Oh, the Weather Outside is Frightful

What a December!

Yes, it is winter here in Nigeria, as we are still North of the equator (barely). The humidity is 84% right now so it's pretty much like August in Louisiana. We haven't had much rain since we got here as we are heading into the dry season. I think we've had only one afternoon shower that lasted just a few minutes.

The dry season in Western Africa, called Harmattan, is when the winds come in from northeast and bring sand from the Sahara Desert.  It's supposed to be mid-November through March...but I don't think it has arrived here yet. It's supposed to be a dry, dusty heat...but so far we're still experiencing okay visibility and stifling humidity. Although it is pretty hazy outside (as evidenced by our beach pictures), I'm not sure if it's caused by pollution or the Harmattan. And I don't know if the dust has arrived yet or if it's just general griminess. But I do know that it is definitely still humid here, I think it's only been below 80% a few nights. Most of the fabrics in our hotel room are a bit moist (ewww) - the couch, the bed, our hanging clothes, things just feel a little damp. I think it's caused by the A/C running constantly combined with the wet air. But we don't really experience that back in the states, so I can't fully explain the phenomenon.

Wonderful Christmas Time

We've been having a very low-key holiday since all of the rotating workers (the people that spend a few weeks here, then a few weeks back home), and most of the expats have gone home for the year. Our social calendar has certainly cleared and it's been a nice change from the long-lasting dinners with everyone. But that doesn't mean that things have been quiet around here! The city is flooded with tons of Nigerians coming back home for the holidays and our hotel has been running a special deal to encourage people to stay here for the holidays.  They've also been hosting huge concerts almost every night,  and they chose this time to do renovations, so things around here have been unusually busy (and loud).

I've gotten a lot of questions about how Christmas is here. Before moving here, I had heard from numerous people that Christmas here is "crazy". I can now attest to this.  Lots of lights, lots of Santa hats, lots of holiday themed roadside displays, lots of people, busy shopping centers, and terrible traffic...just like home! Also, lots of fireworks have been happening at all hours of the night which I take as indications that lots of parties are happening these days. It's a happy time here in Lagos.

 The trickiest part of the season for me is figuring out when it's appropriate to say "Merry Christmas," since there are many different religions practiced here (about half of the Nigerian population is Muslim - although they are mostly concentrated in the Northern part of the country). I've been using the new-to-me phrase "Compliments of the Season," which seems to be a popular choice here and covers everything.

Personally, we had a great Christmas until about 2pm when we were forced to change rooms. We even had to change buildings at the hotel. Then we changed again later that night. The whole process took about 7 hours and left us feeling very frustrated, and decidedly not in the Christmas spirit. We are still waiting to make our 6th room change and get back to the main building. We've also been doing a bit of house hunting, though it's unlikely that we'll be moving to an apartment for at least another month. We've found several good options already and are going out to look again on Monday.

Our controversial Christmas e-card this year! 

Eleko Beach

I finally have something exciting to write about!  This past Saturday we were invited on a beach trip to celebrate surviving the "End of the World".  The party had been in the works for a few weeks, so our host was very confident that we would indeed survive the coming apocalypse -  he even had t-shirts made. We spent the day exploring Eleko Beach, lounging in hammocks, finding shade(we're so close to the Equator!), and trading expat advice.

The beach house and the shirts!

One has to drive about an hour out of the city to get to a clean beach safe for us oyibos*. The drive there took us down a long, bumpy, dirt road through a village, and then down a heavily forested path. But then we were there! And the beach was quite pretty, with very little trash (a huge change compared to the beaches in Lagos and VI). You still can't go into the water though because the currents are very strong.  But that wasn't  a big deal to us though -  the temperature in Lagos hovers around 85-90 degrees year round, so the water stays quite warm and isn't exactly refreshing! A few brave people did wade in a little bit though.

Us in front of a shipwreck along the beach. 

Intense wave action.

Ryan + waves

Terrifying clear crabs!

My favorite parts of the beach experience were the merchants from the village that came by to sell us goods. They sold  table cloths, wall hangings, jewelry, aprons, baskets, sarongs, wood carvings, and paintings. We purchased a large table cloth, some matching napkins, and an apron. There were a few really funny wood carvings available such as a depiction of people waiting in line for visas and another one of a person using a computer. They also had carvings of boats, buses, nativity scenes (I really want one), elephants, and people climbing palm trees to fetch coconuts.

