Just My Imagination? (plus African food)

Saturday morning I "slept in" until 7am, which felt pretty good but really wasn't enough. For the first time in days, I got to exercise, which felt really good. I climbed up our apartment stairs six times, nearly forty floors. 

Antonio the plumber came by just before 10am to look at the toilet handle that wasn't working. He took it apart, looked inside, and said "there is a piece missing -- this never worked!" I replied that it had  worked fine for the last year and only stopped this week. He said, half kidding, that I must be imagining it! We both laughed pretty hard. He will try to find the replacement part(s) and get back to us. When he returns, we will try to have him fix the toilet that runs continually in the apartment for the Sorelle right beneath us.

After that it was still early enough to go get a haircut, which I have been needing for a while but never had time. Fortunately I only had to wait for one customer before getting mine done, which was even more surprising since it was a Saturday, but after me there was a big line. We went before noon to the Institute so that Dee could make enchilada sauce for the senior missionary couple dinner Sunday night at the mission home. Rhenald was out shopping for ingredients for our African food evening activity and was supposed to be there at 1pm. Dee and I had a pool to guess when he would show up. I said 1:55pm, and she said 2:25pm -- she nailed it! He then proceeded to work on his feet in the kitchen for about 7 hours, directing traffic and always being pleasant. Dee was there assisting the whole time, and Grace came by mid-afternoon to help out as well. 

 

 

 

I spent the afternoon mostly working on my two Sunday lessons, which for some reason weren't finished yet -- not surprising given how full the week was. I also spoke with my mom and my sister Marilyn on the phone. Karen and Dave messaged us to say that their day trip to Venice from Florence went really well -- I am interested to hear what they did.

About a dozen kids would show up, less than we had planned on, but we have never tried this on a weekend before. Given the smaller number and the fact that Rhenald insisted on making too many kinds of food, we had a bunch of leftovers. Here is the menu:

There was also a yellow custard that we dipped the accara (fried beans) into. Some of the stuff came out of the oven late -- it is hard to coordinate the timing with so many different things. By that point, most of the kids were stuffed. I really liked the accara, and the stew was apparently excellent, though too spicy for my taste; African food is well known for being extremely spicy. I also loved the turkey stew and the Accara. It was a pleasant surprise to eat the fried Accara with the slightly sweet custard. 

Emmanuel helping out

Frying the accara

 

Kids playing while waiting for dinner

Starting the custard

Mixing the custard

Dinner is served

Stew

Boiling moi moi in plastic bags!

After dinner

Baked moi moi

Ylenia brought some delicious homemade cookies with honey, which were devoured:

Rhenald basically ruined one of our (inexpensive) kitchen knives trying to cut turkey bones. Anziano Adepoju had done something similar months ago. Maybe this is just how they use knives in  Nigeria? He tried to smooth it out afterward, but I assured him it was irreparable and that we didn't mind. It was worth it.

During the afternoon, Anziano Balzotti called, asking me to order him some replacement toner cartridges for their home printer. Nobody in the office seems to have an Amazon Prime account, so they ask us to get them stuff, which is fine, since they do a lot for us. He also gave me an update on the mission cell phone plan. Nothing has happened yet, but Frankfurt is furious at how much we are paying, given the contract they had negotiated. Meanwhile, the mission continues to pay a lot. Hopefully some progress will be made soon, even perhaps a refund would be in order. I invited them to come down and enjoy some African food with us, which they did. We got to visit, and then they started working hard on cleaning up. They helped us carry a whole bunch of the leftovers home in the car to bring to our ward for the regular GANS after-church meal. It was just over 10pm when we got home, and Dee still had a bunch of work to do on her talk. What a week!