Looking Back....

I was going through all my old blog posts yesterday while I was sitting outside and Aubrey was splashing away in her kiddie pool. I was going through and labelling them all (pain in the butt and I don't know why I felt compelled to do so) and I happened upon these pictures of our apartment in Grenada! It's crazy to think that we lived that differently less than 4 years ago!

Because we weren't there permanently, we rented a place that was furnished and let's just say, it was NOT my taste. But it did the trick. The kitchen had no hot water and for the first few months I would boil water every time I wanted to do the dishes! That got old really fast and I said to heck with it. I bought dish soap that was antibacterial (that cost an arm and a leg) and called it good. I'm sure the amount it cost to boil the water on the propane stove, not to mention trying to cool down the house after using said stove, worked out cheaper to just buy the spendy soap. That's what I'm telling myself anyway.

Hahaha! The couch was the most hideous fabric/color I have ever seen, so we covered it with a quilt we brought along (naively thinking we'd need it to sleep there. ummm not quite!).

This area was also our guest room :) This apartment was small, but didn't feel super small because of the high ceilings. But when we had guests?! It was jam packed! We'd put a good ol' air mattress out here and call it a guest room. Best part was when Astrid(my sister) and her husband Jo came to visit with their son Jacob, we all squished into our bedroom! Willy Wonka style. Well, not quite, they slept on the bed and Zach and I took the air mattress on the floor. Ah, the joys of having the only AC unit in the house be in the bedroom.

I thought this was funny, it's what I wrote in the original post.....

"The bedroom, the only room with A/C. Needless to say, we are in here most of the time. Zach has his desk in here, so this is where he spends his endless hours studying(while I spend endless hours sleeping!). Yes, that is Zach having one of his infamous power-naps:)"

and the bathroom, oh the bathroom! I was classy to say the least....but it was a bathroom and a toilet IN the house, which is more than a lot of people had in Grenada.

And last but not least......

The classy shower head.... Bare exposed wires! IN a shower. I don't know how we didn't die?!?

I didn't think that I could love the house we are in more than I already do, but after seeing these?!? I LOVE MY NEW HOUSE!!!

There was one perk to our place in Grenada....we had a cleaning lady! It was built into the cost of rent and it was fabulous! At times I wished we could have just saved the money and I could have cleaned, but it was nice to help a local lady who really did need the money more than we did. But I always had this feeling she was looking at me thinking I was lazy for not cleaning my own place! I would try and not be home when she was there, I just felt too guilty! I always felt like I had to explain myself to her, "No! I would clean my house, but it's built in the rent! Don't hate me please!!". Ahh good old Menno guilt ;)

Goodbye lunches and hot showers...

In honor of Laura's last day here, a couple of girls went out for her goodbye lunch yesterday. It was a lot of fun, well, aside from the fact that we arrived at the restaurant only to be harassed by a guy trying to ask for money and sitting down with us at our table (and not leaving), and once he finally left (after I gave him 10EC for whatever cause he was "allegedly" peddling) we were told that the kitchen was out of chicken...that's right, completely out of chicken. Now, I've heard of a restaurant not having a specific item on their menu for whatever reason it may be, out of season, etc., but to be out of an entire type of meat is just wrong. With there not being any chicken we were down to about four choices. And, again, in normal circumstances (aka, back in North America) we would have left the restaurant and found some other place. Now Grenada is no normal circumstance and there aren't a lot of choices here, so we just decided to stay. The rest of the lunch went great though and it was good to spend one last afternoon with Laura.



Today our landlord came by and fixed our shower. We have had no hot water since I got here in February. Now most of you must think that in a hot country, one would not need a hot shower. Well, to you I say: come down here and try it on for size! It is not as refreshing or as great as you'd think. The water is stinkin' cold! And try shaving your legs in freezing water, good luck! So today I had my first hot shower in months and it was fabulous! Below is a picture of our lovely high-tech shower. That's right...those are exsposed wires that you are seeing so close to the water. We like to live, and shower, dangerously.

