Starting out 2024

This photo has nothing to do with the blog but it is from our visit to Festival Dary,
a Chadian Festival that celebrates Chad. It is a lot of fun if you go on a day where there are no riots.

It’s a new year, and some new year miracles are happening—first, I’m writing this instead of doing some other useless thing. Second, my priority checked bags actually both arrived nearly first off the plane in N’djamena and I got out of the airport before almost anyone else. Manon and Joe were waiting in the car to pick me up. Pika continues to hate car rides unless she knows we are going to buy some goat meat for her dinner. Ziggy was not invited along because she is very mad at Manon for getting another kitten and keeps trying to attack her. Now Zig sleeps with me and stays exclusively in my house. Manon is sad, but those are the consequences for getting a kitten that can walk and chase mice. The consequences of keeping Zig mean she is constantly falling into the dogs’ water bowl and knocking her food all over the kitchen but she is so cute.

Manon's new kitten

Zig is unimpressed by her new neighbor

I’ve already had one visit here in Chad, which I thought was going to be fairly easy and painless. My boss, his son, and 2 new colleagues were coming. Well, the woman colleague’s plane was canceled due to the snow and she couldn’t make it. This was sad to me because I’m almost always the only girl here, and it would have been fun to have another one along. It was also sad because she was bringing me her winter clothes to wear on my trip to Antarctica. Yes—I’m going there next week. 

Excited to eat grilled camel meat

I turn 40 this year, which is an age I always thought was SO OLD as a kid. Probably because when I was a kid, it was en vogue to throw grave yard parties with black balloons and “over the hill” signs for people who turned 40 and we had a lot of those parties for my parents and others of their expat friends. My life did not follow the traditional plan where I am now married with several children who will give my old age purpose and visitors and black balloon parties, but I think I should embrace the things I did end up with—flexibility and freedom to travel. So I have one more continent to visit to “collect them all,” and I’m heading there next week inshallah!

I also get to embrace these 3 things that do not particularly like being embraced.

Anyway, back to this most recent trip…

I picked up the guys and we went to visit projects in Dourbali. Everything went fairly smoothly except that the night we spent in Dourbali we ended up taking a woman to the hospital who was in a minor motorcycle accident. My diagnosis is that she made herself hysterical, but was actually not badly injured at all. It is a good thing I am not a doctor because I have no bedside manner. I let Matt drive her to the hospital because it is the greatest joy of his life to drive in Chad when roads aren’t paved. I ended up driving back to the hospital later that night to pick her up when she was discharged because Matt was already asleep. I got in bed around midnight that night.

BTS of a Matt video in front of a terrible water source.
Good news: a well is being drilled in this village right now!

The next day we visited another village and they insisted on us riding camels and horses into the village as they celebrated. Matt and I rode the horses since we’ve ridden plenty of camels in the past and let the others ride the camels. I’m not a fan of horses much but these ones were fine, except it is awkward to ride astride in a dress. I’m glad to see people happy to have clean water, but I do feel awkward in those types of celebrations. People here get a kick out of it, so I try to have fun with them. 

The presented us with camel milk, which I told Matt to pretend to drink. He did well.
The kid's sign is asking for education for children in the village,
sadly that is not something we do, but I hope that there will be a school in this village someday.

Anyway, all was well. The visit went well. Jeff drove back some of the way until we got to the paved roads and had a great time. I took everyone for pizza back in N’djamena. They’d all done so well eating the Chadian food and enjoying it, so I always reward people with pizza after that trip.

The next day I went to pick up the guys from the hotel to take them to breakfast. Matt and Nathan were there, but Jeff didn’t come. I went inside to find him, knocked on his door and he appeared in his underwear with a miserable look on his face. He had diarrhea and vomiting all night and was still going. I said to rest and I would come back later with meds. Matt, Nathan and I went on to the French bakery for some nice pastries. Then we went to my house to drop off their bags so we could go see the hippos. I called Claire for medical advice, she gave me the names of meds to get and Abiner went off to find the meds. Then I got a call from Jeff. He said, “The police are here and they are wanting to arrest me. I don’t know what to do.” I told him to pass me the phone and had the following conversation:

Me: “The nasara is sick and I left him there to rest. I’m coming back to pay for the rooms. Please leave him alone so he can rest.”

