PhotoADay May: It All Begins With J

Jammies!

The PhotoADay theme for today, May 1 2014, is ...

"Begins With J"

It was too dark out when I got around to it to get my planned image of the girls Jumping on the trampoline in Grandma and Papa G's backyard here in Mesa, AZ.

So instead I give you a sweet image of the girls, ready for bed in their matching jammies.

These were a gift from Grandma and Papa G when we visited at Christmastime and they treated all 10 grandkids (and parents) to a ride on the Polar Express train. Wonderful memories!

I realize this PhotoADay thing may be better suited to those (not me!) with photography aspirations or at least an iPhone with filters and whatnot, but this will at least get me on here every day with an illustrated post, which I think -- I think -- is better than nothing.

Back By Popular Demand

Time to fire up the ol' blog, there are big changes afoot!

This web log started when I was single, living in VA. It continued when I got married, moved to Argentina for two years, and had our now-four-year-old daughter, Nile. Some of our next three years in Botswana were chronicled -- but not the birth and delightful infancy of our lovely, now-17-month-old, daughter Pilar. Sorry, baby girl!

Now it is time for the biggest change of all, and I keep being asked if I'll start blogging again, so here goes.

A mere 18 days from today we will relocate to deepest, darkest Western Europe! Switzerland, to be exact! We will begin a new phase of our lives in the lovely (at least in the Google images) Swiss capital of Bern, pronounced "BAY-urn" by those in the know. Consider yourself in the know!

I am not the biggest social media participant, and living in Africa for three years with slow internet and no smartphone didn't make it easy to keep up on this blog or Facebook.

I keep seeing the Facebook hashtag #fmsphotoaday. About five minutes ago I finally got curious enough to look it up. Photo a Day is apparently not just posting a photo every day -- there is a suggested theme for each day; for instance today, Sunday, April 27 the theme is "Under my feet."

The themes are published from Australia on the last Monday of the preceding month, so quite coincidentally when I looked it up, guess what? It's Monday in Australia! I got to see the list of daily themes for May 2014, a very big month for me and my family. And that was the impetus for writing today's blog entry.

On Thursday, May 15, 2014 we board a plane in Phoenix. On Friday, May 16, we touch down in Zurich.

The respective themes for those days are "From Where I Walk" and "Create."

So appropriate, how could I not take this as an invitation to begin blogging again? Our first weeks in Switzerland include the photo a day themes of Sunrise, Neighborhood, Meal, Unique ... I think this will be a fun way to document my first impressions of our new environment!

New Developments

There is a lot of development going on here in Gaborone.

A "5-star" hotel and office space anchor a brand-new, mini town centre -- walking distance from our house (although there are no sidewalks for us to walk there).

Is this what you thought Botswana looks like?

Gaborone's first coffee shop.

Office space with a restaurant and fountains below.

It's surprising and exciting to me, too. The centre is modern and has a few new restaurants, a spa, and some shopping -- clothing, gift, and home decor boutiques, a Bang and Olufsen, and an Apple store! (Turns out I don't think they are actually a licensed Apple retailer ...), and my hair stylist opened his own salon there. Love that all of this is so close to my house! It is also halfway between my house and the office, very convenient.

We went to dinner with friends at the new French restaurant, La Touche de Provence, in the hotel. Great food.

Appetizer: Mussels and sauce with garnish n a pastry round. Still craving more!

Appetizer: Blue cheese souffle.

Kingklip (white fish) on polenta.

Kingklip on potatoes.

Stuffed chicken.

Rack of lamb.

Desserts: Apple crumble and fruit compote.

 

To appreciate all of this, you have to realize that NONE OF THIS DEVELOPMENT was here when I arrived a year and a half ago. It's quite a juxtaposition; the area surrounding the new developments are still bush, with scrub trees, thorn bushes, and dirt paths.

Feeding the Pets

Nile loves to feed the pets.

Luckily they're quite patient with her.

Don't worry, they get fed in separate bowls, Nile just likes to ration out Bolu's (the little toy poodle) food to Mr. Chips (the big dog) sometimes!

In South Africa

While in Pretoria, South Africa, we went with our friends to a gift shop that had all kinds of items, big and small.

I was nervous to turn my back on this trio. My rational mind assured me they were stuffed. But I think some animal instinct inside me said "DANGER!"  It was unnerving.

Did you notice this guy in the corner of the pic above? I don't know what to say about him, either.

