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Day 251 - 11 March 2006 I.S.T. & A.V.C. aaaahhh, beautiful Tarrafal...white sand beaches, beautiful clear water on top of bright blue-green reefs. and then, the UGLY Bruma Seka comes in and blocks out the sun, the moisture and tan I was gonna have after that week. poop on stick. Bruma Seka (as it was told to me) happens once a year and is when a HUGE cloud of dust blows over from the Sahara belt in Africa and basically just makes for an ugly sky and a super dry climate for a week or two. talk about bad timing! unfortunately, Bruma Seka wasn’t the worst of our problems. the sessions this time around were just a liiiiittle too reminiscent of the not-so-beneficial ones 6 months ago. obviously some of them were VERY necessary, but could have been run smoother and/or allotted more time since all of them seemed rushed at some point. the guest speakers were great and had lots of interesting things to share. hopefully I’ll get to coordinate something with at least one of them during my time here, although I’m quite sure how difficult that will be with the inter-island divide that the ocean seems to provide. «fingers crossed» I think a few of the sessions could have been scrapped and the time allotted for them could have been redistributed for the more necessary ones or just left out so we could enjoy more time on the beach or with each other in more informal settings. so in order to hang out and enjoy the company of folks I hadn’t seen in months, I sacrificed my sleepytime and expanded my drinkytime. we somehow ended up at the same restaurant 3 of the 4 nights there and enjoyed Italian cuisine with the longest drink list I’ve seen in this country! the waitress was a total sweetheart with the newfound overcrowdedness we provided. she took it all in stride though...attagirl... the bungalows we stayed in were SWEEEEET! beach bungalows surrounded by coconut trees and wild monkeys! (little ones) and I came to found that my student who works at the electricity company designed and fabricated the keychains for the beach bungalow hotel. what else happened, you ask? how about THE football game of all beach football games. co-ed and super intense, there were a few tense turnovers, a bunch of miraculous wide open touchdown catches and even a few amazing tackles and full field runbacks. screw the Superbowl, this was THE best football game THIS country have ever seen! (Cape Verde that is) the bungalow I stayed in happened to have a rooftop with a beach view. so of course, we did it justice by hosting the rooftop parties the last 2 nights there. too bad the wrestling matches never materialized. it’s a tradition for a couple of the Volunteers to throw together ridiculous wrestling match-ups with hilarious title names and this year was no different. after a long list of announcements following the final dinner of the trip, most people had at least a few good laughs and were ready to go. but for some reason when we relocated to the larger beach to get it on, nobody was down anymore. somehow the rooftop party cut in line and folks were just up to chillin and relaxin...chillaxin as we say...a bit disappointing, but not all bad I guess...and somehow, don’t ask me how, the Hapa Q? emerged...the explanation of the term followed by the romanticizing of the people as a whole followed by, you would have never guessed it, the Irish Q? are the Irish JUST AS underrepresented and disenfranchised as Hapas? or as any other people in the states? who knows how much of that was Mr. Sagres or the Volunteer in all of us talking, but it sure stirred up some emotions and fun follow up convos...maybe it was good we didn’t wrestle? the following day was a formal PC event attended by all and a night of interesting meal match-ups. we found our way to the "armpit of the cobra" for some yummy crepes. The return of Santiago tummyaches was in full effect for most of the trip for me, but I didn’t let that slow me down. I even made it to visit the host fam and distribute li’l gifts of lotion and chocolate. and boy did I take them by surprise! mom was workin away kabalalera’n (stylin hair) a few ladies at once, while the kids were fixing toy guns and cars. nobody seemed to respond to me too quickly, maybe since I showed up unexpected? but after an hour or so, they were all over me and showin me pics and askin me to print some of us for them. it was great to see them, but unfortunately enough for those few hours. back in the capital, I met up with the folks again and we set out (unsuccessfully) to the pizza place that had a broken pizza oven...NOOOOOO!!! enjoyed the penne instead and hopped on over to the ice cream shop to cooooool down on yet another super hot day. all in all a great trip because I got to see everybody I hadn’t for so long. hopefully I’ll get to visit some of their sites sometime in the future... <--- CARNAVAL!                Ides of March BEWARE! --->