If I write this blog now, then I will have successfully made it through the whole morning, right up to lunch without getting any work done at all! Why not indulge a little. What would really make this moment complete would be if I could have a little soundbyte from "Office Space" playing on a loop with the Chotchkie's Waiter saying "ohhh looks like someone's got a case of the Mondays..."
This weekend was halvsies/halvsies in terms of quality... Friday was awesome, we went out to the new Ethiopian/Abyssinian coffee shop with Petra. This place's gimmick is to do a full-on Ethiopian-Abyssinian buffet for dinner on fridays now. The food was sensational! And after a rough week the beers went down really nicely. It was also a good vibe because we had to get up early on Saturday to go to that &*£%$ wedding in Malahapye (2hrs away), and she had to get up early to work, so all 3 of us wanted to have an early night but also wanted to eat something amazing and have a few drinks. Which we did! Fred & Lilly joined us as well and it was just that perfect vibe of the right group of people with the right objectives for the right type of friday-night hangings-outings at the right time, etc etc. We sat out on the terrace and ate ourselves stupid and laughed and talked and ranted and sunk a few weekend pints and it was flippin' great. Exactly what I needed.
OK we missed our traditional friday-night sundowners at the pub (I'm sure our regular drink-bringer James didnt know what to do with himself without us) but this was even better.
And, P. and we organized what will end up being my first (FINALLY!) gig event here in BW. This semi-famous afro-fusion band called Freshly Ground is actually coming TO GABZ-CITY!!! At 100Pula per ticket, I can't imagine how and why they're managing to pull off 2 shows (That's a whole half-month income for some folks around here!) with an audience, but they're good and well-known, and f'in A! am I excited to finally get some live music back in my life. It'll be freakadelic.
Then Saturday was the wedding. We had to fetch T. at her place at (gag!) 8 a.m.!!! What with my obsession with "The Great Saturday Sleep-in" every weekend, this was way beyond my recipe for a good saturday. The wedding was bleeeeehhhhhhhhhhhh. I mean I'm so glad we were invited and so glad we went but the whole service was in Setswana (although upon spotting the half-dozen whiteypants in various parts of the audience, they did call up a translator which I thought was totally sweet) and the soundsystem was crap so we couldnt even hear the translator and the Batswana couldnt even here the preacher! DAMN those ceremonies are long. Started at 10am, finished at about 1. That is three long hours of sitting on a really terribly-crafted wooden bench with no backrest on it, struggling to hear a word, and being so far at the back that you cant even see the bride and groom. Again, I'm so glad we went, but on the fun-scale of 1 to 10 it would honestly boil down to about a 2.
Then the lunch... the way village weddings work here is that every man woman and dog can come to the wedding. Even if they dont know the bride and groom, if you know it's happening, you can come. Heck, weddings are a reason to live, out in the villages where there's nothing to do but sit around all day, work, sleep, and eat. They're the social events of the year and everyone goes. This yields about a good 500 people at the lunch. Most of 'em don't even go to the ceremony (because it's boring, duh) they just rock up to get fed. I can't imagine being a bride who has to cook enough food to feed a whole village AND the bride/groom's friends and family who may not even live there but drive up for the wedding anyway. It's friggin' expensive! No wonder T. says she and her honey "can't afford to get married yet".
Anyway we stood in the blazing sun for over an HOUR in the food queue, with people elbowing and pushing and shoving (they're all totally aware that the brides often underestimate the actual number of people who rock up on the day, and food sometimes runs out.) By the time we got our turns, the plates were gone and we got paper plates and plastic forks and about 80% starch(es), 15% meat, and only 5% veg/salad. Talk about carbohydrate coma on the 2-hr drive back home. We ate, a few prayers were said, we left. That was it. bleehhhhh. No booze, no dancing, nobody else we knew there except for T., and oh yeah, we were all 3 placed at what obviously happened to be "the old granny" table, where the elderly all got served and we were the only ones who had to physically get up and stand out in the line to wait for our food. I totally admire the Batswana way of life with the "respect for the elder" stuff, but man I would'a killed to be 90 years old on that day, which is pretty hard to comprehend considering I hit emotional rock bottom just for turning 31.
