So what's been happening??
- Getting my multiple entry visa and ID card - can you believe it! It only took 10 months! It is valid until next August, so I could come back.. Now all I have to do is get a new passport, because this one is almost full with Lao tourist visas. The most amusing thing is the ID card, which says that I am a 'foreign expert'.
- Ultimate frisbee. Chris and I have started playing on a Thursday after work to get our muscles a bit more active (the only muscle that gets regular exercise is my jaw, from all the chewing...) Its a lot of fun - for those who have never played before, it is like netball crossed with American football, with a frisbee instead of a ball :-) However since it rains all the time, the field is usually a mudbath and you end up getting absolutely filthy and spending most of your time trying not to fall over..
- Playing music at church. I have never sung in front of people before!! I've been playing now for four weeks, and really enjoying it, although it is time consuming finding music (the stuff we have here is really old and I know none of it!), picking songs and practicing throughout the week.
Unfortunately we have had some sad times at church recently - Kenji, a Japanese man, was back visiting his family this month when he was in a car accident, which landed him in hospital and killed his wife and parents-in-law, and Sue, an American woman in Laos for many years, had to rush home to spend time with her nephew who is dying from leukaemia. Please keep them in your prayers. - Hanging out with some new friends. Sunlabob and LIRE have had an influx of new falang colleagues, so now we find ourselves with many new people to hang out with. Bowling, eating dinner together, going out for drinks, housewarmings...it is a very social group! Unfortunately though we had to farewell one on Saturday - David from Germany, who I have worked very closely with for the last six months. While he drove me mental sometimes (its the Germanness I think!) he was lovely and we got along very well, so I will miss him. Being part of the expat community here, you see people come and go all the time, but it is never any fun to see them go - and it will be my turn soon.
- Going to another costume party - this time for Nin, a Lao girl who worked for Vientiane College and who was leaving for Canada studying fashion design. This time I actually made an attempt and took a prop! (the little dagger we bought Sam for his birthday...)
- Working. We have made some nice progress with our water purification project - we're now making clean water! - and so we're getting ready to install our system very soon. We are off on a field trip to Ban Sor this Friday (the village where we will install the system) to do some site assessment :-)
- Cooking - Chris and I used our kitchen for the first time in months last week! Chris made spaghetti bolognaise, and we also had brie from the French delicatessen, some sourdough, some salad with balsamic vinegar, and sweet treats from Le Benetton, my favourite bakery. Yummy!
My Flickr photos this fortnight, while they are few, show the Mekong river furiously rising. According to our friend at the Mekong River Commission, the Mekong has only been this high 10 times in the last 90 years, and about half of these years it has flooded. If it floods I can guarantee my living room will be under water...
Compare this photo - http://www.flickr.com/photos/susieblue/2479566783/ - with this photo - http://www.flickr.com/photos/susieblue/2734543861/ - to see just how much it has risen since April :-)
You also might like to watch the video that I put together for my mum's birthday (which was last Sunday, so now I can tell you about it!), which is about us visiting the sites where my grandfather was a POW in SE Asia during WWII. You can find it at http://www.youtube.com/susiebluec :-)
Sok dee!
Susan
No comments:
Post a Comment