January 25, 2008
Well I don’t know much about our new Mama Fugee, but I know this, I am going to like her really really a lot. I can tell. She has spunk. pizzaz. sass. Key elements in a long lasting and enjoyable relationship of mine.
One of the clues in which I am basing my opinion on is the fact that she has artistic decorational flare. We arrived at the Fugee apartment the other day and were greeted with a small red present bow taped to their door. I thought this was incredibly charming and figured that someone must have given them a Christmas present and in true Fugee form, not ever throwing ANYTHING away, they decided to hang the bow as a welcome gesture on their door. This made me smile.
I then remembered their first day in America and how when we knocked on their door, they did nothing. Knowing they were inside and likely scared out of their minds, I did what makes my husband incredibly uncomfortable and that was to put on my “aggressive and borderline obnoxious hat” and I opened the door and let myself in. As I’d imagined, Mama Fugee was standing on the other side wrapped in a blanket, slightly concerned and exhausted beyond belief. Mike then saw my logic. He just sometimes can’t believe how IMPOLITE I can be. Which is SO impolite to let myself in and turn up their heat being that they had just arrived from AFRICA and were now living in the arctic conditions of Boise Idaho. The nerve.
Knocking on their door this time was an entirely different experience altogether. Mama Fugee quickly opened the door, gave us that warm welcoming smile that starts in her eyes and then stepped out to greet us by cautiously trying to give us a traditional Burundian welcome which I think was to hug us and kiss us on the cheek maybe (?) but we were too inbred in our freaky American ways to realize what was happening and ended up stiffly twitching and rotating in circles in what probably looked like a do-see-do on crack.
Upon entering the apartment, we were blown away. We couldn’t help but to immediately freeze where we were standing and start to conditionally ooooh and aaaah at the sight of her TOTALLY AMAZING AND UTTERLY UNBELIEVABLE transformation of the house. You could tell she was insanely proud, practically beaming actually, which made us up our shocked excitement level even more. We walked wide-eyed around the apartment taking in the HUNDREDS AND HUNDREDS of assorted and multi-colored present bows taped to EVERY SINGLE surface and fixture within their teeny, tiny apartment. It must have been a logistical nightmare. But the affect was incredible. Bows on each blind, bows on each door frame, bows on the tv, bows on strings dangling from the ceiling, bows bows bows bows bows. If you weren’t instantaneously filled with elation upon entering their home, you were broken. There would be no hope for you. Because this place. This place, was psychedelic.
And at that point, I knew I would like her. Because what woman doesn’t want to plaster every inch of her home with present bows but refrains from doing so? Mama Fugee refrains not. And I love that. Plus, intermixed with some family pictures taped to the wall was this picture:
Why? We know not.
Driving around town in an attempt to get her an ID card was relatively simple (mostly because we have BLUE STEEL, the best minivan on the planet) but things started to get progressively worse on the second leg of our journey. Littlest baby Fugee started crying (right at the time that Mike started playing the Greatful Dead, coincidence? I think not) and it became one of those scenarios in which there are too many Chiefs. Everyone in the car thought they knew how to make the baby stop crying. Baby Fugee’s older sister kept trying to reach back and pat his head, Delaney kept telling him “nope nope nope!” while Mike was obsessively changing songs over and over again on the radio. I passed back a snack pack of crackers with cheese to Mama and that worked for about 3.3 minutes before Baby was just too pissed to take this horrible life any longer. Everyone was starting to get on edge and the scary strappy cage things that we forced her kids into were not only questionable in her mind, but were downright annoying. Mike tried to ask her if she’d like another snack pack to give Baby to which she replied no. And since I automatically assume that since Fugees don’t know English, they must not understand anything ever at all, I then offered again but used a VISUAL of a snack pack this time. She not only said no to us again, she basically DEMANDED in her tone that we die. SHE GOT IT THE FIRST TIME AND THE ANSWER WAS STILL NO, THANKYOUVERYMUCH. Geez, frickin nincapoops.
See what I mean? Spunk. I like it.
By this time, we had pulled up to the DMV and Mike had to take Mama Fugee inside to get her ID. She questioningly looked at me and I gestured for her to go inside and I’ll watch all three kiddos in the car, including the wee screaming banshee. I then had one of the freeze frame moments in time wherein I was frantically caught up in the moment only to stop and realize “Holy Crap, this is what it’s going to be like!” It was like a glimpse into the future, a future with Delaney and 2 more kids, African kids at that. A little surreal.
