(Kanchan here posting photos for Lisa)

Front of our house and the front yard

Sept 16 – ok I tried uploading photos but the system kept crashing so sorry, no photos yet. I even compressed them! The largest photo was 49kB. Whatever.
Ben is now registered for school. I paid the first instalment of $150 and still owe about $150. Not bad for a private school. He has a uniform, for which we bought material to make him a couple shirts and have to buy him some jeans. Poor Ben, the 2 things he hates most to wear, jeans and button down shirts. I’m sure it will be easy to convince him that at the end of each day he needs to change into play clothes. School starts Sept 28th. They go from 7:30 AM til noon, Monday to Friday, and 3 – 5 on MWF afternoons. Kinda weird hours, but sorta matches the work day. They have before and after care too, you can arrive as early as 7AM and have til 6pm to pick up. The school provides books, we provide workbooks, pencils etc. They get a recess in the morning with a snack and they do a bunch of other activities as well such as swimming and martial arts apparently. His courses will be French, English, Math, Science, Geography, History, Art/Music I think, and Social studies. The school is not far away, less than 5 min on motorcycle but I think it’s about 1.5 km away. A bit of a walk in the noon time heat so I’ll have to figure something out for lunchtime pick up.
I can’t recall if I mentioned previously that the school offered me a job as a coordinator of children’s activities. I’m still thinking about that although it is unlikely that it pays very well and I would have absolutely no idea what I’d be doing! My other option was to start doing my Master’s but I don’t relish the idea of doing an entire master’s by correspondence (London School of Economics – Environmental Economic program)
We also now have water, sort of. They came to install the water meter and turn on the water and then ran away as fast as they could. The tap in the kitchen works fine which is fantastic. When I turned on the outside tap to allow water into the bathroom area, the bathroom was showered in water because the pipes connecting the sink were broken (soft pipes) and it sprayed the bathroom. Neither the shower nor the toilet work in the main bathroom and I was so frustrated I didn’t bother checking the en suite. At least we don’t have to live out of containers anymore and can start drinking tap water (the containers held diesel so only used the water for cleaning, taking showers and flushing the toilet). This means we start drinking tap water soon. It’s not the parasites or anything that will cause problems... it’s the chlorine. The available free chlorine in the water here is higher than the amount allowed in swimming pools in Holland.
Sept 17 - Other advances into the modern world, we have hired a girl to do the housework. Caroline is 18, and she will be here from 9AM til 6PM, 6 days per week to clean, cook, run errands, wash clothes and watch Ben if I ever find work. I pay her $75/month which is a good salary. She watched him this afternoon while Loren took me to the bank and groceries. She did her high school in Ghana so speaks English if with a very harsh accent. Ghanaians speak English but it’s hard to understand. Earlier this afternoon, we left Benny to play while we walked to the market (it was far about 45 min!) to get baskets and cloth. I was wearing sunscreen, 30 SPF but I still look like I’m wearing a white t-shirt with a bright red necklace. Matches my Rudolph nose very nicely. Doesn’t do much for the mosquito bites, scratching is not advised.
For those moms freaking out that I left Ben in the house by himself, it’s all good. I left Ben one day for an hour to play with his friends because Loren only had his motorcycle to take me to do errands. I locked the door to the house and he played outside with his friends. I felt bad at first but I knew that Luik’s dad was home if he really needed anything. Then I found out there are several kids here, same age as Ben whose parents leave them most of the day locked out of the house. They work from 7 til noon, come home for lunch and sieste, then go back to work from 3 til 6. THAT I cannot imagine! Like I said earlier, there are a lot of freedoms here that we couldn’t and wouldn’t do at home. Here, I know he is safe, I leave him my phone (he can call his dad), and there are lots of neighbours and people around to help.
Loren brought a special snack over today... caterpillars. It wasn’t very timely because we are having a small problem with them right now, there are a bunch of fuzzy ones wandering about – you need to look in your shoes before you put them on – Ben found a cricket the hard way, in his boot one morning on his way outside to the toilet. I digress. So the caterpillars were in a little clear plastic bag, with the fuzziness burnt off them, and fried in oil and salt. These are very specific caterpillars which are apparently hand picked extra special off the karité trees here – extra high in protein. To quote Ben: that’s just gross. I had to agree but Loren just laughed. Loren drives me crazy with that kind of stuff. The one thing we can agree on here is none of us likes fish other than fresh caught. Loren prefers if he caught it himself. I can’t argue with that.
We have an ant nest somewhere in the house as I spent much of last night trying to brush them out of my bed. They are sugar ants and they bite if you piss them off, for example by lying on them. I keep all our sugar, flour, etc in the Tupperware containers I brought so they shouldn’t even be able to smell it and we sweep and wash the floor every day. So I may have to have the house sprayed.
So a couple more weeks till I can buy a car since I have to wait for money to come from Canada as the bank account isn’t connecting to Canada somehow. Today also I couldn’t exchange my traveller’s cheques because the internet isn’t working.
Sept 18 – went again to the bank downtown but in a rather amusing manner. There is a bank nearer to me than downtown, it’s about 2 km instead of 15km so I decided to walk to see if I can take money out on my Visa card. As I was walking, a man stopped on his motorcycle and asked me where I was going. I said I was going to EcoBank. He said to get on and he would take me there as he was going that way. (how often does that happen in Canada? And how often would you agree if it did?) So I got on and he started driving. We got to the main road and he said he wanted to take the road, instead of the dirt path next to the road but the entrance to the highway was going in the other direction so I thought whatever, he gets on the main road, gets turned around on the next exit but then instead of continuing in the direction I was going, starts heading downtown. I thought maybe he has to cross back this way. Well finally I realize he’s taking me downtown and I’m getting farther and farther from where I was originally going. So he’s talking on about how his son is on a scholarship in Canada with the bank and he himself is a swimming teacher at the Hotel Pacific’s pool and I should take his phone number and call him if I want to go. So I take his number, we shake hands and he leaves.
There was still no internet downtown but I did manage to get money.

