half way!

It's Friday after work and we've figured out that we only have 15 more work days; pretty much we're halfway done working! I can't believe how fast the time is flying here.
Continuing from last post when we were at palm paradise:
The food was amazing on the way down... unfortunately we had a few casualties from it! Three people got sick from the food there and couldn't work for the next two days because they couldn't leave the side of their toilets! Luckily I wasn't one of them. Everyone's stomache is feeling fine now but a whole bunch of us are already sick of the site of curry in our diets. For breakfast we eat fruit and jam on bread, lunch we eat rottie (which is like a curry pizza pocket... they were amazing at the beginning but lunch after lunch of them tends to wear down the excitement), and dinner has been a lot of trial and error nights ending up with very small meals all the time. It's hard to eat a lot here though because of all the heat; it's interesting knowing how much your body needs on a regular day and how much you should be eating working as hard as we do yet we can't even make ourselves down that much food.
Our two groups traded work sites on wednesday but when we left the temple the wall was already halfway up! now the foundation is completely done and they're working on a few houses in the area. At the trade school we're still working on the foundation; all the sides are done and now we're just connecting them in the corners. We only have one tea time at the school site but at lunch we play volleyball or cricket with the locals that we work with, or they bring their guitar and sing to us, one day they even read our palms for us! (I'm going to have one true love, three kids; one girl and two boys, I have a good mind and heart... I think that's all they told me) and yesterday they taught us how to count to ten (eca, deca, tuna, hathera, phaha, higha, hata, otta, novena, dehigha!). Anyways it's a lot of work but also a lot of fun. Since it's so hot out we work hard for 10-20 mintues and then have to take a break so noone dies of exhaustion; sometimes we go longer if there's a nice breeze or a cloud overhead but usually our breaks are longer because we work faster than the brick layers or other limiting factors.
The weather here is sunny every day all day and usually around 30... I end every day with a little red to my skin but by the next morning I am back to my typical cinnamon colour that I adopt over summer; however my tan is only on my arms... since i wear a hat all day at work and a sleeved shirt... hopefully our one day weekends will be enough to even it all out!
At night we almost always have a lightning show but rarely ever accompanied with rain. It's really amazing to watch and it completely lights up the sky. I took a video on my camera of it so everyone at home could see.
Tomorrow is our half day of work and then the caretaker at our hotel has his birthday! so we're going to come home and get cleaned up (and probably nap) and throw him a birthday to remember! we're all pretty excited. and then Sunday morning we are going the the elephant orphanage/santuary! sooo excited for that. I still can't believe all the animals they have here that are just running around: water buffalo, monkeys, cows, dogs, cats, monitors, geckos, goats, peakocs! everything is just so surreal still!
Funny story I forgot to mention at the worksite the other day: the locals were really impressed with how hard I was working and how strong I was (compared to the other girls) that they made me queen of the worksite... they made me a crown out of cashew leaves and everything! it was really funny and made me feel pretty good at the effort I've been putting into this.
Everyone here has their own bed and there's 9 single rooms, and 4 double rooms each with their own bathroom with a flushing toilet and a shower (not as bad as i thought it was going to be at all!) which leaves two people stuck in the two beds in the living room... since I'm the nice person that I am I volunteered for one of those beds... bad choice on my part! In the mornings I have to wait to use one of the bathrooms in the guest house... all of which are double rooms so there's quite the line up... I can't change until everyone else is done, and we don't have a ceiling fan... just a floor fan that goes between the two of us meaning we get really hot and then nice and cool allll night... BUT GOOD NEWS! today we're switching rooms! we realized that one of the double rooms had the two people staying in one bed (sharing a mosquito net) and leaving the other bed completely unused... so they're moving into one of the single rooms with a double bed and Jacquie and I are gonig to be roomates! I'm pretty excited for this and am pretty sure I'm going to kick everyone out as soon as we get back haha.
I had an injury on the worksite the other day... we were carrying buckets of cement to build the foundation and i walked into this wooden post... I ended up getting a substantial sliver in my leg but we had a first aid kit on site... we cleaned it up and tried to pull it out but ended up breaking it off and leaving it too deep to get at there. One of the locals broke up a bunch of leaves there and put it on the sliver and made it completely stop bleeding which I thought was pretty cool. Anyways, back at home we performed minor surgery in Devon's room (aka I layed on teh bed while 5 people watched as he pulled it out of my leg). It was pretty deep though so I ended up with a bit of a hole in my calf and a nice oversized bandage to look hardcore afterwards :P Don't worry, I survived and it looks like I get to keep my leg too! (I bet my mom's not laughing at that one)
I'm trying to remember everything to tell you guys but I can't even remember what I've said here!
everything is so laid back, there's no pressure to do anything in a hurry and everything seems so cheep! i just bought a 500 ml tub of ice cream to share with a friend ehre for 120 rupies... which is the equivalent of about 1 dollar! and I thought I was going to lose weight here... hahaha
I felt really bad the other day buying some things from a man on the beach because we all bartered with him (which is expected) but the amount that we cut it down must have meant so much more to him than it meant to us. It's hard to remember that they're having such a hard time right now when everyone is so happy and welcoming all the time.
Anyways I guess I'll quit while I'm ahead and let some other people use the computer now!
talk to you all later!
lots of love
Karen