Hunger Games: Finding our favorite restaurants in Maputo

Since we both work during the weekdays, we try to go out to eat in the evenings when possible. Dan's office is just a short 5-7 minute walk from the hotel. I work either in the hotel room, in the cafe downstairs, or in the small business center just to change my scenery around when I can. All this means is that we try to go out to eat off the property when we can. We've tried a few restaurants around town so far, but there are still plenty to explore. Luckily, Dan's coworkers here are friendly and kind enough to offer up some recommendations.

Our first night in Maputo we went to Maputo Waterfront. Dan had a seafood rice dish that was a bit like a cioppino. I had some tasty red snapper with potatoes and veggies. The takeaway from the first night was: "oh thank goodness, the wine is better here." Suppose when you're a former Portuguese colony who sticks with the language and culture, the wine ought to be of Portuguese standard as well.

Sunday, we ran some errands... found the local supermarket and got some snacks to have in the room on days when I don't feel like going to the cafe or breakfast buffet. That night, we ate at the cafe downstairs and watched the Cowboys/Packers game on the computer via Slingbox. (And no, we shouldn't discuss Dez Bryant's probably-should-have-been-a-catch-to-likely-win-the-game-but-some-stupid-rule-says-it's-not.)

Monday, we tried a sushi joint that Tripadvisor had dubbed the best sushi in Maputo. Let's just say we hope it's not the best sushi in Maputo. If it is, we will be looking forward to our return to Accra where we have at least two sushi restaurants that are significantly better :)

Tuesday, was our most interesting find. A place called Wine Lovers (right up our alley, right?). A tapas style restaurant with a wide selection of bottles and an extensive menu. Biggest challenge? Servers only speak Portuguese and menu is in Portuguese. So we took a stab at it and ordered a few dishes and some wine and had a nice evening.

On Wednesday, we decided on a more casual vibe and went to Mundo's. It had come highly recommended by Dan's coworker, Driaan. Considering that he's "melanin-deficient" (aka white) and from South Africa, we trust his expat tastes. Upon pulling up in the taxi, we quickly learn that Mundo's is a HUGE, open-air Sports Bar. Way to go, Driaan! So we had some beer and wings and pizza and watched some soccer. I forgot to take pictures that night (whoops) so here's the logo for Mundo's:

Thursday was a quiet night at the hotel restaurant as I had some work that went into the evening and needed to stick close to home.

I'd say there's one major food takeaway so far: everything, and we mean everything, comes with french fries. While that was fun for about 3 days, we are totally sick of them on every level. Thus, one of the first Portuguese phrases we have perfected (along with thank you, good morning, and big bottle of water) is "sin batatas" or "without potatoes". We get some surprised looks for rejecting the fries but it's better for our health in the long run. Looking forward to seeing what else this city has in the gastronomy department. More foodie posts to come, I'm sure since this was only the first week's recap!

Welcome to Maputo!

The adventures continue... Dan is officially on loan from the Ghana office to the Mozambique office in the capital city of Maputo. Now before you run to Google to figure out where in the world Mozambique is, let me save you the trouble.

There ya go... At the bottom of the country you'll see a little tip that goes south... That's where Maputo is. On the Indian Ocean, not far from Swaziland (the little circle bordering Mozambique) and South Africa (the much bigger, and appropriately named country covering the Southern portion of Africa).

We actually arrived almost two weeks ago and have been taking that time to adjust to the city and culture here. Here are some notable differences that we've encountered thus far:

• Maputo's infrastructure is significantly better than Accra. There are pretty decent roads that actually have lane divisions painted on them, parking spaces are marked and many streets have (gasp!) sidewalks.
• Maputo appears to be more European than Accra. More high-rise buildings, rather than the sprawling development of Accra. 
• Mozambique drives on the left (we assume because South Africa does and the countries border each other). Since we don't drive, this isn't a huge issue but is important when walking that you look the appropriate direction to check for oncoming traffic.
• Mozambique speaks Portuguese... womp womp. We can both read Spanish fairly well so that helps quite a bit with menus and written directions. However, spoken Portuguese sounds nothing like Spanish so we're having a hard time with that part. When in doubt, a little charades with a server or hotel staff goes a long way.
• Less taxis available here in Maputo. We kind of miss just walking outside and having our pick of taxi as they honk at you beckoning you to pick them in Accra.

