Our new life

Every day I go to my Google Reader to see which of my friends have posted a blog. I'm sure some of you also check to see if I have recently blogged! I can't say that busyness has kept me from it; just haven't had the inspiration. But let me take a stab at portraying for you what our new life looks like. I must say that it is strange to never have my phone ring, never have anyone stop by for coffee. No one really needs me here right now and I am a person that likes to be needed! So this is a challenging time for me in a lot of ways. I am trying to make the most of it and realize that it is only for a short season and soon we'll be back in the thick of it. Since coming here, life has never been 100% normal I guess since we still have curfew every night. But I have nowhere to go anyway so it really doesn't affect me. Things seem to be pretty normal now in the country after an incredible week of demonstrations, shooting, looting, burning, etc. The only topic of conversation with every taxi driver is about their new-found freedom. People openly blast the government and the late president. In every country we've lived in overseas, we have always been very careful not to photograph anything having to do with military; in fact it's illegal. These days around here, you can walk right up to the tanks and soldiers and have your picture taken with them. People even climb up onto the tanks and photograph each other. It's really unbelievable! Walking down the main street of town, you can see thousands of people milling around, drinking coffee and taking lots of pictures. Randomly, a group of people will form and one will get up with a loudspeaker and start giving a speech. The atmosphere is full of excitement & hope for a new future of freedom. We are comfortably settled into our small, one-bedroom apartment on the 6th floor overlooking a very busy street. (there is an elevator & we have 24-hour electricity:)When the weather is warm enough, I love to sit out on the balcony with a cup of coffee and watch the world go by down below. We have a large grocery store (Monoprix) right up the street from us and every other convenience we could want or need. It's really perfect for our needs right now. Still, I guess every woman longs to have her own place and fix it up and feel like she's HOME. I've already started looking at houses for rent in the newspaper:) We feel like God led us to this place and I don't want to complain about His provision! It is just small and we're both in the living room all day long; no place else to go! It will be sweet when I have my own little corner where I can listen to my music & work on my projects. But until then, I am determined to make the most of this season!! We have begun language programs and that is proving to be more challenging than I thought it would be. Even though I speak Arabic quite fluently, I feel like a baby trying to pronounce this dialect! It's SO different. My French comes in very handy all the time and it's fun to be able to use it again. Our big project for the moment is trying to get a car. The process is unbelievable. Darrell's already been to multiple gov't offices and we haven't really started yet! The car we've picked out is a dark gray 9-passenger Citroen van called a Jumpy. So, there you have a bit of our news. We sure appreciate all of friends & loved ones back home and around the world. We are blessed, to say the least!