Homesickness, homecoming and homework

No sooner had we started to feel fully settled in our new home than the urge to be back amongst family, friends and our own culture has hit. It is the little things I miss, like being able to go for a brisk walk in the cool air, being able to communicate fully and freely with contractors so they tell you before cutting the power to the pc (grr!), being in the same time zone as people so that you don't have to make all your phone calls in the late afternoon and evening with a fractious child and a tired Mummy, and so on.

So we are booked to return to the UK in May although before then I need to finish assembling the Falklands plant data ready for the next phase. So it is all systems go. Fun stuff like baking, crafting, photography and hard phys are on the back burner until the blessed spreadsheet is populated. Big Man recently said "there is only one thing more boring than data entry, and that is talking about data entry" but if you could picture an Excel file 324 rows tall and 101 rows across, equalling 32,724 cells in total, then that might give you some idea of my days at the moment. Currently 39% complete!

Better get back to it ...

Borders in Borneo

It has been a busy month here in Brunei with the Easter holidays and two very memorable journeys. Our first big road trip took us across the border into Sabah, Malaysia, where we based ourselves around Kota Kinabalu for 5 days. We saw orang-utans at a rehabilitation sanctuary for orphaned animals, drove to Mount Kinabalu National Park and walked one of the trails (actually one and a half trails as the signs were not clear) and then got a boat to one of the islands and had a go at snorkelling.

I was very lucky to be allowed to go into the jungle in Brunei the following week and see some more incredible sights. Reaching the field centre involved travel by road and by river, which in itself was a fantastic experience. The first evening I climbed a gantry to the top of the rainforest canopy and was rewarded with a beautiful combination of rising cloud and sunset. Once my knuckles had loosened from the fear, I was even able to capture some of it on camera!

Now back home and the school term is well under way again. Big Man is busy at work, I am trying to get my Falklands project completed and Woozles is now riding the bus to school, like the very big brave girl she is.

The only excitement last week was noticing that the 'grains' in my out-of-date Ryvita started to move across my plate in a fashion contrary to gravity - weevils!!!