Monday, July 28, 2003
Thought I would write an email since it's tougher for you to get online now. I hope you are holding up to all that travel to reach school. How have you been the past few weeks? Is your mom doing better?
Since we last chatted, I seemed to have full days. Now that the summer is nearing an end, things have become more hectic. Last week itself is an example.
I spent the weekend on Kit's (my summer roomie) farm. It was my first time on a real farm. And I got to meet his parents and his sister. I like this girl, she's very sweet. Helped me out by cleaning my room with me and driving me around when she was at Coe for a week on a camp. I had some good ol' American food. I took a tour of his farm, equipment and the fields. I helped them move the greenhouse they were making. I drove an ATV four wheeler, that was fun! They also have a pond with a paddle boat and a canoe. Its a nice place there and their parents were very friendly. I really had a good time there.
Sunday ended with a raging storm in Cedar Rapids with tornados, 3 of them. It was crazy here, all of us took shelter in the basement of my dorm, ie our floor. Quite a few big trees got uprooted, and some of them broke a few feet above the ground. I saw the mess when I was getting to work. The funny sight was our college President standing out in the quad looking at his precious broken trees sadly. And we also had a fabulous steak dinner thrown to the research students and faculty. I had a huge steak, it was so big that I simply couldnt finish it. Food flows too freely here, dangit! Doesn't help me with loosing weight..lol..
Tuesday, me and Scott had to go to Iowa State University to run some Raman IR tests on some of the glasses that we had made. These glasses absorb water like hell, so we can't work with these in air. We had to work in a Helium glove box preparing pans for the Raman for 3 freaking hours straight! Anyway, the test took only about an hour for 9 samples. Well, although the results that we saw weren't great, we figured that it was a first step towards improving our samples. And then before coming back, we both spent $25 in a Pizzeria! lol..thats about 4 times the normal amount, although the pizza that we ate was huge and very good and this went on Doc's tab because he told us that he would pay for our lunch there! Food yet again, its a change from microwaveble food and peanut butter- jelly sandwiches atleast. And I did drive about 60 miles on the way back from the University. Scott let me drive his car without a licence on the highway, I was so excited to drive a car for the first time here!
Wednesday was the lunch day and we had Thai and Chinese food since the talk was about Anna and the King of Siam. We learnt some very interesting things about this story. First, most of the stuff in the movie didn't happen the way it was potrayed. Secondly, Anna was a liar. And contrary to popular belief, she was not born in England but in India and was the child of a mixed marriage, Indian woman and a British army man apparently. In the evening, me, Sara, Kit, Darbie and some of her friends went to drive-in movies in a town about 75 mins from school. We saw Legally Blonde 2 and T3 for just $6, it was awesome. Just one minor problem was that it got deadly cold by 11 and the movies went up to 1 in the morning on a school night (ok..work night).
Thursday was not a good day in research. Our nitrogen tanks ran out and we hadn't ordered new ones which made Doc mad because it wasted the entire morning. Well, there was only the morning to work today because we were going to a lake nearby to unwind. We splashed about in the water for a while playing frisbee. And then went for a boat ride and played sand volleyball. Its sad that the only thing I can do is serve, I wish I could do the rest of the stuff. I got back quick because my parents wanted to call me since I haven't got to chat with them a lot because the time difference is a bit annoying. And then one on my closest friends called me and told me that she won't be coming back to Coe. Man, that was so depressing because we hung out a lot along with Kristin. Atleast Kristin's coming back and I talk to her often, so I dont miss them a lot. Thank god for email and free phone calls.
But this weekend has been rather slow, apart from talking to Kristin, I did nothing else. I wish you would have come online but I know you are pretty busy, so I understand.
By the way, if this was too much detail, just tell me. I just wanted you to know how my week went. Tell me whats going on there..
Sending you lots of love
Joy
I spent the weekend on Kit's (my summer roomie) farm. It was my first time on a real farm. And I got to meet his parents and his sister. I like this girl, she's very sweet. Helped me out by cleaning my room with me and driving me around when she was at Coe for a week on a camp. I had some good ol' American food. I took a tour of his farm, equipment and the fields. I helped them move the greenhouse they were making. I drove an ATV four wheeler, that was fun! They also have a pond with a paddle boat and a canoe. Its a nice place there and their parents were very friendly. I really had a good time there.
Sunday ended with a raging storm in Cedar Rapids with tornados, 3 of them. It was crazy here, all of us took shelter in the basement of my dorm, ie our floor. Quite a few big trees got uprooted, and some of them broke a few feet above the ground. I saw the mess when I was getting to work. The funny sight was our college President standing out in the quad looking at his precious broken trees sadly. And we also had a fabulous steak dinner thrown to the research students and faculty. I had a huge steak, it was so big that I simply couldnt finish it. Food flows too freely here, dangit! Doesn't help me with loosing weight..lol..