Luckily the whole early-morning wedding thing meant that we were home by dinner time at which stage we were just too blehhhhhhh to do anything decent, so couch/tv vegetation commenced. Then Sunday we built a fence for Reggie, and in the aftermath of what happened last week, got invited over to the OTHER neighbours for tea (the H's) and got briefed on all the expat gossip that you'd ever need to know and more. The H's are probably the most "established" expat family in the city (and strangely enough we happen to live right next door - "strange" in the fact that their architecturally amazing mansion totally juxtaposes our humble little pre-fab jobby) and the Mr. is really sweet, lovely, soft-spoken, bird-watcher, down-to-earth, nature-lover retired guy you'll ever meet while she is more the traditional white "madam": full of gossip, full of complaints and bitching/moaning and uber-concerned with all things material. In essence they're a bit of a mis-matched hoot. Just so long as you can get past the Mrs.'s incessant complaining, they're great for a bit of a laugh and a serious chin-wag. My dearly beloved told me after we left, that I "talked too much". But it's just impossible to not have a big verbal-diarrhea session with these folks, they're so chatty (I think they're bored with a bit of an empty-nest syndrome thing going on). Anything you want to know about ANYONE who's ANYONE in Gabs (including our psycho landlord), just ask the H's. Or rather, don't even bother to ask, just show up and you'll get the whole earful. For hours. But notwithstanding this, they're dog lovers as well... Nugget (Golden Retriever) and Cody (the mutt) are just precious. Oh, and her pottery studio is amazing. I'm *this close* to signing up for her beginners class. But money issues may prevent this just yet.
Watched "Lord Of War" last night with Nicholas Cage. I must say I really liked the movie, despite it making me so angry. There's lots of movies like that, I guess. It made me angry for Africa, angry for capitalism, angry for society in general, and just plain old pissed off. Oh, AND I hate Nicholas Cage, but this was bearable. Jared Leto was HOT hot hot, and Bridget Moynahan looked stun-NING!
Another win for Ferrari/Felipe but I'm really annoyed about this Lewis Hamilton nonsense so I'm not really having a very good season so far and I'm kinda un-motivated as a fan in this weird surreal post-Schumacher era. ugh.
This weekend was halvsies/halvsies in terms of quality... Friday was awesome, we went out to the new Ethiopian/Abyssinian coffee shop with Petra. This place's gimmick is to do a full-on Ethiopian-Abyssinian buffet for dinner on fridays now. The food was sensational! And after a rough week the beers went down really nicely. It was also a good vibe because we had to get up early on Saturday to go to that &*£%$ wedding in Malahapye (2hrs away), and she had to get up early to work, so all 3 of us wanted to have an early night but also wanted to eat something amazing and have a few drinks. Which we did! Fred & Lilly joined us as well and it was just that perfect vibe of the right group of people with the right objectives for the right type of friday-night hangings-outings at the right time, etc etc. We sat out on the terrace and ate ourselves stupid and laughed and talked and ranted and sunk a few weekend pints and it was flippin' great. Exactly what I needed.
OK we missed our traditional friday-night sundowners at the pub (I'm sure our regular drink-bringer James didnt know what to do with himself without us) but this was even better.
And, P. and we organized what will end up being my first (FINALLY!) gig event here in BW. This semi-famous afro-fusion band called Freshly Ground is actually coming TO GABZ-CITY!!! At 100Pula per ticket, I can't imagine how and why they're managing to pull off 2 shows (That's a whole half-month income for some folks around here!) with an audience, but they're good and well-known, and f'in A! am I excited to finally get some live music back in my life. It'll be freakadelic.
Then Saturday was the wedding. We had to fetch T. at her place at (gag!) 8 a.m.!!! What with my obsession with "The Great Saturday Sleep-in" every weekend, this was way beyond my recipe for a good saturday. The wedding was bleeeeehhhhhhhhhhhh. I mean I'm so glad we were invited and so glad we went but the whole service was in Setswana (although upon spotting the half-dozen whiteypants in various parts of the audience, they did call up a translator which I thought was totally sweet) and the soundsystem was crap so we couldnt even hear the translator and the Batswana couldnt even here the preacher! DAMN those ceremonies are long. Started at 10am, finished at about 1. That is three long hours of sitting on a really terribly-crafted wooden bench with no backrest on it, struggling to hear a word, and being so far at the back that you cant even see the bride and groom. Again, I'm so glad we went, but on the fun-scale of 1 to 10 it would honestly boil down to about a 2.
