I didn't have a camera this morning when I took a break from the craziness and dragged my kids up onto our roof to hang out. Now, don't get your 'safety-first' panties in a bunch. Roofs up here are flat and made to be walked on, sat on, and even slept on. Ours has a 2 1/2 foot wall around the whole thing. People use it to hang their laundry out during sunny, dry days. It's really the only place you can get your laundry dried under 2 days during the cold season because of the fog and damp air.
So, we had just finished several days of rain and clouds and so our kids (and their Mama) were needing a breath of fresh air. Up we went. I told the boys to wear their boots because the roof might still have puddles on it from the last few days. It did. I also told them to pick a toy or something to bring with them. Jed opted to wear his Batman costume while Abe chose a sword. Lucy chose to toddle around and lose her shoes every other second. So, there I was looking out over the city that is vaguely our home, gently (read frustratedly) telling the boys for the 15th time to put down that person's flower pot and patiently (read impatiently) grabbing Lu off of the concrete-steps-with-no-railing for the 21st time, when I kicked myself for not bringing the camera.
I looked over one edge of the wall and some guys were painting the side of a house. Now, that may not seem like such a big deal, but wait . . . here's where the photo would have been helpful. The house next to ours is 3 stories high. It sits behind another, smaller house on the same lot and in between the two houses is a shack where a family (probably servants of the owners of the houses) live. The shack is situated directly below and against the house on the portion of wall that's being painted. The house in question has walls made of bricks with plaster over them. It had been painted before, but the paint was chipping off and needed to be redone.
There were 4 guys involved in the project. One guy was standing around in his nicer-looking clothes, so I imagined that this may have been the owner of the house or the painter-boss-man. He did no work, but watched on as the other 3 did their thing. The other guys were equipped with top-of-the-line painting equipment.
As I surveyed the scene, two thoughts went into my head. First, I had a flashback to my days leading summer camp when I did a lot of rock-climbing and rappelling. We would always talk about doubling the safety system. Double anchors. Double carabiners. Double knots. Double rope systems. I thought to myself, "Well, at least they've got 2 ladders in case one breaks!" I also was looking around for any indication that the man himself (who was easily 40 feet off the ground) was roped to anything . . . nope. The other thought that went into my head was, "I wonder what kind of coin toss he lost to get that job." As much as I've been missing hanging precariously off of things since there's not much of a chance to rock-climb here, I wouldn't have ever thought of trading places with that guy.
So, instead of turning quickly away like I usually do here, I watched on. How in the world would they get that guy back up on the roof? He was already too far down to grab the edge and pull back up. Then, I got my answer. The guy who was doing nothing sprang into action. He took the thin piece of rope and lowered it down the edge of the wall until it touched the ground, held the spot, and then pulled it back up. After that, he walked over to the ladder and proceeded to measure the thick rope with the thinner one. Much to everyone's relief, the thick rope was longer than the thin one. The guy at the bottom of the ladder proceeded to slacken the rope in his hands a bit. The next guy slid the rope through his hands a bit, and the guy on the swing sunk about 4 feet and grabbed his scraper. So, they were just going to lower him down. Well, that was somewhat of a relief. Until I realized they didn't measure the rope until after the guy was already over the wall. Safety First! Thanks, India.
And that concludes my 1000 words. Yes, the end of that paragraph was exactly 1000 words. In case you were wondering. I'm having flashbacks of High School essay assignments which were supposed to be within certain word requirements. I was ALWAYS over. Just have a lot to say. So, feel free to check out on this post if you only signed up for 1000, but if your interested, read on.
The guy continued to scrape paint. It fell on the thick, black plastic and old tires of the shack's roof beneath him. I realized that the women who lived in the shack were cooking over a fire under a smaller shack off to the side. Their children were gathered around them. And I thought of all the paint chips that were soon to mix into the dirt around that home. I thought of the millions upon millions of people here just wanting to make a living for their families, ready to hop over the edge of a building to scrape another wall if it means that their wife has flour to make some flatbread and some meat to add to the curry. I also thought of the millions upon millions of people in America who refuse to work at 'menial' tasks or 'labor' type jobs because they view it as beneath them. I'm proud of that man, scraping away. And as one of the women looked up to see me surveying the whole scene, I raised my hand in a sign of peace, and turned back to tell Abe, "Stop swinging that sword at your Sister!"
