Home Sweet Home

It’s been a while since we’ve posted anything and a lot has happened in the last few weeks. I will probably have to make several different posts to get things caught up.

One of our most exciting moments was when we finally moved in to our house!! We moved in on Thursday after 5 days in our temporary housing. The Embassy sent a huge canvas-topped military truck to move all of our things. The Embassy worker who came to get us smiled and said “I was told you have many suitcases; I should bring big truck”. Well, he was right about that. After a short drive up the peninsula, we were home.

We had seen pictures of the house, courtesy of our sponsor, Andrew. We were very pleased with what we saw in person. Our house is one of three in a compound. There is a 9 foot concrete fence around the entire property. We have 2 guards at the entrance at all times. Each of the 3 homes also has a 4 foot concrete fence around its property. We were very pleased to see that we have our own yard for the pups to run around in.

Our house is a 2-story house. When you walk in the front door, you step into the living room, which opens into the dining room. The stairs are to the right. Next to the stairs is a spare room (we are still debating whether that is going to be the “man room TV center” or the pretty guest bedroom). There is also a full bath underneath the stairs (yes, it’s quirky). To the right of the dining room is the kitchen. The kitchen is a very nice size with a large pantry (apparently a rarity here). We also have a large laundry room in the back of the house with plenty of storage shelves…and….most excitingly…a dishwasher!!! We were told there are no dishwashers here, so we didn’t even bring dish soap with us. I am most ecstatic to have a dishwasher as I do NOT like hand washing.

Upstairs we have 3 bedrooms (yeah, Cash finally has his own room!) and 2 full baths. The upstairs is also considered our safe area. Each Embassy home has an area that is enclosed with iron bars (windows and door). At the top of our stairs is a locking iron door. In the event of an emergency, we are to retreat to our safe area, lock ourselves in, and call the Embassy on our radio. Currently our biggest use of the iron door is to keep the dogs downstairs while we are sleeping at night.

The Embassy has fully furnished the house for us. We brought a few things (our bed, cribs, rocking chair) but otherwise we will us the lovely Embassy furniture. We are borrowing Embassy cribs for the kids until ours arrive. The Embassy also provides us with a “welcome kit” to use while awaiting our shipments. The welcome kit include: plates, bowls, silverware, cups, dishtowels, bath towels, a few pots and pans and a vacuum.

The house has also come with Peter. Peter is our gardener who was employed by the Embassy while our house was empty. Apparently his contract is for a month, so even though we are in the house now, Peter is here until mid-June. Peter is not that fastest worker in the world, but he works hard. He is here every day at 8:00am sweeping our porch and driveway. He has also trimmed all of bushes, cut the grass with a machete, weeded the flower beds and (constantly) waters the yard (even if it has just rained). We are working with him on the concept that rainy season means no need to water.

We received news that the car we ordered from Japan has been shipped. It’s currently aboard the Morning Menad. It is scheduled to arrive in Dar mid-June. After clearing customs and paperwork, we should have the car by early July. We are very eager to get our car. Although the Embassy provides a car to get Mike to and from work, we are relying on taxis for all other transportation. We have been lucky to have been introduced to Frank. Frank is a taxi driver who drives for a coworker of Mike’s. Frank has been very good to drive us around and give us really good rates (think $10US for about 3 hours of driving to 4 different destinations as I ran errands one day).

We have also learned the art of walking. Thankfully we are within walking distance of a grocery store and bakery (a French one at that). Walking to get groceries definitely adds a new twist to things. On one of my first outings I bought the 20lb bag of dog food, not really considering that I’d have to carry it home. Thankfully I had the stroller and was able to cram the bag in the bottom. However, it took up the whole space so I had to carry the rest of the shopping bags home.

Grocery shopping has been an interesting experience in and of itself. There is a rather large grocery store that we frequent called Shopper’s Plaza (or as Sadie likes to call it, Walmart). You can get most everything there, but it is at a price (think $7US for a box of Corn Flakes). They also do not have good quality meat, produce or bread there. For those things we have found specialty shops are the way to go. So we go to the butcher shop for our meat, Garden Market (a tiny little shop) for our fruits and veggies and Epi D’or, the French bakery, for our breads.

We had a new experience recently when we visited the fish market for the first time. There is a very large fish market in Dar with better prices, but a much longer drive. We chose to go to the one on the peninsula to check it out. It is an open air concrete building. As we stepped out of the car we were met by a dozen men each selling their catch of the day: red snapper, salmon, octopus, shrimp, crab, squid, flounder….just to name a few. Thankfully our driver went in with us to help negotiate. We walked away with 8 large salmon fillets, 6 red snapper fillets, 1 lb of jumbo shrimp, and 1 lb of calamari. I was very glad to have the men clean all of it for us.

On a sad note (for me at least), Audra is now on her way back home. We feel so very blessed to have had her with us for these first few weeks. She was an amazing help with the children, so patient as Sadie worked through her jet lag and general confusion related to this big change. We laughed that Audra was our guinea pig as we learned our way around our new town and new adventures. So for each of you who come to visit us later, you can thank Audra that your trip (hopefully) goes very smoothly. A million thank you’s Audra!!