Ten days and counting...

We have less than 2 weeks left of our trip, and I have to say, the time has flown! With our few remaining days, Jared and I plan to make the most of this beautiful place. Dinner, drinks and good byes with our friends Doug and Amanda, Freddy, Pastor Milton, Allen, Jose and Maria, Isilda, and Madalena will be filling a lot of the last days. Jared is cruising through as much as he can at the archives and is completely satisfied with the work he has done in the last 9 months. We closed our account at Eco Bank on Friday, and the bank manager and tellers were surprised and a little sad to see us go. It was pretty touching to have everyone waving and wishing us luck in life.

We are taking our fill of the sun and the food too before we go. We are eating as much marlin, sail fish and swordfish as we can at B24 (a hole in the wall in the park) because it is so delicious and cheap! We pay about 3 Euros for a huge steak of fish, fried bananas and rice – and in the US, these types of fish are $10 per pound usually! We are also eating our fill of buzio del mar (sea snails) at Papa Figo and enjoying the grilled chicken and rice at Sabor da Ilha. This is the only meat on the island that we trust and eat, and it is so good! The restaurant is owned by a Portuguese man, and it has wonderful food! The rice here is fried in oil and then boiled, so it remains a bit crunchy, but has a ton of flavor! We can’t get enough of it! We also are visiting Jasmin quite a bit because this spot has the best dessert on the island. Jared favors a cake made of wafer cookies and I love the chocolate mouse! And of course, we are spending as much time as possible at our favorite spot, the Pesante café next to Mirimar hotel. This café is right on the ocean and the view is stunning! Blue and white waves crash on black volcanic rock, there is always a breeze, so no matter how hot the sun is, sitting there is refreshing, and there is usually some sort of ship out in the bay to watch. Jared and I waste so much time here on the weekends! I order a café (European espresso) and Jared orders a galao (café with milk) and we chat and stare, completely at ease and relaxed like we have never been before. I am so going to miss this!

We are also working on our tans at the pool! Neither of us have ever really been the type to tan easily, and so even though we are totally tan for us, I am sure we will not be as tan as our friends back home. Oh well, I think the sun has done us some good. It has relaxed us, I think!

Along with food, sun and friends, we are plotting the rest of our souvenirs to buy. There really aren’t a lot of options on this front. São Tomé does not have much tourism yet and the tourism that does exist is resort, 5 star, very elite and expensive tourism. So, the few items that are available are totally expensive, way out of our price range, and really not at all “São Tomean”. – Like a painting will be of elephants, but there aren’t any elephants here, and it will cost 250 Euros. So, there really isn’t much for us to choose from. However, the island is known for its coffee and chocolate, so these items are what we are going to arm ourselves with.

10 days and counting….

It's Election Time in Sao Tome

For the last month, 15 different political parties were having parties all day and night trying to sway São Tomeans to vote for them. Luckily for us, most of these parties were held across from our apartment in the soccer stadium in the local park. These parties did not consist of speeches and promises for a better tomorrow, no, they were straight up parties - loud music, local musicians, food and drinks. Some of these political rallies went late into the night and some were held during the day specifically for children. During the days, trucks and cars drove around town with flags waving, people yelling out the windows, and some with speaker systems in the bed of the trucks blasting loud music. The different parties had colors, so if the cars and trucks were driving by super fast (which was usually the case) then you could still see what party it was for. There were about 4 major parties with the most money to spend for votes that we saw most frequently in the city. Oddly, around the same time as the elections were drawing near, new clothes and accessories started to appear on people, new cars and trucks appeared on the roads, and tons of new scooters and motorcycles appeared. Our friend who is the Cape Verde Ambassador told us that during election season (which happens every 5 years) money suddenly appears. Money that is not around any other time for roads, education, or health care. Another friend of ours told us that the owner of the Toyota shop in town was bragging that during election season, he sells 5000 motorcycles and scooters! Enough to get him through till the next election time. A guy we know worked for one of the parties, and his job was to go into communities with a truck full of clothes, beer, and soccer balls and to just give it all away in the name of the party. The local park, like I said earlier, held quite a few of the rallies, and because of this, light bulbs that had been out for months were replaced for the late night parties! Its so nice to walk through the park and see where we are going now. I know that in our country votes are bought and bribed for. I am not so dumb as to not think it happens. But to see it so openly and blatant, especially in the face of such need and negligence – it was really hard to witness. There is not a local paper that regularly is printed here, and the news on the TV and radio did not talk about specific parties, so Jared and I have no idea the platform of these various parties, and I think – given the multiple rallies we witnessed – that a lot of São Tomeans did not either. Several people we talked to (Pastors, artists, and the guard on our street) all said that they do not vote because the whole government is corrupt and it doesn’t matter, that the parties are not about issues, just money. How sad. To be a democracy, to be able to vote and to feel that your vote does not matter – its just like the USA in that respect, I guess.