Christmas in March

A week and a half ago, Zach's mom came to Grenada for a visit. She is here until this coming Tuesday and we've been having a great time hanging out and relaxing. I've had someone to share my lazy island days with! We've gone into town once, hit up the local "malls" and just relaxed on the beach to top up our tans. Our evenings have been spent eating out, reading books and watching tv. Zach has of course been studying as usual, but a prolonged dinner here and a few extra evenings off there have been great for him too. He took all last Saturday off and it was great for him to get to enjoy Grenada from another vantage point other than his desk. When mom came to visit, she brought two huge suitcases full of stuff from home(and a bunch of clothes that I got her to pick up for me, even better then internet shopping!). We will be hard pressed to run out of nuts, chips, chocolate or books in the next coming months. She also brought 4 Lbs of Starbucks coffee for us and that should last us until the end of next week...kidding...well, not so much, we do kill a LOT of coffee here:) Zach made a comment, as she was unloading her bags that this was better than Christmas. Here we don't have the option of going out and buying or exchanging whatever we didn't get. So it made us really appreciate what we got and how much there was. Needless to say it was very exciting(of course not more exciting then the visitor herself! Although Zach did tease me with questions of what I was more excited to see, the clothes or his mom!). So far the trip has been great and tomorrow night will be our last together and we are going out to a restaurant called The Beach House, which is our favorite, for an early birthday/end of midterm/going home dinner. Should be fun because it's also an excuse to dress up, which we don't get to do too much here(it's a bit of a fancier place), and I love to do.


Local flowers.


More local flowers, couldn't tell you what kind though!


At Stuart's, which is a bar/restaurant where we went for a friend's(Kristin) birthday on Friday.


The view of the bay at Stuart's.


Out for dinner at a place called the Beachside Terrace. I had the most incredible lobster here...mmmm. Zach and I are also both sporting our new clothes that mom brought for us!


Zach's chair decided to give out, one of the legs broke off and down he went. it was one of our cheap patio chairs that had seen better days. It's probably one of the funniest things that I've seen in a long time. He was drinking coffee out of the mug that he got me for Valentine's Day(see earlier blog to see mug) and he did everything in his power so that the mug didn't break, and it didn't. But he got his butt kicked in the process. The best part was that we had two of our neighbours over for dinner, Richard and Bruno, and mom was there too so he had an audiance for the whole thing. I think that his back is still sore from that fall, and so is my stomach from laughing so hard!


We went for dessert to a place called Coconut Beach(most places, as you may have already noticed, have the name beach in them), but this place was actually on the beach.


This is for Ed. This is not one that I found in our place, it was outside, but the ones inside look just the same.


Grand Anse beach, the one about a five minute walk from our place.

The Big City...

The other day I told my sister-in-law, Linda, that I had updated the blog and she promptly asked if there were any pictures on it and, well, there weren't. But I can take a hint, so here you go Lin. These are just some random Grenada pictures from downtown St.George's. Hope you enjoy...


The fruit/vegetable/spice market.



Local spices.



The newest nightclub in Grenada...just kidding, they really do sell meat out of here though(can't say I've ever had the urge to buy).



Fish market, you should see the amount of flies in this place. And the smell, I'll tell you one thing, I ain't buying anyhting from here.



This is one of the main roads downtown. To the very right you can see a boarded up building, this is the KFC and it is getting a facelift. The Grenadians love their KFC, can't quite figure out if it is the KFC itself or just the fact that it is the only fast food joint on the island...?

You Know You're In Grenada When

Well...I just finished studying for my Pathology exam tomorrow and I figured this was a good time to make my blog debut before I get into Microbiology studying. Since the blog is The Adventures of Zach and Jen, I figured Zach should make a post. Yes, this is Zach, not Jen... and I just referred to myself in third person. While we've been in Grenada we've noticed a few things are different in comparison to home...you've all seen those emails titled "You know you're from Saskatchewan when..." or "You know you're a Menno when..." Let me introduce the "Top 10 You Know You're in Grenada When...":

10. It's "cooling off a bit" when the temperature hits 35C

9. The price of a shot of rum at home is the same as the whole bottle

8. The food court at the local mall is a top 3 choice for places to eat on date night.

7. You are routinely chased by the police station's pet goat on your daily run...

6. One day you decide to fight back, you turn around and chase the same goat...screaming

5. You go into the grocery store on March 25th and realize an expiry date of March 17th is "not bad"

4. The teller at that same grocery store looks like she has "bitter beer face" when you put your groceries on the conveyer belt

