A roof with a view

I just wanted to capture some pics of those things that surround us and that we look at every day from our high-rise apartment.  As the pics show, our environment looks the same year round.  It's difficult to tell the time of year we're in because we don't have the drastic variations in seasons here.  There is no snow or cold in the winter, or a massive change in leaf colors in the fall, or spring flowers in the spring, etc.  I did happen to catch a few of these pics at sunset so there are beautiful colors in the sky.

Here is the view from the back of the house.

 Some teenage boys looking for their ball they lost among the satellite dishes up on the roof of their apartment building.  Not the best place to be playing ball, but I get it--the space to play ball here in the city is very limited.

Across from our building is  an open green area with some small brick sidewalks.  It's an area that attracts homeless people and men hanging out together.  People pass through on their way to work or school and women selling food on their heads all day will relax in the shade as well.

I noticed there are a few trash cans around the grass, and they actually have trash in them.  These are literally the first public trash cans I think I've seen here--not a pile of trash accumulating  every day, but an actual trashcan.  The government apparently cut the trash collecting budget last year from $30 million to $10 million after oil prices plummeted, so now Luanda is suffering from more malaria and now yellow fever as a result of the mosquitoes, as well as cholera, diarrhea and other illnesses.  There have been a number of deaths reported, as well as very ill people just since December.  The Angolan government has been meeting to try and figure out how to deal with the crisis.

 And because of heavy rains and the piles of trash contaminating the local water (and budget issues), the drinking water is now colored and is brown, especially in outlying areas of the city.  Our water, in one of the nicer buildings in the city, is discolored, which is not nearly as bad as what the poorer people are dealing with.  The embassy facilities guys are trying to manage this issue in all of the embassy residences.  Luckily we still get our water through a distiller which provides drinkable water.  Here's the water in our tub that I prepared for the girls to take a bath in last week:

Kids playing soccer in an open courtyard area, houses around us, a street light that doesn't function properly but just blinks yellow all day, and a Coca-Cola logo.

 A few mornings, Thomas caught the sun as it was rising (the kids get up early for school):

 
Night lights.  I love our night view--things are slower and quieter, and I love the lights.