Six Weeks in the USA

It is 1:30 AM and my kids have been up since 11:30 PM AGAIN!  I am cranky and wishing they would get their acts together and figure out we have changed time zones.  I will use this time to complain about my latest travels.  Our vacation was great, just the getting to and from had issues.  Thank you to all of the people in the world who are kind and patient to those who are travelling with small children. I hope that I can remember what it is like and be helpful to others when my monsters are a bit older.

We were all really looking forward to our vacation in the States.  The boys and I had made a countdown chain more than a month in advance.  It seemed to take forever for it to be time to go and then suddenly the day had arrived!

Since we didn't leave until the afternoon, I kept busy doing all the laundry, vacuuming, and doing whatever else needed to be done so that when we returned our home would be clean.  Obviously there would be dust and stuff, but it would be orderly upon our return.

The airport in Namibia is incredibly small.  If it weren't for the required security measures it would remind me more of a bus depot or small train station from some made for TV movie.  The size has its pros and cons.  Not a lot of services available, but you certainly aren't going to get lost or have trouble getting where you need to be. 

Last year we had trouble at check in because we were going from Namibia to South Africa to Atlanta to Seattle to Spokane.  For some bizarre reason they can only put 3 locations on baggage tags, so our bags could only be checked through to Seattle.  This year we were going from Namibia to Frankfurt to Chicago to Spokane.  Yay!  Our bags could be checked all the way to our final destination from the start.  The check in agent did not know the airport code for Chicago.  Seriously?  Are we the first people to be going to Chicago?  Isn't it in the computer or a book or something?  The woman was totally clueless as how to check our bags.  We told her the code for Chicago and also Spokane.  I still found it very, very strange.  Still, bags checked and boarding passes to Frankfurt were in hand.  Of course Air Namibia doesn't work with any other airline so we would have to get the rest of our boarding passes later.

We had our exit papers all filled out ahead of time.  At the immigration counter we handed over our passports and completed papers.  The woman wanted to go through them one at a time rather than look at us as a family.  Okay, but should she really start with the children?  A two year old should not be separated from his parents, should he?  I had visions of him running past the counter once he was cleared and going heaven only knows where.  Security was pretty much of a non issue except for the big old car seat we had for Ryan.  Ugh.  No one ever knows how to get that thing to fit through the x-ray machine the first time.

Normal waiting to board.  No pre-board or anything for people with young children, so we wait.  We gate check our stroller, leaving us with four carry-ons (two of which were backpacks) and the car seat.  We walk out to our plane and up the stairs, dragging the bags and kids with us.  Back through the plane with all of our stuff we settle in.

Ryan is ticked that he has a car seat and Justin doesn't.  We aren't too thrilled with it either.  Justin didn't need a car seat for the plane when he was two, but Ryan is a bit more active.  Who wants to  be forcing a child to keep his belt buckled for a ten hour flight?  For an overnight flight it made sense anyway since Ryan sleeps well in his car seat.  Once situated, the flight attendants actually have little bags of goodies for the kids.  That made their days.  Not a lot of airlines do that anymore, so a real bonus.  We wait and wait and then it is FINALLY time to take off.

The little safety spiel is done and Justin is still reviewing the safety card from his seatback pocket.  A flight attendant comes up to us and tells us that the airline does not allow car seats to be used on the plane.  What?  Is that the most bizarre thing you ever heard or what?  We have to get Ryan out and buckled up.  I wanted to smack the woman in the head with the car seat and tell her what I thought of her, but arguing with a flight attendant is not the best way to start out a trip.  I would probably be arrested and never get to go on my trip.  The woman was a complete idiot, but what could I do?  We got the seat out and, along with the other passengers, got to listen to Ryan cry about having his seat taken away.  He did NOT sleep through the flight as we had anticipated.

I know airline food is not looked upon as great to begin with, but somehow the Namibian touch made me really want to gag.  Thank goodness that I packed plenty of snacks. :)  The entertainment was the movie "Like Water For Elephants" shown on a screen up at the front of the cabin and a couple of pull down monitors.  Reminded me of traveling long ago except the headsets were marginally better and didn't cost five bucks.  I kind of wanted to see the movie, but with kids that wasn't an option.

We get to Frankfurt and are among the very last off of the plane because we have to wait for the flight attendant to get our car seat for us.  We walk down the stairs and our stroller is not there.  It is, we are told, on the baggage carousel.  Maybe I am missing something here, but why would I gate check something if I wanted it on the baggage carousel?  We get on the bus to get to the terminal.  I am sure that the other passengers hate us.  I can't really blame them.  They wait on us to get our kid out of the car seat.  Our kid screams on the plane because he doesn't have his car seat.  Now we are the last people off of the plane and the bus is waiting for us while we try to locate our stroller.  I kind of hate us too, but I don't think it is our fault.

Inside the airport we have to get clear across the airport to another terminal, go through security again, and get boarding passes for our other two flights.  We have enough time to do this. What we do NOT have enough time to do is go to baggage claim and wait for our stroller, go through customs, find the United counter to get our boarding passes (rather than getting them at the gate if we don't exit to baggage claim), go through ticket control, passport control, and security.  We opt to abandon the stroller.

Once on United, things went better.  We were allowed to use the car seat.  Imagine that.  In seat personal entertainment systems keep the kids happy.  Somehow even though I called in to request our kids have children's meals we only ended up with one.  It worked out okay.  They shared that and a regular meal.  They enjoyed controlling what they wanted to watch.  Ryan watched the same segment of "Rio" over and over.  His system finally crashed as we were landing in Chicago.  I guess it can only show a segment a thousand times before it goes berserk.  Another flight of about ten hours, but this one was not as bad.

Short time in Chicago and on to Spokane.  33 or so hours of travel, but we made it there alive.  Only the Air Namibia flight sucked.  I mean, not like it is enjoyable to travel that long with kids, but Air Namibia was the only bad part.  The kids behaved well, considering.  They were cranky at times, but that is a long trip.

Guess what?  Our stroller showed up in Spokane a couple of days after we arrived.  There was a big piece of paper with a note on it asking for someone in America to call us. :)

While in the US we flew from Spokane to Portland, Oregon and Burbank, California.  Those flights were uneventful.  Yay!

