The Front Porch Swing

[Beekissed]

GOOD GRIEF!!!! I've been gone not quite a week, and am over 100 PAGES behind! WOAH!

Guess what I did this morning!!!!!!

You were missed!

And I love these pics!!! I'm so pleased to see a young couple bringing up their children to help with the growing and gleaning of food for the family...it's a dying concept in this world and I am so proud of you for making them a part of all that learning and doing.

Bee (or anyone else), I would like to pick your brain on electric netting fence. What do you keep it charged with? How well does it work? Thinking of getting one but they look complicated, which I doubt they are, so I must be over thinking it.

It's very, very simple. I used a solar charger, which has pros and cons....pros are that you can move it anywhere and don't have to have an electric source. Cons are, if you have a weed or twig shorting out your fence it will drain your solar charger pretty quickly, and this won't happen with an electric charger.

If I were going to use it for a permanent paddock, I'd lay down black plastic under the fence line and pin it down, then erect the fence, and I'll tell you why...the biggest pain of the electronetting is keeping the grass, twigs, leaves, weeds, etc. from touching it and causing a short. You have to move it and mow, then move it back. If you are going to move it to a fresh paddock, you have to mow a fence line under it and then move to the mowed fence line to get any use out of it before you have to mow the fenceline again. If I ever used it again I'd do the black plastic weed suppression right under the fencing so that I never have to worry about the fence shorting out or moving the fence to mow under it.

 

[enola]

I don't move the fence and then move it back. I mow right by the fence. Move the fence over. And then mow the other side of the fence. Next time I mow I repeat the same action. That way you only have to move the fence once each time you mow.

 

[Oldmomma]

Well as for life here when I came in 2006, I got a good picture of how the community was since everyone for few miles around is somehow related. Libya is more moderate than you would expect in fact well into the 70s you would think you were in a western society. The last ruler set them back but there are many who either lived abroad or travel widely that influence a majority of public perception. It varies by family and even within my husbands family I see great diversity. While many of the older generations speak many languages, the past 30 yrs english was banned in all but a few instances. Its resurgence here is amazing but it wasnt just english but native Amazigh was banned as well and its now free to learn. Libya has a high literacy rate and is number 1 in recitation of holy scripture per capita. While all of my sil were educated only 2 dont have degrees. Most women here educate to bachelor's or Masters degrees. More than 75% work outside the home, drive and play active roles in their communities. While my fil and mil might be old fashioned its my mil who has the hardest seeing as her education was minimal and is only now learned to read at 70 yrs old. There are very backwards thinking folks here to but I know many women american and uk born who have lived here for over 20 yrs and would not think to return to their homelands. Im getting to experience life in a place that some days you could turn and expect to see disciples of Jesus walk past yet find all the comforts of modern life a block over. I remember seeing an old neighbor years after they moved from my block. He was divorced and in debt struggling to make ends meet. He told me he wished they had never moved away, they were so busy keeping up with the jones's they lost what was most important, family, faith and love.
Media makes it seem much worse than it is and I was talking to another american lady today about the threat of another war, but my faith in God helps me see that this current situation needs to happen, their identity has been stripped from them, faith was rammed down throats or carved up to suit personal agendas and now that they have seen beyond the walls they want what is out there but not at the cost of faith. Too many youth here to keep the country repressed again but enough that respect the values of faith to keep it a moderate culture. Right now so many countries are playing the political game of what can we take advantage of while they sort out what they want. I will continue to liken this country to the book Time Machine. The morlocks are dead and 3 books have been brought...what will they learn? There is some bias about the west here but part of that was propaganda, how the west helps them move forward will do more to shape future generations.

 

[Triple Willow]

Iran ought to be a lesson to all countries in that region. If not Iran, Egypt.

 

[RachaelS]

Quote: I want some of that strawberry goodness

Thanks Bee was kind of worried about that also. We tend to get super hot and dry here and that has it's own issues.

 

[Triple Willow]

Sometimes I really forget to be thankful. Here's a pic of some of our brothers and sisters in the Sudan. No doubt most of our chicken coops are nicer than the hoop coop style "houses" that they live in. Not only that, I bet our chickens eat much better than those people do. Lord forgive me.

(PPF Sudan)

 

[Tomtommom]

Sometimes I really forget to be thankful.

