla mode.
No mixing cement in my living space.
No chewing paan.
No loud music via tinny cell phones.
No leaving the door open so my children can wander away into the gulley.
No leaving the door open so we get mice again, or rats.
No smoking in the house.
No crass jokes.
No pictures of my kids.
Just work, work, work!
I am hoping just to get away from the Crazy White Lady they will work fast. Real Fast.
Yay, you wrote about this. I feel like posting it to anyone who needs to know what real life here is like. Argghh...I'm so sorry you have this particular send off committee. Love you. L
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