Dubai Photos

We did a 'hop on, hop off'' tour  by bus. This is a shot from the top level of the bus.

The bus turned out to be a nice tour of the city, with history thrown in (audio tour part).

Love this.

I tried to take photos in each country of the food we have in the States, but in different languages. The kids got a soda almost every day. NOT remotely the norm at home, they enjoyed it (in fact I think they've had none in the 6 + weeks we've been back, or none with me anyway.)

This child was impossible to photograph on this trip. It would have been easier at times to have a cat pose in a suit for photos.

Another city shot.

What is amazing is that just 200 years ago this was a simple pear diving village. This is from an old fort that is now a museum. We enjoyed the museum very much. 

I have no photos of the indoor ski slope; the gold plated, diamond encrusted cell phone or the great food we had. I think Paul  has them on his iPhone.

Chugga Wedding Photos

 Just a few photos to go with the Traditional Wedding Celebration post, 9/23/13.

Traditional banana beer. Very unfiltered. Made me understand old books written about unfiltered mead and why they write about people wiping their mouths. There is a trick to drinking it that they showed me so you don't get so much of the frothy head. The bride must taste then offer a taste to her husband to be, then family members (in a certain order) then to the older people in the community and so forth.

O was folding origami which drew a crowd that grew larger and larger. This little girl sitting to his right was so shy and wouldn't talk to him when Paul pressured him to say hello to her (I say pressured since he was shy too).

L was drawing pictures, also was interesting to the kids. Here he is giving the portrait he drew to Paul's friend Emanuel.

PHOTOS FINALLY!! of Moshi...

I finally have the time (holidays, moving etc.) and my Wi-Fi set up, so now it's possible for me to upload the photos!!! I thought about going back to each post and inserting where they should be. Instead, I am going to add the date at the end of the post it relates to if you want to go back and read its corresponding text or story.

In Moshi we stayed at a B&B, rather than at some of the local hotels Paul's classmates were staying in. It gave the boys and I some space to feel more at home during the day and the use of a kitchen. These two were the staff there who made ALL the difference in the world to us, and especially me. I even tear up now writing this, thinking of how much they mean to me. Grace cleaned and made our breakfast, Ben was the gardener. We, I, learned so much from them and they were so warm and kind. Moshi was our first African city. Now I know that it's a small, easy city, but it didn't feel that way at the time. Then, it felt very, very intense. They offered me comfort and help on how to navigate to get what I needed, as did the owner (from the UK but married to a Tanzanian man) who would stop by from time to time. (See post Monday, September 2nd)

This is from the Tinga Tinga tour I arranged for the boys. The man between the boys, Materu, is the artist who very kindly and patiently stepped them through painting their own (what they are each holding) Tinga Tinga painting. Behind L is Jon, our guide, for the day. (See post Monday, September 2nd)

Grace would escort me to the market in town. This is the guy I bought my dry goods from. One day, I saw a mouse running down the wall. He also sold small, dry fish. I wish I'd taken more photos at the market but it felt too invasive and I wasn't as comfortable taking my camera out. It was pretty intense the first few times I went, then I got the hang of it, but I was always so grateful for Grace being with me. This is the one and only time I didn't drag the boys around with me. They'd stay with Ben at the B&B, otherwise, they were with me all the time.

This is one of the signs at a well known hotel. I didn't make sense of what it mean until I found the bathroom, see below.

Here is the door to the ladies bathroom. In Asia you commonly saw a photo of a toilet or a squatty potty so you knew (or could choose?) which one you would be using. This is the only photo I saw like this. BUT there were many more amusing signs IN bathrooms telling you what to do or not do, which I wish I'd gotten photos of . Paul has some in his photos from his travels. 

This is the deaf collective that sewed and sold items around town. They were so incredibly sweet. I LOVED talking to them. I finger spelled in Swahili then they'd tell me the Swahili sign, then we'd compare the English to Swahili sign and then they'd correct me when I got confused. I went back and visited 3 times. I wish I'd found them sooner. The boys were too shy to sign to  with them much. I brought them fabric to make me some bags (I am holding one in this photo).  

