So the field school kids are gone. It is very weird not having twenty other people around. I am sure I will like some of the quiet, but I know it will get old quick.
I am watching the LSU - Arkansas game right now. It feels so nice to be able to watch it. I will probably miss the championship games though, unless there is a third game, b/c we are going to the south coast with three other people to document a church, an aqueduct, and any other buildings we can. It will be nice to see some more of Jamaica than just the northern parts. We are going to Alley, a small town, and then on the way home, we are going to stop in Negril and stay there a night to see what it is like. It should be a nice little trip.
This last week was filled with work and play. We basically finished documenting our first building in sketchup. It has more detail than the other buildings we have to do so the others should go faster. We went to the beach several times, including today. I actually think I got some sun today and not sunburn. I dropped down to 50 spf for today and the sun was a little stronger than it has been the other days we have gone to the beach. The field school peeps left plenty of extra sunscreen so Gareth and I should be set for a long time.
I think my favorite thing about Jamaica is the sounds. I have a lot of them memorized and they have become kind of likes sounds of "home." There is the ice cream man who rides around on his bike and honks a little horn. There are the dogs who bark late into the night. There are the honking horns - Jamaicans use their horns a lot when people are walking in the road, or really for whatever reason they like. There are lots of sounds of people talking. My favorite sounds come on Sunday when you can hear singing from several of the churches. If you walk around town, you can hear sermons, singing, etc. It's really nice. I think these sounds will stick with me and when I am home, I will hear a bike horn and think oh there goes the ice cream man...
Tonight we are going shrimping with Peter. We are also going to take the boat to the Rock and get dinner. I am excited b/c they have festival - it's a type of biscuit made with cornmeal that is delicious. Otherwise, the Rock serves a lot of seafood so I had a cheese patty so that I won't be starving and will survive on the festival. After dinner, we are going to take the boat to glistening waters. I am going to bring my camera this time (in a ziploc bag) and try to take pics and video of it to put on facebook so others can see how cool it is. Then tomorrow morning, we leave for Alley...
So far the Manse is feeling more like home. When we get back on Wednesday, Gareth and I are going to set up our own rooms and the studio/living room. Then on Thursday, Jessica and Josi (the other two people still here who we are helping on this project with) leave and it will be just two of us....which will be very weird...
Well, LSU is really laying it on Arkansas so I guess I'll watch the rest of it and then get ready to get on Peter's boat - fingers crossed that his engine doesn't die.
j
--this is a juggling whale & while he can only juggle one thing at a time, you try doing that & holding your breath for six hours & let's see how well you do--
Friday, June 19, 2009
Tuesday, June 9, 2009
Settling in...
Sorry for the delay in updates...been busy getting settled in (which has taken me a little longer than others I think) and getting into a routine.
I still am waking up at like 5 when the sun comes up, but now I get up, take a shower, and then get back into bed for a little nap before breakfast. It seems to be working out great; I get a nice hot shower and don't disturb anyone else, get back in bed, listen to some music, and have a nice rest before the day starts.
The lime burn at Good Hope was a lot of fun. We ate jerk chicken (which by the way is tourist Jamaican food, not real Jamaican food, they really don't eat a lot of jerk), vegetable soup, breadfruit salad (similar to potato salad), and coconut bread. My favorite was definitely the coconut bread -- think similar to those Hawaiian rolls. We walked around the property which is huge, toured the great house, and swam in the Martha Brae river (see facebook for photos). It was a good day and nice to be out in the mountains where it is quieter for a bit.
Sunday was spent lazing around the Manse and at the beach. It was cloudy though so no sun. I wouldn't be surprised if I came home the same color as when I left. That 70 spf really does work, but I kind of hope it lets a little bit of color through.
Monday was like any other Monday. You'd think that Mondays in Jamaica would be different, but nope. I didn't feel like I got much accomplished yesterday as I worked on doing the courthouse gate in CAD all day. But I finished it today, it looks awesome, and I got a lot of other stuff done too. It was quite a productive day. I actually started putting stuff in sketchup and hopefully by the end of the summer, I will have mastered the program.
We watched the sun set tonight - it was so beautiful. I didn't take any pictures, my bad, but I figure I'll see another one over the next weeks. The clouds looked like they just ended in the ocean. It was pretty cool to see.
I am learning more and more about Jamaican culture, etc. and how it really is much different from the US. It is more aggressive and that is hard to explain, but it is. And not aggressive as in violent b/c they will have arguments and yell and situations that normally at home would result in a fight, here they don't. It ends at the argument. And it is a male dominated society even though the women do so much. They really do basically do everything. But don't start thinking that the men are chauvinists or not nice to girls b/c they are. It's just really interesting to see how different cultures work and it's almost better to accept the fact that you won't understand why they do what they do. I guess it goes both ways.
