Birthdays here are a big deal for children as the mortality rate for little ones is high. Once the kids are older, the day is recognized but the poorer people just don’t have the means to do much in the way of celebrating. We wanted to make Elizabeth’s day special plus having she and Miguel visit we hoped would give us an opportunity to speak some to them about marriage and communication. They are presently doing much better but we want them to realize that marriage takes full blown commitment and lots of work from both parties.
When they arrived at the house, I was busy in the kitchen finishing up lunch preparations. Jim and Miguel were talking out on the carport and Elizabeth wouldn’t come in to the house without being invited. I decided lunch could be a little bit later and went out to get her. We did the usual greeting of a kiss on the cheek and an embrace but then I got an extra hug that was a bit tighter and a bit longer. She whispered “Gracias” in my ear. I introduced her to Freddy as one of my friends. They spoke the typical greeting to one another. I smiled at Elizabeth and patted her arm which she promptly linked through mine and that’s how we “toured” the house, arm in arm. It’s a good thing she’s as skinny as she is ‘cause if she were a normal sized person, we would never have made it through the doorways, side by side.
Miguel and Elizabeth were so fun to watch as we entered each room. They are both so expressive – Miguel with his face and Elizabeth with her eyes. Miguel’s voice would get louder with each new “discovery” and Elizabeth’s voice would soften with wonder. They acted as though this was the nicest place they had ever been. Later I wondered if perhaps that were true and it made me see my own house with eyes that were colored with a new sense of appreciation.
After the short grand tour, with lots of oohing and aahing over our view (which is one of my favorite parts of this house), Miguel spied our giant Spanish-English dictionary, parked himself in one of the rockers in the front room and lost himself in the wonder of words. Elizabeth didn’t know quite what to do with herself as she was totally unfamiliar with working in an American-style kitchen. I decided it would be a good time to go ahead and give her presents to her.
As I handed her the gift bags, her expression was priceless! She was stunned that she would have gifts from us and that there would be so many. There weren’t that many and they certainly weren’t expensive, but it was more than she had ever had for a birthday before. Again, something I have pondered many times since…how little most of the world has and how much we just assume is expected. We have come from the Land of Excess to live in the Land of Need and the awareness of the disparity between the two continues to grow.
Again, lunch was delayed as I didn’t want to miss watching Elizabeth open her gifts. Even Miguel’s curiosity got the best of him and he came in to the living room to hover right over Elizabeth’s shoulder, not wanting to miss out on a single thing, touching every single package with her as she opened them, teasing her that the gifts were really his. Later, realizing they were all “girly” gifts, he decided she could keep them for herself!Elizabeth’s hands were shaking as she tried to figure out how to untie the ribbons I had tied around her package wrapped in tissue paper. I got
her a pair of scissors and she asked if it was okay to cut the ribbon. I told her it was and that it was okay to tear the paper. She wasn’t quite so sure about that and carefully tried to pull the tape away from the paper. Finally, she unwrapped a bronze-colored handbag…which I must say, I just loved and would have been tempted to get one just like it for myself! Luckily for our budget, the store had only one! From the look on Elizabeth’s face, she liked the purse as much as I did! And although by American standards, the purse was far from expensive, costing less than $13.00, that was more than ½ a weeks’ pay for Miguel…so it was something she would never have dreamt of having for herself. The truth is many women here don’t carry a purse for one of two reasons – either they’re afraid 
someone will steal it or they don’t have anything to put in it. Knowing that Elizabeth rarely comes in to Managua, I chose to go ahead and take the chance of getting her the purse and also bought just a few little things for her to put inside…a brush, decorative hair pins, a small mirror, etc.…purse-type things. She slowly and carefully examined each item, running her fingers over the shapes. I was mesmerized watching her. It was as though she was trying to commit to memory every single item.
someone will steal it or they don’t have anything to put in it. Knowing that Elizabeth rarely comes in to Managua, I chose to go ahead and take the chance of getting her the purse and also bought just a few little things for her to put inside…a brush, decorative hair pins, a small mirror, etc.…purse-type things. She slowly and carefully examined each item, running her fingers over the shapes. I was mesmerized watching her. It was as though she was trying to commit to memory every single item. Her next gift was a turquoise pull-over top. I had guessed at the size by just looking at it and thankfully, it was perfect. She was thrilled. Miguel said he had given her a skirt which they had stopped to buy at the Oriental Market on the way to meet Jim. Miguel said the top would match perfectly. Later, she changed in to both…I don’t necessarily agree about the matching thing so much, but I was happy she was happy. And she looked beautiful in both the skirt and the top.
