How to stay clean in a dusty country: Have help

There is an interesting dichotomy here between squalor and cleanliness. The streets are full of trash (mainly plastic bags), discarded parts of fruits, and splatters of tobacco spit. Also, dust is everywhere. The streets are made of dirt, which is disturbed by tires and hooves, and the wind is continually depositing a layer of dust over everything! Inside a given shop, however, the shopkeepers maintain immaculate cleanliness. They slap at the floor, benches and counters with their version of a duster made of a rag attached to the end of a stick. They constantly polish and wipe their wares free of dust. The homes are also kept very clean in spite of often having dirt floors, thatched roofs, and wood-fire cook pits. They carefully maintain their work and living environments with more success than many westerners. Despite living in a situation which necessarily contains dirt, trash, and smoke (from burning trash and cook fires), these people are not dirty.
The Stock family mops their concrete floors every day in addition to daily dusting of all surfaces with a wet cloth. Electronics and bookshelves are covered with plastic when not in use to keep out the dust. They wash clothes every other day and would never wear something without ironing it first.
Pat is able to keep up with all this housework by employing a local woman to help. Every day a woman named Zivi (meaning “life”) comes to help wash dishes, clean, prepare lunch, iron clothes on the floor etc. The Stocks also help to support a man, Padri Emmanuel, who comes on Fridays to receive guests who call on the Stocks asking for medical help and advice. Another man, Babu, is employed to help with buying groceries and transporting villagers who come to the Stocks for rides. One other man, Unice, helps out by running the water pump and fixing things around the house.
Pat explained to me that in the west it seems strange to have a maid and that only the rich employ “servants” but this is because the “servants are included in the products”. Western families don’t have to boil water to wash dishes, boil their buffalo milk and scrape off the cream every morning, make most all of their meals from raw veggies and spices, make their own cat food from rice, chicken liver, and chicken feet, and bake their own tortillas one by one everyday to go with each meal. In the west, milk and pet food etc. come ready to use, already prepared by other hands. The Stock also must work around unexpected power-outages and empty water tanks. With a little help from the local people who need employment and are eager to help, Pat is able to keep up with daily cleaning and cooking while still having time to home school two children, lead Bible studies, attend village events, and receive village visitors etc.
It is currently after lunch. I am tired. Meals here spaced out in time (breakfast at 8:00am, lunch at 2:00, dinner at 8:oo or 9:00.) When meals do come, they are often relatively starch heavy. Veggie and chicken curries are served as garnishes to the tortillas used to scoop them up. Sweet snacks are available between meals in the form of mangos and sweet tea. All these factors combine to make me feel fairly light headed throughout the day. Thankfully, I am usually in a position to rest a little after lunch.
I don’t know how Pat does it. She works conscientiously from when she wakes at 7:00 until she allows herself to go to bed at midnight. She serves the family often without thanks, making people individualized breakfasts, cleaning up, reading aloud the children’s lessons to them etc. Pat’s way demonstrates impressive endurance and sacrifice but it is not likely to be my way when I have kids. If it were me, I would let the children toast their own toast for breakfast or make one meal for everyone. I would also have the children take turns reading the lesson aloud to each other while I cleaned or vice versa. And I would definitely institute a household siesta after starchy meals!
I am not likely to get to rest this afternoon, however. I am with Paul at his place of work, the Christian Audio Visual Center. Soon Pat will be coming here to lead aerobics class and then the whole family is going over for dinner to the house of "the movie star". More details on that in the next blog!