We dreaded returning.  After much deliberation, we decided not to take the car seat on the planes.  We knew it would be helpful for the trip from San Francisco to Frankfurt, but didn't want to have to haul it through the airport at Frankfurt for five hours and not know if we would be able to use it on Air Namibia or not. 

Things went smoothly from Spokane to San Fransisco and on to Frankfurt.  Once in Frankfurt we were anxious to get our boarding passes for our last flight to Namibia.  Air Namibia is not a major airline and our gate was not posted nor was the counter opened.  We spent quite a bit of time wandering around the airport.  We eventually found a check-in kiosk and were able to print our passes.  Rob was confused when he was required to scan our passports face down for the machine to read them when the machine specifically said (and had a picture to match) to have them face up to scan.  He asked me if he was just too tired.  Nope.  The instructions were incorrect.  Yay Air Namibia.

We spent more than two hours at McDonald's and its playland.  Thank you, McDonald's!  The boys got out a lot of energy before the flight.  Without the car seat to deal with, getting onto our flight and situated was not so bad.  I knew it was going to be a loooooong flight with "Diary of a Wimpy Kid 2" our source of entertainment.  Probably just as well that it wasn't something that the boys would want to watch because they couldn't see the screen.  The boys did pretty well.  I wish they had slept more.

I had very low expectations for Air Namibia and they didn't disappoint.  They claim to be the spirit of Namibia or some such thing.  I think the country should sue the airlines for slander unless the spirit of the country is supposed to be inconsistency, incompetence, and indifference.

When we landed, of course our gate checked stroller wasn't at the gate, but we didn't care.  We had to get our bags anyway.  We were pleased that the diplomatic line was open so we didn't have to wait in the long line to get through immigration.  There were only a few people in front of us.  When it was our turn, we had our forms filled out.  The line next to us for SADC (South African Development Community countries) was able to process 23 people in the time it took the woman to process our family of four.  Our forms were completed.  We had the diplomatic passports with appropriate visas.  The information was virtually the same.  Why, why, why would it take so long to get four people through?  I think Air Namibia and immigration must get their employees from the same employment pool.

I shouldn't have been so cranky, because our bags were not out when we got through.  Half an hour after the flight had landed the crews bags got through.  Our bags started showing up fifty minutes after we had landed.  Remember, it isn't a big airport.  Their are two baggage carousels and you can stand in the middle of the two and watch both.  I'm wondering if they made some poor soul hand carry our luggage from the plane rather than transport it on the baggage cars.  Our bags (including stroller) all made it. :)

If you aren't declaring any goods they randomly screen bags.  The woman who was choosing who to screen choose the next two people in line, but her idiotic co-worker misunderstood and starting having everyone go through.  There wasn't room for people to wait as the bags went through the x-ray.  I continued on through with the kids and the carry-ons (I decided not to have those screened and no one seemed to care) while Rob stayed with the luggage.  Our bags were filled with goodies like 15 pounds of salsa, 9 pounds of peanut butter, and other things we wanted to have with us here.   They had him go to have the bags examined.  Rob takes the bags over to the woman at the goods to declare side and she asks Rob what she is supposed to be examining.  Uh, how is he supposed to know?  If you were hiding something would you really tell her anyway?  

Our shuttle driver was waiting for us.  We made it home safely.  The house was clean. :)  I guess I shouldn't complain, but I am.  Now comes of the question of what I will do next time if I have the option.  Will I choose the horrible Air Namibia or will I opt to go through crime ridden Johannesburg, additional security screening and pat down, and deal with four flights rather than three?  I don't know.  I do know that I am glad Ryan will be done with the car seat and stroller.  I am also glad that I won't need to carry bulky diapers with me.  That's something.

Now I realize that I should be happy that I am not the housewife who got hauled off the plane and searched and interviewed.  If I were in her place I would be really really upset.  I don't know the whole story though, and am guessing that she probably got pulled because of the people she was sitting with.  People who saw the men by the restroom probably got nervous and I would suspect the flight attendants got multiple comments by other passengers.  Justified?  Perhaps not, but I think that probably things played out as they needed to be played out.  I understand being upset, but I think that people were probably doing their job based upon the information they were given.

With the exception of Seattle, I have always been treated respectfully going through security.  Employees have been kind to my children (currently 4 and 2, but we have travelled with them younger too) and been polite and patient carrying out their duties.  Yes, they have patted down Ryan's rear end.  I know that upsets some people and they say that babies aren't security threats.  I think that a poopy diaper would be a great place to try to sneak things through.  Do you really think the employees enjoy having to search kids and the elderly or infirm?  Seattle, on more than one occasion, has ticked me off.  The people there were, in my opinion, very rude and disrespectful to me and others in the line.  I think a lot of the security measures are strange.  I think there has got to be a better way.  In the meantime, if employees are just doing their jobs,I try to be patient with them.  I can save my frustration for the idiots of Air Namibia.  I guess we all have our own little issues, don't we. :)

Oh, and in case you haven't guessed, I hate Air Namibia. 

Happy (Early) 4th of July

Even though it isn't the Fourth of July yet, we attended the annual Embassy family party to celebrate.  (Not to be confused with the official party which I seriously doubt will include a bouncy castle!)  Since we are in the Southern Hemisphere, it is winter here right now.  It was an absolutely gorgeous day!  I had the boys in long sleeves, but they would have been okay in t-shirts.  Oh well, saved me from having to put sunscreen on their arms.

That's my boy, going up the slide!

 

Justin and Rob were partners in the three legged race.  I competed with Ryan tied to my leg.  He thought it was the funniest thing ever.

Doesn't Justin look comfy?

After the three legged race, Justin decided a game of tug-of-war was in order.

Penduka

Rob and I went to visit Penduka, a small community not too far outside of town.  From what little we had read and heard, we were under the impression that it was a tourist type destination.  We knew that it was an organization that helps disadvantaged women by teaching them how to make craft products that can be sold.  I envisioned a large gift shop with smaller areas where you could watch the women working on the projects.  There is indeed a small gift shop and you can see the women at work, but Penduka is not there for the tourists, it is there for the women.  It is a no frills operation focused on helping women in need become more self sufficient.

A map painted on the wall of one of the buildings shows the layout of the community, which includes some bungalows for housing some of the women.

One of the small buildings was for bead making.  Glass bottles are collected throughout the city and then broken and molded into beads for jewelry.  The women who make these beads are all deaf.

View out to some of the bungalows.

