twenty-something years of "what have you been up to?"

Author: place2place

  • making my week this week

    OrangeStefan and Camille are on vacation this week, so we went swimming and sat outside in the covered terrace by the pool. I felt like we were at a resort! We had lunch–whole wheat pizza bagels and oranges– and tea.

    Julia_child_2My Life in France, the Julia Child book, is so charming, I am utterly enchanted by Julia’s wonderfulness–I love reading about her beurre blanc research but more interesting is her process of becoming more deeply who she always was. Her husband’s photos are dreamy.

    I’m so inspired by the great pictures my friend Norma took at the Cure Salé that I asked permission to gather photos people have taken here in Niger and put together a small photo exhibit at the Embassy. I think it could be very theraputic for those of us leaving, and hopefully interesting and inspiring for those staying. And everything looks good on black background, right?

    08aspr_wg289_cor_3My dad is out of the hospital. That’s always a good thing. Alaska2africa: Peter’s sister Nina bought her plane ticket and is coming to visit. And something good is coming from Boden.

    Camille can bake cookies all by herself now.

    Swingset

    Peter’s back from Ouaga, and he took some amazing photos on the road. His photo of the girl with honey–yes, that is honey, the black stuff in the plastic bottle–is over at the photo-a-day blog today. Of the 500 Daily City Photo Blogs the Niger photo-a-day blog is the 10th most popular. I’m happy people like it, and I’m happy for Niger to be 10th in something positive.

  • actually, no

    DCM (one person down from the Ambassador) to me: “I heard you got Moscow. Are you happy?”

    Me: (does a little happy dance)

    DCM: Uh, have you ever actually been to Moscow?

  • nigerien circus

    Kittens55_2

    Four kittens are a terrorist circus, rolling somersaults off each other, hanging upside from my pantleg, chasing their tails, then screaming in pain when they catch it, attacking for no reason, except being a six-week-old kitten. Now they each have a different personality, the most siamese-looking “Smokey” is very mellow and affectionate, the tabby one “the Rascal” is the first to do everything, open its eyes, eat real food, go outside, claw the furniture. He’s super social, always the first one to come out and say hi, but more independent. The one with pink ears “Pinky” wants to be as crazy as the tabby one, the one with the black nose “Mignon” is the shyest, but doesn’t want to be left out. Right now s/he has half a crayon in her/his mouth like a cigar and is spinning in circles. And she’s the calm one.

    We have a home for one of them, maybe two. The kids have two weeks off school–lots of time to watch the kitten show. As soon as they go back to school we will foist the kittens off on some unsuspecting first-grader families. Or maybe I’ll have a raffle. Here’s how it works: if you don’t buy a ticket, you win a kitten.

    Kitten6

  • another chapter from mrs. piggle-wiggle

    Thank_god_for_ebay

    At bedtime, after reading the chapter, “The Won’t-Go-to-Bedders Cure.” Stefan said, “What would Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle do for me, since I can’t get to sleep at night?” “Well,” I said, “First, I have to call all the other parents, and ask them what they do. ‘Ring, ring. Hello? Mrs. McGallicutty? Do you have a problem getting Drake, Carlotta or Bruchetta to go close their eyes at night and go to sleep?’

    And Mrs. McGallicutty, says, ‘Oh no, as soon as the children’s heads hit their pillows they fall asleep, sometimes BEFORE their heads even touch the pillow. Why?’ ‘Well,’ I tell her, ‘Stefan has such a hard time closing his eyes at night.’ Mrs. McGallicutty says, ‘Have you spoken with Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle?’

    And Mrs. Piggle-Wiggle says, “Have Stefan ride over on his bike to pick up the Can’t-Go-to-Sleepers kit.” But the kit is so huge you can’t ride with it on your bike. In fact, you have to pay a big African man to carry the kit back to the house on his head.

    The kit consists of lights that we have GSO install in your room. Lights so bright, so colorful and twinkly that when you lay on your bed, you HAVE to close your eyes AND wear the sleep mask from Air France over your eyes.

    And after three nights, you beg to have the lights removed. You say, “Can’t I just count sheep?” And I say, “Maybe, if you are good, you can just have the overhead light, and the hall light and the little bedside lamp.”

    “The big bright lights are a good idea though.” says the Won’t-go-to-Sleeper, who has to find just the right stuffed animal to sleep with, and have a glass of ice water and have the mosquito net adjusted before he finally gives up.

