In the last two weeks we have definitely made headway on making our home more homey. Last week I ordered 2 couches, a loveseat, 2 big fluffy chairs for looking at the sea and two more chairs for the living room. So we should have all the seating taken care of for our TV area in the basement and our living room on the top floor. It will be a great improvement on the office chairs we have gotten used to cuddling up in.

Next will be my quest for accessories, decorations and RUGS!! It is hard to hear anything in the abyss that is this marbly cement palace. The echoes bounce all over the place, much to the pleasure of the girls. Although they have stopped yelling just for the sake of listening to their own echoes. Thank Goodness.

Our day to day life hasn't changed much yet as we still don't have many friends. It's really not that bad but I think we all need to get out more and associate with different people so as not to annoy each other so much. Although the people at our local market, Monoprix, know the girls well enough that they don't even need to stand and stare longingly at the candy section of the deli to be given candies. Yesterday one of the men (who told Hunter in French that he loves her and she is beautiful. Awww.) told the girls to follow him and he gave them candies and told them to come back tomorrow for more. Nice. Then they moved down the aisle and were given cookies too. Lovely. At least they don't mind coming shopping with me.

Part of the draw of the walk to Monoprix is also that we walk over the train tracks, or railway, as Hunter corrected me today.

This is the LRT that travels from Tunis centre to Sidi Bou Said, which is a community up the coast but still really part of Tunis. A lot of kids travel on the train, perhaps going to and from school for lunch, I'm not sure. The way people travel the train here is much different than ours is run in Calgary. For example, there aren't necessarily doors on all of the entrances to the train. And the doors that are there, seem to be easily pried and held open. Also, there seems to be no law against hanging off the train or standing between cars. The first day we saw a teenager hanging on to the train, hanging and dragging his feet along the platform. I'm sure my jaw dropped as I saw that. But I'm a mom now so not supposed to be cool about all that stuff anyway. As much as I would never get used to that in Calgary, it doesn't shock me as much now. Just as the garbage on the street or stray animals don't make us blink an eye. Or seeing a vendor pushing his cart of food down the highway, or people riding motorcycles without a stitch of gear on. It's all strange and I'm not sure why it still happens but it's the way things are done here.

Yesterday the girls and I went for a two hour walk, travelling a few more streets from our house. I let the girls lead and they chose to go up a set of stairs down the street from us. As they walked they were picking flowers, and bugs and diseasey looking leaves. Neither of the saw the big man with the machine gun and both girls bumped into him. We have some important person living down the street so there is a guard in front and behind the house. We after say Bonjour to the front guard but have never gone behind the house before. Neither girls seemed to be too concerned about running right into someone and Elliot didn't blink an eye when he swooped her up and gave her a kiss. It shocked me a bit that she was rubbing right up against his big Aug (or whatever Travis told me it was). I was told the guns aren't loaded during the day, but still.... Not something you run into every day. I wish my camera had been working. I also wish I'd had a camera when we saw two dogs locked outside a window between the iron window cage and the window. It was airy but still a strange place to keep your pets.

We had a lovely walk and got down to the water where the girls had a fun time throwing bits of grass and leaves into the sea. We walked right on to the beach as the tide was out a bit and watched our grass being swept out to sea. That ended when Elli sat in the water. We also walked in to some park area with ruins. I probably should have read what it said. Something about Anthropological, I think. Anyway, we mostly looked at all the ant hills and noticed that when you step on the hill thousands more ants come out. It was fun. Then we dodged bees pollinating the flowers in the grass. There are a lot of bees here.

I've started being a bit more adventurous and have been buying seafood from the seafood guy at Monoprix. It's not that big of a deal but I often don't really know what I'm talking about. I usually just point and nod. Apparently we have the best, freshest seafood in the city because the President lives in this area and gets his seafood here. Good garbage pick up and fresh seafood. It seems to me he's doing a fine job. Anyway, I've gotten chevrettes (not to be confused with crevettes which are bigger shrimp. I got mixed up.) which were a pain to peel and didn't amount to much but were tasty. And I got salmon steaks the other night. I squeezed a bit of a citrus fruit on them from our yard (which turned out to be Bergamot, not Lemon) and they turned out fine.

Phew... I'm noticing that I can be long-winded. I'm sure I'm the first to notice. ;) I'm going to bed and will update with the rest of our adventures another time.

Good night from Tunis.

Our weekend in Djerba

Since we have just gotten internet in our new house (YAY!) I will write a couple posts so as not to make one too long...

The last I posted was that we were taking a weekend trip to the Island of Djerba. We flew down Thursday afternoon so had the afternoon and early evening to explore the beautiful resort Hasdrubal Thalasso Prestige Resort & Spa. (Hasdrubal was Hannibal's brother in Carthaginian history, Phoenician soldiers) What a beautiful resort!

Probably the most beautiful place I will ever stay! We had a suite so the girls would have their own room and what a suite it was! Our room was at least twice as big as any hotel room I've stayed in

and each bedroom had its own balcony overlooking the pool and sea. And the bathroom was a like a spa! Lovely! One of the best parts was having a stand up shower!!! Not only a stand up shower but one that had the shower nozzle on the wall! Oh sweet heaven!

