Our trip to the desert wasn't really how I thought it would be, but none the less we had a great day. Both my boys are sound asleep now for quite some time and the smell of open wood fire still lingers in their hair, as well as lots of fine sand.
I have lots of imagination, that's why it's quite easy for me to imagine why off-road-four-wheel-driving sounds and is really attractive to many people. I am not one of them though. I highly appreciate getting where we're going to but the way there I do not enjoy so much. For one I tend to get slightly carsick, and humping and bumping around doesn't count to my favourite activities as well. Nonetheless I was humping and bumping around on the back seat of a 4W drive once again to go out into the desert.
Our very first stop was a butcher to get some freshly butchered chicken... I think I have never bought a chicken at the butchers, always in the supermarket... sad but true... sometimes I really dislike the modern life I live, at least a little bit.
Our next stop were sand dunes again, sand dunes with extremely fine sand, sand dunes with extremely fine sand and quite a bit of wind so that extremely fine sand was everywhere (I tried to cover my camera with a plastic bag, hopefully it helped to keep the sand out). So there I sat on top of a sand dune, watching one of my sons playing with some beach toys (thanks Hilde for lending them) while feeding the other one his bottle (which I had accidentally dropped and it had rolled down half of the sand dune before I could reach it... yumm, sandy milk) and contemplating life.
After that we went to the place we were to have lunch, actually where we were to prepare lunch for ourselves. I didn't really understand why we were going where we were going, they told us that it was some sort of a flat. The longer we drove the more I started to dread the way back again, still not really understanding why we'd be going there at all and not just have lunch somewhere in the desert, maybe because it was quite windy and also quite cloudy.
Anyway, we were driving through the middle of nowhere when all of a sudden we could see a house on top of a hill, which ended up to be our destination. This house had some nice grass around it (in the middle of the desert) and some animals next to it: camels, doves, sheep, goats.
When our guide unlocked the house our eyes met with quite an impressive looking living room as well as a toilet with a "Wow" effect. As Cedric hadn't really slept the entire morning (he did get a little bit of sleep while being bumped around in his little car seat which I luckily insisted on bringing), I preffered to go outside again and put him down for a nap on the grass. So I sat there watching him sleep, crocheting some more of my cap and enjoying the peace and quiet on a grass patch in the middle of the desert while the men started to prepare lunch: BBQ chicken, spicy Macaroni, bread and cucumber/tomato/spring onion salad. It did feel rather strange that I was the only woman and all the 6 men were busy in the kitchen preparing lunch or watching Ned (thank you "uncle" RonnieJ), BUT I didn't complain too much JJJJJ.
After lunch we went into this grand living room. Have you ever stayed in one of the houses of your president, chancellor, prime minister or whoever is leading your country???? Well, neither have I, I don't even know were good old Angie (Merkel) lives. But here I was sitting and bottle feeding Cedric(again) in one of the places the leader of Libya stays when he happens to be in this area of his country... we were told. I bottle fed Cedric in (one of) his living room(s)... and took a photo of the toilet (I don't want to offend anyone, but the toilet looked really so fancy, I have never seen such a fancy toilet ever before). Hello!! Reality check!!!
Ned, although being two already for quite some time, is still a nappy boy and unfortunately he has quite some problems with his plumbing down below the last couple days, if you get my meaning. So while I was feeding Ced in this grand living room Ned did something in his nappy and Ben, no worries at all, went off to change said nappy. I guess we culture shocked quite some men (and have done so in previous trips as well). While Ben was gone Mr. Mohamed said to me: "You need to pray 20 times a day and thank your God for this husband"J... he's right, I should say thank you way more often for this awesome husband of mine, love you, BenJJJJ!!!!!
When we finally left around 4pm (we were supposed to be back by 4pm) we did another stop in the desert, to make bachbuti (or something that sounds similar to what I just wrote or maybe not at all, because I really don't have a clue anymore what it was called, but as you don't know any better you just have to believe what I write J... but I digress) . It's what I call desert bread, the pita you bake in the fire in the desert.It took forever this time, because normally the sand of the desert is really hot and helps baking the bread, but today was rather cool and the bread would and would not be ready. But how often in your life can you just sit in the desert, smell wood fire, watch some camels in the distance and one of your sons playing with his toys in the sand (this time a rather rougher grained sand, which didn't get everywhere, PTL!!!) I have learned to relax a bit and go with the flow. If we don't get there now, we'll get there laterJ !
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