We have Pets!

Living in a foreign country brings many new things to live with as well as some familiar ones in new settings.  For instance, we had both seen cows in the states but to have people actually using oxen to pull carts is quite a different experience.  Also, the main mode of transportation on our road, actually after 'feet', is the burro.  This is a new thing to see and live with even though we had both seen burros before.

We are actually not purposing in moving into the animal market.  That is, we don't want to buy an ox or cow or burro or chicken... at least not yet.  But, here some animals seem to find a way into our home, or yard, whether we've asked them to or not.  So, we have a variety of animals that we affectionately call "Pets."  Even though we kind of like them, we're still not overboard with this pet thing and so we have not named any of them!

We have an inside friend that Ellen really likes.  He's a gekko, or maybe she's a gekko.

For a long time it seemed that we only had this one but now we have seen several little gekkos.  This raises two distinct possibilities; 1) it wasn't just one gekko (very likely), and 2) we're on the brink of a real invasion!

We also have a pretty good size lizard which probably measures about a meter to the tip of it's tail.

This guy sun bathes on the cinderblock base of the fence line straight out from our bedroom window!  I don't think he does anything else, which leads me to believe that he must be retired and probably moved here from the north for the warmer temperatures.

This poor guy is probably the only one of our 'pets' that is actually trapped in our yard.  Here he is getting a better view at what freedom looks like.

Here's a better close up.  As you can see he's pretty good size but we'll probably still have to wait a bit before making soup.

This big guy is sort of beautiful in a gross and ugly sort of way!!

He comes and sits outside our front door every night.  This is probably because to him our outside light reads like a buffet restaurant sign.  The light attracts bunches of bugs and the bugs attract him.  The most amazing thing about him is that for being such a fat blobby looking guy he easily jumps a good three feet!!

These are all the regular critters at our house.  In a way, we've grown kind of fond of them... well, not really but they are fun!