Some Days

Some days I just miss the comforts of the States...

Heat Wave

I am sorry I have not been blogging as much as I should be lately.  One word to sum up the ten days since my last blog: HOT!  Incredibly, stifling hot.  It is really hard to get motivated to do much, including blogging, in this heat.  It takes a lot of energy to do much of anything.  The scary thing is, it is only the beginning of summer!

Last week we had language lessons every day!  Quite an accomplishment and it made our week much more busy.  We also had some people come in to visit from the capitol.  Andrew and I spent the weekend boarded up in one room of our apartment with our little wall AC running full blast, only making appearances in the evenings when the temperature dropped down closer to 100.  I am beginning to understand why this culture is such a night culture.

Today, Andrew had his first language lesson with a prospective new teacher.  Andrew really enjoyed his new teacher today and hopes that it will work out more permanently.  So be keeping that in your thoughts :)  Unfortunately my teacher cancelled today, and since Andrew was meeting with his guy teacher at our house, I had to make myself scarce.  I spent the morning at Gloria Jean's coffee shop studying Arabic and making a few more final plans for when my family comes out to visit this summer.

Well, this was not much of a blog, but I just wanted to keep ya'll updated on the things going on in our lives here.  Not too much since we returned from Prague, just sticking with the grind and trying to stick out the heat :)

Praha Personal

Since Prague has such a bloody history, there are many Ghost tours available for tourists.  Andrew and I are not big ghost people or anything, but we along with a few friends we made, thought it might be fun/funny to go.  It was quite funny, not really at all scary, and we actually had a few people in our tour group from the area of the world we are currently living, so that was exciting.  So here is Andrew with a ghost or grim reaper who was our tour guide.

While in Prague, we got to go seen Pirates of the Caribbean.  They had an IMAX theater and we were hoping to go there since we have never been to an IMAX before, but it was only showing in Czech so we had to go see the normal version, but it was fun none the less.

Andrew and I with a knight at a traditional Czech restaurant.

While we were in Prague, Andrew and I celebrated our 3 year anniversary!  To celebrate, we went out to a steak restaurant called "The Crazy Cow."  It was decorated with Mexican and Texan posters which made us feel at home.  The steak was delicious, but the dessert was what I wrote home about.  It's called "Hot Love."  A huge spiraling dish with vanilla ice cream, warm raspberries topped whipped cream, raspberry drizzle and a couple of mint leaves.  It was the most delicious thing I have ever eaten in my whole life and I think we're going to try to figure out how we can make that here :)

The old town square is definitely the place to be if you are in Prague.  Almost every night they had some kind of production, be it a concert or international festival.  In the square you can find just about any type of person, where anything or anyone is accepted.

Here are Andrew and I on the train to go visit the bone church.  As soon as we found our seats on the train, I immediately felt we were on Harry Potter's train to Hogworts.  I was so excited the entire time.  We ended at the bone church which was not quite Hogworts, but I guess it worked

We had a great trip to Prague.  We almost didn't want to come back to real life.  But we are back with renewed energy and vigor.  We are glad to be back in our own bed and not having to eat out every meal.  We miss that everyone there had a dog and the independence I had to go out on my own and the use of public transportation rather than taxis.  We look forward to more visits to Prague, but are thankful for the friends and relationships we have developed here and look forward to how He is going to use us in this place.

The Rock 2

We just got some pictures from some friends, from our Weekend excursion the other weekend, that I felt needed to be posted as well.  Enjoy :)

1st Birthday (Overseas)

I would have to say that my first Birthday overseas was a good one.  I am now 27 years old, I hope that my life has been fruitful so far, but I hope that it will be even more fruitful in the coming years until the day that I leave this world for another, better one.

We actually celebrated my birthday with friends the night before my birthday.  I unfortunately had to make my own Gluten-Free cake, but I am thankful that I was even able to have cake :)  My favorite thing about birthdays here are the flaming sparklers atop a birthday cake, not simply candles that are easily blown out.

The morning of my birthday, we got on the VIP bus to head to the capital city.  I am not going to lie, Andrew and I were both a little nervous about boarding this bus and traveling with all that has been going on in World news lately, but there were absolutely no problems on either leg of our trip and we felt completely safe the entire time.

When we arrived in the capital and checked into our hotel, we promptly went to Chili's followed by Starbucks and a movie.  It is such a treat to be able to get away to the capital and get some American things.  Not quite the same, but close enough to make us feel at home.

