A little too much right now!

The trouble with spending so much time on your own is your always right, and even when your wrong 'NOBODY KNOWS', trouble is this tends to lead to a false sense of your own cleverness, and yes that is a word, it's a quality you know.

Azzadine and I chat away as best we can, me with my broken french, and he with his broken English, I ask questions and he answers with a mix of Algerian, French-Algerian and English, we manage, we get where we are going and we are not late, often! 

Lessons are still on going, and I continue to practice on the computer when I am alone, I turn the sound down so the neighbours don't get sick of the sound of 'Où est le chat?' or 'l'éléphant est rose', although I think the neighbours baby will be speaking fluently in under a year... just ten months to go then.  I understand far more French now when people are speaking, well unless it's really fast, then I just give my best puzzled look and things slow down enough for me to catch up, sometimes!

Over the weekend I kept forgetting to get meat out of the freezer, so it was really unfortunate but we had to visit the Taj Mahal twice, once on Thursday then again on Friday, on our departure Friday the cheeky monkey on the door said 'see you tomorrow', it was only shame that stopped us going in yesterday, although we very nearly walked round for a take away....

iTranslate, NON

This week once again I am alone, my beloved is away to the sandbox, but not the Saudi one you understand, but the Algerian one. So since Sunday morning I have been left to my own devices, never a good thing, I have had one coffee morning, one French conversation group and two french lessons, and still I am no further forward with the Français, although now I can count to just over a couple of mille, and recite the passages handed too me, it's not pretty, it is only marginally French, but it's definitely not English.

In the middle of the pink area you can just make out my beloved waving...

I have often wondered about the language that we find ourselves the mother of, me I speak one language and it's a mixture of English, with quite a bit of Scottish and a wee smidgen of 'what the hell did she just say', that would be the swear words then! But it's not until you sit with someone and dissect your mother tongue that you realise just how odd it is.  For instance today with my French teacher we were talking about coffee, and how in Scotland we use the term fly or fly cup, this amused her no end, and then when I informed her that tea was in fact nothing to do with tea where I came from and was in fact the evening meal she was very perplexed and asked so when do you drink tea, the only logical answer to that question is 'whenever there is work to be done'.........So you see the language we use is not always the language of teachers, it is taken apart-reconstructed and thrown out there in a format to suit the occasion, and for me every occasion should start with a fly.... 

I learn't today that in France le goûter is a term for a tasty treat at 4pm, and yes it is that precise most especially for children returning from school, and is as much part of the French culture as tea is to the English.  So if I'm clever I can go from breakfast to fly to lunch and afternoon tea, and to le goûter without breaking stride, and then I can have tea, followed by supper and if god forbid I'm still peckish I can have a late dinner, it just depends on which friends I'm visiting as to which meal time it falls across, oh and don't forget there is always snacks in between times.....

Tonight I had the washing machine technician pay me a visit, the new washer does not like washing anything bigger than say a pair of knickers, and if you do try it will vent its disapproval by smashing the inner drum on the sides of the outer drum, I have tried everything to get it to wash and spin my towels and without success so the technician was called. So of course the machine was started (empty of course) and would you adam and eve it, no noise. C'est perfect! errr no could you please try it with some washing in this time, anyway the damned thing behaved until the last spin cycle when it banged just a little.  I was told I must use the synthetic cycle only or the quick 15 min that was for lightly soiled clothing, my eyeballs were rolling at this point, and my head was beginning to twitch, so I took out my computer and google translate was put to good use, now this would be ok if said gentlemen(there were two by the way), could spell, neither one was any use on the keyboard but we managed and eventually I accepted I am a dumbclutz and must do as I'm told, only use synthetic wash programme and all my problems would be resolved.... So just before leaving the technician decided to look under the machine into it's innards and low and behold in broken English I do believe I have a broken spring! God give me strength not to kill a technician, so I have it on a promise that the spring he has removed from the innards of my machine will be replaced tomorrow after midday, Inshallah - and remember tomorrow is Thursday my beloved comes home on Thursday with his washing and if the machine is not fixed he will be going back to Hassi on Sunday with the same bag of dirty washing....

Stitch playing dress up

Stitchworth of Arabia

Last Wednesday I received a message which started an avalanche of emails, texts and Facebook posts, I had just finished my French lesson, and was waiting for my driver, whom unfortunately I had given the wrong time too, mainly because my lessons started earlier and I forgot to adjust accordingly.... even timings are difficult when you don't do numbers, and I had been so proud of myself to be able to instruct said driver of my finish time in french, just a shame I was an hour out...


Anyway our boy Stitch needed rehousing ASAP, for reasons that are not mine to tell my poor friends had to ask for us to find someone to take him, now this is no easy feat especially when you are in one country, your friends and Stitch are in another country, and neither of those countries are home countries, so to Facebook I went and after a very stressful few hours back and forth between my wonderful friends we had a new home and family for Stitchworth. 

The King of the compound was going home to Scotland, Gods country! although I think when his little paws hit that tarmac he may wish he was back in the sandbox, this boy is not used to cold.  I was lucky enough to have three families wanting to take Stitch, and in the end it came down to first come first served, and the family that are taking him responded straight away with a unanimous 'we want him', I will always be grateful to all my friends and their offers of help with little Stitch, a very stressful situation indeed made easier by the animal lovers of Scotland,  that boy has a piece of our heart and we miss him terribly, but we just can't bring him here, and we don't have the luxury of turning down work. Like most people in this industry, that is just not an option in this climate, but that means for us we have to pass the reigns over to someone who will be settled enough to keep a dog forever in their home.

