Nice to meet you, Milk

It’s hard to imagine that yesterday marked only the first week since Burch and I arrived in Luanda.

Five things I miss so far:
1. Skittles
2. Water Pressure
3. Chewy Sprees
4. The ability to completely comprehend dinner table gossip
5. Sour Patch Kids

All in all, not so bad (and my dentist should be dancing a jig somewhere). The no-running-water-in-the-morning thing is a drag though. I’ve taken to setting aside a kettle of water at night to boil in the morning so I can shave. The morning cold water sponge baths don’t seem so unusual anymore, but shave with cold water I will not.

In other news I joined a gym yesterday. I think the name of it was Acadamia Corpo Total, and one of its best features is…a working shower! I think it’s probably worth the $100 a month to join just for that. About halfway through my first real workout in months a local gym rat asked to cut in on the machine I was using. When I asked his name he responded “Leite” which is the Portuguese word for milk. Now, this guy was really buff and I didn’t want to inquire further, but this seemed a bit sketchy. After asking around it turns out most Angolans have a real name and a nickname that they use more commonly. Just ask Rabbit (one of the language teachers whose real name is Pablito) or Kiss Me (an Angolan man I met in Lisbon a few weeks ago whose real name escapes me). I swear I’m not making this up. I do wonder how people get these names though. Does Leite just really like milk? Does Rabbit…have rabbit-like qualities, whatever those might be? I need to get to the bottom of this.