We live in a hotel while we are here in Mozambique. We are currently not certain of the timetable for Dan's work here but assume we will figure it out as time goes on. Dan's business visa is good for 6 months, whereas my tourist visa is only good for 3 months. We will reassess the situation in April to determine if he is almost finished or if I should attempt to renew my visa.

I'll leave you with a couple of photos of the view from our balcony:

The Sea Freight is here! The Sea Freight is here!

Praise the customs officials! The Sea Freight is here!

If you recall, we packed and shipped our items on 20Aug2014. We were quoted 2-4 weeks for air freight and 7-11 weeks for sea freight. The air freight took 4 to arrive, clear customs and be delivered. The sea freight took 15! Maybe they should adjust their estimates haha. The challenge is that customs required Dan's passport again to clear the sea freight. Not a huge issue except that we have travel plans that require his passport. I have to admit I think it made our customs clearance go a lot smoother given that we had a tight deadline.

All in all, we've survived just fine without our stuff but it sure is good to have it back. The major highlights for me are having our mattress back as well as our artwork/wall hangings. To me, those are what makes a place home, besides Dan of course. But, he was already here (old news haha)

The movers arrived and said they would unload the truck then unpack the boxes once everything got upstairs. The boxes just kept coming. There were four guys and they just kept bringing stuff in. Where did all of this come from?! How did it fit in our teeny tiny 827 sq foot apartment in San Francisco?! This apartment is almost twice the size and I don't have a clue where all of this is going to go! So after my initial freak out, I was ready to attempt the task of giving these items a "home" for the next couple years.

Slowly but surely the boxes came upstairs, the guys put our bed back together and moved the small amount of furniture we did bring to the appropriate rooms. It was a very busy day between getting my work done, the movers coming, unpacking, and dealing with an air conditioner that decided the day should start off with a lovely puddle on the living room floor (ha!)

Alas, most of the stuff is put away... aside from the electronics which I refuse to touch and I think Dan prefers it that way. With the unpacking almost finished, it surely must mean that it's time to repack. Seems to be the way of life, just a series of packing and unpacking. We're off to the US for four weeks of work, family time, holidays, visiting friends, wine tastings and New Years in San Francisco. The blog will be on hiatus during that time as we won't have any riveting Ghana stories to share with you.

Upon our return, hopefully we will have artwork up and everything in it's place and we can share some pictures of our Africa home. Best wishes, Happy Holidays and Happy New Year to you all! We'll talk to you in 2015!

Love,
Jen and Dan

What?! No Halloween in Ghana?!?

Ok, ok... Let's admit that this isn't all that surprising. With as Christian as this country is, I can't say I'm shocked that they don't celebrate a little Pagan holiday that is chock full o' costumes and candy.

Those of you who know me well know that these three months from October to Christmas are pretty much my favorite. I love decorating our house for this time of year and Halloween is the kickoff to the season. So when we packed up our items back in San Francisco, I made sure that the Halloween and Thanksgiving decorations were in the air freight. Yes, we may not have half our wardrobe or our real bed, but you better believe I've got pumpkins and turkeys out the wazoo.

So without further ado, here are some of our favorite decorations for this spooky special occasion.

Note: Sunday's post may be a little late as we're attending Accra's Oktoberfest on Saturday evening and it may take me a bit to send/upload the photos.

So... What's in the BOX?!

Excuse the terrible Seven reference... But I bet you're wondering, after Dan's guest post on Thursday, what the heck was in that box? You know, the one that was a bit more spherical than rectangular by the time he actually got to leave with it? Actually, here's photographic evidence and no, we did not open it.

So what was so important that we had to have it shipped from the US? What are the things that make us think of "home"? What are the household essentials that couldn't be located here in Accra?

