Adjusting to Mexican Time

Throughout my life there have been several stories of my lack of patience. My mom tells a story of me coming home after the first day of my freshmen year of high school exasperated, saying, "I'll never pray for patience again! I had sit by the most annoying kid in every period!" And there is the classic story of me exclaiming to Ben in frustration, "I'm the most patient person in the world!" mere days before he finally asked me to date him. Just for the record: I didn't pray again for patience. But apparently the Lord thought I still needed to learn that character trait as he plopped me and my family right in the middle of life in Mexico.

Mexican life is where nothing ever works out in the time it's supposed to. Our visa delay was the perfect example of "Mexican time." How I didn't realize that situation would be indicative of our first weeks (or whole time) in Mexico, I'm not sure. I naively envisioned us arriving in Monterrey, having our second vehicle for my usage ready to be picked up, an appointment for us to get our residence card made, and a helper to assist us in getting new phones, a bank account, etc. As you can imagine, none of that has happened. In fact, we got the news that we'll probably have to fly our entire family to Mexico city (population: 21 million) in order to get our residence card finalized. And that has to be done 30 days from our entry into the country (April 17) or we have to reapply for our temporary visa. Of course, there are many things that we cannot do until we get our residence card; the most important of these is that we cannot get our container of goods from America. Which means that we have about four toys and 10 books to entertain my children for the next month. Perfect. We also cannot get a bank account or local cell phone. I can't stop rolling my eyes as I write this. So darn frustrating. Everything is so frustrating.  

The good news is that the human resources department has realized how disorganized they have been in helping us transition to Monterrey and has asked Ben's help in making a sort of manual, or check list to help future expats move here. The bad new is: WE'RE THE GUINEA PIGS! We are the ones who have had nothing done in a timely manner. 

I'm learning daily not to expect efficiency, nor perfection. I'm learning that the American way of pointing out clear expectations and then assuming they will be carried out in a relatively concise manner will never work here. Instead, time must be spent developing a relationship with the person helping you, and then hopefully they will work hard or find connections to help things work out. So instead of asking Ben to nag his HR rep because we still don't have a quote for a lease car for me to use, I asked him to butter her up. Desperate times call for cultural correctness. He spent the first five minutes of their meeting asking about her family, her Easter, etc...and she spent almost the whole afternoon working on our transition. Perhaps we are learning...

Last Thursday and Friday we had a two day cultural training for the whole family. It was from 9-5 and thankfully at our house. The company had someone come for the kids (well, Seth and Sam, Josh didn't really participate) and then someone for Ben and I. It was an enlightening experience learning all about Mexican history, culture, and also being given tips to help with culture shock. The boys did great with their teacher and even got to make a pinata. Our teacher was wonderful as well, but the ironic thing was, the cultural differences in how Mexicans deliver information compared to Americans, frustrated me the whole time. They are so indirect and it takes (in my opinion) way too long to explain anything. However, despite that frustration, it was a great chance for us to learn a lot of the technicalities of why we feel so out of place here. It's not just because we're the only white skin, blonde hair, blue eyed people around, it's because we view so many things differently: time, hierarchy, communication. It truly was fascinating. And the flip side of them not being in a hurry was that they would thoroughly cover any question we might have. For example, we mentioned we might like to go hiking. Well, we now know every hiking spot within a 100 miles radius. I asked for their favorite restaurants in the area, and we received a huge list. The Mexicans are such helpful people, if you don't need that help by a deadline.

 Joshy's gloves for pinata making

Seth holding the base of the pinata

Sam's cutting paper for the decorations

Maria was such a great teacher for the boys and a great encouragement to me.

The finished product!

Please don't assume that we're terribly unhappy, or that we are regretting our decision to move here. I'm just airing frustrations. I know all these feelings and frustrations are part of the natural transition to another culture. It helps me to write about it, and I also look forward to reading this again in six months to a year as I have come to accept and even admire a lot of these cultural differences. I just hope that we'll have our container and a car by then.

Here are some pictures of the good times that we've been having as we enjoy this weather. I've been in touch with friends from home that have been getting poured on the past week.