After the movie, we dinned at Fudruckers.  Not quite the burger and fries dinning experience we know in America, but a fine dinning, sit at a table and be waited on dinning experience.

At Fundruckers we enjoyed milkshakes:

 Andrew enjoyed a southwest burger and fries:

Notice his bacon is not really bacon but more like bologna

 And I enjoyed a delicious steak and potatoes:

 The next morning we ate breakfast at a nice little bakery that sells Gluten-Free bread on Sundays.  Unfortunately we were not there on a Sunday, so they had nothing Gluten-Free for me, but we decided to support them none the less by ordering coffee and omelets.  Yum!

As we were leaving the bakery, we saw this herd of goats crossing the street and heading down the road.  Not particularly an uncommon site, but I still can't get over being in a big city and seeing a guy herding his goats.

After all of our birthday celebrations were done, we headed off to the dentist.  The dentist was a whole new experience overseas.  The dentist had his own office.  He had no assistant (at least not the day we were there) and did all of the work and cleaning by himself.  He seemed to be quite a good dentist though, and had lots of complaints about my previous dental work.  Unfortunately we will be making a few more trips to see him in the coming months when we get the time.

We also had our first language evaluation while we were in the capitol.  We were both nervous about this, but felt in the moment that it was going pretty well.  Unfortunately when we were finished, the proctor did not think that we did as well as we should have done.  We will not get our final results of the evaluation for a few more weeks, but it was a bit discouraging to hear her reaction.  We have had a difficult time finding and keeping language tutors in our time here.  Because of this, we unfortunately have a few gaps in our learning and are a bit behind where we need to be.  But we are encouraged, because maybe we did do alright and she was just over exaggerating, but none the less, we are going to continue to try to learn this very difficult language and keep at it even if it does take us longer than it would others.

The Rock

Here are a few pictures from a little weekend excursion we took.  We were very excited because now as residents we were able to get in for a little over a dollar, whereas non-residents (aka tourists) have to pay about an arm and a leg for the entrance fee.

I have been wanting to get a picture with one of the camel crossing signs, but it is difficult to get the bus driver or taxi driver to stop on the side of the road.  Since we rented a car for this trip, we were finally able to stop and snag a picture.

It was such a beautiful day for our excursion!  It even rained on us a little bit, but it was a welcomed rain in the desert.

Don't jump Drew!

Andrew ridding a camel

I tried to get a picture of myself on a camel, unfortunately I got none of the camel, oh well.  Also, notice the necklace I am wearing now.  I purchased this from a village lady.  It was advertised as camel bones, but I'm not entirely convinced.  Also I think she was impressed with my bargaining skills.

SCUBA

We have not gotten the chance to go SCUBA diving again (hopefully soon we will), but we were just able to get ahold of some pictures that Andrew took the last time we went SCUBA diving.  Andrew was using a friend's underwater camera, and we just got the photos from him.  Warning: Most of the pictures are of me, Andrew was behind the camera.

So, I don't always trust my mouth to keep the air thingy in, so I hold it a lot to make sure I'm not going to loose it.

Swimming around by a shipwreck.  This was pretty crazy.

Yay, finally one with Andrew!  Although he's almost out of it.

I'm not entirely sure what I am doing with my hands here.

To get SCUBA certified you have to take off your mask and put it back on several times throughout the training.  This was the most difficult thing for me...I've got my eyes closed real tight.  Also please note that due to my height, my wetsuit is not nearly long enough for me, so the shirt I am wearing underneath is showing quite a bit over my wrists.

It was fun.  Quite scary at times, but I am looking forward to going again sometime soon!

Hats & Steaks

We have officially been overseas for six months now!  The time has flown by.  It has been great and challenging at times.  We have finally found a new language tutor that we still start with tomorrow!  I am excited about finding a new tutor, but we still really need to find a separate tutor for Andrew to work with.

To celebrate our 6 months overseas we went out to a fancy new steak restaurant that opened up in a new hotel in town.  In reality, we were just going out for a date night and wanted to try out the new restaurant.  While we were there, Andrew remembered it was our six months overseas anniversary, so we decided it was a perfect reason to splurge.  I believe we were the first customers they have ever had.  We were the only ones there (apparently they had a media group coming in right after we left) and they were very attentive to our needs.  Which is why I think we were their first customers ever.  While we were there, it was almost had to believe we were still overseas.  The place was so fancy, and I probably only one or two of the staff even spoke Arabic.