Sept 7
We have been in the house a few days. It is a nice house. There is still no water though we now have electricity (but we have long power outs all day which is a bit annoying but that’s the way it goes). Water is because the water company’s computers are all screwed up from the flooding so they cannot bring up the info on how much the owner still owes. Therefore they will not give him a new meter/account. For water, we send our guard to the local water tap and he fills up 4 large containers, this water is only used for washing and cleaning as the containers were used to hold diesel and gasoline, so we buy drinking water. We generally use the outside toilet except at night because we aren’t sure of the “quality” of the sceptic tank, and from the smell of the toilet it’s probably not so good, even when we run a couple buckets of water down it. Tap water is very cheap at a cent a gallon approximately, and drinking water is about a dollar for 1.5 L in a bottle or 10 cents for a half litre in a bag. It’s pretty clean but it gets expensive when we’re each drinking a couple litres per day. I don’t have a fridge yet so have to be careful with how much food I buy and how I store it – good thing I brought all those Tupperware containers. The garbage collection in Ouaga has improved. They have a group/association that comes around every few days – women with carts pulled by donkeys – collecting garbage, costs $5 per month instead of people burning it. Not sure where it goes from there. The things we take for granted in Canada!

(side story – when I lived here in 1998 and worked at the Ministry of Environment, someone came in my office asking “Minotti, what do you do with garbage in Canada?” to which I replied “Landfill?”. He said thanks and left. He came back 2 minutes later and said “what’s a landfill?” so I did a quick sketch of a cross section but didn’t know the word for liner or geotextile so described it as plastic cloth. He grabbed my sketch with a quick thanks and ran off. Makes me wonder if that sketch became the design drawing for African landfills... scary)

The owner said he would paint the house and fix the broken windows but I am not going to hold my breath on that. It’ll probably have to wait until it stops raining anyway so it’ll dry faster. They need to wash the walls first as they are quite dusty. I am still looking for a girl to come do housework, cooking and such. She will also be able to watch Ben now and again, pick him up from school, or at least be someone who is home if I get work or run errands.
I have many things I still need to get for the house. We have no plates or glasses so are currently eating semi- African style, communal pot but using forks, and communal plastic cup.
The house is in a nice neighbourhood although a little loud – but that is typical. We are unfortunately quite close to the mosque, where they like to remind you several times a day exactly how big God is, by loudspeaker, and notably since it is Ramadan, at 3 AM where they tell the muslims to get up and break their fast before going to pray at 4:30am, again at noon and again at 7PM. Makes it easy to always know what time it is.

