Pics

Okay, I put around half of all my pictures up on facebook, you should be able to view them with these links, enjoy!

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2045843&id=1567320184&l=351e011b69

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2045844&id=1567320184&l=9c69737467

Lazy

I promise I will post some pictures soon. In fact, I P-romise.

Hm

Back in America.

Mixed feelings.

Not ready for the pressures of America again.

Wishing I was still in Cabo Verde.

But excited beyond belief to be seeing my family.

But missing my cape verdean family.

Can't have your cake and eat it too, huh?

Quick update

Good news. By mid Wednesday morning I was feeling a ton better, which was perfect because I got to go to Praia Grande with my friend Sergio! That beach is PERFECT. Perfect perfect perfect.

Today Nelida and I and a couple of our friends went down to Sao Pedro and hiked to the light house and to a cave! It was also spectacular. Here is so beautiful. Sad to leave.

Tomorrow is my last day! Then off to Praia and Fogo!!! Gotta run, no time!

I´ll post pictures and update more when I get home! Or if I have time tomorrow.

SEE YA!

Ugh

Today, I am sick. The most sick I have been since I got here. It´s just been me and the bathroom all day long. COME ON BODY. My last week here?!?! Really?!?!

I have my class party tonight. I hope I feel betttterrrrrrrrr.

Cape Verde keeps getting hotter and hotter and hotter. I have never sweated so much--especially when I´m out walking with the sisters. This is resulting in a nasty zit break out. Oh well.

Well I have a week and half left in Cape Verde, Less than a week left in Mindelo, and two days left on English class. Where does time go?!

Everyone keeps asking me if I am going to come back soon and all I can say is, I sure hope so. I´m getting sad realizing that I won´t see so many of these people that I have come to adore for a long time, if ever again. It´s a hard realization. I wish I had a bunch of money and I could come visit whenever I wanted.

I hope I fit in everything I can this week. So far the week should go like this:
Monday: SOS village, lunch at Nelida´s, São Pedro beach, English class, James´ birthday party.
Tuesday: Prison, baking baking baking with sister Goff for my class party, Out with the sister missionaries, and then Classsss party!!!
Wednesday: PRAIA GRANDE. The most beautiful beach! And then Outreach, which is like a young single adult program here.
Thursday: Last lunch with elder and sister goff, Sister missionaries, and present shopping.
Friday: Last trip to Laginha beach, Last lunch with James and Karina, Finish present shopping, pack, Outreach, Final dinner. :(
Saturday: flight to Praia. :( :( :(

BAH, I can´t believe it´s my last week in Mindelo!!!!!

Anyway, last week I went to the SOS village with a peace corp volunteer. It was basically like a day care for children. A place for kids in need to play, eat a meal, and have activities. I´m going to go back on Monday with Nelida for some activities planned for the kids.

I talked to the peace corp volunteer for quite a while and learned all about it. Shoot guys, its looking like I´ll be joining the peace corps after college.

Story from this week. So I was sleeping over at Nelida´s and we had turned the light off, but I needed to check the phone for something. As I was reaching over to get the phone I thought I felt something on my arm, but I dismissed the thought because I assumed it was just one of my bracelets. I then realized I needed the light on, so I got up and turned it on and then looked over to my bed to see a CEM PÈ CRAWLING ON MY PILLOW. A cem pé in english is a centipede I think, or a milipede. In anycase, they are bad here because if they bite you, you get swollen and sick for three days. After I discovered it, and ran out to Cajo (nelidas brother)for him to kill it, but I couldnt remember what they are called so I just kept repeating ´mil, mil (thousand, thousand) cem, cem (hundred, hundred´ and making weird wiggly hand motions. Somehow he knew what I was talking about and he and his dad found and killed it. But now the WHOLE family makes fun of me everyday because of the weird wiggly hand motions I made. Hahaha.

Also, yesterday I went scuba diving again, and saw TWO sharks. Yes, TWO sharks. They were less than five feet away from me. SO cool. They were nurse sharks though, and apparently nurse sharks aren´t even remotely dangerous, so no worries dad.

Um, I´m sure there are a thousand other things that I have to tell everyone, but I keep forgetting because I keep trying to remember the things I have to do in my last week. Sorry! I´ll try to post some pics tomorrow!

Yay!

Today is the hottest day that I have experienced here so far. I go out with the sisters in a half hour and I am a little scared about all the sweat that will come. BUT GUESS WHAT?! Today I got a package from Jake!!!!


