Happy New Year!  Can’t believe it’s almost the middle of January, and I’m just now getting around to posting the photos from our trip to the airport.  I do apologize!

For most people, the actual vacation is what you look forward to at holiday time.  For us, it’s the adventure of getting to the airport!  The adventure began at 3:30 on a Friday afternoon, when 24 of us boarded three buses to get to the airport to catch the Freedom Flights out of Lagos.  We were on the bus with the kids, for obvious reasons, and a fun time was had by all (all of the kids anyway!)  Sorry for the teacher who got a migraine. ;(

It took nearly two hours to reach the airport on this lovely, sunny day.  I’m not really sure what the distance is, but I do know that when we come home late at night when there isn’t any traffic, it only takes about 35 minutes!  So, two hours on the road with children singing Christmas carols and generally being silly.  We did manage to play a few games as well (“tell me when you find a purple car”  kept them going for a while!).  

Looking out the windows was very, very interesting, as you’ll see below.

 

 

I like that you can shop from your vehicle!

 

Crossing the big bridge took a while…

 

 

The ladies in this van were all dressed up, so we snapped a photo:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Interesting views from the bridge:

 

Random photos along the way:

 

 

Thanksgiving began for us at school on Tuesday.  The parents put on an amazing Thanksgiving Lunch for the staff, and it was quite something!  You wouldn’t believe the food!  All of it delicious too.  Thanks PTO for organizing this!

Chris and I got up at 4am on Wednesday to cook my class turkey.  (No, not the silliest kid… an actual turkey!)  My students prepared the classroom and the parents brought in all sorts of goodies.  We had a wonderful feast (we called ours Thanksgiving Brunch, since we ate at 10am!)  Then the kids left at 11am and the weekend began!

Laryssa had her Thanksgiving Brunch in class tool.  Tuesday evening I prepared cupcakes for her class!  (Pilgrim hats and leaves, in case you aren’t sure!)

Wednesday afternoon Laryssa invited her little friends over to make Christmas crafts.  We made reindeer, snowmen, gingerbread men and women, angels and snowflakes.  Our doors are now decorated, including Janet’s across the hall.  (We don’t ask anymore, we just do it for her!  She likes it, or at least pretends to!)  Once the little ones were gone, we got out our few decorations and Christmased up the place!

Ben got a little distracted by the cable-car…

I made my mother-in-law’s Millionaire’s Shortbread for Thanksgiving dinner the next day. Chris’s job was to make dinner rolls.  (Mary, everyone LOVED the dessert!)

Happy Thanksgiving!  We began our day with a request from Laryssa for pancakes… not exactly what you want to eat on a food day, but anyway.  She played outside while I finished making my dessert and Chris made his rolls.  We were then off to the Luce’s home across the way (in the flat opposite ours), where we joined 14 others for Thanksgiving dinner.  It was delicious!  We all ate too much… but I suppose that’s what the holidays are for, right?  Get together with friends and family and share a meal and good company.  We’re thankful to have made such good friends so quickly, and are very happy in our new home.

Friday I got to escape the campus for a bit!  My friend Susan took me grocery shopping at the big SPAR store.  Sad when grocery shopping is the only outing in a week!  Ha!  I did enjoy it though, and even picked up some Christmas lights to put in our windows.  Chris spent the time using the leftover turkey (from my class brunch) to make turkey curry.  Laryssa and I went for a walk, and then spent some time in the pool.  It’s about 37 C here these days, so the pool was very refreshing!  We watched a Christmas movie last night, Christmas in Wonderland- filmed in Edmonton!

More fun today as we decorated a little more and I wrapped the few Christmas presents that will stay here.  Chiara came over and we made some more crafts… now she can decorate her door too!  🙂  This afternoon a bunch of people got together to play baseball on the field. It was a hot day for it, but they had fun.  I decided to sit this one out, but it did look like fun, so next time I’ll participate too.  Laryssa is still playing outside… how wonderful for her to have so much freedom here, especially compared to Singapore. You’d think it would have been the opposite!

Laryssa playing in the sprinklers with her friends:

Baseball:

Tomorrow is our last day of this long weekend.  I’ll spend part of the day in my classroom, planning for the next few weeks.  It’s kind of nice to be able to wander over there and do that.  I put music on and get lots done.

We have just one more weekend before we leave for Canada on December 13th.  Time is really flying!

Random photo:

One of the many lizards we have around campus.  Usually they are too quick for me to take a photo!