There are a WHOLE bunch of boys on this street ranging in age from 7 to 12. Ben has already made good friends with a few of them. Some just come to play with his toys but others are genuinely just interested in playing with Ben which is great. One kid in particular, Luike, is 8 years old and has his own DS so they play that together. Ben spent a few hours at Luike’s house one evening and I met Luike’s parents and his 2 older brothers. Super nice family. The other kids, some I had to educate on the African protocol of coming to a person’s house, knocking, greeting the person, asking for Ben, and again, saying good bye when they left. They are more diligent about it when Loren is there of course. However, they don’t have any problem when I ask them questions or to run errands. I have already sent Ben to fetch drinking water with some of the kids. It’s not far, probably took him 20 min to go and return. Something he’d never be allowed to do in Canada. So he is having a lot of fun now, which is great. He can run all over the neighbourhood. I think I will get him a cellphone for just in case but otherwise, he’s good about telling me where he’s going and generally it’s within a block or so. It’s very safe.
Today Loren and I went to go register Ben for school. It’s French system and has English Immersion so Ben would have to do school in French. Supposed to be a decent school with a high rate of success. The level should be approximately the same as Grade 2 in Canada but maybe a little harder. Hopefully he’ll meet even more friends there. Apparently they have uniforms which will be new for him but makes it easy to know what to wear everyday!

Our health is getting better, the diarrhea seems to have stopped for the most part although once we get to drinking tap water we may have it for a bit again.

Sept 10 – it’s been a little stressful. Loren came with a fridge which is great. Last night there was another big rain storm at midnight. It didn’t last long, about an hour, but was so intense that it was frightening. The sky was blood red! I got up to close all the windows as rain started to come in the house but I was so scared I went back to bed quickly. I thought Ben was asleep when I looked in on him but apparently he woke up and was too scared to even come to my room!

I was talking to Luike’s mother on Tuesday and saw Ben fall off his friend’s bike. He seemed to be okay so I went in. He came in crying moments later with his hands full of blood and his chin cut open. I was trying (rather unsuccessfully) not to panic. His chin was split about a centimetre and I felt he might even need stitches. I had nothing with which to clean it and close it as I didn’t bring any medical tape nor antiseptic (I knew I could buy some here but don’t have it yet as I didn’t think I’d need it so soon!) I used drinking water to clean the cut but had only paper towel to use. I used the last units on my phone to call Loren thinking he might take Ben to the hospital. He didn’t think it needed it so just used a regular bandage to cover it up. I’m not convinced it will stay clean that way – it keeps falling off because it’s near his mouth and because he’s so sweaty.

Wednesday, Ben was climbing a tree and the branch broke, he fell from about 6 feet up, flat on his back on tile and hit his head. He was ok but has a bruise on his head. Loren went to the pharmacy for ibuprofen, antiseptic and heat rash powder (Ben has a REALLY bad heat rash all over). Loren joked that for most people these are the bare essentials, for Ben they are his “quotidien” (daily dose). Another friend joked that Ben’s African education was commencing early.

Loren and I will hopefully go get me a car soon so I can get around to buy stuff like medical tape, food (now that it won’t sit and rot on my counter. It’s hard to keep you and your child healthy eating food that is slowly rotting on the counter. I had to throw out a quarter watermelon and 4 eggs the other day.)

On the good side, I managed to charge my computer and Ben’s DS (the power stayed on long enough!). I also hope to get my air card and internet set up soon so I don’t feel so cut off! I think that’s why I’ve been writing so much (that and of course there’s a lot that is new).

Sept 11 – have internet, sort of. Took 2 hours to do a 300MB download and it only did part of it for some reason. Downloads clocking in an astounding 20 Kbps. May not be updating or emailing as often as I thought, don’t have nerves of steel to wait for pages to open. It’s worse than dial up. Looking into ADSL because Skype will not be a possibility on this wireless trash.

Sept 1, 2009 - We are still in the hotel. Part of the city is in a state of emergency. I heard the rain start at about 4AM and by the time we woke up at 8AM our courtyard (out back of our room) was full with 6 inches of water. They had record rainfalls clocked in at 240mm over 8 hours, 266mm by the end of the day. For a country that annually gets under 900mm that is quite a lot, I figure it was the 100 year storm. We were very lucky, there is little effect where we are – we had a tiny leak of water, but the room next to us was flooded. About a quarter of the city was flooded and many people are homeless. I heard only one person died, it was a police officer, but a few are missing still and potentially dead, swept away by the water. A lot of people live in mud brick homes so if it had been overnight a lot of people might have been hurt as houses collapsed all over. There will be no power for awhile and probably no clean water. Markets will be closed as will stores. I think the hotel is well stocked and has a generator so we’ll be okay. I was purifying water and putting it in bottles but I think I will buy for now as the water will be quite dirty. If things don’t clear up soon, there may be cholera. I just hope that it gets hot again for several days to dry things up quickly. We will stay at the hotel until things clear up, well realistically we can do nothing else as we don’t have any mode of transport other than Loren right now and many roads are closed. It’s a good thing we didn’t move or we’d likely be stranded with nothing. One bridge is broken and the main hospital has damage so they are transporting the sick to other hospitals. The government has opened the schools for people who have nowhere to go but they have no insurance or anything so they will have to rebuild on their own dime.

