Weird Weather...

Burma seems to only have 3 seasons: Rainy, dry and hot. I'm still trying to figure out whether the brief 3 days of cool evenings in January actually qualifies as 'winter', but I do know that it is now summer (according to my students).

The heat is such that a wander through the garden is enough to leave you sweaty, and the post-cool shower glow only lasts until the exertion of putting on your clothes makes you start sweating again. The taxi ride sometimes unbearable (even with Mr Win Tin's "Myanmar Aircon" - hand fans made of woven palm leaves), and it's not surprising to arrive at work with wet patches on your clothes.

Well - until Japan was hit by the tsunami and earthquake. All last week, it rained. The evenings were freezing - and had us scrambling for hoodies and socks that had been stuck in the back of our closet since Abu Dhabi.

Most of our Burmese friends were shocked: it had never rained during the hot season. Other ex-pats told us that last year, they hadn't even seen a single cloud from January until May.

The cool temps and the rain were a nice break from the heat, but there may be a higher price than just having to wear a sweater. According to Mr Win Tin, the farmers are drying their rice harvest. The more rain there was, the more crops were damaged. I wonder what will happen in the coming months. Rice is a staple here - the poorer citizens depend on it - and a damaged harvest may end up spelling disaster for them.

On Being Busy...

I suppose it would be the understatement of the century to say that we've been busy lately. Between working full-time, studying part-time and being stupid enough to say yes to extra projects, we've both ended up doing little more than work for the past month.

The other thing is that our favourite wifi spot (Traders Hotel) seems to be having some issues with its internet of late. There's nothing more frustrating than looking forward to the treat of an 'internet morning' (can you believe that the internet has become a treat for us?) and lunch at Traders, only to spend a frustrating 2 hours waiting for pages to load as the internet cuts out every 5 minutes! This also means that it's just a lot harder for us to reply to e-mails with something more than just a few lines, or upload photos to Facebook.

We can use the internet at work, but there aren't enough computers to go around... and it isn't really fair to monopolize one when someone needs it for work. Also, our work schedule has us finishing at 8:15pm three nights a week - and we can't really stick around afterwards.

We've had a few adventures too, and I think we need a wee update:

• I accidentally stepped on a snake! See, what happened was this... One evening, I wandered out the front door and onto the cement driveway. I felt something (imagine stepping on a big magic marker or something) under my foot that made my ankle twist a bit. Looking down, I saw what appeared to be a ribbon under the cuff of my pants. And then (according to Ty) I jumped about 2m in the air. We watched as the snake (slim, black, moving with a sort of ripply sideways - not sidewinder - movement) moved quickly away. The next day, I described him to Smeagol (our gardener), using charades. He mimed back to me that he wasn't poisonous. Of course, everyone I've told here has been quick to remind me that it's very lucky to see a snake. I'm not sure if it's also as lucky to step on it...
• I accidentally grabbed an iguana-thing's tail! See, what happened was this... One morning, I was wandering around the garden, inspecting the flowers. I noticed that there was a twig sticking out of a bunch of bougainvillia, so I went to pinch it to pull it out of the flowers. Suddenly, it ran away, attached to a much chagrined iguana thing, who stared at me (with a certain amount of shock - understandable, methinks), then started doing his little push-ups, neck bounce threat display. I've now made it a habit to check certain trees and flowers for these lizardy guys, who I stare at, then attempt to identify with my handy new reptiles book... A few nights later, he was back in the same bunch of bougainvillia - This time I got Ty to take a few pics (which I'll attempt to upload at some point!).
• I accidentally crashed a Hindu parade! Well, okay, I didn't actually walk in it, but I was the only white-face there, which made it all the more surreal. The Hindu community here is quite large (probably from indentured labour who were enticed to Burma back when it was a richer country, and a part of British India), and it wasn't that surprising to see a parade on the street. Except... it closed the whole intersection... so I jumped out of the taxi and ran up to see what was going on. There were about 20 or so men carrying big statue things on their shoulders - each one was decorated with gold, ribbons, umbrellas. They walked along, each one surrounded by a group of young revellers who encouraged them to walk. They seemed oblivious to everything, including the fact that the rather heavy looking statue things were supported not on their shoulders or hands, but on pointed metal sticks that poked into their skin! Everyone who passed waved and said hello to me because, really, when you've got the choice between me and a guy carrying a 200-pound thing on skewers, who are you going to look at?

We do still love living here -- and still love our jobs -- but we are also looking forward to our next bit of time off (in April). We're thinking of heading to a beach, so do please let us know if you'd like to come out to Burma and join in the fun!