Outside of the main building.  This building houses the gift shop as well as the sewing area, the pottery area, and the batik printing area.

I was very impressed with their TB program.  They provide treatment to people with TB.  The people are monitored to ensure that they take their medication.  Before they take it, they are given some food.  Being fed is a motivator to come and it helps reduce some of the side effects of taking the medication on an empty stomach.  During treatment, patients are taught how to make simple bead crafts.  They are paid for each piece they complete.  The catch is, no payment until they have finished their treatment.  I thought that was brilliant!  Who wants to give up all of that free money? 

With so many charity scams and mishandling of donations, it was nice to be able to see something in action.  It was also nice to be able to buy some crafts that were actually made in Namibia.  So often the things you find here are brought in from other countries and the prices are marked up.

Here is Ryan wearing the apron that I bought him at Penduka.  I loved the colors and the animals on it.

Justin looks pretty cute in his apron too.  They had some with gorgeous embroidery, but I knew I would never allowed those to be used as aprons!  Now my boys have aprons to wear when they "help" cook and when I want to help protect their clothes when they are eating.

Here is the Penduka website: http://www.penduka.com/en/

Here is a shot of the area around Penduka.  I took it through the van window on our way home.

Here is a picture of one of many barber shops set up along the way.  Why you would need so many places to cut hair is beyond me.  I suppose it is a way to try to make some money without much in the way of start up costs.  Unemployment is incredibly high here.

More random homes/businesses/storage sheds

Back in town we stopped at this little shop.  Someone had told Rob they have the best fries in Windhoek.  Well, the fries were good, but not great.  They must not like crispy fries here because they just don't make them that way.  At least they are potatoes and probably contain trans fat.  How can that be bad?  Our vote for best fries in Namibia is definitely out at Okapuka game lodge.  Kind of far to drive for fries though. 



Game Drive Afternoon Trip

We FINALLY made it to the Okapuka Game Lodge.  It is only about 40 km away from Windhoek, so it is one of those things that we could do any afternoon.  Of course that means it is something we hadn't gotten around to because it is so close and doesn't require a lot of advanced planning.  Fortunately, we went with a couple who is only here for a couple of months.  That means they have a tighter timeline.  That was the motivation we needed to go. 

Warthogs were everywhere!  I took this shot while sitting at our table.  We snacked on some fries while we waited for it to be time to leave for our drive.  Rob and I agree that the fries were the best that we have had in Namibia.  Very reasonably priced too.



We saw two crocodiles while we were out on the game drive.  While we were snapping pictures of one, a warthog came trotting down the path.  It saw the croc, returned back into the brush, and made a wide detour to get around.  Not that I really had any desire to see a creature mauled by a crocodile, but it would have been interesting to see how fast that croc could move.  He looks so harmless just resting there.  I've seen enough nature shows to know better though!

We saw probably about 20 giraffes in all.  We didn't get close to a lot of them though.  I was amazed at how well they can blend in to the the landscape.  They are obviously tall and I would have thought that would make them stick out.  Their coloring matches up with the dry bushes and trees though.  I find giraffes one of the most interesting animals to watch.  They are graceful and just different.  Very neat to view them here as opposed to a zoo.  I get better pics in a zoo, but it just isn't the same.

The tour guide feeds the rhinos, so we saw plenty of them.  I liked this picture because you can tell how close they got to us.  It would have been easy to reach out and touch them.  Our guide assured us they were vegetarians, but that doesn't mean anyone wanted to run around and play with them.  These guys are BIG.  We saw a couple of them have a disagreement and I sure wouldn't want that horn coming my way!

These are springbok.  We saw tons of them as well as kudu, oryx, sable antelope, blue wildebeest, hartebeest, eland, and the like.  Our guide had the facts about which were the fastest, which could leap the highest, which were the largest, etc. etc.  They eat a lot of these animals here.  I have tried some when we went to Etosha.  Not horribly impressed, but I am not big on game meat.  We saw one oryx with only one horn and it was facing the wrong way.  Our guide told us it was from incest.  "Incestuous antelope" became my favorite phrase of the day.  The little oryx looked a bit like a unicorn reject.

I love all the birds' nests hanging from the trees. Namibia has a lot of interesting birds, but they are fast, small, and hard to get pictures of unless you have patience and a good camera.  We also saw baboons, but they were fast and uncooperative with getting their pictures taken.  Baboons cause a lot of mischief here. 

Nice fire going at Joe's Beerhouse.  We had an early dinner so it wasn't cold yet.  When the sun goes down, winter can be chilly here, especially if there is a  wind.  Joe's is  a tourist "must" for eating out in Namibia.  I opted for a beef steak rather than some of the more exotic game choices that are available.  Our poor waitress seemed a bit confused by Americans who didn't want sauce dumped all over their meat.  The garlic butter on it was perfect!  Why would we want to mess with that?  They really love their sauces here.  Unfortunately, I don't find them very appetizing.

A friend told me that the boys wouldn't do well on the drive.  I know a lot of places don't allow small children because it is hard to get them to follow directions precisely if wildlife get out of control.  I think our boys would have been fine as long as they weren't sitting on the edge.  I would have felt that they were safe, but I sure wouldn't have enjoyed myself.  They would have been bored.  Justin is so clueless at spotting things too, I wonder if he would see a rhino unless it touched him!  They got bored just looking at a few pictures.  The comment Justin made was along the lines of you saw a rhino, cool, let's go play now.

So Mom, Dad, Meredith, or other potential visitors.  I will take you to Okapuka if you visit us.  It is close, the game drive itself is short (only 90 minutes) and inexpensive.  You get to see a little of the wild without it being inconvenient. :)

Rant, Rave, and Well Deserved Praise

I love to shop at Kohls for clothes for baby and toddler items as well as some other basic odds and ends.  When our Chinese rice cooker died, Kohls had the best price on the replacement (okay, I only compared with Amazon, Macys, and two or three other sites), especially since I could get it at 30% as a Kohls charge card holder AND get $10 back for every $50 I spent.  I am a regular Kohls customer for things like that. 

This week my two kitchen wooden spoons arrived in a box big enough for a bed pillow, but they had it dropped shipped from their supplier so can't blame them for that, and my other items did not arrive.  Box came with packing slip and some baby items that were not at all what I ordered.  Not even close.  Sigh.  So I want to return the things that aren't mine and get the things that I ordered and paid for.

