Schedules

John often wakes up before 5am.  I, Erin, wake up about 6am, and the boys follow about 15minutes later.  We get ready for the day, trying to push the boys out the door by 7am so as not to be late to school.  The boys return from school about 11am.  We eat lunch and then follow with homeschooling until about 3pm.  The rest of the afternoon is spent by the boys and I playing outside, interacting with neighbors, or just hanging out at home.  Dinner is a quicker and lighter meal in the evening, then the boys shower and are in bed by 8pm.  The rest of the evening John and I have spent just the two of us catching up or relaxing, as we are usually pretty spent by that time.  This schedule has worked pretty well in our home, but it does not always mesh well with the culture outside. 

Whitman and Caedmon playing outside. 

We recently covered our front yard/parking area with a palm frond roof. 

Locals, here in Barat, are up early like us, off to school and work early, then after lunch they take a nap, children and parents.  This nap then promotes a very late bed time.  Most of our neighbor children are up well past 10pm.  This also results in people stopping by our house, quite a lot recently, after 7pm.  Many events really get going about this time too.

Whitman at school, waiting to greet his teachers. 

(usually by 7:30am)

 A couple weeks ago we were invited to a groom’s pre-wedding party, the night before his ceremony.  We met our friends at their home at 5pm so we could all drive together in their car.  We ended up leaving their house after 6pm, and hanging out at the groom’s house, also the location of the event, until things got started, sometime after 7.  Though the event was interesting and a first for all of us, it was stressful as none of us had taken naps, Whitman almost turned into a pumpkin, and it all resulted in a later dinner and night than we are used to, all on a school night too. 

The groom, center, with two nephews. 

A small ceremony, performed by a couple key figures, was done in preparation for the wedding ceremony the following day.   

Food served after the ceremony. 

From top left: chicken, crunchy sweet noodles, fish cakes, shredded chicken, duck eggs, and curry in the middle. 

Watching the ceremony. 

Men sat on one side of the room, while the women sat on the other. 

The occasional event and altered schedule, even unplanned, doesn’t kill us and usually turns out just fine, but John and I frequently discuss how to adjust our schedule to better enable interaction with locals.  Unfortunately, aside from changing our largest meal to lunch, which enables me to spend more time with people in the afternoon/evenings, we are at a loss for how else to change our schedules.  This is a common dilemma we face in most aspects of life overseas; how do we adjust the way we do things, to enable people interaction, yet be sustainable by us for the long term.