My journey back up to monapo ended up taking a little longer than planned. So I’m up into inhambane, and I just don’t feel well… my head felt like it was detached, I was sweating profusely even though I wasn’t doing anything strenuous, and I felt super nauseous. At first it was just really bad diarrhea and vomiting to the point where I wasn’t eating and it was still continuing. And then the fevers started. I don’t think I’ve had a fever in my adult life so I didn’t really know what was going on or what to expect, but that first night I thought my body was going to either burst into flames or spontaneously combust. The next day the fever still hadn’t gone away and when we measured it, it was at about 39C which is about 102F and that was when I was feeling a little bit better. Over the next two days my temperature went back and forth from about 100-104F and the times when it got up to 104F I felt like straight death. But like all sicknesses I thought this would just pass, so I didn’t call the doctor til after about 3 days. I even thought I was getting better so I tried to travel again, but I left my friends house, and I got as far as the main road in front of her house, which is only about 20yards away, and I was already winded, sweating and then finally I threw up. I am seriously so lucky that Alexandra was around to take care of me, force feeding me oral rehydration salts and electrolyte drinks, making me cold compresses and singing really awesome songs for me. I finally called the doc who said to keep hydrated and to take antibiotics and we would see how to felt in another day or two. Well unfortunately all symptoms continued and finally the doc decided to fly me down to Maputo to check me out. So in the 4 day stretch after getting sick at alex’s, I had eaten a bowl of soup, some crackers, a banana and a piece of toast. It was definitely the sickest I had been in my adult life. So I arrive in Maputo and the doc after checking me out a little took me to the hospital so that I could get hooked up to an IV cuz I had gotten too dehydrated. So I was there for about 24 hours getting hydrated, getting shots on my butt to help me not vomit, and when I got fevers, they gave me a paracetamol drip and my fever went away almost instantaneously! That was good stuff!! They also ran tests on me to see what was going on cuz up to this point the doc was thinking maybe I had malaria, but when I took a self test it came out negative, so a few blood, urine and stool test later it turned out I had tick fever and some sort of dysentery stomach inflammation something or another. Basically it wasn’t just one thing but a few things that hit me at once and made all symptoms way way worse. And being in Maputo by myself was so friggin lonely… in a hospital alone, at the hotel alone, walking around alone. But what really sucked was that I was starting to feel better, yet my stomach was still not so that meant I still couldn’t enjoy quite possibly the only good thing Maputo has to offer… good food! I was still eating only saltines, bananas, apple juice, Gatorade and water. In the 9ish days I was in Maputo I think I drank about 15L of liquids and in all honesty that could even be an understatement! Luckily my friend Anna was in town for a few days and had her laptop with her so we got to catch up and watch some big bang theory too! Also, I mentioned the Hazels in the last blog, and they are an American family of 4 living in Maputo for work and they are amazing. They really took to PC volunteers so they let visiting PCVs crash at the house, raid their fridge, do laundry, watch cable tv and use internet! They were within walking distance of my hotel so once I started feeling well enough to walk around, after test and dr’s visits I would head over to the Hazels and hang out at their pad usually with their 2 girls, who go to a private school kinda like I did in korea so we had lots to bond over, but mostly just talking about American things we missed most! it was just nice to be around people and they made me feel so welcome and seeing all the good food they were eating, kinda made me wanna get better faster! I think it was really good motivation! Finally about 2 days before I was leaving Maputo I finally started feeling well enough to eat normal human food, while still staying away from certain things, and boy was it great! They have a BEAUIFUL dream kitchen, and just to say thanks, the girls and I baked a pineapple upside down cake and then later I made us a penne pasta bake with probably a pound of mozzarella cheese on top! Then the next night we had a picanya (this one part of the cow that melts in your mouth like butter) bbq with their neighbors and omg I think it was a small glimpse of how I’ll be feeling after living here for two years and going back to the states. After not eating for 2 weeks, this was heaven! There was this salad with another leaf kinda like arugula… I forget… and