Forgive Me Father For I Am In Awe

I am simply awestruck by Praia. I can't say that I had any real preconceived notions of how Cape Verde would look, but I did have some coworkers/friends who told me that it was dirty. I always try not to let the experience/ideas/opinions of others color my views but I'm sure they crept in like a thief in the night anyway. Take a looksey at the wonderful sights.

Man Can Not Live on Bread Alone

We went to a bakery down the block from our hostel. Local cuisine is always a plus for me. Cape Verdean bread reminds me of Dominican bread. I had a flaky pastry that had chicken and cheese with fresh squeezed orange juice. Tropican-who? 

I am a huge flour fan. Bagels, baguette, croissants, muffins and rolls. The more gluten the better. 

This looks like a Haitian chicken patty. Different flavor but tasty nonetheless.

I told y'all about my love for flour products. I had to get some more bread to satiate my appetite.

Salut!

We went to this really chic restaurant for dinner. There was a live band playing a lot of classic Cape Verdean tunes. Our lone Cape Verdean quipped that the music was from his parent's generation. I loved it. Aside from food, music is one of my favorite introductions to other cultures.

Happy Holidays

How Not to Order Dinner in Another Language

I've never considered myself very adventurous. In fact, I actually think that I can be a stick in the mud at times. Like I've always been wary of traveling to far away places with hard to identify foods. Come on we all know I live to eat. Then there's also the language barrier. Oy ve. Can you imagine thinking you ordered chicken and they bring out a goat's head or cow liver? I say all this to say that is almost exactly what happened to us in the restaurant. The lone Cape Verdean in the group wasn't with us for lunch so we had to make do on our own. 

Take a look at the menu and see if you can figure out what's what.

This is before we took a look at the menu

Pretty Pretty Praia

Praia was so pretty and clean. It was also surprisingly quiet. Most of the folks that live in Praia made an exodus to their respective islands (Cape Verde has 10 islands, but only 7 are inhabited). 

Futbol stadium (CV was qualified for a huge game)