Adventures with feline spring rolls(I kid, I kid), electronics shopping, and tasty snacks AKA Saturday

I'm going to try to catch up on some blog posts here.

We'll start with Saturday when I had a chance to go out for lunch with a couple of co-workers to a place called Darifify, which I've spelled wrong and it is pronounced not the way you'd think All you need to know is they make absolutely fantastic deep fried spring rolls full of mystery meat which were honestly some of the best I've ever had. They also make what they call an upside down bowl which is white rice, chicken, beef, shrimp, pork, and two friend eggs all done in a bowl and then flipped over onto your plate, and you eat it with the following view:

Yea - that's the ocean, and a palm tree, and what? No snow!

Of course there were drawbacks to this two course meal for three, that we ate by the sea(poet), in +28C(oh yeaa)... It did cost roughly $35 - for all of us. :) OH and we had to put up with a couple of really cute dogs and this cat who sat like this for an hour and a half.

Of course the thought just occurred that the cat may have stuck around to mourn his cat brother who may have been in my spring roll. Sorry feline friend - he was tasty.

It was a tough lunch.

On the drive to and from the plant / camp you pass an area of land that was gifted to the people a year or so ago by some local politician. Said politician essentially decreed that from X location to X location people were free to homestead and setup houses etc. This led to an enormous amount of huts springing up in a matter of weeks I'm told which was great until the politician died in a boat accident before the decree was side into law. The drama is ongoing over whether or not the law is going to be passed but in the mean time I snapped a pic of an occupied hut to give you an idea of what some people over here (not all mind you but a good portion) live in.

Later on I'd like to take the camera out and get some decent photos but this will do for now.

This is "rural" housing. Cities / etc have more permanent housing ranging from concrete beautiful places to things stood up all over the place with seemingly whatever is laying around.

It certainly makes you appreciate what you've got.

Following lunch Leo and I (my boss / partner in work crime) went and did some shopping in downtown Toamasina. He needed to find a cellphone for his daughter in Cuba and I needed a TV to replace my god awful 19" CRT that they give you with your room. Most impressive was that we found a chinese android dual sim phone unlocked brand new for $70. Pretty hilarious.

Almost as equally awesome was shopping for TVs. There are a few "major" appliance type stores in Toamasina that stock quite a lot of stuff. If I had to guess at square footage I'd say they are about the size of your average 7-11. Anyway, we hit up those local establishments to try to find a cheap 32" LCD TV. They had them if you wanted to pay 1,000,000AR - or about $500CAD for a four year old panel. Pretty stellar deal I'd say.

I'd all but given up on a TV when mid phone hunt we passed a hole in the wall shop that had four LCD TVs, a billion fridges, about 30 deep freezes, etc all crammed into a rectangular shop about the size of half of a single car garage. They had a new 32" Philips that we bargained down for more than half of what the other guys wanted - it felt very Saudi like to me. Needless to say I was able to watch Formula 1 without sitting in my chair about 20" from the screen and squinting. Totally awesome.

20" OF BEAUTIFUL 240 INTERLACED AWESOME - NOW WITH INTEGRATED DVD PLAYER! I'd love to know where in the hell they found ~200 of these in 2008 when they built the place. Insane. 

Sweet sweet sanity.  Gotta haves my racing.

Following the shopping trip of which I took no pictures, I know I'm bad at this blogging thing, I finished off Saturday with some more terrible eating by picking up my favorite Malaysian snack from the commissary and watching Formula 1. I loves me some prawn crackers. The other package are local peanuts, which are also tasty.

Nomnomnom.

That covers off my super exciting Saturday! IM SURE YOU WERE ALL GLUED TO THE SCREEN!

Anyway, I was planning on doing Sunday's blog for which I took a whole bunch of pictures of my room and the camp but it's way too late to be awake now so I'll have to do Sunday tomorrow. I'd planned on having more time tonight but I was invited by a bunch of guys on the project to come and play street hockey. Well actually I got invited by some other guys to play tennis but there was five of us for doubles and I am horrible at tennis so I joined in with the hockey folks in the other tennis court.

So for the first time in over a decade I played an hour of street hockey. I followed that up with my regular workout and now I'm having trouble moving let alone keeping my eyes open. It was a hell of a lot of fun, they play three times a week and I plan on participating as much as my legs will allow. I am also happy to report that I wasn't the worst player! I credit my good Canadian genes.

This is what an hour of street hockey does to me. You can't tell from the photo but my shirt is soaked all the way through with my manly awesome sweat. And yes - that is the worlds oldest "new" Blackberry.

Until next time!