feta and tomatoes and cucumbers and chickpeas and a balsamic vinaigrette and so friggin good! And the meat… holy cow… it was just these picanya steaks salt and peppered and thrown on the grill for like a minute and then taken off and cut into pieces immediately and you just eat right off the cutting board! Still dripping juices and perfectly marbled with fat and OMG! And then there was this celery salad that was pretty much just celery and onion but sooooo goood! Anyway, food aside, the Hazel family just made me feel like I was a part of their family, which when sick, felt really really great. THANK YOU SO MUCH HAZELS! MISS YOU SO MUCH ALREADY! REALLY REALLY HOPE I GET TO SEE YOU SOON!! Anyway so after 10 days in maputo I was finally feeling in good enough shape to head home, so I got to fly up to nampula, stay in the city for a night, then headed back to monapo! It had been so so long since being home it was so weird and so great all at the same time. The best thing about being back is getting all my clothes washed, as I had been washing things here and there in the sink of my room, and not living out of my backpack anymore! Since being back I had a few more fever attacks with really bad chills, but it’s now mid feb and I think I’m pretty much back up to 100%! Ok I think that’s about it for now! Hope you enjoyed reading about my last 4 months! I put up all my pictures from these blogs as well so be sure to check em out on ‘the Facebook’! can you believe I only have like 10 more months? CRAZY! Miss everyone so much!
Healthy panda
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
Schoooooool’s OUT! FOR! SUMMUH!!!
So as I had mentioned before, for our summer break a bunch of us decided to visit our neighboring country South Africa. After traveling 2,500km and a few pitstops along the way, I finally made it to Maputo! It was my first time visiting our capital city since training so I was pretty excited! I was also super super excited to get to meet Von’s mom and cousin marti! They are so awesome! When I first arrived at their really swanky hotel, after jumping on von and bear huggin her for a while cuz it had been like 2 weeks since I’d seen her, I got to catch up on the fam news and hear all about their cape town/Krueger trip! The food in Maputo is something else… good pizza, real Chinese, club sandwiches?!?! It was pretty great~ I also got to go out to dinner with Colin’s parents and the Hazels(I’ll tell you more about these amazing folks later) at the Polana buffet which is like 5 star class class class, and is it sad that more than the different kinds of meats, which were delish, I was more excited to see things like broccoli and mushrooms! Omg it was so amazing! THANK YOU SO MUCH FOR DINNER JONES’!! Von’s fam and I also got to visit Namaacha and our host families, and even though my host mom was in Maputo for the day, just plain bad luck as we completely missed each other, I got to hang out with my host brother Eduardo all day!! He’s the greatest and he’s going to begin teaching at an elementary school next year!! It was really great, but I hope I get to go down that way again so I can see my host mom too!
So then Diana, von and I left Maputo on Christmas eve to leave for Johannesburg. We got tickets for an overnight bus that put us in joburg at 4am Christmas day. Upon arrival in joburg however, we couldn’t find a bus that would take us where we wanted to go on the schedules and had to wait until the ticketing counters opened at 8am, but there were no clear signs as to where we needed to wait and which carrier we should wait for. So we were standing in the line that I thought was right, but just past 8 I saw this lady walk by and go toward a different ticket counter and I just had this hunch that I needed to follow her so I told Diana I’d be right back and followed her to another office that she opened up and I was second in line and when I got to the front I asked her for 3 tickets to mthatha and she said the bus was already sold out and my heart just sank… but then she was like ‘oh wait a minute…. To mthatha… ok.’ And I was just like ‘ok…what…?’ and she starts telling me what time the bus is and how much the total is and I think I was too shocked to feel anything, but I got the tickets and I came out to meet von and Diana, who were so confused as to where I had run off to and why I looked so shocked, and I just held up the tickets and we just started freaking out cuz we were so happy that we got tickets! It was a friggin Christmas miracle! Unfortunately it was another overnight bus so we would be spending the next 10 hours in the Johannesburg bus terminal, but as long as we had tickets all else was A-OK! We ended up taking turns napping, eating bad terminal food, playing too many games of phase-10, and enjoying real ice cream cones! All in all it was an interesting Christmas day and the next day we finally made it to our first destination, Coffee Bay!
