Lovenest

 I feel like I need to apologize for not posting recently.  I've either been in funk or really busy.  Owing to my recent busyness, my house is much cleaner than normal.  There's still a lot of clutter to be dealt with, but I've been slowly getting the walls and surfaces cleaner.  At least part of that has been child labour.  Today one child grated a bar of soap to make laundry detergent, while another scrubbed a door.  The youngest was supposed to be wiping down a wall, but he had issues so his daddy helped.  The walls and doors that we've managed to clean glow!  It's a lovely feeling. :)

 Part of my motivation in working so hard today was an upcoming date night.  Friends of ours are opening a restaurant downtown and invited us to the grand opening.  She is a refugee from Eritrea.  We met her through our school.  I've been reading a lot about Ethiopia and Eritrea recently.  During my reading, I've learnt a lot more about their food.  Since I'm a foodie, I was quite excited to get to try their cuisine, especially the coffee!  Ethiopian coffee is made very specially and is rumoured to be quite good.  I'm happy to report that it is amazing!

 Tonight was not my first time trying Ethiopian food.  Several years ago, I tried it at the Multicultural Festival.  I hated it.  Seriously, couldn't finish it, had to dump my plate.  I felt horrible.  Two years ago, I had it again at F&ST.  This time, I liked it.  Since then, I've had the odd Ethiopian/Eritrean dish and I've enjoyed it.  Then I began to do a lot of reading on the culture.  Shortly after my reading blitz, I spent the evening my friends from Ethiopia, Eritrea and Somalia.  This time I actually had good questions to ask as I finally knew something about their culture.  After I expressed interest in their coffee, my friend told me about the restaurant she is opening.  We received an invitation and off we went.

 We weren't the only white people in the restaurant, but we seemed to be the most out of place.  I'm very glad I had the foresight to dress up.  All of the staff were in traditional dress and the other patrons were dressed up either in Western or traditional garb.  I like African clothing. :) One woman even had a headwrap on.  I like headwraps. :)  This was my first time going to an ethnic restaurant after learning a lot about the culture I was visiting.  We surprised some of the staff by knowing the names of various things, like injera.  As we were leaving, our friend introduced us to the manager and said that we know a lot about Ethiopia and Eritrea.  Normally, I'm very open to new cultural experiences, but not very knowledgable.  It was a neat experience to be more the culturally aware of the two of us.

 I have more to write, but we're going to finish our date by watching Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom.  Since I'd like to get to bed at a reasonable hour, we'd better start. Hopefully I will write again soon.