Mauritanians love Barack!

Our last night in Nouakchott we went to this fancy restaurant with tons of amazing Barack artwork. Our personal favorite was the painting on the left where Barack is painted wearing a 'boubou', the traditional clothing of moor men.

Bunny Ears Make Everything Better

There is nothing more entertaining to me then pretending to celebrate normal festivities like you would in America. Although it may seem ridiculous, and somewhat childlike, pretending that Mauritania is a mini America makes me a lot more sane. For instance, “Spring Break Boghé!”, Halloween costume party, stuffing Christmas stockings… so naturally Easter was no different. Thanks to my mom, this holiday was complete with everything a 6 year old could dream of haha….

Me, Julie and Yates started the Easter festivities off with egg dying at the Boghé house on Good Friday. It was unanimously agreed on that everything is better (and more hilarious) when wearing bunny ears. Washing the dishes, packing, doing work, cooking, everything. Also, putting Easter bunny ears and bells on Bailey is always a recipe for a good time.

Then I went up to Aleg to visit Amanda for a little bit before we both went to Nouakchott together for some much needed R&R. All I can say is thank god I travel with bunny ears in my purse because we just happened to run into a guy selling vegetables (on Good Friday mind you) with an "I heart Jesus" hat on. The perfect holy week photo op! Once we got to Nouakchott Saturday we decided to buy each other “easter baskets” (plastic bags with goodies in them) and hid them around the room for us to find on Easter morning (with bunny ears on of course). On the right is a pic of us with our Easter complets and goodies!

After baskets we went to mass at the Catholic Church here in Nouakchott. It was a really nice mass, even complete with some Mauritanians converting and taking their first communion (notice the Africans in the picture on the left wearing completely white/sequins/glitter ball/rhinestone dress and hair creations). On the right is a picture of the courtyard outside the church, although it is also surrounded by a huge 20 ft tall cement fence so no Mauritanians can tell what it is.

Some of my friends that I went to Easter brunch with…

Everything is better with Easter ears! Picture on the left is me doing some work in the Huda, our hotel in Nouakchott. And on the right is me with the newly installed picture of Obama! Interestingly, if you go back to my Christmas post there is a picture of us with George Bush (lame duck president) and next to him, Sidi, the old president who was ousted in a coup back in August. Now Obama has replaced Bush and the other frame is vacant…

Spring Break Boghé!

This week is the break between trimesters in Mauritania and although even in America we have switched over to the politically correct time of “Spring Break”, Mauritanians call it “Pâcques”, meaning Easter in French. Yes, the Islamic Republic of Mauritania where only 3 Catholic Churches exist (to legally solely serve the purpose of foreigners). Besides the fact that the break isn’t even close to Easter, it never gets old when my girls ask what I’m doing for “Pâcques.” I try to correct them and say for my school vacation but they continue to go right on using it.

So for Pâcques break all schools are closed and thus both the girl’s education and English education sectors have a little break as well! So Julie Ann came in for the week and we decided to have our own college-reminiscing spring break celebrations (well for me I used Dayton to Daytona for inspiration haha)… complete with kiddie pool, all day long party, beach (do you count the desert?), beverages, DJ (aka ipod), ping pong, bathing suits and beach balls. It wasn’t exactly Daytona, but we try!

Then we took a road trip with Ryan to visit Matt in Kaedi for a few days… it was ncie just to relax, make a ton of amazing lemonade (theyre in season!), go fabric shopping (Kaedi is known for their fabrics), and play games (just like back when the 4 of us were in PK7 with none of the amenities we have now).

All in all it was a great break, time to get back to work!

On the right is me and Julie in the kiddie pool, which took FORVER to blow up and would periodically start losing air every so often. I cannot even begin to tell you how amazing a pool feels in horrible heat! (gift idea for anyone who is interested, electric air pump). On the left is Julie with her beloved beach ball and our dog Bailey (yes, when she had to pack her entire life into 80lbs of luggage back in June she had the foresight to pack a beach ball).

The pic on the right is at the regional house where, despite the incredible heat, Bailey insists on laying all over me and making me miserable. On the left is a picture of my host family hanging around in our courtyard in the afternoon…