Expat Trouble

I’m frozen in terror. Our kamikaze driver is writing, eyes down, one hand on the steering wheel. The car is drifting into the left lane . . .

In Indonesia, my four-year-old expat daughter is outraged and in tears, suffering from a culture crisis. Is it funny?

I stare at my funky self in the mirror. What to do? Screaming is hard work, so I decide to be Zen about it. It is what it is. Hair will grow back.

Here she was, a lapsed Lutheran female in a smelly animal market trying to buy a sheep from a long-robed male Muslim trader. Oh, the things you learn!

Straight out if the movies: Four good-looking, rugged guys on camels with meters of cloth wrapped around their heads to protect against sand and sun — dusty, dirty and starving. Dutch and American, they show their true colors when looking for food.