It's 4:30 am and I'm wrapping up my work day to the overlapping cries of roosters who started at three am. Although I know it's the rainy season, the persistent damp is like living in a hot cloud most of the time. Even now, just before dawn, when I'm sitting on my balcony with my San Miguel Lite, there is a continual misting. Ironic, since I left the gorgeous Pacific Northwest with the singular complaint that it rained a bit too much...
Today was a "gettin'-er-done" day with a list and a personal determination to accomplish all three items on it. After getting a good night's sleep, a whole 7 hours, I finally motivated myself out of the front door armed with my orange umbrella, a purse full of credit cards, and more than a few sub-lists. I made it as far as next door when I paused to watch the scene unfolding in front of my landlord's unit, three doors down.
Two men, one fully grown Husky dog, and her 9 puppies were all crouched inside of a cage that smelled of afterbirth, under the warm glow of lamps in an already hot day. Now, I haven't gone fully into the issue of animals in cages here, so I'll try to be brief with my bewilderment at the mistreatment that is rampant here. Dogs live in cages and on short leashes everywhere. This is a cultural difference that I don't know if I'll ever be okay with.
My landlord has three, huge Husky dogs that are firmly tied to his tiny front porch. Their total daily exercise (since Aaron mentioned they needed exercise two months ago) consists of a 30 yard walk to the deeper recesses of the property and being tied up to a tree close to my bedroom window where they pass their time barking. If I were treated so poorly, I might bark a lot too. The landlord has bred his one female dog so he can bask, Scrooge McDuck-like, on a pile of pesos derived from her abject misery as a puppy mill in a cage just large enough for her to turn around in.
I stopped and took a look. The lady of the house, Ann, came out and started giving orders to the two men in the cage on how to arrange the shards of cardboard to more adequately protect her husband's investment. I congratulated Ann and moved on. I stopped at Aaron's school where I dropped off a diagram of some shelves we're commissioning from the wood shop there to hopefully organize our living space better. I poked my head into Aaron's classroom and then made my way to the tricycle stop outside of the school.
I had waited a while there when an SUV pulled up in front of me and rolled down it's window. A woman asked me where I was headed and she looked vaguely familiar. I said, SM Bicutan. She said to get in, so I did. Now, it's embarrassing to admit this, but it was my landlord's wife which I realized about a kilometer after getting into her car and based only on the context of our conversation. Note to self: Memorize faces!
We ended up in the semi-thick traffic of pre-rush-hour Dona Soladad and I had a rare opportunity to get to know the woman who lives next door. I like her. She wants a peaceful home, knows how to handle her husband, cares for her family, and works her ass off as a flight attendant for the Saudi Arabian airlines. We talked a lot about her daughter, serving a complex meal that include crystal and china on a one-hour flight, how to cuss someone out in Arabic, and the difficulties of laundry. She offered to help communicate with my maid, I promised to go to coffee some day soon, and there was the mutual admiration that comes from recognizing a kick-ass chick who deals with the same frustrations and exhilaration that life brings.
I got out at the mall and started shopping from yet another list in my bag. I had to strategize this trip. After fulfilling my list at this store, I would have to carry all of the bags across the entire mall, purchase a few more items in a store over there, and then make my way to the tricycle station where I would catch a "special" trike with all of my stuff and hold it until I got to my house.
What it ended up looking like was more like this: The only foreigner in the mall struggling up and down escalators with seven shopping bags crammed with dehumidifiers, bread, enough Nescafe to give Black Beauty diabetes, a half of a watermelon, a full pineapple, and a few other things. Then I was accompanied by five eager salesmen trying to sell me vacuum cleaners, water filters, and plastic organizers while one of them pushed a cart with all of my stuff behind me. Then it was just him and I carrying everything to the tricycle station while he asked such intelligent questions as, "Why are you doing this alone" and "Where is your husband?". Then it was me laiden with everything and moving step by step forward in a line of no less than 70 people waiting for a "Special" ride. When someone hollered, "Camella" I jumped out of line and into the back of a tricycle, bags falling out and into the rain water of the street. The woman already in the "Special" grabbed a couple of bags, a kid that couldn't have been 9 retrieved my groceries, and we were off before I was fully inside.
I had a long time in the rush hour traffic to seat myself and unwind numb fingers from their plastic nooses. I got to know Judy who was sharing my ride. She's 47, a neighbor, a nurse who bizarrely worked mostly in Saudi Arabia too, and a great companion with perfect English for this kind of a ride. When I got home, I was impressed with myself and amazed at how Aaron ever got that amount of stuff plus a stove in the same fashion.
The guy that said, Don't Sweat the Small Stuff, obviously never lived in the heart of hot and muggy Paranaque lugging bags of small stuff and trying to flag down a 35 peso ride on a road riddled with pothole and gutter water containing... well, I'll let your imagination do some of the work.
When I went for my post 2am meal, I opened the food cupboard to find a cockroach the size of my thumb. When he spotted me he did what any intelligent cockroach would do, he crouched. It looked like a six-legged push up in a ridiculous attempt to be hidden. I am in a whole new world on so many levels, but today felt like a combination of the completely unknown and the very familiar conversation between women who could be sharing a ride anywhere in the world. We try to do our best with hunting and gathering for our families, being proud of their accomplishments, fight the boredom that comes with household tasks, and gab like crazy when we're in the same space.