Her next package held 4 little scented candles in the sweetest little white bowls. I had found these at one of my favorite stores at the mall and was thrilled they weren’t expe
nsive. Again, I loved watching Elizabeth’s face as she sniffed the candles and examined each one of the little bowls…all identical but that was irrelevant…there were four little candles and each was considered a gift worthy of inspection. Again, another gift I really liked and wouldn’t have minded seeing perched on my own hall table. I know my girls know exactly what I’m talking about here…I usually tend to give gifts to my friends and family that I like myself and so actually parting with them can sometimes be an act of the will! With Elizabeth, it wasn’t much of a struggle.
nsive. Again, I loved watching Elizabeth’s face as she sniffed the candles and examined each one of the little bowls…all identical but that was irrelevant…there were four little candles and each was considered a gift worthy of inspection. Again, another gift I really liked and wouldn’t have minded seeing perched on my own hall table. I know my girls know exactly what I’m talking about here…I usually tend to give gifts to my friends and family that I like myself and so actually parting with them can sometimes be an act of the will! With Elizabeth, it wasn’t much of a struggle.
Her last gift may seem strange to you and though it was more of a serviceable gift in our eyes, it was also was a bit of luxury to Elizabeth. I filled a small plastic tub with personal care items just for her, like sweet scented soap, a fluffy white net scrubbie puff, a soap dish, a pretty pink hand towel, a tube of lightly scented hand cream, a glass nail file, a cute box of tissues and a tiny little package of Hershey’s Kisses I found at the grocery store. She was ecstatic! It was such a fun time.
Finally, I was able to get lunch served. Knowing that beef is a real rarity for them as it is so costly, and after much thought, I fixed some medallions of beef in the pressure cooker with potatoes, onions and carrots. Miguel had asked for an American meal when we first talked of having them come for lunch one day. In one of our recent conversations, he mentioned that Elizabeth didn’t know how to use a dinner knife at Kenet’s birthday party and that she was embarrassed we might have noticed that he had to cut her meat up for her. We didn't as there was so much activity going on that kept our attention elsewhere. When I asked why Elizabeth wouldn’t know how to use a knife, he told me that knives are used only by “people of position” and that many of the poor don’t have them as they are not necessary for beans and rice.
That made sense so although I wanted to fix beef for them, I wanted to fix something that would be so tender that a knife wouldn’t be necessary. I was glad that Miguel had shared that with me as it helped me decide what to fix for lunch. Enter the use of my invaluable pressure cooker! It works magic on the tough cuts of beef here. Cooking that with the veggies, cream of mushroom soup, dried onion soup, some herbs, a few good shakes of Worcestershire sauce, a little beef base and some chopped up garlic, the pressure cooker makes culinary miracles happen and the meat comes out so tender it is easily cut with a fork.
I served the main dish with a great little braided cheese roll that the bakery near our home makes. The cheese flavor is so delicate in it that it is barely detectable and serves more so to make a nice tender roll. It is one of our favorite breads from there and each roll is large enough to make two servings so one package fed us all. Miguel and Elizabeth loved the bread but what was an even bigger hit was the tub of light Country Crock margarine that we had. Neither had ever had anything like that before and they loved it! Miguel thought it was one of the tastiest things he had ever had and kept telling me it was very “rich”. And I had bought it because it was familiar...
I had considered making potato salad but instead, decided upon a bit more economical carrot, raisin and apple salad. I say that but upon reflection, the only cheap ingredients in that salad were the carrots! Apples are over $1 each and the raisins were almost $3…but they were well worth the money considering how much Miguel liked it. Elizabeth ate all the apples out of her salad and asked for a second helping of only the apples. Thank goodness, Jim and I like the salad as we’ve eaten on it all week and finally finished it up last night.
One more thing I want to share re: the salad…when I was packing up the leftovers for them to take home with them (which I had planned quite a bit extra with that in mind), I asked Miguel if his mother had a small refrigerator in her house. He told me no and wanted to know why. When I told him that the carrot salad had mayo in it and that it would need to be refrigerated, he said that he would take it anyway. I told him he could get really sick off of it because of the heat turning the mayo “bad”. He told me he would eat it all that night and promised he wouldn’t get sick. It was with great trepidation that I sent some home with them. Great news...no one died from my carrot salad. Good news...no one even got sick.
