Sylvia's Journal

A dark dream and dreary images from the Dutch ‘hunger winter’ indicate that there is some anxiety about my upcoming trip to Kabul. You’d think that by now I would be a hardened traveler. I am in some ways and not in others. It may have something to do with my destination and the fact that I have only the vaguest idea what I will be doing in Kabul this time.

Yesterday morning I made no headway with my reference checks in Ethiopia. I suspect they also have a second Easter day, like in Holland, except Ethiopian Christians are of the Orthodox kind and celebrated their Easter this weekend. Monday the 20th may have been a holiday. I am trying again this morning and got up early for that reason. The workday ends there in a few hours.

Tessa and Steve have their first experience of having a sick puppy in the house while needing to go to work. Chicha has pulled a muscle, probably because she did a little too much retrieving with everyone throwing balls and Frisbees for her to catch over the weekend. She spent the day lying on one bed or another looking sad and pathetic. Lucky she has two doting parents and another two doting grandparents. I never think of dogs being sick. No one went for a walk yesterday.

I worked a bit, packed a bit and started some seedlings, hoping that at least something would be ready for planting when I get back. I also cut the potatoes in pieces with a bunch of eyes each and, as per instructions, left them out to dry before planting. I did not check the asparagus progress as I was told a watched asparagus does not grow.

In the evening Axel and I drove to Nuha and her brother who live in a student apartment in Cambridge, he a marketing sophomore at Suffolk, she about to graduate from Boston University with a master’s in public health, this May.

The meal consisted of Saudi comfort food: Makaroni bi Béchamel and something that sounds like Djerish and is like a savory oatmeal porridge. The meal was wedged in between a light but very spiced coffee and dates before and sweetened tea with apple crisp (comfort of the New England type) afterwards. Nuha is trying to learn as many New England dishes as she can before she heads back home in June. Cooking fruit, like apples, is one of the odd American cooking ideas she has now gotten used to.

We watched a series of YouTube videos about an American visiting Saudi Arabia (No Reservations) and heard stories about what Saudis do for fun – camping is one of those things. It can be done with or without all the comforts and distractions of daily life – like here – but without woods and trees it is quite different from what we consider camping over here. We were both invited to experience it first hand – I would be drinking tea and singing with all the other women, sitting around the campfire while Axel and the guys would be preparing a goat dinner and then cruising the sand dunes in powerful vehicles. Good thing they don’t allow alcohol.