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04 January 2008
The humblings always come when one may have been just a wee bit haughty. I boasted to a friend how I never am affected by jet-lag. I simply am a sleep-banker. I adjust easily to different schedules. Well, that all may be true, but what I forgot to factor into the equation was the fact that my sleep is largely dependent on my baby's sleep. Add to that, the two-year-old, and it turns out I am having a very difficult time “adjusting.” Having been up almost all night two nights ago with both Nathan and Bobby, then last night, we managed to get Nathan to sleep through, but Bobby wasn't interested, I didn't manage to pull my head off the pillow until nearly noon local time again today. The children seem to be better off. They went to bed at 9:30 local time and slept through, except for the visit I got from Ian and then Rachel sometime around 4 and 5 a.m. Respectively. They both said they were cold, and where better to warm up than next to Mom? By the time I did get up and showered, the milk was gone, so I didn't get to enjoy the Honey Nut Cheerios I was so proud to have found at a reasonable price yesterday. Waaaah! So after a breakfast of wafers with cream cheese and two pieces of toast with jelly, I sat on the deck and enjoyed the warm sunshine and some quiet time. That didn't last long enough as the children were getting antsy and the noise began to escalate, so I felt urged to get them out of the apartment. Joanna from the Embassy came to the rescue with a loaner futbol for us (soccer ball) so we got everyone dressed and headed out to the fields across the street. There are two mini-fields caged and locked most of the time. They are part of the University of Valletta grounds. We went down and found one locked and the other had an open gate, but as soon as Ian and Addison stepped on the field, some boys yelled something in Maltese to them, and they took it to mean, “Get off the field”...then minutes later, a nice young man came up and said that he didn't mean to be a pest, but he had just told the Maltese boys they couldn't be on the field, and so the same is true for us. The University rents them out, and you must pay 30 euros ($45 US) an hour to use it. This was, to us, a huge disappointment. So we asked where can we take the kids to play, and he said he didn't know. Nice. The track infield is all stone and gravel, so that's not real helpful. Joanna later told us she could take the boys over to St. Julien's, near her home, to play sometime. Great, so what do we do to run off their energy each day? We shall continue to seek a solution to this problem. We're feeling discouraged today about the prospects within any walkable distance. Dave went up to wait for Joanna to return with a cell phone, after our disappointment at the futbol field, and the kids, Isabelle and I took a walk. We explored our immediate neighborhood. It consists of many tall, four-to-six story buildings, mostly apartments. There are shops on the lower level of some of them, and we found a route across the busy highway to the University area. About three blocks from here, there's a skate park between the highway lanes; We got to it by crossing under the northbound lanes, as it is built in a large space at an intersection of highway. We went up to the other side of the highway by walking through another tunnel, and found a couple pub/cafes, and a few stationary shops. We returned to the other side again, and swept down through another part of our area. We found a mini-mart and another grocery that was closed. I bought milk at the mini mart, and then we walked back toward our apartment. Directly on the other side of our building is a place called the “King's Cafe” -- it is a non-smoking internet cafe. It was closed this afternoon, but the sign said open. (Later, we asked, and Joanna says it should be open after 6.) The good news, for today, we learned our internet will be hooked up early next week. So apparently the apartment manager was persuasive with the cable company. This means we'll also have a landline phone. Dave was given a loaner cell phone today by Joanna, so he can finally get in touch with MCAST. We're finding that the cost of living is quite expensive, and it seriously would have helped if we had managed to rent even one of our homes in the U.S. (Cottage or Point) Not sure what the utilities will cost, but I'm hanging clothes on the line while I can, (no rain) and trying to limit water usage as much as possible, a difficult thing to do with this many in the family. We are told to purchase drinking water, and we go through about 6 liters a day. And that's with great restraint. It's difficult to keep up nursing with so little water, milk and nutrition. Hoping I can sustain it, because the cost of formula would only add to the problem. Right now, I have pushed the two large livingroom chairs together, and they are in front of the livingroom windows, so I can look out over the city. I didn't mention the other day, in describing the apartment, each bedroom has an armoire, a dressing table, and a bedside table, so all our clothing has a place, and it really has worked out splendidly. We have Rachel and Isabelle in one room, and David, Addison and Ian in the other. I pushed the twin cots together in their room, so they sleep across them lengthwise. They're all quite happy with their new place. The closet in the center of the hall by the entrance is large with many shelves, so we stored our suitcases and the stroller in there. Homeschool supplies are stocked on the shelving unit outside the closet. It's really all the space we need. And when we have guests, we can move Rachel to the couch, and give up the one bedroom, if needed. There is a window in the boys' room, and one in the hall and one in the larger bathroom that has washer and dryer. It's just an opening in the center of the building, to allow ventilation to the inner rooms. The opening is about 8 by 10 feet. This all may be more information than any of you desire, but I'm documenting it for my children as well, since some of them will have only a vague memory, if any at all, of their time here. All for now.
Time for tea and crackers and a little rest.
DeDe Send us an email about this post! dgibbs at uwsp dot edu or dedegibbs at gmail dot com |
