Saturday, May 1, 2010

So much for getting work done over the weekend...

This weekend has seen no work done so far. Friday and Saturday have been big adventures.

Friday morning, we went up to SF and failed to get our visas. Long story short, the guy wanted to see our flights, which we did not have. So I think we're back to Plan A, which is to get the 30 day visa on arrival and figure it out from there. I feel like I should've made the trip to the embassy on a work day and tried to figure this out first. Oh wells...

After I came back, my soil berm team biked 5 miles to meet with the president of an architecture firm in Menlo Park. His office is out of the way and we couldn't get a ride. He didn't really like our big engineering solution that involved retaining walls and use of heavy machinery to get things done. He said he had imagined something more along the lines of a 5m high berm that a neighborhood can do for themselves with shovels. I like this idea a lot actually. I think in some parts of the town, a 5 m high berm would be sufficient. And it would not take up a whole lot of room. It would be easily done and would not involve big time engineering. Much more along the lines of what I imagine solutions for the developing world to be. I'm not sure the rest of my team likes this idea though. I think they like the huge engineering solution. They think I worry about useless things when I keep asking about available equipment in the country. I mean, I know Indonesia is much better off than Sierra Leone. But I feel like we're coming up with a developed world solution that is not going to make sense for a developing country.

On our way back, we stopped by the Menlo Park Caltrain for food. I was hoping that this one Japanese place I knew of would be open but we got there at like 2pm and they were not open between lunch and dinner. So we went somewhere else instead. Then we stopped by Safeway. Basically, we took a very scenic route back. I didn't do much after that other than laundry.

I went running Saturday morning. I really need to get back into shape. I think I'll run the Dish tomorrow (Sunday morning). I think my cardio is very good but really need to build those muscles. After that I went on a AAGSA dim sum outing. It was fun. Met some new people and helped out with food ordering. I biked over to Fry's electronics after that to pick up a couple of things. Came back and went with some friends to the shopping center where I picked up a pair of flip flops. I think I need a pair of good flip flops and/or sandals for this summer. One for everyday walking and another for meetings with important people. I'm not sure I'm going to keep the pair I got today. Not exactly 100% happy with them. I think I'm going to go to the REI in SF. I've seen that store many times and always wanted to go.

After all that, I rushed around and made some cookies for Mahalia's bday BBQ. I was going to make red bean mochi at first but didn't have enough time. In retrospect, I totally could've made them and just showed up later. Oh wells. I couldn't fine corn starch at the highly upscale grocery store at the mall.

I had wanted to go to another Indonesian movie night but didn't want to leave the party early. So I showed up to the movie night late and found an empty room. Maybe no one showed up? I just wanted to return a DVD that I had borrowed.

I finally did some reading after all of this but really haven't done much work all weekend. Very nice weather these days though. Everyone's been hoping that the rain would end. We've been having a couple of rainy days a week, between very sunny days. No rain forecasted in the next 10 days though. So maybe the dry season is finally starting?

1 comment:

YW said...

visa...where?