Long Time, No Write.....Catching Up

I honestly cannot recall the last time I published anything on my once-often-used Blog. Sure, sure, you meet a guy, he takes up a lot of your time, you write less and less and pretty soon you are living life more than observing it. The problem is you loose the precious observations you make about the life you are living if you don't record it. Perspective is lost to time. Today I'm taking a moment to reflect and catch up with myself and with my audience....if there is anyone still out there who follows this! Recap since Liberia 2015: After more than three months in the harsh conditions of Ebola and an embassy decimated by ordered departure (low morale, too much work, too few people), I arrived for 21 days of quarantine in Praia, Cape Verde. I had barely heard of the country before I was on a plane there. AF (Africa Bureau) waited until the last possible minute to find me a place for me to go to fulfill my 21-day quarantine requirement because The Gambia would now allow me back into the country until I could prove I had not contracted Ebola. Praia is beautiful! Rocky coastline, beautiful beaches, nice breeze, good infrastructure, charming people, good food, nice Embassy staff. Compared to Liberia, it was like landing in paradise. The Ambassador had only been there about two weeks and we worked well together from the very first minute. He's nice, professional, smart, considerate, not-micro managing. After a few days, he asked me if I would consider working for him permanently and accept a two year assignment! I looked around at the spacious housing, the nice environment, the calm nature of the country,the endless beauty and then asked Lee his opinion. Lee was with me because we had not seen each other for more than 4 months and he drove to Dakar then flew to Praia to be with me for a few days. Lee also loved Praia so we decided to take a chance and accept the position. I was thrilled! The Gambia was a terrible experience for me--sometimes an assignment goes awry and you should cut your losses, but I didn't do that. I should have. We liked Praia so much that we decided to extend for an additional year, making the assignment 3 years. The biggest challenge has been the language factor--we don't speak Portuguese and since I was already at post, there was no time to take language training in DC. No matter, I dove into private language lessons and online distance learning courses. We managed to learn quite a lot and although far from fluent, we can get by. After the first year, Lee secured a position at the Embassy as the Community Liaison Officer (CLO). He manages our 'fun,' makes sure family members can be employed if they want to, looks out for activities for us to do (hikes, cooking classes, seasonal parties), etc. He's good at his job and well-respected. We have traveled to other islands in Cape Verde--to hike a volcano in Fogo and to the beach with friends in Sal. I also visited Maio to enjoy more beach time (Lee is not a beach person) and I took a solo trip to Mindelo to experience the famous music of Cape Verde and also traveled by ferry to Santo Antao to see the majestic mountains. Finally, we visited Boa Vista in September for my birthday and I ended up getting a broken leg for my birthday, so I spent the next 7 weeks on crutches, flying to London for treatment and am now in recovery mode to regain my strength for eventually running again. Needless to say, there will not be a return trip to Boa Vista where the somewhat rough ocean caused the leg fracture. Being immobile for such a long time gave me a lot of empathy for people who have to live their lives in a wheelchair or on crutches. I never realized how valuable it is to be able to bend your knee and carry things while walking and all sorts of simple tasks you take for granted in life. It was humbling to crutch round London, practically being locked in my hotel room because it was just too taxing to crutch down the stairs, climb into a taxi and feel exhausted by the time I arrived where I was going. I somehow managed to see a movie (with 700 other people in a very crowed lobby) and eat my favorite English meal of Fish and Chips (in the rain, of course) but it's not a trip I would repeat--with countless trips to the hospital and doctor for MRI's and braces and appointments. Let's just say I'll never again take WALKING for granted!! Our assignment in Praia ends in July 2018. We will then take home leave--a term for spending a lot of money, visiting family and friends, buying a right-hand drive car, not having enough time to absorb the culture of USA and then it's off to the new post in August. We are going to (drum roll......) Namibia!! Look it up: it's a beautiful country in the south western part of Africa. It has a massive desert full of famous sand dunes, safari trips abound, it has a coastline larger than California, and it has a wonderful Ambassador who has asked me to manage her office for the duration of her tour. We are very excited to start this next adventure! Now, we just have to figure out how to get Ruby (a 90-pound Rhodesian Ridgeback) and Lily (exceptionally curious house cat from The Gambia) across the continent of Africa--including a 30-day stay in the USA. I'm sure it's going to involve lots of money and patience, but eventually we will all land in Windhoek, Namibia. It's a great vacation spot, so this is an all-call for visitors to come and stay with us! Well, I hope this little catch-up finds everyone well, and living life to the fullest. If not, you can always change your life to do just that--which is what lead me to this career in the foreign service in the first place. Life is what you make it--make it good.