Irons are the devil. They are easy enough to use when they work well, but you can never predict when they are going to get super hot out of nowhere, or cool down, or leave rust behind.

I can explain the laundry thing!

I don't know.

That sounds a lot like what I use (mix of vinegar, baking soda, bleach, boiling water and scrubbing, depending on the job to be done). It really does the job.

Super offensive.

They have to go to school, but they are much more familiar than non-doctors' children with the medical world, and that gives them a major advantage when trying to get in to a school, when studying, and when making decisions about various specializations.

Interesting!

While my experience of American embassies is all second-hand, I've visited a few Canadian ones and they are indeed terrible. Everything seems set up to make you feel as powerless as possible; decisions are poorly explained and recourses few. And that's as a citizen, things are even worse for people (legitimately! as…

She didn't adopt these children, so it seems bizarre for her to have to employ laws designed for a situation that's quite different from hers.

Entirely with you on the subject of Pete. He's the character that I hate to love.

I think that he what he did was definitely rape. She was in a position where she could lose her job - a job where she is dependent on her employers for room, board, etc. while living in a foreign country - if he should choose to tell on her. Heck, even if she cried out for help, caused a commotion, or tried to fight…

I find her accent in English rather convincing. I know people from that generation who've basically neutralized their ESL accents in ways that people in my generation would refuse, on principle, to do. There is something off about her English pronunciation (the extreme flatness, mostly) that evokes that effort.

The "câlisse" is the only thing that I've found implausible about her manner of speaking! I can buy that her using the term, consciously, in order to make an impression (being young, rebellious, etc.), but I don't think that it had yet entered anyone's lexicon as the automatic swear that it now is (which is how she…

I don't know her personally, but some possibilities (all based on scenarios drawn from friends, family, and colleagues of mine):

There are pit stops! Islands (the Azores, Curaçao, Madeira, etc.) where ships would stop to get fresh water, fresh food, etc. Presumably they may also have become important trade centers, since so many trans-Atlantic ships stopped there.

Although your other points stand, men and boys are often victims of human trafficking. The work they do (like the work women do) is often dangerous, or made dangerous by bad working conditions. I suspect that while sexual abuse is much rarer for adult men than it is for women, it's probably a fact of life for many…

I've never used washcloths (I don't really see what they are supposed to accomplish) and never thought anything of it. When it does come up in conversation (e.g. visiting friends ask to borrow one and learn I don't own any), most people seem to find it disconcerting. Soap should suffice!

Completely agreed. My brother's life isn't worth any less than mine.

I picture him as the Kardashians' mister Bennet.

That makes sense. It's too ad that that's the approach they took, because it isn't that hard to organize something exciting and celebratory but not obscenely expensive (and that doesn't reinforce the idea that only obscenely expensive can be celebratory!).