Two and a half weeks in....

I have had many requests for an update...sorry for my negligence. Not sure what to write!! For those who would like to check my facebook, I did post some pictures of our first week.

We are thankfully over our jetlag. It took about 5-7 days, which is typical (so they say...a day per time zone crossed and we are 7 hours ahead of Edmonton here so it is about right). Jaelyn will start school on Wednesday but her school starts at 7:30am! SO we still need to do a bit of schedule shifting. The problem is not getting the kids up early enough...it is ME! I cannot get up to wake them up at 6:15! :) We will hopefully get Nathan registered for preschool soon and he will start in September (just half days).

We are still in "settling in" mode. We are living in a temporary house while ours is "under construction". There have been some delays in this process, but we are so thankful to have one of our teammates spear-heading the whole project and putting a flame under the workers to get moving. Rog will likely get to start helping out there too which will also get us into our house faster, and ensure the quality of the construction is above African average quality. :)

So I am slowly learning my way around these roads. Honestly, the first week, one dirt road looked the same as the other and there was no way I could get myself around! Our team has been so great in helping us settle and showing us the ropes. I have been out a few times on my own to get groceries and have only gotten lost once (in the neighborhood!)

Yes, things are definitely different here in Niger...as expected...but there are a lot of things that are not that bad! When we arrived, there was rain earlier in the day so we got off the plane and felt that it was not hot at all (because it wasn't!). We were quickly introduced to warmer weather, however...but still tolerable. We have been told that we are in "cool" season which is a bit scary but maybe we will acclimate more and more.
It has been surprising to find that we can find all the basics that we seem to need to cook (rice, soy sauce, sesame oil, garlic etc) in the stores here...just at 2 to 4 times the cost of Superstore back home! EVERYTHING is more expensive here, but at least available! (toilet paper, toiletries, etc.) The meats have been a bit harder to find. They sell whole or parts of chickens frozen but definitely no "boneless, skinless" stuff so it makes it harder to cook...you have to think ahead, thaw, debone, deskin, marinate, then cook...I have only tried ground beef and not bought any other kind (so expensive)! The good thing is that the chickens are not hormone pumped and ground beef is all extra lean!! (there are NO fat animals in Niger!) I buy meats at the "store" and not at the "market". I was at the market today and wanted to take a discreet picture of it, but could not without feeling really bad. They sold meats and fish but you can imagine...they were black from the flies and there is no refrigeration (in 37C heat!). It was a bit disturbing, but I will just not be buying meat from there. Another different thing...food goes bad in the fridge really fast. We had homemade pita pizza in the fridge from 2 days ago and took it out today for lunch but it had a layer of white mold on it! It felt like such a waste (seeing as the ground beef and cheese that were on it were so expensive!) but at least things here do not go to waste. We fed it to our housemate's dog but when we don't have a dog, we collect all food waste for goats. And I have been told everything we throw into the garbage also gets a once-over so though there is no recycling program here, there is reusing...which is even better!

The kids seem to be adapting well. Jaelyn better than Nathan. We are again so thankful that there are other kids on our team that they can play with. Nathan has said (just once) that he "hates Africa, I want to go back to Edmonton!" but it may have been a reaction to not being allowed to do something...or due to his sweating. :) We all sweat a lot...part of life here and a built-in cooling system! Our feet (and indoor crocs) are brown at the end of the day, as are our clothes and I can see why they say our clothes here wear out faster and why our whites do not stay white.

Rog and I hope to start language studies as soon as the kids are in school. We will be learning Fulfide, the language of the Fulani people...and we have heard that it is HARD! yikes! We met our language tutor and looks like it will be a grueling 2 years! :)

I have been trying to learn to ride a motorcycle (it would be much cheaper for me to run to the store in a motorcycle than have to fire up a big truck) but the first day, it fell on me (so much heavier than I thought it would be!) and the second day (today) I wiped out (but thankfully the sand is soft!). Maybe third time will be a charm!

Oh, and the truck we are using now is being lent to us by our team leaders. We are still in need of a vehicle and still not sure what we will buy. Rog has been looking at a site online to import a used Japanese car, but the right-handed driving may be difficult in the chaotic traffic here. A 4X4 has been deemed a necessity here (we have discovered this quickly as the roads are almost all made of sand and depending on the rains, can end up very bumpy or muddy). Please refer to our blog on support to see how you can help us out financially if you are interested.

Thank you again for all of yours prayers and it's good hearing from you, even if I don't email you back! Will try to keep posting!!

first few days here...spent 3 hours peeling garlic (got the kids in on it too!)  but am almost done that batch of garlic so bought some pre-peeled stuff!!! (it took me a long time because garlic here is not the same as in Canada...the cloves are tiny and take a lot longer to peel)

Nathan sitting in his undies because he was too hot to get dressed

Jaelyn poses for a picture. This is in front of our temporary house. Quite green from all the rain we have been getting. That machine in the background is a swamp cooler that is not hooked up as it should be (if it were, it would be blowing cooler air into the house but that would require making a hole in the wall of the house...so it has been sitting out there for a  year, or so I have been told!)

Rog has learned to ride this thing, though he needs some practice...the sand makes it tricky. It belongs to the team (in case you thought we would buy one instead of a vehicle!)

we had a team retreat to get to know each other and there was a "fear factor" part...where we had to eat this goop (look below"...my tongue stayed blue for hours and I am proud to say that I ate the most and managed to keep it down (unlike some of my unfortunate teammates pictured here!) 

so the stuff in the tupperware on the top left is what we ate...made up of tapioca, green leaves of some kind, dried fish and what I thought was spices turned out to be sand...yeah...it was gritty....

thought I would add a picture of my pantry shelf. yes, that is a big bottle of hot sauce I found! it is good stuff  (a bit pricey but am indulging), since mango season is coming to an end, bought 10kg of them and that is what is not ripe enough yet to freeze (bottom middle), instant noodles have been a staple (yes, I know, so not healthy!) but has saved me from having to cook many times (but it took a while to find one my kids liked!), no name cornflakes in the background there on the left...not bad when you mix it with the "choco souffle" at the end!

on the left, milk powder..N will not drink it but J seems to like it in her cereal...on the right, rice that  I bought at the store and put in (what I thought were air-tight) ziploc bags...but was looking and there are little critters crawling in there...oh well...good thing it gets washed before I cook it! and the gin bottles...they sell peanuts in them! They have salty ones and sugary ones and they make a good snack!