Pretty Much a Normal Week

So life out here can be kind of funny sometimes. There are some days where I am out traveling or out heading to some remote village, but for the most part, life out here seems pretty normal. Well, normal to me I guess. It is amazing how quickly we can adapt to different things and our day to day life, no matter how strange it seems to others, can end up being pretty normal. With that being said, the last couple of weeks out here have been . . . pretty normal.

This past week has been pretty slow, which has actually been a blessing. Because I haven't had a lot going on I've been able to get back to normal things like playing basketball, getting to see my friends, and going out to eat with them. I've had a lot of opportunities to catch up with some of the basketball guys this past week. We had a surprise game on Friday afternoon and we played some gov't team. The team was actually really good. They had a guy who was bigger than I am (and who actually knew how to play a little post) and another guy who was at least my size and knew how to get to the basket. I honestly have no idea how we beat them. Well, I kind of do. We basically stuck a big older guy on their big guy and he just fouled him every time he touched the ball. It is kind of cheap and really not the way you are supposed to play basketball, but at the same time they do it to me everyday, so I didn't complain. After the game I went out with five of the guys and we went to some random restaurant that they had heard about. I have no idea how they heard about this place because it was a shack and the food wasn't even all that great. I made the mistake again of letting them order, so we had some pretty random stuff. There were some potatoes cooked under pig fat, some kind of gelatinous intestine thing (which wasn't all that bad), and then, my personal favorite, stinky tofu. I didn't eat it this time though. I figured I ate it last time they ordered it and, since I've tried it once before, I could take a pass on it this time. It was a great time of getting to catch up with the guys and hopefully we are going to get together again this weekend.

I've also been able to run into my environmental engineer friend. I talked to him at the gym last night and we are planning on going out to eat sometime this week. He speaks really good English and he also has some of the best local language out of anyone under thirty that I know. We were talking last night and he was explaining to me about how most people under the age of thirty or forty can't really speak the local language all that well. He is actually the third or fourth person that I've heard that from. With that being said, his language is really good and he is willing to get together and he can give me some tutoring.

Other than that, not a lot is going on out here. I'm planning a few things for next month but other than that I'm just going to class and doing things in town. It is also getting a little colder here. It still gets up to about seventy degrees during the day, but it gets a little chilly at night. All things considered it is really nice for mid-November. I think it just seems colder because there is no carpet, heating, and I have to ride my bike everywhere. Hopefully it'll stay warm for another month until we get out out of class for winter break.