Living overseas presents challenges, and returns are one of them.  With the time difference and the often crappy connection I have for phone calls, e-mail customer service would seem the way to go.  I explained the situation.  Questions were asked of me.  I responded, but of course the same person didn't get that e-mail.  Trying to go over things (guess they don't read the whole thread or the notes that they take) is like a game of telephone and the message doesn't get through. 

I gave up and called as I had done on a previous occassion.  Nicest customer service on the phone.  Very polite, very helpful, and the problem was dealt with.  Not only was it corrected, but it was corrected to my advantage as a courtesy for my inconvenience.  Nice.  They have kept me as a customer.  I hope that as they look over my order history they can see that I am a reasonable person.  I know that there are people that try to scam companies over things like toddler boy socks and bath tub ABC letters, but I am not one of those people.

Specific kudos go to the supervisor who just knew that 20189 is State Dept zip code and that they could not schedule a UPS pickup so I could return items.  The wonderful woman who spoke with me on the phone honored the prices of my original purchase OR the current sale price, whichever was to my advantage.  Now, how much money is Kohls out?  In my mind, they aren't out any. They have kept a customer.  For me, it wasn't about the money either, but about customer service.  Thank you, phone customer service.  Now to get your e-mail representatives with a more efficient, helpful way of doing things.

Rice Cookers and Fighting Eland (Two Different Subjects)

Such exciting happenings in the Weber household. Our rice cooker died, or was at least very sick. It would sometimes shock you when you touched it. Hmmm, not a good sign. Our outlets all have individual on/off switches so I could just turn off the power before touching it, but really it seemed like a sign to get a new rice cooker. We bought it in China for something like $10 to $12 US and it had a good run. During our move from China to Japan it got dented, but it kept on working. Now, after just over five years of faithful service, it was ready to get a new one. The replacement ended up costing $70. We have only used it once so far, but it seems to be of a better quality. Time will tell how it holds up. Now I just need to remember that it is 110 volts and not 220 so I don't plug it in directly and blow it up. (Left: old cooker, Right: new cooker)

Before swimming lessons, we stopped off at the petting zoo. We saw two elands (or is the plural eland just like the singular?) butting heads and pushing each other around. These guys are taller than I am and were being quite aggressive. I wanted to take video or at least get a picture, but my camera was in my purse and I didn't want to let go of Ryan's hand. The animals roam free and we weren't too far away. Ryan was trying to be a peacemaker and I feared that getting out my camera might just be the distraction that allowed him to enter the fight himself. I got a shot of one of the eland a bit later when we were further away. Doesn't he look calm and friendly in the picture?

See how exciting our lives are?  Maybe you have had a rice cooker die lately, but how often do eland fight right in front of you?  Hopefully after our day trip on Saturday I will have something a bit more exciting to post. :)  Just wanted to put something up since I said I would post more often.

I Just Want to Plug In the Humidifiers!

It is winter now.  The long summer rainy season is over and humidity levels have dropped drastically.  Time to plug in the humidifiers in the bedrooms.  I put it off longer than I should have because I knew it would not be a simple task.  We have three humidifiers.  One came with the house and it has a skinny European style plug.  One that we brought with us is from the States (okay, probably made in China, but a US brand) and has a US plug and needs a transformer to convert the voltage.  The one we purchased here has a round European plug.  Now, to get them plugged in and operational...  Pictured are some of the many styles of adapters we have.  Here in Namibia they have the most ridiculous plugs, just like in South Africa and who knows where else.  The prongs are huge and make me think that these are training plugs, kind of like they make the fat crayons for toddlers.  I figure out a configuration that works, but wouldn't you know it, when one of the adapters is plugged in, it turns off the power to the outlet.  All of the outlets have on/off switches, and to push the adapter in far enough to make contact forces the outlet off.  It took probably about 40 minutes to get three humidifiers plugged in.  The outlets alone are a reason not to live here.  I hope that the next place we lives has something more sensible that can use a universal adapter.  I feel like I have enough adapters that I could open my own Radio Shack.

Back to Blogging?

Okay, there have been a lot of reasons that I haven't been blogging.  One of them is actually pretty stupid.  There were two obnoxious widgit graphics that appeared over my text and I didn't know how to get rid of them.  I know that I could look online to find out or just experiment with settings, but our internet can be SO slow sometimes (remember dial up speed?) and with the boys constantly distracting me it was just not something that I was doing.  Today (I hope) I did it!  Yay!  Now that that isn't there to bother me, perhaps I will get back to more regular blogging.  At least I have been doing monthly updates of what I have been doing with the boys on my blog http://entertainingmykids.blogspot.com/

I want to write a bit about our trip to Etosha last month, but for now I will write about my tripS to the store to buy food.  This morning I went to the fruit and vegetable market to buy produce and milk.  That was all that I needed.  I got the produce.  I can generally accept that our produce is trucked in from South Africa and does not always look the way I expect produce to look.  I can also usually deal when an item or two is out of stock.  Today there was no milk to buy.  Correction, there was no milk that had an expiration date any later than today.   There was some with yesterday's date and some with today's date.  That doesn't really help me for the rest of the week.

This afternoon I decide to head out to the market to buy milk.  My husband wants some ramen for work as well.  Simple enough.  Still, since I am making the trip I might as well buy for the week.  They had tortillas in stock (yay!) which I have not seen for three weeks.  We are out, so I bought five packages of eight tortillas to put in our freezer.  That starts us out at $15 US.  I continue, happy that they do have milk AND ramen AND even the kind of yogurt my kids like.  The dates on the products are all good.  Of course since I am buying so much I figure I should get flour since I am low, chips, etc. etc.  Once we get over the magic number of $15 US we need to get a tax receipt so we can be reimbursed for the 15% tax on things here.  (Your state tax isn't sounding so bad now, is it?)  I load up the cart and decide I should check how much money I brought.  I wasn't going to get much and now I have quite a bit.  I have about $100 US so I plan accordingly.  I end up buying about $70 worth of stuff.  The boys have been playing with food in the cart, trying to climb out, making loud noises, grabbing for things on the shelves, etc. etc.  I am so frazzled as I check out that I forget to get my tax receipt.  Grrrr... I could wait in the looooooooong line at customer service, but I really don't want to be with my screaming demons a moment longer.  There goes $10 US down the drain.  I know, not a huge sum, but it still makes me mad.  There was no good reason not to get that "free" money. 

