{"id":608,"date":"2013-09-11T11:16:24","date_gmt":"2013-09-11T15:16:24","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/katie-moore\/?p=608"},"modified":"2013-09-11T11:27:07","modified_gmt":"2013-09-11T15:27:07","slug":"playing-aunties","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/katie-moore\/2013\/09\/11\/playing-aunties\/","title":{"rendered":"Playing Aunties"},"content":{"rendered":"

Rachel and I are pretending to be aunties this week. Our friend Agustina\u00a0<\/a>had to go out of town. She set off on foot Saturday morning carrying her 1-year-old son to a village about\u00a015 miles away. From there she will see if she can hitch a ride to the town down on the coast.<\/p>\n

\n
\"\"<\/a>
Our friend Agustina left her two oldest kids in our care. To read more about her story, click the link above.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

She left her other two children, Alma (9) and Dario (7) in our care. I have to tell you, I felt pretty honored about this whole arrangement. Agustina doesn\u2019t really have any family in the village, except for a grandmother who doesn\u2019t get around very well. Despite the fact that we have different cultures, eat different food, and are two strange white girls, Agustina entrusted her children to our care. I could probably write pages and pages about our \u201cadventures\u201d since Saturday afternoon, but thought I would just cover the highlights.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n

\n
\"\"<\/a>
The families here eat tortillas morning, noon, and night. We're trying to make sure the kids don't have to eat too much "foreign" food.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<\/div>\n

Saturday 6 pm: After a more traditional lunch of beans and tortillas, Dario eats his body weight in pizza, proving that at least SOME gringo food is edible.<\/p>\n

Saturday 8 pm: We finish watching Old Yeller together, and it is deemed the best movie of the village. I mean, donkeys, rifles, rabies, and dogs chasing rabbits\u2026what\u2019s not to love?<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Alma volunteers to help do dishes.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Sunday 7 am: The troops are up and ready for their bean and tortilla breakfast. (Can\u2019t say the hour was a highlight for me personally\u2026) Afterwards we sweep and mop, feed the chickens, go feed their animals, make pumpkin bread, clean the filter, play with the dog, and try to distract the kids from missing their mom.<\/p>\n

Sunday 4 pm: I teach Dario how to take a shower indoors. I show him where everything is, heat up the water and get him all squared away. I have to remind him to shut the door because we\u2019re all girls and will get frightened if he doesn\u2019t. He comes out 30 minutes later and hands me a dry towel and a pair of sopping wet underwear. He apparently copied his creek style and bathed in his undies and then stood on the bath mat until he was dry. The shower floor gets a second mopping, but Dario is happy.<\/p>\n

Sunday 4:30 pm: Alma takes to indoor bathing like a pro. She is thrilled with shampoo and warm water. She claims that she is going to shower every day while she is here.<\/p>\n

Sunday 8:30 pm: After sitting through team church, I introduce the kids to the tradition of a story before bed. They\u2019re fans.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Story time before bed. Most of the kids in this village have never been read to before.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Monday 7:00 am: Over a breakfast of bean, tortillas, and hot sauce, the kids ask me (picture me sitting in a mental cloud and thinking about coffee) if they can watch a movie when they get home.\u00a0 Since it\u2019s been raining non-stop for days, I tell them we\u2019ll have to see if the sun comes out to charge the players\u2019 batteries.<\/p>\n

Monday 7:30 am: The sun peaks out from behind a cloud.\u00a0 The kids jump around in excitement.\u00a0 They have hope for their movie.<\/p>\n

Monday 2:00 pm: The kids come home from their first day of school.\u00a0 They went by their house both on the way there and back from class so that no one would ask them where they were going and so that they wouldn\u2019t have to admit to staying at our house.\u00a0 We weren\u2019t offended.\u00a0 Drawing attention to yourself in any way is a huge source of embarrassment in this culture.\u00a0 They learned from the adults in their lives to avoid anything out of the ordinary where others will want to ask you questions.<\/p>\n

Monday 3:00 pm: We help the kids do their homework.\u00a0 The four times table for Alma and words that have the \u201cbr\u201d sound in them.\u00a0 Dario is supposed to copy a huge paragraph.\u00a0 Since he doesn\u2019t know his letters yet and is in first grade, I make an executive decision and tell him to copy one sentence.\u00a0 It\u2019s a long one, and half an hour later he is finished.\u00a0 He and I write \u201ca\u2019s\u201d and \u201ci\u2019s\u201d and think of words that start with those letters.\u00a0 Then we play a letter version of memory and call it a day.\u00a0 Alma is worried that her brother will get in trouble for not finishing his homework and I assure her that I will talk to the teacher if he does.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
Dario, who is in first grade, is supposed to copy the story in yellow for his homework.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Monday 8:00 pm: Rachel and I are exhausted after trying to study all day and get the kids cared for.\u00a0 We eat tuna with crackers and the kids watch Finding Nemo<\/em> on my battery operated DVD player while Rachel and I watch an episode of The Mentalist<\/em> on her player.\u00a0 By 9:00 we are all in bed.<\/p>\n

Stay tuned for more from the rest of the week…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Rachel and I are pretending to be aunties this week. Our friend Agustina\u00a0had to go out of town. She set off on foot Saturday morning carrying her 1-year-old son to a village about\u00a015 miles away. From there she will see if she can hitch a ride to the town down on the coast. She left […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":331,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[125,6400,6388,416],"class_list":{"0":"post-608","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-ministry","7":"tag-culture","8":"tag-funny-things","9":"tag-nahuatl-culture","10":"tag-village-life","11":"entry"},"aioseo_notices":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/katie-moore\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/608","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/katie-moore\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/katie-moore\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/katie-moore\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/331"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/katie-moore\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=608"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/katie-moore\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/608\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/katie-moore\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=608"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/katie-moore\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=608"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.ethnos360.org\/katie-moore\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=608"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}