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psychopersonified · 4 years ago

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Interrupted

Q’s video conference gets interrupted by a half naked man wielding a cat...

Inspired by the multitude of wonderful fanart featuring Q and Bond in front of a computer, some clothed, some not quite 😉. And also by stories of zoom call accidents.

Tags: Freshly established relationship. Breaking the news.

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“…How much progress are we making in regards to the drag coefficient?” is the next question on Q’s mind as he reviews the R&D stage-gate checklist. Q has his attention on the tablet in front of him, marking up the design drawing with a stylus. The image is shared onscreen with the other three participants of the call.

“Wind tunnel test results are back, the best we’ve achieved so far is using V308 design, but as expected it does come with some compromise to practicality—”

At R’s sudden pause, Q looks up and turns towards the screen displaying the participants’ video feed.

“Sorry R I didn’t catch that, you might have cut out for a moment.” He adjusts the wireless earbuds in case they’ve come loose.

Jenny’s image smiles widely and the others follow suit. “Sir, did you adopt a new kitty?”

The unexpected question prompts him to look around his desk. He spies Spot lounging out of view of the webcam, by his favourite window perch having just had breakfast. Q assumes the other black and white cat, Jellicles must be somewhere under Spot’s large orange lump.

“Uh, no?” he is a little discomfited, not knowing what brought on the bizarre tangent in the discussion.

“Boss, you sure about this? He’s a big one. Might eat you out of house and home,” Nish joins in the ribbing.

“Granted he’s a silent killer. Any unwanted gifts dropped off on your carpet yet?” Jamila this time.

“What on earth are you all talking about—,“ in his own video feed minimised out of the way on the bottom right corner, Q finally catches sight of movement in the background.

The problem with open plan living Q notices for the first time, is the lack of privacy. Not an issue if you’re living alone, but when you have house guests, it makes it trickier. Q’s webcam faces the dining area where Agent 007 is currently making a spectacle of himself. His shirtless muscular back is half turned to them. The light grey sweatpants he is wearing slung dangerously low on his hips - the tops of his well sculpted glutes artfully exposed.

Bond had wandered absently into the dining area, one arm cradling a restless black and white cat to his chest like a baby, but his attention is focused on the tablet held in his other hand. Jellicles is not happy at being ignored - headbutting Bond under the chin and attempting repeatedly to bop the human on the nose to get his attention.

When the agent is sufficiently annoyed, he locks eyes with the cat for a moment before tipping his head to smush his nose against cat’s forehead - which causes Jellicles to meow loudly in reply.

Q turns back to look at his monitor, all three participants on the call are staring in open-mouthed shock. He searches his desk for something to throw; a squishy stress toy in the shape of a cow would suffice. Q aims for the torso, but the toy bounces comically off Bond’s rock hard arse instead.

That catches Bond’s attention and he turns around - Q regrets not thinking this one through. He and his little audience are now treated to the frontal view, which is arguably even more distracting. The agent’s golden tan glows in the morning light - accentuating the definition of his well developed pectorals all the way to the rippling planes of the chiseled abdominals and the blonde trail of hair peeking out of the waistband. Further below, the soft cotton blend material of the sweatpants does little to hide the endowments underneath.

Bond raises a quizzical eyebrow at him. He’d put the tablet down and caught one of the cat’s paws in his hand in the interim - to stop it from trying to touch his nose and was kissing each little toe-bean before the interruption. Bond is in a fantastic mood this morning and Jellicles must adore him enough to allow such manhandling.

Q scowls at him and mouths ‘I’m on a call’ while using a hand to gesture at his monitor and the webcam. Bond’s expression turns apologetically wide-eyed for a second in acknowledgment of his little gaffe. But in the next moment, he appears to brush it off -hanged for a sheep as a lamb-.

Instead of ducking out of view, he takes four purposeful strides towards Q’s desk, the cat still in his arms. Q can’t decide if disabling his video would cause more suspicion or if they should just cease with the charade - somehow ‘he’s just a friend who sleeps over and cuddles my cats’ defence doesn’t quite stack up at this point.