Andrew waiting patiently for his steak, enjoying his freshly baked bread and complementary soup.

Sarah waiting patiently, not enjoying freshly baked bread, but enjoying complementary soup

It was so good, we forgot to take a picture before we began eating

If you read here, then you will know about the hat I ordered off of etsy a couple of weeks ago.  Well, it finally came in!  I think it turned out super cute.  I haven't worn it out yet, but I am excited about it's debut.

Flower

Today at the local Friday handicrafts souq I bought this little flower that is perfect for my new nook case.  I think it's super cute and I get to help support local handicrafts.  What do you think?

I still need to find some velcro for the flap, but I think the flower is perfect :)

Sometimes You Just Need a Win

Today has been what I would consider a bad day.  A couple of weeks ago our language tutor called to say that she would not be able to keep tutoring us.  She and her husband have been trying for years to get pregnant and have a baby.  They have gotten pregnant many times, but have never been able to have a healthy baby.  She recently found out she is pregnant again, but the doctors have her on bed rest, indefinitely.  She was sweet enough to find a replacement for herself, her cousin.  Unfortunately, her cousin has another job as well as a busy, stressful life right now.  We only got to meet with her two times last week and this morning she informed us that she would not be able to come the rest of this week!  That was the first disappointment of the day.

Lately I have been using a system called ProVoc to help me study Arabic.  It is a really neat system.  You type in all your vocab words in English and Arabic and it comes up with Tests for you and all sorts of other neat stuff.  The first week our language tutor wasn't with us, I spent entering all 2,187 Arabic words we have.  I discovered a really cool thing this program does.  You can record audio too, which is great because I can read and recognize a word, but hearing it is a totally different ball game.  We took a little time last week at the end of our language lessons to record our new tutor saying some vocab words.  When I found out she would not be coming the rest of the week, we decided to take a little more time at the end of class to get a lot more words to help in studying.  Well, that time came and I pulled up my ProVoc program.  We recorded several words then all of a sudden the program freaked out!  We tried Andrew's and his did the same thing!  I was so discouraged because now we will spend another week without language lessons and I won't be able to study the way I was hoping.

After language today I just felt like I really needed a win.  I had seen a friend of mine's case for her Kindle.  I had been thinking to myself how to make one for my Nook.  So, the second our new language tutor walked out the door, I pulled out my sewing machine and fabric pieces.  It was not an easy to task.  I just kept in mind what my Mom always says, "That which you sew you shall also rip."  It made my ripping not seem so much like a loss, but rather just part of the process.  I still need a button and maybe some Velcro to keep the flap down, but I think regardless it still turned out as a win.

So here I sit at Gloria Jean's Coffee Shop.  I was greeted by name upon entering (I think that's a win).  I guess they could tell I was having a more difficult day because I got three hearts on top of my Latte rather than a tree or just one heart.  Blogger quit working about half-way through this blog, but I was quick enough to copy and paste before I lost my blog, so I will also consider that a win :)  Oh yea, I won't even go into the fact that I didn't have the money to pay for my Latte so I've got to wait for Andrew to come pick me up for him to pay for it.

I hope your day is going well!

Hats

The part of the world that we live in is a mix of different cultures.  There are so many people who live in our city that are originally from surrounding countries.  I believe I heard somewhere that only about 30% of the population is originally from this country.  So, while the country that we currently live in is not all that conservative comparatively, those from surrounding countries bring in their more conservative traditions and attire.  We also live in a fairly touristy city.  Many people filter through daily from Europe, and they bring with them their liberal, scandalous for this culture, attire.  So where does that leave me?  What is considered conservative and modest in the States is okay for some of the cultures here, but not for others.

The major issue is the shabab, or young guys.  They are not used to seeing girls, so when they do they don't know how to handle themselves.  When I go out with Andrew, there is usually no problem except for a lot of staring, but when I go out with my girl friends, it can get a little more uncomfortable (don't worry, it's nothing too bad just lots of people staring and sometimes people saying things to us).  I would say that 95% of the local women all cover their heads with a hajab or head scarf.  All of those women are also Muslim.  Another American girl who lives here and I have been trying to figure out a way to dress modestly in this culture, but also not come across as being a Muslim.  Our new solution: hats!  We don't wear them all the time.  Mainly when we go into more conservative areas of town or go out in the evening together without our husbands.  We like to think we are invisible with our hats, unfortunately we are not, but I do think it helps a bit.

