Wednesday, July 06, 2011
Do you ever take certain things for granted that you learn as a young kid…not thinking about having to pass that information on to someone that hasn’t seen it done before? A good example is the sugar packets at a restaurant. We all know that when you go to a restaurant, and want to put sugar in your tea, you open the sugar packets and pour in the sugar. When some friends of mine in Kigali were looking to hire house help, they asked for the family to meet them at a restaurant that is a little bit higher class for many Rwandan families. When the family went to put sugar in their tea, they put the entire packet into their tea, not realizing that you have to open the sugar packet. How do we know to open it? By watching our parents as young kids open it we learn that is how we use the sugar packets.
The family that helped me to purchase my pots and stoves, took for granted the same type of thing that they learned as young children, not realizing that if you do not grow up using charcoal stoves, you do not know the full process of using charcoal stoves. The family got a good laugh off of me, when I told them how I light my charcoal! Using paper towels or napkins, apparently is not the “ideal” way to light the charcoal. Instead, there are these sticks that have been covered in some kind of coating that catches on fire quickly and lights the charcoal almost immediately. These cheap sticks are easy to get, and now that I know what to look for, I can find them anywhere in town. If they hadn’t shown me to use these, I would have never known what they were! (They kind of look like sugar cane, so Blake and I thought they might be food!) Nor, would I have known to use these to light my charcoal. It’s one of the things they took for granted that they just grew up doing…of course everyone knows to light charcoal with these sticks, right? Just like everyone knows to open the sugar packets right?