Police: “We know he is sick. We don’t want to cause problems for him, but there is a problem at the hotel. We are arresting everyone. Can you come get him?”

I live 5 minutes away so I hopped in the car and went to get him. 

Probably one of the last times Jeff was smiling in Chad.

I get there and the place is crawling with military, police and tons of people. People are carrying out lamps, sheets, food, mini refrigerators, and it is mass chaos. I go inside and find the nice guy from reception and make sure he is not about to be arrested. He assures me he is fine, but the owner of the property and the Chinese renter (it is the Hotel Hong Kong) are having a spat about the rent and the Chadian owner took the Chinese renter to court over it and they were currently there and fighting it out. So everyone has to leave. Not as bad as I had thought, but I guess if you can’t speak the language and stuff is coming out both ends and police bang on your door you would think that is pretty bad. Jean from reception said, “Do you mind if I get your bill to you later? Everything is a bit unorganized right now.” He was not wrong.

I brought Jeff back to my house where Antani had graciously cleaned my room up nicely for him, but he collapsed on my very uncomfortable small sofa instead and insisted he was fine and didn’t want to move. I brought him a pillow, made him take some meds and drink a sprite and then we went off to go see hippos.

Matt and Nathan were excited to see the hippos, but we made the mistake of putting everyone in the same wooden canoe and we nearly sank while paddling to the little island where the hippos were sleeping. They also didn’t want to go closer because hippos are a little scary. Before we made it to the island, Matt kept trying to get us to go back, but the guys refused, probably because turning around would have tipped the boat for sure. Both Matt and Nathan’s shoes were soaked, which I felt bad about because they were flying out later that night, and it isn’t fun to travel with wet squishy shoes. Matt said the hippos were not worth the boat trip, but we got two canoes to pick us up and the trip back to shore was not bad. Nathan said he enjoyed it anyway. Chad weather came through for us and their shoes were dry by the time we walked back to our truck.

See? They didn't sink!

Then we spent some time buying soccer jerseys for Matt’s other kids and finally we got back to my house to check on Jeff. I noticed he was no longer on the couch, so I went into my bedroom where he was sleeping on my bed. I congratulated him for moving to a more comfortable location. (Really the only people who like to sit on my couch are Joe, Pika and Ziguégué). He said, “I think your couch is like a futon or something because it folded up.”

It is not a futon. He just was too big for it and it collapsed. Fortunately Manon has an extra couch in our storage room and she let me take that while Matt tried to find enough straight nails in our nail jar to fix my old one. I like the new couch better anyway, but I need to buy new cushions for it because my ones are too small.

My new couch will look like this once I get cushions that are the right size.

Jeff skipped our late lunch/early dinner too, but perked up for souvenir shopping before heading to the airport. (Dr Claire saves the day for the neverthirst team again. She says, “I always know to keep my phone by me when you have a neverthirst team here.” And Matt says we need to keep her on retainer. Honestly, she has even helped with medical advice when I’ve been in Niger, Ethiopia, and Uganda even.) Their flight was delayed again, but I think everything else has been ok because I’ve not had any other messages from them. I doubt Jeff will ever want to come again to Chad, and now I need to find another go-to hotel, but otherwise it was a mostly successful trip. I’m happy to say that I think Nathan had a good time, so at least we are passing good memories on to the next generation.

Another recent visitor--cute little CODA.
His hands are blurred because he is trying to sign to me.

Now I’m sitting under my fan in my room typing this and feeling very cold as Pika licks my legs for no reason. I am happy that the warm clothes I ordered on Amazon made it to Debbie’s house so that I can have some warm clothes for Antarctica because if I’m cold in these clothes under the fan, I’m not going to be ok hanging with the penguins without some extras.

Pika is unsure of these chili lemon gummy bears, but I love them.
Thanks to my niece and nephews for the Christmas present.

