CHRISTMAS HOLIDAYS!

We're departing African soil tomorrow for a place far north where Santa Claus lives. Above is a picture of our little elve that will be travelling with us to meet him.

Rovaniemi is a city located on the Artic Circle in Finland.

After spending two nights in Helsinki, we arrive in Rovaniemi on Monday, ahead of the week's activities laid out for Chritmas! We will be visiting Santa and his post office, and will go husky dog-sleighing, reindeer sleighing, and snow-sledding, and may even have a glimpse of Northern Lights. For a once in a lifetime experience! We have never ever had a "white Christmas"! This year we will have a Christmas Eve dinner surrounded by snow. Wow, I am so excited, as I'm certain Paul and I will be transported back to a fantasy world. We can't wait to see the look on Torden's face when he sees this white, icy, fluffy stuff with which to build a snowman!

When we ask him what he wants for Christmas from Santa, his usual reply is: "I want a stinky shoe!" So now I have a "stinky hat" in my stocking, and Paul has a wishlist for a stinky sock. I have no idea where he gets that from....

And for those of you thinking about the cold, here's Rovaniemi's weather forecast from when we arrive next Monday, 22 December 2008;

Monday NightOvercast. Low: -6 °C . Wind light. Windchill: 0 °C Heat Index: 0 °C .
TuesdayPartly Cloudy. High: -4 °C . Wind NNW 10 km/h . Windchill: 0 °C Heat Index: 0 °C . Tuesday Night Scattered Clouds.Low: -16 °C Wind NNW 3 km/h Windchill: 0 °C Heat 0°C . WednesdayChance of Snow. Scattered Clouds. High: -5 °C . Wind South 10 km/h . Chance of precipitation 20%. Windchill: 0 °C . Heat Index: 0 °C .
Wednesday NightChance of Snow. Scattered Clouds. Low: -7 °C . Wind South 10 km/h . Chance of precipitation 20%. Windchill: 0 °C . Heat Index: 0 °C .

I'd like to wish all of you a Joyful Holiday Season, and an uplifting 2009!

FASHIONABLY LATE!

My husband has always been the timekeeper in the house. You see I came from a home where we were mostly on time, but it wasn't really an issue, if we were late for a party, a half an hour or so, it didn't matter to us, as we were not affected. But we were always on time for school, church, most functions etc. When I met Paul, things changed a bit, I started to see his side of things. I realised that being late for anything, be it an informal invitation to someone's house, a birthday party, meeting someone at a restaurant etc, was actually extremely rude and to keep the other party waiting for you was disrespectful! Where I come from, it is quite okay to be a little late, as it is a laidback city! The joke is always, " they call Cape Town the "mother city" as it takes 9 months for anything to happen!". Well, when I arrived in Kinshasa, I realised that this is the city where everyone is Fashionably Late! Even when you attend a wedding, the invite states a time, and all the guests arrive about 3 - 4 hours later! We attended an end-of-year function last Friday, and all the guests were late, now I'm talking about 2 hours late, which makes everything late, the serving of dinner, the speeches and of course, the time that you come home! The funny thing is it is expected that most people will arrive late! And somethings will never change!

LIKE A BIRD!

I AM AS FREE AS A BIRD

ALL I NEED IS WINGS TO FLY

TO ANOTHER DAY IN TIME

I HAVE TIME TO GROW AND SPACE TO CLIMB TO A HIGHER PURPOSE!

FORGE AHEAD AND DON'T LOOK DOWN, FEEL THE WIND BENEATH YOUR WINGS,

LOOK AT YOUR BEAUTY IN THE REFLECTION OF THE RIVER DOWN BELOW

THIS MOMENT IS YOURS

-Ingrid

THANKSGIVING!

We were fortunate to be invited by an American friend, to join her family for a belated Thanksgiving Dinner! We had never experienced this "famous" celebration before, so it was a real treat! The turkey is the main feature of the meal, and gammon ( I now know that folks in the US call it "ham").

What we found unusual was a yummy sweet potato dish with a marshmellow topping and pumpkin bread served as a main side dish ( these are two dishes that we would usually have as a dessert!)

First time for me was, cherry pie, and pumpkin pie. They're both delicious, and we have subsequently found out, that Kristen, our host, is a "fundi" on making sweet dishes.

(Kristen, hope you get to read this, but Paul is dying for some of your choc chip cookies).

Besides the food, we had great company amongst friends and people we would not have met otherwise!

We have the best of both worlds, we get to experience cultures, without having to visit the country!

I guess we have a lot to be thankful for surrounded by all the poverty here!

OUR LITTLE YOGA GROUP!

So we're not fully fledged yogis, but we try hard and meet bright and early on Mondays and Wednesdays. If there was one thing, I really wanted to try and keep on doing was my yoga classes, but never had the discipline to do it on my own. I even bought a DVD on yoga, and actually followed it for a while, but no luck when you have a spotted dog licking your face while doing the "downward dog". My Mom even, joined us while she was here and loved it. It really is a blessing to be around such positive people, and Meeja, you are an inspiration! NAMASTE!