Brochettes, Frites & Friends: Hanging out at the Hippodrome

Last month, Rebekah, Nadia and Anna were invited to spend the afternoon with one of their friends from school. Her name is Zeina.

Zeina and Nadia have been great friends since they started going to school together in the "Moyenne section" (i.e. K4) class of École Alliance. And now, almost 6 years later, they are still best buddies.

We always enjoy having Zeina come visit us - and we usually drag her along to the pool. But our girls prefer a visit to her home, her family's concession at the hippodrome or to their gardens outside of town. Zeina's parents spoil our girls rotten, and being typical little girls, they love the lavish attention they receive.

This time, when we went to pick the girls up, we all went and spent a bit of time just sitting around watching the kids play, visiting, and... as you can see... taking lots of photos.

They were all fascinated with the gazelle and the process of making Tuareg tea (featured in yesterday's Wordless Wednesday), scarfed down some yummy brochettes and frites, engaged in lots of "bavardage" (or visiting and telling stories), chasing the goats and the birds and just having an all around great time. It ended up being a pretty late night.

When we finally decided it was time to call it a night, we wanted to get a photo of the whole group. When we walked out of the concession to where the vehicles were parked along the road. A shepherd was bringing a rather large herd of sheep and goats by at the time.

What was really incredible was how much dust was kicked up into the air. You can only barely see the animals in this photo... look for their eyes!

Zeina's parents are on the back right of this photo. Our girls all think "Madame Zeinabou ngya" is one of the most beautiful ladies they've ever met.

And here's a photo of all the kiddos.

They've been driving us crazy to go back ever since...

I especially love this photo: our gentle, never-met-a-stranger-friendly Nadia, sandwiched between her two best friends, Zeina and Anna. Don't they look like best buddies loving' their time together?

And, just curious... Nadia and Anna want to know how many of you know what a "hippodrome" is? Hippodrome is about the only word they'll use... even though they all now know the English translation.