First post in Abuja!

Hi everyone!  Hope you're all doing well!  Just wanted to let you know what I've been up to since arriving in country for my new position at the CDC.   Still living in a hotel for the time being, and while it's not the nicest place,  at least I magically got the air conditioner to work (this consisted of pressing all the buttons on the remote in random order), so I'm not waking up in the middle of the night sweating like a monster.  Me and the other fellow will move into our apt on Wed.  For now, we've just been hanging out at the hotel, catching up on sleep, recouping from being sick, and then going out at night to meet with new friends! Fun!
Yesterday we tried out an Indian restaurant in our neighborhood to be, then went to someone's house for trivia night.  My team won!  It was a lot of crazy yelling and drunkeness from expats all over... The Irish one was particularly drunk, and particularly funny.  Our new trivia buddies dropped us off at the hotel when it was over, and we ended up getting stopped twice by police roadblocks.  It was Nigerian Independence Day today, so security was ramped up because of the bombings that happened last year... Anyhow it was pretty funny, watching the police trying to shake down our friend for bribe money ( they call it "dashing" here)... One of the policemen just wanted to chat with us (maybe practice his English?) since we were all foreigners in the car.  
Today a friend of a friend took us out for a tour of the city, and we had our first Nigerian meal of heavy heavy starch, everything starch!  I had fried rice, jollof rice, which is a redder version of fried rice, and spicier to boot, then yam porridge, fried plantains, some beef stew thingy, and moin moin, which are savory cakes made from some sort of bean mush paste concoction.  Wasn't able to finish it, and then had a major stomach ache trying to digest it all.  It was good... Just... Going to take some getting used to.  Then we shopped at the local fruit market, where I got heckled because I was wearing shorts, but I had the most delicious tangerine ever!  The pineapples look different, much longer and squatter at the bottom, but I heard that once you eat pineapples from Africa, nothing will ever be the same... I'll let you know and chronicle more food and eating adventures further down the line.   Lastly, we went to tour the Transcorp Hilton, which is where all the dignitaries and fancy whatevers of state stay... Super posh, super expensive.  I like how there was "The Dollar Shop", actually written in quotations, where a pair of slippers cost $685 USD!  That is not like the dollar store back home.
Tonight, we hung out with some friends at a rooftop bar, Where we were the only people there.  Nice to have it to ourselves though.  Got a great view of the lightening storms that they have here... Though it didn't actually rain.  I also tried my first malt beverage, they call it Malta here, and it's made by Guinness, the beer company.  Tastes sweet, nothing like the nonalcoholic malt drinks in the States... And is supposed to have a lot of vitamins, haha.  Someone said it was marketed more towards the Muslim population here, although I'm not certain about that.
Work hasn't started yet... It is a federal holiday on Monday, so we don't actually get started until Tuesday.  And even then, our boss isn't here yet since he's traveling on CDC duties, so I have absolutely no idea what I'm going to be doing... Since everything works on "Africa time" here, where all processes are maximally slow, and nothing ever gets completed, we shall see how much I can get done this year, although the living experience in Nigeria itself with be something of worth, haha.   Miss everyone tons! Please keep me posted on your respective lives in the states! Either comment and let me know you're still alive and well, haha, or send me something via email or Facebook. Hugs all around! Until next time, Dwee