Our African Adventure

While I know I said I would share some journal excerpts with you from our recent Africa trip(I know I've been an extreme slacker about posting), after trying to decipher my hand writing from the bumpy overland trip I've decided it would be better to just give an over all review of the trip over a few posts. I will begin by saying that this was yet another incredible journey I've taken with my wonderful husband, and if you are of an adventurous spirit, and can occasionally conform to a "go with the flow" attitude (something required in Africa), I highly recommend doing an African overland trip.

Our trip was a total of 13 days with travel, as we left our apartment for JFK Airport on Thursday, May 13th and returned on Tuesday, May 25th. I must interject here, that I now believe that travelling mid-week is the much preferable option (I returned to work on a Wednesday of a short week, as it was Memorial Day Weekend, and I definitely couldn't have planned it better). We flew into Nairobi, Kenya, by way of Zurich, Switzerland, and flew back to New York from Dar Es Salaam airport via the same route. From the map below, you can see that Nairobi and Dar Es Salaam are a 12 hour drive from one another, and we spent our most of our vacation in some form of vehicle seeing the country.

While travelling this way could be exhausting, and you may be thinking that your idea of spending your first vacation in a year and half is not in a huge truck

I must say that it was honestly the most amazing thing to look out the window and see this unique and colorful country go by. Small children would wave and run after our vehicle, extremely excited to see Westerners, and I would be lying if I said it didn't warm my heart every time to see their smiling faces. As Mr. B would say this was a country where they may be poor, but you couldn't feel the poverty, they were poor but that was just how they lived. I couldn't agree more with that statement, and I was continuously intrigued as we drove by the small villages and the witnessed the way life was lead. It was amazing to me to think of all the things us Westerners deam necessary to survive when I saw the way the African people throughout Kenya and Tanzania lived. I found the landscape and the people to be extremely beautiful, and overall the trip was extremely eye opening.

Our trip was organized by a group called Nomad Tours(www.nomadtours.co.za, which we booked through a lovely woman named Nicky at www.africanoverlandtours.com. The group was a total of 12 people from all around the world (literally), and we were led by a tour guide and a cook. Mr. B and I went the more budget route, and were on the camping tour, and we stayed at some great camp sites and the tents were the nicest I've ever seen. We began our trip in Nairobi, where we met up with our new pals for the next 10 days, and headed towards Arusha.

The trip to Arusha consumed our entire first day of the trip, but as I said earlier I was alert and excited as I gazed out of the window at all of the sights. I kept missing pictures because we were driving, and either we went to fast or the road was to bumpy to capture what I was looking at, but here are some images of what we saw as we drove along.






The roads in Africa were something else as well! We would be driving along and you'd see something like this:

(picture courtesy of AR from our group), and you'd be off onto a dirt road on the side of the main road until eventually you found a paved road again. It was really wild, and really bumpy! They also threw stones along the road in place of parking cones, something I found highly amusing.

After a full day of travel we arrived in the town of Arusha, which didn't really seem like much of a town, but it was more populated then the villages we had passed, and had a Shop Rite super market, so I guess it could qualify. There was time to relax for the evening at our pretty campsite, where we had a delicious meal (I stayed veggie with the hubs for the trip) made by our chef, and got ready for our excursion to the Serengeti which we would leave for in the morning.

More exciting posts about Africa later. Sorry for being MIA! SB.

Opps....

So obviously I've been a bit MIA the last 2 weeks, and I realized I never posted that I'd be on vacation for 2 weeks! That's right, vacation, an alien word I'm not used to using since I hadn't had one in a year and half, and it was much needed! Mr. B and I went on an amazing trip to Africa, overlanding from Nairobi, Kenya down to Dar Es Salaam/Zanzibar with a Safari into the Serengeti. It was an incredible trip, and I plan to share some excerpts from my journal in the next few posts! So, that's why you've been missing me, I'll be in touch now. :) SB.

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Book Review: "One Thousand White Women" by Jim Fergus

If you have not noticed, I've listed book recommendations on the side of my blog, and I've decided that it would be beneficial to review them for my readers. I'm an avid reader, and really enjoy historical fiction. This book "One Thousand White Women: The Journals of May Dodd" by Jim Fergus was an excellent book, that I highly recommend.

This book was originally recommended to me by my mother, and while she and I don't always see eye to eye on books, I decided to give it a try. I found the book to be captivating and heart wrenching, and I was completely drawn in by the triumphs and tribulations of the characters.

