Trail REMARKS

I found this comment interesting from a book about here the other day:

"Last week, when Miss Thompson gave us a lecture on the American
election, she took off her woolen sweater and tied it to her waist.
To us, it's almost unimagineable. How can a teacher do that when
she / he is having a lesson! But thanks goodness, we major in
English and know something about America, it didn't surprise us. But
if other people saw this, they might can't believe their own eyes."

Hopefully that comment only applies to teachers, because I remember
walking down the street the other day like that.

Reminder to self: Maybe I better find out when this part of culture
applies?

I think we are settled in, but adjusted to life here is another
matter. Each day brings it's own challenges and we try to remain
focused and keep an open mind to things that may be different, but
not necessarily wrong.

Obviously getting the apartment set up was a big issue within our
lives. Just a couple days ago our couch arrived, so it's nice to
lunge around on something different as opposed to the carpet on the
floor. I do have to admit that I am sitting on the carpet in front
of a heater rather than on the couch. :) Yes, even though we are
living in warmer climate space heaters are a necessity. THere is no
central heating system in the city, so everyone relies on solar power
or electric hot water heaters for warm water or space heaters to keep
the rooms warm. We've found that the apartment is colder than the
outside air at times. Go figure. We are thankful for the provision
of this place.

Language study begins next week for us. I will start at a local
school next week (Feb. 25th) with 10 hrs a week and we hired a tutor
for Ayuna to meet with her 2 times a week. We are excited to get
started. Obviously classroom and sessions with a tutor will not be
it. There is homework, getting out and talking with people, and much
more that we will be doing in order to comprehend the language and be
understood ourselves. We'll see how the first month goes and see if
we have time to add more tutor time or other language study
opportunities.

Time is a big issue as always. It's something that you can be
thinking of us in as we juggle this new schedule of language study,
family life, and so forth.

The girls are doing well. They had a virus recently, but for the
most part they are better now. Constipation is another issue. Maybe
it is the change in diet, environment, or something else, but our
little girls have really been suffering through it lately. I guess
we'll buy the big bag of prunes that we saw the other day. :) They
continue to grow, obviously, and are always ready to eat or sit
around. We are thankful they are so content. Paulina plays peek-a-
boo really well. Lydia is getting closer to turning over with the
help of some object for leverage (usually Paulina is the object of
leverage). Sorry we haven't posted pictures recently. It's an issue
we are working on.

Well, feeding time is upon us, so I need to get going. Thank you for
thinking of us and catching up with us through these means.

Yes, we are alive and well. The first couple of weeks here have been
busy, but we are thankful that things are starting to settle down.
Settled down in the sense that we have all the essentials for daily
life. There are some things that we have ordered, but won't be ready
until after the 2 weeks of holidays.

We'll try to update things once a week, but there may be a lack of
pictures until we figure out how to post them.

Thanks for checking in on us.