Coffee Bay was the most difficult place to get to, but it was worth the trip and hands down my favorite spot in SA! We stayed at Coffee Shack, which is the absolute best run backpackers I have ever been to and a backpackers that all other backpackers should strive to be even half as awesome! I won’t go into details but one of the really cool things we did here was go on this death hike on the Cliffside of coffee bay and it was tiring, exhilarating and terrifying all at the same time. But the reason why we went on this death hike, knowing very well that these could be the last steps we ever take, was because the hike would be ending with us getting to go cliff jumping! It was about a 10m jump into the ocean and it was by far the coolest thing I had ever done! I mean the scenery was absolutely breath taking and the hike there was so scary that it almost made the jump seem like the safest thing we did! Anyway I would go back there in a heartbeat especially if it also meant reuniting with the 2010 Coffee Bay Pub Crawl Crew! Our slogan was “Like we’ve been friends forever” cuz we forged this out of this world bond over 2 days with 3 other travelers and it was so much fun!
Next we travelled to Plettenberg Bay, where we spent new years eve, but we rang the new year in with a serious jump off the Bloukrans Bridge! A lot of jumping this trip! We went to Storm’s River to bungee jump off the highest jump bridge in the world! It was 218m to the rocky river under us and it was AMAZING! They took our group of about 15 across a walk way to the middle of the bridge where they have their entire business set up between the bridge where the cars go by and an arch underneath. It was also quite possibly the best party I have ever been to in my entire life! There was party music blasting and all the people who work there had the most amazing personalities that just made you feel comfortable and pumped you up for what was to come. I should also preface this story by telling you that there is a bar where pre/post jumpers, fam and friends can hang out and watch live video jump footage. So right before leaving to go across the bridge I stopped in the bar for fun and I walked in just in time to see this chick refuse to jump. She was like in tears and kept trying to back up and not jump and then finally the workers just kinda pushed her off the ledge… terrifying for her, HILARIOUS for everyone else watching in the bar cuz everyones screaming JUMP! JUMP! So then I run outside to tell the others about the crier and they all come in to watch some other jumps and we noticed that there are good jumps and bad jumps. A good jump was dependent on whether they actually took a leaping jump off the ledge or just kinda fell or got pushed off, and if they had good form. So they take you one by one and strap you into all the necessary gear and up til this point all we’re talking and thinking about is our form and how we’re gonna jump. This was key cuz it took our minds completely off what was going to happen after that form perfect jump off the platform. My turn finally came up and they bound my legs and attached all the cords and then no joke the next few steps all happened within 20seconds… they helped me to the ledge, said look and wave hello to the camera, so I gave em a big esther smile, and then they yell 5,4,3,2,1 (but not like 5mississippi,4mississippi… more like in nanoseconds) and at 1 I bend my legs a lil and then jump up and out, arms straight out superman style and in my head I’m thinking ‘OH YEAH that was a gooooood one’ and then it hits you… the music starts to fade and you’re diving head first into nothing and your stomach drops and so I started rowing my arms backward and out loud saying “OH MY GOD! WHAT DID I JUST DO! HOLY COW! WOOOOOOOOOOOOO! OH MAN! WAAAAAHHHHHHHHH! THIS IS FRIGGGIN AWESOME! WOOOOOOOOOO!” and as you get to the end of your bungee you stare down at the river and trees but it’s silent except the babbling of the river and some birds chirping and it’s so peaceful and then it springs you back up and I thought it would be a lot more jarring but it was a smooth ride up and a couple times you’re completely upright and staring out past the bridge to the river mouth where it meets the ocean and it was seriously the coolest feeling and sight ever! I hear you freefall for about 7seconds and then bounce up and down for about another minute or two and then they bring you back up. The whole process from when it’s your turn to when you get back up on the bridge I think is about 5 minutes but they are the most exhilarating 5 minutes EVER!