So we get home and the boys are walking so slowly while I am carrying heavy bags.  They are fighting to get in the house and I open the door without turning off the alarm first.  I have to push past the kids who are hanging on my legs and trying to be the first ones in the house and get over to the control panel to turn it off before the alarm company starts calling.  Then Ryan is upset and needs comforting.  Justin decides to help put away the food because he knows I am not pleased with them.  He puts some in special "tricky" places for me.  Lovely.  I think I have found everything.  I wish I hadn't been busy with Ryan so long.

Good thing I got more than milk and ramen because I am NOT looking forward to my next trip to the store!

Swakopmund Vacation

 This weekend we finally got out of Windhoek for the coast. We made the four hour drive to Swakopmund, Namibia, the second largest city in Namibia (not saying much) and the closest city to Brad and Angelina's place in the country. We had a nice time, but I think it it overrated. Don't think that it would be nearly as popular if there were more to do here.

We got to Swakopmund at lunch time on Friday. Everyone always talks about the cute little cafes and restaurants. They are supposed to be kid friendly (which I have decided means you can let your children run around like brats without regard to their safety or any consideration of other people), but come on, my kids are four and two. We decided to just hit KFC and even waiting for that was hard for the kids. They were EVERYWHERE! At least they enjoyed the food. We made our way to where we were staying, a 3 bedroom place in the north end of town. It worked out perfectly for us. We had plenty of space and had a kitchen, meaning we didn't have to eat all our meals out. :) We rested a bit and then walked over to the beach for a bit. Yes, we had to get sandy and wet so we had to go back home and change. We made a quick stop at the Snake House. For about $4 each, we were able to see snakes in three roms that all together were smaller than our kitchen. The boys enjoyed the snakes, and loved watching the chameleon get fed. They also loved climbing on the jawbone of a whale. Easily entertained. We walked around the downtown area for a bit and then headed to the grocery store to pick up a few items.

Saturday was cool and rainy, but we headed for the main beach area and playground. Next to the playground, a bouncy castle park was set up. For a fee, the kids could bounce around to their hearts' content, and oh how they loved it. We spent HOURS there. Justin's favorite was the inflatable water slide. Ryan tried it once, but when he climbed to the top he was freaked out by the water and perhaps the pitch of the slide. I think it was just as well because otherwise he would have been wanting to climb up it all day. Instead he kept climbing up a rope cargo net, using his arms and not his legs. He got really tired, but what great upper body strength!

For lunch we found a charming cafe (meaning overpriced mediocore food) and then headed over to the Kristall Galerie. This is a pretty small museum that could be seen in about 10 minutes. It has a cave replica which frightened the boys the first time through. Ryan was wrapping his legs around mine, afraid to move. After the first time through, we couldn't keep up with the boys. They thought it was great. They also have an area where you can "find" polished rocks. Ryan mostly wanted to throw them in the water.

Back to the bouncy castle area for a couple more hours.  Justin kept gong back to the water slide over and over, while Ryan and I wandered over to the ocean.  Justin and Rob eventually joined us, and we enjoyed having the waves get our feet and legs wet.  When the boys started to shiver, it was time to head home.

Sunday was a lazy day.  We had gotten WAY too much sun on Saturday and all ended up with burns. :(  We headed out to a pizza place for lunch and had an African take on Italian food.  Home for a quick nap and then we were back at the beach.  This time we had hats and protective clothing as well as PLENTY of sunscreen.  Justin liked playing in the sand and Ryan liked playing in the water.

Each evening after the boys were in bed, Rob and I watched a DVD.  While taking small children on a trip means it is a trip and not a vacation, it was still nice.  It was good to be at the beach and to have a few days without laundry and other routine chores.

Internet Shipping Woes With Various Merchants

Usually I do not have problems with online shopping.  Lately, it seems, things just haven't been going my way.  I suppose that considering the amount of shopping I do online, I am bound to have problems at some point.

My first incident was with Discount School Supply.  Let me say right up front, it was NOT their fault.  It was the fault of our stupid mail drop.  Discount School Supply was AWESOME!  I received a fast, personal response to my question.  I couldn't believe that it wasn't a generic script.  This was a conversation with an actual English speaking person who was trying to help me even though my situation was not their fault.  The customer service rep helped me come up with a few possible solutions.  They truly went above and beyond.  I even fell below minimum purchase for free shipping (not to mention they had to ship things out more than once for me!) and they refunded money to me for the undeliverable merchandise but did NOT charge me for shipping.  I love Discount School Supply.  They have fun things, good prices, and the best customer service I have encountered.  Even so, I had to deal with it and was disappointed by the whole mail drop issue that I couldn't resolve.

Next, I placed an order with Toys R Us.  They were having a fantastic sale on Thomas Wooden Railroad things.  Some of the items were 50% off!  I am not a big Thomas fan (probably an anti-Thomas, person actually), but Justin and Ryan like the stuff.  How could I resist this (and some of the other) sales?  It was a one day thing, and I quickly took advantage!  Got my order confirmation and was good to go, or so I thought.  A few days later I get an e-mail saying that my order was canceled because of an error with my billing address.  Please contact my credit card company if it isn't correct, blah, blah.  The only thing I could come up with was that Toys R Us refused to allow the apostrophe that my billing address contains.  Back and forth I went in e-mails with their customer service.  FINALLY I got someone who told me that it wasn't my billing address, it was my IP address, they just didn't have an error message for that.  Well, indeed I am ordering from outside of the US. They have sent me things here before without any problem, so what was the issue?  I was told I could re-order, but the sale was over so things would be full price.  Great deal, huh?  I was ticked!  Phone calls and e-mails were not very helpful.  Ironically, I became a "fan" of Toys R Us on facebook and it was there that I actually got some real help.  From there I was able to get information that would actually help.  Eventually, I got my order at the sale prices.  It was a lot of work though.  I thought that since I had a confirmation number, tracking number, etc. and they canceled my order without contacting me first that it should be easy to fix, but no.  They made me fight for my sale items.