• Honey Nut Cheerios
• Goldfish - Dan is obsessed with cheese flavored crackers, which is odd because he doesn't really like cheese
• Cheez-Its
• Shakeology
• A Dishwand with sponges (the one where the soap goes in the handle)
• Chlorox wipes
• Swiffer Dusters
• A Swiffer handle for the wet Swiffers that I brought (not pictured. If you're thinking "why in the world does she have the wet pads but not the handle, the answer is the handle is in the luggage that was supposed to come with us initially but got lumped in with the sea freight. So in a couple months I'll have two!!! Is there such a thing as too many Swiffer products? I think not.)
• Damp Rid - safety precaution with the humidity here so we don't ruin all our clothes
• Clinique makeup - yes, I had my makeup shipped from the States. Unnecessary? maybe. Sorry I'm not sorry.
• Popcorn kernals for the air popper
• Harvest Yankee Candle
• Worchestershire Sauce - because... burgers on the grill.
• Low Sodium soy sauce

And those, my friends, were the contents of the first care package. Stay tuned as there is another en route from the other set of parents with more American goodies!!

Introducing: Aspect Court

Hooray! We finally have moved into our new apartment in Accra! Friday was a crazy busy day of meeting the air freight and furniture delivery people, unpacking everything, and attempting to find new homes for our things. Nothing was broken and there were only a few miscommunications. All in all, we have had a very productive couple of days and are looking forward to settling in and spending our next 23 months calling this space our home.

The apartment is 3 bedrooms, 2.5 baths. Quite the size upgrade from our 827 sq foot, 1 bed, 1 bath apartment in San Francisco, though quite similar in market value. There's a master bedroom with an en suite bath, a guest bedroom with a sizable bath across the hall (you hear that, potential guests?!?!), and a small third bedroom which has become my office and our workout space. There's a large great room that will be both our living and dining space and a decent sized balcony. Currently, the balcony only holds Dan's most prized purchase... the grill. We intend to purchase some outdoor furniture from a vendor on the side of the road at some point (I think there's a new blog post brewing there).

Here are some photos of the new space. I intentionally took these before anything got delivered as I wanted you to see the "blank canvas" if you will. Once we get things situated (read as: get all the dirty laundry washed and put away), I'll take others of the furnished space to share with you. Hope you enjoy these in the meantime!

Living/dining space looking out onto balcony

Kitchen... though I'm quite sure you didn't need a descriptor here.

Guest bedroom

Guest bathroom (hell-oooooo, soaker tub. Have I mentioned 

I love that corner ledge for a glass of wine? Just sayin')

Learning to Cook... all over again

Apologies for the late post. I've had technical difficulties most of the morning.

Now that we've been here for almost 3 whole weeks, we're starting to get into the groove of day to day life. Grocery shopping, working normal hours, cooking/eating dinner together in the evenings, etc. Speaking of dinners/food... we've had our share of meals out and about. Mostly the normal go-out-to-eat cuisine: some Italian, Sushi/Japanese, Mexican, British Pub, even Chinese delivery and a pizza delivery. (I'll give you three guesses what we were glued to the Slingbox viewing when delivery became a requirement).

As far as home-cooking, we're slowly getting acclimated to the local grocery's offerings. Most of our meals are chicken related, though admittedly, we were pretty chicken heavy back in the States as well. I'd say the weekly grocery staples are a variety of fruits and vegetables (notable missing items include berries and zucchini), chicken, quinoa, lentils, and some additional salad fixin's. At least one or two meals, we try to incorporate something new beyond the usual fare.

We have tried some beef and pork so far which has been noticeably different in taste and texture than we are used to. We assume it is due to the soil and crops grown here that become the diet of the animals. Imagine the temperature and humidity contribute greatly. To be fair to the pork, it deserves another chance. Dan thought he grabbed a pork loin (based on appearance and the label on the package that said "pork loin" haha); however, when he opened it, it unrolled into a long, thinly cut piece rather than the round loin he was anticipating. His preparation was still very good; however, the mistake was an oven miscalculation. He was quite confused as to why the oven only went to 280 degrees. It wasn't until later that he realized he probably overcooked the pork quite a bit because that 280 degrees was Celsius (or approximately 536 Fahrenheit... whoops!)

