Playtime

One of the great things about living in the tropics when you're five years old is that 12 months out of the year you and your best friend can sneak off outdoors during a rain storm, get naked and play in the mud for as long as you want - or at least until your mom finds you.

Survivor GABON!

Well at least somebody in the States has discovered how exciting and exotic Gabon, Africa can be! The makers of the US TV show Survivor are apparently over here (where? where?) getting things lined up to film the next season on a beach in Gabon! (I'd be willing to lend them our private island if only they'd ask.)

Check out the preview: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sY6Hb-1ffKs

And an article:
http://hollywoodinsider.ew.com/2008/05/jeff-probst-tal.html

Filming begins at the end of June and the show will air in September. Ask me how badly I want the interpreting job on this one!!

Now if only I could help the announcer learn to pronounce the name of the country properly...

Walking

My friend Mary (in white tee shirt in the picture below) and I each added a baby to our respective families at the same time last summer. Soon after returning to Gabon with baby I realized that every time I found myself driving along the waterfront in town I would see Mary power-walking along next to my car! (Well, maybe not the same speed, but you get the picture.) A few weeks and a whole lot of drive-by disgrace later I got up the courage to join her three mornings a week for 10K walks.

One day at the end of our walk Mary asked me if I would mind having "a very nice, old woman" join us in our walks once in a while. Figuring my pace was pretty slow anyway, I said of course she could join. "Oh, but she walks very quickly though," warned Mary.

The next morning Mary and the "old woman" (woman in red shirt below) showed up at my door to start our walk. Hmmmm....I thought to myself, I guess Mary considers late 50s to be "old".
Our new walking buddy told me her name was Lillian, and as soon as we headed out I realized she was in much better shape than I was. Both Mary and I had to pretty much jog to keep up. Here's a shot of Lillian walking:

About a half hour into our walk Lillian began talking about her daughter who's in her late 40s, and I started wondering how young she must have been when she had children. Trying to calculate quickly while keeping up with her pace, I tell Lillian she must have been quite a young mother. That's when I learned that this amazingly fit, very talkative, speed-walking French woman is 74!!!! I of course spent the next hour of our walk pumping her for information on HOW SHE DOES IT! To summarize, she walks 20-30 kilometers a day, eats small meals and uses normal facial cream from the supermarket. I'm not sure I can manage all that walking into my schedule, but I can say I'm definitely hooked on walking now and I guess I don't need to change creams.

Here are a few typical scenes of what we see on our morning walks through downtown Port-Gentil. In these shots Germaine, a Gabonese friend of Lillian, is joining in.

Mr. Obame

I'm teaching English these days to a great number of French-speaking Gabonese oilfield workers. They all work on rotation on the oil platforms out here, and for those of you not directly embedded in the world of oil, it may make you chuckle to know their official job titles are Roustabout and Roughneck. Even better, though, is hearing someone describe his job with a French accent. I mean, try saying "I em a Ruffffnek" as if you were Pepe Le Pew and tell me it's not kinda cute!!

The students are all very eager to learn, as they work for a large US firm and have to work with Americans quite a bit. One of my favorite students is named Elvis, so of course when we had our lesson on body parts I just had to teach him the world pelvis. Another student is named Parfait (Perfect) Obame! Not a bad name, I must say, even though he swears he is no relation to the future president of the US. I'm thinking I might not want to take any chances and give him an A anyway...

Libreville

Jourdain, Cecilia and I needed to make a day trip recently to Libreville (the capital city) to renew our passports. Although we transfer through Libreville airport four times a year to get from Manji island (where Port-Gentil is located) to Paris and back, we had never actually seen any of the city itself.

The bumpy plane ride to Libreville was nothing new, but excitement was still in the air for the young pair who got to skip school for our outing! (I should add here that our poor little 8-month-old Noah is going to have to wait for his US citizenship, as this trip is just a bit too, um, adventurous for me to want to take him at this point.)
As usual, the kids scooted right up behind the pilots to watch them magically work those levers and dials as they do. I myself prefer to pretend none of this is happening while I look the other way, pray for no turbulence, and simply hold my breath until we land 40 minutes later... Of course I do this all while keeping my "mom is calm and in control of the situation" face. As we took off over the ocean towards Libreville our plane headed directly over our private weekend-getaway island, which is the long fish-shaped vegetation surrounded by white sand to the right in the picture. Towards the bottom of the island, on the right, you'll notice a square of sand with a small black dot set into it. That's our cabana and the clearing around it. The black water between the island and the mainland is a deep river that winds around and heads inland just out of the picture.

This was our first day-time approach to Libreville, and it was only then that I realized the city is not quite the thriving metropolis I had always assumed it was.
Once in town though, and on our way to the embassy, I understood the city was at least big enough for a billboard boasting the past 40 years of dedicated public service of President-for-life Omar Bongo.
The city, it seemed, was even big enough for a second billboard advertising the "40 years of economic and political decisions" of President Bongo, resulting --naturally-- in "peace and stability".As our taxi drove us on to the embassy I couldn't miss the next billboard explaining that Bongo and his wife are helping in the fight against HIV AIDS.
Most importantly though I discovered that Libreville is so thick with propaganda that if I kept on taking pictures of it all I might not have much memory left in my camera for the rest of the day's events.

The three of us needed new passport pictures, so we stopped en route at a crowded photography shop. Once inside I turned to see Cecilia next to me holding her breath for so long that I thought she might pass out. "How can you STAAAAAAAAAAND it, Mama???? Can't you SMELLLLLLLLLLL how much it stinks in here?" I thanked God no one in the shop understood English and quickly told her not everyone has a shower in Libreville. At the US Embassy things smelled a bit fresher, but as we were the only ones in the room there was much less entertainment to keep the kids occupied.
We put our coloring books to good use...
and made up for the boredom with a quick pizza and swim before catching our bumpy little flight back to Port-Gentil.