But his friend looked quite ferocious.

 

The store had all kinds of stuff, but I was most tempted by the zebra-skin rugs. I hope to get one as a souvenir of living in Africa!

The next day I met a friend for brunch at an adorable little place called Isabella's.

I miss having a proper bakery to go to!

I did get some cookies to share. The food was outstanding, I had the toasted smoked salmon, egg &  cream cheese bagel:

"Smeared with cream cheese, topped with smoked salmon, spring onion, sliced avocado, capers, gherkins, pickled onion, parsley, creamy goats cheese & fresh sauce made with mayonnaise."

It was DELICIOUS! Made me miss "real" food all the more.

We had a great time just hanging out. Neil enjoyed imitating their mini-bulldog, Rugby.

Katie and I are both due with our second babies about a week apart! Hopefully we get posted together one day so the kids can be friends.

When it finally came time for us to head home, we felt like we had enjoyed a mini vacation in the city. On the drive home, I saw the countryside with a little clearer perspective: Desolate, but beautiful in its starkness.

Drive to South Africa

Last weekend we went to visit friends in Pretoria, the capital of South Africa.

It was a lot of fun getting together. They are pre-FS friends who have now joined and are in their first tour. That brings the count to 3 of families that we were friends with before this overseas journey began who have now joined too! I'd like to take credit ;)

The drive to Pretoria from Gaborone, including the border crossing (getting out of the car and going through customs and immigration) takes about 5 1/2 hours. Some people I work with say it takes them 3 hours. They are lying.

I am not a fan of long road trips, and I consider 5 1/2 hrs. quite long. Of course, other people I know go on multi-day road trips throughout the region. Road conditions in this part of the world are not great and much of the roads are through desolate areas, which scare me, so it's not particularly my cup of tea.

But anyway we made the trip last weekend and here is some photo documentation of the drive down:

A lot of the way looks like this.

And this.

Yes, we drive on the "wrong" side of the road here. And yes, it's mostly 2-lane roads, so passing can be difficult. It is also dangerous to drive too fast, especially at night, because donkeys, goats, cattle, not to mention wildlife, or even people, can come out in the road at any time and cause an accident.


Most of the drive, Nile looked like this.

And I tried to look like this.

Zeerust is the first town after the border, about 30 mi. (no, I don't do kilometers) into South Africa, and it looks like this.

People sell crafts outside the shopping center

Rustenburg is the next notable town, about an hour and a half outside of Pretoria, and a good place to stop and eat because .... do you see what I see??

THE GOLDEN ARCHES!!!!!

Yes, Rustenberg is best known by folks here in Botswana because it has a McDonald's!!!! Don't judge, you'd be amazed how much you miss and crave it when you live in a country that does not have McDonald's, or any other type of American fast food (OK, there is KFC, with the only drive-through of any kind in Botswana) and the local fare is otherwise unremarkable.

They had just reopened this location after extensive renovations, there was a radio station broadcasting from the restaurant and a whole van of school kids with their teachers.

Cute little South African schoolboys.

There was an atmosphere of excitement, balloons, and an appearance by Ronald McDonald himself!

I seriously love this picture. I don't know what Neil was doing behind the camera. Or why he chanced it with only one shot, that turned out like this. Really, this one is so universally bad, it needs to be framed.

Military Exercise - the Wild Side

So to continue from the previous post, the military exercise that we toured had some animal highlights courtesy of the Botswana Defence Force.

A big part of the BDF's job is anti-poaching efforts in remote areas of the country. Soldiers are trained in how to deal with the wild animals they will encounter in the bush. This means they have a collection of wild snakes, hyenas, big cats, and other wildlife for training purposes!

They brought some of them to display for the day.  Including a giant constrictor.

They were using this apparently "tame" snake to drape over anyone's shoulders who wanted a picture with it! No way was I going to do that!!

Later, when they were packing up, they put the snake in a big dog kennel -- with the door open -- and just left it there to chillax. I panicked when I realized that's where it was and Nile was hopping around toward it! If anything would trigger an animal like that, I would think the easy prey of a child would!

This was a "baby" lion. I didn't like the way it was looking at Nile.

But she couldn't have been more excited.

A crocodile.

These guys are apparently highly trained in snake handling. I still didn't want to get too close, this snake was PISSED.

Have lion, will travel.

Nile was worn out by the time we headed home!