Home Sweet Home

So we were just realizing that all of you might want to know more of the specifics of our daily life – what things are like at home, etc. So in case you would like to know, here you are.

We’ll start with our house. We live in a simple, one story building in Delta 3, a nice area on the outskirts of Dili. When I say simple, it’s very simple in American terms, but here it’s on the really nice side. On our walk to the school some of the houses are made of wood and tin and tarps, so having a house with a similar structure to home is a blessing. One of the houses we see everyday only had one full wall and a roof until recently – the family bedroom and bathroom were open for anyone passing by on the street to see.

We also went over to visit one of our friends from Bible study who was sick and his house is so different from ours. He rents two small rooms connected by a doorway (but with no door). There is no furniture and the floor is concrete. Inside he has one gas burner on the floor, his shoes, and in his bedroom he has a mattress on the floor, small dresser, and a crucifix on the wall. It definitely gave me a different perspective – I can either compare our house to our family’s homes in America or I can compare it to other houses he

Our house has a green gate and a few feet of driveway for the small car. You enter through a small, red-tiled room, and make it through to our living room. We have some wicker furniture and a few plastic chairs that the Sisters brought us over last week and, more importantly, a prayer corner.

And then, you have made it through to the kitchen. We have a table for four with a fan on it that we have running constantly while we’re eating. We have a dorm-size refrigerator that is quite a blessing for keeping leftovers edible and for keeping the little red ants out of our food (they can’t handle the cold of the fridge).

We also have a sink with two sides, one for washing and one for drying, but the water only runs in the mornings and it’s not safe to drink even if we had access to it all day. But luckily we have a water dispenser and fairly easy access to clean drinking water. In other parts of East Timor clean water is much more difficult to get a hold of.

To the right of the sink we have two gas burners that we do all of our cooking on. Thank goodness for the transition time in Rome. I had never even seen a gas burner that you have to perpetually light with matches until this past September. If we would have been flown from America to East Timor with no transition I think we might have starved to death. The shock of going from a normal oven and the all-powerful microwave to two gas burners might have been too difficult.
I still remember fumbling with the matches for the first time, not wanting our new community members to see how completely new this type of cooking was to me. It’s amazing how fast you learn though – now it feels natural to go into the kitchen and warm up a meal quick. And I’m finally not afraid that somehow I’ll blow the house up…much : )

Another transition that’s occurred for us is going from using a washer and dryer for everything at home, to Rome where we had a washer, but air-dried our clothes outside, to here, where all of our washing is by hand. Now about once a week we break out our big red bucket and wash our clothes.

It’s been a process learning how to do it the best way. The first few times our clothes still came out smelling like they did when they went in, and we weren’t sure what to do. But what we’ve found works the best is to soak the clothes with water and the powder soap overnight and then we have a system where we wash the clothes and then take them through two rinse buckets and let them sit in a softener bucket for a short time before we hang them up. It takes us about 45 minutes to do a week’s worth of clothes, but at least now you can tell that they’ve been washed!

Finally, we have three fans in the house that we use to desperately try to keep cool : ) We’ve also made some friends here and sometimes they give us rides in their air-conditioned cars. We’ve even begun plotting to every now and again spend a few hours relaxing in one of the nice hotels in Dili that have a strong breeze or air-conditioning. Hopefully we’ll be able to sit there and lesson plan and just love being a little cooler for a short time. Air conditioning probably doesn’t sound too nice too you all right now when we’ve heard Minnesota and Iowa have been having -30o F weather, but imagine it’s the hot, sticky Midwest summer and then add 10 o or 20o to that, and you’ll understand.

Oh yeah, and the most unthinkable of all, we don’t have a TV!?! But I can’t say I mind too much. I think especially being here and seeing and experiencing all these new things, a person needs A LOT of time to process everything, pray about them, and get something out of the experiences. If we had a TV here I think that time for thought and prayer would be cut in half, because when there is a TV it’s difficult not to watch it. Most of us love to be doing something all the time, even if some ways to spend time are more valuable than others. So there’s no TV here, no games systems, but we have fun : )

So why do we tell you these things which might sound a little painful? Well, this blog is a good way for us to process our thoughts and experiences, a good way to keep in touch with everyone interested at home, and it’s a way to bring you along on the trip of a lifetime. We have been blessed with this chance that most people won’t ever get. As we find ourselves being transformed by living in a new reality maybe you can gain a little bit of a new perspective as well.

We and our families are blessed to live in America and Australia, two of the richest countries in the world. Now living in East Timor it’s easier not to take that lifestyle for granted, where as at home I honestly had never known anything significantly different. When you have a washer and dryer and microwave and airconditioning or heat it’s difficult to imagine life otherwise unless you’ve experienced it. When we compare ourselves with others it’s normally to our friends and neighbors, and we forget the rest of the world where billions of people live without the modern conveniences we’re accustomed to.

So appreciate the conveniences in America and Australia and what a gift they are, but make sure you’re still able to realize what is important. In my young life I have been blessed to begin to understand the secret of what’s important and what leads to happiness – a close relationship with God, family, and service to others. And here in East Timor it’s even easier to remember that daily when all the other distractions are gone. Here’s wishing you a distractionless day where you can really appreciate the blessings in your life!

Love always,

Rach and Brendan