Tuesday, June 10, 2008

The News In English

We aren't moving .... Yeah !!!! I didn't seriously think we would . We've only moved back and forth from the US to Libya , to the US , to Libya , to the US , back again for the final time to Libya in 1990 . I refuse to move trans Atlantic EVER again ! Really ! I mean it ! Enough with the packing all you own and love into two suitcases.


I told Moe years ago that when I die to just bury me in the family cemetery here because this is my home .The only thing I want .... lol , is ..... for them ( the family ) to serve the people sweets instead of the bread with the tea that is customary to serve during funerals here , since that is sooo boring. Don't you find you get a hankering for something sweet when you are upset ? I think this might be wishful thinking on my part here , the grief I mean. Oh , something else ... I want some rock and roll music played when they bury me .A couple of my favorites . Oh , I nearly forgot ... I want to be buried in clothing too , not naked ! All this is contrary to custom but it's my funeral ! AND I KNOW THIS ISN'T ISLAMIC , so don't throw stones at me , ok ? This is what I want , but I won't be there so , hey , who knows what they will do ? LOL !


THE WALL update ..... the guy that was building the wall on our land has quit . He says he is tired .The doors need to be installed still . I guess we will have to find some one else to finish it .


Then , week before last , our roll down shutter that covers the living room balcony door broke .A disaster !!!!! No sunlight in the living room . It is like sitting in a cave . I called the seranty ( that's what the shutter is called here )guy and told him my tale of woe . Asked him how soon could he come over to shed some light on our subject ,i.e. the living room . He said in a day or two . He would call . Now he is a pretty reliable man and does good work at a reasonable prices , so I said good see you soon , inshallah !God willing !!!

We waited .He came four days later . Oh well . He put the shutter up for us and said he would have to come back the next night . Ok . The next night he comes and says he can't repair this old worn out shutter . We need to replace it with a totally new one. OK, I mean , what else can we do , right ? Well , how much is that gonna cost ? Don't know he says . Well , we can't live with out one so , go ahead and get us one . He had by this time managed to roll down the thing , why I don't know , but he did , and it wouldn't go back up ! Sighing going on here , can you hear me ? He said he would have to leave it like that , down , until he could bring the new one to install .I said ok , what choice did we have ?

We waited a day or two and no word from the seranty guy .I got Moe to call him . I would have called but the guy is clearly uncomfortable talking to me , a woman , when a man is there instead . The conversation was interesting to listen in on, to say the least, since the phone was doing it's own thing with the creaking , buzzing , swooshing, and humming in the back ground while Moe , who was stressed out having to talk to the guy , was having his own troubles talking that day . He was shouting above the din on the phone , trying to get the right words out . The guy was trying to figure what Moe was talking about . Sad to say , I found this funny , well it was , and started to laugh! Poor Moe was trying to talk and glare at me all at the same time . I had to leave the room .

Long and short of that conversation was , he would come over to try to roll up the seranty . He was hopeful that he would have the new shutter that night to install and could just skip fighting with the old one. He didn't have the new one and couldn't get the old one up . More sitting in the dark . He came last night with the new one . Yeah !!!! BUT ..... as he ripped out the old one and shoved in the new shutter , he told Moe that this was good news / bad news . Good news , here is the new shutter .It is in the up position . The bad news ... it still needs a new part that he can't find BEFORE we can roll it down or up ! So , if you drive by a condo on the seaside with it's living room shutter open at night , it is probably mine .Work in progress .

5 comments:

lisa said...

You told me the moving back and forth would stop after 20 years!!!! Aughh!!! LOL :o)))

Seriously though, I still hold your words of understanding close to my heart - at one time when I was most confused and frustrated regarding my husband wanting to move to KSA (again!) you really comforted me - thank you!!!

I thoroughly enjoy your blog! Keep it up!

PS: I tag you! http://desertfences.blogspot.com/2008/06/my-first-tag.html

Herr Esharif said...

oh god ...
same things happend here in libya .
1st he told u iam coming tomorrow ..then nt coming ... may coming after 2or 3 days !!!
then say wll comback tomorrow bt also after couple days later coming in d end ...

2nd ...he told uthts need 2 repaire then after few days wll told u ... no no thts need a new one .....hhhhhhh

thats why always here in libya thers many conflicts btw Workers & owners of homes for reasons like this ....
i hve happy news 4 u ...
There is more suffering with other workers for different reasons ...
wish allah `e u ...

rock when bury u !!!
thinking again !!!

on the edge said...

Well, Lisa sometimes these things get outta hand lol !You know how it is when you/they get home sick , lol !

Abdullah , thanxs 4 the sympathy ! I need it LOL !

ibeebarbie said...

Salam On the Edge,

Lovely last will and testiment you wrote concerning your burial wishes. ;-) Got it down. :0)

I just love the situations you describe with Moe. Love that guy for just being him. Seems like such a good man, and considering this particular scene described I couldn't help but laugh too.....sorry Moe, but really it was a funny scene.

I wonder if after you get the "good news/bad news" statement you could respond back with your own "good news/bad news" statement. Something like, the good news is we are happy you are willing to do the job to the end/ the bad news is we don't plan on paying you until it's completely finished---so figure it out.

on the edge said...

Ah , ibeebarbie life in Libya is nothing but "good news / bad news " with every single thing it getting to seem .

That's what happened with the wall guy .Every time we gave him money for something for the wall , I noticed that he had money to do something for his house and our stuff that we paid for didn't get done . So , I stopped paying him until he did what we gave money for . Thats when we ran into the work stoppage .He true to say we didn't give him money for this or that but I had written it all down , the day , date , the reason , and the amount . He went into shock . The next thing I know , he was too tired to finish . This is so typical here . Or the workers just never show back up for work . It's a given here .What to do ?