My house is the white house that looks like it belongs on a Greek island, and it is officially know as " the house," or in Créole, "la case." It is great; it came furnished. Not just furnished, but I'm talking pots and pans, sheets, curtains, silverware, more armoires than we know what to do with...
6 of us live in la case, 4 Americans (3 girls- me, Sarah, Davida; 1 boy, Dane), 1 Brittish girl, Caroline, and a Spanish girl, Marina. I am sure that living with 5 women must be a bit much sometimes for Dane, but he takes it in stride. In general we speak English at the house, much to my disappointment, but Marina is really good about speaking French with me. She is also very gracious when she corrects me if I make errors, for which I am so grateful. Improving one's abilities in a language requires lots of practice and making lots of mistakes. Good thing I do a lot of both!
The best part about the house has to be our electrical appliance situation. We have no hot water, even though the ouvriers (workers) have installed a chauffe-eau (water heater) in addition to the solar heater, it does not work when we use it. Seriously, only when the ouvriers are there does any hot water come out, and only for about 5 minutes. The problem is not the number of people using all the hot water, it is that there IS no hot water. Our "big" fridge went out the other day and our small fridge freezes everything. Surprisingly, the situation does not irritate me; I find it really humorous. Although, I would really like a hot shower... The other thing is that we just bought a washing machine, the 6 of us together. I have never made such an grown-up purchase, 1/6 of a washing machine.
We live on chemin des orangers, which means "Orange Tree Lane." Poetic, non? It is at the top of a hilly neighborhood called le Moufia and it is quite a walk to/from the grocery store. "Sweat" is the word that comes to mind.
The past two days have been windy but beautiful. Tonight I am going to a Créole festival. Should be good food. I am going to the beach again tomorrow and have plans to hike the VOLCANO next Monday!
That's all for now, take care everyone!
Love, Katie
Wow...sounds exciting, adventurous and so grown-up (I mean, 1/6 of a washing-machine!!!!!)
ReplyDeleteI saw on the news today that it was snowing on Le Piton de la Fournaise for the first time in years. So take your scarf (I guess you'll have to buy one) to go hiking.
sup katie its the sc gang and we were just wonderin how u are? so it is a long walk to the grocery store huh? that sounds cool and i bet u r gettin in shape. we miss u and cant wait to see u again! love ya!
ReplyDeletehunter
Ps i got my second rank and on my way to third!
Hi Katie-
ReplyDeleteGrampa and I loved all of the photos and descriptions of your life on Reunion!! Hope you get your camera going..too much to miss! (don't bring us a jackfruit)
All's well here..hope you get some hot water soon.
Keep us posted! Sending loads of love-Gramma M
LOVE the Bedspread!
Talked with your mom tonight who raved about the blog and pictures, so I finally figured out to copy the link, exit my system and paste the site into "THE Google" and voila, I found you.
ReplyDeleteLoved the pictures and description of life.
I've never owned 1/6th of a washing machine, can't wait to see how you all decide to split it.
An early Happy Birthday.
Love, MC