Malaboy, our day guard has become one of our favorite people here. He is hands down Little t’s best friend (Little t calls him kAkA – uncle). Today as I walked outside to hang laundry I heard Malaboy, who was sitting in his little room, say to someone,
“welcome to my room! You are my special guest today! Here, sit here on the special cushion, and we can listen to music on the radio!”
I realized that he was talking to Little t who had made a bee-line out the door in front of me. For the next hour, they sat and chatted together, listened to music, played with the flashlight, Little t danced, etc.
I really consider it a blessing to have a patient older man who works in our yard. He is very good with Little t. He doesn’t mind being followed around everywhere, he talks to Little t the whole time, explaining things to him, letting him help with little tasks. It is great for Little t’s language and his social adaptation to this place. They love to have water fights in the afternoon when they are watering the garden, and Malaboy just laughed the other day as Little t chased him around with muddy hands.
Malaboy is a great father and it shows in the lives of his children. They are polite and respectful. They play well and work hard.
It is really nice to be able to interact with him quite comfortably because in this place it is challenging to navigate male/female interaction. He seems okay with chatting and interacting and I appreciate it. He always has new vocabulary to test out on me and is quick to give advice when I need it (or even when I don’t need it! J ). We are both learning to read and write, so we compare notes on that and look forward to the day where I can write a shopping list and he can read it instead of just having to memorize it!
He jokes with me about the garden. Having put so much time and effort into it, I was really excited to see how it turned out. At first nothing came up and Malaboy joked with me that it was a major fail. Then suddenly it went crazy and is now one big blooming mess. It is gorgeous, really. Today he joked with me that I actually played no part in it, it was just stuff that came up again from the year before when he planted it. I joked back that next year I wouldn’t do anything to it if that was the case. I still don’t know if he was serious or not…but it is nice to joke and dialogue about things like that.
Malaboy lived in the village until a year or so ago when he moved his family here to M-ville because of his job. Because of this, he still thinks very village-mindedly…which is good and bad. There are fruits and vegetables that he is not familiar with…so I can’t ask him to shop for them. There are other times I will ask him to buy fruit or nuts and he will come back and tell me that he decided they were too expensive, so he didn’t buy them. It is frustrating at times, but also helps me keep in context the reality of life for many of the people around us.
Our team leader who is in charge of all of the guards commented just the other day that even when all of the other guards complain about not having enough money, wanting bonuses, etc. Malaboy doesn’t complain. We are thankful for this and the fact that he appreciates his job and works hard.
Please pr.ay for Malaboy and our other guards. More than anyone, they see us for who we really are; the ins and outs of our lives, the good and the bad, the times we laugh and enjoy each other and the times we…don’t. I have been pra.ying a lot lately that the peace we have would be tangible and very real to those around us. Pr.ay for that peace to welcome Malaboy and the other guards each time they come into our yard. That they will see something different in our lives and yearn for that.
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