Behind him now and without a trace of shame, Bond bends over a shoulder to wink at the three familiar faces in the monitor. Q resists the urge to slap the man away, opting instead to glower at him. The agent senses a rebuke forthcoming, so preemptively uses the cat as a shield. He holds the black and white cat up to the webcam, then pushes the cat in front of Q’s face - Jellicles doesn’t disappoint, immediately latching on and playfully chewing on Q’s nose.

“Ah! James!” Q tries to flinch away. The assault is over in seconds when Bond pulls the cat away but then unexpectedly returns to peck Q on the corner of his mouth before he can even protest. When Bond straightens again, the expansive view of naked chest and abs fills up most of the right side of Q’s video feed.

Q has to half turn and physically nudge the agent away with a splayed hand against warm hard muscle. The touch a searing reminder of their activities the night before. Bond is immovable when he doesn’t want to be moved, but he relents after a second or two. His parting gift, was to dip down and nuzzle Q in the hair, using the misdirection to hook a finger around the collar of Q’s jumper, exposing the top of a well bruised collarbone. The hand then slips to caress a long line down his chest to his stomach.

“James! Will you stop it!” Q hisses. His next reaction is to stab the bastard in the side with the blunt tip of the tablet stylus to salvage his ruined modesty. The man is a menace!

The bloody peacock doesn’t even have the decency to retreat out of camera view after that, instead he claims a seat in the dinning area, beaming with a satisfied smile. The cat now balanced on his stomach and chest, he moves another chair around so he can prop his legs on it and stretch out, putting himself on blatant display. An artist would beg to paint such a perfect tableau. Q wants to taser the smile off his face.

Q clears his throat, not daring to look directly at his colleagues - too flustered to offer an explanation as to why 007 was molesting him in his home. So he tries ineffectively for the pretend-it-didnt-happen route, “Um… Right. Where were we? Jenny, the wind tunnel results?....”

Jamila blinks furiously. Nish makes a hoarse croaking, “Whaaaa…..” like air escaping his lungs.

And R… well R just says, “Sir, I think I speak for everyone here that we’re traumatised by what we just saw, bloody traumatised. We don’t think we can continue with today’s discussion until a satisfactory explanation has been provided...” R forces Q into a corner. Two other heads nod their support for Jenny’s statement. None of them appear disapproving - but it is guaranteed they are going to take the mickey out of him.

There is no way he is going to spill tea with Bond still within earshot. The agent’s ego is unmanageable as it is. “If I promise to reveal all on Monday, can we please get on with this?” Q tries to make his whisper sound imperious to no avail - a half naked man lounging in the background tends to undermine one’s authority.

“Health & Safety would disagree. It’s an occupational hazard you know, to be distracted around dangerous lab equipment,” Jamila points out. The others agree. Mutiny from his top three.

“How is my personal life -your- distraction?”

“When there is a not inconsiderable pot waiting to be distributed. Come on boss, there’s still time for me to collect my winnings if things go my way,” Nish begs while consulting his phone for the records.

“So… he’s -James- now is he? Is this a one time slumber party or an extended sleepover?” R powers through heedless.

Q considers his answer, he is marginally aware of the betting pool around the stupid game ‘Fluster the Quartermaster’ and its various derivative odds regarding which agent, the timeline, where, method of burn etc. - but he doesn’t want to know the specifics as he wants to maintain plausible deniability should it implode in everyone’s faces.

Bond is still playing with he cat in the background, trying to teach it commands. Q doesn’t want to say it out loud, so he types it into the group chat on the side of the screen:

::We’re moving his things over later today.::

“Called it!” Jenny slams a hand on the table and punches the air in victory. Oh she knew it! Q taking the Friday off (or any day off for that matter) that had nothing to do with his cats was enough cause for intrigue.

But after the suspiciously expensive gift in the form of the red Hyundai a few months ago, it was just a matter of time. It was not the cost that was the issue, Bond’s wardrobe of bespoke suits probably cost more than the car several times over - it was the sentiment behind it that gave Jenny the courage to place a sizeable bet on them taking the next step towards cohabitation. The car, she read correctly in Bond’s weird wooing language was tantamount to an engagement ring.

