Hawker

I made the mistake of telling Thomas his “stuff” will be here this week. It is a mistake on many levels:

1. While we were told our stuff left Durban on the 18th of this month and that it could be here by the 19th or 20th – we have had no confirmation of its arrival.

2. Thomas has no sense of time. "This week" of course means, tomorrow, today, now…ect.

3. When I try to explain to him, said concept of “this week”, he moans, “mom, I can’t wait that long…I need it now.” As if I, in my ultimate state of mom power, can get it for him just because he wants it.

4. And to the point of this post. Since I told him that his things are coming he stops every Zambian within earshot of our car, doesn’t matter if we are moving or not, to ask, in one uninterrupted breath, “Hi, do you have any children? Because my stuff is coming and I have a lot of really cool swords and a real bow and arrow, not a wood one, a plastic one, that is really really cool and I am going to give some of my real swords to your children.” The poor Zambian stares, bewildered at this freckled, white boy shouting at him in unintelligible English. I have had several of them say, “I can’t understand his slang.” I usually just explain that he is telling them about his wooden swords and wants to know if they have any kids, hoping to get out of the conversation that has delayed our progress by at least 10 minutes at this point.

After about the third time this happened today I asked Thomas why he wanted to give all of his swords away. He said, “No mom, I am going to sell them. I am going to make lots of wooden swords and sell them to the kids.”

Aha! So, I think this declaration is the result of two factors. The first being that he has seen Zambians selling everything in the middle of the road here and has become very adept at purchasing and consuming strawberries before I have the time to realize what he has done (window lock has become my ally). The second, and perhaps most likely influence in his behavior: he is Seth’s son. That man can sell anything. In our almost 5 years of marriage I have seen him sell many things. Often, he sells something we bought used for double what we paid. Some of the most impressive items: a half pipe skateboard ramp, a pair of hiking boots salvaged from dumpster and a stroller from the same dumpster, a used printer and several used computers. One of my most favorite sales was in fact a trade – a really nice jacket traded for a climbing rope and a chop saw.

So the moral of the story…becoming a hawker: nature or nurture, in Thomas’ case – both!

Unrelated, but here is a picture of our new house:

and our banana tree