After the jump we went to Jeffery’s Bay and relaxed, ate at a real Mexican place, had the best mint chocolate chip ice cream, shopped and even had a real South African Braai, which is just their version of a bbq. We then headed back up to Joburg but stopped for dinner in Blomfomkstein, which is where J.R.R Tolkein was born! I mean who knew he was South African and now not only does the scenery of LOTR make a lot more sense, but also S.Africans are hobbits. I mean really, LOTR just makes so much more sense now… I can’t get into it, but man! Haha so we couldn’t agree on a place to eat because some people, AHEM mike and kelly, didn’t want mcdonalds, and we didn’t really see anything else, but there was a mall there so we decided to food court it so everyone could choose their own cuisine. Well there was also a movie theatre there and I just about peed my pants cuz I was so excited to see a movie theatre so I spent the next hour trying to convince everyone that we had time for a movie, and being the super persuasive person that I am, got everyone on board and we saw Due Date! The next morning we finally made it to joburg and we couldn’t get a bus out that day so we stayed one last night in South Africa, but I got to cook everyone Migum’s famous chicken, spinach and tomato cream sauce pasta! It was so yummmm!
Anyway so that’s the South Africa trip! Sorry it was long, but it was an eventful trip and I even cut out half of it! a few other notable things from the trip: I got to skype with my family a few times which was awesome! I love South African gas stations! I had about 20 chicken, steak, mushroom, spinach and feta pies during my trip… they are delicious. And even though we were only there for about 10 days we even got to have pies from the place where they supposedly have the BEST pies in all of South Africa. I was hooked = ]
traveled panda
So then Diana, von and I left Maputo on Christmas eve to leave for Johannesburg. We got tickets for an overnight bus that put us in joburg at 4am Christmas day. Upon arrival in joburg however, we couldn’t find a bus that would take us where we wanted to go on the schedules and had to wait until the ticketing counters opened at 8am, but there were no clear signs as to where we needed to wait and which carrier we should wait for. So we were standing in the line that I thought was right, but just past 8 I saw this lady walk by and go toward a different ticket counter and I just had this hunch that I needed to follow her so I told Diana I’d be right back and followed her to another office that she opened up and I was second in line and when I got to the front I asked her for 3 tickets to mthatha and she said the bus was already sold out and my heart just sank… but then she was like ‘oh wait a minute…. To mthatha… ok.’ And I was just like ‘ok…what…?’ and she starts telling me what time the bus is and how much the total is and I think I was too shocked to feel anything, but I got the tickets and I came out to meet von and Diana, who were so confused as to where I had run off to and why I looked so shocked, and I just held up the tickets and we just started freaking out cuz we were so happy that we got tickets! It was a friggin Christmas miracle! Unfortunately it was another overnight bus so we would be spending the next 10 hours in the Johannesburg bus terminal, but as long as we had tickets all else was A-OK! We ended up taking turns napping, eating bad terminal food, playing too many games of phase-10, and enjoying real ice cream cones! All in all it was an interesting Christmas day and the next day we finally made it to our first destination, Coffee Bay!
Coffee Bay was the most difficult place to get to, but it was worth the trip and hands down my favorite spot in SA! We stayed at Coffee Shack, which is the absolute best run backpackers I have ever been to and a backpackers that all other backpackers should strive to be even half as awesome! I won’t go into details but one of the really cool things we did here was go on this death hike on the Cliffside of coffee bay and it was tiring, exhilarating and terrifying all at the same time. But the reason why we went on this death hike, knowing very well that these could be the last steps we ever take, was because the hike would be ending with us getting to go cliff jumping! It was about a 10m jump into the ocean and it was by far the coolest thing I had ever done! I mean the scenery was absolutely breath taking and the hike there was so scary that it almost made the jump seem like the safest thing we did! Anyway I would go back there in a heartbeat especially if it also meant reuniting with the 2010 Coffee Bay Pub Crawl Crew! Our slogan was “Like we’ve been friends forever” cuz we forged this out of this world bond over 2 days with 3 other travelers and it was so much fun!
