Sunday morning after a good sleep in and some breakfast on the patio in front of our room we made our way by taxi (our first solo trip and some good negotiating by Conor) to the meeting point and off we went to River #2. Btw, I asked…there is no River #1. Who knows the story behind that.
One of the ladies at work, Anna, is an ex-pat from Essex working in SLE for a few months. This gal is definitely in to experiencing the pure culture of the area and has the best Krio accent (from british to krio is impressive). She’s savy and we certainly lucky she’s here.
We met Anna in the pouring rain at 9:30 on Saturday morning to go and watch the ex-pat football team play a team from the British military training unit (IMATT – International Military Army Training Team I think). Once the rain stopped and we started to dry things became much more enjoyable. We went to the game with Anna, Laura (who works at the British High Commission and is from London) and Kate (who is an Aussie and works at the Special Court (note to self…write about the Special Court sometime this week) who were a hoot. Even the British High Commissioner was there to open the match and present the trophy. Met some of the fellas on the team and I think they convinced Conor to join!
After the game a bunch of us headed for lunch including Abdul (who works with Anna at Plan) and two dutch girls – Quirine (an intern at UNDP) and Emma (who was on vacation from Liberia, yes…people apparently vacation here, who works for Right to Play) We ate on a patio by the bay and chatted for hours.
The afternoon was napping and a quick workout before getting ready to hit the post-game party at IMATT. The party was great. The ‘Africa bar’ was full of players and their friends. There was a pig roast and buffet and they replayed the game on the big screen. After the party, Nana picked a few of us up and we headed to Paddy’s.
Paddy’s is a legendary bar in Freetown and much drinking and dancing was had. I won’t go into details but let’s just say we didn’t get home until 4:30 am and I didn’t even really notice the time.
(sorry no photos. I'll steal some from Conor and post in this post later)
This place is park amusement park (apparently the only playground in Freetown), park event centre (there was a HUGE wedding here on Saturday 
This place is way ahead of the old place. Our ‘flat’ is a one bedroom place with a bed in the sitting room. Chivalrous Conor has allowed me to have the bedroom but I think I will either offer to switch after two weeks or build him a little wall to separate him from the front door. It’s clean and comes with free laundry, internet (which I have yet to get to work) and breakfast. Brilliant!
I noticed a GIANT cockroach upside down beside my dresser. 
Well we are settled in at work and even have our own fabulously disco cell phones (see photo)now (incoming calls only…talked to mom and dad from the restaurant on the bay last night!) and the folks around the office recognize us and are making amazing efforts to help us feel at home.
How do I describe the ‘flat’…ghetto! I have since confirmed with Nana (our host team-mate) that I am not just a white gal with snobby needs but that our flat is truly ghetto even for a developing country. His face was priceless especially when he checkout out the kitchen. The living room and bedrooms are fine aside from the lack of power when the noisy generator is off.
The sketchy part is the bathroom and kitchen. As Bryce would say, I have earned my ADP ‘stripes’ for this one. I don’t think we’ll even attempt to go into the kitchen for now. There isn’t much in there, no fridge and a tired looking stove, so no big loss. It would be nice to eventually cook for ourselves but we shall see.
The bathroom is tiny and grungy! The shower has two settings, on and off, and one temperature, cold, which let me tell you is amazing after a night of sweating away. I am actually quite proud of myself for managing to sleep. I suppose the heat during the day is 
enough to knock me out. All this to say I think we’ll be moving by the end of the week. Just need to find somewhere else.
We set off after work to Family Fun Kingdom for dinner on the beach in Aberdeen. Aberdeen is really the tourist centre (if you could say they have one) and a hangout for most of the ex-pats. FFK has a lovely patio across the street from the beach where we enjoyed coke in glass bottles and I ate the tenderest and moist barracuda steak I have ever tasted! Delish! Don’t worry…I am remembering: Cook it, Peel it or Leave it! So far so good with the tummy too…knock on wood.
who says he's ugly so I don't talk to him anymore. Plus his cat's name is rosepetal or something sissy like that so what does he know? Also note the Tim Horton's mug. A classy touch of home. Thanks Martha!
My fair team-mate (note: the American Express headset was staged and HIS idea). Check out the windows behind him. We have the best office in the building.
The new folks who moved into our space are great but I was sufficiently freaked out by this...
We chatted and napped and made delicious dinner and watched my current favourite tv show (the search for the new Joseph on London’s West End complete with Sir Andrew Lloyd Webber) and then sat through the sometimes painful Eurovision song contest. Some songs were tremendous…some were tremendously hideous. The countries perform and then the viewers vote. The trick is that you can’t vote for your own country. After hours of revealing the votes country by country Serbia took the crown. A very interesting experience and a perfect day if you ask me.
Sunday morning we got up bright and early to head into the rainy city and find Martha’s hotel. We checked her in and wandered around the city including Soho, Camden and Covent Garden. It was a lovely ‘agenda free’ day complete with fun purchases (polka dot Wellingtons for M). Our only plan was to get to the Maple Leaf bar to watch the hockey game from the night before.
garding the game’s outcome we cheered the Sabres on through the game and an OT period. Unfortunately I had to head back to Woking so we left after that knowing deep down that the Sens would win by one despite the first Sabres’ goal was called back (hmmm….can you say cheap?!!? and yes, I am just like Mr Ruff!). 
Go to Eden Project: It’s difficult to describe but imagine an old clay mine that was converted to a thriving gardens depicting the relationship between humans and plants. Two HUGE biomes including a Humid Tropics and a Mediterranean dome. Wow!
L-R: Durba (who recently left the team but was WICKED), Susan, Nicki, Paulina, Khalila and Nair
Big deal...perhaps but it's still just RW&Co price-ranged clothes that are fit for a waif. Anyway, there were people lined up OVERNIGHT for this stuff. Seriously. That's some pretty high levels of dedication for clothes that they will make more of. Makes you wonder.
