Kwanza River

Well we decided to do some exploring outside of Luanda. Our first big trip was to the Kwanza River. It is located about one hour from our place about 45 minutes out of the city, a peaceful ocean drive. It was a beautiful drive there and we pasted some really interesting things along the way. We pasted a golf course, YES there are actually 2 golf courses here, one actually looks really nice, the other one you have to bring your own mat to apparently.  We also past huge cliffs that have been eroded and many little villages. 

I asked Brett if he got an pictures of Ella having lunch, he said yep, and this is it. 

This is your view from the table

We had lunch here and then went for a walk around, lunch was $50 each and was a buffet the only things we recognized was rice, potatoes, chicken and fish that later made me very ill. You can fish along the river and apparently there are crocodiles here too. 

This is our driver, he looks a little grumpy here (they don't smile for pictures - kind of funny) but he has a great smile and is wonderful, especially with Ella - he calls her bebe. 

Ella took this photo on the way home of her and baby jag who also made the trip.

Awwwh I love this place!

Well today was a great day, and as I was driving home today I was thinking about how much I really love this place. The people, both expats and locals are wonderful, the country is laid back, it is always warm!!!  Yes, the poverty is heart breaking but within it is an amazing sense of love among the poorest of the poor. No other place have I seen both adults and children watching out for every other little child. In the very poor areas it is like everyone is just one big family, it doesn't matter who is your biological family, if you live in the neighbourhood or if you are a small child someone is looking out for you.

I realize that I am choosing to see things this way and others will have there own perspective, maybe mine is seen through rose colored glasses, but it made me think can one have the best of both worlds? Or does this compassion for one another develop only out of necessity ?  Enough about my deep thoughts, I am sure you are probably sleeping on your computer by now. It is just so interesting to me to see how different worlds function.

Well today Ella went back to school, she was up at 6:30 all by herself ready to go, it was me saying 5 more minutes. Brett left for Soyo today till Friday so hopefully the week will go by fast.  BIG NEWS we got our wireless yesterday and apple TV, so I was able to watch Grey Anatomy and Modern Family!!!  Sadly it took me all day to set up ...



Went to the Orphanage today here are some pics

The children were playing with my camera so that is why there is lots of pictures of me and not so many of all of them, plus there were only 13 children there today.

Baby Sea Turtles... (or as Brett wanted me to call this post...Saving the world one baby sea turtle at a time!)

Well last week Brett was able to do something really amazing, he help release endangered baby sea turtles back into the ocean up in Soyo. He said they were the cutest things he's ever saw. I totally agree

 Haha I had to add this picture ...

what you didn't see at the beginning .... Brett asked someone to take his picture with the baby sea turtle and then he dropped it....not sure if that one will be making it to the ocean.

Baking ....sort of.

Well anyone who knows me or have read parts of this blog know that I lack any talent, ability, gift, ect.. when it comes to cooking, and I am only slightly better at baking.  But since Ella is back at school and I have finished all the chocolate chip granola bars from Costco (yes the big box) ...more on that later, I have had to make snack food so that I don't waste hours standing in front of my fridge thinking that something eatable will appear.

So the only thing I can make as of now that is delicious (as in all three of us will eat them and I am not too embarrassed about giving them to Isabel or Zeferino) is Banana Chocolate Chip Muffins or as I like to call them Lisa's amazing and somewhat health muffins - I don't have to get any more specific since I only can make one kind.  Anywho today  is a big day because I am trying a new recipe that I think might be a winner. Where did I get this recipe?  Well some of it off the web, but once I get baking I tend to add a lot of my own stuff. (note: usually this does not work in my favour but I can't help it.)

So to set the scene I have limited baking tools, all I have is a bowl (seriously just one I have looked through my cupboards once again hoping another will magically appear but no luck yet) so I have a bowl, a sort of measuring cup (goes up to 1/2 cup) and a teaspoon. Not to worry though I rarely measure things anyways. (Just to let you all know I am well aware that not measuring things out may contribute to my lack of success in cooking, even Ella has pointed out that I am suppose to level off the teaspoon with baking powder on it -  but it is just not going to happen - my free cooking spirit just wont let it. ) So back to the scene... I am attempting to make a new muffin recipe.  It is going to be a Blueberry Banana Bran muffin recipe- yeah doesn't that sound great. The original recipe was just for bran muffins - quiet boring.  So I have mixed all my ingredients up and the muffins are currently cooking.

I have to be honest this is not my first attempt at bran muffins I tried to make them before and when Brett took a bite of them his eye brows went up and he stopped chewing.  I knew they were bad but I didn't want them to go to waste. It may have had something to do with this oil I put in them because I didn't have any butter and you have to understand that all the food product labels are in Portuguese thus making it a little difficult to figure out just what type of oil I was using... anyways the muffins tasted like oil...they were SICK.  

Okay so the muffins are now out of the oven and look not bad. I am really hoping they are eatable because 1. the ingredients probably cost me over $50 and 2. because I want to give some to our neighbours who just arrived back here and are probably really jetlagged and I know they have no food in there house - until they go shopping so these could hold them over.

