Here's the thing...

Organizations that send expats abroad pay a lot of money to insure against something going wrong. Which it inevitably does for most of us eventually. You can't live with bugs and grime and stress, and quirky foods forever without something happening. So, after about twenty days of chest pain I decided to call our travel insurance people. I was travelling out to Singapore anyway. Why not see a doctor? I had already self/internet-diagnosed (always the surest way of diagnosing) it as heartburn. Now what I didn't know is that the words, 'chest pain' spoken to a medical consultant at the travel insurance company cause them to begin behaving like a Jewish grandmother. The woman did everything short of telling me to sit down right where I was and await an airlift. She advised me against flying to Singapore. She gave me dire descriptions of what could possibly be wrong. Of course, there was really no choice since the best medical care in the region is in Singapore and the only

A friend of mine is a pilot and today I was flying out to Medan. She had no co-pilot so asked if I wanted to sit up front. Do I ever!?!?! I got the sweet headset, the little dials and knobby things in front of me - even that steering gizmo. If she keeled over I would have been in charge. Probably should've been frightening to the other passengers but they didn't need to know that I couldn't fly. I sensed that their respect for me went up the moment I climbed into the cockpit. Yeah, no more was I one of 'them'...now I was a pilot. Well...not really, but again, what they didn't know couldn't hurt them - unless there was a plane crash, of course. That would probably hurt them. But it would hurt me more. I digress. Now, I learned some things today about being a pilot. I mean, apart from the actual fact that I could never, ever fly a plane. Not even if the tower was 'talking me in'. Seriously, there's a lot of stuff going on up there. No, the first th

Well, you know how I blog about our vehicles getting stuck? Another such incident occurred today. Luckily, I have video to entertain you with...but let me give you a little prep first. I am standing in the back of one vehicle that is stuck in the mud up to the door. We have just dug out the second vehicle that will be doing the 'towing' after getting it stuck in the mud. We're edging toward hour 3 of the rescue effort. Be sure to notice: 1) the number people sitting around looking bored; 2) the song from Monty Python's, Life of Brian, that's being sung, 3) the number of items that could, inadvertently, become deadly projectiles; 4) that BOTH our tow cables are too short. Ahhh, and a good time was had by all.

What does the rain in Malaysia have to do with anything? That, is an excellent question. I first heard it today when our internet went down. I walked (read:stalked) out of the office and demanded of our administrator (who has no actual control over our internet) what was going on. "It's raining in Malaysia," she said looking up sleepily from her computer. Apparently, I was not the first to have asked. Later while we were all getting our lunch our logs asked the girl next to her what was happening with the internet. The answer had gotten more succinct: "Rain. Malaysia." And the funny thing is that the answer works like a charm. "Ahhh, of course! Rain in Malaysia!" If you don't think about it too long there seems to be some sort of inherent logic in it that you just don't understand. There's something about that answer that makes you not want to ask any more questions. Rain in Malaysia. The key is not thinking about it too long. I've deci

I love those books. The ones that are filled with 'absurd dilemmas to ponder' like: Would you rather live in a world where Afros were mandatory for members of Congress or where it was legal, in fact encouraged, to crucify mimes... or... Would you rather give blood or read Hamlet ? Well, I would like to add this one. Would you rather live without electricity or without water. This might seem like a no-brainer to some. Electricity, of course. But, living on the equator where it is light for 12 hours and dark for 12 hours a day, being in the dark for 12 hours a day gets old really quick. But, of course, if you then choose to be without water instead you can't wash your dishes, clothes, shower, or flush the toilets. This also gets old pretty quickly. Luckily, we haven't had to make that choice here because the powers-that-be who are in charge of the utilities ensure that we have a day or two without electricity, followed by a day or two without water. See, so we never ha

Well, there are better ways to ring in the new year than paddling around in the Indian Ocean and generally lying around on the beach but it's hard to think of them. Here are some pictures from my New Year. Not a soul in sight.. . Jennifer's fantastic...and tasteful...sunglasses... Playing soccer... Riding quads...