Loud System Sound Speaker

Got a bit of extra time with these kids, 
thanks President Deby

While in the car with my sister on the way to somewhere, probably a covid test, I forgot how to order words in sentences, but context clues still allowed the conversation to flow. Or possibly genetic brain connections for siblings. But in true sibling fashion, Marian decided she wanted to steal the new words that I had so cleverly strung together for her own creative writing, and I knew I had to act fast and use it first. So this is me, several weeks later, after she’s posted multiple times on her blog and instagram, acting not fast at all. And it is relevant because in spite of a 20:00-5:00 city-wide curfew, local bars have started up their loud system sound speakers at 21:00, and it has been annoying me. Nighttime silence is the only good thing about the pandemic. Why are you taking that away from me with your rule breaking? Wear your masks on your chin, and I will not be the busybody saying anything to you about it, as I’m sure you already know that it is supposed to cover your nose (in French it is literally called a nose-hider), but I will call the police on your after-hours party if I weren’t sure that they were already there and 4 drinks in. 

Weird Mickey Mouse ice cream cones

Recipe from Micah's Disney cookbook

Creative use of available materials,
credit: Auntie

Here is your 2021 update for the 3 people who care (and probably already know): I’m back in Chad. I would once again like to use this moment to advocate for last minute ticket-buying. So far there are only two of us who firmly believe in this system: Leif and me. The rest of you are illogical and/or infrequent travelers. Of course Leif was too last year and it nearly killed him to be stuck in Sweden for almost an entire year. He lives in a beautiful 100 year old red farmhouse on the banks of a picturesque lake in central Sweden, but he is desperate to stay in an always-dusty, cement house with roof rats so we can get stuff done here in Chad. Then he pops over to Sudan to get stuff done there while texting me about a plan we have to get to Somaliland in the near future. I want to be him when I grow up, minus the 17 grandchildren because I just don’t have enough time to make that happen. He bought his ticket to Sudan the day before he left Chad. Once when I was in Sudan, and he was buying me a ticket to Kenya or Uganda or somewhere, he bought it for me the day before I left, and said, “I’m glad you’re not like the other people in the Head Office in Sweden. They always get so worried if they don’t have their ticket in hand before they leave.” 

Here is Leif fixing my ceiling fan.

Here is a meme my sister sent me with the caption:
Amanda buying plane tickets

Now I have neverthirst Head Office people worrying about my ticket-buying. They do not share Leif’s and my laid-back attitude towards trip planning. This didn’t stop them from adding an extra donor meeting into my America time at the last minute. I did not mind that because the donor is a friend of mine, and also because last minute changes rarely bother me. It did mean that I needed to change my return ticket back to Chad. True to form, I waited until near to last minute. I did send an inquiry to the travel agent who has become my go-to in Chad because I try to buy tickets online and then the internet messes up at a crucial spot and I get annoyed. Mahesh (lovely Indian guy who did not do his part to keep the Indian restaurant open in N’djamena when I was gone on some misguided trips a few years ago and it closed for lack of my business) immediately got back to me and gave me some ticket change options and the change fee. I left it for a few days, and then heard that Chad had decided to close the borders and the airport for one week “renewable” (which is a clause they add in every single decree to allow for open-endedness that gives them an easy flexibility and keeps everyone else on the brink of uncertain insanity). My original return ticket was in that airport closure window, which means that my ticket was canceled by the airline, and I didn’t have to pay a change fee when I rebooked. If I had rebooked before the airport closure, properly in advance like a good time-conscious Westerner, then I would have had to pay the change fee. Procrastination saves money! And now, Chad, please open back up to the Brits--they're really not as dangerous as you might think, and many of them are really nice people and have genuinely put their Africa colonizing (colonising) days behind them. Claire needs to come back, and I really need her to come back too because I miss her and I already ate all the gummy bears I brought with me from America.

President Deby thinking about closing the airport indefinitely.

President D probably doesn't know about the Airport Cat
who guards the luggage conveyor belt, but the Cat knows
that his presence is crucial to the smooth functioning of luggage retrieval.

"Why is the nasara taking pictures of the cat?"
"I don't know, maybe she wants to take it home with her."
But I told them no because I already have two dogs.

