learn to live with it!

I grew up in a rural small town.  Then, for the last three years I've lived at a rural farm in the Colombian mountains.  I'm not used to city noise, I'm used to space, and I've never lived in an apartment building before this month.

There is a child in our building who cries and whines and screams about 80% of the time.  Sometimes he/she wakes me up at odd hours with the concert.  I think there are several probable reasons for this behavior:
1. children sometimes cry and scream (but not that much)
2. she's spoiled?
3. her parents don't respect her need to sleep (I've heard her screaming long after I'm in bed and again before I'd like to be awake... would still be sleeping if it weren't for the crying...)
4. her family bothers her, instead of letting her be a child?
We've gotten much more used to it though.  Now, when we walk into the building and, as if on cue, hear the wail start up from the fourth floor, we look at each other and laugh incontrollably.

Another thing we've gotten used to was a shock at first: sharing a single bed.  The woman who lent us the apartment is single, and there's really not room for a larger bed, since it's a studio-type space.  At first it was uncomfortable; we were afraid to move and wake up the other, we have different sleeping positions, it's hard to share a single sheet...
But now it's the norm!  We've learned to put two twin sheets on the bed to have enough.  Plus, I'm a cuddler, and now he has to be!

Something else that's different here is the health system.  "Why are you learning about the health system on your honeymoon?" That's an excellent question.  We went for a checkup with Julio's gastroenterologist, who discovered several small gallstones in my otherwise-healthy husband!  Since then we've been in private clinics and the public hospital more times than I can count this month... mostly waiting.  In Colombia I thought I had learned to be much more patient with things like banks and doctors offices... but this takes the cake.  I know nothing about waiting, compared to Venezuelans.
Basically, there's no way to get rid of gallstones other than operating to take out the gall bladder... so we're planning a surgery for June, and praying that God does a miracle to get rid of the stones, and learning how to eat for gall bladder health (no beans, nothing fried, elimiate as many fats and oils as possible, eat as many fruits and veggies as possible, but not that cause gases...)

I, on the other hand, have kidney stones!  Since my dad is an expert (with plenty of personal experience) I'm following his recommendations, and in the meantime thankful that I don't have any pain.  

So here we are in Venezuela.  This is our last week, and then it's off on another adventure:  Argentina and Chile!

Honeymoon and Culture Shock

Julio and I have been in Venezuela just over two weeks now.  When we first arrived, we went to an amazing bed and breakfast called “Mi refugio” (my refuge), run by a Swedish lady.  Ample and airy, the room was lit by fresh sunshine, and we awoke to birdsong.  The owner cooked for us, and we were the only guests there at the time.  Some days, we walked up to the nearby national park, La Mucuy, to play in the creek and relax on boulders under old trees.  Everything was perfect!

After our week there, it was time to move down to the city, where our plan has been to spend the month visiting with his family, friends, and church.  Since it’s carnaval/ferias time, it was really difficult to find an apartment available (and reasonably priced).  Thankfully, a young woman from Julio’s church offered hers to us, and we moved in.  
The space is very different from “My Refuge.”  The third-floor windows open up to the hallway, so the light that enters is diffused after making its way down from the fifth-floor central opening.  Fully furnished, it’s a bit cramped, and the shift from open spaces and bucolic silence to downtown and neighbor noise, plus bringing our bags into another person’s already-full, notably petite, apartment, was a surprise.  I had to laugh as I barely squeezed past Julio to grab my toothbrush: this space will require us to learn a delicate dance, to keep organized, and possible to resolve some conflicts!
Because the gas has never been hooked up, we can’t use the cute (and new!), four-burner stove and oven.  In its place, the owner has an electric hotplate, and an electric Foreman-style grill.  Julio’s mom invites us to eat lunch at her place, so we bus down there and back.  (Lunch is the big meal here, you may remember.)  One day, we decide to cook for his family, but without an oven my possibilities are limited.  Julio finally suggests pasta with chicken and vegetables, which I love, but I feel insecure about whether or not it’s “acceptable” for his family.  We walked down to the house that day, stopping along the way to buy fruits and veggies, and at the butcher shop for the chicken.  

Everywhere we go, Julio sees someone he knows.  They usually give me a kiss on the cheek as if we’d met each other before, and I often can’t distinguish their names, but say “Mucho gusto,” It’s nice to meet you.  Then they talk for a while about people or things I don’t know about, and we continue on our way, me quietly asking Julio who that was and how they know each other.  
The butcher has chicken breast filets, if I understand correctly, and the price doesn’t seem to make sense to me (too many exchange rates in my head, perhaps?).  Then he asks if we want it cut, but I thought it was filleted, but it looks like whole breasts, so we just buy it like that to cut at the house.  
We start working on the meal, and talking with his sister, when his mom comes in all worked up about something and fussing at the sister.  Their bickering increased my stress about the meal anyways, and during lunch I felt like crying, but didn’t.  
Later, back at our apartment, I told Julio about how I was feeling.  I don’t know where I am, nor how to get from point A to point B alone.  I don’t know anyone outside of Julio and his family and friends that he introduces to me.  I know the language, but the accent is different from Bogotá, and a lot of times I don’t understand what people say.  I feel helpless and dependent in the midst of so many unknowns.  On top of that, I struggle with finding acceptation through what I do, and I want to make a good impression on his family and friends.  This is culture shock and it hits my weak points, unable to hide them.  
“Maybe this is why we needed to come to the city, and not stay at ‘My Refuge’ anymore,” said Julio.  
We enjoy the perfect times, and rest in them, but we don’t grow as much, I’d say.  

Since then, I received an email with a thought-provoking question.  “Emily, do you feel ‘married’ yet?  Has the chip switched from ‘I’ to ‘we’?  Is it worth it to be away from home – neither in Colombia nor North Carolina – in this beginning stage?”
This query made me realize that the wonderful thing about this honeymoon culture shock is that I desperately NEED Julio here.  I can’t leave the apartment and go somewhere else on my own, get away from it all and be the single, independent woman that I’m so used to being… because I don’t know how to alone, and besides, where would I go?  
The psalmist says, “Whom do I have in Heaven but You (God)?”
I say, “Whom do I have in Venezuela but my husband?”