The Yellow House

I am in Cote d’Ivoire for work, and was in Nigeria for 12 days before that. When all is said and done, I’ll have been bouncing around West Africa for almost a month.

When we travel for pleasure, we happily suspend our routines in an excuse to eat out and explore local foods. These are the types of experiences that span beautiful, full-bleed spreads in food and travel magazines, whether it’s a high-end destination restaurant or stopping at a street food stall. Some of us even go on vacation because we want to eat something particular, want to spend an afternoon in a French café or walk down a street in Bangkok with the burn of chili on our tongues.

But when we travel for business (at least, for non-food-related business, I suppose), those of us who are hungry often end up disappointed.

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Hello. I’m posting this from the first place I’ve had web access in a week. A lot of people write to me asking me to post more photos of my work. I hold off because I don’t really want to be a poverty monger; nor do I wish to be latest in your social media stream of white girls holding African kids. Moreover: work is work, and at least half of my time is spent sitting at a desk, and I worry it will be boring.

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Conakry, the capital of Guinea, in West Africa, is on a very narrow peninsula projecting out into the Atlantic. I was there all this week. You can’t really drive from one part of the city to another without seeing a glimpse of water, and my commute from my hotel to the office was no exception. The driver weaved in and out of the hordes of uniformed kids walking to school, vendors selling soap, people burning trash, and then, boom, la mer. It nearly reaches the road in some protected areas when the tide is high.
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After Christmas, we packaged up the remains of the rib roast with horseradish cream, the mashed potato casserole, the creamed kale; stuck the house keys and car keys in someone else’s hand (along with instructions for chicken and duck care and keeping); and got on a plane.
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I’ve been in Indonesia the past two weeks for work. I wasn’t going to write anything about it because I’ve resented it. I’m not sure what kind of jaded, callous homebody I’ve turned into that I get an expenses-paid trip to Southeast Asia and am annoyed about it, but there you have it. Work is work, my friends, and there is some summer living to be done at home. (Nightly, I interrogate Ben on the phone: “Are the tomatoes ready? You’re eating one right now. AREN’T YOU?! I knew it. You’re eating tomatoes. I knew I would miss them.” Missed-tomato paranoia of Hitchcockian proportions, I’m telling you.)

Anyway, last Saturday I decided to get over myself and go find something beautiful. » Click to read more