Last Year's News

So I have to quickly apologize to all those of you who regularly check this site. I have been out of contact, but only because I have been so busy.

Firstly I think I should tell you that I have moved out of my sweet little house on the mountain and moved closer to the market into a nice little red-brick house. The move was based on the fact that a) the rend rate I thought I was to pay was a lot less than the actual amount and b) I met a nice couple of Indian decent that needed a house sitter. So yeah now I live in a house that is walking distance from everything and I have access to the Joshua’s car (bless them). House sitting is a good gig I tell you. Well the down side is that Ramses had to be given away, Mr. Joshua is allergic. But Ramses didn’t go far he is at Isa (my Japanese friends house) and I visit him nearly every lunch hour.

Other than that my life has been about work! I wake up at 5am nearly ever morning and head out to the field at about 7am. The day there after usually looks like setting up cloth mating cages, finding fish in farmer ponds, weighing them, stripping them of their eggs to ensure maturity of fish, and placing them gently into their cloth motel like mating cages hoping they will be in the “mood” for love. :) The good news is that we have had success….the bad news is that methodology has wavered from original proposed plan and it has not been documented…..AHH! (scientists nightmare). These glitches are surely because I took Christmas vacation. For all the other workers there was no real Christmas break….other than the mandatory weekends. In the picture to the left I have a female catfish....shes "ready ready" as her eggs revealed.

This month with my field research I was also able to go to Thyolo, which is the tea estate region of Malawi and it was beautiful! Almost as nice as Sri Lanka’s area. I also got to climb Mulanje the tallest mountain in Malawi. The thigh-burning climb up was worth the cold air that I found on the mountain. It was just such a treat to be able to have a sweater on, drink hot chocolate and sit by a fire! (December here is the hottest month so usually such luxuries of our Christmas season, normally would be un-thinkable.)
The best thing about working in the field is the little dive restaurants we get to visit near villages. There is this one really small one with only room for two tables and they have gotten use to me coming in. As I am veg (well sort-of...as I do eat fish....maybe I should say I am a piscatarian) they always put an egg on for me! Its probably some of the best Nsima and relish I have ever eaten!

Thats it for now. . .