Happy Birthday To Me!
on Phil Bradfield (The Gambia), 11/Aug/2010 13:38, 34 days ago
(Written 12/08/2010 10:00, Max Montes’ House, Kanifing)My first“special occasion” since I’ve been in Gambia: my 26thbirthday was yesterday. I’m not really fussed about birthdays, but I enjoyed this one, which is especially good given it could potentially have been quite a bad homesickness day.The morning was spent in Banjul getting a new ID card: Gambia is switching to biometric IDs, so all VSOs have to swap our old paper residence permits for shiny plastic cards with our thumbprints stored on a chip. The afternoon was spent lazing around in a cafe, drinking coffee, surfing the internet and enjoying the birthday wishes coming in on email and phone. The evening was spent at the Italian Connection, a very good restaurant up in the swanky area of Cape Point. Many thanks to all who came: I’m glad you made it and it means a lot to me that you made the effort. Special thanks to Max (for giving me a bed while I’m staying in Kombos), Pete and Liz (for the presents), Jo and Les (for couriering said presents from Britain), Lucy and Rach (for coming despite it being a right arse tryingto get back to Brikama late at night) and Courtney (for the cake!). Also, a very special mention to the proprietor: he was entirely on his own most of the time (his staff were all away breaking their Ramadan fast), and thus he simultaneously served as chef, waiter, barman and general host! Couple that with his main gas bottle vanishing, leaving him with only a single hob to cook on (good job so many ordered pizza), and it was a minor miracle that eleven people got food at all, let alone the excellent fare that he served us!The only thing which put a (literal) dampener on the day was the torrential downpour of rain which, typically enough, waited until just after we’d left the restaurant to thunder down on us. And yes, as soon as it starts raining, taxis in this country do exactly the same vanishing trick as they do back at home. So, apologies to all concerned for getting them drenched! All the fun of The Gambia, eh...