CC and R's Would Help A Lot

The covenant condition restriction (CC and R's) establishes the general rules and guidelines that homeowners within a community agree to abide by. These rules may include requirement/restrictions on outbuildings, house color, the general appearance of your home, etc. These rules are designed to help keep up the appearance of the neighbor (thereby protecting home values), and in condominium situations, they're also designed to "keep the peace" amongst neighbors since people are living in close proximity to each other.

Living on a expat compound is not being a homeowner, however that does not mean that CC and R's would not help in building a better living community. In fact, I think it's doubly important when you have people from all over the world trying to reside next door to each other. People born in Third World countries tend to have a different idea about what is appropriate with it comes to being neighborly than those of use who come from the west. So you can imagine the frustration one would feel when you have one neighbor who is let's say for the sake of argument Palestinian and the other is British. The Palestinian believes with all his might that his children have the right to play outside all hours of the day or night, in their neighbors yard, destroying their plants (i.e. personal property), etc. Then you have the British family who comes from a culture in which intruding on someone's space in such a manner is rude, beastly, and inconsiderate. These two are going to have problems. And, such is the case all over camp. I've heard stories of people trying to keep chickens on the compound at their houses. Seriously. And, the person who's rooster is waking up its neighbors at the break of dawn doesn't seem to get that this is a nuisance to everyone around them, but the biggest part is that they don't seem to care. There seems to be an uncanny ability to ignore how one's behavior has an affect on those around them. This makes for a lot of tense situations.

So, on camp, could we benefit from CC and R's? Absolutely. In fact, due to the level of too many different cultures trying to reside in a small space (both in land mass and due to the houses being connected; a lot of homes are duplexes) there is bound to be problems. CC and R's would/could insure that these problems are handle in a fair manner based on the agreed to rules, and not based on a persons nationality, race, or religion.

With my limited experience in living in this type of situation, I understand some of the effects and issues that arise out of so-called multiculturalism. Chancellor Angela Merkel stated in a press conference that it doesn't work. I think I agree. Now, we don't want the Germans rising up against any group. LOL. We all know how that turned out. But, I sympathize.