Differences...They Make The World Go 'Round

In the Foreign Service, I had the privilege of serving in Honduras, Oman, Pakistan and then, after retirement, I was asked to go to Singapore and now Brunei. During my years of service I had the chance to observe how things are done differently in every country, many times with the same or very different result.  It's not that one way of doing things is right or wrong, but just different. The following things happened to me or someone I worked with at one of my posts overseas.  For those of you who follow me on this blog and are members of the Foreign Service, I'm sure you can relate and probably have many of your own examples!

·        You're driving and you need to change lanes.

o   Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei - You put your turn signal on. The acceptable culture is that the car in the lane you wish to be in slows down and allows you to enter their lane.

o   U.S. - Hell no! You can't come in my lane! I'm going to speed up and close the gap. So there! Often you end up passing your turn and making a U-turn to come back to it. Or you bully your way into the lane.

·        You are pushing your basket down the aisle in a grocery store.

o   Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei - There is a clerk sitting on the floor stocking items on a lower shelf. She has several boxes on the floor and there is not enough room for you to pass. You end up turning around and going back the way you came. She never looks up.

o   U.S. - The clerk quickly stands up, moves the boxes and apologizes. Often nothing needs to happen because the aisles are nice and wide.

·        Security has told you to vary your route driving to and from work (the embassy) to avoid being predictable.

o   Tegucigalpa, Honduras - One route is pot hole-free as you know it. You change your route and hit 4 pot holes large enough to have their own zip codes. You also drive into a hole in the road that is missing its man hole cover, probably being used as a cook top somewhere.

o   U.S. - No need to vary your route to work unless you hear a bulletin on the radio about a wreck.

·        You need to buy some chicken for a fried chicken dinner.

o   Bandar Seri Begawan,Brunei - You wander back to the meat department, following your nose. Chicken is in open cases, self serve style, each one with differing chicken parts. You pick up the tongs and pick your pieces. You also have chicken feet, tiny chickens and oddly chopped pieces to choose from. You shoo away a fly. The man next to you moves a few pieces with his hand, looking for just the right piece.

o   U.S. - You look at packages, carefully sealed with 'sell by' dates printed on them, all marked USDA Inspected and monitored carefully by the people in the meat department. You can also choose from chicken in a glass enclosed case. No fly is seen.

·        You and your friend want to go to the mall to do a little shopping.

o   Karachi, Pakistan - You request a vehicle from the Security Officer, making sure there is a driver and body guard available to go with you. Once at the mall, you must stay together and not more than 6 feet from your body guard. Fortunately, you can go in the fitting room by yourself.

o   U.S. - You drive to the mall.

·        You decide you want to go to the beach for a swim.

o   Muscat, Oman - It's June and a great day for a swim. You drive to one of the many beautiful beaches.  It's 115⁰.  You park the car and start walking toward the water. OMG...the sand is blazing hot! Half way to the water, you begin to run and by the time you get there, you have 2nd degree burns on the bottom of your feet. But the water is gorgeous and feels so good on your feet. You enjoy swimming in your shorts and tee shirt.

o   U.S. - It's a great 86⁰. You walk to the beach, lay down your towel and ice chest and stroll toward the water in your ittsy bittsy bikini.

·        You aren't feeling well, probably need to take something.

o   Tegucigalpa, Honduras - You go to the drug store and choose from any number of antibiotics, anti diarrhea meds or strong pain killers.  You choose 3 different medicines that you think will help it and pay the $5.00 for all.

o   U.S. - You call your doctor and find out they can't see you for 3 weeks. You try the neighborhood clinic in the neighborhood drugstore and after 45 minutes of paperwork, they tell you that you really need to see your personal physician. You grab a bottle of Advil and hope it helps somewhat while you wait the 3 weeks to see your doctor.  Three weeks later, you see the doctor and his $275 bill is all applied to your deductible.

·        You need to drive your kids to school.

o   Tegucigalpa, Honduras - You pile all 3 kids in the car and head to the school. Due to the security risk, you have your emergency radio with you and hear a warning that demonstrators have blocked the road to school. You struggle with an alternate route but end up having to go back home due to the threat of violence.

o   U.S. - You pile all 3 kids in the car and head to school. You arrive 5-10 minutes later and pull into the drop off lane. Kids kiss you and head into school.

