So its officially impossible now to write everyday, but I will keep trying. Promised.
On Thursday it was straight to Yoga after work, first session at the American Embassy in weeks and then collapsing into bed exhausted. Then, yesterday was of course Friday. It was a busy day doing handovers with literally all my colleagues as in good expatriate fashion people start their christmas holidays in mid december. As I am not going home this year I will be alone in the office as of next Monday and Hurray for that! Fridays I also like to go for an afterwork drink and if it hadnt been so overcast again i could have posted Kigalis best view from Panorama Bar right here.

And now back to April 2009. I hadnt been back to my beloved Scotland in a while now and was therefore mighty happy that my very good friend Isadora (formerly known as Laura) got married in her native land and gave me a reason to visit. Of course I was equally happy she had found the man of her life in the first place. It still makes me consider going to Afghanistan for work every now and then as I know at least 4 people who went there and got married with people they met there - emergency countries, way to go, lots of eligible young men!
On my way i stopped over for my annual visit to London to do some last minute wedding outfit shopping (as a bridesmaid we had to come up with a peacock theme!) and to spend some time with my friend Ines. For this time of year the weather was exceptional and I was walking around London in a T-shirt enjoying bright blue sky and sunshine. And I took that weather with me on a lovely trainride up north. As I arrived at Edinburgh Station the castle on the left and busy Princess Street on the right for a moment I travelled back in time and was 19 again. I was going to head further towards a little B&B near Isadoras house in Fife where I would stay with Liz during the days before the wedding. But before I wandered around town a little following my memories of places I used to love and ended up in my favorite cafe at Haymarket where I sat happily for an hour with my fudge cake and the afternoon sun in my face.
In the evening I met up with Liz and the bride for a happy reunion, first time we were all together again after Liz and Isadora left Rwanda. In the days to come I had time to show Liz a little around, we went to St. Andrews and for a coastal walk. On Good Friday we headed to Dundee where Isadora and Sabour had rented a big old house for the wedding. When I first entered I was blown away as it smelled exactly like the house I used to live in near Stirling, a mix of old furniture, dust...ok, that doesnt sound very inviting but it was in fact. So our first duty was to check out the rooms and allocate them to the wedding guests, from the big lovely rooms for the parents to the small downstairs servant rooms for the male single friends of the groom - all with quite distinguished names as "Bruce" or "Lady in waiting".
It was a very lovely and relaxed atmosphere the whole time, the cooking was done by ourselves, I think the bride actually made her own wedding cake. Most of the time we sat around the big AGA stove in the kitchen refreshing old memories and forging new bonds.
The wedding was a Baha'i ceremony, an religion coming out of Zoroastrianism in Iran. It comprised elements from different religions including a poem by arabic writer Khalil Gibran that I was honoured to read. I had heard of it for the first time then but as it turned out later its quite a wedding favourite. Again the sky blessed us with bright sunshine and bearable temperatures which meant relief especially for the ladies' wardrobes as we had feared to ruin our lovely peacock coloured outfits with hideous jackets or other unattractive accessories to keep warm - although I cherish the memory of the bride's red and brown knitted legwarmers underneath the beautiful white Thai silk dress deeply!

Here is a picture of the whole wedding party and one of the lovely couple amidst daffodils - ah, Scotland in spring!







Im April war ich in Schottland zur Hochzeit meiner guten Freundin Isadora (Laura). Ich war schon so lange nicht mehr dort gewesen und hab es daher sehr genossen, zumal das Wetter einfach grossartig war. Das Paar hatte ein schoenes altes Haus gemietet und so war genuegend Platz fuer Freunde und Familie. Hier ein Bild der Hochzeitsgesellschaft und Isadora mit ihrem Mann Sabour.