Party on the Patio

We had a little BBQ last night on the patio.  It was a fun evening, under a beautiful clear sky.  The Christmas lights on the Sonangol building in the background were turned on, adding to the festive feeling.

Here are some additional photos.

Sonangol is the state-owned oil company here in Angola.  They have a beautiful building, with a high-tech sign on top.  They have added this "light sculpture" for the holidays.

Here's a view of the pavillion where we serve the food.  These parties are always "pot-luck", but what makes them fun is everyone brings their supply of treats from home, so there's always something interesting to try.

Lunch with the Team

Our team usually eats lunch together in the cafeteria downstairs.  Today, we ventured out to a small "house restaurant" near the building where we work.  This is a favorite of the local staff, and I was glad they were there to lead the way.  It was about a 5 minute walk from the building, and although the weather is starting to heat up, the days are still quite pleasant.

We walked past the park near our apartment and continued on down the street.  After a few blocks we turned into a small alley that led to another even smaller alley.  There at the end was the Tia Maria restaurant.  The dining room is covered, but outside of what used to be a house.

We found an empty table and looked at the menu.  There were about 6 items on it, none of which looked all that familiar.  Luis, offered to help me order, and we found some grilled chicken, which seemed like a safe bet.  When the waiter took our order, I found out everyone else had ordered the same thing: Funge (pronounced Foonzh), beef in a stew, and beans.

Funge is a national dish here and comes in two main flavors; corn or cassava.  The corn is quite good, and the cassava is quite heavy, bland, and thick.  It is a joke among my team members that they only eat funge on the weekend because it is so heavy and time consuming to make.  The cafeteria serves it on Thursdays, and I think it is a major profit center for them; when you hand your plate to the lady serving up the funge, she starts piling it on.  I think she has been coached to do that because the food in the cafeteria is sold by weight, and funge is definitely the heaviest stuff you can put on a plate.  Yesterday Cesar's plate of funge cost $25!

My plate of chicken was delicious, but next time I'm having the FUNGE!

The REAL thing - Funge in an Angolan neighborhood restaurant

This is what goes on it - beef in a stew, and beans

Some of my team - Luis, Eurico, and Cesar (left to right)

The entrance to the restaurant

The Cassequel Branch

This is the building where our branch meets.  It has a lot of rooms inside, and a large meeting space on the top floor.  When you first look at it, it doesn't look like much, but as you get to know Luanda, you realize it is a pretty nice building in a nicer part of town.  And, the good news is it has air-conditioning!

The Cassequel Branch is one of 3 branches in Luanda (Terra Nova and Luanda 2 are the others).  There is also a Group, which is smaller than a Branch.  These 4 units make up the Luanda District.  Each branch has its own meeting place.

 

This little boy fell down running around after church.  He jumped into Lisa's arms when she reached down for him. This is the hallway along the side of the church.  Directly behind Lisa is the big black gate in the photo above it.

Day of Service

Saturday was a Branch service project.  We picked up trash at a local park.  Many families were there, and, as you can see, kids will play on anything - even dilapidated old (dangerous!) park toys.  Its a little sad that the park isn't in better repair.  You can see the remains of a children's pool, animal statues throughout the park, and a building that used to be a library.

There are many beautiful, old trees of a wide variety.  The tallest tree was home to more than a dozen large cranes.  Because it is winter, most of the leaves are gone, so you can see all of their nests.  They made quite a noise as we cleaned up below them.

Although it was a small dent in the mountain of trash that litters Luanda, it was good to see the difference in the park.  We made a special effort to pick up broken glass and rusty old cans that children could step on.  We may "adopt" this park, and hopefully future service projects will bring fresh paint to cover the graffiti, and repair some of the broken toys.

My Daily Commute

One of the best things about living in Torres Atlantico is my daily commute to work.  I take the elevator to the first floor of the residence tower (actually the 5th floor because there is a 4-story parking garage below it) and walk across the patio to the office building.  My desk is on the same floor as the patio, so I walk in the door and sit down at my desk.  Total travel time (depending on the wait for the elevator) is approximately 4 minutes, which is even shorter than my commute in Anchorage!

Because the apartment is so close, I can come home for lunch, or run up to get something if I forgot it.  Cool.

Here's what my daily commute looks like.  I walk across the patio, and through the gate at the far end.  The gate is locked, and only residents of the apartment building can get through it.

This is the view from one of the openings in the patio wall.

