slow day at the office

Getting up this morning was hard. yesterday we went to this cocktail party that my dad was invited to--just he and i, at first, which was sort of nice. to have his undivided attention, for once. well, as undivided as it ever is. but then it became clear that it was more than just a cocktail party, it was a dinner and potentially all-night rager. well as all-night rager as a gang of unicef workers can go...which was pretty surprising. anyhow, open bar, i'm not complaining. but my body wasn't too thrilled about it this morning.

anyhow, when that became evident i suggested that we get louise and julian there too. julian reminds me of me a little. he's not really used to being around other kids too much and seemed more interested in sticking around with mom then playing with the others, which made me kindof sad. it also makes me worry about dad's plans for retiring to st. felix where there are no other kids. he's cute and gorgeous and apparently according to a lady last night has my eyes (ha! hahahaha!) and totally a flirt and super friendly with adults, but if he doesn't grow up around other kids he will wind up being totally socially awkward. 

anyways. so that was fun-it was actually really nice being part of the "family" and that was a surprising warm, fuzzy feeling. am i still in a hurry to start my own? not necessarily a hurry, but i know who i want to start it with... and i think that because i've accepted that louise and julian are dad's family now and therefore mine, it means i'm ready to move on, move out, and get on with life. once my nine months are up anyhow. 

so the decision to stay at dad's is kindof tricky. i saw the volunteer house today, its totally not a bad place. much nicer than i'd imagined and definitely livable, in fact almost more so than the thies house in some ways but with a worse (maybe) kitchen and not such a nice living space. the other thing that gives me hesitation is the thought of living with like 6 girls. i know its somewhat anti social but rowan and i are having a great time at the office and hopefully going to hang out more next week, hopefully when eva comes back we'll chill too because she's the one that's going to be here about as long as i am. lets just not bring up the last person that is there... who i already can't stand. 

so tomorrow i have a day off and i'm hoping to get to the beach. and maybe do other sight-seeing type stuff over the weekend. i just need to enjoy being in africa. i can't believe its not even been two weeks yet, in fact its been just over a week today. 

i'm not unhappy, i am just full of doubts and i guess its the normal phase of settling into something new... did i make the right decision to stay at dad's and not at the volunteer house? did i make the right decision to ask to be posted to dakar and not thies or elsewhere in the field? will i get to go to the field? do the people in the office like me yet or do i still need to warm them up to me? do i want to be like dad and wind up working for unicef or hcr, or do i want to go to theatre school or be a journalist or an editor or... or ... or... ?

i guess a lot of this is normal because i did just graduate from college and now i need to sort myself out and i feel like now is the time to begin making really strong statements about who i am. again i run into this feeling that all of my clothes are slightly inappropriate. so maybe i am someone who shows a lot of skin when she dresses. i think i'm mostly just overly sensitive. funnily enough i've been enjoying dressing nicely for the office except for the fact that its hot. i do want to get nice senegalese clothes, but i don't want to rush out and buy them to have them to wear for friday (thank god tomorrow's off)... and i don't want to feel constrained to say hi to everyone in the office in the morning (because apparently its traditional to greet everyone when you arrive). i hate mornings. anyone who knows me at all knows that i'm probably doing the world a service by NOT going and greeting everyone in the morning. it takes me that long to warm up. 

ok. enough nonsense rambling. i'm going to call this person back and see what she wants. i'm not particularly impressed by the fact that she hasn't shown up yet and its 11:30. so i'm not particularly inclined to do whatever she tells me. but the truth is, i don't really have much else to work on today, so we'll see....