A Happy, Happy Birthday

So yesterday was my 31st birthday and it was a pretty good day. Not quite as good as my 30th last year when I was Super Irish but it was right up there. We had pizza with velveeta cheese, which was amazing, and some of the best macaroni salad that I think I've ever had. There was even a cake, made from scratch, that was DELICIOUS! And of course the company, as always, was awesome. Gorgol is definitely the best region in Mauritania, hands down :-) I could not ask for better site-mates. I really expected a kind of crappy birthday being away from family and friends from the states. I was very pleasantly surprised with how much fun I had. I never thought that my first birthday in country would be almost as good as the one last year (which for the record was by far the best birthday I can remember. In general I tend to hate them)

I went to my first Karate lesson yesterday too. We went back again today and we're going again tomorrow. I still haven't discussed how often I can go or how much it will cost. That will probably come up pretty soon. I haven't decided if I'm going to continue with the semi-private lessons or go to the school. The instructor is great but I have to admit it's kind of weird taking Karate lessons in French. Who knows, maybe it will help my French. It feels so good to finally have some physical activity in my days again other than the grueling walks to the market in the heat of the day. I never thought I'd be able to learn Karate in Mauritania, and at my site no less. Sometimes life is very funny that way.

We finally found a house. It's actually pretty big but it's a little expensive too. We're hoping to find a roomate during the school year. If we can get a Mauritanian teacher to live with us, I think that would help our language skills quite a bit too. The house has electricity and water. It needs some repairs, specifically plumbing repairs, but that should be taken care of Sunday, inshallah. There are three bedrooms, two of them with connecting baths (which means a sink, shower and toilet), a salon, a seperate douche and turkish toilet, and a kitchen. One of the bedrooms is on the roof, which I'm very happy about. That's probably the room we'll take once we have a roomate since we'll have a better breeze sleeping outside on the roof and it will be a little more private.

Speaking of sleeping outside, we've been doing that almost every night since we got to Africa when it hasn't rained. The sky here is absolutely gorgeous. I cannot believe how many stars I can see in the sky. Another thing I enjoy is the shortcut that we take to get to the market. I feel like I've stepped back in time when I walk that path...then we see a car coming towards us, squeezing through the alley past a donkey cart and I realize when we are. It's the little things that amuse me and I think they keep me sane.