Turkey, Boxes, 10k, and Car

Our HHE (household effects - our stuff that was sent by ship) arrived Wednesday, so I took the afternoon off to watch eight men unload ten shipping crates full of our belongings. Needless to say, we spent much of the weekend unpacking. Clara & Gwendolyne were overjoyed to have their bicycles again finally.

Now that we've been living fine without all this stuff, we realize we have too much. For example, I sent sweaters that I'll never need in this fine weather, so will store most of them. We have more towels than we can ever use, and I have t-shirts out the wazoo. I'll be giving away a lot of stuff, I think, in addition to the bicycles and four boxes of baby clothes we already planned to give to a local orphanage.

Our sponsors invited us to their house for Thanksgiving but we had already started defrosting the (outrageously expensive) turkey, so I stuffed and roasted it anyway and we took it with us. The children all played together and we adults had a nice evening chatting.

Yesterday (Sunday) was the Great Ethiopian Run, and Patricia and I both ran all 10k, finishing in 64 minutes. We received a medal and (of course) another T-shirt. The group dynamic was great, and I felt fine even though I hadn't trained sufficiently. Patricia had been running quite a bit and so beat me by ten meters.

Our Nissan Patrol is finally in Addis. I paid for the registration last week and the insurance today, so we should have the car in the next few days. We have to have it by Friday, because we're getting away to Lake Langano for the weekend.

Sorry I don't have any photos but it's not always easy to connect my computer to the network.

Debre Zeit and the Car's on its way...

Not having a reliable Internet connection has hindered my updates, for which I beg your forgiveness, dear reader. I'll be putting in a request with the telephone tech. to find out why our dial-up connection always drops after five minutes. Also, the broadband connection I was able to use has been in short supply lately. On the other hand, the school has a wireless connection, and since they're right next to our house, I might have more opportunities to hook in over there.

Two weekends ago, Seifu, his fiancée Hanna and her brother Jimmy (Girma) took us to Debre Zeit about 40 km south of Addis Ababa, where we spent the afternoon at a volcanic lake, Lake Hora. Emperor Haile Selassie used to have a weekend house there. We packed a picnic lunch. Patricia made all pork-product sandwiches until I reminded her that our Orthodox friends would have to go hungry, so she made some PB&J and some tuna fish as well.





We had a nice walk along the shores and then a lovely boat ride across the lake on a boat that clearly did NOT meet US Coast Guard safety standards. Coming back, we approached the tree where the Araicha have their October festival, there were quite a few of them dancing and celebrating as we passed. We felt a bit uncomfortable taking pictures though.

On the way back we bought a couple of kilos of fresh honey, still in the comb, for 95 birr. Yummy!

We finally have some good news on the car. There must be a chat shortage in Djibouti, because our Nissan Patrol left there on the truck on Monday, so it should be in Addis Ababa on this coming Monday. Once it arrives, we can go check it out and make sure it's in one piece, and start the clearance process. Then we need to pay for insurance - Ethiopia requires us to purchase comprehensive here - and registration. The whole thing should take another five days or so, with any luck we'll have use of it next weekend.

Last weekend was the Marine Corps Birthday Ball - the social event of the year at the Embassy - at the Addis Sheraton. Patricia had nothing to wear, so instead of going naked, she had a bespoke dress made. I'll post some sexy pics of her in it next time.

This evening I'm going to visit the Goethe Institut - Addis Ababa for the first time, to attend a screening of Berlin is in Germany. Next week Patricia plans a French version of the same thing, to see Le couperet at the Alliance Ethio-Française.

Today was International Day at school, and the girls were excited to be the French representatives. Over 80 nationalities are represented there, and they all paraded around today and brought food from their native countries. Patricia and the girls really enjoyed it - I missed it due to work.

The weather is still sunny and dry and in the 70s. Eat your heart out!

Halloweened out

We had a busy weekend, with Halloween parties both Friday 27 October at ICS and Saturday 28 October at the embassy. Patricia dressed up as a witch at the latter party at the CLO's (Community Liaison Office) request, and provided lots of entertainment for young and old alike.

Needless to say, after another Halloween the previous weekend and two parties last weekend, we were all pretty tuckered out. We felt especially fatigued after spending Sunday 28 October at ICS: I played soccer with the Embassy team, Pat ran the track, and the girls played in the playground.

We're still frustrated about not having our car yet. It was supposed to arrive in Djibouti on the same day (4 October) that we arrived in Addis Ababa, but nobody bothered to contact us to handle the paperwork to have the car cleared and shipped up. The expediter and I both sent faxes and e-mails and made phone calls to the shipper, the agent in Djibouti, and the local Nissan dealer, all without success. Finally I lit a fire under the salesperson, who finally got things moving. Still, it should be another 15 days or so before our wheels show up.

Another point of frustration concerns Patricia's job - she should have started almost three weeks ago, but bureaucratic delays have kept her from working. All in good time...

We managed to catch The Birds on AFN with the girls, which I had never seen in its entirety, and About Last Night.

I also managed to read some literature, The Call of the Wild. Mrs. Neveras would be proud!