The Mexicans are brilliant in providing play places at most big stores. I've never had my kids ask me to return to a furniture store again. And another note: when did America get rid of "ball tanks"?  

 Saturday afternoon was spent at the pool. It was wonderful. 

 

It's such an awesome pool

 Seth

 Sam

 Daddy tossing Sam

 Seth's turn (caught Sam nose picking in the background)

 Warming up on the hot ground

 Josh is full of funny smiles these days

 Cuddle bug on Daddy

 The apartment has a small yard for football; it's not our back lot, but it will do!

Sunday was rainy and "cold" (65 degrees), so we filled up the hot tub on our patio. I don't anticipate us using it a ton, but when we do, it will be great!

 Ben's first day back to work, the kids and I spent the afternoon at the park that's about a 7 minute walk away. It is a beautiful park with lots of different equipment, lots of trees and shade, and the most beautiful bird sounds all around you. 

 That's not "Pacific Northwest" bark

 Beautiful flowers

I love these ones too.

Seth in swing, Sam in the tree. I've been joking with Sam that's he's trying to make it to the emergency room via tree climbing. 

We've Made it to Mexico!

It's hard to believe that we actually are here in Monterrey, Mexico. Including a day for travel, we've been away from home for three days. So much has happened in those 72 hours, it's hard to know where to begin. Due to exhaustion and lack of time, I'm hoping to quickly bullet some highs and lows of the whole moving process:

- High: our flight didn't leave until noon, so we had plenty of time to say goodbye to our home on Monday morning. Ben took the boys to the back yard for one last lap, last slide, etc. It was a beautiful, sunny morning.

Last Pictures in front our house. I'm glad that I got to see my daffodils bloom!

I'm curious how tall they will be by the end of all this; I'll have to take a duplicate picture when we're home for good!

-High: Ben's dad was able to drop us off at the airport with our nine luggage bags, 5 backpacks, and a stroller. It was so nice to have an extra pair of hands to help with the kids as we checked-in and lugged around so many bags. It was also nice to have one last goodbye with Deedo.

-High: the kids were able to have MOD pizza one last time for lunch.

-High: after we landed in Dallas, I stood Josh up on his seat to stretch his legs. The ladies behind us exclaimed, "Oh, we didn't even know he was there!" What a great compliment! It was also fun to watch the twins chat  periodically with a older gentlemen sitting next to them throughout the flight. 

You'll be happy to know that Seth and Sam diligently watched the safety video as well as read the manual. Safety first.

-High: we ate at the sit down restaurant in the airport with what we thought we really squirrely kids (especially Josh). At the end of our meal, the waiter told us that the gentlemen two tables down (who had already left) had already paid for our meal. We felt so blessed! What a kind gesture to two tired parents juggling kids at an airport!

-Low: it seems that we bring the rain with us whenever we fly. There was a massive storm system over Dallas, thus delaying a ton of flights. We were originally supposed to arrive in Monterrey at 9:20, we arrived at 11:30 (CST...which is two hours later than PST). We weren't all in bed until 1:30 CST.

High: the sunset from the Dallas airport

-High: there was an amazing lightning storm over Monterrey as we drove from the airport to the hotel. We were able to watch huge bolts across the sky which illuminated the mountains.

Tuesday

-High: we were able to get help obtaining a rental car, and they even delivered it to our hotel. 

-Low: we realized how bad our Spanish is.

-High: we were given the keys to our apartment and it was even better than I remembered. I love it and am so thankful that we chose this as our temporary home.

How about this for our new "backyard"?

-High: they recently put a play structure into the grass area at our apartment. Also as exciting, the unheated pool is starting to get warmer! 

-High: the owner of the apartment is so kind and energetic! I think he will take good care of us!

-Low: there is still some basic work that needs to be done on the apartment, and as Juan Angel says, "The workers will be here tomorrow...or maybe next week." Which means in a week, or two, or three.

-Low: out of all of us, Josh seems to be struggling the most with adjusting. Or maybe he is just verbalizing it more. He didn't want to be at the apartment, but wanted to go back to the hotel because that's where "Mexico" is. He misses his "Ellie." He is whiny, tired, hungry at weird times, full at weird times (mainly at restaurants when he thinks by saying that we will leave the table and play at the escalators with him), and overall, kind of difficult.