    Wont_go_to_sleeper

  • song lyric here

    Moon
    Total eclipse of the moon tonight! Go here to see what time it happens where you are. If I’m up at 4:30am and can figure out where the moon is, I’ll have a look. This is what it looks like here tonight in the dusty sky of Niger.

  • jazzi

    Jazzi_2

    Stefan is now riding Camille’s old bike, a light blue one with white tires and blue streamers on the handles, pink stars and “jazzi” painted on the side. At home I would have to teach him that he can’t ride that bike in public, it’s too girly. He rides it every day and is looked upon with envy, even by teenage boys.

  • les chausseurs

    Shoes
    Sometimes I find Zoure washing our shoes.

  • afriki

    Music_habib_afriki_cover

    Last night, under the stars and moon, we ventured out to the Centre Cultural Franco Nigerien–otherwise known as the Say Say Eff En–to hear some music. All the French people were there, shocking me a little bit: Stefan’s teacher smoking a cigarette, Camille’s normally demure tutor in a sexy t-shirt.

    Soothing, acoustic, listenable african music: thy name is Habib Koite. He was so charming, sang with a rich lovely voice and his band backed him up on all kinds instuments, new and ancient. He’s been on David Letterman (why not on one of the nights I watch?) played at Bumbershoot in Seattle and Rolling Stone magazine calls him "Mali’s biggest pop star." Peter pointed out that the band had so many different sounds, sometimes latin, sometimes reggae, but always with the talking drum and Koite’s beautiful guitar. Go listen to a little bit of Africa over at Amazon.

    Imagine you are sitting under the little dipper and as the music goes on, the moon sets. It was a moment.

  • recipe cheat sheet

    Dinas_recipes_small

    I’m blatantly ripping off Amy’s angrychicken recipe cheat sheet, perfect for hanging on the refrigerator. I thought it was so smart I had to do it. I am so sick of looking for the same recipes all the time. We have gone through so much vanilla and flour (I order it by 25 lbs bags from King Arthur) than I ever used before. If you want something here, you have to bake it yourself, so there has been much baking in the last year and half. Which is good, because the low fat banana bread that I love from Starbucks, according to their website, is 380 calories. Whoa.

    I hardly ever use the salt called for in the recipes, except in the pizza dough and crackers, in which case, it’s crucial. I usually use half or two-thirds the butter called for and substitute a local plain yogurt they have here, that doesn’t even have a label. The butter here is all imported from France, and it’s awesome. I also use at least partially whole wheat or white whole wheat flour in almost all the recipes, most of the time, after the year-long brainwashing from Jennifer Fulbright. Like Amy at angrychicken, these are the original recipes, I make substitutions as I go along, depending on what’s around, but I like to start with the originals. Like Amy, I don’t need the cooking instructions. I just need the proportions, I know the process and which pan to use and that most everything does fine at 350 degrees.

    The recipes come from a variety of sources. Ludmilla, Peter’s sister is a baker extrordinaire and I could easily do a whole sheet of her original recipes. The pumpkin bread’s origins are hotly contested. It might be a recipe first used by Peter’s sister Helen, who cooked for a restaurant for years. But I got the recipe from Ludmilla. Years later I asked Peter’s nephew Peter for his amazing pumpkin bread recipe, he said he got it from his mother, and she got it from Milla, so it was the same recipe boomeranging around the family.

    Angel Biscuits recipe from Cooking Lite magazine, circa 2000, Sky High Biscuits from a restaurant we frequented in collage, the Epicurian in Arcata, California. A friend got hired there, thank god, so she could sneak out the recipe to their amazing whole wheat biscuits. Sesame Water Crackers from a Portland local, restaurant owner and cooking show star Caprial, from her cooking with kids show. Roll the dough out in a pasta cranker and bake them in huge sheets, serve with hummus. Brilliant. Pancakes and waffles from Joy of Cooking. Carrot Muffins and Chocolate Cake from Everyday Cooking. The Apple Cake came from Camille’s first year of preschool at the San Francisco Jewish Community Center. The class baked it for Rosh Hoshana and I think every parent asked for the recipe. They baked something, usually challah, every Friday and we were always encouraging her teacher to write a cookbook. My sister is always a great resource, and luckily she’s compiled her recipes in a cookbook she gave me. Many of the recipes here I copied off sheets of paper stuffed into a recipe book she hand wrote for me when Peter and I got married.

    Printable recipe sheet here.
    Download dina_recipes.pdf

  • what took me so long?

    Desk
    I hung up a cotton ribbon to make a changing display of inspiring items over my desk.