Nish and the others weren’t as good as reading signs, so majority of the odds were still focused around the early stages “NO! What? Wait… When did this happen? What about first date? First snog? First shag?” Nish scrolls furiously through his phone.

The bets have taken a far more intrusive route than Q had ever expected. “Well I’m sorry my personal life does not follow the path of standard operating procedure… now can we -please- move on?” He’s acutely aware that he is blushing bright pink from head to toe.

Jenny shakes her head, the only person that would dare to override him, “Q, you took the day off - so take the day off. The prototype can wait. No emergencies at the moment, the castle is still standing. We’ll call if something pops up. Now bugger off and enjoy your day with -James-!”

*Sigh* Q rubs his temples and gives in reluctantly, “Fine! Yes, alright…” . He knows when something is a lost cause and the news is likely to cause a buzz in Q-Branch that would last the whole weekend - there goes department productivity. He’d hoped to come up with a less sensational way of disseminating the news. He expects massive ribbing on Monday.

“Oh! Permission to inform Ms Moneypenny about the change in status?” Jenny asks. The girls are having drinks tonight and it would be hell trying to conceal anything from Eve.

“No no! I’ll… inform her myself... and please try to keep this within Q-Branch, for now?” Eve would find seven ways of killing him if she had to find out from someone else. She’d already ripped into him, calling him a bloody clueless twit when she’d found out about the car Bond bought him as a ‘birthday gift’. As cars go, it was a cheap one - but Bond’s logic to get him to accept it was the sweetest thing anyone has ever said to him.

When they’ve all signed off, Q shuts down the computer and lets himself be drawn back into the life inside his flat. Balanced on Bond’s stomach, Jellicles has miraculously learned how to give high-fives on command.

“Get dressed please. I’d like breakfast before we head over to your place.” Q tell him as he passes behind the agent. He places a hand on James’ shoulder, causing the agent to tip his head back. Q drops a kiss on his forehead.

“By the way, have you told Eve about… this?” Q asks as he combs his fingernails across Bond’s scalp.

“Mmm… Not yet. Was thinking of letting her know on Monday.” Bond mutters, eyes closed. The relaxed blissed out look on his face was worth enduring a million papercuts.

“Well, that’ll be too late. Since you’ve gone and announced it with as much discretion as you conduct your missions…,” Q tugs firmly at Bond’s ears as reprimand, ”…the whole of Q-Branch will know before morning tea. Which means Eve will find out by lunch.”

Just then Q’s phone on the dinning table buzzes with an incoming call. They both pause to stare at the screen. Caller ID displays ::Moneypenny:: ominously.

“I’ll get dressed. You tell her… She called me a dithering halfwit just last week.” Bond straightens before bolting for the bedroom.

“Coward!” Q yells at him. He steels himself to answer the phone. When he does, he all but squeaks, “Hello Eve?—“

——— FIN————

Notes: The mention about the car gift is from another fic of mine and can be found here - Car troubles and Not Quite Dates.

If you liked this fic, there’s more like it on the blog. Enjoy!

#00Q #ooQ #Q #Quartermaster #00qfic #00q fanfiction

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my-sad-little-diary · 3 years ago

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Profile of a Cat: Kelly

Given Name: Calliope

Aliases: Kelly, Skelly, Telly, Tilly, Twilly, Squilly, Nelly, Fat One, Poopie, Baby, Angel, Puppy, Bird, Person, Personal Person, My Love, Toot, Tooter, Loving

Age: 3

Sex: Female

Weight: Chubby Tummy

Breed: Shorthair Mix, racing stripes and spots

Mannerisms: Sticks her bum high in the air to tell you to scratch the end of her back by her tail, bumping her face into things to leave her scent behind, blinks slowly at me to tell me she loves me, sleeps under a blanket then stretches her feets out, sits on my mousepad on the desk next to my bed so we can play Tap (I tap her head and she must try to stop me).