Next we travelled to Plettenberg Bay, where we spent new years eve, but we rang the new year in with a serious jump off the Bloukrans Bridge! A lot of jumping this trip! We went to Storm’s River to bungee jump off the highest jump bridge in the world! It was 218m to the rocky river under us and it was AMAZING! They took our group of about 15 across a walk way to the middle of the bridge where they have their entire business set up between the bridge where the cars go by and an arch underneath. It was also quite possibly the best party I have ever been to in my entire life! There was party music blasting and all the people who work there had the most amazing personalities that just made you feel comfortable and pumped you up for what was to come. I should also preface this story by telling you that there is a bar where pre/post jumpers, fam and friends can hang out and watch live video jump footage. So right before leaving to go across the bridge I stopped in the bar for fun and I walked in just in time to see this chick refuse to jump. She was like in tears and kept trying to back up and not jump and then finally the workers just kinda pushed her off the ledge… terrifying for her, HILARIOUS for everyone else watching in the bar cuz everyones screaming JUMP! JUMP! So then I run outside to tell the others about the crier and they all come in to watch some other jumps and we noticed that there are good jumps and bad jumps. A good jump was dependent on whether they actually took a leaping jump off the ledge or just kinda fell or got pushed off, and if they had good form. So they take you one by one and strap you into all the necessary gear and up til this point all we’re talking and thinking about is our form and how we’re gonna jump. This was key cuz it took our minds completely off what was going to happen after that form perfect jump off the platform. My turn finally came up and they bound my legs and attached all the cords and then no joke the next few steps all happened within 20seconds… they helped me to the ledge, said look and wave hello to the camera, so I gave em a big esther smile, and then they yell 5,4,3,2,1 (but not like 5mississippi,4mississippi… more like in nanoseconds) and at 1 I bend my legs a lil and then jump up and out, arms straight out superman style and in my head I’m thinking ‘OH YEAH that was a gooooood one’ and then it hits you… the music starts to fade and you’re diving head first into nothing and your stomach drops and so I started rowing my arms backward and out loud saying “OH MY GOD! WHAT DID I JUST DO! HOLY COW! WOOOOOOOOOOOOO! OH MAN! WAAAAAHHHHHHHHH! THIS IS FRIGGGIN AWESOME! WOOOOOOOOOO!” and as you get to the end of your bungee you stare down at the river and trees but it’s silent except the babbling of the river and some birds chirping and it’s so peaceful and then it springs you back up and I thought it would be a lot more jarring but it was a smooth ride up and a couple times you’re completely upright and staring out past the bridge to the river mouth where it meets the ocean and it was seriously the coolest feeling and sight ever! I hear you freefall for about 7seconds and then bounce up and down for about another minute or two and then they bring you back up. The whole process from when it’s your turn to when you get back up on the bridge I think is about 5 minutes but they are the most exhilarating 5 minutes EVER!
After the jump we went to Jeffery’s Bay and relaxed, ate at a real Mexican place, had the best mint chocolate chip ice cream, shopped and even had a real South African Braai, which is just their version of a bbq. We then headed back up to Joburg but stopped for dinner in Blomfomkstein, which is where J.R.R Tolkein was born! I mean who knew he was South African and now not only does the scenery of LOTR make a lot more sense, but also S.Africans are hobbits. I mean really, LOTR just makes so much more sense now… I can’t get into it, but man! Haha so we couldn’t agree on a place to eat because some people, AHEM mike and kelly, didn’t want mcdonalds, and we didn’t really see anything else, but there was a mall there so we decided to food court it so everyone could choose their own cuisine. Well there was also a movie theatre there and I just about peed my pants cuz I was so excited to see a movie theatre so I spent the next hour trying to convince everyone that we had time for a movie, and being the super persuasive person that I am, got everyone on board and we saw Due Date! The next morning we finally made it to joburg and we couldn’t get a bus out that day so we stayed one last night in South Africa, but I got to cook everyone Migum’s famous chicken, spinach and tomato cream sauce pasta! It was so yummmm!
