Do 1 thing every day that you used to

Someone gave me a tip recently: you have to continue to do the same things you did before in order to not go crazy.  (Although he mentioned he continued to mountain bike while carefully navigating the landmines with a bike he carried on the airplane, I thought I'm not THAT dedicated to my hobbies).

But I have found that many aid workers tend to work hard, (long hours as well as weekends) and drink even harder.  This lack of work-life balance combined with the sheer number of cigarettes at ‘parties’ (boring gatherings with no dancing) got me thinking this was good advice.  So I resist the temptation to do work on the weekends and instead I have been:

Not my photo b/c I ate them all before I could take one

Cooking - I go to local markets and buy new vegetables. I came across this (I don’t recall the Arabic name) was striped green and yellow, was the size of a roma tomato, but looked like an eggplant inside...so I sautéed it up with garlic and YUM!   

I’ve made curried lentils, creative omelets, chili, hummus, roasted vegetables, sauces with okra, a pumpkin and chili pepper coconut curry and luckily I have an Italian roommate who manages to find Barilla and panna cotta so when in need I still eat a farafelle delicioso.  

My honey-oat bread

There is a food shortage and food prices are high, for a while we had no bread, and even when you can get bread its not the whole grain, organic, local stuff I became spoiled on.  So I started baking and using half flour, half oats that I ground up to make it a little more ‘grainy’.  

The funny thing is, it makes you appreciate food more.  When I came across cheddar cheese from Kenya, I bought it and thought ‘how delicious’ and then laughed realizing in the US, I would have declared a non-sharp cheddar cheese not suitable for my palate. 

Gardening – this is a new one, we all know that I lack a green thumb and if anything I have a dead thumb.  But when I realized that I could plant arugula and then have fresh greens, I got very excited.  Although I have been eating some fresh greens, I have to admit, the plants would be dead if it wasn’t for my cleaning lady.  But I have time to figure this out :-)

Salsa Dancing – Juba actually has a nightclub - De Havana - where there is salsa dancing.  Apparently a contingent of South Sudanese rebel fighters were sent at some point to Cuba (which rhymes with Juba) to learn from Fidel and Che.  I’m not sure they brought back the intended lessons because when they returned they opened up a salsa bar - true story!  So you can imagine my excitement when I arrived and realized I could still dance.  However due to ‘criminal activity’, the UN has barred us from going (I think its because its run by the ‘Cuban Jubans’).  Luckily, there are a number of people that have instead brought salsa to a local restaurant.  So every Thursday for 2 hours, I  dance in an African tukol, at a Lebanese restaurant, Latin salsa, with a lot of Scandinavians. 

Random goat = curry dinner?

Running – my broken foot healed and I’ve started running again.  I realized a white girl wearing shorts running through the streets probably wouldn’t go over too well, so I tried running the perimeter inside my compound.  

2 minutes a lap x 10 laps = a 20-minute run + I understood what prison must feel like 

20 minutes = an eternity = an understatement 

So I headed off to the peacekeeping base, where the peacekeepers have a ‘track’ (read: a dirt path in the middle of grassland).  This has taken running to a new level.  Mind you a ‘cool day’ is 96 and dry.  Anyway a couple times a week, I run.  It's interesting, you see UN helicopters taking off and landing, vultures circle overhead which when alone gets a bit eerie, all the different UN peacekeeping units, and occasionally you pass Ban Ki- Moo (the cow given to Ban Ki Moon for a sacrifice when he came to South Sudan, but he doesn’t believe in animal sacrifice so Ban Ki-Moo was sent to live on the running track).  One day after a rain, I almost smelled the ocean and pretended I was running out at Asilomar or Ocean Beach.  But all the while the sunsets are the most beautiful, vibrant red I have ever seen and I feel good to be free, running, zoning out and letting the stresses of the day escape. 

Don’t worry friends, I’m actually quite happy I’m also studying Arabic, planning my volunteer work, hosting dinner parties, reading all those books I meant to, and my work is rewarding.  :-)