Packages are seriously the best. Jake included all sorts of freaking cool stuff:

solar powered calculators
Paper
colorful pencils
pencil sharpeners
Colorful erasers
a mini U.S. constitution
Batteries
2 LED Flashlights
A filtered water bottle
And a Quark tactical flashlight (which I am SO excited to use)

Dear Jake, thank you thank you thank you! I have the perfect place for a lot of these school supplies. I´m going to the SOS village this week to work with the children and the peace corps and I am positive they could use a lot of this :)



A quick pic from the weekend:


The past weekend was spent at Nelidas again. We have so much fun. Dance parties galore, food, and the beach :)

PS. there is a water problem in the city and a ton of houses are with out water right now. Our house has been without water for two weeks now. The Goffs ran out today too. AY! Luckily the office and Nelida´s have water for showers and bathroom using.

NatiRuts

This week a popular Reggae band, Natiruts, has been in Mindelo. I met João from Portugal last Monday who was here hanging out with the band, and by getting to know João this week, I also had the opportunity to get to know all of the band members. Last night was their concert and Nelida and I got free tickets and got to chill with everyone backstage before and after the show. It was soooo fun. In fact, this whole week has just been so much dang fun. All of my new friends from Portugal and Brazil left this morning and I am so sad. I hate realizing that all of these amazing, fun, cool people that I am meeting over here I will probably never see again. I only have three weeks left here and the end is coming far too quickly for me.

(Ps it was awesome that all of them spoke pure portuguese. No creole!).

Unfortunately I only took a few pictures with Nelida before the show and then I left my camera, but I´m going to try and have João send me his




(Random pic from last week.)This is a common occurrence here in Mindelo: Random groups of people storming the streets with their drums and dancing.

Fourth of July Weekend

There were so many great things about this weekend and one bad thing:

The fact that my debit card decided to stop working on Saturday. And my credit card. and that I was left with 5 dollars. In a foreign country. By myself.

Let´s just say, I freaked out a little. Luckily, my parents are angels, and called the credit card company Monday to get it fixed. And I have a new debit card on the way. PHEW. But let me tell you, I was really worried those two and a half days that I did not have any money.

Anyway, Friday and Saturday night I slept over at Nelida´s house. It was so fun. Friday was her graduation from highschool, so she and all of her classmates stormed the streets dancing. It was SO cool. The had the drums going and the graduating class paraded through the streets for about a mile, blocking all traffic. They were all dancing and yelling. Her family and I went to Fun D´Mar for pizza and then got ice cream. Then we headed back to her house, and talked and slept. Saturday was filled with talking, lot´s of eating, lot´s of walking, reading, and music listening--and more eating. Oh and some worrying because that was the day my card stopped working. Nelida and her mom were so sweet to me though, they made me feel a lot better. Her mom is HILARIOUS.

Sunday, we went to church. They are in a different branch, so it was cool to see another branch in action. (PS I got to play the piano for sacrament. I´ve never done that before!). THEN I went to the Goff´s house to celebrate the 4th of July. We had cheeseburgers, potato salad, fruit salad, chips, and corn. AMERICAN FOOD. Wooo hoo! Then we had icecream and cake :) oh man, it was so good. Americans easily have the best food, recipes, etc. Choir was cancelled at the church (well it wasnt actually cancelled--no one came) so the Goffs and I went to the city square and listened to the band play :)

Monday was the independence day of Cape Verde! So all the stores were closed and everyone had of work. James, Karina, and I spent the whoooole day at the beach :)
all in all, a pretty dang good weekend (minus the money scare).

Last month

Okay, I have been here for almost exactly two months now. I am in my last month. As I predicted, time has gone by fairly quickly. This week I really missed my family and best friends though. But here is what I realized today:

I am capable of anything.

I am a strong, beautiful, smart American girl and I just realized that I am capable of so much more than I ever thought.

I can fly to an African island, not knowing literally a single person, and live there for three months. I can even make friends on an African island-- friends who speak another language and live a completely different style of life (in fact, pretty sure I´m having a sleepover with Nelida tonight). I can navigate the bus system on an African island. I can navigate the streets of an African island. I can do anything.

Good day. Good realizations. Hope I´m not seeming egotistical. Have a good weekend!