Last month I wanted to take advantage of a sale at Linens and Things and get a comforter for Ryan since he is sleeping in a twin bed.  When I would get to checkout, it kept telling me that my credit card could not be processed at this time.  I thought it was a problem with the site, so I tried again later.  I decided that it might be a problem with my IP address, since I was ordering from Namibia.  I have had that problem before.  I decided to block my IP address and try again.  Unfortunately, our internet is so slow here that when I did that, my session would time out.  Frustrating!  I noted that they take paypal, so I decided to pay that way.  I forgot to unblock my IP address first, so Paypal put a hold on my account because they had reason to believe someone was trying to access my account fraudulently.  Sigh.  It took awhile to get things squared away with them.  It was a bit of a pain, but I understand why they did it and don't blame them.  Just an annoyance for me.

A week or so later, I decided to set up an iTunes account.  I don't have an ipod, iphone, or ipad, but have been exploring my options.  I went to sign up and it told me that my e-mail already had an account.  Oops!  I figured that I had set one up sometime and just forgotten.  I had it reset my password via e-mail.  I signed in and set a new password.  I looked at my security questions and they were bizarre.  They weren't mine!  Then I noticed that the account was set up for a Larry B--complete with address, phone number, etc.  Guess he must have a very similar e-mail address because I can't see any benefit of him giving my e-mail address instead of his own.  I sent iTunes an e-mail.  They said they would take care of it.  They were very prompt with their reply.  Unfortunately, it has been 22 days and they haven't taken Larry's credit card or other info off.  I also have credit.  Poor Larry B is now locked out of his account.  He hasn't used it for about 15 months, so maybe he doesn't care.  My friend, LT, had trouble with iTunes charges on her credit card for several purchases that she did not make.  Now I am a little wary of iTunes.  Anyone else have problems with them?

I wish my sister were here.  I would rant and rave and tell her my woes and have her write my blog.  I just find that I am not very motivated to make these the great stories I know she could make out of them.

Happy Shopping!

Under $20

Remember in China how I was always so impressed with how much I could get for so little?  My Namibian shopping experiences are not at all like my experience in China.  I have to take a pasta salad to a party on Saturday.  According to the recipe it serves 12, but since it is a potluck side dish I figure it will serve more.  

• Medium jar of mayo (generic was $1.90 cheaper a jar than Hellman's)
• Red wine vinegar (hopefully!  Didn't see any red wine vinegar at the store, but decided brown grape vinegar might be it.  Generic was $6.28 cheaper than German brand)
• Black olives (jar, but equivalent of a can of olives in the US)
• 1 kg of spiral pasta (saved just over $4 by getting non-colored over tri-colored)
• 2 yellow bell peppers
• 4 tomatoes

FOR A TOTAL OF $17.98

Maybe I am just really cheap and out of touch with US prices, but this seemed like it cost a lot. Often there is not a choice of brand. Since some of the items here had a local or imported option, I was able to save. For produce I got the cheapest option. All the produce was looking pretty dismal.  There are some other ingredients that I already have on hand.  We will see how it tastes.  Perhaps I should have spent $12 to get "quality" ingredients. 

Of course I also purchased additional items including 1.06 gallons of milk ($6.85) and 17 cough drops ($3.32).  The cough drops taste like burped up sausage, though they claim to be cherry flavored.  I think I will stop coughing just to avoid using one.

Eggplant Recipe?

When we lived in China we used to go to a nearby restaurant and get an eggplant dish that I absolutely LOVED.  I never knew eggplant could be so delicious.  So today when I was on allrecipes.com and saw they had a Chinese site, I wondered if perhaps that site might have a dish similar to the one I loved so much.  Well, they might; I am afraid that even with (or perhaps because of) the babelfish translation of the page, I will never know.  I think this one is close though!  http://allrecipes.cn/caipu/2009/----.aspx
0 Easy Altogether takes time: 25 minutes
Prepares 10 minutes to manufacture 15 minutes

Component: 3

The daily family activity eggplant is together the delicacy the good for both young and old cooked food. The land has the different cooking method color fragrance to be but complete.

Preparation material
Eggplant 500 grams
Tender garlic stem 2
Green pepper 3
Auricularia auricula 50 grams
Oil 7 buckets
Thick bean sauce 1 bucket
Soy sauce 1 bucket
Salt, monosodium glutamate respectively right amount
Water starch 1 bucket
Chili oil 1 bucket

Manufacture method


1. Peels the cleaning the eggplant, slivers the length 4 centimeters, thick 1 centimeter strip; Slivers the section the tender garlic stem cleaning; Slivers the scrap the green pepper.

2. On the wok burns down the heat, puts in the oil 4 buckets, pours into the eggplant strip to turn fries several, adds the salt, bakes receives basically to the eggplant strip moisture content does, bails out the oil asphalt is ready to be used dry.

3. The wok gets angry again, puts in the oil 3 buckets, fries the fragrant thick bean sauce, gets down the tender garlic stem section, the auricularia auricula and the blue hot pepper block fries the fragrance, pours into the eggplant strip, uses the soy sauce to blend flavors again, the water used starch thickens soup, to drench into the chili oil to fry uniform then.

18 Months Already!

Last week TB (short for Tiny Baby since I am trying so hard not to call him Tiny or Tiny Baby anymore) turned 18 months.  A friend of mine was coming up with ideas for her son's birthday cake, so I decided that half birthdays are great reasons to have a cake and made one for TB.  I ate about half of it.  Oops.  I also discovered that I need to call way in advance for well baby checkups with the pediatrician.  We don't get in until July 6th.  Evidently there are only 6 pediatricians for a country the size of California (much smaller population though).  Oh well.  Don't really have concerns about how he is doing so it isn't that big of a deal.

To add to Ryan's previous word list, he can now also say:
moon
sunbeam
tree
cat
bath
hat
shoes
hot
eyes
ears
teeth
nose
up
banana
chip
cracker
snack (meaning fruit snacks, something Justin didn't even know about at 18 months!)
spoon
more
water
bubbles
ball
whee!
wow
boo boo
Momo (name of toy hamster)
Justin (hard to understand, but consistent)
Diego (and Go, Diego, go)
Bo Bo (as in Bo Bo brother monkeys from Diego)
Click (from Diego)
llama (because of Diego)
Oh man!  (from Dora the Explorer)
teamwork (from Wonder pets.  He doesn't know what it is, but he knows it is what's going to work.)
Ah-choo!
Ha! Ha! Ha!
prophet
Jesus
amen

I think that these are new.  I was writing a list on the back of an envelope and tried not to make duplicates, but without having the other list in front of me I am not sure.  Regardless, even if every single one was a duplicate, Ryan can say much more than Justin's 10 words at 18 months.  I am surprised Ryan can say anything at all because Justin never shuts up!  When he runs out of things to say he just kind of stalls with mumbles as he looks around the room for an idea for a new topic.  I think sometimes he even bores himself, but he keeps at it.  Could we have a future lawyer or politician?  He is pretty creative with excuses too.