·        You need a new pair of black pants for work.

o   Bandar Seri Begawan - You go online, find a pair at a Big Box Store and place your order. You get an email confirming your purchase. You immediately get an email cancelling your order. For the next 2 weeks you exchange emails with Big Box Store with no one able to explain why your order was cancelled. Extremely angry, you search for an email address for Big Box Store. You find one in New York and fire off an angry letter. A week later you receive an email thanking your your business and patience and oh gee, we just can't explain why your order was cancelled. Please place the order again. And by the way, we will give you free shipping on your next order. Six weeks later you get your black pants.

o   U.S. - You head to any Big Box Store near you, find the pants, try them on, pay for them and head home.

When The Check Stops...

When you're young or even middle age, the thought of retiring seems like a distant galaxy that you'll really never arrive at.  You think...I'll start saving. I'll start participating in the company's 401(k). I'll start an Emergency Fund. I really need to start saving.  You say, 'Honest I will.'  Next month.

I didn't start to get serious about saving until I was in my 40s.  I had a good job and my employers had a Profit Sharing Plan.  It's like a 401(k) but it's based on how well the company does, hence the name Profit Sharing.  It's a great idea...employees come to realize that the better their bosses do, the better their contribution to the Profit Sharing Plan will be.  When I left my employers to join the FS, (and they were just about the best guys in the world), I left with about $90K in my account that was 100% contributed by them. That was my seed money for today.

In 2007 when I joined the Foreign Service, I immediately began participating in their 401(k)-like program called the Thrift Saving Plan (TSP).  There was matching contributions and I could contribute what I wanted, up to the maximum allowed by law.  I was 59 at the time and knew I would only have 6 years in this, my second career.  I had taken a cut in pay to take the job so I decided to contribute much less than the maximum.  A year later, I bumped it up to the max and also started adding the "Catch Up" amount, which is for those 59 and over.  That's so you can...well, catch up.  My money began to grow.  The TSP did great and I felt good about the dreaded Age 65 Exit from the Foreign Service.

My last 2 years were in Pakistan and because it was Pakistan, those of us who volunteered to serve there were rewarded with Danger Pay and a Differential.  The Danger Pay is self explanatory.  The Differential is an add on to your salary to make up for the level of difficulty of the post and can vary from one country/city to another due to the cost of living, hardships, etc.  Because of this, I was able to save money like a mad woman. When I retired I was able to put a very large down payment on my home in Texas.

Dropping from a 6 figure salary to just Social Security and a small pension from Uncle Sam is a big adjustment.  But when you plan for it, it can be very manageable.  But I'm the kind of person who is always looking for added security.  I'm single with no one to turn to in a financial emergency.  I've found several ways to supplement my income and hopefully to not have to begin taking a monthly draw on my investments until I am forced to at age 70 1/2.  Let me tell you how.

For the year leading up to joining the FS, my friend and I would go to estate sales every week, buy stuff and then list them on Ebay.  I also had 2 part time jobs after leaving my terrific employers.  But it's Ebay that was the most fun.  As soon as I returned to Texas, I started doing it again.  Just about every month I make enough selling on Ebay to cover my house payment.  When my PayPal account reaches a certain set threshold, I transfer some to my bank. It works like a charm.  If any of you frequent Ebay and want to see my auction, just do a search on the site for yayato3boys.  My 3 grandsons call me Yaya, hence the name.  And for my DOS friends serving overseas, I do ship to APO and DPO addresses.

I love photography...always have.  And after traveling all over the world, I have some pretty good photographs.  I have found 2 online sites where I can sell my photographs.  One is fineartamerica.com and the other is on Etsy.com.  Both places do all the credit card transactions so I don't have to worry about that.  To find me on Fine Art America, just do a search for my name and to find me on Etsy, the name of my store is my name...DebiDemetrion.  On FAA, you can have my photographs printed in all different sizes, matted or not, made into cases for your smart phone or even greeting cards.  It's very cool.  On Etsy, I am currently offering my photographs in 3 different common sizes.