-High: finding Snoopy plates for the kids and a new Starbucks mug for my collection (I try to buy one each place we travel to!)

 

-High: having a Costco to shop at...familiar in an unfamiliar place is wonderful. 

-Low: doing a huge shopping trip with three tired boys in tow. Not my favorite.

-High: buying 8 huge avocados for under $5!

-Low: having the new International Credit Card that you signed up for specifically because you can earn flight points and not have any international fees be rejected at the check-out line with two carts full of goods. We were finally able to make the purchase using our debit card, but were very frustrated!

-Double low: not realizing what was really happening, we headed from Costco to Walmart to load up another two carts, only to have NONE of our credit or debit cards work. Note to anyone moving to a foreign country: notify your banks and credit cards that you are moving so that they don't freeze your accounts suspecting fraud. Thankfully after about half an hour on the phone (and thankfully a box of sourpatch kids for the boys) Ben was able to verify his identity and we made the purchase. It was SO frustrating and embarrassing. 

The kids love these new-to-us ramp escalators

-High: the fun of setting up a new home.

-High: listening to Josh yell, "Hola!...Espanol!" at one of the apartment maintenance workers.

-Low: the exhaustion that comes from setting up a home that only has some basic furniture. That means we're purchasing all kitchen goods, cleaning goods, hygiene products, basic groceries, etc. It's overwhelming and exhausting. Especially as all the labels and are in Spanish and I have to read a lot of labels due to our food allergies. Try to convert dollars to pesos while simultaneously trying to convert kilograms to pounds in order to figure out the price of meat. It's so tiring! 

-Double low: as we were unloading groceries I made discovery that there is NO DISHWASHER. Um, how did I miss that before? Such a bummer.

-High: returning to La Felix for dinner, a place that the boys just loved last time, and Ben and I loved the time before that. Again, it was nice to be somewhere that felt familiar. Ben had the boys try "escamoles," which are ant eggs, and they bravely did so. We were proud of them. (They weren't fans).

We love the restaurant La Felix

The bathrooms at La Felix let you write on the walls in chalk, which is the coolest thing ever. Can you see Josh's name? 

-High: the boys fell asleep quickly with no complaints of being scared.

-Low: all the boys woke up in the middle of the night scared and with bad dreams. In fact, Josh was calling for us, which woke Seth up and he thought something was really wrong and started screaming for us. I've never seen him that worked up before. Poor guy. It wasn't a great night's sleep as we discovered that there is a fair amount of road noise and I'm having to adjust to what are "apartment noises" compared to "kid noises." I'm sure we'll all get used to it as time goes by

Wednesday

-High: waking up to a beautiful view of the mountains. Reading my Bible and drinking my coffee in the beauty of the sunshine.

Look closely at the chimney on the house...that's a man standing on the roof of a very tall house, wearing no brace or rope. We watched him lean out around the chimney to clean the outside of it. Things are definitely done a bit different around here.

-High: while I'm used to waking up and putting on sweats and a sweatshirt, I had to rummage around to find shorts and tank top. I haven't had to wear a sweatshirt yet.

-Low: not having pots and pans yet (or eggs) we had day two of granola bars and jerky (or turkey as Josh calls it) for breakfast.

-High: the kids having free time to play games, write letters, and just get used to the house.

-High: setting the twins to the task of sorting and putting up and organizing all their clothes. They did a delightful job. And Josh distributed toilet paper for me to all the bathrooms. It was fun to have their help!

-High: emptying and putting away all the luggage!

-Low: only being able to find one of Ben's sandals.

-Low: struggling to find a restaurant to eat at for lunch. Did I mention our Spanish sucks? Well, it does. However great we thought we were coming along at our Spanish lessons in Portland, we weren't. It's so hard in real life. Try asking if the buffalo wings are dipped in flour in Spanish. Oh, you don't know the word for bun? Or pizza crust? SO FRUSTRATING.

-Low: the restaurant we landed at was brutally slow and we were starving. Except for Josh; remember: he's full when he gets to restaurants because he doesn't want to sit there and wait for the food.