Well, all that ranting to say:  I am excited about the fact that I just ordered this

off of this Etsy shop yesterday!  I ordered the hat in gray and the flower in fuchsia.  I am very excited about it and can't wait till it comes in.  

Saint Patrick's Day!

Well, in the States, I never really cared much about Saint Patrick's Day.  I guess it's because here no one even knows about Saint Patrick's Day and a need to have some American around me, but I forced Andrew to wear green today in Saint Patrick's honor.  We went out to dinner with some American friends tonight, and I thought it would be funny to go buy some green food coloring and give it to the people at the restaurant to put in their rice so when they served us it would be green.  But alas, we did not (it would have been funny though), instead we just got occasional laughs from our friends for wearing green.

Blast From the Past

This is a picture from the summer of 2003.  I spent the summer after my freshman year of college in Burkina Faso, West Africa.  That was the sickest two months of my life; looking back I would like to think it was the Celiacs'.  It was the most painful months of my life physically: living in village huts, sleeping on the ground, walking miles every day in painful heat, being sick the entire time I was there and topping it all off with Malaria to finish up my trip 30 lbs lighter than when I left (thanks to my freshman year of college which gave me something to loose).  Although it was the most challenging time of my life physically, I look back on those two months with joy and fond memories.  It was the worst and best two months of my life.  

It was the first time I had ever spent more than two weeks out of the country, and it confirmed for me my desire to live overseas permanently one day.  I am pretty sure I was the tallest, whitest girl in the entire country.  I got at least one marriage proposal every day I was there, but thankfully I held out for Andrew :)  Even to this day, a certain breeze or a random building will take me back to those two months in West Africa.  When Andrew and I decided to head out overseas and were thinking of where we would go, West Africa came up frequently in my thoughts.  It was a tough place to live, but it will always hold a special place in my heart.

Mom Cave

I really enjoy sewing, crafts and just in general making things.  I get a Quilting Daily newsletter via email everyday.  Today's was about "Mom Caves."  Although I am not a mother, I would love to have one of these!

I have not been nearly as creative as I would like to be since we have been here.  It is difficult to get into the mood of making things and making a home more homier since I know we will not be in this house long term. We do not need to accumulate stuff, and I feel like we have already accumulated enough to make it the bare minimum of homey.  One day maybe I will have my own area to be creative in :)

Threading

I have always wanted to get my eyebrows threaded.  I had a friend once who said she could do it for me, but I was a little scared and decided not to at the time.  At the gym/spa I go to, they do threading, so today for the first time ever I got my eyebrows threaded!

I can't decide if it hurt worse than waxing your eyebrows.  Waxing is a bigger area, but it's all at once, while threading is less area but lasts longer.  Here are some photos.

They Say You Only Get Married Once...

I should start this blog by backing up a little bit and telling you about how great my husband is.  As you all know, we are currently living overseas, well, we have been here for 4 1/2 months now and are working on getting our residency.  This whole residency thing is a lot bigger of a hassle than we thought it would be in the beginning.  My amazing husband, Andrew, has gone in to the government office every morning this week trying to get all the ins and outs of residency done.  This morning they informed Andrew that they did not believe our marriage license and since we have the same last name, they think we are siblings.  Our marriage license from the states is in black and white, including the stamp and signatures, so they obviously think it is not legit.

So what's the solution?  Get married again!  So, this evening, after going to the gym, we dropped by the local kanisa, or church, to get married again.  I say we got married again, but in reality we really just got marriage confirmation.  We still have our marriage license from the states, it just now has a local stamp and blue ink signature on it saying we are legitimately married.  Tomorrow morning Andrew will go back to the government office and hopefully this new and improved stamp will do the trick.  If not, the third marriage is the charm!  We have already confirmed that if they do not accept this new stamp, we will go back and get a completely new Arabic marriage certificate.  If that happens, we're definitely going to throw a whole marriage party Arabic style!

The Newlyweds!

(I know I look horrible in this picture.  I don't take good pictures when I'm nervous)

Celebrating our Second Marriage out on the Town