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My companions who get excited about my construction projects need reminding I am just a poor and lowly civil servant.

I propose modest renovations. They respond with grand designs. I suggest simple and low-cost improvements. They say, “You can do better than that.”

Yes, we paved our road ourselves because the municipality wouldn’t. But that was out of necessity, not because I had spare pocket change.

Those left behind have a lot of misconceptions about those living abroad. New arrivals often quickly learn that resettlement was not all it was cracked up to be.

It’s true that in the past, we have availed of beneficial exchange rates and market conditions, enabling us to achieve there what we couldn’t here.

Either way, that was only possible through frugal living. If our companions imagine me a wealthy entrepreneur, they are sorely mistaken.

I have become a man of means, by God’s mercy, but not of great means. Whatever I have achieved has been by the grace of God alone.