-High: Ben dropped me at the grocery store to shop on my own while he took the kids to the park.

-Low: setting a bottle of salad dressing on top of your cooking spray causing it to start spraying oil on the things in your cart.

-Low: the lack of familiar spices in the store. And no 25 pound bag of Bob's Red Mill gluten free flour either, go figure.

-Low: did I mention that my Spanish is horrible?

-High: sitting down for our first family dinner at the ding room table, eating homemade Thai food and not having to navigate another Spanish only menu.

-Low: Sam stubbing the same pinky toe that he broke a couple months ago. The poor boy also rolled his ankle in the play place at the airport. He's had sore feet to say the least. 

-High: putting on a movie for the kids while Ben and I organized our clothes closet.

-High: having a neighbor stop by and bring us cookies and card. I may had teared up a little as I felt again God's faithfulness to remember us. And I felt lonely for the friends and neighbors we left behind.

-High: having everyone sleep through the night!

 

Goodbye Rosey

Saying goodbye to Rosey was a day that we all (especially the kids) were dreading. We were thankful that we found a good family for her to live with: a retired couple that love dogs and were really wanting one of their own. But, Ben and I felt terrible giving away the boys' first dog.

The weeks leading up to Rosey's last day at home we spent a lot of quality time with her. We did some of her favorite activities: chasing bubbles, laying on the heater with the kids in the morning and visiting her best dog friend down the street, Kona. I was much more lax with allowing Rosey to be in the living room, knowing that time was short. 

The day before Rosey was leaving, I happened to talk to an older (and wiser) friend who recommended that we go and visit Rosey when she was at her new home. I had figured that it might be easier for the kids to just say goodbye once and never see her again. My friend, however, made me realize that it would help take away some of the sting of goodbye if they knew that they could see her again. That night, when we told the boys that we would visit Rosey at her new home, they were so happy. It was such great advice.

The morning that Ben took her away, the twins did really great. In fact, it was Josh who cried and had the hardest time understanding. "I want Rosey!" he cried. It was so sad.

It was a couple hours later, as I sent the kids outside to play by themselves, that I really noticed how much I was really going to miss Rosey. I hadn't realized how much I relied on Rosey to watch out for the boys and bark if there was any stranger around. It was weird not seeing her familiar black and white body tootling around after the kids out back. Within a few hours I was already mentally telling myself that we'd get a dog again (something I never thought I'd hear myself think).

I'm not going to lie: Rosey and I had a real love/hate relationship. There was a period of time, when I was exhausted and emotional due to thyroid issues that I was seriously talking to Ben about giving her away. She loved to climb over the fence and find neighborhood dogs to play with. She chewed my garden gloves. She dug my dahlia bulbs. It was a pain to find something to do with her when we went anywhere. Her white hair was all over the house no matter how much I cleaned. And the few times she puked in the house just about undid me (who wants to clean up dog vomit, anyways?). But...she was a good dog. If it wasn't for Rosey wanting to go down and play with Kona, we wouldn't have formed a very special friendship with Chris and Jackie down the street. Her need for a walk got us out of the house almost every afternoon. The boys loved playing with her and petting her. Seth especially couldn't walk past Rosey without some sort of hug or pet. Ben and I liked playing catch with her in the yard and watching her run fast. Sam felt so much safer when Rosey slept in their room while they fell asleep. She will always be our first dog, and a great one at that.

Seth on the heater with Rosey in the morning. They would make a "tent" for her with their blankets and snuggle. It was so sweet.

Blowing bubbles for Rosey

 It was really fun to watch her chase them.

Sam

Seth

Josh, Sam, and Seth

Getting a family picture with two dogs looking at the camera is near impossible. Here's Rosey with her best friend Kona, and our dear neighbors Chris and Jackie. 

I think of all the kids, Seth is missing her the most.

Again, pictures with dogs are awkward. The kids were basically choking her to hold still.

A week or so after we brought her to her new home, we went and visited Rosey. It was so fun and special. She seems really content in her new home, but still recognized us. We took her for a walk and to play at a park. We're hoping to visit her again one more time before we move to Mexico and hopefully another time when we come back home for visits. She sure is a good dog.