Merchants selling table clothes along the back fence of the house.

There were about 15 people in our party, but our group was the only to have a security team trailing them all day! Nothing like bringing a couple of armed guards to a relaxing day at the beach. Better safe than sorry!

Our security! 

Our friends, Chris and Valerie, own the property and were gracious enough to invite, entertain, and feed the group for the day.  They had a great food spread for us including cheese steak, coleslaw, roasted corn, potato salad, pasta salad, and a cold chickpea salad. Needless to say, it was a welcome change from hotel food. Chris has been living in Lagos for 10+ years, so he's been a wealth of information for us. It's very entertaining to see him interact with the locals (especially the merchants) because he speaks the pidgin english very well, and the natives get a kick out of conversing with him. 

They pay rent for the house to the villagers and they take care of the property when they aren't there. This obviously isn't the house they live in all the time, but just a weekend retreat. The house has no electricity, but they have installed a working toilet, sink, and shower by using a generator to pump water out of a well. Chris and Valerie take very good care of the villagers, so the villagers took good care of us, and even let us snap a few pictures on our way out. 

On the way back to the cars it's a tradition for the new expats (us!) to hand out candy to the local kids. They were all waiting for us when we started packing up. The kids know that they're supposed to stand in a line to get the candy, but we did a bad job of enforcing this rule and were swarmed for the prized lollipops. There were probably around 20 kids waiting!

Village kids waiting for the candy. 

The village. You can't see how bumpy this road is, but it's very bumpy and apparently much worse when it rains.  

Taken while driving through the village on our way back from the beach.

On this particular day there were lots of people going to church and having Christmas parties. The village is probably more indicative of how the rest of Nigeria lives, so it was good to get some perspective since we are so isolated on the island. 

The gang!

All in all a great day and we can't wait to go back to the beach!

* Oyibo is the term Nigerians use for white people, or any foreigner, really. It isn't meant to be an insult. The translation means something along the lines of "no skin" or maybe the absence of dark skin. 

Sweet Suite

Late last night we got a somewhat alarming phone call. It was 9:30pm and management was calling to tell us we had just been approved to move into a bigger room. A suite, in fact, and we jumped at the opportunity to spread out. This is our 3rd room change around the hotel, each time for more space. The call yesterday was unexpected and we are grateful, but unfortunately we're taking it as a sign that we will be in this hotel for awhile. We're thinking through February, at least! So while it's nice to spread out a little bit more (and we now have 2 rooms! and a couch!), it would be even better to unpack for good.

You see, here in Nigeria everything takes about 3x as long to get done as it would in the states. We have several factors against us here, namely the fact that the official contract for the project we moved here for is yet to be sign, and they just pushed the date back until January 31. The original date was October 1. I think it has something to do with the government here approving the project, and then the company contracting my husband's company agreeing on terms - all I really know is that it's out of our hands and that no amount of complaining will help. We are hopeful that they will sign sooner, rather than wait out the full extension. We know we're costing the company a lot of money by being in this hotel and having all of our meals paid for, so we're hoping that that will be incentive enough to move us out ASAP. After the contract is signed, we have to wait on housing to be approved, and then start the process of applying for short term residency here. After that we get an apartment and our shipments will finally be released and on their way to us. Good thing we brought 9 bags of luggage to hold us over!

Living Room

Another shot of the Living Room

Bedroom 

The hole they cut in the wall to connect the rooms.

What you can't see is the fact that we have TWO bathrooms, TWO safes, and TWO closets now. And it feels borderline luxurious. 

So for now we're just trying to focus on one day at a time, and not be too overwhelmed by the prospect of living out of suitcases (kinda) and being in these rooms for the next few months.

Movie Review

Today we went to the mall and checked with the theater to see what movies were currently showing.  Our expat friend, Tyler, grabbed a flyer to check movie times.

The front of the flyer.

The movies being shown are pretty much the same ones currently in theaters in the states. A few weird ones thrown in, but all things considered, a very good selection. And on the other side of the flyer, Tyler pointed out a very interesting review for Skyfall, the new James Bond film.

How often do you read a negative review being put out by a theater trying to sell you a ticket to the movie? Strange, huh?

This is what it says if you can't read the small type in the picture:

Hello exquisite people. My brother in law is a bit of a movie buff and a James Bond Movie fanatic, so I decided to get him to review Skyfall. I'm not too big on James Bond movies but he takes the biscuit. He's watched all the James Bond movies and knows tem inside out. 