For dessert, I decided to make my Grandma Mann’s wonderful banana bread plus a couple of loaves of mango bread, using a recipe I learned last year. Both are excellent. It doesn’t hurt that right now, the mangoes are in season and are unbelievably sweet and juicy. As a matter of fact, I used the fresh mangoes that Miguel and Kenet had picked for me the week before. I had contemplated fixing a regular birthday cake for Elizabeth, but they are not fond of how sweet our sweets are so I opted for the quick breads. Both were a great hit and later, I sent home the other uncut loaf of mango bread with them.
When we actually sat down to lunch, I noticed that Elizabeth looked at how the table was set. We don’t have china but we do have plastic dishes we use for most of our meals and then a nice set of regular dishes we use with company…unless you’re Tom, Nora or Jackie and then you get served on the plastic dishes, as well! Only people here with some money have tables and chairs. Most meals are eaten off mismatched dishes held on laps while sitting in plastic chairs or on rough hewn wooden benches. A table set with a tablecloth, dishes and silverware must have seemed intimidating to her.
Miguel spoke right up and said he wanted to watch us so he would know how he was to eat his food. I asked if he wanted to serve himself or if he wanted me to fill the plates. He asked if I would do it. So, we fixed plates and began, with Elizabeth and Miguel mimicking our initial moves, tasting each new food with some trepidation. I laughed and told Miguel he didn’t need to be scared that it wasn’t like I was serving him pelibuey for the first time! He laughed and said he now understood how I must have felt, not knowing how the flavor was going to be. I think they were nervous to try our food and I was nervous they wouldn’t like it. With Miguel, it wasn’t a problem. He ate second and third helpings of everything. With Elizabeth, I wasn’t sure as she ate very little and was very quiet. I found out today from Miguel that she was afraid she would make a mistake and that when they got home, she ate the leftovers non-stop! So, I guess the lunch was a success.
Afterwards, Jim and I cleaned up the table and I washed the dishes while he dried. We sent Miguel and Elizabeth out on the back deck to sit and relax. We could hear them talking and it wasn’t long their voices relaxed and we could hear laughter and teasing back and forth. A bit later, they moved out to the front porch where it was cooler. They sat in the rockers and dreamed the dreams all young married couples dream. It was encouraging to hear them speak of a future.
When we finished the kitchen duties, we took two more rockers out on the front porch and joined them. I don’t even know how but God directed our conversation toward the importance of having time to relax and enjoy the company of our spouses; of how important it is to be able to communicate ideas and opinions without the threat of being met negatively and how God created us to honor Him by honoring one another. Miguel was quick to agree. Elizabeth listened but without comment.
It was getting late and Jim and I had already decided we would drive the kids back to Tipitapa so they wouldn’t have to juggle their food and Elizabeth’s gifts on the bus. When we told them we would take them home, Miguel was speechless. He couldn’t believe we would drive them all the way back home. I told him that riding the bus once that day was all that was necessary since it was Elizabeth’s birthday. She smiled and gave me another hug.
Each time I glanced in the back seat as we made the hour’s drive to Tipitapa, I was encouraged to see Miguel and Elizabeth, relaxed and holding hands. It was the first time I had seen that show of affection since we first met them. When we finally arrived at Miguel’s mother’s house, we helped them carry their things to their little house out back. I spent a few minutes with Miguel’s mother but we didn’t stay as we wanted to get back to Managua before it got too dark.
Today, we surprised Miguel with a photo album we had put together of pictures we have taken over the last few months, including pictures of Elizabeth’s birthday. I told him that when he and Elizabeth were being short with one another, that I wanted him to look at those pictures of them laughing and smiling and to remember how good it felt to have that time together. I told him they needed to remember how special the other one is and to treat one another as such. He nodded very seriously.
He told us that he and Elizabeth had talked about how wonderful we had made her birthday and that she said it was a day she would never forget. He said she has looked at each one of her gifts over and over and that she used one of the little candles last night when the power went off. He said she loves using her “special soap” and that she ate almost all the mango bread by herself. He said that they both thought it was the best birthday celebration. I am so pleased they enjoyed their day here but I am waiting for the day that Elizabeth is born again…that’s the day even the angels will celebrate.
No comments:
Post a Comment