Missionaries

Have I talked about the sister missionaries yet? Well I adore them. I go out with Sister Smith and Sister Alves every Tuesday, Thursday, and Friday and I always have the best time. I am starting to pitch in thoughts and scriptures into the lessons a little more everytime I go out with them, which makes me feel cool. Like I could maybe someday be a missionary. We will see...

Monte Verde

Last Monday, Alexis, Nelida, and I walked to the top of Monte Verde which is the tallest mountain on this island. We started our walk from the city. It took us about an hour to get to the base of the mountain and then it took us who knows how long to get to the top. Maybe two hours more. Here´s the downer: it was super cloudy that day. When you get to the top you are supposed to have this spectacular view of the island, but all we could see was mist because we were legit standing in a cloud. Well all was not lost...at least we got to hang out with the army for a half hour to watch part of the World Cup. Yeah, who knew. Some soldiers are stationed up at the top to guard the satellites, etc. Anyway, we then walked back to the city which took another two hours.

We hiked to the tip top of the mountain covered with clouds. Which you cant even see.

But don´t worry I took a picture of the peak on a more clear day! See the highest point in the background? I was there!



Hobson and I went on an unofficial tour of Mindelo Thursday and Friday and got to see the whole island. It was incredible. I am living in one of the most beautiful and unique places on earth. We saw the most breath taking beach I have ever seen: Praia Grande. No beach will ever compare to this one.






Oh Thursday it was São João, some holiday here that celebrates a saint john. Apparently it´s tradition to jump over a fire the night before São João. No one here knows why its tradition. it just is. So Wednesday night there were tons of fires with kids jumping over them, then in the center of the city everyone gathers together and there are three BIG fires with adults jumping over them. Except the fire is too high for them to actually jump over them so it´s more like people jumping through the fire. It was crazy. On Thursday there were parades of people banging on drums, and whistling whistles, and dancing. It was really neat to see. So different!



Got some braids done and a new dress:)


new favorite place to eat :) they have the most american pizza and spaghetti you can find here

Ps

Some guy asked me if I was Brazilian today and was completely surprised when I told him I that I am American.

Wooo hooo!

Uh oh

Ivania told me straight up that I am getting fat. HA. She said ´when you first got here you were very thin, but now you are gaining a lot.´

Oooops! Who would have thought that I come to an African island and I get fat! I can´t help it though. The food is just too good :-)

Ivania

I don´t know why this picture came out so big, but oh well. This is me and Ivania. Ivania is from Santo Antão. She lives in the house with me and I absolutely adore her. Every night, Ivania comes home from school (she goes to night school so she doesn´t get back until 1030 or later) and we talk and laugh for hours. She is such a riot! The other night we discussed how to say `I farted´ in portuguese and english. We literally laughed for an hour straight. She kept saying ´I fark-ed´ and I kept using the wrong portuguese phrase. They have like three different ways to say it.

Ivania is engaged and talks to her fiance, Rony, every night. Rony lives on another island. I often fall asleep while she is playing with my hair and talking to Rony at the same time. Ivania and I also started going to the beach to swim together. She always says, we need to swim for exercise so that we can be thin and beautiful!

Ivania has a daughter who is three years old, and she wants nothing more than to marry Rony and then be sealed to her family in the temple. Unfortunately, the father of the child is doing everything in his power to prevent this from happening. It´s really sad to see, but Ivania has strong faith that things will work out. She is such a strong woman. I love talking to her every night and I love hearing about her life and I love that she speaks clear PORTUGUESE to me and that I can understand what she says to me :-)

Anyway, that´s Ivania! I always get lucky with room mates, don´t I?

In the clouds

On Friday, President Hobson and I took the ferry over to Santo Antão. It was
I N C R E D I B L E

We took the afternoon ferry, so we got there at about 5 pm and walked around to explore. Then we found the hotel and checked in. Hobson stayed in a room below me and I was on the level above. This hotel was a little different then other hotels I have stayed in. My room had to twin beds (I think they may have been smaller than twins), and there were no blankets, just sheets. There was no bathroom in my room. I had to go out and into the hallway to use the bathroom and each floor only had about three hotel rooms. Then we went out and found a place to eat. We ate at a restaurant named Felicidade and it was phenomenal. We had baked chicken, I think, and french fries, and apple fanta. It was the best meal I have had here yet. I don´t remember what happened next, but we went back to the hotel, read scriptures and went to bed to get a good nights sleep for hiking the next day :)