Her story: Mom and I were looking for kittens/ cats when our twins passed away (Bean and Lemon, they were identical; they died of leukemia with their mother and other siblings). We felt that after a few months, it was time to try to fill the hole in our hearts they left behind.

We came across an advert for a pretty shorthair kitten that was rescued from a township about half an hour away. We excitedly took the drive to fetch her, I had planned her name a week before and gotten all her toys and beds and whatnot already.

When we arrived, the lady who rescued her came out with her in a box and showed her to us, she looked about 8-9 weeks old and the lady said that she was abandoned and without a mother. I promised myself I would be her mother.

Then the lady said that she had another kitten, that was a little smaller and she wasn’t sure if they came from the same litter or not but asked if we’d see her and consider. We were already in love with one kitten so we said sure, we’d look at her potential sister. We’re really big on keeping as many kittens together from the same litter as we can, and even if they weren’t in the same litter they had still spent some time together so we wanted to keep that bond.

Kelly was a lively, exciteable and adoring kitten. She’d sit on my knee while I watched TV, she would sleep in my arms while I traced her forehead. She was very active and very clever, figuring out shortcuts to things before her sister.

There was some clash with introducing the kittens to our older cat, Jackson, mainly because Jack at this point was already around three years old and considered herself an old lady and didn’t want to concern herself with the out of control and rambunctious youth. There were a few tense moments but in the end Jack tolerated the new additions and now she even gives them a kiss every once in a while.

However, Kelly instantly gravitated towards our oldest pet, Garfield. Garfield at this time was our only male in the house (and the last male in the house), he was the alpha male type. He enjoyed most of all pissing on our curtains, bags, blankets, etc. He liked to make his presence known. For some reason this attracted Kelly to him.

They were both fixed thank gods. But ever since Kelly first bumped her head into his she would take naps with him, follow him around, play fight with him and push her little face into his until he started licking her and if he stopped she would bump him again and he had to lick her until she fell asleep so he could sleep too.

Garfield was Kelly’s favourite person and spent much of her time with him, when he died she imprinted herself more onto me and replaced sitting with him with sitting with me and nudging me and following me. I took a gap year and when I first returned back to a school environment, Uni, my mother reported to me that two hours after I had left Kelly had started meowing in my doorway telling me it was naptime. I’m now her favourite person and she’s mine.

With online school, we spend all day together and all night. She is my baby and I cuddle her and kiss her and treat her like my baby. Her sister is a little more independent on that front, which isn’t saying much. Kelly however does go through a period of alone time where every couple months she’ll disappear for two entire days and reappear as if nothing happened.

The smaller kitten however, we did not think would make it... but you can read her story on Kissie’s Profile.

#cat profile #love of my life #sweetest baby

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everyonethinksmynameiskayla · 8 years ago

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Eggs & potatoes in a tropical paradise

Last week Brittany and I took a “ladies vacation” as my mom called it to Cabo Verde (until recently “Cape Verde” in English although it’s “Cap Vert” in French which is how I think of it since all the planning was done here). You could be forgiven for not knowing anything at all about Cabo Verde - it’s a tiny country made up of 9 also tiny islands off the coast of Senegal, just south of the Canary Islands. We visited three of the islands throughout the week, so I’ll divide this post up by island. I made a video compilation of all the little clips I took of the landscapes: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hVfdJw9M1Pw (set it to high resolution so you can see the images better).

1. Santiago - Praia side

Santiago is the biggest island (it takes two hours to drive from top to bottom and about an hour to do the width) and we flew from Dakar to the capital, Praia, which is on the south side of the island. We took the Cabo Verde national airline, TACV, which I was expecting, given that the flight was about $100 round trip and was going to be an hour and TACV mostly does island hopping within Cabo Verde, a puddle jumper plane with a bring-your-own-folding-chair to sit on type deal but boy was I wrong. The plane was the size of a regional jet in the US and pretty new and they even served us all sandwiches, which blew me away. Granted, the sandwich was a hotdog bun with some cheese slices, but still, I was so impressed.