3. You don't need a lawnmower when the neighborhood cow is hungry

2. The punishment for wearing camouflage is the same as being in possession of porn

1. A police officer in his cruiser is knockin' back a cold Carib beer

Not the hero I thought I was

Today I really learned how useful I am. I decided to clean out the cockroach poo from under the bathroom sink and once I got started I kept finding more and more poo...and eggs. Well actually, not eggs, cases-did you know that cockroaches lay eggs in cases? And each case contains who knows how many eggs... Well, I now know this and that is why they can reproduce at such alarming rates! Anyway like I said, once I started I kept finding more so I took out one of the drawers and I found the mama. Sitting there laying another "case", too stunned to move. Remember in the last post when I said that cockroach was the biggest I had ever seen, well I was wrong, this was it. Well, naturally I lost it and called for Zach to get the bug spray. I pulled out the rest of the drawers and Zach killed the roach while I was cowering in the bedroom calling him to see if it was dead yet. Some big help I am. Anyway, we (and by we I mean Zach) killed the mom and most of the babies but that, I guess, is just for now. Well, see how long that lasts...

My worst nightmare...

It is said that cockroaches can survive a nuclear holocaust, that they are one of the hardest things to kill. Well, I'm here to tell you that they are. I have been battling the roach since I arrived in Grenada, a year and a bit ago and they are quite possibly the grossest creatures on the planet. The ones that I've encountered (too many to count) have been huge, seriously. Not just "in the heat of the moment" huge, but truly big. I'm talking about two inches long. They have the hardest shells(makes it hard to smash) and these giant antennae. They can scurry so fast that you can loose track of them on an open floor and they can fit into a hole of any size. I'm telling you all of this because for the past two blissful months, I have not seen one cockroach, not one. I could hardly believe my luck when I got back to Grenada after Christmas break, I thought that I was free. I thought that we had got rid of them once and for all. Well, I thought wrong. They're back. I came into the house after a whole day away, Zach turned on the lights and I went to the sink to put a cup in and there it was-staring me in the face. Zach kindly "disposed" of it for me and I have been jumpy ever since. I swear it was the biggest one of all, the mother of all cockroaches. Here it was, my enemy, the reason our electric bill is so high (I keep all the lights on so they wont come out) back again. And to top it all off, they have multiplied and the eggs have started to hatch, infant cockroaches running around our apartment. Another generation, ready to grow up and terrorizes us yet again. Will it ever end?!

Ladies and Gentlemen...We have reached a new level...

Wow, it has been a while since I last wrote. Funny how not much can happen in your life, but you still are too busy to do simple little things like update a blog. Or maybe it is because not much is going on in my life that I haven't written, I'm going to go with that one, better than just sounding plain old lazy.
Well, Zach is now in ultimate over drive. I always wonder how he could possibly get any busier, and then he does. He has just been given a paper to write by Monday (which will be published) and that means researching it and writing it in that time. This is on top of all his other studying, not to mention the fact that he has convinced himself that he has been afflicted with Meningitis...don't ask. Apparently this is something that happens to people who are on the road to becoming doctors, they read about a disease/virus/ailment and think that they have contracted it. The ultimate in hypochondriacism. He has coined a new term for this, MSH, which stands for Medical Student Hypochondriacism. He has also started to diagnose others (he's sharing the love) and apparently I have a mild case of passive-aggressive disorder (don't know how to take that, but to tell you the truth...I think he is right). He might as well be a doctor already for all the diagnosing he is doing. It doesn't help that every time he talks to one of his friends back home they tell him their problems (real or not) and ask him, calling him doctor of course, to tell them what is wrong with them. He usually tells them something made up to satisfy them and get a laugh.
So this crazy weekend is progressing at break-neck speed and Zach has, of course, deemed certain things unnecessary, namely sleep. He got to bed, I repeat GOT to bed, at 7 this morning, proceeded to have one and a half hours of sleep and woke up to continue writing. This is what I have to deal with, crazy med student and all his baggage. And you all think that it is fun and games in Grenada, well I'm here to tell you that it is not!

