The weather's been quite erratic in the last week. On the
weekend we had more snow with the temperature dipping to about -5 Celsius but
as I'm writing this it's a mild 12 degrees. All the snow has gone and it's
spring jacket weather once again. Not that I'm complaining, if it stays like
this the rest of the time I'm here I'll be happy. As of today, I have 26 days
left.
I was talking to a friend at home last night about New Years
plans this year and how he wants to travel somewhere but couldn't get a few
other guys on board. So I suggested he come out here for a week. Hopefully he's
able to pull it off, if he's able to find a cheap enough flight he said he
would for sure come. Fingers crossed.
As for the rest of the week it was the same old. Sitting
around the office during the days sometimes until 10:30pm, reading text books
on display technologies then coming home to try to coordinate an effort on
a report that has to be written with a colleague from home. The problem is
he gets to work at 8:30am, for me that's 10:30pm and by that time I'm starting
to wind down and I'm not really in a working mood anymore.
In mountain climbing news, we went on Sunday in the bitter
cold all dressed up in our winter gear. We made it about half way up and
decided it was too cold and slippery to continue so we found a trail that went
down the opposite side of the mountain. We went that way to explore a little
bit. We wondered into a clearing where we found what looked like small homes
centered on a small village square. There were no people around so I'm not sure
who lived there, or IF anyone even lived there. I think it might have been
a retreat village where monks go to meditate or something. That's the feeling I
got, especially considering after we walked up 30 or so stairs leading away
from the buildings there was a giant stone with a huge Buddha carving in it.
Under the carving there was a hole in the rock large enough
that if you crawled you could fit in. I wanted to check it out because there
was light coming from inside. After crawling through this small opening it
opened up to a fairly large cave. The light was from candles that were burning
along the perimeter of the walls. There were bamboo mats on top of foam rubber
covering the floor, we took this as, "take your shoes off please." So
we did and went in. On the back wall there was a tiny staircase that you could
squeeze into that went up to a second level - I think it was a natural
formation in the cave. At the top was a small 10 foot long by 3 foot wide room.
Again, candles lined the room and there were carvings of smaller Buddha's
in the walls. There was also a box of incense, a lighter and a box for
donations. I just kept thinking how cool this place would have been when I was
10 years old as a fort.
We sat there while I struggled to take some pictures in the
low light then left and went home. It was starting to storm and was too cold to
stay outside any longer.
I'm writing this entry in a new lab that I started in today.
So I'm meeting a whole bunch of new people. I seem to be causing quite a
stir, they all seem very happy to have met me. It's usually the case
when I meet new people here. First their mouths drop open, and then they give
me their best, "HELLO!”.They start busting out their best English catch
phrases and telling me their English names. It goes on for a little while and
then the excitement finally dies down.
As I've been sitting here watching this the comparison has
finally hit me, Mary had a little lamb. This sums up exactly how I've felt most
of the time I've been here.
"It made the children laugh and play to see a foreigner
at school."
I also have a fleece as white as snow.
