I went to bed early last night but, around 1am, I woke up and couldn't get back to sleep. I contemplated reading and then the phone rang. It was brother John in England; poor lad doesn't seem to fully understand time differences. We had a great chat for nearly an hour and, when I said goodbye, I was so wound up I couldn't sleep. I then read for an hour. I'm thoroughly enjoying "The Shadow of the Wind", by Carlos Ruiz Zafon. It's a translation from the Spanish and I'm loving the flow of the words and the story itself. It's all based around a book and is a sort of detective story.
I got up around 6.30am and managed to do most of my 10,000 steps before the phone rang; it was Thornin asking if we could have coffee together before he returned to Battambang. I did my Sir Galahad bit on the way for coffee. An elderly man fell of his motorbike so I helped him get up. Two other people came to help and one of them sounded quite angry so maybe he did something he shouldn't have done. He wasn't hurt. Coffee shop visits always end up being long, drawn out chats and so we stayed for 1 1/2 hours. I happened to ask him a question about the market and he said he had to go there to buy gifts for me to carry to Canada and so off we went. By the time we'd finished shopping, it was time for lunch and so off we went to the food court in the Surya Supermarket. I normally wander around on my own to choose something but today I told him to get me the same as he got. I told him I always noticed that his meals looked better than mine so it was better for me to get the same thing. We had lunch and then he dropped me off at home. I enjoyed my morning so much I forgot about English class. Anyway, it was payback time as the lads didn't bother coming the day before.
There was a mouse in the live trap this morning so I took it to the balcony and let it sail through the air with the greatest of ease. How they land safely, and run off, after a jump from a 3rd floor balcony is beyond me. It's also beyond me why they visit the trap when there's no food in it. Curiosity not only killed the cat! I had another balcony visitor - a sparrow. It was pulling strands of the grasses from my broom, presumably to add to the nest.
I was so droopy, with being up half the night, I decided to have a snooze. Now there's no such word as 'snooze' in my vocabulary if it involves an afternoon nap - I end up sleeping and it's so hard for me to get moving again. I thought I'd have a cold wake-up shower but, with the water tank being on the roof, it turned out to be a warm one which didn't have the same effect. I do my best letter writing early in the day so I'm not so enthusiastic about computers in the late afternoon and evening and so none got done. Then, in walked Samnang, who decided to stay as long as he could instead of going to Chinese class. I told him about Google's new gaming programme so he searched on the internet and I then had a 1 1/2 hour lesson in gaming and its technicalities. It's interesting being taught things I don't know by a 14 year old. His mother normally phones to make sure he's left for class but this time she phoned to say he wasn't in class - she'd obviously phoned the teacher. She knows the boys hate learning Chinese but she's determined they do. I'm on the side of the boys as I'm sure I'd hate going every weekday evening, after school, for 2 solid hours.
There was an interesting programme on the BBC this morning about the cures for malaria. Mao Tse Tung ordered scientists to search old books for ancient Chinese herbal cures. They found Sweet Worm, also known as Artemisia in a 4th century manuscript and that became the basis for research. It was during the cultural revolution and the top scientist's husband was put into a labour camp and her children in care - so much for being a well respected, hard working lady. Everything was top secret so their success was not shared with the West for many years. They even had to test their discovery on themselves in the lab. I wonder how much Artemisia is in the stuff we buy nowadays?