This novel is based on actual historical events that took place in 1875, when 1000 white women were traded to Native American tribes by the United States Government for horses, as a method of integrating the Indians into American society. The book follows the journey of May Dodd, a strong and smart woman who travels with the other members of the "Brides for Indians" program across the plains to marry men from the Cheyenne Tribe. May marries the chief of the tribe, Little Wolf, and struggles to fit in to a world that is unfamiliar, unsure of where her loyalties should lie. The story follows the bonds she shares with the rest of the women in the program, and their struggles to learn who they are, and confront why they've all come to be members of the Cheyenne Tribe.

I loved this book, it sucked me in from beginning to end. It literally made me cry at parts, as Fergus' ability capture May Dodd's character is impeccable, and her story is truly special. If you like historical fiction books, I suggest you don't pass up this novel. Hope you enjoy! SB.

Bar Crawl in the Burbs

Mr. B and I participated in a Bar Crawl this past weekend in the suburb where most of our friends have moved recently. I will admit when the hubbster first mentioned the idea of going on a bar crawl in suburbia, I was not all that keen to participate. I thought to myself, "is this really what we've come to?" It really made me feel like an old looser to be heading deeper into New Jersey then I already lived to engage in an activity that was so not the type of thing older married people with babies and houses usually do. I felt like I was handing in my "youth card" by agreeing to go, but the truth is it was a hell of a lot of fun.

I learned at this little function, that a parent with a baby sitter is more then ready to take advantage of a night off! While all of our tolerances are a bit lower, and I did hear a few complaints about it being past peoples bed times, this little crew partied late into the night, and we all held our own drinking more then our fair share. I hope those parents that were with us, were not as hung over as I was, or if they were that their children stayed with in-laws or grandparents until later in the day!

A big part of this "bar" crawl also seemed to be a recruitment tour for the town. I can't pretend I wasn't convinced by the end of the night that it would be great to move to an area where a lot of cool friends were there to soften the blow of suburbia. Hence, I think the evil plan could have taken root just a little.

Overall it was an awesome night, that helped me realize that it may not be that bad to move into the burbs. I was having a panic attack on the way there at the idea of living there, but the fun night made it less scary. I guess taking that next step into growing up won't be that bad, I hope. SB.

Rewarding

Speaking of the small things that get us excited, I've decided to reward myself tonight for all of the hard work I've been doing the last few weeks. While I do wish things were going a bit more smoothly as a result of all the effort I've put in to try to facilitate just that, they are going pretty well, and (THANK G-D) my schedule is starting to normalize. Hence, I feel I really deserve to treat myself to something nice.

So, I'm going for a manicure pedicure tonight at my favorite nail salon for the first time in months! Here are the colors I've picked out for my nails and toes (and yes I picked them out online because I'm so excited).


Toes:
Essie "Chubby Checks"


Fingers:
Essie "Cute As A Button"


Although they both looked much cuter on the website then they do here, and I'm the worst at picking my color so I'm sure I'll change my mind ten more times! I love Essie nail polish, and always have a hard time choosing!

I can't wait! SB

Oh The Things We Look Forward To

I've found as I creep up in years, the things I look forward to and get excited about are more and more lame. I find that I relate very easily to my father, and all the things he looks forward to and gets excited about, and perhaps less to my younger sisters. Joy.

It can be anything as small as a great new flavour of yogurt or getting a new pan, but either way it's a little depressing. I don't really remember what it was that used to cause excitement, a new Barbie, maybe a new crush speaking to you in school, going on spring break perhaps, but for some reason I'm feeling like the reasons to get excited get fewer and far between as we get older. Hence, we get excited over things that wouldn't make other people think twice.

Is it because as we get older we get settled into who we are as people, as a family, in our careers? Life suddenly forms into a routine: gym, work, dinner, tv, sleep, repeat. We work for the weekend, we play hard, and look forward to anything that may cause a blip on the radar. Does that about cover it?

While I do I think it makes me a lamo however, I can't wait until I'm a home owner, because when I am I feel like I will be a "real" adult, and will start getting rid of some of our current things. There are a lot of items in Mr. B's and my apartment that I feel I make do with, and I'm ready to upgrade. Dishes for instance, I think it would be great to have matching dishes. There is nothing wrong with plates from the Salvation Army, they've served us well, but I would like having a set of dishes, with matching bowls, and salad plates, etc, etc, etc. It's the part of me that is ready to be an adult that wants these things, matching plates, nice pots and pans, stainless steel appliances. I can't help it, I just do!

So when all is said and done, I guess I'm just excited that I can be excited about these things. I'm sure there are people who don't, and they must find life boring. At least I have my dishes! XO-SB.