So one of my favorite things about living in Haiti is watching my kids readjust to the United States when we come back for visits. It. is. hilarious.
Two quick stories from today--
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We decided to do a little bit of grocery shopping today. (Well, actually we PLANNED to do a little bit of grocery shopping, but then we took a family nap and it accidentally lasted over 8 hours... so it's in the plans for tomorrow.) We were planning out the foods we wanted to prepare this week and I asked the kids what their favorite American foods were that they wanetd me to buy-- I told them they could have ANYTHING they wanted.
- Nia said, "Shake and Bake" (actually she said, "that stuff you shake on chicken to make chicken nuggets.")
- Nico said, "cereal."
- Josiah said, "spaghetti with hotdogs" (most definitely NOT an American food, but rather a common Haitian dish we have several times a week... see here for the recipe.) I asked him to try again because spaghetti with hotdogs wasn't an American food and he said, "ok, hotdogs with spaghetti." So what the heck, we'll make it.
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I was getting ready to bathe the kids. (In an ACTUAL bathtub with WARM water-- heaven.) The kids were all taking turns going potty. Nia yells in, "Mom, there's no toulet paper in here!" I come in the bathroom and she's searching all over the back of the toilet.I say, "Nia, it's right there, attached to the wall."
She looks all around and then finally notices the toilet paper holder mounted on the wall. She looks all surprised and then exasperated. And then says, "Wow. I am not used to this."
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Other random things:
- Hoping to have some writing time tomorrow-- am almost finished with chapter 2 of the Patricia story. I miss that baby. A lot.
- The US is COLD. Like FREEZING cold. Wow. Really cold.
- We literally DID take an 8.5 hour nap today. We went to nap at 11AM. Didn't wake up until 7:30PM. Think the family was a little tired? After sleeping through lunch and dinner we were hungry. By 8:30PM we were pulling into Torerro's for some delicious Mexican food. By 10 PM we were home and ready to start watching a movie as a family-- "Where the Wild Things Are." We're going to try to get back on a realistic time schedule tomorrow.
- Gretchen is doing very well. Still has a lot of recovering to do, but is on the mend! She's on some sort of new breathing maching (non-invasive.) She actually talked to her kids on the phone today. They ALL needed that.
- I miss Haiti, but it's very relaxing to be in America where I can take hot baths, eat familiar foods and not have to see broken buildings and refugee camps everytime I decide to leave the house. But I still miss Haiti.