We arrived in Praia in the evening and quickly made friends with a French guy who was in our hostel and he explained that apparently Praia is dangerous at night because of gangs so we went the three of us to get some food at a restaurant near the hostel. I was blown away by how dead everything was. It was only 8 PM and there was almost no one outside and practically every shop was closed. It was the quietest city, even during the day, that I’ve ever been in. The next day as we were exploring the city, I was struck by how small it felt, especially coming from Dakar, and how orderly and calm it was. It almost felt European at times, and occassionaly even kind of reminded me of Goa in India (Portuguese colonization being what the two places have in common). We went and explored the ruins in the old city where the Portuguese had first arrived and walked up to the fort. We came across an old abandoned bar/restaurant, which was wild - it's state wasn’t so dissimilar from the ruins of the old cathedral which were several hundred years old, but it was probably only a couple of decades abandoned (I would imagine that has something to do with weather wear). You could see all the old spots where there used to be a bar and bar stools and the bathroom, but it was totally gutted.

^The abandoned bar/restaurant

We ate dinner at a jazz club/restaurant downtown which was great because Cabo Verdian music is lovely and we got to try homemade “punch” which was everywhere and was basically rum with honey and coconut and tamarind (there are other kinds too, every sort of flavor you could imagine) and it’s so good. However I was massively annoyed because we both ordered the “vegetarian” dish which I was expecting to be like a vegetable curry of some kind which sounded good and I asked if it came with rice (the waiter told us he spoke French and seemed to be telling the truth) and the waiter said yes but then it came out and it was a plate with like 10 slices of raw vegetables on it and nothing else and I was absolutely furious because it was like 8 dollars which is completely insane given that most dishes in restaurants were in the $3-5 range.

2. Sao Vicente

The next day we went back to the airport at 5 AM, which, armed with the unfortunate knowledge that Praia is not a good place to be hanging out in the dark, was not fun because we had to stand around on the empty street waiting for a cab with our phones and passports in our underwear like idiots because the hostel owner never showed up the previous evening so we couldn’t ask him to call us a cab for the next morning (not that this was a surprise, he had messaged me before we left Dakar asking if we wanted to be picked up at the airport, to which I said sure, and no one showed up to pick us up). We found another woman standing waiting for something and waited with her, luckily only for about ten minutes before a cab drove by. We felt bad leaving her on the street but with the language barrier (Cabo Verdians speak Creole and Portuguese) we couldn’t get across that she could come in our cab to wherever she was going also.

Just as in Praia, when we arrived in Mindelo, the cultural capital and the only big city on Sao Vicente, the cab that the hostel was allegedly sending us didn’t come. I was still stoked about the hostel because it’s also a cat shelter so there were cats everywhere.

^ Some of the cats at the hostel; they had their own special area and every time I came in they would go nuts and start chatting away and meowing like crazy and trying to climb up me

Mindelo is much bigger and more alive than Praia and also absolutely gorgeous. The city is nestled in a half-moon cove with a lovely marina on the most perfectly blue water that looked more like the light blue Gatorade than the ocean. We spent most of the day sitting in the floating cafe we found in the marina enjoying the view and the perfect weather and tranquility and then Brittany went to nap in the hostel and I walked up to the old fort that looked like it would have a good 360 view. When I got to the top I discovered that it was private property but that sign was accompanied by only about 5 feet of fence so I just walked right by it to do a quick round and take some pictures, since there was absolutely no one around. Those pictures are on the photo blog. Then we went to the store and bought a bunch of chips and snacks and went and sat on the beach. We swam but neither of us had bathing suits so we wore our PJs, which was bizarre because that meant wearing shorts in public which I would never dream of doing in Senegal, but in Cabo Verde most of the women were wearing mini skirts and short shorts most of the time.