Tuesday, me and Scott had to go to Iowa State University to run some Raman IR tests on some of the glasses that we had made. These glasses absorb water like hell, so we can't work with these in air. We had to work in a Helium glove box preparing pans for the Raman for 3 freaking hours straight! Anyway, the test took only about an hour for 9 samples. Well, although the results that we saw weren't great, we figured that it was a first step towards improving our samples. And then before coming back, we both spent $25 in a Pizzeria! lol..thats about 4 times the normal amount, although the pizza that we ate was huge and very good and this went on Doc's tab because he told us that he would pay for our lunch there! Food yet again, its a change from microwaveble food and peanut butter- jelly sandwiches atleast. And I did drive about 60 miles on the way back from the University. Scott let me drive his car without a licence on the highway, I was so excited to drive a car for the first time here!
Wednesday was the lunch day and we had Thai and Chinese food since the talk was about Anna and the King of Siam. We learnt some very interesting things about this story. First, most of the stuff in the movie didn't happen the way it was potrayed. Secondly, Anna was a liar. And contrary to popular belief, she was not born in England but in India and was the child of a mixed marriage, Indian woman and a British army man apparently. In the evening, me, Sara, Kit, Darbie and some of her friends went to drive-in movies in a town about 75 mins from school. We saw Legally Blonde 2 and T3 for just $6, it was awesome. Just one minor problem was that it got deadly cold by 11 and the movies went up to 1 in the morning on a school night (ok..work night).
Thursday was not a good day in research. Our nitrogen tanks ran out and we hadn't ordered new ones which made Doc mad because it wasted the entire morning. Well, there was only the morning to work today because we were going to a lake nearby to unwind. We splashed about in the water for a while playing frisbee. And then went for a boat ride and played sand volleyball. Its sad that the only thing I can do is serve, I wish I could do the rest of the stuff. I got back quick because my parents wanted to call me since I haven't got to chat with them a lot because the time difference is a bit annoying. And then one on my closest friends called me and told me that she won't be coming back to Coe. Man, that was so depressing because we hung out a lot along with Kristin. Atleast Kristin's coming back and I talk to her often, so I dont miss them a lot. Thank god for email and free phone calls. And I think I set a personal record on the phone, 3 hours with Kristin!
Monday, July 07, 2003
Another night in Dad's office scanning photos and also wondering as to the method of transfering the pictures from this computer to anything else. To give you a picture of the computer I am using, its a PII machine with 128 MB RAM. All this has is a floppy drive which is practically useless in this case because I have to do about 80 MB of transfer atleast. I then decided that the internet was my best option. So I tried Yahoo!'s Briefcase but it seems too slow and it won't accept most of the filenames because they are too long. So, that venture was a failure. And then experimented by sending these pictures two at a time using my father's office mail which was fortunately open. So, far its working. *crossing fingers and praying*.
Thursday, July 03, 2003
*The damn firewall in the office blocks all messengers! Even at home, it blocks AIM while it lets the rest of them to work, I dont know what's up with that. I thought I'd chat as well and scan. Doesnt seem like it now. I simply can't figure out why it doesnt work even with the proxy input. I give up!*
This time the trip home has certainly not been a cakewalk. Got to the airport and then found out that Air France and Delta had different baggage policies. I had to pay 110 bucks to carry the cycle along with me, I was soo pissed. They are both members of the Skyteam, some team members. I really dont feel like flying Air France anymore, I have seriously had enough, over priced tickets and sub par services. Anyway, flight to Paris was 8 and a half hours long because the plane had to circle and land in the airport from the other side due to cross winds. That ate 30 minutes of my 2 hour transit here. And then after landing it took the bus 45 minutes to pick us up. ie 15 minutes left for me to get to board which included taking a bus and passing security checks. I barely made it to the flight only to find out that the flight would be 1.5 hours late due to a cargo door part malfunction. What luck! But I was glad that I got to Lagos at last and with all my baggage! Thank God that Papa also arrived the same evening, thats the only reason that I was picked up too, because they had me slated in to come tomorrow. Got to the guesthouse and set out for home at 5.30 in the morning. great! to top off the armed robberies,we now have a fuel strike. This country is going to the dogs, wait, its already gone to the dogs...
Wednesday, June 25, 2003
four solutions, rest of the things in the day were good. I finally got the
much awaited camera that was a royal pain in the ass
to order. Took a short break from work to fetch it from the mailroom after I saw
that it had arrived using the tracking number. Its a wonderful camera, half my
palm.. its a teeny tiny camera perfect for mom! I am going to try it out before
I take it home for sure, maybe take some pictures in Peterson.