Will you be my Valentine?

Zach and I celebrated our second Valentine's Day in Grenada yesterday. I didn't get the usual dozen roses that I got most other years (along with yummy chocolate), but instead I got some gifts straight from New York City!! How much better could it get?! Zach got me this really cute mug from Starbucks and a necklace from H&M, which he picked out by himself (can you tell I'm proud?!). The reason that I didn't get flowers hinges mainly on a story that I must share which happened last year right around this time. A poor, innocent, unsuspecting Zach walked into a flower shop just down the road from us (which by-the-way is the only florist on the island) and asked how much the roses were. The lady behind the counter said, "30EC (it's about $13 Canadian)" and Zach said, "Oh, for six?" to which the lady replied, "No, just for one.". Zach looked at her, picked his jaw off the ground, and said, "Well, how much for the six then?", thinking, well six should be a bit of a deal. The lady told him that the six would be $180 EC, she obviously was lacking some business skills. Zach nearly lost it, he is Menno after all. He just mumbled a, "No thanks" and walked out. He came home and, after explaining why he had no flowers for me, felt like a bit of a cheap-skate. He then told me that I could use the money for shopping purposes when we got home, which I was completely in favour of! So this year he decided think ahead a bit and take matters into his own hands. This year I was the one to not buy a gift (or think ahead and get one from home), so I guess we're even:)



Me displaying the gifts I got from Zach.



There was a heart in my coffee, I thought it was pretty cool. You know, it being Valentine's Day and all...
And no, Zach didn't put it there. He's good, but not that good.

I'm baaaaaaack!

Well, it has been a while since I have updated, so a lot has happened. I'm back in Grenada and have been since the 31st of January. It was great to see Zach again and I think that he felt the same way. Or maybe it was just the fact that he had his cook back...who knows! Anyway, things are back to the same ol' here and to be honest, it feels as though I never left. What a scary thought. I walked into our apartment for the first time and I got this strange feeling like I was home, weird! I never thought that this would feel like home to me, but it is getting there (just in time to leave again for good in four months). I guess I won't really have a sense of home for a long time, another scary thought! I have no clue as to where we will be next year and it is a strange feeling. We might go to England to do some clinical rotations, or we might go straight to New York, or New Jersey, who knows. It is actually a bit of a liberating feeling to have our future so wide open, who knows where God might take us?! Weirdest of all is that I was the BIGGEST fan of staying in Abbotsford (my home town) for the rest of my life. I hated the thought of change and could not picture my life anywhere else. And here I am, thousands of miles from home and contempaleting, with my husband, (why does it still feel so weird to say that?) if we will go to the US or England, just cuz we can! Life never ceases to amaze me. Well, enough philosophical talk for now, back to life here. The best news of all is that I have not seen one cockroach since I've been here! And to think I spent all that money on buying roach traps when I was home?! We are going to set them up anyway, just in case this is some sort of grace period they are giving me. Zach is still working like a maniac, as usual. Wow, he makes it really hard to blog about him, he never does anything out of the ordinary for me to report. I burnt myself at the pool the other day, aparently you can't go out for the first time in six weeks without sunscreen (yes, I know this is bad). Well, I have to get back to another hard day of reading and TV watching!

A Grenadian Christmas!

My friend Laura hosted a Christmas brunch this last Saturday and it was a lot of fun. I must say, she put together quite the party for Grenada (for North American standards as well), I was very impressed. She had a huge spread of food, decorated her little one room dorm with palm fronds and a little mini Christmas tree (that she borrowed from a friend who is staying here for Christmas and felt the need to get in the spirit a little more) and had us all bring gifts for a gift exchange. The pictures are of the group of girls that attended and then two pictures of me, one with Kristin and the other with Laura (yes, I know that sounded vain, but lets face it, a blog is a pretty vain thing. What makes us think that we need to dedicate and entire website to ourselves?!). Needless to say, it was a great party and it did a great job of getting us in the Christmas spirit! We ended up ruining all of Laura's effort though, we went to the beach afterwards to work on our tans!