It was a working weekend for Travis so he and his coworkers drove out to Tataouine on Friday for a big presentation (they actually made quite a few of the newspapers in the country, (including the President's parties paper), and radio and TV). The girls and I had a lovely day playing at the beach and in the pools. I never did make it too far into the pools as it was still a little chilly for me, but the girls had a wonderful time. Especially after they met a friend, Sasha, from Switzerland.

We ended up meeting him and his family at every meal after that which all the kids enjoyed. On Saturday we spent the morning at the indoor pool and the girls had a great time swimming and playing.

Elli stripping in the hall. She kept yelling that Cookie Monster was going to get her.

Hunter is a great swimmer and as long as she has her life jacket on she has no fear, even in deep water. Elliot doesn't have any fear either, with out without a life jacket. She just doesn't have any inclination paddle once in the water. She would sink.

We enjoyed and relaxed for the afternoon and took a flight back to Tunis with the rest of the company. It was a lovely weekend and we will definitely be back. I still can't believe that we are an hour's flight, at the most, (many resorts are with in an hour or two of driving) from such beautiful resorts!! We didn't get to see much of the island this trip beside the drive to and from the hotel but I think there are many interesting places on such a small island.

Finally, we've moved!

The last couple weeks have been busy... although I do try to make it home for the girls' naps in the afternoon. That is essential. I stressed last week about getting all our bedding so we could move to our new house. Travis had to work late most nights, unfortunately (mostly for him, he had very long days) so we weren't able to get out in the evenings. Finally on Thursday, Feres from Travis' office was able to take the girls and I out to a few shops to get what we really needed to move in. Namely, towels, bedding and pillows. I still haven't found sheets that fit the girls beds but I got flat sheets to wrap around the mattress for now. The girls were quite pleased with their new beds! (I will add photos when I am able to access internet from home)
So we have moved in and are living quite simply right now. We have one of two working fridges so I run up and down the stairs a lot in the day. We use the upstairs kitchen right now because that is where the table is but the working fridge is downstairs. I won't need the gym after all that exercise! We haven't had time to get out shopping to the rest of the furniture but Travis did pick up a TV and we have some office chairs, that weren't being used in the Storm house, for right now. It works for now.
We are also waiting for the new car. Well, mostly Travis is waiting. It really hasn't bothered anyone else that it's late. ;) It will be here tomorrow, or after tomorrow. Kind of the philosophy of Tunisians. Just like our shipment will be here next week, or after next week. Who knows when we will finally have everything in order! Most days it's ok and I can handle living in limbo but sometimes it does get to me and I would just like to have it all done.
Tomorrow, Thursday, afternoon we are flying to Djerba (pronounced 'Jerba'), an island down the coast of Tunisia, for 2 days. Travis and some of his co-workers will be going to Tataouine on Friday for a scholarship presentation the company set up. The girls and I will stay at the resort and play in the sun. On Saturday, we will have Travis and will either spend the day at the beach or perhaps go the Medina to look around. It will be nice to have a shower or two in a stand up shower!
On Monday night, we were invited to the home of the Canadian Ambassador for a cocktail party in honour of a merger or buy out of Storm and Talisman Energy. Or something like that. There were a lot of reps from other companies too. I visited with the wife of the Ambassador, Sarah, and the wife of the Consul, Nallin, quite a bit and look forward to seeing them again. Sarah sent me the information to a book club and an International Woman's Group which I look forward to joining once things settle down a bit for us. I was also able to visit with many other people Travis does business with, so it was nice to put faces to names. It was mostly just nice to be able to dress up and visit with other adults, no matter what language there were speaking! ;)

And we are lucky to have Amira and Rym, Travis' coworkers' daughters, as babysitters already. The girls had a lot of fun.
I think we are going to work on getting our marble tables built in the next couple weeks so we can have balcony and patio tables. And of course, we would like to get couches. Travis is going to be ordering a new fridge, washing machine and microwave soon which will be nice, although they might take a couple weeks to arrive. So we will probably be making another trip or two back to the company house.
Hunter is very observant as to the differences between Calgary and Tunis. Last week she asked if she could start throwing garbage on the ground because everyone else does it. We explained that no, we weren't going to start doing that, we would still pick up garbage and throw ours away. And no, when she gets a truck she can't let her friends ride in the back of the truck just because it looks fun and just because they do it here. The environment here makes for interesting conversations with her. And Elliot has discovered a new favorite word. Radar. She heard it while we were talking about the addition of a radar and a police car at the spot that Travis decided not to stop for the police officers telling him to pull over. That officer did not happen to have a radar or car at the time. Yes, Travis is figuring this Tunisian driving stuff out just fine.
The girls and I toured the new neighborhood yesterday. We didn't find anything too surprising but we were able to get down to the water fairly quickly. There is no beach, just rocks, seaweed and garbage, but it is fun to get close to the water and have an undisturbed view of the sea. Although I still think we have a better location as we can sit up on our balcony and see so far out to sea. This morning we saw two ferries or cruise ships going by! Often we see smaller yachts or tiny fishing boats out there also.
And another nice thing we have learned this week is that our garbage gets picked up twice a day. Because we live so close to the presidential palace there are a lot of perks... fresh fish in the market and a lot of garbage pick up and cleaning of the streets. The bowlful of spaghetti that was dumped on the grass across the street from our house two days ago was gone yesterday!! I'm not sure if it was a stray dog or city worker who got to it, but it was all cleaned up!!