Now, the part that brightened my day was that Bhav
finally sent me some of the pictures that I had been bugging her for the last
8 months!! Pictures from her childhood, ie baby size and then probably 5
year old pictures. And then there were some more recent photos, from school and
junior college.. some with friends and some without. The picture I liked the
best was the one with the lovely smile during her 17th
birthday, youthful exuberance in her grin... Where did those days go :-(?
days I would talk to her everyday, talk to someone I had met just once or twice
but yet best friends....
Tuesday, June 24, 2003
Saturday, June 21, 2003
Saturday, June 07, 2003
Sunday, me and Ben went for a ride around the city first to search for a place to eat and then garage sale hopping, it was definitely fun. And then we ended up watching another movie in the night. The night before I watched 3 movies including one with Jenna. I wish we had more time to hang out but oh well.. So overall, a good weekend I'd say..
Monday, June 02, 2003
My day started out with Bhavya finally coming online after 3 painfully long weeks. I would wait every weekend in the morning to get her online but it never happened. Then I realized she must have been nursing her mom once she got out of the hospital. She is one of the most responsible people I know. There have been many friends I thought were responsible and "good". Well, I'll never see them in the same light anymore, I still like them exactly as before, maybe a bit more but I will see them as normal people with temptations and the inability to conquer it, no more super women. With every chat, I get to know her better. I just wish I could hear her voice with all the inflections and nuances in the tone to catch her train of thought. eChat simply is not enough, even though I have audio-video chat capabilites, she doesnt. Its just not the same.
*I still remember when I talked to her after almost a year when I was in Toronto, Canada during Spring Break. The 30 minutes of talk time was enough to quench my thirst that had been building up all this while. She has a lot on her mind, I want to be there for her all the time and I think she knows that she has one friend here who loves her the way she is. She changed my life since I've met her, I see things differently. I think one of the saddest days in my life was when we met for the last time before I left for Nigeria. The lunch at Pizza Hut (our first lunch date), the shopping at Lifestyle for my watch (I spent a major chunk of my pocket money on this, my parents were really pissed about it, oops), she then bought me a book (Abduction by Robin Cook) and I ended the shopping by buying a shirt for her. She didnt want me to, but I told her that I wanted to buy her something before I left, because I wouldn't see her for a long time. I took her home to meet my parents because they hadn't met her for the 3 years I'd known her. For that, I had seen her only thrice in all the time I knew her. For the first time with a bunch of my friends around. Adu got her, and we saw each other for the first time then. Adu was a sweetie and still is if I can get to talk to her. Bhavya and me were very shy around each other even though we had talked on the phone for the last year. I guess it was strange to meet your a voice you hear on the phone in real life, in person.*
Oh my! I went off on a tangent there. Coming back to the topic of me talking to her yesterday. She wasn't home for three weeks, she was at her grampa's. No wonder she couldn't come online. Even yesterday, she made a point to get out and get me online. Thats so sweet of her, that meant a lot to me even if she didn't notice. She did something like this last year as well. She woke up at 2 AM just to talk to me. My, this would something I would normally do. I wake up early for my parents all the time especially when they call me because thats one time they can actually get a hold of for sure. Anyway, she was telling me how she had to be with her mom most of the time to massage her to prevent DVT (Deep Vein Thrombosis) because the hip implant was replaced. She really needs to take some time off and relax for a few days, let her sis and dad handle it for a few hours so that she can go out for a breath. I am really worried about her health too. I also discovered one thing about her that she "forgot" to mention in all our chats before, she beat the shit out of a girl in her grade 11 residential hall. Oh my! She is a firecracker! I didn't think she had such a short fuse! The story was action packed! I wish I was there to see this catfight as she put it. But whats a cat fight with pulling each other's hair or scratching faces! We talked for a loooong time. It felt so good. Brought a smile to my rather damp week, a ray of sunshine, something that wasnt there for a long time. The only other people who bring sunshine to my life are Mary and Kristin....
Thursday, May 29, 2003
I wonder how my friends are doing now. Mary should be on her way to Seattle, i dont know how long that drive is. Kristin is swim coaching, and painting houses. Jeshica, Rishav and Komal are working. Jessi is working at a hardware store, I don't know for sure what Tara is doing, Michelle's at a frat house for the summer. Jenna will be going to a christian camp as a counselor I think but before that she's coming back to Coe for an Alumni event next weekend. I will be spending time with her then as far as I know.
Wednesday, May 28, 2003
Tuesday, May 27, 2003
Monday, May 26, 2003
Friday, May 23, 2003
Wednesday, May 21, 2003
Now, I am waiting to take 2 finals today, chem and calc..I hope they go good..