Heh...now I've seen everything....

Yesterday, Hamid and I were driving somewhere, and we stopped at an intersection near the house. Whenever you stop at an intersection here, your car is immediately descended upon by any number of people. It’s usually people begging for money or people selling things like the IKEA catalog, some obscure magazine, or toy cell phones. But yesterday, I looked as my window was being tapped on and saw something I really wasn’t expecting. A man in drag. I said to Hamid “Is that a man?”, because it was honestly just something I never thought I’d see here. He said “No is man, no is woman! You have in America?” and I said yes, I had seen plenty of them in America, and we chuckled a little. I figured that it would be too complicated to explain that most of my male friends in college were gay, and when I would go out dancing with them, drag queens were the main event at some of the places we’d go to. I mean, he was wearing a lovely salwar kameez, but he clearly needed more practice wearing heels – he almost fell off his little wedge sandals. And his manicure could have used some work. No self-respecting drag queen (he may have just been a transvestite, actually – don’t know if he was an executive transvestite, though…) would go out in public in the US without knowing how to walk in a fierce set of heels, and without making sure her manicure was impeccable.

Another Sunday, another day at the pool (have I said that before?) My swimming continues to improve, so that’s fun – I respond well to goals. Not that I have a specific goal in mind, I suppose, other than “get better”. So…mission accomplished! My Sundays here are a major contrast to Sundays at home. Here, I sleep until I wake up, futz around a little, go to the pool for a few hours, come home and do a little washing, maybe watch a movie, check e-mail, do some reading. Stuff like that. At home, if I’m not at church early to help out with something, I’m still there, and then from there the day manages to fill up fairly consistently. It’s all good stuff, I get to spend time with people I care about, whether it’s friends or family or both, but it’s always a full day. Here…not so much. I don’t like to plan things for Sundays, because that’s the only day we don’t work, and that’s the only full day that Hamid can spend with his family, so I don’t want to drag him out here just because I feel like going shopping or something. I know it’s his job, and he has always said that if I need anything it’s “no problem”, and I’m sure it would be no problem, but he’s got four kids, so if I were him, I know I’d appreciate a day with them. I dunno. It’s also kind of nice for me, because then I can be as lazy or industrious as I want. It’s about 5:30 right now, and I really couldn’t tell you where the day went. How often do I get to say that?

I leave for Vietnam on Friday, and I’ve got a little over two weeks there, then I come back for my last month here. I don’t quite know what to expect there, but I’m really looking forward to it. Who would have thought that I’d get this many stamps in my passport off of just one trip? Certainly not me. I think I’ve figured out what makes this okay, though. If I have a place where I can cook, and a place where I can do my own laundry, it’s easier to settle in a bit and feel normal. As pretty much all of you know, I love to cook, and I think I’m a fairly decent at it (fortunately), so I like not having to go out for every meal – that makes any trip seem longer. Little things about that, too. I can have breakfast right after my morning workout, as I’m cooling down. I don’t think too many restaurants would let me in wearing a sports bra and yoga pants, and really – I think it’s best that way. Especially around here. (Captain Obvious just decided to pay a visit there…) So it’s nice to be able to have some cereal, watch BBC World News, and then hop in the shower without having to worry about whether or not I’m appropriately dressed or if I have enough money on me. The place in Vietnam is going to be like that, too, and I think that’s going to be a criterion for me for future assignments, wherever possible. (Clearly, if I’m working in Liberia or something and there’s no guesthouse/extended stay apartment available, I’ll suck it up. Because I’ll be in Liberia, and it’s probably not going to be a good idea to be picky. But I’m talking about preferences here.)

The guy who owns the house I’m staying in, who is also the Executive Director of the company we’re working with here, is such a nice man. He came by with his family yesterday afternoon to pick a few things up out of a storage room they have here, and he asked if I liked to watch movies. I said yes, I did – anything but horror movies. He said “well, we have a lot at home. I’ll bring some over for you to watch.” I said that was very nice of him, which it was. Well, last night, he brought over about 20 DVDs. I mean, my goodness, I almost hope I don’t have enough sitting-on-my-butt time to watch all of them (only five of which I’ve seen before), but let’s face it – I have a lot of sitting-on-my-butt time. Ah well. He also brought over a book he thought I’d like, which I’m looking forward to picking up after I’m done with my current selection. Once again – people here are so nice and hospitable, they really, really are.

Sorry this has been a bit rambling today – all of my doing nothing has, apparently, worn me out quite a bit, so my tendency to blabber on and on is more pronounced. Fortunately, my talkativeness shouldn’t come as a surprise to any of you. I think I’m going to try to make it an early night, at any rate.