I am happy to report that I got the baby to stop crying and managed to entertain older sister. Everyone was happy until Mama Fugee showed back up and baby started crying again at the sight of her. Without one SECOND’S hesitation, she picked him up and threw him on her boob, outright refusing to place him in the strappy cage. Which is probably exactly what I would do in the reverse situation. I couldn’t help but respect her for taking control and telling us to piss off. She’s already doing better in America than she thinks.
Posted by Jamie @ 3:46 pm • Fugees
RSS feed for comments on this post.
TrackBack URI
January 25th, 2008 at 4:22 pm, Jess Says:
That decor is just awesome. Just amazing. Where did she get all those bows?
I like Mama Fugee too. Go her.
January 25th, 2008 at 4:48 pm, JMC Says:
I think I’m confused. Are the fugee families in any way connected to the kids you are adopting? For some reason, when I first started reading your blog, I put them together in my head, something along the lines of: The fugee family is the family from which the children are being adopted. But this seems to be wrong. So now I’m thinking these are two DIFFERENT endeavors. Is that correct? And when you get a new fugee family, what happens to the old one? This is all so interesting, and the fugee mama sounds awesome!
January 25th, 2008 at 5:01 pm, mandy Says:
You are so cool to have new Fugees! And I agree they do sound totally awesome, the fact that they have a Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie pic makes them even cooler. We’re in the process of redoing our living room–I’m thinking of suggesting the bow thing, you never know, it might work, right?
January 25th, 2008 at 5:13 pm, misty Says:
LOL! i love her. About 8 years ago we had the privilege of bringing Bosnian refugees to Boise and helping them. It was amazing…
This sounds like a great experience. I laughed at the Mr and Mrs. Pitt photo. I imagined it mirroring your expressions as you drank in the bows!
January 25th, 2008 at 5:44 pm, Ms. Battle Station Says:
JMC,
Sorry to be confusing!!! I automatically assume that people know everything about me, I’m self centered like that.
The Fugees are something totally different. We volunteer through the International Rescue Committee which helps Refugees resettle in America after leaving refugee camps. We mentor them and teach them how to live in America and whatnot. It’s all on a “whenever we have time” basis.
The last Fugees moved to Texas and so we took on another family. The last family was from Congo and the new family is from Burundi.
I’m glad you asked. That would have been confusing.
Jamie
January 25th, 2008 at 5:54 pm, dcrmom Says:
I love it! Thanks for sharing. What a hoot. And can I say AGAIN how much I admire you for doing this??
January 25th, 2008 at 6:20 pm, Julie Says:
What a coincidence! I have that SAME picture of Brad and Angie taped to my living room wall.
January 26th, 2008 at 12:15 am, mandy Says:
Thanks for the explanation about the International Rescue Committee, sounds like a great organization!
January 26th, 2008 at 2:16 am, chou2 Says:
OK I LOVE this woman. Love her decorating flair and love her willingness to stand up for herself and do it her way.
Awesome.
January 26th, 2008 at 9:44 am, annselma Says:
H-I-L-A-R-I-O-U-S !!!!! That is what I would call you if I were talking to you. I like spunk too but sometimes I’m not sure where to go with it. Thanks for sharing with us, the internet, and the fugees too.
January 26th, 2008 at 8:47 pm, emily Says:
I’m pretty sure that Nate Berkus prefers bows as well.
January 27th, 2008 at 10:43 pm, Cami Says:
I love your rendition of a day on the town with the fugees! We also mentor a family through IRC, here in Phoenix, AZ. I am wondering (and of course this would be a crazy coincidence) if you can tell me the name of your current and past refugee family. The families we hang out with are also from the Congo and their father came from Burundi. They told us they have a cousin in Idaho and a cousin in Texas. They came here in September. I’d LOVE to track down their cousins for them so they can at least communicate by mail or even phone. It takes forever for the volunteer lady at IRC to get back with me, so I thought I’d just check and see. Wouldn’t that be cool if they are related?!?!?! We can email off the blog and I can give you the name of our guys here.
Keep up the great bloggin!
Cami
February 1st, 2008 at 8:58 pm, Erin O' Says:
Oh, I have that picture in our house, too.
Man, someone else already did that one!
Very funny post, chica!