Loren spent the day helping a friend whose house fell down and said he would come by later. He is out with some friends, sitting in the dark, drinking beer. Some places will have generators but not many, certainly not the places where he is drinking J.

I am worried for Dembele. I can’t get through on the phone and I’m sure that their house has fallen down by now. With the last rain, the roads were already inundated and terrible. I think he’d be lucky if nothing happens to them. I worry for Cita and her pregnancy. She could get very sick. With people leaving their homes, there are many thieves as well since people can’t take everything with them.

Sept 2, there was no internet yesterday so I couldn’t send. We got into the house today and it is fine, but needs some cleaning. I am hoping to move out of the hotel today but the house needs cleaning, needs the water and electricity hooked up, and has no furniture. We spoke to a carpenter this morning and he will have beds built by tomorrow, a dining room set for 6 by Monday or Tuesday next week and living room set by the following week. That’s fine, we can deal with that, it’s just the first couple days that will be challenging. The owner is out of town and will meet us this afternoon I hope. Having already spent 4 months rent on this hotel, I am anxious to get out of here but not at the expense of staying in a house with no power/water etc. We’ll see how it goes.

Driving around you can see the aftermath of the storm. A lot of stores have all their stuff out front, drying. Many homes and shops are destroyed and some areas where the water was flowing really fast are dug out and the dirt spread everywhere. But otherwise it appears mostly business as usual. It is sunny and hot so everything is drying up nicely. Loren said there will probably be no mosquitoes for a few days because the storm would have washed out all the stagnant water and their nests. Positive thoughts in a challenging time.

Sept 3
I am currently waiting to hear from Loren that the owner has settled everything. We are hoping to have the house today, but who knows really and even if we get it, it may not have water. It needs cleaning as it is quite dusty, a couple windows are broken, there are no screens on the windows yet and we are having furniture made. Loren has some stuff already, like burners to cook on, but need to purchase a fridge (second hand from France so probably full of Freon), cushions, mattresses and need to get someone to install cupboards. It will take quite some time before we are complete.

Ben’s school doesn’t start until October. He gets 2 weeks vacation for Christmas and Easter and other days off, school ends in June.

So far it has been a real range of temps and weather as it is rainy season. Some days it’s hot and sunny (35oC) and humid; and other days, usually after it rains, it is cooler, like 20oC. Nights are pretty cool but the rooms are hot still. There are no screens so I cannot leave the door open (we are on the ground floor and have a terrace door so someone can get in the room, as can bugs – and there are LOTS of mosquitoes and flies – they hang knitted curtains which are only so effective). Ben has lots of bites as do I but his legs look like minced meat from scratching. We are being careful with him taking anti malarials but haven’t been super smart with the bug dope. There aren’t a lot of bugs in the room, but mostly because they spray the hotel, which doesn’t make me too happy. There is no where to put up the mosquito nets in the rooms. We are getting beds made with posters for hanging the nets.

The food is awesome as usual but then I am not so picky about the appearance. They make a lot of sauces that I really like. Tomatoes and bananas are quite cheap and plentiful as are oranges and grapefruit. People are focussing on cultivating grains right now during the rains and will get to the fruits and veg more in dry season. Mangoes are done unfortunately but now mango juice is readily available. There is a new company – Dafani, that specializes in juices, so for $2.50 you can get a litre of juice that is quite good. Ben is a little picky so has mostly been eating spaghetti, rice and bread. He doesn’t seem to like meat much but did eat some rabbit and has meat sauce on his pasta. Milk is in short supply so I have him taking supplements. People here get their calcium from bones, marrow, cartilage but he won’t eat those either. There is some cheese but it’s expensive. A box of 8 “Laughing Cow” costs about $4 and they don’t exactly have a lot of calcium in them. Ben doesn’t like Emmental which is the most common cheese here. 150 g of parmesan costs about $4.

