30 years

July 13

It's a milestone. I've never feared it, only looked forward to it. Being 30 means so many things - my thirties are supposed to be better than my twenties, and I'm certainly excited about that but this specific birthday was certainly not the best.

We had only had Leelu for barely one day but I wanted to go out for a walk with her. Went out, brought my phone and within the ten minutes we were gone, I some how lost my phone and despite my efforts, it was no where to be found. I was a mess, tears all over the place and me kicking myself for being so irresponsible. And it was my birthday so that meant I couldn't get any fun text messages or phone calls.

That night we gathered with a small group of people at one of the nicest restaurants in town, Amanzi, and the evening truly was great. Good conversation and good dessert - all I could ask for really.

Leelu!

July 12
We got a dog! We talked about it for so long and kept telling ourselves that once we had a little more security, we would get one. It's all I could think about and my 30th birthday was coming up so we decided now (then) was as good a time as any. 2 days before my big day, we went out to the Friends Animal Foundation to check out their puppies. There were tons of dogs at the gate to greet us when we showed up and a fat cat even tried to stow away in the car. When it came time to pick one, I froze. All of a sudden the decision seemed overwhelming. I've never had a dog in my life and all of sudden this huge feeling of responsibility came crashing down and I didn't know what to do. Thank God Jason was there - he took one look at me and saw the tears welling up in my eyes and made the decision. He found the cutest one, with the strongest personality and said we'll take her. And she's the best thing to happen to us this year (well, besides getting married).


On the ride home we tried out a bunch of different names but the one that stuck was Leelu. My favorite movie is The 5th Element and when Jason suggested it, it just seemed perfect. Leelu Multipass Rosenfeld

Getting warm after her first bath.

Naughty! She's not supposed to be on the bed and snuck up there when I wasn't looking. So cute, it was hard to get mad at her.

FRIENDS!

Finally, after way too many months, we found a solid group of people that we quickly determined were going to be our good friends here in Zim. HIFA was the turning point for us and it drastically changed our quality of life. Having genuinely good people to hang out with and relate to makes a huge difference in truly enjoying a place you ultimately call home.

There are quite a few restaurants to try out in Zim, most being mediocre at best but it's something fun to do. Dinners out with a group of friends is a multiple hour affair (as it should be) and more often than not, we are the last group sitting around a table at 10:30, while the entire restaurant staff tries not to show their impatience when all they want to do is close up shop and go home. There are a few ethnic restaurants that people operate our of their homes - a sketchy Thai place and delicious Ethiopian spot run by a very sweet woman, who offers a full menu plus the traditional coffee ceremony at the end, complete with popcorn.

Rachel and Debbie

Kirstine

Sam and Sofia

As there isn't much to actually do in Harare, we end up hanging out at people's houses a lot. Despite winter being under way, we hosted a few Friday night braais (BBQ's to those who don't know the lingo) and a Sunday brunch, just to enjoy hanging out with good people.

Craig trying to pierce Rachel's tongue...she lost a bet about baked beans...there may have been alcohol involved!

Ursula and Josh...they're now engaged!

Will and Leila

Courtney

June

Heather and Theresa finished their Peace Corps tour and traveled to Mozambique, Malawi and ended their COS trip in Zimbabwe, hanging out with us. We toured all the cafes in Harare (the most exciting thing to do in Harare) while Jason worked and had some delicious food at Doon Estates (a nice but expensive place to shop). Monkeys will always fascinate us but someone recently equated them to the squirrels we have at home…good analogy but still, monkeys are way more exotic and fun!
We took a weekend trip to visit the Great Zimbabwe - the stone ruins that have been around since 1100AD. Many skeptic Rhodesians will tell you that there is no way the black Zimbabweans built it but that is just evidence of how deep the racism/hate goes…we've been apart of many of those conversations and it's exhausting. So much so that we eventually had to distance ourselves from those type of people to avoid those types of conversations. It's a shame. Anyway, the ruins are really cool and an interesting Must-See if visiting Zimbabwe.

It was a fun weekend and it was great having the girls around.

where to begin...

I don't even know where to begin. I just looked at my blog and realized that the last post was from May! There were 2 posts that I had written and never managed to get up so I just posted those but it's shameful really. So much has happened since May, it's hard to know even where to start. But I have some time on my hands so I'm going to get those who are interested, caught up on the last 6 months of my life.