February 24 "No one likes you when you're 23"

Today I feel it is appropriate to tell you 23 things that happened today. Here goes. 1) Instead of the stray dogs chasing my on my run today, I ended up chasing them. 2) My stalker student did not show up for tutoring today which is good because he is no longer allowed to come. 3) Female D&D made me a yellow cake with chocolate frosting—my favorite!—and delivered it during breakfast, which was a bold move. She told me she didn’t decorate it nice because she didn’t want to try to take the place of my mom. J 4) I was asked in class by one of the wives today about how young girls approach puberty in America and equally awkward and more awkward questions. 5) Today (and most days), I taught students who happened to be breastfeeding their children. 6) T made me a HILARIOUS card and gave me a gift that made it all the way from the states. My favorite was that it was wrapped in tissues. 7) We gave the kids candy (or sweets, as they are known here) for my birthday today and yesterday and I heard some of my little preschoolers saying birthday as I walked past. J 8) While the preschoolers were waiting for their teacher, they got excited by sounds of me leading a rousing round of spelling words with the older students, so T had to literally chase and shoo them out of the guest house area. 9) After being shooed, 3 of the preschoolers continued to be curious and climbed a tree so they could see what we were doing over the wall. Yes, the lesson what that good that all the students wanted to come in! hahah 10) I celebrated my birthday by having no power or water for the entire afternoon. 11) When the transformer blew, my initial thought was that it was a Civil War cannon. My father has taught me well. J 12) We later learned that the “explosion” was caused by a monkey who got too close to the transformer. 13) During pm tutoring, the students got to illustrate and read a story about my birthday.  14) I FINALLY got my little second grade friend to spell her name correctly more than one time in a row (her name has five letters in it), and the ABC chant is helping her recognize letters and know what they say. 15) L and her son N brought me a basket full of yellow roses today! I didn’t even know they knew it was my birthday! 16) We went to The Tourist with D&D, which, to my surprise, involves a math teacher from Wisconsin. 17) The name would fool you, but we ate at Mike’s Kitchen tonight, across from the theatre, which is a South African chain. The food was pretty good. 18) D&D snuck off to tell the waiters it was my birthday so I received a delicious sundae, fully loaded with sprinkles and red and green sauce and even a sparkler on top, while they serenaded me with a birthday chant, comparable to the one at Friday’s. J 19) We found out what was going to become of the monkey. One of the sem students is taking the monkey, preparing it, and offering us monkey meat to eat tomorrow. 20) S&P and their daughter S were at the same restaurant we were at. When they came over, S invited us to a South African magic show that is going on at the school she teaches at, AIS—American International School—on Saturday. Random, but fun! 21) I am preparing to shop until I drop as D&D are taking us to the big Dutch Reform market that happens once a month on Saturday. 22) T and I FINALLY picked a date for our game park adventure with D&D. Three weeks away; I’m so excited! 23) T and I appropriately ended off the evening by taking a series (my word of the day for tomorrow) of awkward/funny pictures, while a spider and lizard watched on. We were just happy that the power had come back on while we were gone! And that is how I celebrated my birthday in Africa. J