So please friends one more request, keep your fingers crossed for Stitch who flies on December 1st with another lady who is returning from the sandbox to Aberdeen, Stitch will fly as excess baggage and his new family will meet him in Aberdeen, he will be their Christmas present come early, and not from the North Pole but from Saudi Arabia, I bet this little lad never thought when he was dumped at the beach in Cyprus he would be this well travelled.......

We had offers from friends in Saudi too but for one reason or another these offers would not work out, so it was decided the best place for Stitch was home in Scotland where the dog lovers of the world live.

New House Mean Time

So Azzdine and I escorted my beloved to work with the car loaded to overflowing, we then headed to the new apartment for the first of four trips back and forth, taking with us 6 suitcases and numerous household items I had been collecting since arriving in Algeria.  Everything was left in one bedroom, and once we unloaded the last box it was time to start unpacking and organising, today is Tuesday of the following week and I still have what would amount to one full case to sort out, everything else has found a home, having a kitchen with loads of cupboards is a blessing, even if most of them are empty, when you don't eat food that comes from a packet or most of the time not even a tin your cupboards can look pretty bare thats for sure, just means I have more room for kitchen utensils....

The apartment has a verandah which runs almost completely around it and is a beautiful sun trap, and after the scorching sun in Saudi it is a pleasant change to be able to sit outside with out the insides of your eyeballs beginning to boil. 

So over the next few days I sorted out my new habitat and settled into the area, our first night in the apartment was spent trying to adjust the air con to suit, I have yet to work out how to use those damned zappers, as it appeared I had set a timer and after 30 minutes the air con went off and we began to cook, now it is winter here but the apartment having three open sides would lead you to believe it would be cold, but once the metal outside shutters are down everything gets real cosy.

We decided to head to Taj Mahal for our supper well it would be rude not too.  So our local curry house is around a km walk from the house which gives you ample time to work up and appetite and plenty of time to walk off your excesses.  We also popped in again on the weekend so even though they don't sell alcohol it is now our local.

We took a couple of strolls over the weekend as my beloved needed to get out from under the computer, and get some cobwebs blown away, we found a nice little cafe not far from the house, and on our second venture out we found some really nice shops not too far away.  More investigations need to be done as I have found nothing to compare with the market in Golf and the shops surrounding it, well so far anyway.

 My very clever ironing board that doubles up for short people to gain access to high cupboards

Burning down the house

We arrived in Algiers very tired and then waited and waited for our luggage, three bags arrived relatively quickly, but the last one just wasn't appearing, it wasn't until they shut the carrousel that we really started to panic, my beloved was standing with a group of gents who likewise were missing their luggage when out of the corner of my eye I spotted a little red shoe lace attached to a black suitcase, I ran over and hauled the thing off the belt and suddenly realised that we had in fact been waiting for the wrong colour suitcase, my beloved was still gurning when I called him over, he still didn't notice the case I was standing in front of, we had waited almost an hour and a half for a case that had probably been trundling round for most of that time, lesson learnt, remember what colour your cases are.

We arrived home and decided there was no point unpacking as we were signing contracts in two days, so cases were lain open upstairs and the basics were removed.  My beloved had a fantastic surprise for me when we sat down to eat, he had in his hand luggage my wedding tray, the one I had made just after we got married, and also the digital photo frame that has our wedding photos on the memory card, having had to pack all our belongings and send them home to the UK this was an absolute delight that my beloved had been so thoughtful and managed to stuff three items into his hand luggage and all without me knowing, the third item was my 'your so blind you need magnification mirror', for those times when I don't wear lenses but need to apply make-up and not look like coco the clown.

Sunday was Independence day so no office for my beloved, which just meant he worked from home, internet permitting. We then took a walk in the afternoon to get a little shopping, my beloved dragging his man trolley behind him. We are so lucky that we don't care we don't speak French, and the Algerians don't care that they don't speak English (for the most part), but between us all we get our needs met and our purchases paid for, and when my chicken butcher said Grande supreme he wasn't kidding, now I find it odd that mainly it is chicken butchers I find on my travels, its not always the case that you find a store that sells both beef and chicken, most interesting indeed! 

I have been searching for quite some time now for coconut oil and ghee/clarified butter, neither of which I can find, so I have resorted to making my own ghee and last night was the night, and may I say I am rather impressed with myself I now have two jars of the amber nectar which should last me quite some time, or at least until I find some in one of the many stores around town, now don't misunderstand me I can find vegetable ghee all over the place, but that stuff is not for me, blaaaaah its animal ghee I'm needing so I had to resort to making my own.

Monday morning and it was a meeting at the new apartment to take note of the things I will need for moving in, and to be fair I don't need much, an ironing board is a must and everything else we can manage with until we have settled.  I now have a set of keys to our new home, and tomorrow the engineer will be to adjust the tv or at least the satellite dish so we can have english channels, now I have no idea which English channels they will be, but to be honest as long as the internet is working I really don't care! I am saying a little internet prayer as I type............

ps... I forgot to mention for the second time since moving in I have tried to burn the house down, we had to take the battery out of the fire alarm as it was so sensitive it kept going off when we were cooking, unfortunately on Sunday I completely forgot the cauliflower bake I was cooking and only realised when the smoke started billowing under the kitchen door, I pulled the bake out of the oven and threw the blackened mess into the sink where I made the mistake of dousing it with water, gads the smell was like horse manure and had my eyes streaming and my head pounding, windows and doors thrown open and the smoke was allowed to escape, I swear I could still smell the horse poo when I woke the next morning................