 Cooking supplies

My pineapple plant I am trying to grow

Update on garden: 

Someone picked my little lettuce plant and the peas all died.....damn it. 

Funny things

So there has been a couple funny stories that have happened since we got here and I wanted to post this one just because it has topped them all so far.....

So the day we were at the Orphanage there was a nurse there who checks all the children. A little boy wasn't feeling well so I was holding  him, she took him to test him for a fever and malaria. Brett and I went out to see how he was doing and I was talking to the nurse about the boy. When she finished she said...   and I quote: "So did you come here with your Dad?" - At first I was a little baffled and then I looked at Brett who was standing beside me and started laughing, I said "Nope this is my husband," --- feeling a little creepy when I said that out loud,  I added we are the same age THIRTY ONE.  She felt so bad, but  it was all pretty funny. The story got out and now everyone refers to Brett as my dad.

Funny thing is Brett brought this "incident" up continually asking if he really looks that old? Then he somehow determined that it may have been the hat he was wearing - so he took that off.  Little did he know that the day before we were at the twins house and a lady stopped by and asked my friend who she had in her house with the girls?  She said me, and the lady said "oh, it looked like a 12 years old."  (Really lady 12 ??  I have gotten 16 or 17 but  12 that is like before puberty !)  Anywho I am chalking it up to a expat cultural thing.

Christmas Day

Well guess who made it to Luanda?? Santa!  

Friends of ours are German and it is a Christmas tradition that Santa comes to their house on Christmas Eve at 4pm and gives the children one gift.  Since everyone was leaving for Christmas I may have volunteered Brett to help out (not really thinking that through). After we got him all suited up I had him do some practice HO HO HO's. Needless to say I was a little worried. Anyone who knows Brett, knows that he never really took to Drama in high school and unless he has a whole lot of alcohol under his belt his acting skills are ...hummmmm somewhat challenged.  But I told him not to let down the children, this is a small tight knit community and if he screws this up we may no longer have any friends.  

However all reports came back that he did a great job, Santa even turned down the drink he was offered, oh and they got it all on video, which one day I hope to see. 

Later Christmas Eve we went to our neighbour house for the best chicken enchiladas I have ever tasted. I ate so much I felt sick and I basically rolled home but it was so worth it. 

 Since then I have been scouring the internet looking for chicken enchilada recipes. I get my hopes up looking at the pictures and remembering that beautiful night ..... and then Brett walks by and says, we don't have  sour cream, we don't have tamales, we don't have...... why can't he just let a girl enjoy herself. 

This is Ella and her two new friends, they are the sweetest twins I have ever met, we were calling them the twinkle triplets.

Did I mention we also had Margaritas!!!!

Opening gifts. So this year needless to say under the tree was a little bare. Brett and I figured we spent about $10, on Ella this year and the rest of her gifts were all give to us by friends who actually planned ahead. Please believe me when I say I was not trying to be cheap this year, I went to the one mall twice determined to find Ella a great gift but everything was ridiculously expensive, (ei. barbies $95, dollar store princess necklace $30, Barbie nightlight $91, Princess castle - didn't even want to know).   

But when we opened gifts christmas morning Ella was so excited and happy, she even said this was the best christmas ever (note: she does say that every christmas, or any day she gets more then one new toy). So I guess it really may be true, less is more.

 Both Brett and I were thinking this is great, she didn't get spoiled, she is so happy, we don't have 50 new toys she will never look at again. We felt it was a pretty good Christmas. (Further note: by afternoon our early risers became extremely tired and proceeded to tell us this was the worst Christmas Eve ever....ahhhh )

Christmas Eve

Our drive to the Orphanage is very interesting, we travel to a different part of the City, it is obviously a poor area but it has a certain beauty to it that is hard to describe, maybe it is only something you can feel when you drive through.  These pictures (both on the way there and home - do not represent all of Luanda. It is very different in each community). We were in one of the poorest as you will see by the pictures at the end. 

I know this is a bad picture  but they women here are truly amazing.  

Some of the back roads we had to go on were flooded because of the rain we have had but our driver did great. 

So on Christmas Eve we went to one of the Orphanages about one and half hours away. We went with 2 other families that we are friends with. It was a wonderful day and such a pleasure to meet all the children. They put on a dance for us and sang songs, it was all very endearing. The school had organized for all the children at the Orphanage to receive a gift, however there were 3 little girls that were not on the list, but we managed to find them something. I had a little boy maybe around 5 or 6 come up to  me at the end and hold my hand, then he kissed it and said obrigada - which  means thank you in Portuguese. It was the sweetest thing. 

The younger children singing a song for us.

 On our way home there was terrible traffic. It took us 2 hours and 15 minutes to get home. It was pretty funny, for a good 45 minutes Brett, who was in the front seat, got to stare at a dead cow in the back of a truck with some other furniture..... sure hope they weren't taking it to shoprite!