This is Henry. He is one of the boys MOST FAVORITE of Paul's classmates (they liked all of them quite a lot but Henry truly is one of a kind and held a special place for them). He and the boys had a kebab eating contest one night at this place, Taj Mahal, a Muslim restaurant in town.  They had really good kebabs. I loved the Zanzibar pizza (thin dough with veggies and an egg folded into an envelope-like square, and grilled). Once I asked them how many they made in a day. I would see them start to clean and set up when I ran with two of Paul's classmates at 6 am and they'd be cooking still at 10 pm. They told me they sold around 350 Zanzibar pizzas in a day. By the way. O held his own here but Henry won out. The next day O said he felt like he was being punched in the stomach from the inside out. 

The first weekend we had in Tanzania was our only full weekend with Paul as a family. We did one day safari with him and then a day trip with his classmates to a snake park. This was a really cool place that used the admission to the snake park to fund a snake bite clinic. I can't find the picture (as I am writing this) of all the dried spit inside the glass from the cage of the spitting cobras. This is a picture of when you are a "bad" mother and let your child be pet by a caged rescue baboon. (See Monday, September 12th)

The boys and I went to swimming pools as much as we could. This is the YMCA pool, where we went the most. I liked this sign. I took this at the start of the trip before I really had learned much Queen's English. Swimming costumes are bathing suits in case you were like me, and confused. The other piece of this is cultural. You do not go around exposing your legs (above the knees in particular) so to be respectful you would only be in this one area with your swimsuit (or costume) and not the rest of the building. Granted, there was just a fence and people sat all around and just watched the swimmers.

This is a super sweet local boy the boys were friends with, Brian. We hung out here with him and he would text me asking when we could next come to meet at the pool.

This was the death climbing wall at Zumba Land. Their idea of safety is different, of course the kids loved it. I did ask the manager one day, since the staff would come over and chat with me, if a kid had ever fallen (you could just fall to your death on that edge). She said "no, if they can't climb they don't go." I guess the people in Tanzania govern themselves with common sense, different than the American public. (See Monday, September 2nd)

Here are the extent of the kitchen implements that were available at the B&B. I became better at cutting things in my hands rather than with a cutting board. 

One weekend when Paul was busy, I arranged a cooking class for the boys and I. One thing we learned was samosas. It took us 3 hours total to make them and about 5 minutes to eat them. These classes were at the edge of a coffee shop parking lot and the security guard kept coming over and chatting, it was cute.

Sri Lanka

Sri Lanka is so peaceful and relaxing. We spent our week up in Polonnaruwa (4+ hour drive from Colombo). The country is lush and green. The people are relaxed, open, friendly and quick to smile. It is like laying in a grassy area with the sun caressing you, a line of fresh sheets flapping nearby and you can smell the clean crisp scent. One morning I thought there was a thunderstorm but it was only monkeys on the roof of the hotel. We stayed in Polonnaruwa, along the lake. Almost every day we could see elephants come out of the jungle and down to the lake.

Polonnaruwa is both the name of the city there and the name of the ancient ruins. The ruins were the main factor in choosing this area. We were able to ride into town and to the old city by bike. It's a pretty incredible place, the best part (for me) of the ruins was to see the giant Buddha statues. We had a very kind and informative guide. It rained A LOT, we sat out for a long bit of it, then just rode back to the hotel in the rain anyway. It was warm enough air temperature and warm rain- not like Oregon!

A day trip took us to the Sigiriya rock fortress. Wicki, our Polonnaruwa guide, hooked us up with a friend of his, Shunil, to drive us for the day. Shunil was a long-time guide and former history teacher and was FULL of fascinating information. Pretty much the whole day, we felt like we hit the jackpot. Not only did our visit to Sigiriya pass our expectations but we also saw Asian elephants, birds, more monkeys and peacocks (native to Sri Lanka).

