Transitions

Long layover in Dubai

I love the culture shock of coming home.  Even better this year is watching Tegan's culture shock.  Some of the things that have gotten us this time around:

-drinking from the tap!
-eating fruits and veggies uncooked and not peeled without soaking and cleaning - and not still worrying about what is still living on it despite all the precautions
-hot water from the sink (and the shower, 100% of the time!)
-shopping carts - what a fun discovery for little miss (at one point today we used four different ones: T sized, normal, mini, and one with a plastic car hooked to it)
-driving - we both did it for the first time since Christmas break, luckily for my mother-in-law's car it's just like riding a bike
-bread, cheese, mexican food, and beer (for J)
-so much English, Tegan is picking up words left and right
-fall weather in June

Round 2

Pretty sure the last time we had so much dead air here was around the time we announced this.  I have an equally good reason to not be blogging this time around too - we're preparing for Oh, Baby O.2!  Baby is due beginning of December and we couldn't be more excited!

So, what have we been up to?  I had a bit of a hiatus there where I was too tired and sick to do much other than play with Tegan from the couch - she's a trooper.  Jeremiah hiked Annapurna Base Camp, no big deal.  I'm hoping he'll write a bit of it here, we'll see, at the very least share some of the pictures.  Warm weather has come, as well as some crazy monsoon rains.  Rain means more electricity though so I'm all for it.  We've also been wrapping up the school year; at the end of the week we fly home for what I'm sure will be a fun-filled summer!  

Work travel

I'm in Bangkok for work this week and while I've only been to Bangkok a few times before, some of it is oddly comforting and familiar after being out of Taiwan for awhile.  Streets lined with food carts, 7-11s on every block, good fruit all over the place.  Anyway, so far I've mostly seen the inside of meeting rooms, but did get a chance to walk around a bit.  Here's some of what I saw:

Small things for small carry-ons

Sometimes little things can make travel better.  These 2 are my recent faves:

Smith's Rosebud Salve and J. Crew passport case - both christmas gifts

Oh, and flying without a baby after lots of long flights with one?  Amazing.  I read the whole time!

Hot lemon and honey

It's a common drink to see on the menu here; great for cold weather, upset tummy or sore throat.  I prefer to get the honey on the side so it's not overdone.  Soon though, I'm also going to start asking for it in a mug.  Why is a hot drink served in the same style glass as the other popular lemon drink, fresh lemon soda, a cold drink?  If anyone figures it out, shoot me a line!

Hot lemon and honey at Cafe Soma

Holi-madness

I left my house this morning in a stark white t-shirt and came back drenched and covered in caked on red pigment.  Holi, a Nepali national holiday, is to celebrate spring and represents a story of Hindu religion.  As we experienced it today, folks, mostly kids, throw water bombs (plastic bags filled with water, sometimes colored water), shoot water guns, pour buckets of water, and smear color dyes on your face.  Some of this is done nicely with a "Happy Hol!", some quite competitively and some not so nice (especially we've heard depending on the area you are in).  Often the water comes from windows or roof tops stories up and when you least expect it.  And no doubt about it, when those plastic bags of water hit you square in the back they smart.  It was a lot of fun, high energy, and after a few hours a cab ride home sounded fabulous - and though the man that picked us up was a bit concerned about how wet and colorful we were we did our best to keep his cab as clean as it was when we got in.

Sunday roadblock

This morning there were activities at school we were going to attend and Jeremiah went ahead while I got ready.  He sent me a text not long after saying "bring a bunch of 5 rupee notes to pay the road stop string kids".  Some friends warned us that soon this would happen.  I found all the 5 notes we had, shoved them in my pocket and off I went thinking I'd only have to pay a few kids off.  I turned up our shortcut to school and found 10 kids with 4 sets of ropes in succession with big smiles on their faces.  I handed out money and they let me pass.  A little further up on the road there was another rope, and again I paid them.  The last block I had to talk my way out of since I'd run out of small bills.

I googled why they do this and found today is Shivaratri, a Hindu festival of the god Shiva - there is a good description of the festival over at The Longest Way Home.  I read here that:

“It used to be very cold during Shivaratri before and people, who fasted and awoke all night worshipping Shiva, blocked roads asking for firewood to keep themselves warm through the night with bonfire (samidha). With time, kids started blocking roads asking for money,” shared Madan Kumar Rijal, Associate Professor of Culture at Tribhuvan University.

I've only got a few small bills left and have to go back to school later, I'm hoping the kids will have gotten tired of standing outside and given up for the day!