Anyway, another very popular bribe is power. The electric company is owned by the government, and as the elections drew closer, our power got better and better. In fact, the elections were supposed to be in March, but were pushed back twice and finally were in late July. As we discussed power issues with people the whole time here, a common lament was “Oh, the power is good now because of the elections. Just wait until they are over. You haven’t seen anything yet!” On any given day, Jared and I have about 14-20 hours of power. The outages are usually 1-3 hours long and happen all throughout the day. There is no schedule for the power here, unlike other countries and even the island of Principe. The longest we went with out power was 14 hours – we had two of those back to back with 2 hours of power in between. But, as the elections drew near, we were having 20 -22 hours of power everyday! It was great! But, we were also worried about the days following the elections. Luckily, it hasn’t been too bad. The last two weeks we have been having about 16 hours of power or so a day and usually the longest outages are late at night when we are sleeping.

A new party ended up being elected, but not by a huge majority, which means the old party and the new one will have to work together. This, we think, will be good for São Tomé. Learning to compromise and work together is good for anyone!

Thank God we are in a country that is stable, safe, and non-violent. The last attempted coup was 5 years ago, after the last elections. A group of rebels stole the nation’s only tank and planned to storm the Presidential Palace. However, the tank needed gas and the São Tomeans in line at the central gas station in town refused to let the tank cut. So, while the tank was waiting in line at the gas station, the military retook the tank and the “coup” was over.

July, 2010

It has been a month since our last blog post. Sorry about that. Really, there has not been too much to report on. In the last month, we rented a car again and our friend Beth joined us on our trip. Beth is from Washington D.C. and works with Waveplace, a non-profit that picks up with programming where One Laptop Per Child has left off. She came to Sao Tome last year for 2 months to start a program in a school here and came back for a month this summer to check on the progress. Her arrival brought about Polly's departure, which was really sad, but Beth was fun to hang out with, so that was cool. And, she introduced us to some people on the island, which has proven to be useful.

So, the rent-a-car trip...Jared needed to get pictures of various monuments, statues, and the like in several places on the north and west of the island, so this was the direction we set out. We hit Guadelupe, the 5th largest city on the island (not that big of a deal seeing as how there are only like 7 cities total). Then we went to Augustino Neto Roca, the largest one on the island. THis one was quite impressive, as it had a beautiful, maintained garden to visit as well as a hospital (no longer in use) and a church that happened to be decorated for a wedding the next day. Most of the items in the National Museum are from this roca and it is a big tourist attraction, if you want to go so far as to say there are tourist attractions here. After this, we drove to Neves, the 3rd largest city where the Rosema brewery is, and then on to the landing cite of the Portuguese nearly 400 years earlier. We are lunch at the lighthouse above Lagua Azul and I have to say, it was one of the nicest moments of our time here. The dry season had taken its toll on the long grasses around the inlets and everything was golden like hay and the waters around were dark blue, the sky was bright crystal blue and in the distance, you could see huge Baoba trees with their empty short and twisted limbs framed in the blue above. It was so peaceful! Also, along our way, we had picked up sugar cane and cocoa to try, so after lunch, we munched on some fresh sugar cane - so hard to rip apart with your teeth, but super good - and then we cracked open a cocoa pod and sucked on the beans inside. It was awesome!

After that break, we went to Fernad Dias, a north point on the island that where the horrible Batepa Massacre ended. A deep water port is in the slow, African process of being built, and so the monument that once stood there in memory of the massacre has been destroyed. Not moved, but demolished!!

*Interesting side note here - the port right now is in the city, very near our apartment. This has been the port since the city was born. However, the water in the bay is very shallow (and as a result, cluttered with lots of decaying and rusting boats and ships) which causes container ships and all other vessels to anchor out in the ocean. Then, little tug boats with small barges go out, load or unload, 3-4 containers at a time and then chug its way back to the port. The whole process is very slow and ships will be out in the sea for a week waiting to unload and reload. The new deep water port would be twice as fast if not more! Its amazing it hasn't been done yet!

