I about went cross eyed shaping the chipmunk piece on Thursday

November 7, 2019 - Thursday evening

21 degrees/clear skies/breezy

Pentoga Road

I'm writing tonight as I'll be at Florence Elementary bright and early to greet the munchkins as they arrive Friday morning.

Thursday was spent in the shop. It was cold and windy and I had no want to be outside. Other than work up a batch of dehydrated apples and eat lunch, the majority of my time was spent sanding and shaping the lowly chipmunk.

I also started turning the hickory blank. Other than pausing every few minutes to put an edge on the chisel, it went well.

I exchanged emails with my longtime friend, Eileen, in Maine earlier today. Her daughter, Stef, and son-in-law, Robb, are teaching in Beirut, Lebanon. I had sent Eileen an article about the student protests currently going on and asked if Stef and Rob's students were involved. 

With Eileen's permission, here is her two part reply:

Hard to tell if any of their students were/are involved.  They teach at a private school and have been out of school for 3 weeks, first week was a planned week of vacation and then 2 full weeks.  They went back to school for half days Tuesday of this week.  Last week they were sending homework/lesson plans via email to parents.   She has not mentioned what the public schools are doing.  Those Lebanese know how to party/protest.  They start mid-afternoon and have 2 shifts of protesters, early evening and midnight thru early morning.  They open the blocked roads for the morning commutes so the kids can go to school mornings this week and they don’t know about regular schools.  I will have to research the history but according to Stef the civil war 30 years ago started when militants commandeered a school bus.  So, no buses for her school this week.  The protesters are now using couches and refrigerators to block intersections and when they think they will get kicked out of that intersection, they just move to another intersection.  They have trucks that go to the protests and have multiple charging stations for phones.  Leave your phone off and go back an hour or two later and it will be there, no one will take it.  AND they have cleanup crews that go in the mornings to clean up debris, all volunteer stuff.  Stef and Robb went one morning as they are early to rise kinda people to help clean up.  Robb can ride his bike okay and the protesters/blockers will actually help him map out routes that have less debris on the roads!!!  They  feel VERY SAFE but money is a HUGE problem.  It is not like a country is trying to overtake them.  The powers that be think the public is like toddlers having a temper tantrum and it will die out soon.  Stef is not so sure.  When the civil war ended 30 years ago, the government that went in was corrupt and it has only gotten worse over the years.  Banks are open very erratically and when they are open, it is hit or miss times of day.  No American money and that was never a problem as Lebanese Pounds is equal to American dollars.  They round up or down for everything as they only have 1 or 2 coins and no tax or at least no tax that is tacked on.  The price is the price.  They can’t get money out of ATM’s this week and she is very afraid that when they do get it out it will be worthless.   They are thinking of going to Cyprus for a weekend just to change money over to Euros.  They took money out of ATM’s every day so they have too much cash hanging round the apartment and can only bring so much back to the US.  There is rumblings that some of the staff will go home for Christmas and forget to come back.  They are shopping countries, but India and China do nothing for them.  They lucked out going to Lebanon 3 years ago as it is a rather normal country compared to those countries.   Google is banned from China even with a new VPN (?) number. 

Update:

          Talked to Stef today.  YES.  Their students are involved in the protests. She said that nothing will change until the protests get messy and maybe violent.  But they are so organized!!!  They are protesting the lack of movement on a new government to be formed.  She says they are so well organized. They organized the protests in 2 weeks and have done more than the government has done in 10 months.  Yesterday it was just the women in the COUNTRY protesting.  If they were too old or sick then they stood on the porches and banged pots and pans. She said it was like 1939!!!!  But the powers that be still do not recognize this as a major concern.  They are still calling it a toddler having a temper tantrum.  Banks are a big issue.  The pay checks go into the banks, but they cannot get any money out.  Today they waited in line 30 minutes to be told they were past the time to get money out.  She was mad.  So, basically it is a human face saying no.  Even in Tripoli the protests are very strong and they are  strong backers of the prime minister but guess they are quite disgusted with the time frame.  And the rules of the banks change daily and each bank is different. 

Thanks, Eileen. Sure is a big world, but definitely getting smaller by the day. Stef and her brother, Andrew, were students of mine from the time they were quite young until they graduated from high school. I taught with Eileen and her husband, Uncle Bert, for years in northern Maine.

Sargie just called and is on her way home from work. I'm looking forward to a relaxing evening sitting by the wood stove.

After all, a man's work is never done.

So are the tales from Pentoga Road...

A Yooper delicacy... a self contained meat and tater pie (and whatever else one wants to throw in) known as a pasty