Why am I telling you all this?  Well, the obvious reason is that I hope you'll visit one of the sites and order a photograph or bid on one of the many terrific items I have on my Ebay auction.  But there are a couple of other reasons I'm writing this.  One, to stress the importance of planning ahead for a huge financial change in your life when you retire and to stress that you need to start early putting money away for retirement.  The other is to let you know that there are many ways of generating income once you retire.  Find something you love to do and then find an outlet for it.  I've been retired now for 8 months and am still looking for the best way to market my skills.  I may find better ways later, but for now, this seems to be working for me.  And the longer I can leave my money in investments and hope it grows, the better.

Good luck!  And happy shopping!

Winding Down

As expected, I have mixed emotions about leaving the Foreign Service. As the days and weeks go by and I approach my June 20 departure date from Karachi, I've reflected on the good times I've had and how those memories will be with me forever.  I'll miss so much of this lifestyle when I make my transition to retired person.  But I'm also excited about returning to Texas and now that I finally heard that I am a homeowner once again, I am thinking about what all I will now have time to do in that house to put my stamp on it.  I know all my carpets will look beautiful on the floors.  I was lucky to find a house with no/no wall to wall carpet, so I won't have to rip anything up!

 

These past 6 years have been so good; I don’t even know where to start listing what I’ll miss when I return to a normal life.  Probably the biggest thing I’ll miss is working with the local staff at the posts…Tegucigalpa, Muscat and Lahore.  Unless you are exposed to other cultures and people in other countries, you can’t appreciate how much I will miss this part of my job.  Living in America, we tend to believe that our way is the best way, the only way and any other ‘way’ is unacceptable.  This is totally not the case. I've learned so much from the Hondurans, Omanis and Pakistanis.  Not only do you learn that there’s more than one way to do something, depending on your circumstances, what supplies you have to work with and the skills you have to get the job done, you also learn that that your way may not be the best for all.  And the way of doing business around the world is amazing.  When I was in Oman as well as here in Pakistan, I would look at carpets…gorgeous, expensive hand knotted carpets.  There would be 30 carpets unrolled in front of me and the shop keeper would say…”Take some home with you and see how you like them.”  Hey, we’re talking over $1000 per carpet and this man is telling me to just take a few home.  “Pay me later”, he says…”or bring them back.  It’s OK.”  Of course, they knew that once you got it home, you’d fall in love with it even more and the carpet would never be returned.  You would go back the next day or week with cash in hand, thanking him profusely for letting you take them home to see just how you liked them.  Can you see Macy’s doing that?  Heck no.  There’s also a place in Islamabad who would sell items and, knowing we were diplomats and would be leaving in a year or 2, would buy back the items you had bought (less a small percentage) when you moved on if you decided you didn't want to keep them.  It’s kind of like a rental service for local items without having to keep them forever if you don’t want to.  This helps you avoid the problem of accumulating a ton of things at each post around the world.  After a 20 year career, I can imagine a home looking like a museum!

What will I not miss?  That list deals mostly with the quality of life.  It will be nice to be able to drink the water from the tap again.  I will love being in the same time zone as friends.  Being able to pick up the phone and call my doctor, insurance company, or whoever it might be that I have a problem with instead of waiting a week for emails to bounce back and forth.  And I will not miss being chauffeured around!  I can’t wait to get my car back!  And I won't have to soak my vegetables in bleach water.  

There’s another thing that I’ll have to deal with when I return home.  I've had the greatest opportunity to travel the world and see things that most people never get the chance to see…and experience things that others will never experience.  I’ll have to be very careful to not go on and on about my travels and experiences when with friends.  I have photo books with photos I've taken that I’ll leave out and if people ask, I will be happy to talk about my travels.  I may need to find an outlet for my love of places I've been…maybe the library or schools that sponsor things like this where I can share my experiences.  As much as I want to share where I've been and what I've seen, I don’t want to bore my friends.  I can see their eyes rolling and them thinking…’here she goes again.’