TB is already sleeping in a twin bed (with the toddler bed beside to "catch" him if he rolls off) while Justin was in the crib until we needed it for Ryan. He is climbing, jumping, and doing a lot of the things that Justin is doing now.  Maybe he will decide to use the potty soon.  Yeah, right.

Justin is Ryan's favorite person, with Diego a close second.  Too bad it isn't them that Ryan calls for in the middle of the night.

Happy Birthday to Meredith!

     This year my sister, Meredith, has been writing nice tributes to family members on their birthdays.  Since I doubt that she will write one for herself, I decided that I should write one.  Hopefully, she will put a link on her blog to mine so that her friends can see how wonderful I think she is. 

     I don't have the writing ability or creativity that Meredith has.  To do her justice I should have started on this long ago.  I won't put it off until next year though.  It seems to me that all too often people put off saying nice things about people until they die.  It is nice to be able to share stories and memories about someone who has died, but isn't it nice to tell the person while they are still alive?

     Meredith and I are very different.  We have very little in common, yet I always enjoy the time I spend with her.  She is incredibly creative and that comes through in just about everything she does.  I love her writing, her drawing, her pictures, her crafts, and the way she is able to recount simple, everyday things in a way that has you on the edge of your seat.  To get a letter from Meredith means a handmade envelope, a cute little doodle, or witty words.  To have her tell you about something she saw or did is like you were there yourself.  I really admire her talent.  I often think that I have some good ideas, but not the talent to do with them the things she could do.  Maybe I am just lazy, but I feel like I would have to work so hard to come up short of what I see her regularly achieve.

     I see myself as a rather boring person.  I like to be safe, comfortable, and secure.  That may seem like an odd statement from someone who currently lives in Africa and moves every 2 or 3 years.  I don't like to take risks.  Meredith dreams big and finds ways to make it work.   I love the way she makes bold choices that I would never make.  She doesn't go for easy, she goes for exciting.  I would be a nervous wreck living the way she does, but I love that she does it.  I think that when she looks back on her life she will have very few regrets of things she did not do.

It was hard to decide what to write and what pictures to include.  I started with a huge pile, but realized that I needed to choose only a few.  I tried to find some that people may not have seen of her.  The first is pictures of sweet little Meredith when she was a newborn.  She is ten years younger than I am and seven years younger than our brother.  We were so excited to have a baby sister and we loved her to death.  At four pounds, four ounces she was like a doll.  Even at an early age she was her own person.  She had the cutest little facial expressions and she knew how to SCREAM!

This next picture was taken the second time we lived in Belgium.  I don't know exactly how old she was when it was taken, but kindergarten age is the oldest she could have been.  She decided that she wanted to marry someone we knew from church.  She made him a picture and I think considered it an engagement.  What a good sport he was!  Don't you just love Meredith's Rainbow Brite dress?  Very 80's.  She had a lot of clothes with personality including two jackets.  The purple one was Michael Jacket and the pink one was Janet Jacket.  How cute is that? 

Meredith and I generally got along.  Sure there was the normal squabbling that you would expect siblings to have, but with so many years between us we weren't competitive or anything.  She was my baby sister and I loved being a big sister to her.  When we did have fights, arguments, or whatever you want to call them, they didn't last long.  This is a note that she wrote to me near the end of my senior year.  She would have been just shy of eight years old.

Here is a picture of Miss Meredith A Bak playing T-ball.  Even at a young age she was good at sports. :P

I wish I knew when this picture was taken.  Obviously it was some Christmas.  I believe it was between 1991 and 1994, but no guarantee.  We decided to be "Bow Legged Sisters" though I am not sure why.

This is another Christmas picture.  I would guess it is also 1991 to 1994, but not the same Christmas as the previous picture.  Our dad had (and still has) a tendency to call Meredith my name.  One time she had a friend come over and when he answered the door he greeted her and said, "you must be Kathryn's friend."  Poor Meredith.  (In defense of my dad, I only have two children and I can't keep their names straight.  Not only do I call them each other's names, I call them my siblings' names as well!)  My dad had labeled some of our Christmas presents and we decided to label ourselves to make things easier for him.

 

Meredith has always been creative.  In high school she was into drama.  Here is a program from Meredith Madness II.  (Yes, there was a first Meredith Madness too.)  She wrote and directed all of the plays AND acted in most of them.  She has the ability to crack me up.  In college she continued to be part of a drama group that performed as far away as Hawaii.  Don't take a big sip of a drink when Meredith is talking, or you might just have it come spraying out your nose as you laugh.

This last picture is one drawn by Meredith to represent our family on a trip we took to Yellowstone in May of 2001.  There is our dad, mom, me, Meredith, our brother (Nathan), and his wife (Amy) holding their son, David.  Nathan and his family were living in Colorado at the time, I was living in Maryland, and Meredith was home from college for the summer.  Now I understand Meredith is not going to have pictures hung in museums as great masterpieces of our time, but I love her style.  She has made posters, books, shirts, and other things featuring her cartoonish art work.  It always brightens my day to see something that she has drawn.

I had hoped to go through this yesterday and fix it up a bit, but I had a migraine and didn't even turn on the computer.  There was something else that I wanted to add, but I can't remember what it was.  It will have to go online as is.  Sorry, dear Meredith, that it is not better.  I love you.  Happy, Happy, Birthday!

Cleaning for the Maid

Not too long ago, I read a post on Facebook about cleaning before the maid came to clean.  I could identify with Sheena's post and, based on the comments, it seemed that a lot of other people could too.  Now it isn't like I clean the windows or vacuum or anything before she comes, but I figure I need to try to get a lot of the clutter put away.  How well can she really clean if I have things out that she needs to clean around?  Nice to know that in cleaning for the maid I am not alone.  I do have some issues though.  I haven't found anyone who can clean things right.

"Wow!" is what I know you are thinking.  What an incredibly together person this Kathryn is to have things so perfect that no one else can reach those standards.  Yeah, not even close.  I can be completely unbothered by an inch of dust on the bookshelves or some other thing that you would think would annoy me.  It is in the little things.  See this picture of how the canisters were put back after the kitchen was cleaned today?