So, we had just finished several days of rain and clouds and so our kids (and their Mama) were needing a breath of fresh air. Up we went. I told the boys to wear their boots because the roof might still have puddles on it from the last few days. It did. I also told them to pick a toy or something to bring with them. Jed opted to wear his Batman costume while Abe chose a sword. Lucy chose to toddle around and lose her shoes every other second. So, there I was looking out over the city that is vaguely our home, gently (read frustratedly) telling the boys for the 15th time to put down that person's flower pot and patiently (read impatiently) grabbing Lu off of the concrete-steps-with-no-railing for the 21st time, when I kicked myself for not bringing the camera.
I looked over one edge of the wall and some guys were painting the side of a house. Now, that may not seem like such a big deal, but wait . . . here's where the photo would have been helpful. The house next to ours is 3 stories high. It sits behind another, smaller house on the same lot and in between the two houses is a shack where a family (probably servants of the owners of the houses) live. The shack is situated directly below and against the house on the portion of wall that's being painted. The house in question has walls made of bricks with plaster over them. It had been painted before, but the paint was chipping off and needed to be redone.
There were 4 guys involved in the project. One guy was standing around in his nicer-looking clothes, so I imagined that this may have been the owner of the house or the painter-boss-man. He did no work, but watched on as the other 3 did their thing. The other guys were equipped with top-of-the-line painting equipment.
- 2 8-foot bamboo ladders
- 2 5-gallon buckets of cheap white paint (guaranteed to blister and peel at any change in temperature or precipitation)
- 1 piece-of-something-sharp to scrape paint with (I can guarantee you that it wasn't a commercially made paint-scraper)
- 1 thick, horse-hair brush
- several strands of thick rope
- 1 2 foot section of 2X4
- 1 thin strand of rope
As I surveyed the scene, two thoughts went into my head. First, I had a flashback to my days leading summer camp when I did a lot of rock-climbing and rappelling. We would always talk about doubling the safety system. Double anchors. Double carabiners. Double knots. Double rope systems. I thought to myself, "Well, at least they've got 2 ladders in case one breaks!" I also was looking around for any indication that the man himself (who was easily 40 feet off the ground) was roped to anything . . . nope. The other thought that went into my head was, "I wonder what kind of coin toss he lost to get that job." As much as I've been missing hanging precariously off of things since there's not much of a chance to rock-climb here, I wouldn't have ever thought of trading places with that guy.
So, instead of turning quickly away like I usually do here, I watched on. How in the world would they get that guy back up on the roof? He was already too far down to grab the edge and pull back up. Then, I got my answer. The guy who was doing nothing sprang into action. He took the thin piece of rope and lowered it down the edge of the wall until it touched the ground, held the spot, and then pulled it back up. After that, he walked over to the ladder and proceeded to measure the thick rope with the thinner one. Much to everyone's relief, the thick rope was longer than the thin one. The guy at the bottom of the ladder proceeded to slacken the rope in his hands a bit. The next guy slid the rope through his hands a bit, and the guy on the swing sunk about 4 feet and grabbed his scraper. So, they were just going to lower him down. Well, that was somewhat of a relief. Until I realized they didn't measure the rope until after the guy was already over the wall. Safety First! Thanks, India.
And that concludes my 1000 words. Yes, the end of that paragraph was exactly 1000 words. In case you were wondering. I'm having flashbacks of High School essay assignments which were supposed to be within certain word requirements. I was ALWAYS over. Just have a lot to say. So, feel free to check out on this post if you only signed up for 1000, but if your interested, read on.
The guy continued to scrape paint. It fell on the thick, black plastic and old tires of the shack's roof beneath him. I realized that the women who lived in the shack were cooking over a fire under a smaller shack off to the side. Their children were gathered around them. And I thought of all the paint chips that were soon to mix into the dirt around that home. I thought of the millions upon millions of people here just wanting to make a living for their families, ready to hop over the edge of a building to scrape another wall if it means that their wife has flour to make some flatbread and some meat to add to the curry. I also thought of the millions upon millions of people in America who refuse to work at 'menial' tasks or 'labor' type jobs because they view it as beneath them. I'm proud of that man, scraping away. And as one of the women looked up to see me surveying the whole scene, I raised my hand in a sign of peace, and turned back to tell Abe, "Stop swinging that sword at your Sister!"
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