KBR and the several other flavors of contractors throughout Iraq hire many third country nations from many different countries. To me this makes sense. American workers demand too much money to do the same job. Why would you want to pay someone $100,000 a year–which is the rumored and inflated going rate for Americans out here–to clean toilets or serve food. So, KBR finds someone from a lower income economy and hires them to help us with those kinds of duties at a lower, yet adequate if not profitable, rate for the people that choose to do the work. I say all to say that there are many people here who don’t speak English.
I’m OK with that…most of the time.
One time I wasn’t was when I encountered a air conditioner worker whom I thought pulled the Internet cable out and all he knew how to say was “I fix Air Conditioner.” And when I pointed to the Internet cable he said “Not my responsibility.” That was the one time, I was so OK with it. But, looking back–I may have said the same thing…good going guy!
This morning, I was awakened by SIX Ugandans that said “Fire Inspection!” and proceeded to check my fire alarms and fire extinguisher. I was sleeping in at 0800–so I guess it was my fault for them waking me up.
Then at Supper, I got creative and succeeded to order chili cheese fries. The Nepalese man had fries, cheese, and chili all group together–but I don’t think the highly paid American showed him how to mix them together. So through acting out, as if I were a mine, I instructed him to place the fries on the bottom, then the chili, and then the cheese. It was quite comical.
So it is interesting to interact with other cultures.
But my favorite interaction is to go through the Ugandan guards and they know how to say “Hello Chaplain.”