Friday List...and a Happy Birthday!

JILL'S LIST:

"A birthday once apocalyptic..." Oh, this was written way back in 2003. 30 is clearly all the rage now, in modern days. 

Here, I am shaking my finger at 30-haters.

I've wanted to be at least 30 for a really long time.  I was always kind of lying about my age when I was a kid.  Like, saying I was "almost seven" when I had just turned six.  Or.  "I'll be 24..."(in about 2 years).  Being a nurse, it has never been terribly helpful to be or look young.  People don't really want to place their life in the hands of a chipper young thing.  Really, they feel safest with old, brusque, and gray-haired.  So, I've been hoping for at least 30 for years - as a professional requirement.

So, today, I really feel like, finally!  And, if as a birthday necessity, I have to tally off my life achievements, it's looking pretty good.  Almost 10 years of marriage, check.  Two lovely kiddos, check.  Living in the Congo with a bunch of my closets friends, check.  Gray-hair, check.

So, read on...and go 30!

Awaiting me in 5 years?

I must see this immediately.  Surely one of my students has this on a hard drive somewhere...

Oh man. Statistics.

So, who's making me a photo montage?

Apparently, Kinshasa didn't make this list. 
  
1982.  Good for so many things.

That's right, Roger Federer.

I mean, I want to be like Beyonce.  Don't you?

In good company.

It should be noted that, for my birthday, my dearest husband contracted malaria.  Yes.  This is true.  He feels very bad about it.  So, in a weird fit of fever-induced guilt and love, he filled my computer with little pieces of paper.  Confetti!  (Don't worry.  He is being treated appropriately and has promised me a complete recovery by tomorrow.)


SARAH'S LIST:

$180,000 a year for being a nanny? Bonus points if you speak French? We're getting the deal of the century.

Photo credit: Jill Humphrey.

Fascinating photos of Congo. Here's what the photographer has to say, "I originally chose the Congo because I wished to find a place in the world, and in my imagination, where every step I took I would be reminded of the limits of my own articulation, of my inadequate capacity for representation. I wished for this to happen in a place of hard realities, whose narratives urgently need telling, but cannot be easily described. Congo is just such a place." And I couldn't agree more.

  by  Ana_Cotta 

Next week is Spring Break...#2. Oh, the life of an international teacher. In the past we'd be gearing up for a trip to Cape Town, or Zanzibar or safari in Kenya. This year I really couldn't be more excited for swimming at the pool, looking out for these funny birds with Charlotte on the field (their tails are so long they can barely fly!), and cuddling up to watch Mr. Maker (our favorite British arts and craft-er for preschoolers).

Oh, Tori. Happens to the best of us.

Happy Easter! Getting up at dawn for sunrise service on the river at Sim's Chapel. One of the oldest in the city.

  by  Julien Harneis 

Tweet

Pin It