Tomorrow is market day. Well the main market day. There's a market on the weekends too, but not nearly as many people come in to sell goods. We are taking Calvin with us so that we get the best deals on fruits. Our goals are to get sour sop, sweet sop, and jack fruit. We had some sour sop yesterday and it is a strange texture, but really good. It's kind of custardy I guess you could say. I have had watermelon, pineapple, Julie Mangos, and regular mangos. In order, my fav is the watermelon, Julie Mango, pineapple, and reg mango. The pineapple here doesn't even compare to the stuff at home. I really don't like pineapple at home at all, but here it is really good. Plus. the fruit guy a block from the manse is really good and will get us anything we ask usually. And he is an artist at cutting the pineapple up, it's so cool to watch.
Oh and the height of Jamaican fashion for men is mesh tank tops. There are some that are sold with sleeves, but some very lucky friends of mine may be getting mesh tank tops as souvenirs. Like they wear them in all colors. No joke. I have gotten so used to seeing them though that I don't even do double takes when people wear them. Peter makes them look good. Lila even told us the proper way to wear one i.e. don't tuck it in and don't wear your pants too high when you are wearing the tank top.
Well Sean and I have a "date" at 10:30 - he stood me up last time (he was having computer problems) so I don't want to be late....
j
--What if we all got along & people loved each other & sang songs about peace? he said. Would that be a good world? & I said I didn't know about that, but it would be a good summer camp & he looked at me & shook his head & said, It's no wonder you're leaving us with such a mess. --
I still am waking up at like 5 when the sun comes up, but now I get up, take a shower, and then get back into bed for a little nap before breakfast. It seems to be working out great; I get a nice hot shower and don't disturb anyone else, get back in bed, listen to some music, and have a nice rest before the day starts.
The lime burn at Good Hope was a lot of fun. We ate jerk chicken (which by the way is tourist Jamaican food, not real Jamaican food, they really don't eat a lot of jerk), vegetable soup, breadfruit salad (similar to potato salad), and coconut bread. My favorite was definitely the coconut bread -- think similar to those Hawaiian rolls. We walked around the property which is huge, toured the great house, and swam in the Martha Brae river (see facebook for photos). It was a good day and nice to be out in the mountains where it is quieter for a bit.
Sunday was spent lazing around the Manse and at the beach. It was cloudy though so no sun. I wouldn't be surprised if I came home the same color as when I left. That 70 spf really does work, but I kind of hope it lets a little bit of color through.
Monday was like any other Monday. You'd think that Mondays in Jamaica would be different, but nope. I didn't feel like I got much accomplished yesterday as I worked on doing the courthouse gate in CAD all day. But I finished it today, it looks awesome, and I got a lot of other stuff done too. It was quite a productive day. I actually started putting stuff in sketchup and hopefully by the end of the summer, I will have mastered the program.
We watched the sun set tonight - it was so beautiful. I didn't take any pictures, my bad, but I figure I'll see another one over the next weeks. The clouds looked like they just ended in the ocean. It was pretty cool to see.
I am learning more and more about Jamaican culture, etc. and how it really is much different from the US. It is more aggressive and that is hard to explain, but it is. And not aggressive as in violent b/c they will have arguments and yell and situations that normally at home would result in a fight, here they don't. It ends at the argument. And it is a male dominated society even though the women do so much. They really do basically do everything. But don't start thinking that the men are chauvinists or not nice to girls b/c they are. It's just really interesting to see how different cultures work and it's almost better to accept the fact that you won't understand why they do what they do. I guess it goes both ways.
Tomorrow is market day. Well the main market day. There's a market on the weekends too, but not nearly as many people come in to sell goods. We are taking Calvin with us so that we get the best deals on fruits. Our goals are to get sour sop, sweet sop, and jack fruit. We had some sour sop yesterday and it is a strange texture, but really good. It's kind of custardy I guess you could say. I have had watermelon, pineapple, Julie Mangos, and regular mangos. In order, my fav is the watermelon, Julie Mango, pineapple, and reg mango. The pineapple here doesn't even compare to the stuff at home. I really don't like pineapple at home at all, but here it is really good. Plus. the fruit guy a block from the manse is really good and will get us anything we ask usually. And he is an artist at cutting the pineapple up, it's so cool to watch.
Oh and the height of Jamaican fashion for men is mesh tank tops. There are some that are sold with sleeves, but some very lucky friends of mine may be getting mesh tank tops as souvenirs. Like they wear them in all colors. No joke. I have gotten so used to seeing them though that I don't even do double takes when people wear them. Peter makes them look good. Lila even told us the proper way to wear one i.e. don't tuck it in and don't wear your pants too high when you are wearing the tank top.