I can’t wait for what’s in store for me…

Carpets and rugs...Rugs and carpets

Many of my friends have asked me about the carpets/rugs I've acquired over the 4 years I've served in the Middle East.  I decided it would be a good thing to build another blog with pictures of them and a bit of information on each one.  This serves 2 purposes.  One, it is a great way for me to share my love of these things and it's also a great way to catalog them so I never forget the information about them.  I've also tried to share knowledge on hand knotted rugs/carpets, writing a bit about each one.  And you can read when it's a rug and when it's a carpet there too along with other bits of information about this wonderful craft.

I will be flying home tonight (3/31) for my final R&R and my time will be consumed with looking for and buying a home to move into when I return to Fort Worth as a retiree July 1, 2014.  Having little to no carpets in the house is at the top of the list.  My 27 rugs/carpets will look beautiful on the floors!

You can find my blog, Irresistible Temptations, here...www.couldnotsayno.blogspot.com. Once I upload all of my carpets, I'll add other things I just couldn't leave behind! 

Hand Knotted Carpets 101

I’m now on my 3^rd and final tour with the Foreign Service, serving in Lahore, Pakistan. Oh, how I wish it were not my final tour but mandatory retirement will shove me out the door June 30, 2014. 

While serving in Muscat, Oman, I fell in love with the hand knotted wool and silk carpets that were available.  I am the proud owner of 15 gorgeous carpets, some wool on wool, some silk on silk.  And if you have never had the pleasure of walking on a silk carpet, you’re missing out on a real treat.  These carpets are really works of art and beautiful on the floor or hanging on the wall.  I jokingly said I needed to enroll in the 12 Step Program for carpet purchasing!  Well, I’m  once again back where carpets are produced and recently I had an experience (and temptation) I won’t soon forget.

Several of us from the Consulate took a trip to the Lahore Carpet Manufacturing Co. (www.lahorecarpet.com) here in Lahore, Pakistan.  This was my Disneyland moment in Pakistan!  I learned so much about how the carpets are produced and brought to market.  I now understand why these things of beauty cost so much.  I’ve always believed that each one was an investment and now that I’ve seen just what goes into the making of a hand knotted carpet I understand why they cost what they do.   This is just one more reason why I am grateful to have served in this region with the opportunity to buy and learn about this wonderful art form.  Leading the tour of this 150,000 square foot facility with over 400 employees were the 3 partners of the company. Their father established the company in 1949 and they are carrying on the tradition he began over 60 years ago.  This is an art that goes back to the 5th century BC.  I was amazed at the entire process, from the way the colors are established to just how many times each carpet is inspected before it is ready to hand over to its new owner.  We were told that the U.S. is their biggest customer, with approximately 60% of their business going to Americans.  Believe me when I tell you that designers are beating down their door for these carpets, another reason that these carpets are an investment!  Turkey is another good customer, so if you’ve served in Istanbul and bought a carpet there, it could actually be from Pakistan.  China, who used to enjoy the majority of the market in hand woven carpets, is now one of their customers, due to the economy.  Below is my photo trip through the Lahore Carpet Manufacturing Co.  Enjoy!

Initial designs are hand drawn on graph paper and filled in with color.   The designs then go to the people who write the ‘code’ or special language called Talim, which is what tells the weaver which colors to use on each line.  The design originals are archived and copies are sent to the weavers.  I was surprised to learn that weavers are located all over Pakistan and Afghanistan.  None of the weaving is done on site and we were assured that no child labor was used in the making of these carpets…and no child was seen on our tour.  I asked about the workday hours and was told that the work schedule is 8 hours a day, strictly enforced.  

Once the design is complete (the picture  below is a part of the completed design on the graph paper), the yarn is dyed.  Color schemes are driven by styles and trends…they already have the colors that are scheduled to be in style for 2013-14.  This information is vital in order to get the wool and have it dyed and meet the carpet demand 1-2 years in advance. Their wool comes from all over…Australia, Afghanistan and New Zealand to name a few.  Some sheep are sheared once a year, yielding a longer strand, others twice a year with shorter strands. This all comes into play in carpet manufacturing. 