I know, you are wondering what it is about them.  Is it the missing wooden spoon?  Nope.  I broke that long ago.  Could it be the pill container sitting on the tall canister?  No.  That's where I like it.  Is it that they are not evenly spaced with the fronts centered?  Kind of.  The brown sugar canister (the one without the spoon) should be centered under the outlet as shown in the picture below.  THAT is the correct way for it to be.

I have many, many little "things" like this.  I know they are things that shouldn't matter and they really don't.  If Rob were to clean the kitchen and have the canisters back incorrectly, that would be okay because it would be thoughtful of his to have cleaned.  If I have them back the wrong way, that's okay because it means that I was in a hurry or preoccupied.  If my main focus was cleaning though, I would do it the correct way.  So having someone come in to clean and then not do things "right" bothers me.  It primarily bothers me that I notice it and want to (and often do) fix it.  I think that I am jealous that I don't have the opportunity to give a cleaning task my undivided attention the way I would if I were my own maid.  Hmmm... there's an idea. 

Now Rob is probably just shaking his head if he reads this.  He is wonderful and encourages me to have someone help with the house to take some of the load off of me.  Guess he will think this just proves that no one can do anything right and make me happy.  That isn't true. I was always in a great mood in Japan after Bimala had cleaned our place.  She didn't always get the spacing of items on the bookshelves quite right.  I noticed, but I was able to move on.

Oh.  Yes, Mom, I am taking my zoloft.  :)  See how well adjusted I am to notice these kinds of things and be able to deal with them?

(Plumbing) Repairs in Namibia

Okay, so we seem to have a leak in a water pipe or something outside.  The plumbers arrived quickly. Yep, three of them to check things out.  That was over an hour ago.  Now there are only two of them.  Guess one is the driver.  English (which is Namibia's official language so I don't want anyone giving me a hard time about expecting people to speak English rather than learn the language of the country) is not their strong suit.  Hopefully plumbing is because it appears that all the brick walk along side the house is now dug up.  Great.  Can you say loooooooooong project?

I hate having people come to repair, inspect, or do anything.  It is so much work.  I knew we were off to a typical start when I was asked if I had a mop.  Evidently, they meant plunger.  I gave them a plunger and they wanted to know if I had a better one.  Hello??  Maybe you should bring some tools.  (I know, what am I thinking?  We have had people using rocks as hammers until we have lent a real hammer.)  THEN I am asked for an adapter so they can charge the cell phone.  It has a European plug not a funky Namibian/South African one.  THEN they asked me to feed them.  I don't mind providing drinks when people are working but (1) they are not working.  The two of them are hanging out in the shade sitting on my chairs waiting (I am assuming) for guy #3 to come back with equipment.  (2) This is not a luncheon.  I did not plan on feeding you today.  I give them bread and fruit along with some lemonade.  This is done primarily because these guys are working on my water and I don't want to get them upset at me because heaven knows what they could do to mess things up or draw out the process forever.  I TRY to assume that it is just cultural because I know that workers are usually provided meals or meal allowance as part of wages.  They are already ticked that I don't have coffee for them.  Sigh.

Meanwhile it seems that every time I try to do something they need to be let in or out or have the power turned off or something.  I kind of need to be available to them and I don't all together trust them either so I have to keep an eye on them.  I guess we really need to have the pipe fixed though, so what can I do?

And She's Out!

Okay, so this morning (it was still Mother's Day in Idaho where my mom lives) I was wishing my mom a happy Mothers Day and chatting with her as I often do on her Sunday evening/my Monday morning.  I am in the play room with TB.  He is watching Go Diego Go while I am talking away.  Justin wakes up and comes in.  He sees Grandma on the computer screen and says a quick "hi" before starting in on his wish list.  He tells Grandma that he wants party blowers, pudding, and various other things.  She sends us a lot of packages, but the way Justin rattles off his list like he is sitting on Santa's lap telling all about what he wants for Christmas.  I don't think he understands how lucky we are to have someone like her in our lives.

So after he has made his wish list known, he decides to go over and watch Diego with his brother.  Of course the episode that is on is not acceptable to Justin so he starts whining for me to change it.  Wanting a few more minutes of quiet so I can talk with my mom, I get up to grab the remote and skip to the next episode.  I pick up my laptop as I stand and walk over by the TV.  Next thing I know, I am on the floor, my laptop is on its side, Ryan is shaking his sippy cup (his not-so-subtle way of saying he wants more) while Justin is complaining that I haven't changed the show.  Evidently I passed out.  My back and head are now sore and I am developing quite a bruise on my foot where the laptop hit it.

Been feeling lightheaded all day.  It's the day AFTER Mothers Day though, so I guess I need to try to push forward.  The day of rest is over.

Neglecting the Blog

Rob went back to the US for over two weeks and I have certainly been neglecting this blog.  Life was even more boring than usual in terms of things to write about.   The boys kept me VERY busy, but there was nothing really to say about going through the chores of the day and keeping the kids under control.  Now that he is back, I am hoping that things get back to a comfortable level of boring with some fun thrown in every now and then.
I have been blogging, however.  I have been working on a new blog.  It is called Ways I Entertain My Kids and it is located at http://entertainingmykids.blogspot.com/ .  Its purpose is to remind me of the things that I do to keep my kids busy.  When Ryan gets older, I can repeat some of the activities.  If I go back to teaching, some of the ideas might be useful there as well.  Anyway, I decided to put them in a separate blog because I write enough about my kids to begin with.  If you don't have kiddos the same ages as mine you probably don't want to hear about nursery rhyme crafts or their favorite toys in detail.  Even if you do have kids the same ages you might not want to hear about that.  So anyway, look if you want.  I plan on keeping most of the ideas VERY simple.  I am not trying to be Martha Stewart or some sort of child entertainment genius.  I am going with what gets me through the day.  Soon I will probably have a post about the kids playing in the boxes that their toys come in.  Sometimes the boxes are better than the toys!  So really, it will be down to earth, nothing fancy.  Any "special" materials I have will be leftover from my teaching days and things that can be easily improvised in a simpler fashion.  I just wanted my school stuff to be durable so I didn't have to make it again every other week. :)
Enjoy or ignore.  It is primarily for me.  I think the boys will enjoy it later in life too. :)