Started out on Friday morning when my colleague here baked me a cake, which we shared at tea time with all the translators here. It was good fun - they even sang me happy birthday.
Then, I actually had a night at home alone on Friday night, in which I indulged in back-to-back episodes of the West Wing (I'm only on Season 2, so don't tell me anything that will give anything away!).
On Saturday morning, I had a little adventure - I drove out to a colleagues home to help him bring some old iron sheets to his house near the mountain. It was quite an adventure bouncing over the roads, and snaking our way through the tukels and up and down the little ravines. Good thing it's dry season - I don't think I'll be able to drive to his place during the rains. Once we were there, one of the daughters was sent to the corner store to buy me a soda (it's just normal practice to offer any visitor a bottle of soda when they arrive, and you can't refuse!). While Kabas unloaded the truck, I got to sit on a chair in the shade and cuddle his little baby!
How cute is this baby?! Her sister was pretty cute, too. And the sister was even more fun because I could actually talk to her - she's four, so her Arabic is much better than mine, but we had a little conversation about the goats that were trying to eat their tomatoes. That little girl has a pretty powerful rock throwing arm when it comes to protecting her tomatoes from the goats!
After delivering the sheets, Kabas and I went to a meeting with the elders and pastors in his church. They are interested in starting literacy classes in the church, so I went along to see how we could help them. We've had in our plan for a while to help them do some teacher training and get them some books to use. It was a bit intimidating - me sitting in the church in a circle with 10 elders and pastors from this particular language community. They all spoke in their language, and it was translated for me, and everything I said was translated for them. It was great, because everyone had to have their say, even if they were saying the same thing! I'm getting the hang of the "patter" that you have to do here - there's a lot of flowery words you have to say to people in those situations before you just come right out and make your point. but it turned out to be a really good meeting, and everyone was keen on starting with some teacher training, and they're going to start to find some teachers. And we're going to get ourselves some classes started :) I'm really looking forward to this whole thing.
Once that meeting was over, I got back to the compound, where one of my colleagues from the Ministry of Education was waiting for me - he needed some help on his computer. Unfortunately, I was already a bit late for my birthday lunch, so I just took his computer, stowed it in my room for later, and drove off for my birthday lunch with Annamarie. Annamrie treated me to a lovely t-bone steak dinner! It was really good meat - actually chewable, which is saying a lot!
After our lunch, we were off to... get this... a swimming pool! Of course, the president was also on the move at the same time, which meant we were trapped in the neighborhood for a little while, and ended up driving around in circles for a while trying to get onto the main road, which was all closed up!
But we eventually made it. Annamarie has some friends who are staying at a lovely lodge/hotel a little ways out of the city center, and they have a lovely pool there! And it's not busy at all, because it's basically just for the guests who stay there. So for the first little while, we pretty much had the pool all to ourselves! It was so relaxing to just float around in the cool water, to sit under the shade and read a book... ah... so nice. And my feet finally got clean, too :)
After cooling off in the pool, it was time to come home and get ready for my little birthday shindig. Annamarie made some lovely food, Kristina brought a yummy cake, and we all drank more apple juice than I've ever seen drunk at an adult birthday party!
But the highlight of the evening was my "Happy Birthday" bagpipes! Dear Peter brought his pipes, and after a rendition of Happy Birthday, played some dance tunes, which we clumsily danced to for a few minutes. Our resident Scot came in a bit late, so didn't have much of a chance to teach us enough to redeem our pathetic attempts at highland dancing... but it was definitely enjoyable!
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