Tea Time is My Favorite Time

Willem just asked me to attend a conference with him next Monday and I'm already excited about Tea Time.

Tea Time in Namibia is more than just tea - it's a regular meal, and conferences usually have TWO (in addition to lunch), one around 10am and the other around 3pm. When I attended a 3-day workshop my second week here, I was blown away (delightfully so) at the amount of food served with our tea and coffee. In the morning, they would usually set out several platters of open-faced sandwiches - crusty halves of mini-loaves spread with butter (all sandwiches here begin with butter) and topped with ham and cheese, salami with olives, egg salad, or a raw meat mixture I wasn't brave enough to try. After a full lunch at 1, the second round of tea is usually includes some sort of sweet cookie treat, and of course, coffee, Rooibos tea, and cream. This is par for the course for any conference or meeting in Namibia. Makes you wonder a bit, though, about the money spent on all this food, especially when it's a group of non-profits or government agencies getting together... it seems like an excessive misallocation of funds and food considering the poverty here. I have more thoughts on this, perhaps I should save it for a separate entry.

At any rate, I do love my tea time and recently institutied a modified version of the practice with Victor and Lucia. Every day around 10, I have a cup of Rooibos tea and some rusks, a South African food that is basically a rectangular, hard, dry biscuit (or twice-baked bread) and dipped in tea. According to Wikipedia, rusks were used extensively during times of war and long-distance travel as a way to preserve bread in the dry climate. So far, I've tried the Muesli, Lemon-Poppyseed (my favorite), and Wheat flavors... next on the list is the Sweetened Condensed Milk flavor. Yum.

I felt proud yesterday morning when another lawyer in the office said she was "happy to see me drinking Rooibos tea - most of the other visitors don't like it." I do love the tea, but I think I like the idea of rusks more than the actual taste. Oh well, I think it makes my co-workers happy when I bring in treats, and it's a good morning snack. After all, when in Rome...