Well I haven't written in awhile... mostly because I'm in a quiet, sober place right now. More on that later... but to pave the way for more writing I thought a funny story would do me well. Well, funny a bit... gross a lot... and anger-inducing for my special someone. Intrigued?
FOOD. One of the most important extensions of friendship in cross-cultural ministry... if not the most important. If we are invited to someones home, or happen to be walking around and they lead us ever so lightly (ha!) by the hand into their apartment and begin sharing food with us... there is just no question about it. You eat the food, you eat it happily, and if they give you more... you eat that too. So far I've had some funny run-in's with the delicate balance of honoring them and trusting the by receiving this gift of friendship VERSUS keeping it down and not losing it all over the plate, thus shaming them for a lifetime! So far I have succeeded... but that almost came to an end yesterday.
It all started the first week we lived here. I delivered some fresh baked cookies to a family (I will leave details out, heaven forbid they ever read this!). As is customary in these cultures, I fully expected them to return my plate with another treat. Well weeks went by and finally they came back with some of their own cookies plus an entire pot of dinner for us. This particular dish we've had before and neither one of us desired to willfully partake inside the privacy of our own home so we just let it sit there while we ate our own yummy American food. The next day (yesterday) I was coming home from the gym and the wife/cook sees me hauling both my sleepy kids to my door and in true community fashion, she picks up a kid and starts trailing behind me to come into the house and help. NOW... if I thought she might just drop him at the door and consider her help over I wouldn't have panicked... but they NEVER stop at the door. How American would that be? They come in, pick up toys, close my open cabinets, put extra sweaters on my kids because apparently they are never warm enough.
So there I was, pretending not to find the right key to get into the house, sorting out how I could hide the dish without her knowing. My success in this moment determined the fate of our friendship with this family and if I would shame her beyond our American comprehension. So I rush in and take the lid off and dump the whole dish down the sink and stick the empty pot over the drain. She walks in behind me, after about 3 seconds sees the empty pot, smiles, I smile back... pat my tummy and say "Excellent!!" in her language. She lit up and was so happy that we ate all of her dish and thought it was amazing. She left and the second wave of panic set in. How on earth can I get this out of the sink? I knew it wouldn't clear the pipes... and I made one large mess... and the topper was that I had to work in the office an hour later. So I got around, my husband came home and I left him with two babies and a clogged sink full of food he had no desire to eat let alone sift through with nasty additions that have been sitting in the drain pipes.
Long story short, they had to snake the pipe (eeeek!!) and the water (if you can call it that) slushed out all over the tile and was quite the scene. The second I walked in two hours later my husband said, "TAG" and walked out. He needed some alone time.
Moral of the story? Use the trash next time... and do it the night before. What a mess.
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