Cat close up

Anyway, when they opened the airport two weeks later, I was on one of the first flights back. Annoyingly they changed the covid test dates of validity and that meant I had to get another test as the first one was no longer valid, and I had to do some intense searches for 24-hour PCR tests. There is a shortage of those in the US. Why is it such a big country? Finally I found one grâce à une colleague in Alabama who has connections. They charged me $250 and I had to do the test myself. Definitely a rip off. I’m sure I did not stick the thing as deeply into my nose as a professional would have. At any rate, the test was negative and I made it back to Chad where I mostly followed vague and inconsistent government quarantine procedures, but people came to visit me at my house anyway. I busted out a tiny bit early to help Leif get his covid test before he traveled to Sudan. We both continue to defy the odds and remain impossibly healthy. It is our carefree attitude towards life, probably. 

The kids excited to watch me covid test

$250 for this

$30 for this

Wear your iphone Apple print robe
when you go pick up your results.
(You may have to zoom in, but it's the cool guy in the hat on the right.)

It is good to be back. My dogs were so happy to see me and get taken out for walks again. No one else wants to take them because they like to be in charge of where we go. Pika MUST bark ferociously at any dog who looks at her. Joe doesn’t usually pull, but he hasn’t been walking in a while, and I think he’s afraid that every walk will be his last, and so he wants to make sure he sees everything. But he is getting better. Pika is getting a bit less barky because I’m bringing a small spray bottle and that seems to surprise her into silence. She’s been a bit ill lately, and the Chadian vet and I have had fun looking up DIY vet videos on youtube. He said, “You know, my education was mostly about camels and goats and cattle. We never studied dogs. I need to get a smart phone so I can learn more things about dogs.” If anyone know a vet who wants to offer online courses to Chadian vets who want to learn about dogs, let me know. I now know how to say “express the anal sacs” in French so I can translate. 

Pika stole my butter and ate it. 
Maybe that's why she is sick?

Just before Christmas, while out walking Joe and Pika,
Joe snatched a sneaky chicken I didn't see hiding in the bushes.
He has strong hunting instincts. The chicken met a swift violent death in front of her babies.
I told bystanders to get the owner so I could pay. Owner came and said it was a very
special and precious chicken, but he knows my dogs are usually nice dogs and I can pay him
whatever I think is fair. I called a friend for advice, and she told me what to pay but told me
to go back to the scene of the crime and bring the body back so we could make use of it.
I didn't want to reward Joe for his bad behavior, but I also didn't want to be charged 
multiple times for one chicken, so I went back to get the body. There we were met by many young men
who had nothing to do with the situation. They told the owner that I should have paid 4x the amount that I paid and also made sure that all of the chicken's future children had a college fund. They said it in Arabic,
so I also yelled at them in Arabic to butt out. I had had a very long day. They butted out, but the owner,
who had previously been happy with the fair amount that I paid him for his chicken,
suddenly got a call from his uncle, the REAL owner, who said that when chickens are killed
under violent circumstances, there is a 12% increase in payment for their deaths. A quick usage of the
calculator app on my phone, showed him that I had already paid him over 12% more than the chicken was worth. Indeed, everyone before the group of irrelevant interested young men had told me that I had been generous. My guard told me to go inside and stop making things worse and he handled the situation.
I've not seen the kid again since then. And I had a dead chicken in my fridge for 2 days.
Eventually the chicken was prepared and the dogs feasted on the bounty of Joe's successful hunt.
I couldn't find a chicken toy in Walmart, so I got the duck toy, hoping to satisfy Joe's interest in poultry
with a fake bird. He remains uninterested in the fake bird, but Pika likes it.

