August 7, 2018
It’s amazing how quickly we adapt. When you first arrive in a developing country you question everything. Is this the right car? Can I trust this driver? Do I smile back or is it risky to engage? Is it safe to eat that cucumber? That meat? Can I drink this water? Are the guards and all the security REALLY necessary? If so, how dangerous IS this place? What would happen if I stepped outside the gates?
The questions evolve almost over night: do we barter at the market or pay the stated price? Hmmm...did we over pay? Where is the best place to buy an iron? (That was my husband’s question, I don’t iron). Which is the safest atm? What is this fruit and how do I eat it? Have you lived in Georgetown all your life?
And before you know it, you are singing Beyoncé out loud together with your driver. And now you trust him to drive you around town saying, “no problem, Mam, if the girls want genip we will find them genip. Don’t want to go breaking their little hearts.” And he finds you a stand that has genip and they love it. And they knew they loved it because the day before a stranger at the pool showed it to them, told them how to eat it and let them try it. And you, as their mother, determined it was safe for them to do so.
Security is taken seriously here. Every 45 minutes the guard leaves his guard shack by the front gate and walks around the house. At every door he puts a key fob into a round sensor. I inaccurately assumed that he was checking the alarm signal or sensor or something, but Jeff tells me that he is "clocking in." The key fob confirms that he checks every door every 45 minutes, doing his rounds as required.
We aren’t good at security. The security alarm went off two nights ago for the first time. We are so woke that it had to go off three times before we even got up to investigate. In between the second and third time, my daughter padded in and whispered “what is that sound?!?” “Oh, that’s nothing, Honey. Just some street sounds.” In our defense, all the doors and windows here are paper thin and we had been lying in bed listening to the sounds of Saturday night music and partying wafting in from all over who knows where. The security tones sounded like they could be coming from downstairs or down the street. Hard to tell. And isn’t it always better to let you children feel safe?!? In the end, Jeff followed protocol and called the guard before venturing outside. All was well, system failure only. And on the bright side, we now know what the alarm sounds like. Next time I’ll try to muster some fear.
Everyone that comes in the gate has to sign in with the guard, logging a record of who at what time. That said, I was quietly told by an ExxonMobil employee that I should note that log and, in the interest of privacy, if I want someone to come in that I don't want everyone (read: the entire EM security team and by extension the entire ex-pat community) knowing about, I should just wave down the guard and not have him log that person. Only Jeff and I can do that. Anyone who comes in from the security/driver fleet or the landlord's maintenance "fleet" will have to log. And anyone who comes in from either group has been vetted. We were handed keys to the house and we were told that we are the only ones with keys to the house so don't lose them. But it’s hard to feel especially security conscious when so many security-approved people are coming and going that I can’t keep track of who’s who, who belongs to which group and why they are here. I’m more worried about not walking in front of any windows naked and otherwise just staying out of everyone’s way. Plus, I'm not good at security. Case in point: yesterday I’m on the phone minding my own in-my-own-house business (actually, I was talking to my brother) when there is a knock at the door. I open it to find my guard standing there with another man. The guard says, “Hello Mam, you left your house keys in the lock and also the AC contractor is here for you.”
Oops.
Don’t call for help, I am fine.