So, on to a relaxing weekend and then another week of learning about Tunisian life!

We've made it 1 Month!

I can't believe we have been here for a month already!! Wow, the time has flown by. The novelty of being in this beautiful marble palace is wearing off, though, and we are itching to get into our own house and get settled. We found out today that our container coming on the ship has only made it to Barcelona so it will take a while longer to get here. It would be nice to have more than 4 outfits for each of us. And the girls are growing out of theirs or just plain wrecking them. Oh well. More shopping!!! Perhaps at the frip ("freep") - a swap meet with lots of new clothes. Apparently some European brand names. I will have to check out the craziness sometime. We have been out shopping for the house too but I can't remember the stuff we have packed and don't want to double up. So we will do without some stuff until we see what we have I guess.

Today the girls and I looked for a store with "good" bedding. Good right now for me means sheets that don't feel like sandpaper. Unfortunately we didn't find the shop. That will just give us another adventure for another day. However we need it for the end of this week. So we might end up with sandpapery sheets for a bit until we can take the time to look for some good stuff. We met Travis at his office and went to a hotel supply store to look for kitchenwares. When I told Hunter that Dad had called and were were going to the office to see him she asked why the boss of the office wanted to see us. I said that it was Dad who wanted to see us and she said, "But Dad is the boss of the office and he wants to see us at the office. Why does he want to see us at the office?" I think she thought we were in trouble since she has found out that Travis is now a "boss". Up until then it would have just been a visit to the office. Anyway, we got to the store and there was a lot of good quality kitchen stuff which was lovely to see. We picked out a set of dishes, some knives and a pot... with a lid!!! The dishes no longer have the bowls so we came away with only a pot and knives. So still no cereal at the new house! And the shopping continues. Again, this not driving is no fun. I think I will have to learn to maneuver the crazy streets of Tunis soon.

Next week we are going to the Canadian Ambassador's for a work dinner party. Something about a project they are doing... I'm just interested in the party part. So, since all my clothes are on a boat in Spain I get to go shopping for something to wear. I have no idea what is suitable for a party like this (suggestions are welcome) but we'll see what is out there. I may even need new shoes, who knows!!! ;) Oh course, shopping with the girls and having to change in change rooms with only curtains for doors is always a fun, fun challenge. I might come home with 5 dresses just so I can try them on in peace. Or at least without the whole mall watching me.

We have been learning so many things since we've been here. For example, the oranges on the orange trees in our backyard right now are not really for eating. They are gross. The blossoms are probably to be used for orange water which is used for flavouring desserts or hands at the end of a meal. Thompson or Blood oranges, however, are delicious. We don't have those trees though. Also, when crossing the street, I just hold on to the girls and drag them. Pedestrians don't have the right of way. Don't make eye contact with drivers because if you do, you are more likely to be run over. They know you have seen them and will assume you are going to get out of the way. So I try to stop Hunter from waving at everyone she sees!!! Most of the police don't have guns although they do have holsters. But guards at embassies or consulates hang out with machine guns. They aren't mean, they are still smiling and will make silly sounds at the girls. It's strange. The girls love to see the donkeys pulling carts of scrap metal down the streets. I figure that if donkeys can make it in Tunisian traffic, I should be able to drive in it.

Every day I am realizing what an amazing opportunity this is. Today I was looking at all the people we saw and thinking that the more I see and the more I travel the more I see the similarities in everyone. On the surface, cultures have differences, of course, but every one works, cooks and plays essentially the same. The kids Hunter and Elliot meet play the same games even though they don't speak the same languages. I'm not sure if this makes sense but it is interesting to meet new people and find they have do the same things day to day and have the same interests and concerns.

Another thing I've learned is that couscous is NOT supposed to only take 5 minutes to cook!! When we tried to explain that to our friends here they had no idea what we were talking about. They take 2 hours to steam their couscous. Silly people. ;) Of course, theirs tastes much better and is much more interesting and I intend to learn how to cook Tunisian couscous in a proper "couscousiere" steamer pot.

Although I will probably leave out some of the spices. A lot of the traditional food here is very spicy.

As of last night we have company in the house again. "Papa" Terry and Jeff are here this week. The girls actually had an argument yesterday about whose "Papa" Terry is. Elliot has taken quite a liking to Terry and has gotten a big possessive. Both girls get very excited when the guys from the office come. Next week the house will be full of Travis' coworkers so we will be out before then. Roy, one of the guys who was here a few weeks ago, asked Travis if we would be here when they were here as he really liked having the girls in the house. Travis told him we wouldn't be but I thought he should have offered to leave the girls here for the week!!!

It will be a busy week shopping and getting ready for our move into the new house. And next week we are off to Djerba with Travis and coworkers. They are going for a project presentation in the desert. We will go for the beach!

Good night from Tunis.