"I just pick up the bucket to do the floors and I'm sweating." - Eileen
"I just open my eyes and I'm sweating." - Kate

yes, it has indeed continued to be hot and we continue to be sticky.

the picture at the left is basically what it looked like the other night during the longest of the three blackouts before we bumped our way into the flashlights and the matches. three in one is the record so far - hopefully never to be beaten.

the visual is lame because the computers at the cafe have stopped recognizing my camera and providing the software i need to upload my images to the computer. in short, i can't share my pictures from here. i'm trying to find a way to get them up - and there are some great ones! please be patient.

you'll see the aftermath when our neighbor's water tank platform collapsed into ours. you'll see the nursing students preparing one of the hospital meeting rooms to celebrate Mercy Day, and the three lovely ladies I work with most days in the hospital, not to mention baby goats trimming the grass in front of our gate and a sunset from the seawall. you'll see a typical choir rehersal, some of the groups from the concert at the cathedral at the beginning of this month (the conductor of one bore a striking resemblance to maestro Quasi-Modo - "i have a hunch they will give us a striking performance" ;o). you'll witness an emergency gnat removal from one of our guest's ears which Eileen's travelling pharmacy drawer was well-equipped to handle. you'll experience a night with our next door neighbors who invited us to a Hindu ceremony and supper at their place, the supper being sanay (sp?) which means you load up a huge lotus leaf with food and eat with your hands (FINALLY, dad, a culture where i can eat with my fingers all i want and have it be perfectly acceptable!!). soon to come will be pictures of the toad house we build for our new residents at the foot of our staircase. we've grown so attached, mostly because we hope they're helping our fight against the mosquitoes.

what you will not see, though, is the wonder of a good weekend. there is no picture to express what a wonderful time we had last weekend. i tackled a never-ending pile of laundry friday (lasted until the following thursday, no joke) and felt like i had ACCOMPLISHED something. we had an ice cream run on saturday afternoon followed by a walk in the botanical gardens. both were delicious and filling. only one tasted like frozen strawberry quik. we had a belated spirituality night on saturday night during which Eileen found a fantastic meditation for us to do. sunday afternoon i put on my professional hair coloring hat and replaced Eileen's "naturally blonde" color. it came out quite well, so there was another feather for the weekend's cap.

then sunday night we got up the courage to go out at night to the Brazilian Embassy for a free film festival. i learned to say good night in portuguese from a little boy at the gate, and then we walked around the building to what looked like space set up for a garden party. it was surreal. the event started with a tourist commercial about music and fashion in Brazil which mostly consisted of mostly naked ladies on catwalks. the following film was a documentary about the atrocious conditions of an all-male prison in Sao Paolo ... the evening was a study in contradictions, i would say. and next time we'll get a bus that's actually going to the correct street, so we won't have to walk where there are no streetlights, and we'll go back on a bus that does not already have 15 people in it.

we were proud of ourselves, nonetheless, for keeping an eye on the paper for free events, and having one work out and be entertaining to boot! spirits were very high, and those are the kinds of days we choose to hold on to!