Depending on the complexity of the design, size of the carpet and the number of knots per square inch (the most important detail), it could take 2 years for one weaver to make a carpet. Sometimes 2-3 people will work on the same carpet at the same time, reducing the time to completion.  Once complete, it is sent back to Lahore and their process of finishing it and readying it for sale begins.

The carpets are received and inspected.  They are then cleaned, and I mean scrubbed!  They are then laid outside in the large courtyard on clean river rocks to dry, or in some cases, hung out to dry! Carpets are hung wherever there is room to hang them!  The weather is watched and if the forecast is for rain, the carpets are brought inside. 

Once they are dry, the process of getting them ready for sale begins. They are inspected over and over, at every step in the process. This results in finding small errors in the pattern which are corrected by a team. The rugs are stretched to make sure they are exactly straight and true to measurements.  Rows are checked to make sure they line up the way they are supposed to.  After each process they are once again cleaned.  I learned that lots of water will NOT hurt your carpet!  The backs of the carpets are hit with fire to seal the knots and keep them from coming loose.

When the carpets are received from the weavers, they are not trimmed to the short length you're used to seeing; they're really shaggy.  So, off to the room where the shaving takes place!  There are different lengths to a pile and these men have instructions on just how short to shave each carpet.  They have electric ‘razors’ with rotating blades. I didn’t see any guides on them so I assume they just know low, medium or high. After the shaving, the carpets go in a tumbler that removes any excess wool that was shaved off, even though there is a vacuum that sucks up most of the shaved wool. By the way, the many bags of shaved wool are donated to a group who use it for stuffing for cushions and other puffy things.  Nothing is wasted in this process!

Then it’s off to the binding area, where the men stitch around the edge, just inside the fringe, making sure the rug is securely stitched so that nothing unravels.  Once that’s done, it goes to another section for further inspection, stretching, corrections and even re-dying.  Yes, due to demands, more bright colors are being requested by the younger generation of carpet lovers.  Colors like purple, pink and teal!  So, once a rug is completed in the colors of the Talim, the carpet is re-colored by hand.  Yes, the browns, beiges, blacks or reds are transformed to pink, purple, orange or fuscia, depending on the order.  All of us just shook our heads but if the demand is there, you have to supply.  They even have carpets that are a patchwork.  They cut up completed carpets and then stitch them back together to form one patchwork carpet and then (ugh) they are “over colored” to a palette of all blues or purples or reds.  None of us liked this process, but again…supply and demand. 

Once the carpet has been through this long process, it finally makes it to the showroom floor. The showroom is actually like a large warehouse where stacks and stacks of carpets wait to be sold, shipped or repaired.  They are organized by style, size, technique and price.  And those over colored ones?  Those have a place in the back corner! You can see some in the picture below...not my favorites.

This is when we had the opportunity to shop…at wholesale prices!  I found one I liked and it has been delivered to me and has a home under my dining table.  Before it was delivered, it went through one final inspection to insure it was perfect.  One more carpet to add to my collection!  That's it below!

My new carpet!

This tour gave me an increased respect for this art.  In Oman, I was told that the youth in the Kashmir region, where most of the carpets came from, are not interested in learning this skill from their elders.  We can thank the computer age for this reluctance to carry on tradition.  I fear that one day, all carpets will be made by machine and we will have lost yet another art done by hand to machines.  Machine made carpets are beautiful, but just not the same as hand made.  How can you tell if a carpet is made by hand or by machine?  I’ve been told to take a close look at the fringe.  A hand made carpet will have fringe that is an extension of the weave of the carpet, as the fringe runs all the way through the carpet to the opposite end. A machine made carpet will have fringe that is sewn on and you should be able to see this.

The picture here shows how the design charts are bundled and saved. I asked if they had a good sprinkler system in case of fire.  He told me they were in the process of scanning all designs in the computers so they will never lose them. 

All dyes are natural.  These are some examples of the colors used. Brown is never always the same old brown...the varying shades of colors is endless. 

I’m being realistic when I say I am not done buying carpets. I have about 22 months left to serve here in Pakistan and I know there will be more trips to this carpet company. And when I return, I hope to pick up more details that I missed this trip, as well as another carpet or two. 

I love my life.