He got home upset from seeing Skyfall. He reckons its not a true representation of James Bond aka Roger Moore. He's really upset and gave a critic of Skyfall. He said "this boy" aka Daniel Craig is not the man for the job. He's too rigid and too strict to be a Bond. His thought of James Bond (live and let die, the spy who loved me e.t.c.) was smooth, man next door look with Aston Martins and supertastic guns.  

As I type this, he is still going on about Skyfall very upset and he said to me he's getting me his James Bond collection to show me what he means. He then turns around and said "Oh by the way why the heck is Bond drinking Heineken, he should ask for his drink shaken". I'm sorry no offence Heineken. He thinks the James Bond crew should go back to the drawing board.  

Have a great weekend guys and happy viewing!! 

 We'll probably still go see Skyfall eventually as we've heard good things about the movie from other critics.  Just a slice of life from Lagos.

Food (Part 1)

When we came to Lagos back in September (for 3 days) it became quickly apparent that one of the major adjustments for us would be food. Now, I don't want to say that Nigerian food is bad, I'm sure that if that's what you grew up eating, it's wonderful. But it's completely foreign to me and my American tongue.

While staying at the hotel, we've been lucky enough to have every meal cooked for us and the option of 24/7 room service. We've had some really good stuff, but most of the stuff we've tried has been American or International food that we already knew we liked. We did get the chance to go to an Indian Restaurant called The Viceroy, which was really, really good and made my husband very happy. But usually we just eat at one of the restaurants here at the hotel. There's a steakhouse, a buffet, Chinese, Italian, a bakery, a poolside grill, and a very fancy restaurant on the top floor. The Chinese restaurant is probably the best of the bunch, but it's the furthest away and usually makes for a late night.

Every day I meet my fellow expat wife for breakfast and lunch at 8:30 and 1:00, respectively. For breakfast we go to the buffet, and for lunch we usually go to the Italian restaurant. Almost every day I order tomato soup for lunch. And each time it's a little different. It's very confusing actually. The first day I got it, it was a very typical tomato soup with a bit of cream placed in the middle - elegant, homemade, and delicious. The second time, the soup was a bit more orangey and had an entirely different texture. It had lots more things (??) floating around, and I think I tasted carrots (which I hadn't seen anywhere yet). I actually think that they pureed some minestrone soup and added that in without straining out any of the larger pieces.  The third time I ordered it, the soup didn't taste like tomatoes at all, but it wasn't bad,  it just wasn't tomato soup. Just a bright red broth. I think that they must have just mixed the tomato soup with the minestrone broth. I'm going to try to take a picture next time I order it. Stay tuned for updates on Soup Gate 2012!

The food at the Christmas party last weekend was really interesting. I mostly ate rice. Earlier in the day there was some delicious chicken that they were roasting in a pit outside and tasty beignet-esque dough balls. But for dinner it was mostly local dishes that were unrecognizable to us. Some ladies insisted that   my husband try some local dishes, and I was happy that I had been excluded from their enthusiasm. First, they insisted he take a large ball of dough. Except it wasn't dough, it was dish consisting of very bland, pounded yam, called fufu. It had the consistency of mashed potatoes, and very little flavor of its own.  I've also seen people at the hotel use a handful of fufu to scoop up other food items in lieu of a fork. 

I found this picture on google, that big ball is fufu. I think he had some of the green stuff too, but I don't know what it's called. 

They also insisted he take some unrecognizable pieces of chicken and a green substance that looked like sautéed spinach, except that he kept finding weird bones in it, so we have no idea what it could have been. Since I was able to choose my own meal, I had 2 different kinds of rice and a soup-like shrimp dish that looked like étouffée, but didn't taste like it. It was a lot spicier than I had anticipated but still pretty good. They take spice very seriously here.

They also had ice cream from Coldstone Creamery at the party. Whaaaattt! I haven't been in an actual shop yet, but I've seen a few locations. The ice cream tasted pretty good but I'm weary of ice cream here because you never know if it has been properly frozen. The only other American chains I've seen here are KFC, and Dominos, and something called Johnny Rockets is about to open and people are really excited about it. It's very bizarre to me that there are no McDonald's here, I didn't know there was any place in the world untouched by Ronald.

