Home Sweet Home

Thursday July 3rd—

By the time you are reading this blog I hope to be in America being taken care of by my parents. I will wake up to the smell of eggs, bacon, orange juice and Hershey’s chocolate milk.

I will savor this breakfast like never before as eggs here in the ME (both Kuwait and Jordan) aren’t pasteurized or barely even cleaned. Some even still have bits of feathers on them . . . very appetizing.

Bacon is illegal in Kuwait. We can get pork products in Kuwait with a connection to the military base but it is not easily obtained. I’ve heard that there is a pork butcher here in Jordan and the lady who told me about him will take me when I get back here at the end of August.

Todd came back from the ME 15 years ago and didn’t drink milk for a couple of years. He really became averse to it after drinking it here. Living in Kuwait I didn’t understand why because we found fresh milk there that tasted the same as I’ve always known. Expensive, yes. I love milk though so I was willing to pay. But he didn’t live in Kuwait 15 years ago. He was here in Jordan. And I can see why he grew leery of milk. The only fresh milk I’ve found (in the week that I’ve been here) is 3%. That’s not a typo. I asked the same lady and she was surprised we got fresh milk in Kuwait as she thought all the ME was like Jordan in that fresh milk is a definite luxury. The milk here is long shelf life milk that expires about 6 months after it’s produced. It says it’s made from “fresh cow milk” but I don’t know the process it goes through so that I can keep it in my cupboard for 6 months. I bought some and I have yet to get the nerve up to try it plain. I’ve had it with cereal and with Nesquik mixed in. I put it in the mac and cheese. It’s been ok. I just can’t bring myself to drink it plain though. I will in time. A brand was recommended to me so I’ll try that when I come back in August. So this is why I will savor the milk in America.

Hershey’s powder chocolate milk mix is my absolute favorite. I’m nearly 40 now and over the years people have tried to convince me I’m wrong that Hershey’s powder (not the syrup) is the absolute all time yummiest. I’ve tried them all and they’re not as good. Sadly, Hershey’s powder is becoming more difficult to find even in the States. My parents say every time they pass through UT they stop by the Harmons and stock up as that is the store I would get my supply when I lived in Salt Lake. They can’t find it in their usual stores in ID. They know it’s my favorite and my mom tells me they have like 12 cans in storage waiting for someone to drink it. That someone will arrive in 3 days.

I can’t publish this blog at the time of writing because there is no internet connection where we are staying. You don’t realize how much you rely on the internet til you don’t have instant access anymore. One day I even went driving around looking for an internet café. I may have passed a hundred but I didn’t see any “Internet café” signs in English and since that’s the only language I read at the moment I wasn’t able to find one. However, I have since passed by one but now I don’t need it. Someone living near the church has an insecure wireless connection that I “borrowed” to check a few emails a couple of days ago.

We flew into Jordan Saturday night and I’ve already been to two functions at the church. One was a fireside given by Elder Neuenschwander. I’m sure I just butchered the spelling but since I don’t have internet I can’t go onto lds.org to check the spelling. He gave a good talk about the parable of the laborers in the vineyard. The other event was an Enrichment Meeting where we reviewed kitchen cleanliness techniques and made deep fried shrimp balls. They were delicious.

As mentioned, we flew in Saturday night and Sunday night Todd left to go back to Kuwait for a day then on to Lebanon for a few days. He’ll return later tonight. We’re staying in a 2 bedroom apt. rented by the company he works for for employees who come to town for business and they are letting us stay here as the villa we’re going to be moving into isn’t quite ready for us as they are doing some renovating, painting, etc.

So let’s review. I’m here in a foreign country. I don’t know where anything is—or I should say I didn’t but now I know about a couple of malls, a couple of grocery stores, the church, and an internet café. I’m here with 7 kids. We are in a 2 bedroom, one bathroom apt. And Todd leaves after one day.

Let’s just talk about the apt for a sec. There’s a reason 7 noisy children shouldn’t be in an apt. This apt. building is secure in that you have to have a key to enter the building and a different key to enter your apt. I left some of the kids home while I went foraging for food. When I returned I sent Petey with the keys up to the apt. to have one of the boys come down to help unload the groceries. Miscommunication being what it is, the four oldest all came down to help leaving the three youngest by themselves in the apt. When Nic realized this she went into a panic. I was waiting out at the car so when all four older kids showed up to help unload I asked who was upstairs with the little ones. Uh oh. Sure enough we didn’t have the keys to get in. We could hear Nic inside screaming and crying but we couldn’t see her and she couldn’t see us. There is a way through the parking garage to get inside without the key. The kids had done it a couple of times when we stayed here a couple weeks ago when we were looking for houses to live in. Petey went to try that route but got turned around and couldn’t find the way. The rest of us were helpless just standing outside listening to Nic. Then someone from inside must’ve realized what was happening because someone buzzed us in (opened the entrance door from their apt.) We realized that Nic was pounding on someone’s apt. door. She thought it was ours but she didn’t go up enough flights of stairs and was actually one floor too low. Ooops—Sorry neighbors.

Another apt. disaster started the night I came back from the fireside. I came home to a kitchenette (notice I didn’t say “kitchen” because it’s basically a small stove, oven, fridge, and a few cupboards—not even a table) full of dirty dishes. I asked Batman why they weren’t done as he was given the assignment before I left. He said he couldn’t do them because there was no water coming out of the sink. I turned on the faucet and sure enough nothing came out.

