Tuesday 9/16/08

Mike's first day of going to work. The poor guy... Frist, right now he has to drive 45 min to work on a two lane road which is very scary. First thing, he gets a "ticket" for not wearing a seat belt. (How many times have I said....) The cop was really nice. Cindy says everyone her is very nice...The nicest theives you would ever want to meet. She is so right. So after pulling over the cop wants to know if it is OK for him to sit in the car. Make says sure. Mike appologizes over and over, the cop then says "How would you like to buy me breakfast." Mike says, "I'd love to!" He hands the cop a 50,000 kwatcha bill. (Too bad he didn't have anything smaller on him.) The cop says now I wouldn't want anyone to think I was taking a bribe, so just slide the money across the seat down low. Mike does as asked. The cop acted like he was writing out a ticket, and then let him go. It's hillarous here!! Mike had to go to the hospital and get some blood work done, other tests required by work, etc. When on his way back home, he got lost! Then while he was lost, he had a flat tire! He changed the tire, risking his life on these highways and nutty drivers. He takes off again, still lost and finds he is almost out of gas. He sees a gas station up ahead and pulls in. Not knowing anything about the money around here, he says fill it up. Well, he didn't have enough money for the gas and had to beg the manager of the station to let him go and promised to come back and pay him the 150,000 kwatcha he owed. (That's about $45). The man took his name and employer and let him go. Mike asks some guy for directions and he said, not in so many words, pay me and I'll tell you. Mike drives off and sees the smoke stacks of the smelter. He follows this lead, because we live just north of them. He finally finds home. The whole thing would be hysterically funny if it were not so stressful on Mike. He was about ready for a nervous breakdown when he got home. Currently in our temporary home, we live in kind of a compound in a duplex. There are single rooms in a different building and two sets of duplexes. They call them semi here, not duplex. We have 2 bedrooms with a sink and shower in each bedroom, living room/dinning room combo, kitchen and a WC or toilet room. It's very different here. None of the toilets are in the same room as the bathtub or shower. We take our meals in the dinning hall across the way. They feed us breakfast, lunch and dinner. (Course if Mikes at work, I go to lunch alone.) Breakfast is from 6:30 to 7:30. Lunch is 12:30 to 1:30, and dinner is 6:30 to 7:30. Of course here they use military time, so dinner is 18:30 to 19:30. Something else to get used to. When you say "I'll be over at 2," here they think you mean 2 in the morning.