Then the lunch... the way village weddings work here is that every man woman and dog can come to the wedding. Even if they dont know the bride and groom, if you know it's happening, you can come. Heck, weddings are a reason to live, out in the villages where there's nothing to do but sit around all day, work, sleep, and eat. They're the social events of the year and everyone goes. This yields about a good 500 people at the lunch. Most of 'em don't even go to the ceremony (because it's boring, duh) they just rock up to get fed. I can't imagine being a bride who has to cook enough food to feed a whole village AND the bride/groom's friends and family who may not even live there but drive up for the wedding anyway. It's friggin' expensive! No wonder T. says she and her honey "can't afford to get married yet".
Anyway we stood in the blazing sun for over an HOUR in the food queue, with people elbowing and pushing and shoving (they're all totally aware that the brides often underestimate the actual number of people who rock up on the day, and food sometimes runs out.) By the time we got our turns, the plates were gone and we got paper plates and plastic forks and about 80% starch(es), 15% meat, and only 5% veg/salad. Talk about carbohydrate coma on the 2-hr drive back home. We ate, a few prayers were said, we left. That was it. bleehhhhh. No booze, no dancing, nobody else we knew there except for T., and oh yeah, we were all 3 placed at what obviously happened to be "the old granny" table, where the elderly all got served and we were the only ones who had to physically get up and stand out in the line to wait for our food. I totally admire the Batswana way of life with the "respect for the elder" stuff, but man I would'a killed to be 90 years old on that day, which is pretty hard to comprehend considering I hit emotional rock bottom just for turning 31.
Luckily the whole early-morning wedding thing meant that we were home by dinner time at which stage we were just too blehhhhhhh to do anything decent, so couch/tv vegetation commenced. Then Sunday we built a fence for Reggie, and in the aftermath of what happened last week, got invited over to the OTHER neighbours for tea (the H's) and got briefed on all the expat gossip that you'd ever need to know and more. The H's are probably the most "established" expat family in the city (and strangely enough we happen to live right next door - "strange" in the fact that their architecturally amazing mansion totally juxtaposes our humble little pre-fab jobby) and the Mr. is really sweet, lovely, soft-spoken, bird-watcher, down-to-earth, nature-lover retired guy you'll ever meet while she is more the traditional white "madam": full of gossip, full of complaints and bitching/moaning and uber-concerned with all things material. In essence they're a bit of a mis-matched hoot. Just so long as you can get past the Mrs.'s incessant complaining, they're great for a bit of a laugh and a serious chin-wag. My dearly beloved told me after we left, that I "talked too much". But it's just impossible to not have a big verbal-diarrhea session with these folks, they're so chatty (I think they're bored with a bit of an empty-nest syndrome thing going on). Anything you want to know about ANYONE who's ANYONE in Gabs (including our psycho landlord), just ask the H's. Or rather, don't even bother to ask, just show up and you'll get the whole earful. For hours. But notwithstanding this, they're dog lovers as well... Nugget (Golden Retriever) and Cody (the mutt) are just precious. Oh, and her pottery studio is amazing. I'm *this close* to signing up for her beginners class. But money issues may prevent this just yet.
Watched "Lord Of War" last night with Nicholas Cage. I must say I really liked the movie, despite it making me so angry. There's lots of movies like that, I guess. It made me angry for Africa, angry for capitalism, angry for society in general, and just plain old pissed off. Oh, AND I hate Nicholas Cage, but this was bearable. Jared Leto was HOT hot hot, and Bridget Moynahan looked stun-NING!
Another win for Ferrari/Felipe but I'm really annoyed about this Lewis Hamilton nonsense so I'm not really having a very good season so far and I'm kinda un-motivated as a fan in this weird surreal post-Schumacher era. ugh.
Massa Rocks!!!