Here's a pic of some of our brothers and sisters in the Sudan. No doubt most of our chicken coops are nicer than the hoop coop style "houses" that they live in. Not only that, I bet our chickens eat much better than those people do. Lord forgive me.

(PPF Sudan)

Sometimes I would like to trade for a while though. Not worry about trivial crap, no time to be 'depressed'. No day wasted online, doing nothing.

You focus on food and water and shelter, and cherish even the smallest bit of food you get.

It's like those survival shows on TV.. the joy a person can get from a small bit of food. A fish or rabbit caught, a sip of fresh water after not having any for two days. Stuff like that makes you feel alive.

I so often feel like I just go through the motions. I fear I thrive on stress.. when I'm too busy surviving to be worrying about other things. Like right now, so many things I want to do, I don't know where to start and I end up doing nothing at all. I need adrenaline

 

[perchie.girl]

Well as for life here when I came in 2006, I got a good picture of how the community was since everyone for few miles around is somehow related. Libya is more moderate than you would expect in fact well into the 70s you would think you were in a western society.

The last ruler set them back but there are many who either lived abroad or travel widely that influence a majority of public perception. It varies by family and even within my husbands family I see great diversity. While many of the older generations speak many languages, the past 30 yrs english was banned in all but a few instances. Its resurgence here is amazing but it wasnt just english but native Amazigh was banned as well and its now free to learn.

Libya has a high literacy rate and is number 1 in recitation of holy scripture per capita. While all of my sil were educated only 2 dont have degrees. Most women here educate to bachelor's or Masters degrees. More than 75% work outside the home, drive and play active roles in their communities.

While my fil and mil might be old fashioned its my mil who has the hardest seeing as her education was minimal and is only now learned to read at 70 yrs old. There are very backwards thinking folks here to but I know many women american and uk born who have lived here for over 20 yrs and would not think to return to their homelands.

Im getting to experience life in a place that some days you could turn and expect to see disciples of Jesus walk past yet find all the comforts of modern life a block over. I remember seeing an old neighbor years after they moved from my block. He was divorced and in debt struggling to make ends meet. He told me he wished they had never moved away, they were so busy keeping up with the jones's they lost what was most important, family, faith and love.

Media makes it seem much worse than it is and I was talking to another american lady today about the threat of another war, but my faith in God helps me see that this current situation needs to happen, their identity has been stripped from them, faith was rammed down throats or carved up to suit personal agendas and now that they have seen beyond the walls they want what is out there but not at the cost of faith.

Too many youth here to keep the country repressed again but enough that respect the values of faith to keep it a moderate culture. Right now so many countries are playing the political game of what can we take advantage of while they sort out what they want.

I will continue to liken this country to the book Time Machine. The morlocks are dead and 3 books have been brought...what will they learn? There is some bias about the west here but part of that was propaganda, how the west helps them move forward will do more to shape future generations.

Thank you for this insight.

I have a friend who lived and worked in Israel on an agricultural Kibbutz. When Denise graduated high school her parents thought she should see some of the world before she went off to college. They gave her 2000 dollars and airfare to England, and told her not to come back till her money ran out. She went with a girlfriend travel buddy. This was back in the early 70's.

They did the usual stuff sight seeing but were very frugal with thier money... At the time Europe was a pretty easy place to get about on very little money. They stayed in Hostels and Walked or rode bikes or took trains to get where ever they wanted to go. By the end of a year they were in Italy and she was working in a shoe shop selling shoes. She was one of those people who pick up language pretty quickly.

Its been along time since I was told this story so my brain is pretty fuzzy. But again they made their way along the Mediteranean and eventually wound up in Isreal. She learned how to speak and read Hebrew as well. They were in Israel for almost a year before they decided to come home.

So for a plane ticket and 2000 bucks to start she was gone a good two years and had a whole life's worth of experiences under her belt. By the way I believe that was back when Iraq was still called Persia.

deb

 

[Triple Willow]

Tomtommom, I bet you wouldn't want to take your children with you on that swap. People over there are starving to death, literally. Many of them are being killed by their government as they scurry around looking for food and water. I forgot what the death toll is. It's in the millions. Many are also being taken as slaves. I agree on the trivial things that we have our lives filled with though. I have thought a lot on that lately.

 

[Alice28]

GOOD GRIEF!!!! I've been gone not quite a week, and am over 100 PAGES behind! WOAH! Guess what I did this morning!!!!!!

Yum!