Anyway so that’s the South Africa trip! Sorry it was long, but it was an eventful trip and I even cut out half of it! a few other notable things from the trip: I got to skype with my family a few times which was awesome! I love South African gas stations! I had about 20 chicken, steak, mushroom, spinach and feta pies during my trip… they are delicious. And even though we were only there for about 10 days we even got to have pies from the place where they supposedly have the BEST pies in all of South Africa. I was hooked = ]
traveled panda
Happy ‘roast’-day Brian and see you never Amanda Dillon
So somehow I made a name for myself here in Mozambique as the ultimate party planner and here’s the story of how that came to be. It all started when vonnie and I were going out to visit our friend michelle on Ilha. Normally we can find a ride that’s going all the way onto the island, but this time they dropped us off right before the bridge going across, which meant we had to take a chapa across the bridge. Normally this would have been annoying, but it all changed when we stepped into the pimpest chapa in Mozambique! It looked like any other chapa from the outside, but this was no ordinary chapa. When we got in, my jaw dropped at the sight of the wine colored plush velour couch seats! I was as giddy as a PCV getting their first care package, and when we sat down every muscle in my body relaxed as I melted into the seat. The chapa also had a raised roof and surround sound speakers that were blasting JAMS! When we reached our destination, what I really wanted to ask was how much would the driver sell the chapa to me for, but I settled for his phone number cuz we had the brilliant idea to throw a party on ilha and hire him to be our private party chapa! We were looking for any and all excuses to throw a party and realized that our good friend Brian would be turning into a grandpa in December and also that our ex-roomie Dillon was going to be leaving so we decided to convince all our friends to come up for a ‘Happy Birthday Brian and Farewell Dillon’ party! Over the last year we had been introduced to a great little backpackers on Ilha called Ruby’s that is the coolest place and because of how many people we were going to have, I decided to just rent the entire place out for that weekend! Anyway so the big weekend was fast approaching and I had made just about all plans and reservations except one… the chapa. I had called the driver about a 100 times in the few weeks before the big weekend and I don’t know if his number changed or whatever, but he never answered… needless to say I was crushed and almost, almost cancelled the entire party! I mean the whole thing was planned around the party chapa and not being able to book it was a bad omen in my mind… but with a lot of reassuring, I continued with the planning. Finally the highly anticipated weekend had arrived and friends from all over began trickling into Nampula. We spent only a day in monapo before leaving for ilha as our house is not quite equipped to cater to 15 guests! The trip out to ilha ended up working out better than ever cuz brian sat in the front cab of the open back truck while the rest of us planned out just how we were going to Roast him for his birthday! The rest of the weekend on ilha was great! They have a fully stocked kitchen there so we cooked and ate some really good food, including brian’s favorite, homemade lasagna, and had some wild nights on Ruby’s gorgeous rooftop! In true Dillon fashion, there was lots of straight bottle drinking and raging dance parties to really give her a good send-off! Oh dill… I miss you so much already… The roast for brian’s birthday was HILARIOUS, and I was hoping to be able to put up some of what we said on here, but it’s been a while now and I don’t remember… but there was a lot of talk about his pickiness with food, his sweating, and his love for floppy disks = ] After ilha everyone needed a little r&r so we sailed to chocas, a beautiful beach across the water, and kicked it at the very deserted white sand blue water beaches of carushca. We rented out a giant bungalow and played games, listened to music and read in hammocks and of course floated in the very salty Indian ocean. There’s no kitchen there so we, especially me, didn’t have to worry about who was cooking what meal! Everyone loved it so much that we even ended up staying another day so that everyone would be fully recuperated! It was hands down one of the greatest most E.P.I.C. (another special shout out E.sther and P.ete I.ncredible C.ompanions for life!) weekends of my life and it will definitely be talked about for years to come! I may even be able to get more people to come visit up north! Yeah you heard me you lazy southern moz slackers that never come up north!