Other popular Nigerian dishes I've seen in the restaurants here are Goat/Fish/Chicken/Turkey Pepper Soup (I've heard it's super spicy),  Fish Stew (I see this at the breakfast buffet??),  and all manner of plantains. They eat a lot of goat here. I have since learned that goat is the most popular meat in the world, it just doesn't happen to be very popular in the US. I find it's texture to be stringy and a bit tough, but maybe I just haven't had the right dish yet. Someone told me that a lot of the meat here will be tough and stringy due to butchering methods. Although it's a bit unpleasant to think about, the US requires that cattle (and other edible animals) be treated humanely, and butchers go to great efforts to prevent animals from suffering too much, thus they aren't under too much stress when they die. It's upsetting to think about and I'm no expert, so I'm not going to put more thought into that. 

There are lots of other interesting dishes that I can't recall at the moment, but I'll report back later. 

Normal days, parties and birthdays

Many apologies for the lack of updates. Living in a hotel just isn't that interesting. And it's seeming like we'll be here for quite a while :( Not that there's anything particularly terrible about this hotel, but I really want to unpack, get settled, and spread out some. Having a permanent residence is also the impetus for our shipped items to leave the storage facility in Houston. Our air shipment will probably take about a month to get to us (spending several weeks going through customs here) and I'm eager to receive it. Before we left, I had high hopes of receiving it around Christmas, I had even packed our tree and some ornaments inside, but there's no way that will happen now.

We also don't have a driver, so most all of our days are spent on the hotel property. I'm starting to fall into a routine of boredom. We meet for breakfast, lunch, and dinner at set times everyday. And in between those times, life just isn't very exciting. Lots of reading, naps, National Geographic, and Internet browsing. 

This past weekend we went to the company Christmas party. We did have a lot of fun. The party was held at a compound on Banana Island. Outside. Between the hours of 2pm-11pm. There were a surprising number of organized activities at the party including, dance contests, costume contests, karaoke contests, and games where you had to catch rings around your arms. There was also a feast, lots of dancing, and prizes given out. It also happened to be my birthday - I tried my hardest to win the costume contest on this fact alone and got to the finals. But someone far more deserving than my borrowed shirt won. But it was fun to try. I'm sure that I embarrassed myself thoroughly, but there were free drinks at the party, so I'm hoping it's just a happy 5 hour haze for everyone like it is for me.

The party when we arrived. We were late. 

Kids watching the dance contest.

Us. 

Dancing. I love to see people dressed in traditional outfits. Some people mix western clothing like jeans, with more traditional tops. Some people wear all western style clothes.

Yep, it was my birthday this past Saturday. I'm 27! And, the day we arrived in Nigeria was our 2 year wedding anniversary! What a difference a year makes. A year ago, we had no idea we'd be living in a foreign country, let alone one in Africa! But that's what keeps life interesting.

The husband did find me a birthday cake and had it brought out at dinner on Sunday. It was the "Chocolate Dome" cake variety, my favorite of the desserts tried here.  It also came with a single, giant, firework as a candle. There's a picture of it somewhere that I'll have to post soon. All in all, a very memorable birthday.

So far, so good!

It's been 1 week, 1 day since we landed in Nigeria, and I think I will like it here. I am starting to see the little things that make people stay here for way longer than their original assignments. I love looking out the windows of our car at the people on the sides of the road. Everyone is vibrant and happy (for the most part, of course). I know that there is a lot of hardship here, more so than in other places, but the people here are friendly towards me (95% of the time), always seem to offer kind greetings and return a smile. They frequently say "You're welcome" as a greeting - meaning "You are welcome here". Which I really enjoy hearing. So far, Ive had nothing but good experiences and *knock on wood* no stomach issues. But I think that stems from being in a hotel that caters to foreigners and the super wealthy. Our hotel has 6 or 7 different restaurants, so far our favorite has been the Chinese, but one can't eat that at every meal. Everything seems to be pretty fresh and properly cooked.

A few nights ago we went to a boxing match. Not exactly my idea of a great Sunday night, but the tickets were free and it was held in our hotel's convention center. Although we somehow missed all of the boxing, we saw quite a few musical acts that I really enjoyed. It was quite a production and a packed house. My favorite part was the audience though. Several times songs were played and it was like the Nigerians just couldn't sit still and had to get up and dance. Young, old, male, and female. They just couldn't contain their joy and had to dance. I loved it. I can't really think of a song in the US that is so loved across all generations that people can't help but stand up and dance.

