so great:

http://www.freerice.com/

it shows how long it has been since i have posted that when i went to write this entry it took me a second to remember how to make a new post. goodness. anyways, i am headed for the capitol--washington d.c. I got a job with USCCB (United States Conference of Catholic Bishops) in their Refugee Department and will be starting Oct 9th. My official title will be "Family Reunification and Child Specialist". Basically, USCCB is one of two agencies that are referred refugee, migrant, and trafficked children from the federal government and are responsible for conducting assessments and making recommendations on placements of the children.
I'm excited, and the job has come together and worked out amazingly.
I will have a lot of Hispanic clients, and will need to be able to do interviews and translate for clients, and for this reason, I decided a trip to the Dominican Republic was necessary to brush up and get ready for that level of communication. :) So, on Thursday I will leave to go to the DR for five days.
Whirlwind.

my last day in south asia. it is full of people and packing. i am currently desperately trying to figure out how to get everything back to the U.S. and not pay $250 extra for it. it is quite challenging. i now have a scale in my room and am juggling between three different suitcases. the last few days have been great. the people that have been in my life here are fantastic, and i have been deeply blessed by them.

please continue to pray for me as i continue this process and travel back. i am pretty worn out physically and emotionally and it is just a long stinking trip. thanks so much, and i will see you when i get back in country! (monday night!) finally, a small depiction of the ridiculousness of monsoon season!

well hello. it has been a while...i may not even have readers at this point! (and i can't say that i would blame you!) amazingly enough, i am winding down my last days here in south asia. i myself am struggling to realize that i will be on a plane back to the US as of monday morning. for now i am trying to take everything in and store it away in my mind for the days when i won't be here. let's catch up on some things.

my mom and her friend, lisa caramagno, visited recently! it was incredibly fun and exciting to have them here and show them what my life has been like for the last ten months. we went to lots of restaurants, did some shopping, and headed down to a beach resort area for a day. all in all i think they were ready to return to the States, and may have even kissed the ground upon landing in NYC. South Asia is no easy place to visit or live in, but they were champs!
i have a few things on my "to do before i leave" list. i accomplished one of them last night. i had my hair chemically straightened, or "rebonded". 4.5 hours of treatment, 48 hours of no washing, and you can have lovely straight hair too. you may be thinking to yourself, "Marianne, your hair is straight already.." well, that is thanks to my dear friends blow dryer and straightener. there are a few challenging things in addition to sitting still for 4.5 hours:

• not getting your hair wet when it is monsoon season. i should probably receive a prize for my efforts.
• not washing your hair for 48 hours. in addition to not washing, i am not supposed to put it in a pony tail, clip, use bobby pins, or anything else that will disturb the now straight hair. this essentially means i cannot hide my un-washed hair, which i hate.

our maid, whom the faithful readers may remember from her famous appearance on my blog around thanksgiving time, had a marked leave of unexplained absence for about 1.5 weeks. this behavior was unprecedented, and we were convinced that she may have randomly quit without explanation. however, much to my surprise on monday morning at 8:30 as the doorbell rang and i peered out the peep hole, her little 4'6 self was standing outside. i joyfully opened the door and in my best mime+english abilities attempted to ask her where she had been. to which she responded by making a face (tilting her head to the side and sticking out her tongue) and saying "husband". i took it to mean that her husband had died. i immediately felt awful, and attempted to convey how sorry i was. she however, did not seem phased by discussing this most recent death of her spouse. i was surprised, but chalked it up to being one of those things lost in translation. i came into work, and later on in the morning was talking to one of my co-workers about it, and before i could even finish, she said, "ugh..these workers are always kiling off so many family members!" she proceeded to tell me how it is common for domestic workers to claim death in the family instead of asking for vacation. goodness. this makes more sense now seeing as how our maid's uncle, mother, and husband had all "died" within a three month span, with no remarkable sadness or grief being displayed on her account. i'm still slightly unnerved by it though.

there is a strange dichotomy going on regarding the internal vs external reality of my leaving. externally, everything is the same. i take the same autos to work, drive on the roads, see my same co-workers, hang out with my same friends, etc. internally though, there is a storm that surges from time to time demanding to attempt to recognize and deal with the fact that life as i have come to know it for the last ten months will be ending on monday. it is very strange and makes me feel unsettled.

so, that is a jumbled bunch of snippets from life right now. my hair and i (it takes on an entity of its own when it requires this much care) are about to head to the gym (with my rain jacket on, of course). i would greatly appreciate prayers as i transition back home.... and i am incredibly excited to see everyone again!

joy.

my blog has been quiet as of late, which is reflective of just how busy life here has been. in the last two and a half weeks there have been two visitors to our corner of the world. my time here is seeming to wrap up quickly. today my roommate and i tried to figure out a weekend to do some sight seeing, and found that there are really only two weekends that we can actually get away before i leave.

