End of week 4

Hello from Africa! We are still in the Eko hotel. We have selected a flat and been approved by the building committee. Our container is still on the docks of Houston but we will be able to use float furniture (loaned from Shell). We are presently wait listed for float.

In the meantime, the Eko has three separate parts and six restaurants. It covers an area equivalent of several city blocks and is quite comfortable. So everyday, I make peace with being here and we don't have to pay for anything except internet.

Chris has hired a driver named Sam. I haven't met him. He starts Monday. Our new car hasn't arrived yet but Shell will allow us to continue using a loaner car.

We had an interesting experience last weekend at the mall, where we went for the movie, a different mall this time. It was time to buy me a phone, so we passed several different stores walking through and when we saw the Nokia store, I decided that would be good because I trust Nokia phones. We selected a real basic phone, paid for the phone and were when we told the clerk we wanted to use Glo as the provider, he told us we would need to go down to the Glo store and buy a Simms card for the phone and then come back, so we did that and then came back, and he had some kind of issue the the card, so all three of us walked back to the Glo store and finally got phone, simms card and cards with minutes. You don't have to pay a monthly fee. Once you have all of the above, you just buy minutes, but we have to be sure to buy Glo minutes or they wont work in my phone, and you can buy minutes on the street while waiting in traffic. So, now I am gloing!

Everything is slowly coming together and falling into place. Chris now has desk, desk phone, cell phone, smart card, driver, and he is getting into a new rythm.

Yesterday, we celebrated our first Nigerian Holiday: Democracy Day, and the Nigerians are very serious about their holidays. We don't get the American holidays, but the Nigerians have a lot more holidays than the US, so we are okay with that. We celebrated by having a day off and doing our Sunday routine.

We continue to be amazed at the weather here. The highs are usually in the 80's and 70's at night. It is unusual for the temperature to be above 90. So, it is 70's to 90's year round. What a great place, this tropical island!

I am posting a few pics. When Chris went with me to see the flat I had selected, he brought the camera. The only picture he took inside the flat was of one of the closets in master bedroom. The flat has a front balcony and back balcony so he also took pics of the view from the front balcony. I think I have some pics we took before of Niger Towers because we actually decided in January that was our preference. Also, there are some pics of the construction of a new car park at the hotel.

Stay tuned!