"LET 'EM PLAY!"

"LET 'EM PLAY!" I awoke to this noise in the middle of the night, coming from Steve's mouth. I wasn't quite sure what he yelled out, but whatever it was, it was with great vigor. The next day he asked me, "Did I yell something in my sleep last night?" I started laughing and so did he, then he relayed his very frustrating dream. We laughed together, and decided it was a definite blog-worthy dream, as it seemed to symbolize somehow our culture shock and difficulty merging our culture with the culture around us. Here is the dream."I was at a football game, it was a good game and very close and it was at the end of the game, 4th and 1 at the goal line...only one minute to go. The team called a time-out, and then suddenly an Orthodox Priest walked out onto the field. He began praying with the players and then began holding a liturgy. All the crowd became silent and calm.and we waited..finally I couldn't take it anymore and I stood up and yelled out in the midst of the crowd, "Hey..It's 4th and one.let 'em play!" We laughed and laughed that life sometimes seems like that here.customs and traditions and things that just don't seem to make sense to us, but are very much a normal part of these people's lives. Take for example the new year tradition of killing a ram. Most of the families we know killed one, as it is tradition, and it is VERY BAD if you don't kill one on New Year's Day. Their calendar is different from ours, so they just began a new year yesterday, September 11, which is their Meskeram 1, the first day of their year, which is 1999. Today, the roads are filled with sheep entrails, ram heads, and horns. Curtis things it is great, we aren't quite as thrilled. Some boys came to the door with pictures of flowers they had drawn and waited eagerly.we said thank you. Later we learned we were supposed to give them money as a tradition.oops. Then Steve went to work today, Tuesday, and dressed his usual way, pants and a shirt and tie. All the other faculty were wearing their 3 piece suits and the women wore traditional dresses. "Is the dress code in written form somewhere?" Steve asked, since last week these same men all wore short sleeved shirts and khakis. "It's a New Year!" they proclaimed. Oh..we didn't get the memo. Life is like that many days here. Not bad, just DIFFERENT. As long as I am in a good mood and in a good place, having had plenty of sleep and feeling prepared to handle it, life is good. If not, then even though I may not actually do it, I will long to stand up in the midst of the crowd and yell out.