My other dog concern has been the rats in the roof of the house where Leif stays. He didn’t complain (much) about the rats, but we have the regional director coming in a few days and he wants to stay at that house. It’s not a fancy house, but we rent it, and he wants to get our money’s worth. So he will stay there. I suggested a nicer guesthouse, but he didn’t want that. And I know he can take it—while I’m pretty sure that he views Leif’s and my last-minute lifestyle choices and haphazard administrative skills to be recklessly irresponsible, he is a tough Kiwi who lives in Niger, and he can hack it. But we wanted to get rid of the rats anyway. The house owner said he would take care of it, and he sent us a bag of rat poison. Since I believe that is what killed Flip and made Joe very ill, I am paranoid about it. But it seemed our only option. So Danem and I bought some cucumbers (crack for rats here apparently), covered them with rat poison, and Danem climbed up into the roof space and chucked poisoned cucumbers all over like a crazed fairy tale step mother whose mirror just told her she is NOT the fairest of them all. And then we waited. In total 6 poisoned rats fell out the side of the roof over the course of a day or so. I kept Joe inside with Pika and me all night in case more came out while the guards slept and he ate one, got sick and died. Joe hates being inside at night. I used to try to get him to come back in and sleep inside, but whenever I go out to try to call him in, he goes full alert, runs to one corner of the yard and barks loudly. Then he runs to the other corner and barks again. Then he looks at me to tell me that he is just too busy protecting our domain and can’t possibly be bothered to come in right now. Antani says, “Amanda, that is his job as a dog. Let him do his job.” So I do, usually. But I didn’t want him rat poisoned again. He spent the night barking in my face, trying to force me to get up and let him out, but I stayed strong. But I only lasted one night like that. The next night I let him sleep outside. By that time we hadn’t had any more dead rats in several hours, and we’ve not had any more since then. I know at some point we need to go up to the attic to see if there are any bodies remaining, but I’ve not done that yet. Leif said the rats seemed to be gone, so we will hope that our efforts were successful.

Danem and the poisoned cucumbers

I knew he would never let me actually do the job,
but I like to climb things so I also went up.

I locked Pika and Joe out of the house
while we were poisoning rats,
and she cried like she was dying,
which she would have done if she had eaten rat poison.

And that’s the news for now. But there should be more soon because I’m representing Emelie’s fiancé in her dowry ceremony on Friday, and I have no idea what I’m doing, but I’ve been told to say nothing but what people tell me to say. And also to bring all the stuff for the ceremony that she has been storing in my house. And I was told to say nothing after I made several jokes about things that I wanted to say, and she laughed kindly before demanding complete silence and my best behavior for the ceremony. I will try. But I did laugh at her when she asked me if I had purple heels to match the dress she is having made for me to wear. No, I definitely do not own any purple shoes. 

This blog is over except for some photos for the interested. Many of these I posted on my new instagram account. I joined up to support a budding authoress, the talented Marian Frizzell, as she builds an online presence to convince someone to publish her novel, which I read and really liked. You should all go follow her on Instagram. I've also discovered that I, person who wears all her clothes when it is less than 25C out, love watching people climb up ice bergs and dive into slightly frozen lakes, so I'm following Marian and every Nordic country account that I find. I also like the surf and scuba dive accounts because I live in the desert. It's always good to have a new time waster in one's life, isn't it? What else would I do with all this time?

Rosie was not invited to the big kid birthday party
at the trampoline park, so we went for coffee--
well, only Marian had coffee, Rosie had hot chocolate and I had tea.
And Rosie had Attitude. As she always does.

I only like cooking for people who appreciate it.
The bro in law loves these deep fried Indonesian snacks
that I always make on New Year (bala-bala).
Charis wanted to help. She was unsure if she would like eating them though.

You have to get messy to make these.

We didn't make enough. Once the girls decided
that they liked them, they went fast.

Ah, yes, bala-bala in front of a roaring fire...
classic picture of homey coziness.

A few days later in a country where the sun shines hot,
Joe lurks under the table, waiting for Emelie to get back
so that we can start the party already and eat all the food she cooked.

Kadessou is the new Country Director for IAS Chad.
Leif is going to retire, meaning that he has more time to run around the world
doing even more projects. We have a lot planned.

Joe and Pika watch anxiously for any dropped morsel of food.

Emelie shows off the purple coat IAS Chad office
had made for Britt (Leif's wonderful, long-suffering wife).

A camel-skin briefcase for Leif.
I think he likes it.

Goodbye from Joe and Pika. Go do something important:
Save the whales, get a snack, adopt a puppy.