All in all, we're winging it most weeknights and doing just fine. Most of our old go-to meals are a bit of a challenge as we are usually missing a key ingredient that isn't stocked here... namely, any Mexican food staple, ricotta, hot sauce, spinach, etc. But we're learning, even if we are a little bland and/or repetitive right now!

Visual evidence that we don't call in the pizza reinforcements every night!

 

Top row: mixed greens with tomato, bell pepper, carrot, avocado, topped with chicken;
quinoa with chicken, tomato, carrot, bell pepper, garlic, onion.

Bottom row: another quinoa/chicken concoction with cranberries, almonds, garlic and some veggies; chicken thighs with lentils and broccoli; pork "loin" with broccoli and a red wine sauce.

Lessons Learned in Ghana - Part 1

I thought it would be fun to compile a list of "lessons" that we have learned over the course of our two weeks here in Accra. Some of these may shock you and others may not seem odd at all.

• There are very few street signs, so we're going to have to learn how to get around pretty quickly... especially once we have our own vehicle. Thank goodness for Google/Apple Maps.
• Cab drivers are not familiar with street names, due to the lack of signage. Thus, you usually have to give them a landmark that is close by to where you want to go. For example, the Bistro 22 restaurant we went to, we told the cabbie Zenith Bank which was across the street.
• There are no real addresses or personal mailboxes. Our apartment lease literally states the address of our compound as "Off (insert street name), Opposite (insert landmark or noteworthy place across street)". All of Dan's coworkers get their personal mail delivered to the office.
• The US Embassy is laughably large... unnecessarily massive. We really want to go in to see what they have in there taking up that much space. I'm certain we will at some point. Future posting on that? Likely.
• Cabs are prevalent where we are currently living. There are no sidewalks here, but if you are walking down the side of the street, open cabs will often honk at you to offer up their service. Also worth noting, cabs do not have meters so you should always negotiate the cost of the trip up front before getting in.
• Ghanaians speak English with a British twist. They use British vocabulary and their pronunciation is decidedly British, but with an African accent. This makes it slightly more difficult to communicate with locals as the American accent makes it hard for them to understand what you are saying (and vice versa for that matter).
• Dishwashers and Dryers are NOT common appliances here. Very few apartments come equipped with them. Washing machines, however, are considered a standard kitchen appliance and are often located in the kitchen or in a small utility room off the kitchen.
• The "nosh" (you're welcome, Gram) of choice here is toasted peanuts. These are what you get to snack on when you order a drink while seated at the bar.

That's all for this installation of Lessons Learned in Ghana. Something tells me there will be more like this one haha!

The First Few Days as an Expat

We are officially expats (short for expatriates). The term basically encompasses any person who is temporarily or permanently residing in a country other than the country in which they are citizens. We landed in Accra on Sunday evening, cruised through Immigration with our visas and arrived at the baggage claim to find all of our bags neatly grouped waiting for us. There was a driver waiting for us to take us to our temporary housing, which we have provided for us for 30 days while we find our home for the next two years. 

Exiting the airport here is trial by fire, not because of the geography or the culture. We've been here before and knew what to expect. The surprising part is how many people come up to you, take your bags and then demand money or tipping for their "service".... you know, the "service" you didn't request or desire in any way. Suffice to say, we have learned quickly.

Our first few days have been filled with the typical expat tasks: open bank account, obtain new cell phones, explore local mall/shops, and purchase some groceries. Everything moved pretty smoothly and even grocery shopping was a pleasant surprise. 

Some of the takeaways from our first Shoprite experience:

• HOORAY'S 
• full array of vegetables
• multiple kinds of peanut butter
• and incredibly, almond milk... who would have guessed that Accra would have almond milk?!
• WOMP WOMP'S
• couldn't find quinoa at the store
• bananas are quite small and bright green (still unsure if this is normal or they had just come off the truck and not yet ripened)
• JURY STILL OUT 
• avocadoes... they carry them but the bin was empty so we're still not sure how Dan's guac will fair with the local produce
• Vino - mostly Chilean, South African and some Australian wine. We haven't found any American wine so the exploration of new varietals continues.

