This was not in my job description:
Life at the Finca comes with many surprises including things
I never expected to do. Here are a few
of them:
1.
Trash man- Within my first few weeks here, Jacob
invited David and me to help with trash collection on the Farm. We drove around filling the bed of the Nissan
Tundra with barrels upon barrels of
trash (including one full of Ruben's stinky diapers). We dumped it all in the “crematorio”, a nearby
dump where the trash is burned.
**As an added bonus, we finished this adventure by filling
the bed we just emptied with...you guessed it...cow manure!
2.
Fumigator- We seem to have a bit of a shortage
of men on the Finca leaving the 3 of us male missionaries and 1 house dad doing
a lot of the “manly jobs” that would be culturally unacceptable or rare for a
woman to do. With Jacob and David gone
for a few days, the job of fumigating the Finca for mosquitoes landed on house
dads Edgar and Roni (who has since left) and me. While everyone else was sent to the safety of
the beach, Roni and I suited up like
ghostbusters with a skin disorder covering
every inch of our bodies with long pants, long sleeve shirts, goggles, mask,
hat, gloves, and a bandana. With our
gaseous poison spewing from our petroleum-powered backpacks, we trudged around
the Finca mostly deaf and blind due to our protective gear to eliminate our
6-legged foes. I wish I could say I
hadn't been bitten by any mosquitoes since then, but this unfortunately is not
the case.
3.
Poopy paper burner- Just as it sounds. Everyday someone from our house has to burn
the poopy paper. About two times a month
I get to spend warming myself in the glow of a blazing pile of used toilet
paper and plastic wrappers (neither of which like to burn so much as smolder).
4.
Godfather- No, I am not running the family
business and there are no canolis involved. Apparently, this job also comes
from a lack of men; in this case, men who are in good standing with the
Catholic Church and single (I still don't fully understand why the latter is a requirement to be a
Godfather here...but it is). So back in November I
became the Godfather of not 1, not 2, but 4 children. I’m also very excited to
be Godfather to Jose Manuel (one of our very own Finca kids) who will be
baptized at the end of July. For me and in this culture being a padrino is kind
of a big deal, so I really hope I am up to it.
5.
Assistant to the Ambulance Driver- Again,
shortage of Y chromosomes=me doing lots of weird jobs. Our nurses, Deirdre and Ashley often have to
make runs to the hospital with medical emergencies. At night they need a man to go with them as a
security precaution. Don't be alarmed at
this seemingly sexist statement. Yes,
women can take care of themselves, but in this country a woman who is seen with
a man is much safer than a woman alone at night. That's how it is here. Anyway, sometimes we get women at our gate
claiming that they are about to “dar a luz” (i.e., give birth). I rode shotgun as we traveled to the hospital
with one such woman. She did not give birth in our truck, but we joked that if
she had she would have named the baby after me. A few days later we found out that she still
had named the baby, BUT was considering Kevin as a name!
6.
Fireman- One evening I was cooking dinner. My cooking partner (who shall remain nameless
to protect her identity) and I decided to fry up some guineos (they're like
plaintains which are like bananas). We
put the oil on our outdoor wood burning stove in order to heat it up. A few minutes later
I look out the window to
see a towering inferno, a monstrous fireball shooting out of the spot where our
pan had once been. Without much time to
think of a better solution, I grabbed a bag of corn flour from the table and
ran outside. I dumped the bag on the
flames which extinguished the fire only to blaze back up after 2 seconds. As I was about ready to watch burn down the
place, my cooking partner reminded me that we have a fire extinguisher in the
house. Who would have thought? Someone ran and grabbed it. Of course, you must remember that we live on
the property of a home for children, so needless to say, by this point a small
crowd of 11 year old boys had gathered to see what was going on. After telling the small crowd to stand back,
I fired away with the extinguisher. It
really took a lot to finally get the fire out such that we could remove the
pan. The chicken (which was also on the
stove) was ruined by the soft, white snow of the extinguisher, but a valuable
lesson was learned: Don't put a lid on your fry oil and be careful not to get
it too close to flames. Remember that
you have a fire extinguisher.
Only youcan prevent kitchen grease fires!
Well, after several months of living here, I have come to discover the value of the "unofficial 5th pillar" of Finca life: Flexibility. Sometimes I am asked to do things that may not seem to be my responsibility (especially when it's something stinky, vile, uncomfortable, hazardous, befuddling or all of the above). In the end it's really just all part of the job!