Kwality with a "K"

Last night Zach and I decided to get Chinese food for dinner. I bet you are all wondering why I have posted a picture of an Indian restaurant then? Well, that is all part of my story. This place is normally an Indian restaurant, but on Sunday's for some reason or other the owner decided that she should offer just Chinese food. Now, back home this would be a giant red flag that we should not try this restaurant, but here it is a different story. There are about three places on this island to get Chinese food and one of them is too far away and the other isn't, but it has the crappiest tasting food ever (I mean the sweet and sour sauce is hot pink, just wrong). We were down to just this one, so we got brave and headed out. Now we kept our minds open when we entered the place and it smelled like curry, when we didn't recognize any of the food, and when there was about six options to choose from (buffet-style). But when I took a bite and it was SPICY?!?! What the heck?! That is where the open mindedness stopped. Zach liked it because he likes spicy food, but even he agreed that it tasted nothing like Chinese food. I believe that his exact words were that it was 'Chindian food' (an Indian interpretation of Chinese). So the lesson here for everyone out there is to never buy Chinese food from an Indian lady in a Caribbean country. Kwality with a "K" about sums it up!

Baby it's cold outside...oh wait...

I can't believe...it is already December 1st today! For all you people on the West Coast, I'm four hours ahead and therefore it is the 1st already. I (or should I say, we) leave for home in 15 days, that is crazy. As you can imagine it has been really hard to focus on life in Grenada for the past few days. With all the snow back home and knowing that we are leaving in two weeks, it's kinda hard to concentrate. For me anyways. Zach on the other hand is a freaking trooper! He can block just about anything out of his mind while he is in "study-mode". Don't get me wrong, he talks about home whenever his head isn't in the books, but for some reason or other, he can just get down to business when he needs to. I guess that is why he's the one in Med School and I'm the one working on the tan (but really he should work on his tan too. There should be some sort of law that prohibits his degree of white in a Caribbean country!).
This last week has been one filled with events for me. Desperate Housewives on Sunday with the girls (Laura and Kristin), movie night with the girls on Tuesday, Book Club on Wednesday night (with the girls+2), Pool Day Thursday with Laura and the rest of the other S.O.'s (for those of you who don't know this, it stands for the Significant Others...that's me!).......yes, there is a bit of a trend here, there is a lot of girl time, but in my defense, Zach has been having a lot of book time lately:) Anyway, the point of my whole rant is that having so many events planned makes the time go by nicely!
I guess I should give a bit of an update about Zach. Well, he is studying....yeah, that about sums it up! No, just kidding (well, he is studying). He has finished going to all the classes that he needs to and his butt is officially glued to his chair until his exams are over. Only two finals to go and he is done his first year of Med School (Man, where has this year gone?!). Zach has also been cranking out the Christmas tunes to try and get in the holiday spirit. I think that he gets his best studying done when Bing Crosby is singing.
Anyway, tomorrow night is Date Night and I can't help but wonder...will we be going to KFC for dinner or for chicken nuggets at the mall food court...hhmmmm...? Ahhh Grenada, we love you!

More pictures.

It snowed all weekend back home and I wanted to post a few picks from that first snowfall. The first one is of our cat Berndt trying to get out of the snow! Isn't she just the cutest?! The second is taken of Zach's parents deck. Zach and I are just dying knowing what we are missing and having to hear about it when we are sitting here sweating profusely. Try and save some of the snow for us in December:) There are also a few other random pictures of friends attached.



A group shot from a sailing trip that we took a few weeks ago.
Emily, Kyle
Donny, Lisa, Sean, Kristin, Laura, Jason
Ryan, Zach and me


Me, Emily, Kristin and Laura on our sailing trip.


My bookclub(And no, Marcy, we do not have four months to read a book!)
Me, Marca, Lisa, Bethany, and Laura(Kristin is in it too, but she is not in the picture.)

Shots from the past few weeks

Our Thanksgiving spread!


All our friends at Donny and Lisa's house where we had our "feast".


Peter and Sari on their anniversary.


Laura and I at the church's Ladies Christmas Luncheon(which we had before Thanksgiving!).


The table at the luncheon, we had a gingerbread women at each of our spots. The girls did a great job of trying to make it feel christmasy dispite the 45C heat!