So that was our rent-a-car day number 2 and our last trip around the island before we go home Now we have done and seen everything outside of the city that was on our list!

And now, Polly and Beth have been added to the list of people who have gone. Our friend pool now consists of Doug and Amanda, Baptist missionaries from the states, and their two girls - we have dinner with them about once a week or so. They lived here for 4 years, left for a year to raise funds and are now back for 4 more years. Their youngest girl was born in Sao Tome and has dual citizenship. We also met a guy from Sweden, Freddy, who is here building a hotel. He has traveled everywhere, speaks English, and is bored just like everyone else here. So, we get together with him once a week to have a drink and talk about the few things that actually happened that week. Then, there are Allen, Nilton, and Reggie. All Sao Tomeans and all really nice guys. We were introduced to them through Beth and now that she is gone, we see them every once and awhile, which is really nice. There are also Pastor Milton and Pastor Marquez, who Jared taught English too, and of course, the people we see everyday on our walks that we stop and say hi to, discuss the weather, and chat about whatever is happening that day. These people are the kids in the park who wash the cars during lunchtime, the guards of all the important buildings, and the workers of the cafes and such that we visit regularly.

July 4th – Independence and Inappropriateness

On July 4^th Michelle and I spent a sunny and warm morning at the pool. During gravanna the weather tends to be overcast and windy making it just a bit chilly at the pool, but that day was wonderful. Later that afternoon we met up with our new friend Beth to go búzio and beer hopping. You see, there isn’t much to do here so the only real way to celebrate the 4^th was with sea snails and local beer. Beth has joined our circle now that Polly left. She is here for her 2^nd time working with STeP Up. She actually works for a company that helps train teachers and students who receive computers from 1 Laptop Per Child – which apparently is good at distributing laptops but not teaching people how to use them. Anyway, nobody was particularly in the mood for búzio and beer so we only had it at one place before switching venues for coffee. We sat by the sea after dark (it gets dark at 6 pm so it wasn’t actually that late) and listened to the waves crash against the beach wall and talked for a couple of hours. It was a really nice day, although Michelle discovered later that night at home that she had eaten something that made her sick and she would have to go to the clinic on both Monday and Tuesday with stomach issues.

By Friday Michelle’s stomach was finally feeling well enough for her to venture out of the house which was good because on Friday the 9^th is when the American embassy from Gabon came to São Tomé (they are a joint consulate) to celebrate the 4^th. We got our invitations from our friend Isilda who works at Voice of America and is the contact for Americans on the island. The invitation was very fancy and said ‘formal’ attire but we figured that was a mistake because we’ve never heard of a formal 4^th party. The tradition is spitting watermelon seeds, grilling hot dogs, and lighting sparklers, right? Well we showed up to the affair, which was in fact VERY formal. Of course Michelle and I, keeping up a long tradition of being just a little inappropriate, were not formal at all. I was in khakis and an untucked green plaid cowboy shirt and Michelle was in brown shorts and a flowy top. Even Beth knew to bring a dress to ST after having someone comment to her last time that she always dressed “like a tourist on vacation.” So it was Michelle and I dressed for the mall mingling with the Prime Minister, Chief Justice, Head of Health Services and American ambassador all dressed in the nicest suits I’ve ever seen. When we arrived everyone was just standing around so an American woman in a navy uniform approached Michelle and I, after deducing that we were there to party and not network, and told us to go get a drink so everyone else would know they could too. Fortunately the drinks and food were free. It was really nice to drink wine and eat fried foods after so long on a diet of mostly fish, rice, and bananas. Michelle figured that people who were at an American party had to know English so she worked the room, because she’s been really frustrated that she can’t speak Portuguese. The highlight of that was when she introduced herself to the Portuguese ambassador and said, “Hey I see you around a lot watching the world cup at that restaurant Sabor da Ilha.” To which he replied, that in fact he had watched all the games at home. So Michelle informed him that he must have a twin on the island. Jared topped off the night by trying Scotch for the first time. All in all our two 4^th of July festivities will not soon be forgotten, no matter how hard we try.