^ From the floating café. We stole the label off our Cabo Verdian beer

We had been trying to taste the national dish, catchupa, which appeared to be some sort of beans and rice deal, but every time we ordered it they came back and said “no catchupa” (we were mostly getting by with Brittany mumbling in Spanish and hoping for the best, but sometimes when that didn’t work I would try French and then we would speak to each other in English and people would just stare at us in utter confusion and back away slowly). So for dinner we went into this little local looking restaurant and ordered some catchupa and Brittany was trying to explain that she was a vegetarian, but apparently the Spanish mumbling didn’t work because we thought we were getting catchupa with egg and potato instead of with meat - we were sitting there waiting and laughing about how funny it would be if we ended up with just eggs and potatoes when she came out with two plates of french fries and a fried egg. She looked really confused when we both broke down laughing. Every time we ordered in a restaurant after that we were half expecting to be served a plate of eggs and fries.

3. Santo Antão

The next morning we took the ferry from Sao Vicente (the island Mindelo is on) to Santo Antão, which was easily one of my favorite parts of the trip - I already love boats, plus the islands are so close together and both so mountainous that at any point throughout the hour long ride you can see both (those views are in the video I mentioned at the top of this post). Plus the early morning light on the water and the cool breeze, and there was a cafe/bar thing on the boat so Brittany and I were even able to get some coffee.

^ Coffee on the ferry

When we arrived we grabbed an aluguer, amid some confusion. The aluguers aren’t taxis but they aren’t buses either, they’re generally big Toyota 15-seater vans (in fabulous condition, we couldn’t believe it - and the taxis in Praia were late model Toyota Corollas which for some reason was hilarious to us…not quite as much character as my beloved dilapidated Renaults with weird furry seat covers) and you pay your spot like in a bus but unlike a bus they don’t all have a set route. Some do, some have names of towns and/or cities painted on the side and they just go back and forth between those places but others just go where they decide they’re going to go that day and pick up people along the way. Anyway, we were jostled around a bit by the competing aluguer drivers but eventually got one to Paul, the city on the coast at the foot of the valley that we were planning to hike. It was a striking drive, the edges of the mountains of Santo Antão are baren and dotted with dramatic cliffs and drops into the ocean below, which was raging and wavy like I’ve never seen. But in Paul, it starts to get really green, palm trees start to pop up and I’ll get to it in a minute but once on the interior of the island its lush and green everywhere you look. Paul, or Vila das Pombas, I never figured out why some people called it one thing and some the other, is a tiny but nice little town on the water that stretches the coast before shooting up into the hills directly behind it.

^ Vila das Pombas

Our hotel was a few minutes up the hill and owned by a really friendly Italian guy who spoke no English or French but enough Spanish to sort of communicate with Brittany. Despite the language barrier he tried really hard to be helpful and answer our questions about the hiking etc. and his little hotel, with just two rooms, was absolutely adorable. Plus I was excited because he had a cat, one of the cutest most beautiful cats I’ve ever seen, who was super duper pregnant - it looked like she had swallowed a football. She would come sit outside our room and purr so loudly the floorboards would shake until I opened the door and then she would dart into the room, much to Brittany’s dismay.

We got a different kind of aluguer, kind of like a bush taxi here in Senegal, just a pickup with some benches in the back, up the mountain(s) about an 45 minutes (it probably would have taken twenty if we didn’t keep having to stop and reverse for 100 meters down the tiny narrow mountain road to accommodate the occasional car coming the other way, once we had to do it three times before we rounded a single bend).

^ In the aluguer

The hills just kept getting more and more massive - I suppose in some circles a “massive hill” is known as a “mountain” - and steep and green and there were little villages here and there but mostly just lots of banana and sugar cane and what I think was maybe corn and of course palm trees. We hiked the rest of the way up (about 2 hours of basically walking straight up on this absurd winding path) to Cova Crater, which is nothing special but the view from up next to it is extraordinary, especially since you can look down over the hills you just crossed through and see the ocean where you started and all while you’re above the clouds. Saying that walking back down was harder than going up would probably be overstating it, but it was not easy. In most places it was so steep that you couldn’t help but run down it failing your arms around like an idiot, and as we got closer to the bottom the dirt got looser and looser and there weren’t rocks and roots anymore and we were sliding around almost breaking our ankles every five seconds. But we made it down, exhausted and sunburnt (I put on so much sunscreen, religiously reapplied, and still got burnt to a crisp). We found a pizza place in town and basically dragged ourselves inside but it was totally empty and smelled like weed and then the Italian guy who owned it (I’m not sure why there are so many Italians living in Cabo Verde) came out from the back and told us that they didn’t start making pizza for another two hours because island time so we went back to the hotel and laid prostate on our beds half conscious until it was time and then we sprinted back to the restaurant and seriously contemplated getting two pizzas each. The pizza was great (Italians) and the owner, who spoke only Italian and Portuguese (it’s amazing how far one romance language gets you with the other, I understood almost everything that was said in Spanish and Italian throughout the week but since Portuguese has a totally different sound to it the same did not really apply) was so nice and served us some homemade “punch” and also gave us free shots of some sort of Italian lemon-y liquor.