The restaurant here makes great food but has been quite expensive, usually about $15 for breakfast and $20 – 50 for dinner, depending. Djamal came to stay over with us for a couple nights so the meals were pretty expensive. The hotel is nice with a bathroom in the room (toilet and shower are combined), tiled floors, a nice front lobby with tv and wireless (although slow and intermittent – so I type all my stuff in Word then copy). They have a nice area out back with a bar and cabanas, a huge pool and a kids’ pool. I paid about $500 for the 8 nights I’ve been here – I got a fair discount for being friends with Clark/Loren.

I have a cell phone 011 226 76 56 81 82. 226 is the country code and 011 is to dial international. It’s fairly expensive to make calls but not too bad. Canada is a little more than $1/min and I can call locally for about $1/5 min. I don’t know how much internet is yet but surfing is quite expensive.

Loren is back, we can move into the house now. The water will not be set up as the flood caused damage to the Water authority’s computers so it may take some time to get it. However we can get water in a barrel from nearby.
So will write again when able.
Love Lisa

We had an uneventful flight – I had to pay $250 for my extra (extra large too!) bag. My ankles swelled up like crazy in the plane for some reason, so I could barely put my shoes on! I made the mistake of eating in the Paris airport – 33 euros for a quick lunch! We arrived on Wed night at about 7pm local time. Loren and Derek picked us up, we went for a quick drink and checked into a hotel as Loren hasn’t been able to secure a house. I think he wants me to choose it because he wants me to be happy with it. Anyway, the hotel is nice but around $100 per day and a meal for Ben and I about $15 for breakfast or $40 for dinner, so we don’t want to stay here too long!

There is WiFi in the hotel but it was easier to type in my room and copy to the blog page as my keyboard has problems when the computer is running on battery. I was having problems speaking French at first and understanding too, but I think it was just that my brain was full as it seems to be better now.

Thursday we ran a few errands – money, registering at the consulate, which you can apparently do online now, getting a cell phone. Each of those errands was its own lesson in patience – the first bank didn’t take traveller’s cheques, my blackberry doesn’t take a SIM card and it’s really expensive to operate one – more expensive than the plans in Canada so we bought a cheap cell phone – which has a Great Britain/Hong Kong adapter but couldn’t find an adapter head for here. Anyway! Then we visited Loren/Derek’s house and Derek’s family. Ben had fun playing with Danika and Darel and even spoke French with them. He seemed embarrassed to speak French with the adults. Loren found an old adapter for my phone but it didn’t charge. Loren took it apart and fixed it – he’s amazing at that kind of thing.

Friday we went to the farm even though neither Clark nor Carol were there. Alessan, Ben’s friend was there and showed us around. There was a dead duiker (pronounced diker) which had been bitten by a snake. We were warned about walking in the long grass, which is a problem since it’s rainy season and ALL the grass is long. We even saw a viper slinking around. Scared me for sure – Alessan went after it with a rock but it got away.

We had a less than fruitful day yesterday. Loren and I dropped Ben off at Dembele's house to play with Djamal and Rachid. The boys have grown a lot. Cita, their mom is pregnant and due in a month or so. She looks so tired, I think she was sick a lot and I mean like malaria not morning sickness. Anyway, Ben was happy to play with them. The roads in their area make Limebank in winter seem like a dream. I don't think Loren left first gear. It's only about 5km from the main road but takes at least 30 min to drive it.

Loren and I left there only to run out of gas about a km away, so he called Dembele who got us diesel - Loren had to reprime the diesel pump... by sucking the diesel into it using his mouth. I see them doing that all the time. That's gross! From there we went to a bar to meet up with the guy who has the keys of the house we were going to see. Unfortunately he wasn't there because it was raining and he doesn’t have a phone – go figure. It rained all day and everything turned into a giant red mud puddle. Loren said no one does anything during the rain. In between down pours we eventually went to see a place that no one had lived in for several months. It wasn't bad - 2 bedrooms inside bathroom and shower, living room, large yard - but the kitchen was outside way at the back of the yard and it needed SO much work we wouldn't be able to move in for several weeks.