All in all, our first full day was pretty good. We topped off the evening by meeting some wonderful new friends (if you read my second post regarding our move to Accra, I mentioned a friend that I had met on the Internations website). Meeting them was really quite fun, kind of like reuniting with an old friend even though we had never physically met. We had a great evening together and are so looking forward to many more gatherings over the next couple years.

Tuesday and Wednesday consisted of a lot of apartment hunting but we have not yet made a final decision. Hoping to make a choice soon, so I'll hold out on you until my next post!

The Woes of Packing

Today, I write from sunny Frankfurt, Germany during our layover en route to Accra. This week has been an emotional roller coaster for both of us. Saying goodbye to friends and coworkers, while also looking forward to our new adventures. I'd say about 60% of this week was consumed with packing our belongings... and mind you we both worked all week so that was pretty much every available moment we had.

The challenge with this move was definitely the categorizing of our things. Our apartment in San Francisco was only 827 square feet, surely not large enough to have acquired an overwhelming amount of paraphernalia. While I don't think anyone finds moving easy or enjoyable, it's much smoother to be able to tell movers to pack everything and take it form Point A to Point B... all of it... one place.

Our challenge was a bit more complicated. We had the stuff that we wanted to have immediately which went in "sizable" checked bags. Mostly, Dan's work clothes, a transformer to change voltage, clothes for me, bathroom products, the items we needed until the last possible moment, etc. (See photo below for definition of sizable and thank goodness we are able to expense our baggage fees.)

After we outlined the "must-have-right-away's" we moved on to classifying the rest of our items. They had to go into one of the three remaining categories:

• Air Freight (expected arrival 2-4 weeks, not including customs clearance)
• Overseas Freight (expected arrival 7-11 weeks, not including customs clearance)
• Storage in San Francisco (see you in two years)

We decided that the easiest way to accomplish this was to assign each category an area of our apartment and start moving the applicable personal effects to the correct area. This task, while daunting and quite time consuming, actually helped the movers immensely.

Eventually, everything was packed and our little downtown apartment was sad and empty. We only had one small miscommunication with the movers. There was one piece of luggage intended to be checked baggage that was not appropriately located and it was taken as Overseas Freight... so we'll be getting that one a little later than we intended. Oh well. Better late than never.

We will keep you posted as the goodies arrive and hope to have an apartment that feels like our home again by Turkey Time. Off to board our connection to Accra!

The Big Adventure...

As you may know, Dan works for an accounting firm here in San Francisco. We'd been offered an opportunity to live abroad for two years on rotation with his firm. After much deliberation, we agreed to give it a try! We both love to travel and figure that this decision would allow us to experience new places that we likely would not otherwise. So here it is...

We are excited for our new adventure, but getting to this stage in the game was anything but smooth. This opportunity has been on the table for almost a year and we just recently got all of the necessary logistics worked out in order to book our departure date and organize our relocation. Suffice to say that our first experience as expats has been a rocky one but we are not going to let it get us down.

Some of the "lessons learned" that we wanted to pass along (should any of you find yourselves with a similar opportunity):

• Go visit the country before committing to the big move. While this is not a "must", it is "highly recommended"
• The country's consulate in your home country will be your best friend (in our case, the Ghana consulate in Houston has been a life saver. I think I have them on speed dial)
• Remember while packing that you may have differences in voltage and plugs so adapters and transformers will likely be a necessity
• Timely responses to emails and phone calls are generally uncommon in Africa, so be prepared to follow up and try not to get discouraged
• and most importantly, PATIENCE is a VIRTUE (especially when waiting for news)!

My last and probably best recommendation to you: join a website called Internations.org. Think similar to Facebook, but for expats. You sign up and create a profile and then can change your location to where you will be living. There are forums with Q&A, people looking to buy or sell items that may be helpful, apartment hunters, expat gatherings, etc. You can add friends and private message people for assistance. I met a friend on this website who has been in Ghana for a year now and she has been incredibly helpful to us. I so look forward to growing our friendship when I arrive in Ghana.

Only a few days left until we leave the United States for our big adventure! So much to do in such a short time! :)