The next day was quite relaxed because we were both basically zombies. We went to the edge of the island and did a short hike along the coast to a small village built into the cliffs called Fontainhas and then drank some coffee by the water before getting the aluguer back to the port city to get the ferry back to Sao Vicente. This time I stood all the way on top the whole time and it was so windy that I couldn’t wear my hat and I was half convinced that my face itself was going to be blown off. It was so windy I was terrified to take pictures and videos because I was worried about the genuine possibility of the wind blowing my phone out of my hands, so I white-knuckled it whenever I took any pictures.

4. Santiago again - Tarrafal side

We flew back to Santiago and stayed in Praia just for the night since we arrived late and couldn’t keep traveling until the next day. So early the next morning we got an aluguer to Tarrafal, the biggest city (which is not saying much at all) on the far north of the island. When I say we got an aluguer, I really mean we found one going to Tarrafal and sat in it falling asleep for two hours while we waited for other passengers and these two guys used some weird blue filmy material to tint the windows of the van. The drive was about two hours through rolling baren hills and dramatic peaks and then about halfway there the hills grew into mountains and we reached a certain point where you could see Tarrafal on the coast below but unfortunately it was quite overcast so none of my photos from the drive came out. We had been planning to hike in the nearby national park but we were so beat that we ended up just wandering around the tiny deserted city, or town really, sitting on the beach and going to bed at like 8:30 PM. We finally got to try catchupa, after a great deal of confusion and negotiations regarding Brittany’s vegetarianism, and while eating it it was good but it was perhaps the heaviest thing I have ever eaten in my life, I can’t understand how Cabo Verdians eat it for breakfast every day. It literally felt like someone had opened my stomach, placed all of the catchupa into it and then closed it again, and then it sat there like that for 24 hours. For dinner we had a plate of plain rice and some mild cheese cubes because we were incapable of eating real food with the catchupa still in us and I think our waitress thought we were insane.

The next day when we felt like real humans again we finally went to the national park, and even though it was a bit overcast (which did not prevent me from getting sunburnt again) the hike was beautiful - I love green mountains but I almost like bare ones more, because the closest ones look sort of brown but then they fade to purple and then to blue and the clouds cast crazy shadows over them that you can clearly see since there are so few trees. We were just congratulating ourselves on how easy the hike had been, since we started already high up and basically just walked straight along the top of the mountain ridge, when we got to a sharp turn downhill and a sign introducing the new trial which included the qualifiers « Difficulty: Hard » and « Path quality: bad ». Both of those things turned out to be true. Mostly because the path was in many places about as wide as one of my feet and it was basically three hours straight downhill. When we finally reached the town at the bottom where we could allegedly get an aluguer back to Tarrafal, we were disappointed to discover that our excessively vocalized fantasies about going to a little boutique in the town and getting some chips or a Kit Kat bar (which were strangely ubiquitous even in small stores) and some cold water were not going to be realized as the tiny town/village that we ended up waiting an hour in had no stores and also for some indistinguishable reason smelled so bad I thought I was going to pass out while we waited. But eventually and aluguer passed and we hopped on - when we got back to Tarrafal we bought chips and Kit Kat bars and then got another aluguer back to Praia and got cheeseburgers (and a veggie burger) and ate way too many french fries before packing up our stuff in preparation to fly back to Dakar the next day.

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