Ultimate planner panda
Ultimate planner panda
Thanksgiving in true Mozambican fashion
So I invited myself to Gorongosa to spend Thanksgiving with the Mills’. Jordan’s parents were going to be visiting so I wanted to meet them and I def wasn’t about to spend it alone in Monapo, so I made the long journey down! Sidenote: I feel that I may need to clarify. When I say brian and jordan, I mean the mills’, the married couple that has oh so graciously taken me in = ] they’re pretty awe… I mean ok… (I know they, along with their friends and family members, read my blog and I don’t want anyone’s head getting bigger… Oregonians…) anyway so on the journey down I had been talking to brian and he said their power had been out, but we just thought it was from the weather and we kinda just assumed/hoped it would be back before the big day arrived. Jordan’s poor parents got the real moz experience sans energy which means no fans and romantic candle lit dinners! Luckily the weather was pretty overcast and not blazing hot, but still November in Africa is still summer… come Wednesday evening, the electricity still isn’t back so we cook an entire fiesta night dinner on two charcoal grills! Mexican rice, chips, salsa, queso dip, beans and dude it was friggin awesome! But if we thought that took long and it was a lot of work, we were in for a surprise! By Thursday morning we had just accepted the fact that the electricity would not be coming on and at 7am we started cooking! Peeling potatoes, boiling pumpkin, rolling out biscuit and pie dough, and most importantly, getting the charcoal grills going! We bought a giant bag of charcoal and a few extra pots to make a dutch oven and to cook in, and the boys went to go pick up the turkey… the very alive turkey! I guess you’re supposed to feed it alcohol so that it’s not so crazy when you kill it, but apparently our turkey wasn’t so thirsty cuz it wouldn’t drink the wine, although personally I think the turkey just has good taste and knows really bad Mozambican wine when it sees it, so the killing process was a little more hectic, but tikha, the mills’ ‘very excited over a giant bird‘ dog, didn’t help either. After the kill, that left 4 guys covered in splatters of the turkey’s blood, and tikha ripping out most of the turkey’s feathers, colin and espanhol tackled the rest of the defeathering and degutting of the turkey… it was not a pretty site. Well once the turkey was clean, since our dutch oven wouldn’t be big enough to cook the entire bird, we cut it into parts and marinated it and set it aside to get grilled. 13 hours, a lot of beer, and half a sack of charcoal later, it was pitch black dark with the romantic candlelit votive, and we ended up with regular and pumpkin biscuits, garlic mashed potatoes, a green bean and bacon casserole, stuffing, fruit salad, pumpkin and apple pie, turkey and gravy, all cooked on just 2 little charcoal grills! We stuffed our faces that night and I got to have delicious pumpkin pie for the next 4 meals! It was probably one of the most hard core peace corps experiences I have had, but it was a friggin blast and it definitely made me realize how thankful I am to be here and to have had the pleasure of sharing these experiences with some of the most amazing people I have ever met! I will also never be complaining about cooking another thanksgiving dinner where there are ovens, sinks and stoves, but I’m also very thankful for all the stores that sell pre-packaged thanksgiving meals! Oh glorious ralph’s thanksgiving box… how I miss thee = ]
Also a special shout out to my new best friend, pete! He’s the cyclist doing the ‘against malaria’ cycle I talked about last time and anyway he had made it into Malawi, but for some odd reason ahem alex ahem, came back to visit and spent thanksgiving with us in moz! Anyway one thing led to another and we became best friends forever and because that wasn’t enough he’s also my second best friend as well. Really sorry to all those out there who wanted those position, but he’s just really awesome and he has a british accent! I mean how can you beat that? Haha MISS YOU PETE! COME BACKKKKKKKK! Are you in Rwanda now?
Stuffed panda
Also a special shout out to my new best friend, pete! He’s the cyclist doing the ‘against malaria’ cycle I talked about last time and anyway he had made it into Malawi, but for some odd reason ahem alex ahem, came back to visit and spent thanksgiving with us in moz! Anyway one thing led to another and we became best friends forever and because that wasn’t enough he’s also my second best friend as well. Really sorry to all those out there who wanted those position, but he’s just really awesome and he has a british accent! I mean how can you beat that? Haha MISS YOU PETE! COME BACKKKKKKKK! Are you in Rwanda now?
Stuffed panda
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)