things in general have been good. God is doing some very cool stuff, right, i know that's so vague...but i can't be descript, so, vague you get! ;)

a few pictures from things lately:

--scratch the few part--the internet is being snail-like and won't let me upload more than just this one. so, one picture of the outside of a beautiful old french villa i stayed at in a town a few hours south of here last weekend. more stories and pictures sometime when i have things i can write about and internet that is not molassess!

okay...so here they are in no order of any sort...(my battery is going to run out soon!)

camel riding in the desert!

indoor ski slope at the mall of the emirates

CARIBOU!!!! (does it get much better than that? no.)

rogue camels wandering around the desert.

nicolette at the beach with the burj al arab hotel (shaped like a sail in the background)
danielle and i at the beach.

okay. that is all for now! happy mother's day to all the moms, and happy birthday to my brother!

website is under construction! apologies for those of you who have been checking it. you don't really need a login to see it, i just had to do that for a few days until i could work on it a bit!
dubai was fantastic fabulous! i will throw up some pictures and stories when i get a few mins and a functioning computer..mine is currently dead.

my roommate and i's conversation a couple of minutes ago. (background: she threw up this morning after drinking one sip of her tea):


nicolettegrams@yahoo.com says:
at the risk of sounding like *****, is it possible that i have a worm and just don't know it
nicolettegrams@yahoo.com says:
i know i haven't really lost weight, but maybe i am eating enough to support us both
Marianne says: muahahaha
Marianne says: possibly.
Marianne says: we need you on cipro. STAT!
nicolettegrams@yahoo.com says: stat
nicolettegrams@yahoo.com says: yes stat
nicolettegrams@yahoo.com says: and with it all I am still hungry
nicolettegrams@yahoo.com says: which just annoys me
Marianne says: the worm needs to be fed!
Marianne says: and it does not like tea!!!!
nicolettegrams@yahoo.com says: feed it!
Marianne says: get it straight zicolette
Marianne says: when else in our lives will our conversations go like this.....?? lol + sigh.

on being famous...

this morning as i was brushing my teeth, i got a text from an ex-pat friend saying that one of my roommates and i were pictured in the paper. we had been anticipating this as the paper photographer took our photo on saturday night when we were out with friends. when we got into the office, one of our co-workers started talking about how he had seen us. we proceeded to investigate online to see if we could dig it up. the great part (at least to us) was that in a joke on the press, who had caused some serious trouble for us last time we were in the news, we had told the reporter a fake name for my roommate, and that we were from mozambique. as we were perusing the world wide web, our landlord, of all people, texted me and said, "nice to see you guys in the paper this morning". we found the article which included a photo of the two of us-the three guys we were with had been mysteriously cropped out, and a small column on the reporter's take of the place we were at that night. some of the highlights included:
"A lot of ex-pats were seen tapping their feet to the music. Some of the people spotted include Anita, Nichola, Marianne, Peter, and Eric."
so funny...my life here is just funny sometimes.

i almost blend in, right? :)

I ventured to the airport this week to pick up my roommate as she returned from her two week trip to the states. Pick ups from the airport are a special process here, as are many things. We have to hire a car to take us, and the cheapest cars do not have air conditioning. So, around 11:00 pm I got picked up from my flat and made my way, windows down through the city to the airport. I had sprayed myself with bug spray in anticipation of the mosquitos, brought a bottle of water because the lows these days are in the 70’s, and my trusty iPod. After my driver tried to drop me off for departures (wrong, I do not have any luggage even!), and then circled around once before he understood that I meant park and wait, we finally slid into a parking spot sandwhiched between other people waiting.
I texted my roommate in hopes of her phone being charged enough to respond back to me, and waited in the back seat of the car until I knew she was close to coming out. She called me once she made it to baggage claim, and it was time for me to move.
I now needed to make my way up to the arrivals section of the airport. It is entirely outdoors, there is nowhere you can go inside the airport to meet arriving people. There is a long guard rail that lines about 100 feet of the arrivals area, so its kind of like a Hollywood Premiere type of walk from the exit door of the airport to the end of the section where you can finally greet your friends and family-except it is far from the glamour of Hollywood. A world away both literally and figuratively.
The rail to the airport walkway of fame was lined by about 300 people, and 98% of them were men as it was around midnight, and most women are in by about 9:00 here. I of course, was the only Westerner on that side of the rail. I managed to make my way up to the front so I could easily spot my roommate and we could find each other among the masses. People looked on in bewilderment at my lone white face in the sea of south asian skin tones.
My front row spot proved to be the highlight of the night, as I watched all of the bewildered Western businessmen clumsily making their way down the walkway in a jet lagged, culture and climate shocked condition, while the flight crew knowingly makes their way down the concrete carpet and into their travel van.
The business men meanwhile frantically searched for their names on all of the placards, and listened as men would call out, “Mr. Frieberg, Mr. Frieberg!”. I could not help but be amused by this process, as well as feel glad that after being here for about six months I am comfortable on the side of the rail that I was on. I have crossed over. I am no longer the Westerner walking around in a constant state of confusion and shock. Rather, I feel comfortable in my own skin here.