The second session of After School Activities (ASA) began this week.  Thankfully, teachers are not required to host ASAs!  Laryssa chose swimming and Saturday Soccer this time around.  She enjoyed both, though was somewhat dismayed to be in the beginner group for swimming.  (She wouldn’t put her face in the water while swimming.)  She’ll get there.  Soccer yesterday was an evaluation of skills and putting the kids onto teams, so she’ll get to play next time.  

 

 

Soccer Girl- Check out her gear!

The PTO hosted a Holiday Bazaar at school yesterday.  There were more than 40 vendors touting their wares… great for Christmas shopping!  The prices seemed high, and I really had to work hard to get a bargain.  I think I managed to get most of my Christmas shopping finished, with only three items for us!  Laryssa did a bit of shopping too… she kept coming back to me for more money!  It was nice to be able to shop, bring everything home, and then decide if I needed to go back for more.  Of course I did!

Holiday Bazaar:

 

 

 

Saturday afternoon Laryssa and I went to a birthday party for one of her classmates.  We were having difficulty finding someone to give us a ride, and the parent hosting the party sent her driver over to fetch us- how sweet was that!  Laryssa had a lovely time at the party… lots of kids, entertainment, games, swimming…  I had fun too!  Drinking Pimms by the pool (I was more interested in the fresh fruit in my drink than the actual drink!) and helping out a little.

Today we’re off to visit our friend Lindsay and deliver a little baby gift we picked up in England.  Her baby was born in October.

A very busy weekend, and we managed to get off campus for a bit!  Can’t wait for the Thanksgiving holiday next week!

 

Life in Nigeria isn’t so bad.  Not nearly as bad as the stories we’ve heard.  Yes, there is a lot of poverty, and I’m sure there is a lot of crime.  The air isn’t exactly clean, though we do see blue skies quite often.  We live a pretty sheltered life here on Victoria Island, and we’re aware of that.  One really great thing about living here is that we have to make our own fun.  (No running off to the cinema, out for dinner, or a bike ride down to the beach like in Singapore!)

Laryssa is great at making her own fun.  Each day when she finishes her homework, she heads down to the playground.  Sometimes there are children there for her to play with, sometimes not.  It doesn’t seem to matter… she enjoys herself no matter what.  Rainy days seem to be the most fun, as she goes down and plays in the rain and muck.  It’s great to hear the kids all laughing as they’re running around splashing and having a great time being kids.  Yes, they’re full of sand when they return home, but that’s all part of the fun, right?

As for us, we’re learning to be sociable again!  We began polishing our entertainment skills at Laryssa’s birthday, and we seem to be on a role now!  A couple of weeks ago we invited our friend Susan and her husband Jay over for the evening.  It was Susan’s 60th birthday, and she didn’t have any plans.  She seemed really down about that, and wanted to celebrate.  So, I invited a few people over to surprise her for her big day.  Somehow, word got out and people began to call and invite themselves to the party, so the night before, I sent out a blanket email and invited everyone who lives on campus.  When Susan arrived that Friday evening, there were about 20 people here to wish her happy birthday!  By the end of the evening, sometime after midnight, we estimate that about 35-40 people had passed through.  It was a great time, and Susan had a great party.  (She even cried!)

Now, I did say we were on a role… last night we invited a few people over for dinner.  Tracy and Chiara, Donny, and our friend Becky.  Chris made curry and we had a nice time sitting around chatting and eating a delicious meal.  Today we spent the afternoon at the pool with a few of the other Flat Rats (seems to be what those of us who live on campus are called).  Not a bad way to spend a Sunday afternoon.  We were also invited to Thanksgiving dinner at Amanda and Dan’s, so again, we will be socially active!

So you see, although we’re living in a hardship country, we’re actually having a pretty great time.

Laryssa and the rainy day fun:

Surprise Party Fun:

Dinner at our house last night (Laryssa lost a tooth just before everyone arrived):

Sunday afternoon at the pool:

Yes, we brought it with us.  We stocked up at the Pound Shop in Worthing, and it was worth it.  Our apartment is fully decorated (it kind of looks like Hallowe’en threw up in here, especially on our door!), and we’ve had our annual Hallowe’en Birthday Party for Laryssa.  She invited all of the Flat Rat Kids, 10 in all, and it was good fun.  We made some crafts, played some games, trashed the house, ate dirt for dessert.  What more could you ask for?