Went back to the bar, and called another place but it was nearly $1000 per month. The other places are closer to $250. I will have to purchase the furniture for it though. To buy a house would be about $35 - 40k plus the other costs of transfer, and setting up utilities, and furnishing. We went back to pick Ben up - Djamal came back with us - and we ended up getting stuck in the mud. Finally we got back to the hotel around 9pm - what a waste of 12 hours! Carol called me before I left to say 2 things: not to get discouraged by the rain, and that nothing moves quickly so have patience. Useful advice in just the first few days.
So here we are on Sunday – I have Djamal and Ben playing outside, something I would never do at home, just let the kids roam around by themselves. I may have a hard time pulling Ben back when we get back to Canada.
I asked about schools and found out that they are a little different here. They have something called CP1 and 2. 1 is for kids who don’t really speak French – to bring everyone up to speed as there are a lot of kids who only speak their dialect. CP 2 is like grade 1. Then there are 4 more levels of primary grades, 4 levels of intermediate grades and 3 high school levels of which the names are very confusing. The higher your grade, the lower the number – i.e. level 1 is like grade 11 and level 2 is grade 10. The last grade is called “terminale” or “the last grade”. Amusing.
As for health, so far we both have diarrhea and I have a stomachache – I have Ben on probiotics so I suspect that is why his stomach doesn’t hurt. Trying to keep us hydrated and fed as eating times (and types of food) are quite different.
Ben mentioned going home a couple times, but seems happier now that he has Djamal to play with. He hasn’t played with his DS once yet while here. So that’s the update. My phone number is 011 226 76 56 81 82.
Hope everyone is well.

Ok lots of people seem to want to know what I'm bringing. I couldn't really answer before because I was still thinking about it and even now, I still have to sort my bags and I'm sure something will have to get left out.

We get 2 bags each at 50lbs a piece so that's 200 lbs of stuff. Except the bags have weight too, about 12 lbs a piece so really we get about 150 lbs. It costs $200 to bring an extra bag (up to 50lbs or 40 minus the bag weight) and it costs $60 to have a bag weigh more than 50 but less than 70 lbs. Logically then one just adds 20 lbs to each bag, and that is cheaper. It's just REALLY heavy and might rip your bag. SOO much to think about when packing.

So the contents. I told Ben he could have one bag of toys and books. That worked out to 38lbs in his 12 lb bag. He had to do 3 cuts: the first to purge toys he no longer wanted, a second cut to put some toys in storage and some that he wanted to bring - second cut resulted in 90 lbs of toys and books, so he did a third cut that brought him down to the required weight. I was surprised by some of his choices. I added some stuff back in because I felt bad, and i will just deal with the extra cost.

We're bringing about 3 weeks worth of clothes and footwear. You can buy stuff there or have it made - shoes are harder. But really there is hot season, rainy season (which is hot but also humid) and "winter" which is dry but gets down to 5 oC sometimes so requires sweaters and shell jackets. I think for the 2 of us, we have about 70 lbs of clothes/footwear.

Housewares: Loren never really said what the house would have. You can get stuff there but I figured I have it and generally the quality you can buy in BF is not that good. So I brought some kitchen stuff like goodknives, can openers, tupperware, lifters and cutlery. I debated on bringing pots and pans and may yet since much of their stuff is aluminum there. I'm bringing a few towels and sheets just to get us started as well as a couple pillows. It should also help Ben feel a bit like home. I also am bringing a therapy ball and some resistance bands - weights would be a little heavy! I am bringing some weapons to practice with (foam nunchuks and a bo)

Books, I'm bringing about 40 lbs of books to read - everything from religion to economics to management. I remember last time wishing I had brought more books with me. I hope to find a good online e-book seller so if anyone knows of one, I'd be grateful.

Toilettries and medication: again, can get a lot of stuff there but am bringing anti-malarials and some anti-biotics. A bunch of vitamins mostly because it can be hard to get vegetables. Sunscreen, bug itch and Off. The brand of facewash I like, shampoo and conditioners, moisturizer, some make up. Probiotics, omega 3s, calcium. I have no idea how much this might weigh. Will probably have to cut it back.

Stuff I'd like to bring but can't justify or might ask someone to bring when they come: a keyboard/digital piano, microwave -they may have them there, I don't know. My sparring gear and karate gi.

So I figure I am well over my alloted weight limit, I hope to keep the excess cost to under $300, we'll see how successful I am.

It's funny though. This is a puzzle that my brain likes but is tough to optimize. I've spent a lot of time thinking about it and I know it is one of those things that keeps running in the back of my head that causes me to lose part of my brain use for the everyday stuff. So I get forgetful and more stressed.