The food situation in Sri Lanka is fantastic. Personally, I ate the local rice and curry for pretty much every meal. Though, for breakfast, instead of rice, you eat string hoppers. These are little white noodles that are steamed in little individual discs, then served room temperature all stacked up, you peel off what you want. When I say curry, do not think of the Indian yellow curry flavor/mix or the Thai green or red curry dishes. Think of being served a variety (4 to 6) little dishes ranging from the green leaves from the outside of the banana flower (not the leaves of the plant), eggplant, okra, bitter melon, fresh tomato and onion, sambar (fresh grated coconut, salt, onion, lime, salt, pepper and 3 types of chilies) and papadams. You can have just vegetable, or fish, or meat but it's not typical to have meat and fish together. We hired Shunil to drive us back to Colombo when we left and he guided us to a local restaurant and ordered a selection of things for us to try. Sri Lankans eat these things with their hands and he gave us a lesson on that as well. They do not drink while eating, you may drink tea in the morning and around 3 pm they have tea, unless it's cold then you might drink coffee.

The hotel staff where we stayed was really attentive, as well. Seems there aren't too many Americans coming to Sri Lanka. Most people in the area where we were didn't know "America," "The United States (of America)" or "The U.S." In some ways, it's refreshing. It also seemed uncommon for tourists to stay in the area for an extended period of time. The management arranged us an extremely lovely, beautiful four-course meal outside by the pool, and all of the staff wore traditional clothing.They served us these big freshwater prawns, which were amazing, and I don't like shrimp, prawns or lobster!

I would not only go back to Sri Lanka in a heartbeat, but also recommend it to anyone. They do seem to have some strict rules, though. For example, the penalty for possession of illegal drugs is death.

PHOTOS!

We are home now... I have uploaded and semi-sorted all the photos from the trip. In the end, I have decided to post the photos that relate to previous posts as their own separate posts. I'd love to go tuck them back in with relevant text but seems messy somehow. I still have more posts about the trip as well they're just not finished.

People Make the World Go Round

Of course I know this isn't scientifically the literal truth. Tomorrow we depart for home. I am not sure I am ready. We have been beyond fortunate with all the amazing friends we have visited and made along the way. It's people that make a country, and our life, rich.

A Quick Taste of Dubai

Even walking into the airport in Dubai was a big change from our last three months spent in Africa, not surprising. Everything was shiny and had an unblemished feel. The airport was quiet, which was nice. No endless loud flight announcements, just the call to prayer. By the time we cleared our long wait in immigration and caught a cab to where we were staying, it was 5:30 in the morning. Again, we are so proud of the good little travelers the boys are- they complain so little in these sometimes trying situations.

The first day (after our nap) we went to a nearby mall, the one with the indoor ski and snow park area (yes- real snow in a mall in a desert). Even though I didn't like breathing all the burning garbage and dust in Africa, the recycled mall air was oppressive in a different way, with that artificial smell that malls have. What is it? Perfume, plastic, new clothes? It just felt fake or uncomfortable in some way. At one point we went to a toy store with the kids and truly 90 percent (or more) of it was just a straight waste of natural resources. Its the same things you can buy in the States, but it feels like it's all clean garbage. It made me feel awkward. In fact, most of the mall felt just full of useless and ridiculous things.

The second day, we went on a hop-on hop-off bus tour, which was good since it allowed us to see the sights of the city and gave us a bit of the history, all interesting. Dubai was a small pearl diving and fishing village just 200 years ago. Now it has a 7-star hotel, manmade islands and some theme attraction stays that offer things like GIANT aquariums where you can scuba dive and fake reefs with dolphins totally enclosed, just to name a few... I am glad we were there in the "cold" time of year, not when it is 110-115. I even saw one of the ultra swanky low police race cars. Sadly, I am so ignorant about cars that I can't tell you anything besides it was low-to-the-road, red color with two long doors that swing upwards like wings. I think it's a car in a video game for racing, too.

The food we ate was great. Shawarma- the slow spit roasted meats, shaved off, pickled vegetables (O was so happy, he has been craving pickles for months), a creamy garlic spread and bread. We also ate some great food from Pakistan. We weren't there long enough for me to talk my way back into the kitchen of anywhere for a cooking lesson. :)

We were only there for two days, so it was just a taste. I am now really interested in the Bedouin culture. They had a little bit of information at a museum we visited. We found out (a little too late) we could have done a tour that would include a 'dinner and dancing' among other things. I am feel mixed about those types of things. Interesting, but hard not to feel a bit voyeuristic or something- no doubt it would have still been fascinating.

I will miss being in cultures with the Arabic language and the Muslim religion.