Today some wonderful ladies took me around to several different shopping markets. I am so thankful that they did this for me, because after visiting the mall/super market closest to where we are, I was feeling a little down about what I could possibly cook here. Turns out, there are several other places to shop for food and you usually have to go to multiple places to get everything you need. Which is fine with me, since I've got plenty of time to kill during the day. There were lots of American brands and I found all of the things that I was sort of freaking out about having to cook/live without, i.e. ground coffee (not instant), coffee creamer, flour, brown sugar, baking soda, baking powder, M&Ms, canned corn, fresh Atlantic seafood, fresh dairy milk, granola bars, vegetable oil, etc.. I was also able to see where to buy different electronics, appliances, party supplies, perfumes, office supplies, and furniture. I am so relieved that I was able to find these other stores. And so grateful that I had kind people to show me these places instead of just having to figure it out on my own. So today I feel relieved and very lucky.

I still haven't been to one of the local markets, I hear that those can be a bit intimidating because you're expected to barter for everything. Looking forward to that adventure though.

Sorry about the lack of pictures, I haven't been taking too many because I've heard that it's sometimes not appropriate here,  but I haven't quite figured out those cultural differences yet.

I live in Lagos

We made it to Lagos this past Tuesday. We are currently living in a hotel until our apartment situation gets worked out (hopefully soon!).  But we live here now. We probably won't be able to go home until late this summer. And I'm surprised at how un-freaked out or panicked I am about this. I am trying so hard to maintain an easygoing, roll with the punches, mindset about this whole thing, and so far it's working.

I stand by my previous statement, regarding our first trip, that the worst part of Lagos (thus far) has been the airport. This time one of our traveling companions got completely hammered on the plane, he quite literally drank for 12 hours straight, and walked right out of the airport, leaving us and his bags behind. That is just not something one should do at the Lagos airport. There's a security team that meets us as soon as they can, and a plainclothes custom official that escorts/expedites the customs process for us. And all of it should be done with a level-head, and cautious awareness. Anyway,  back to the plainclothes customs official - I have no idea what his role is in the process, but I'm grateful for him. He lets me just go sit down on the other side of the customs gate and leaves the questioning to the men. I'm not sure whether to be offended or flattered.  But it's a relief that he is there to help. Once we found our bags and rejoiced that all had made it seemingly intact, the plainclothes custom official asked us what was inside of them. He acted very upset about the fact that we had a whole suitcase full of food. I say he "acted" because I can't be sure how upset he was about it, given that the problem was instantly remedied by giving him some money to slip to the customs official checking bags. And we got waved right through the horde of people having their bags opened. Hooray!

I would advise those travelling through the Lagos airport to have cash on hand (USD or Naira) to tempt the customs officials, however, I've also heard that doing that can go horribly wrong, as bribing government officials is technically illegal. But the bribing and corruption of government employees is kind of what Nigeria is known for - so just use your best judgement when put in that situation. And just avoid the Lagos airport if Nigeria is not your final destination. Trust me.

I did hear that the airport bathrooms have been renovated since our last trip. Which is a miracle.  But I didn't dare check them out myself.

And then we had to wait  45 minutes in a van with curtains drawn for our companion to go back and find his bags. This made nearly every member of our travel party quite upset. Because despite the fact that we had a Mopol (mobile police) officer in the passenger seat of the van, I still felt like a sitting, sweating duck. So I'm glad the airport part is over.

So far, we haven't gotten sick, and have become slightly more adventurous with our food choices now that we have a clean bathroom at the ready. I am mostly bored during the day but my sleeping hours are so messed up that I'm glad for the lack of organized activities.

Looking forward to our expat friends arriving late next week, and of course, getting out of this cramped hotel room so we can actually  unpack and get settled.

You're moving where?

Our decision to move to Lagos, Nigeria was easy enough:  my husband was approached by his boss, he asked me about it (assuming I would say no), we obsessed over the idea for 4 days,  we decided to go for it, he told his boss we were interested, his company approved our relocation as expats.

Boom. Done.

And now we're waiting (it's been an incredibly frustrating couple of months while we wait for a moving date). We're expecting to leave in late November, tentatively.

We are looking forward to this next adventure with equal parts excitement and anxiety. It will certainly be a life-changing couple of years, fraught with many frustrations (safety, culture shock, malaria, boredom, traffic jams, unreliable electricity, non-potable water, corruption... everywhere, homesickness, etc.), but also with many wonderful rewards. And even in the event it all goes horribly wrong (but please God, don't let it), at least we'll have some great stories to tell.