August 2, 2008

First I will apologize to all of our fans (Hi, Grandma!) for not posting much of anything for the past month.  First we went on vacation in May, and I will post a few pics from that later, but the month and a half after that was utter chaos.  If I were to describe them, you would be reading about the colors of floor tile in hospitals, and the reviews of various airline foods.  Needless to say, we have not spent all that much time in Papua.  I think Eric has been here two weeks since the beginning of May, and I have been here three weeks during that same time period. 

So let’s fast forward to the good parts: life starting to get back to normal.   Eric is feeling good so I decided to come back to work while he is still recovering from his surgery.  And if you want to know what it is, you can email him because I don't think he'd want me to give those details out for the entire world.  Anyway, he on the road to recovery.

My plane was an hour late leaving Denver due to thunderstorms.  In fact it was the very same thunderstorm that had been over my head the entire drive to the airport, as if I were Tigger in a certain Winnie the Pooh movie (I'm sure Cris and Jamie know exactly what one I'm talking about).  Then I had a great cardio workout in LA by walking from my plane to the baggage claim and then all the way to the check-in counter for my next flight.  As I got to my gate to fly from LA to Hong Kong last Thursday, the airline upgraded me to first class.  And information  just for those who haven’t flown first class: they give you a pair of pajamas to sleep in during the flight...yes, for your very own!  Then when I got to Bali, the hotel  didn’t have the room available that I had booked, so they upgraded me to my own private villa (two bedrooms, two bathrooms, and my own private salt water pool).  My flight to Papua was on time (that never happens), and we didn’t experience any hint of a flat tire on the way up the mountain.  So all in all, my trip was pretty good.   And then I got to Papua and things were pretty normal: no eggs at the store, and the meat selection was limited to liver or 10-pound beef roasts.  After a good 11-hour sleep, my boss called me to say that the road up to work had washed out during the night so no one was going up there, at least for a few hours. 

I finally got here and then I couldn’t go to work.   I love that irony.

August 3, 2008

Because we haven't been here much in the past couple of months, the mold has decided to take over.  And this weekend I am waging war on it.  It was on everything from shoes to the carvings to hats, shirts and even watch bands.   I took a picture of the mold, as it had taken up residence on a knife handle.  See that gray fuzzy stuff?  Now imagine it taking over a pair of your favorite shoes or hat.  And then imagine me trying to pick it up to throw it away without gagging.  I sprayed disinfectant on EVERYTHING.  And then I went shopping on Amazon.com for air purifiers and dehumidifiers.  If any of you  had Amazon stock in your portfolios, expect earnings to jump this quarter thanks to me.

August 6, 2008

Here are some of my favorite pictures from vacation that I didn't post on previous pages.  There is no bigger contrast than coming from Papua and going to the US. The contrast of cultures, landscapes and people are like comparing the colors of black and white.  This was driven home to me on the day these pictures were taken.  I was in the midst of flat farm country, enjoying the fresh air, blue skies and the sunset. I had some good ol' redneck bonding time with my brothers, and I can't wait to do this again sometime!

    me having fun with staged photo ops.

  Cris riding on our "track" that we gouged into the earth around Chaun's house

   (photo by Chaun)

   For those of you who don't know my brother, well, this is something typical of what he is capable of.  Moments like this are called "doing a Cris".  I believe the quote was, "A little help?"  It's hard to do a jump and get a quad stuck on its back end, but he did it...TWICE.

And I think Chaun pulled ahead at this point.  This picture makes me homesick.

August 9, 2008

Excitement of the weekend: I have spent the past 30 minutes moving my houseplant, Marty, around my livingroom trying to find just the right spot for him.

August 17, 2008

I went to the lowlands for the weekend and went shopping.

  I found another tifa drum that I couldn't live without.  It is entirely carved, top to bottom, and then white clay is filling in the carved areas.  It is amazing!

  These are my new end tables.  Many thanks to Pat, who lugged them up three stories to my apartment! 

The butterflies were out and about today.  More pictures of them on the Photos2 page.

I thought I was hallucinating for a minute, but there are cows in the jungle here.  It's the herd that the company maintains for us to eat.  After seeing the "free range" lifestyle they have and their tendency to look slightly anorexic, I now understand why our meat is so tough.

August 21, 2008

It was a very good grocery day here.  First of all:

Secondly:

Third, something we have NEVER seen here in our 16 months:

And lastly:

For those wondering about the significance of potatoes, we can only buy these about once every three months, so it's very exciting to think about not eating rice for a meal or two.  :) And the significance of the price tag: this 7 pounds (3.2kg) of red potatoes cost me about $20.

With all of the fresh veggies in the store this week, I have stocked up and will have to eat salad for breakfast, lunch and supper for the next few days...but no complaints here, well, other than Eric has to stand back and watch me eat it all because he still can't eat fresh veggies for a couple of weeks.

August 23, 2008

The other wonderful purchase from last weekend's trip to Timika.

I finally found a taxi driver who knew where the fabric shop was!!! This shop specializes in Papuan-themed fabrics, not only batik. But I happened to find a batik there this time with tifa drums and Birds of Paradise.  I was so excited to show it to you that I forgot to iron it first.  All of the gold tracing work was painted on by hand.  It's a very large pattern, and this particular piece is 10 feet long because that's how long it takes for the pattern to repeat itself.  It's a good thing I have a long dining room table.  Of course I found many other things I wanted there but figured that it will give me a reason to go back if I only bought one this time.  Right?

August 24, 2008

I have read on several home improvement websites that to reduce mold in the house, the humidity in the house should be less than 55%.  This was the temperature and humidity inside our house yesterday.   Even the thermometer/hygrometer is expressing its sympathy.

August 30, 2008

The war against the mold has begun this week.  The dehumidifier and air purifiers have arrived and are working non-stop.  In 24 hours, we emptied 15 gallons of water from the dehumidifer!  This is what the hygrometer has to say about it:

I think the COM means "COMpared to before, this is GREAT!"  Of course, Marty the tropical houseplant and my hair (aka: Medusa) do not agree with this change.  I noticed a thin film of grayish mold spots on all of the teak doors in our apartment today, so the new appliances have arrived just in time, in spite of Marty's and Medusa's protests.