Matt: i was like..marianne is getting interviewed on the internet...it looked like you were on cnn

ha. if only.

this weekend, south asia is winning in our ongoing battle.
1. i got incredibly sick last night, and didn't go to bed until 7:00 am this morning.
2. my atm card would not work.
3. my atm card does not work because unbeknownest to me, it expired yesterday.
4. there were riots/protests yesterday. i had to stay inside my flat all day until it was over.

argh.

this is my roommate, nicolette, on the right. she left for the u.s. for two weeks tonight. this makes me sad, because i like her. you may be thinking to yourself, "marianne, two weeks is a short time". oh, but its a long time when you live in a fish bowl sized bubble.

Marriott asks:

would you like some...

.....sugar? or some brown?

south asia is full of tough decisions.

-exciting, but makes me laugh: http://www.noelheikkinen.com/ go to the march 21 post.

-i have killed three mosquitos in the last ten minutes


-the temperature in my room is 86 degrees. when i have two fans running on full speed.

ok. in entirely true and new news, it is watermelon season here, and the streets are glistening green and red.

to be fair, i had never seen a bug bat in the U.S.! i will work harder on my fact checking before i decide that things do or do not exist in entire countries. :)

As promised, I present to you the Bug Bat:

so, you hunt down some bugs around your room...preferably before bed time when they will wait around to bite you all night long. it looks a little like this.

then, when you catch one, their little bodies spark and sizzle until they dissapear. it is quite exciting. we tried to capture it in the picture, but it happens too fast.

i am aware that i am well overdue for an update, and for that i apologize. it has been really busy here since i got back. i will try to get around to updating this and sending out an update email this weekend.

for now though here is a picture from the most recent village trip i went on:

these two girls are amazing. and if i can get it cleared, i will share their story.

excerpts from an article in Christianity Today:

"Wouldn't it be ironic if Western Christians were more excited about what God did through William Wilberforce to fight slavery in 1807 than about what God wants to do through us to fight slavery in 2007?

The question would seem absurd if not for the fact that there are more slaves in the world today than were extracted from Africa during 400 years of the transatlantic slave trade. More than 25 million human beings are slaves in 2007. They are not slaves in a metaphorical sense. They are held in forced servitude by other human beings.

Today, many North American Christians who have entered the joy of God's passionate global mission embrace evangelism and compassion ministries that bring food, housing, microloans, and medicine to the poor. Yet many are also beginning to see the true basis of slavery, which is another source of suffering for the poor—aggressive violence. That is the core reality of forced labor: coercion and terror. Poverty, ignorance, and spiritual darkness are all part of a complex set of social factors that exacerbate slaves' original vulnerability, but once enslaved, they need someone to rescue them from the brutal hand of their oppressor.

For Nagaraj and his family, who worked 16 hours a day, six days a week, making bricks, there was no mystery about what kept them and 80 other slaves inside the four walls of their compound. It was the vicious beatings unleashed upon those who tried to run away. For Elisabeth, a 16-year-old girl held inside a brothel in Thailand, it was money for Bible college that lured her into the hands of a sex trafficker who lied about a job across the border. Once inside the brothel, however, it was sheer violent terror that forced her to submit to multiple rapes by the brothel's paying customers.

Hundreds of millions of poor people in the developing world today are suffering under an epidemic of violence—domestic abuse, sexual violence, slavery, illegal detention, police abuse, land seizures, and extortion. In their moment of greatest need, Nagaraj and Elisabeth and these millions of others are not crying out for a sermon or food or medicine or housing or microloans. In due course, they may. But right now, they are crying out for someone to restrain the hand of the oppressor. They are crying out for the ministry of justice. You can give all kinds of goods and services to the poor in the name of Christ—but if you have not restrained the hand of the oppressor from simply taking these things away, you have not done much that is significant or sustainable."

an intense couple of weeks.
back in my corner of the world once again.

