Reentry Challenges!
We were back in the US for our home assignment. The boys were eight and six years old. The girls were four and two. We were coming through customs and the officer asked a few questions to see if the information we gave would match the information he had in our passports. He asked our oldest son, “When were you born?” Misunderstanding the question my son proudly answered, “Dallas, Texas.” Hmm. The officer thought he should ask another question, maybe an easier one to understand. He looked at our five year old daughter and asked, “Where are you from?” Now, Kristi knew she was born in Dallas, lived in Jordan though had recently moved to Egypt and was flying into Ohio. She looked at the officer and simply said, “Now that is a good question!” After that the poor man just waved us through.
My parents met us at the airport and took us out to eat where they offered ice cream for dessert. Our kids were so excited! When the waitress asked what kind of ice cream the kids wanted, one said, “Karkaday” (hibiscus in English). Another child said, “I want mango!” Baffled, she said they didn’t have that either of those. My kids wondered what kind of ice cream place it was that didn’t have such normal flavors!
After some time adjusting to the US we wanted to have the kids checked out by a doctor to make sure they were doing well and made an appointment to have them all seen in one afternoon. The nurse came into the examination room and gave each of the boys a cup. She looked at them and said, “Urinate in the cup.” To our defense, please note we still had a two year old and so we had never really gotten around to upgrading our terms for bodily functions. We still used “pee-pee” and “poopie” or in general just “potty.” When I was little I remember using terms like going “number one” and “number two.” We hadn’t even gotten to the numbering terms yet! So it was no wonder my sons were confused. Our oldest son asked, “I’m a what in the cup?” The nurse, looking a little perplexed, stressed each syllable of the unfamiliar word, “No. I said ur-in-ate in the cup.” My younger son looked up and asked, “What am I, a six in the cup?”
Eventually communication occurred, the boys learned a new vocabulary word, and everyone got checked out by the doctor and was pronounced healthy! I guess we could have gone out for ice cream to celebrate but selection was so limited!
