The pre-birthday post

Yep, tomorrow is the big day. I am only a few hours away from a new decade and am in the process of saying goodbye to a wonderful and rocky, roller coastery ride of a decade. I was asked twice today if I ever would have thought that my 30^th birthday would have been spent in Africa, and while I never would have guessed it, I think I probably would have wanted my birthday spent someplace exotic. Perhaps, not alone, but at least the cute guy is at home waiting for me. This decade has actually been bookended by birthdays spent on other continents with my 21^st celebrated in Florence. I guess that means birthday #40 will have to be somewhere on Antarctica, because I definitely hope to hit the other continents between now and then.

Tonight, as a pre-birthday celebration, I headed to a notoriously touristy restaurant called Frankies that serves all-American food as well as Lebanese. I had been fantasizing about the chocolate shake that I heard they served all day and accompanied that with onion rings and hummus. It was the perfect birthday for a modern American 8 year old, but it was also just perfect for me. This was my second trip to Frankies in two days. The day before, I was able to get a lunch of a grilled tomato and cheese sandwich that tasted so close to the American version. It was like heaven in a little styrofoam package.

Food in general has improved considerably for me and I have enjoyed street food also twice in the past two days. One of the great things that I tried was a roasted plantain that is accompanied by “ground nuts” or peanuts. The woman sit by the side of the street and roast the banana relative over hot coals and it gives the fruit a sort of smoky sweet flavor. I have been thriving on fried plantains, so this healthier version was a nice departure. Today, I tried waatche. Bernard and I headed out to find a woman who has
her own little stand with an amazing amount of food set up in medium-sized bowls. In individual bowls she had, hard boiled eggs, pasta, ground cassava, there was a large pot of stew, a small bowl of hot pepper sauce and behind sat a large bowl of a mixture of beans and rice. I think the waatche is technically the beans and rice, but the way it is served to-go is to throw that into a bad with varying amount of the other items. It is then twisted up and blends together as you carry it on your way. I got it to the office, tore open the bag and ate directly out of the bag. Fast food – Ghana style.

The other thing that has drastically improved is the bucket bath situation. No, I still don’t have running water. Although, it worked for about 20 minutes this week and I was teased into thinking it was an early birthday present. I have begun heating the water in a kettle before adding it to the bucket, which makes for a pretty pleasant showering experience. I still prefer the traditional style of showering with a faucet over your head, but the sensation of dumping water over your head is kind of fun and I am definitely much more comfortable now that the water isn’t cold and I am not gasping for air.

While, I have been faring well so far, the same cannot be said for my computer. A dirty flash drive was hooked up to it and infected it with a virus. Of course, I could have protected it with anti-virus software, but hindsight is 20/20 and of course the individual with the dirty flash drive was very apologetic and didn’t realize what would happen. It all just feels a little ironic that I travel to Africa and my computer gets some seemingly incurable virus from an unprotected USB hook-up.

Two hours left of the twenties…

Cheers to many lessons learned, adventurous road trips, great bottles of wine, unexpected sports victories, long phone conversations, a surprise engagement… it’s been a good decade.