I sent the boys to find the maintenance man who speaks little English. They told him we have no water. The boys said he said “ok” and walked off like maybe he was going to fix it. After about a half hour of still no water I went looking for him. I didn’t find him but I found an apt. door open and I explained to the people living there our situation (well, I first asked them if any of them spoke English) and if they knew where I could find the maintenance guy. The kind man at the apt. called him on his phone and within a few minutes the maintenance guy was at our apt. to help. He too turned on the faucet and saw nothing was coming out so he said he’d look into it and return in a few minutes. He did return and informed us that our tank had run out. Of course I knew nothing about a tank. Evidently every apt gets 2 meters of water every week and we had used up our allowance. Did I mention we have 7 kids and one bathroom? And we’re still in this apt. for several more days? The maintenance guy asked where Todd was and I told him “He’s in Lebanon. What can we do to get more water?” He took pity on us and told us to wait 15 minutes. He came back again in 15 minutes and told us he was putting more water in our tank. What a relief. I need to be sure to tell Todd to leave him a big tip for helping us out. We were here 3 days when the tank ran out.

The story doesn’t stop there, however. That was 2 days ago. Tomorrow is church day so I sent the kids to start showers. That’s right. We’re out of water again. Todd’s due home in a couple of hours (well, actually he texted that his flight is delayed but he better get home tonight sometime). I’m going to let him deal with it in the morning. The worst that could happen is the Cummings show up at church with BO and greasy hair.

I can probably explain our outrageous consumption of water though. Had I known though about the water limit I may have gone about things differently. In the apt. is a washer/dryer. By that I mean it is all one machine. It washes the clothes and the same machine dries the clothes. I can’t even keep up with laundry when I have a separate washer and dryer. Keep in mind also that the movers packed up my washing machine in Kuwait a couple days before we left. So I’m not just keeping up with laundry for 9 people, I’ve been playing catch up with the laundry. The washer/dryer has been going almost nonstop since we got here Saturday. I know you’re thinking “Haven’t you heard of a Laundromat?” My reply is, “Yes I have. But someone needs to tell the ME about that great business venture.” There are no laundromats here. I’m sure they’d wonder why anyone would take their dirty laundry to a Laundromat as there are maids to take care of that chore. I’ve thought about taking all my clothes to the dry cleaners but the cost of food here is eating up our supply of cash so I will just take suitcases of dirty laundry back to the States and spend a couple of days catching up then. Or a couple of hours at the convenient local Laundromat.

Our time here has not been all bad. We found a theatre at a mall and went to see “Kung Fu Panda.” I’m not usually big on the cartoons but I would recommend this one. Maybe it’s because I just haven’t gotten over Jack Black in “Nacho Libre” so anything he does I will find the humor in it.

We went to Amman Waves water park. As we were arriving so were about 9 buses of kids in a summer program from Choueifat school which is where the kids will be attending this fall. I tried to get my kids to walk around and meet some of them but they were too intimidated. I would’ve been too. Something about meeting someone for the first time when I’m wearing a swimsuit really intimidates me.

I have to insert a Kuwait reference here. About a week before we left Kuwait I took the kids to the Kuwait water park. It was just a bad experience. We arrived at about 1:40. It wasn’t crowded, the weather was hot—a perfect time at the water park. At 2 we realized why it wasn’t crowded. From 2 to 3 they give the slide workers a break so they shut down all the slides. My older kids came over to the kiddie pool which is reserved for the little kids and their caretakers. A couple of times they were told to get out. I don’t know what older kids are expected to do when they shut down the part of the water park that they can use. Fortunately we have enough little ones that my older kids were their caretakers and they could play in the calf-deep water til the slides reopened. Then at 3 the crowds started coming.

The “crowds” consisted of numerous Kuwaiti boys. Soon after arriving at the park I realized there were no women there in their swimsuits. Even the nannies in the kiddie pool were wearing their clothes. The muslim women that were there were sitting on the chairs on the sides completely covered in the 110 degree heat. I wasn’t about to take off my tshirt and long shorts til I saw someone else do it and I never did the whole time we were there so I had my shorts and shirt on the whole time.

Petey and her friend Reem that came with us were the only girls their age in what we would consider “normal” swimsuits. Most of the girls their age (and I probably saw less than 10) had on their clothes and were just kind of splashing around in the water. Girls younger than them if they did have on swimsuits were wearing more like body suit/ wet suit type swim suits. Very modest. The only problem is the Kuwaiti boys were being very ill mannered toward Petey and Reem making them very uncomfortable. My boys didn’t have a good time because again the Kuwaiti boys were very rude and would cut in line and push their way through to the front and the lifeguards would do nothing about it. We left after a short time. So the Kuwait water park is a great place for young Kuwaiti boys but that’s about it. We were pleasantly surprised that Amman was more “normal” and people there were much more polite and instead of pushing their way to get to the front of the line they would let “the Americans” go ahead of them. We stayed for over 5 hours and we all have the sunburns to go along with it. We’re hoping the burns subside before we fly because none of us want to feel this pain on a plane for 15 hours.

So that’s our week in Amman. I still can’t believe I’m here and doing this. My mother still reminds that I wouldn’t even call my YW leaders to find out about activities because I was so shy. So the fact that I’m in a country where I don’t speak the native language and my husband is out of the country and I’ve got 7 kids to watch out for I’m going to take a little credit for my progress. I even managed to get a Jordan SIM card for my phone when my Kuwait card ran out of money and I bought a watermelon from a roadside stand where I’m sure I paid way too much but the kids and I are enjoying a delicious treat. But I can’t credit myself too much as even with Todd gone I have a back up. The first night we were here the Branch President and his wife (Joey and Shannon Leavitt) brought us dinner and I’ve relied on them to help me out. She’s the one who told me about the pork butcher and the milk.

We’ll be thinking of you all tomorrow with your BBQs and fireworks as it is the 4th of July and American holidays take on a special meaning when you live overseas. We hope to be in touch with you all this summer—although we don’t really know who reads this blog—but whoever does we wish you all the best and a great summer!