Life Lessons

It takes all this to plug in anything from America. Here is our bed heater cord and you have to plug it into the converter box and then into the wall. You should see the converter for my blow dryer it's way bigger than this.

Here is our gorgeous beach. (Well it's actually really rocky and I wouldn't step foot in it because just down the coast raw sewage is being dumped in!!)

Since we don't have a car we must use public transportation. Busses are the cheapest but we don't always know the route so we most usually taxis around town and trains to other cities. And no this is NOT a posed picture

This is a traditional North African salad. Ain't she pirdy? When you go to someone's home for a meal it's customary to go all out and provide an abundance of food until your stuffed and you don't think you can eat one more bite...but you will...oh you will continue to eat as they continue to bring the food and insist you commit the sin of gluttony and have to repent of it later.

And this is Carrie's creation. This is precisely why I don't cook. I am starting a WAMS club (Wives Against Martha Stewart) if anyone wants to join. You just have to hate doing house chores and be terrible at cooking and we'll let you in. Oh and lesson learned, don't try to make "chocolate peanut butter popcorn" by adding chocolate and peanut butter to popping kernels on the stove. They will scorch and ruin your pan!!

Europe Trip

We had to take a weekend trip to Europe to renew our visas. It rained almost the whole time but it was nice to get away and eat some serious bacon.

Here is Cody in front of the EuroHoppa. A real double decker bus!!! He's thinking...PLEASE Carrie no more pictures!!!

This was a bjillion dollar collect call to America.

This is a teeny tiny British "parade" if you will. We ate delicious fish and chips for lunch and of course a few scones. You know I thought it would be nice to be around people who spoke English...but seriously who can understand the Brits anyway?



This is from a hill overlooking a border city in the north. Here is a little hint when learning a new language...don't nod in agreement when you really don't know what they are saying. We had a taxi driver take us for a detour to top of this hill. We didn't know we had agreed to it because we thought we were headed to the train station. It was a little freaky but he was super nice and eventually took us to catch our train.

Rooftop Pictures

Here is some pictures from the roof of our apartment building. Straight ahead through the smog is the ocean. On a clear day you can see the ocean from here. It's about a 15 minute walk to the beach. (I use the term "beach" loosely)



Many people hang their laundry on the rooftops. This is a place where women gan gather and socialize while men are at the coffee houses.


Every home has a satellite dish. Even if you live in a tiny shanty home with no water you still have a satellite. You don't have to pay for service just a dish.

Real Pics from the Big Holiday

As we mentioned last post this week was the big sacrifice holiday. We got up and close and personal with the sheep. If you have a weak stomach for blood then I suggest you scroll past the following pictures. But it is just like skinning a deer (and my Daddy has skinned a lot so I am used to it but maybe not everybody is).



Here's the unknowing little guy now. Everyone buys their sheep the day before or the day of and keeps them in their house or on the patio if they have one. We were on the roof of an apartment building so their were several families slaughtering at the same time. Sometimes they keep the sheep in the bathroom or laundry room until time.






If your knife is sharp enough and your good, you can kill with one stroke.







This was the strangest part. The man put his mouth up to a hole he created an blew into the sheep's cavity to separate the skin from the muscle for easy removal of the wool. And he was putting the bloody knife in his mouth!!! Sick!!!




It's really a team effort. The whole family watches. If the Dad doesn't want to do it he can a hire a butcher for the killing. Here he is fixing to get skinned.

Eid al Adha (Feast of Sacrifice)

This week Muslims all around the world (about a billion or so people) will celebrate one of their biggest holidays commemorating their belief of Abraham nearly sacrificing his son Ishmael and a sheep being provided at the last second. Here in our country, everyone will buy their own sheep and slaughter it, halaal style. For weeks after this people will be eating nothing but mutton! Yipee! That means that the butcher shops won't be selling any meats because no one will be buying, only eating sheep. It should be quite a fun time. It might be just as much fun as this sheep in the picture is having.
FYI: This is also the time of year that the big pilgrimmage to Mecca takes place.



This is the door to an old fort in our city. The city giant, Ali, lives there. He is about 30 feet tall and one heck of a basketball player. He uses the big door...



Carrie and I have spent most of our time here, on the train. The train system here is pretty good. It is really cheap. It costs about 3 American dollars to take a 1.5 hour ride to a neighboring city. It seems the past month we have traveled 2 times a week on this thing. It has been fun seeing the country but quite tiring. In this picture Cody is working hard at finding a renewable energy source that will save the world from it's dependence on oil. Or he is playing Frogger... you decide.



Carrie colored her hair this week. Since she was going to have a picture, Cody felt he should have one too.

Happy New Year!!