Just another week in Grenada...

I bet you are all wondering what happened to me in the last week. Well, true to Grenadian form, our internet had cut out on us. Five days of not being able to blog. You know how hard that was for me?! As a new blogger, and self-proclaimed blog stalker, life was really boring without my new best friend! After numerous calls to Cable and Wireless(internet place), endless days of agony, and one really rude voicemail message(left by me, I hate to admit); I, that is right, I fixed the internet! Look at me, how smart am I? Just a reconnection here and a few clicks of my mouse there and voila! It was back on(eat that Tom!!!). Needless to say, I'm quite proud of myself.
Well, other than improving my computer skills, a few things have happened in the past week. Zach and I, along with our American friends, celebrated our first American Thanksgiving. I still feel full thinking about it! We had quite the spread of all the traditional foods, turkey, ham, mashed potatoes, stuffing...everything down to the pumpkin pie! It was a lot of fun. Seeing as to how Zach and I will most likely end up living in the States, we felt it was a really good "first time" experience to a holiday that we will now be celebrating for years to come!
That same night we visited our friends Peter and Sari who were, along with Thanksgiving, celebrating their 1st Wedding Anniversary. Peter, who stays back in New York to work while Sari studies to become a doctor, flew down for the occasion. We had a blast with them, watching their wedding video and eating leftover wedding cake(apparently mom isn't the only one who saves the tops of the cakes!!) that Peter smuggled in!
Zach also celebrated his 24th birthday on friday doing what he loves, studying! He had a final to study for(which he is writing right now...) and I know better than to try and argue with him over studying. I did make him his favorite dinner and some cinnamon rolls for breakfast(a mom Klaassen tradition that is Zach's favorite!), so hopefully he didn't have too bad of a day!
I also went to a Ladies Christmas Luncheon two weekends ago and that was a lot of fun. The girls from our church here on campus(C.S.A.) put it together. It was fun to get together with other women, students and SO's, and meet some new people as well.

Pictures of our apartment in Grenada

People asked for pictures of our apartment, so here they are...




Our kitchen(we don't have hot water in here and we have a propane oven/stove!).


This is my room, the TV area on the other side of the kitchen. Check out the huge TV!


The bedroom, the only room with A/C. Needless to say, we are in here most of the time. Zach has his desk in here, so this is where he spends his endless hours studying(while I spend endless hours sleeping!). Yes, that is Zach having one of his infamous power-naps:)





These are two shots of our bathroom. I don't know why I felt compelled to show these, but I felt it needed to be shown in order to get the full experience.

Some pictures from Grenada...

That's right, these turtles are getting it on!!!

I have finally done it, I've started a blog!

Well, here it is, my blog. I've got to say, I'm quite proud of myself for figuring this out! I've had no excuse for not setting it up sooner. Just lazy I guess. I must have more Grenada in me then I thought! Well, that's an upsetting revelation.
Anyway, Zach and I are doing well. He is studying like crazy(surprise, surprise) and having a blast! Seriously, I've never seen someone more happy after putting in a 16 hour day of studying. Come to think of it, I don't think I've ever witnessed anyone else studying for 16 hours before. I think that is about the equivalent of all my studying in five years of highschool! Like I said, he's crazy!
Me? Well I'm doing good too. Being that great pillar of strength for my husband...right! I am baking and cooking for him though, and he seems to appreciate it:) My days are usually filled with tv, sweating, running, sweating, cooking, sweating, tanning, sweating...you get the point!
It is a nice comfortable("feels like") 45C here today. I tell ya, nothing gets you in the Christmas spirit more then going outside and sweating your butt off! The only time it even feels remotely like Christmas is when we are in the "mall"(I use quotations for a reason. It's smaller than, and about as classy as, what the old West Oaks was!!). It is completely decked out for the holidays and they have the A/C cranking in there. so...if one uses their imagination well, one could think that they are in a cold climate and the pre-Christmas season is as it should be. I'll tell ya, the lengths I have to go to in this country!
Well, only 26 more days until we leave. I've been chanting that like a moto these past few days, and it seems as though I will continue to do so until we are home! I will do my best to keep up with the "blogging" and provide more frequent updates for everyone. Happy reading:)