The buildings around the office and apartment are much older - some are very old.  Because Luanda is so crowded and housing is in such short supply, people live in every possible space.  A sight that I will always associate with Luanda is laundry drying on the balcony.

Here are some more photos of the buildings around the neighborhood

Birthday on the Beach

This is the view from our table. We were celebrating Lisa's birthday.
Actually, it really was as nice as it looks...

The Birthday Girl

The First Miracle

One of the most important things we wanted to do once we arrived in Luanda was find out where and when the church met. One of the charming qualities of Luanda is that although the streets have names, there are no street signs to identify them (hey - it's just like Girdwood!). As a result, everyone has to learn the location of a building or address by reference to nearby landmarks. Even the locals have to ask directions to a new address if they are not familiar with it.

We had called the District President before we left, and he told us we would be part of the Cassequel Branch, which has a few other expat families. He promised to have the Branch President contact us with all the information we needed, but we still hadn't heard from anyone by the time we arrived in Luanda on Tuesday.

One of BP's strict rules for expats here is that they cannot drive. The traffic is congested, and the rules of the road are more like suggestions. I liken it to pushing a shopping cart at WalMart on a crowded Saturday: no one cares which side of the aisle you push your cart on, or who yields to whom. Generally you just try to avoid hitting each other, and live and let live. Its the same with traffic in Luanda. Make your own way. Try not to hurt anyone. If my car is ahead of yours, I go first. As part of BP's safety policy, expats are assigned a car and driver. That's good news because it means someone else does all the driving through the madness.

I had checked the LDS.org website for the address of the Cassequel Branch, and found out it was located at #11 Rua Commandante Economia. The only problem was that on the satellite image of the area, the chapel was shown as being located in the middle of a huge vacant lot. When I searched for it using Google Maps, the street could not be found. We were a little worried because we had no way of telling our driver where to take us. And we didn't know what time to go.

Once we arrived in Luanda, Lisa and I began praying for a way to find out where the church met. I had the phone number of the district president, but he had told me he would be out of town this week. I also had the phone number of the branch president. I had planned to call him and let him tell our driver how to get to the church.

On Saturday, Lisa and I planned to do some shopping. We had already visited some of the nearby markets during the week, and wanted to go to the newer, bigger stores in Luanda Sul. Driving to Luanda Sul on a weekday can take 90 minutes or more, so we hoped traffic would be better on a weekend. We left about 10 am, and arrived at the store around 10:30 - no traffic!

As we pulled into the parking lot, I saw what looked like two missionaries walking into the store. I quickly told the driver to stop and let us out. We ran into the store, but then saw that the guards who stand in front of the cash registers all wear white shirts and black ties. I must have seen some of them going back into the store. False alarm...

Lisa started shopping for some plastic buckets, which were right by the entrance. Like most men, I started thinking about how to kill a little time while she was shopping. Fortunately, the electronics section was right next door, so I wandered over there to take a look. To my surprise, standing 10 yards in front of me were two missionaries! I walked up and introduced myself to Elder Bauer. He looked a little shocked. I explained that we were trying to locate the Cassequel Branch and perhaps he could tell our driver how to get there. I also told him that Lisa would be excited to meet him and his companion. When I caught Lisa's eye and motioned her over to meet the elders, she practically ran. She knew it was against the rules to hug a missionary, so she gave each of them a very hearty handshake!

It was such a relief to meet them. They knew exactly where and when the branch meets (they were assigned to a different branch), and they went out with me to explain the route to our driver. Our prayers had been answered.

The miracle lies in the circumstances of our meeting:
1. The missionaries had just run into the store to get a memory card for a camera - they were there for about 10 minutes.
2. Luanda is a city of about 5 million people. There are 14 missionaries in the city. We managed to meet them on our first Saturday. The next day at church, I met a member from Chile who had lived in Luanda for 5 years before he finally ran into the missionaries on the street. He had been searching for the church the entire time. This was his second week at church.
3. It turns out the Branch President listed on LDS.org is out of the country, and no longer the Branch President - I wouldn't have been able to speak with him anyway.

I am writing this after attending our first Sunday services in our new branch. It was wonderful. The branch was much larger than I expected - maybe 75 people in attendance at sacrament meeting. Everyone was friendly, and a large majority spoke at least a little English. The church is the same wherever you go. We are excited to be here. We also need to learn Portuguese ASAP!