A party for adults?  We did that too, though we didn’t host that one.  Our colleagues who live in the other building (The Penthouse Divas) hosted the Halloween Party last night.  They had a pretty good turn out, and there were some interesting costumes.  Sorry to say that I didn’t last long… the children’s party (and the prep leading up to it) wore me out!  Chris had fun, and is paying for it this morning!

Note the foot stuck in the door!

 

The clean up!

 

Two weeks ago we had our October break and we were headed for the U.K.  All was well, I wasn’t stressed, until the day of our departure arrived and Laryssa and I still did not have our passports.  We had been told for two weeks that “they will be here tomorrow”… which obviously wasn’t true.  (Our passports were stuck at Nigerian Immigration, awaiting Resident Status.)  The woman who looks after it at our end arranged for us to go to the airport with the others, and assured us that our passports were arriving at 4:00.  She would have someone get them from the domestic terminal and bring them to us at the international terminal.

So… we arrived at the airport at 5:00, and our bus driver received a call saying that our passports were in the air and would be there shortly.  Hurrah!

6:00 rolls around, we are standing in the airport, waiting… and my phone rings.  It seems that our passports did not make that flight, and would be on the next one.  “You’ll have them by 7:30.”  So, of course, 8:00 rolls around and still no passports.  Our check-in closes at 10pm and the flight is due to depart at 11:00pm.  Feeling extremely stressed at this point, as it will be too late for a refund and how do we get back to campus?  Five minutes later we get a call saying they are on the flight and will be here at any time.  At 9:00 we get another call saying she has them and is on her way.  20 minutes after that, we have our passports- finally!  We rush to the check-in and manage to get through pretty quickly.

We then arrive at the security and passport control… very long line, and we have 25 minutes until our gate closes.  By this time we are frantic and Laryssa is hot and sweaty and very tired (read: whiny).  Chris picks her up and she puts her head down on his shoulder.  One of the guards notices and waves us to the front of the line.  His partner yells at him, saying that Laryssa is not a baby, we should not have priority.  He yells back that the girl is obviously not well, and lets us go through!  We tell Laryssa to keep her head down!  We get through, rush to our gate, and walk straight on to the plane.

Way too close for comfort! It was a cultural experience… welcome to Africa.

Sunday October 5, 2013

Another interesting week in Lagos!  We had really heavy rain on Friday.  We woke up to it in the morning, and it lasted through to the afternoon.  When it rains here, it really rains!  A couple of weeks ago I taught my students the phrase “raining cats and dogs”.  On Friday, we decided it was heavier than that, so they said it was “raining elephants and hippos”.  Chris managed to get a few photos.  The flooded yard was taken across the street.  When it rains heavily like that, you don’t really want to be out and about.  For starters, it will take hours to get anywhere.  The roads aren’t in the best shape on a good day.  When it rains, the potholes become bigger and drains overflow (yes, sewers too).

               

Saturday morning arrived with a pretty sunrise.  You can see the sun reflected on the building across from us.  It turned out to be a beautiful day with nice blue sky and warm temperatures, somewhere around 30 C.  Laryssa, Chiara and I spent a couple of hours in the pool in the afternoon.

                         

Saturday evening we had an impromptu barbecue by the pool.  We brought our own bbq and a dish to share.  It was a good turn out…  very relaxing and lots of fun.

     

     

    

           

So, here we are, a month and a half in Nigeria, and we’re still loving it!  On the weekend, a friend of ours invited us to go along with her for the day (she has a car, we do not… yet), and we went to a conservation area just outside of the city.  It was lovely!  We were greeted by peacocks at the front entrance.  They were wandering freely around the grounds, and there were a few babies too.  One of the males was in a tree!  We were then greeted by a little monkey that came running right over to us- it scared Laryssa a little.  I think it just wanted food. We then headed into the jungle… just as you might imagine.  They have a boardwalk winding through the trees, and the further in we went, the less you could hear the traffic and the city noises.  It was lovely!  Very green, very wet… we saw some wildlife: monitor lizards, monkeys, snakes, frogs… we could hear birds but didn’t really see any.  Part way along there was a long ladder built on the side of a tree, leading up to a treehouse/viewing platform.  Chris was brave and climbed up.  He assured us we weren’t missing anything by not climbing up, as all you could see was green.  As we were waiting for him at the at the base, we could hear sounds of trees moving all around us.  Next thing we knew, monkeys were coming closer to have a look at us!  It was so cool!  We even found a little playground for Laryssa part way through the forest!  Unfortunately for us, the boardwalk leading to the crocodile outlook was closed for repairs, so we didn’t see any crocodiles.  Maybe next time!