Well Sean and I have a "date" at 10:30 - he stood me up last time (he was having computer problems) so I don't want to be late....
j
--What if we all got along & people loved each other & sang songs about peace? he said. Would that be a good world? & I said I didn't know about that, but it would be a good summer camp & he looked at me & shook his head & said, It's no wonder you're leaving us with such a mess. --
Wednesday, June 3, 2009
The work has begun...
So we started our project for reals yesterday. We are documenting the courthouse here in town using hand drawings from a previous year and cad plans. Now you would think that those would be really helpful, but we have had to do a lot of alterations, and it will probably take a lot longer to do than we originally thought. We are supposed to do more than this building this summer, but this one should take a couple of weeks or so ish.
last night we went to glistening waters where the martha brae river meets the caribbean and there is a lot of phosphorus that when agitated caused the water to literally be bioluminescent. I don't have any pictures b/c Peter's boat tends to get wet on the inside during the trips, but it was one of the most amazing things I have ever seen. When you swim in it, you leave a trail of light and it's pretty dang awesome. We hit a few spots and the spot with the most phosphorus was full of jellyfish, but Peter saw them right before we jumped in. They were really neat to see too; some were really big, others were smaller, but you could see them floating and their tentacles.
Big news of the day - I slept til 7 this morning and not 5:30. One of my medicines may have helped me with that as it does make you sleepy, but let's hope this trend continues.
Today, Gareth and I are hoping to cut out of work an hour early (I mean we did work during our lunch hour) and go to Tony's - i.e. the beach. I could use an afternoon nap on the beach. Our "office" is an outdoor table in the courtyard of the manse that has sez breezes all day. It's pretty sweet. I am not sure where our rainy day office is yet as we haven't gotten rain while working, but it will probably be inside the manse. Photos will come later. I still haven't taken any pictures yet; just haven't thought about it.
Today was also market day. They call it the bend down market b/c tarps serve as the roofs, but you have to bend down some to get under them. They have literally everything you could ever think of there. One of the girls got some Julie Mangos, and it was delicious. You can also buy underwear (they have Calven Klain - honestly how it was spelled), shoes, and anything else you can imagine. It was definitely cool to see and I will probably be frequenting it for the mangos. There is also a really good fruit stand close to the manse with a really nice guy who could get us the hookup. Walking through the market got me used to being called whitey or hissed at to get my attention to buy stuff. It is actually pretty amusing when the little kids call you whitey - and it's not really an insult, it's just an obvious statement.
On the schedule for the weekend is the lime burning at Good Hope and spelunking in a cave full of bats....
j
--You're not going to see people like this again for a long time, he said & I said I always saw people like this & he looked at me for a moment & said, You're not from around here, are you? --
last night we went to glistening waters where the martha brae river meets the caribbean and there is a lot of phosphorus that when agitated caused the water to literally be bioluminescent. I don't have any pictures b/c Peter's boat tends to get wet on the inside during the trips, but it was one of the most amazing things I have ever seen. When you swim in it, you leave a trail of light and it's pretty dang awesome. We hit a few spots and the spot with the most phosphorus was full of jellyfish, but Peter saw them right before we jumped in. They were really neat to see too; some were really big, others were smaller, but you could see them floating and their tentacles.
Big news of the day - I slept til 7 this morning and not 5:30. One of my medicines may have helped me with that as it does make you sleepy, but let's hope this trend continues.
Today, Gareth and I are hoping to cut out of work an hour early (I mean we did work during our lunch hour) and go to Tony's - i.e. the beach. I could use an afternoon nap on the beach. Our "office" is an outdoor table in the courtyard of the manse that has sez breezes all day. It's pretty sweet. I am not sure where our rainy day office is yet as we haven't gotten rain while working, but it will probably be inside the manse. Photos will come later. I still haven't taken any pictures yet; just haven't thought about it.
Today was also market day. They call it the bend down market b/c tarps serve as the roofs, but you have to bend down some to get under them. They have literally everything you could ever think of there. One of the girls got some Julie Mangos, and it was delicious. You can also buy underwear (they have Calven Klain - honestly how it was spelled), shoes, and anything else you can imagine. It was definitely cool to see and I will probably be frequenting it for the mangos. There is also a really good fruit stand close to the manse with a really nice guy who could get us the hookup. Walking through the market got me used to being called whitey or hissed at to get my attention to buy stuff. It is actually pretty amusing when the little kids call you whitey - and it's not really an insult, it's just an obvious statement.
On the schedule for the weekend is the lime burning at Good Hope and spelunking in a cave full of bats....
j
--You're not going to see people like this again for a long time, he said & I said I always saw people like this & he looked at me for a moment & said, You're not from around here, are you? --
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