I broke into my bottle of olive oil tonight. My three ounce two dollar bottle of olive oil. I was attempting to make pasta and it was necessary. I made my pasta. An assortment of jumbled together ingredients that would not necessarily combine in the real world. Penne noodles (imported from my trip to Thailand because they are expensive here), Green Pepper (called Capsicum here), garlic, and a chopped up tomato sautéed in the olive oil. I cooked the pasta once the water had been boiling for a few minutes and had boiled all of the germs away. I drained the water down our sink which has no garbage disposal (they don’t exist here). I combined my ingredients and seasoned them with a packet of oregano pizza seasoning from our ordered in pizza the other night. Grated cheese for pasta does not exist here either. Pasta sauce does, but is very over priced. And for what it makes in price, it lacks in taste.
I came upstairs and hopped onto our secret internet connection. I began emailing and looking for pictures of a hair cut. I have caved, or rather my hair is the longest it has been since middle school, and I made myself a hair appointment. At a place called “Bounce”. We’ll see how this goes. I decided to use a visual aid since I can assume that verbal aid will be lacking. I also looked for flights to Dubai. I am really wanting to be able to go and visit a friend there in a month or two. The culture and life style here is very oppressive and can be consuming if you don’t give yourself a mental and physical break every few months. The internet connection died. I’m left with two pictures that I found-has anyone ever tried to find hair cut pictures on the internet? Its actually quite difficult.
At some point tonight as I am going to bed or even already asleep, I will be plagued by water dripping onto the tin roof outside my window from a drain a few stories above me. This drain-where ever it is-has become my arch enemy of night time. It claps down onto the tin roof and keeps me awake with its untimely rhythms. I’ve become convinced that Chinese water torture probably is horrible.

in my new profile pic i am drinking some coconut juice(?) milk(?). despite the fact that i look quite pleased, it was not that tasty. the new pic reminded me that i need to post some pics from thailand. so, here are a few:

here we are at the airport. if you can click on the pic, we are pointing to the master card ad that says, "Getting away from the hustle and bustle. Priceless." In a third world city of 8 million that statement could not be true. I think for my own health I will need to leave once more before my time here is over. It is a tough place to live.

Our first real day in Thailand we went on an elephant ride. To keep people occupied while they waited for their elephant ride, the place had a monkey. It was really sad that he was chained up, but he was so cool to interact with.

We were pals.

Here is a pic of Virginia behind us. It is a bit difficult to try and take a picture of yourself while riding an elephant. The place took pictures for you, but in typical tourist trap fashion charged an outrageous amount. Volunteer budget does not equal outrageous amount items.

this was the best that i could do as far as documentation. here are nicollette and i's feet and our guide with the elephants ears included to prove that yes, we really were riding an elephant.

okay. that is all for now, i will post more at some point.

Last weekend i had the opportunity to see Blood Diamonds. I realize this movie has probably been out for a while in the U.S., but the rest of the world tends to have a delayed uptake. Anyways, I would highly recommend that all blog readers go out and see it. The movie is well done and brings to light a problem not often addressed by the first world. Beyond that, I think that it can offer you a greater insight into what I am doing dragging myself half way around the world for ten months.

In other news we are having some people changes at the office here soon. Five of our office members are having their time here come to an end or are shifting to a different office. Please pray for that as the people that you live and work with when overseas are essentially your family.

we have found a random three foot space of wireless network at our apartment that occasionally works, hence the more frequent updating. well, there was december and now january. i had a birthday, there was also christmas, new year's, and a trip to thailand. so, here are some pictures mostly because i'm finding that lately i'm not doing well with articulating and detailing all of the events. the day to day becomes the day to day no matter where you are in the world i suppose. so, on with the pictures.

here i am happy as can be about going to the beach for my birthday.

then we went out to dinner:

next, was christmas. this was our christmas morning spread:

nothing even comparable to home, but not too bad for three girls living off of volunteer budgets in south asia.

we had all of our young people friends over for brunch. we made fruit salad, scrambled eggs, pancakes, crepes, toast, and banana bread.
we also had a mandatory rule that you had to wear your pajamas just like you would if you were at home with your family on christmas morning. it was great.

later in the afternoon we went over to one of our boss' house for dinner and a gift exchange with thirty or so other ex-pats. we did manage to get in a fight with our auto driver along the way. no, i'm not kidding, my roommate punched him in the shoulder! he was trying to do some serious swindling and just being sketchy in general. in the end it was more humorous than anything..but still quite surreal! i got to hang out with my boss' daughter, Adelaide, who is rivaling my old babysitting girl, Abbie, for being my favorite child in the world.

okay. it takes ages to load pictures here because the internet connections are so slow/bad. so i will do pictures of thailand another time. i've been told that people often are asking for updates, maybe an easier way to fill in the gap would be to get on my mass email list which i send updates out to. if you want to be added to that, just leave a comment on any of my posts with your email address, and i will add you! :)

good press.

thailand was amazing. exactly the fresh breath of air that i needed. pictures to come in time.