Okay, Saturday, we woke up, read scriptures and then enjoyed an AMAZING FREE breakfast provided by the hotel. Hotels in America seriously need to pick it up, because NO hotel breakfast compared to this. Fresh bread, Fresh goat cheese, Fresh jam, Fresh milk, Yogurt, CAKE, Juice, etc. All brought and layed (laid?) out in front of us. Mmmmm

Manuel Eduarte, one of Hobson´s old missionaries, met us and showed us around and took us to the beginning of hike. You guys, Santo Antâo is sooo beautiful and unique. I feel like I travelled through four different worlds. One side of the Island is so dry and and then all of the sudden you are standing on top of the clouds and then all of the sudden there is this huge switch and everything is green and there are trees and plants and flowers everywhere and then you get to the coast and you feel like you are in Hawaii and it was just soooo cool. Anyway, I will stop talking and put up some pictures :)

PS sorry, some of the pictures aren´t turning right side up!
PPS the last picture is of my absolute favorite bread here in Mindelo, that I get on the daily. It´s some type of coconut bread and it is so soft and fluffy and yummy

Finishers Wanted

This morning, president hobson had me read a talk given by Thomas S. Monson back in 1989. It hit me hard and I hope some of you will take a few minutes to read it as well.

Enjoy!

http://lds.org/ldsorg/v/index.jsp?hideNav=1&locale=0&sourceId=543227cd3f37b010VgnVCM1000004d82620a____&vgnextoid=2354fccf2b7db010VgnVCM1000004d82620aRCRD

Awesome.

Today was awesome.

First, I went to the prison with the Goffs. The Goffs go to the prison every Tuesday to teach sewing to the ladies. A prison van picked us up at about 845 to take us there. Now this van was a LEGIT prison van, meaning a van to carry prisoners. So sister goff and I are sitting in the back encaged. There were bars everywhere. Tooooo funny.

The ladies were so incredibly sweet, kind, and funny. You can tell that they really love the time they get to sew and the whole time we were there they were always hard at work making things. I loved talking to them, and it was really hard to believe that we were in a prison--because they were all so dang sweet!

We left the same way we came, in a prison van. But this time there was a prisoner in handcuffs with us! HA. I wish I had a picture of this. Just picture it in your mind: Me, Sister Goff, a prisoner, and guard sitting in the back of a prison van surrounded by bars. I can´t wait to go again next week, seriously. It was a blast.

After that, I walked down to the office and James and I went to the post office and.........I GOT MY PACKAGE. Woooo hooo! My mom sent me a package for my birthday which was a month ago, and it got here today! So great, so great, so great.
Me excited beyond belief

My presents :-)

Obv the first thing I did was devoure the chocolate candy.

And then I went out teaching with the sister missionaries. Every time I teach with them, I can speak more and more portuguese. I love it.

And to finish the day, I have my english class in one hour.

Great day, huh? The only thing that could have made it better would be the beach--but do not fret. I am going tomorrow :)

Oh PS, two more cool things.
A lady in my ward made these guys for me! HOW COOL are they? so cool.

And I bought the most beautiful wallet I have ever seen. Coin purses included

Primary Activity

Last Saturday I was supposed to help with the health fair, but it ended up being cancelled and rescheduled for later, so I got to attend the Primary activity at the other chapel which ended up being really, really cool. I´m so glad I got to go!
Pictures below




^Check out this girls braids. Hair here is like an art!

On Sunday, Sister Goff started to attempt to teach me how to do geneology. It was quite an experience. I felt a special reverence and a desire to learn more about my ancestors that I have never felt before. Unfortunately the website was really, really complicated, but hopefully I will get the hang of it soon :-)
The Goffs and Me



Have I mentioned that the wind is INSANE here? So last night, I fell asleep around eleven, and was woken by the wind around 230 am. The wind can be incredibly loud--so loud that I couldn´t fall asleep until about 730 am. Annoying. So in the mean time I read ten conference talks and some of the BOM--Can you tell that I ran out of novels to read? Haha, but really, it was kinda cool to devote all of that time to reading conference talks. I learned a ton last night.

Tomorrow should be a good day. I head out early in the morning to the Goffs and we are going to the prison to sew with the women and then I go to out with the sister missionaries and teach my class at night. Maybe I will try and slip in some beach time as well...it´s been a while :-)

PS got to talk to my sister today. Nothing beats that.