Feb 10

I tried to put this up on the web yesterday, but the internet was giving me problems....

My movement request was approved for tomorrow, Friday - 11 Feb. Ill be taking the UN helo flight into Monrovia and hanging out there until my flight to Atlanta on Sunday afternoon. No plans for Monrovia... I have to take an exam on Saturday but that is about it. I tried to stay busy this week and put myself on patrol everyday. So that has helped pass the time. Ill be taking the same flight I took into Monrovia back in October when LC was born. I watched her birth on skype then had to hurry and get to the helipad to catch the flight. Hopefully there is no surprises tomorrow morning. Today is 10 Feb. One year ago today we found out Shannon was preggers. It is hard to imagine it has already been a year... We knew my name was being thrown around at work for being a candidate for this assignment, but we thought being on shore duty, expecting a baby and about to finish grad school would keep me from going. Hahahaha... not so fast!! Interesting how things work out. What an absolute blessing little miss Leyton has been. I cant wait to get home and play with her! I miss her terribly.... and I miss Shannon too. I will leave Monrovia on Sunday Afternoon, will take a 2 hour flight to Accra, Ghana, will stay on the plane in Accra as they service it and gas it up, and then will take off to the USA. 12 hours after takeoff, we will hopefully be touching down in Atlanta on Valentines day. Ill stay in Atlanta for a few hours then catch a flight to Raleigh-Durham. Dawne (Shannon's mother), Shannon and Leyton will be in Jax, Florida this weekend for a Half-marathon and to visit with Aunt Hillary. They will drive up to NC to pick me up at the airport on their way home to VA. Hopefully these snow storms that keep popping up will not affect our trips. Okay, this is probably the last post from Liberia for a while. We will try to find time to post some things when Im home. Here are some pics from the week:

The security at my house brought me a cocoa to show me how they harvest the seeds. He cracked to reveal the seeds. They say they rinse the juice off the seeds into some water and drink the water because it is really sweet. Then they take the seeds and dry them in the sun for a few days. Then you can eat them, or in most cases, sell them. They also brought me a bag full of dried seeds. I peeled them and ate a few. Tasted a bit like chocolate. Im going to bring a bag of the seeds home for my chocoholic wife.

This was the town of Johnson Bee's Farm. They are all involved in tapping rubber and selling it to Firestone.

They showed me the process of the rubber biz... they collect the (liquid) rubber from the pots on the trees, then they poor it into this mold. They then add HCl acid into the mold and 10 minutes later, the rubber is solid. they pull it out of the mold and take it to firestone. It is a good business, but very smelly.

One of the workers at Johnson Bee's Farm (Nice Shirt!)

This was the town of Groundpea. It was a population of 7.

Some old rubber trees

A baby pineapple in its infancy.

I recently had some work done on my Palava hut. A new thatched roof.

This was one of the bridges we encountered on patrol. Much worse then the picture shows. The gaps between the unstable lobs required us to perfectly position the wheels on the two flat boards. good times.