Still lots of stuff left on the list to do: finish packing, finish visiting. medical claims and 2010 taxes, photo album. Not difficult just time consuming. Something I'm a little short of at the moment.

I think people who really know me will find this funny or ironic or something. I have a lot of people asking me what's happening on the other end, like when we arrive. Where will we live?Where will Ben go to school? What kind of work will I do? I really don't have answers to any of these questions. Part of it is that there is just too much to worry about on this end that I don't have time to consider the other end. Part of it is that there is very little I CAN do from here, without spending thousands on phone bills and even then may not get the best result. Part of it is that this is a partnership, so I'm leaving some of the details to my partner, Loren, to sort out. I sent one email asking about schools, and he got on it - he recently called to say he found a very highly recommended bilingual school (english and french) and has a couple potential houses lined up in the south of the city, but hasn't secured anything at the moment. Part of it is I have confidence in myself to get it resolved when I get there if I need to however challenging that might be.

I wonder/worry about Ben fitting in, making friends, being happy, staying safe, staying healthy - we wrestled with what additional vaccines to get him (rabies? probability of being bitten is low to medium but is fatal and the vaccine costs $600 here - resolved through 1 call to a friend who said I can get the shots there). I worry about his relationship with his dad and my ability to support him/them.

The reason people might find this all very interesting is they know that I am a control freak and wonder if not having control might kill me. I'm sure there is at least a small corner of my brain that is fretting about it, the bit of hardware in the background that is running a program and slowing up the software in the front. I can't help but worry a bit when I let myself think about it, but I give much of that up to prayer. Matthew 6:25-34 says it all - "who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life?"... "Therefore do not worry about tomorrow, for tomorrow will worry about itself. Each day has enough trouble of its own." - that last part always makes me laugh.

What is killing me is that I don't feel like I'm doing this all that well (leave it to me to not only pick a challenge but decide I have to perform well with it). I feel very bad about leaving work early in order to have enough time to pack. As it is, I'm not going to make it without help. The other thing bugging me is how much weight I'm gaining because I eat when I'm stressed and I'm too tired and sore to exercise (somehow lugging boxes doesn't seem to constitute exercise). It's just 2 -3 pounds every months but not much fits anymore and over the last 8 months it has really added up. There is a paradox in there that if I would just go to karate I would probably feel more energized but it is hard to convince myself of that when I feel like my legs are going to break from going up and down the stairs with heavy boxes and I'm mentally and physically wiped from packing/cleaning/purging/sorting/organizing. I did realize that there was a part of me avoiding black belt class because I don't want to see all those people who gave me a hard time about getting my belt so fast - I'm tired of feeling bad around them - but I'm feeling bad because I don't make it to class and I really want to go. All this feeling bad is very tiring! (I can hear my friends laughing at my neuroticism!)

Doing this by yourself is quite draining as well. I hired a girl off kijiji to help with cleaning and I found just having her around to help - move boxes, pack some stuff, go to the store with me - made me feel better and I was more productive. I don't even know her, she's a nice enough kid and quite hard working. But really what it comes down to is kinda like it's easier to be brave when there is someone else to be brave for. It's easier to be motivated and organized when you have someone to be that way for. I have to be organized when she comes over or she has nothing to do. It cuts the work in half and I don't feel so overwhelmed. I am starting to see where all those studies are coming from that say if you are married/have a partner, you live longer and have less stress. I know I can call on my friends but even that has it's own burden.

I might have said this before but the other thing is the logistical nightmare that this is, trying to live in your house, still needing to eat, shower, dress, play, use stuff, etc. and try to pack 2 sets of bags - stuff that stays, and stuff that's coming. That and having gained weight, what clothes do I pack? I know that within a couple months of being in Burkina, I will be back to 155/size 8 but none of that fits at the moment. So I end up taking at least 2 sizes of clothes with me as well.

I have about 14 days til I have to be done packing (it's more but we're away for 5 days this weekend). I have a few days after we move out to do other stuff, like get visas, traveller's cheques, buy a laptop that don't need to be done right this minute. According to my schedule, it's not going to be done (I know it always does - usually by staying up for the last 3 days straight - I can sleep on the plane I guess!). So if I see you and I look a little wild eyed (or sleepy!) it's not you.

Ok I'm good now. Venting done, time to get back to it. Thanks for listening!