Botanical Gardens, Rocas, and Beaches

Jared and I are totally enjoying our last few months here. The weather has cooled down this month about 5 degrees, but the humidity is down about 30%, so it feels so much better now! When we first got here, I about went crazy with the heat alone! I was dripping with sweat all day and night. The night here is only about 2 degrees cooler than the daytime, so when it was the hot season, it was nasty 24 hours a day. There was no escape from the heat! But like I said, now its much nicer. There is always a breeze now, too. Gravanna is the name of the season in West Africa that we are in right now. It is technically the dry season, so there is no rain, but we get the big, heavy winds from North Africa so it is really pleasant. In other parts of West Africa, Gravanna is terrible because there is no rain, its hot, and the winds are dangerous because of wild fires. But ST is a luscious rain forest, so even without rain, the jungle has precipitation and there is still food grown.

We rented a car last weekend and drove around the island a bit. There are still Rocas here that you can visit. They are the old colonial plantations. Most of them are really remote and run down, but a few of them are still operating and produce coffee or cocoa. They are really interesting to visit though, because they are little communities all their own. Most of the families that live on the rocas have been there since the plantation was built and have never been off the land! Can you imagine generations and generations living in one small area and that is it?! Each roca has a school and a hospital, if you can actually call them that. There are old run down colonial buildings that would be considered dilapidated in the US, but people are living in them here. Most everyone speaks Portuguese or some form of it, but a lot of the rocas speak a mixture of Portuguese and Forro (a local language) or a language all their own. It is so strange seeing these places. Its like walking into another world!

We also went to the Botanical Garden here which was awesome! There were samples of all kinds of tropical flowers that I have never seen before! Huge, waxy flowers that ca handle all kinds of weather and heat! There were also a lot of fruit trees, like pink and green guava, jack fruit, bread fruit, banana, papaya, and mango.

We went to a beach too, that is about 45 minutes away from the city. It is the only beach on the island that has sand dollars on it, but they are not like sand dollars you find in the US. Instead of being a circle, they look more like an octopus. The top is circular, but the bottom is cut out so that it looks like legs. They are totally weird. I think we picked up 4 or so of them. Hopefully they do not break on our way home!

Jack Fruit

There are a lot of fruits that grow in São Tome on a regular basis that I rarely have in the US. You can find these topical fruits, but you have to go to Whole Foods and pay a ton of money for them. Fruits like Passion Fruit, Papaya, Star Fruit, and Safu are available on every street corner and at every stand in the Market for, what amounts to, $0.30 in USD. Pineapples, 4 or 5 different types of bananas, plantains, oranges that are not orange but green, avocados, and mangos, are also everywhere. Breadfruit is also here and usually you do not have to buy it because most streets are lined with huge, beautiful, 2 toned green leaved, breadfruit trees that anyone can pull and eat off of.

Jack Fruit, however, is a fruit that I have never seen before or even heard of before. It is the ugliest fruit I have ever seen! It grows off of the trunk of trees, like a tumor, and is greenish-yellow, bumpy and sappy! A Jack Fruit is about the size of a bowling ball, but it is not round. They are oblong and bumpy with bulges at times.

To cut open a Jack Fruit, you must first dip your knife in oil so that it does not get sticky with the sap of the fruit. The women who sell it prepared (and people who prepare it in their homes) cover their hands in oil as well to prevent them from getting sappy. Once the fruit is cut in half, the first priority is to section off the fruit and cut out the white center. Jack Fruit has tons of pods in it with a seed inside each. Between each pod are fibers that need to be pulled away. (The pod is the edible part of the fruit.) Once the center is cut away, you can bend the section out so that the pods pull away from one another and the fibers break off. Then comes the tedious task of pulling out the pods, stripping away the fibers and trying desperately to create a bowl full of pods for everyone to enjoy, instead of eating the pod as soon as it is cleaned!

Jack Fruit is sticky, sweet, and so so yummy! It has the sweetness similar to a pineapple, but not the same taste. The texture is unlike any fruit I have ever had, and it seems odd to call it a fruit because it is so dense and fiber-y.

The Jack Fruit season just started and we are starting to see it in the baskets of the street vendors. So far, it runs $50,000 dobras (2 Euros) for a bag of prepared pods, which is pretty big and holds a lot of pods, and $30,000 dobras for half a fruit, unprepared.

Click here for pictures of Jack Fruit.

The Paradoxes of Africa

I never ceased to be amazed by the paradoxes of this fascinating place. As you may know the World Cup is starting today (and I am totally stoked to be seeing it in Africa!!). I've started asking around to see who most Santomeans are supporting in the tournament. When you ask who they are cheering for in the Cup they say, "Portugal!!" When asked about what they think of Portuguese people they say, "They are bad. They put us in slavery and killed us."