Living without DVR

So I will say that of all the things I miss from living in the US, I miss my DVR the most. I mean, come on... has there been a better invention in the past couple of years in entertainment? Being able to record more than one thing at a time and pause and rewinding live t.v. That's pretty awesome! So of course, Dominica doesn't have that technology yet. (Shoot, I'm pretty darn sure they don't have digital t.v. ... it's all regular cable.) Though you can get satellite dishes (I've even seen those old-school ones that are bigger than your car!). Luckily, I have a great landlord that covers the cost of my cable (the reason will become apparent in a minute). I thought, "This is great! An added perk that I wasn't even going to ask for!" And the t.v. stations are pretty decent too. NBC, CBS, ABC, CW, Lifetime, Spike, Disney, Discovery, most of the American channels that I generally watch. There are even like 4 Starz channels too (~60 channels total), so you can watch movies!

The caveat of this great t.v. experience for such a small remote island is that unbelievably cable is pretty cheap. I'm talking like $30EC, which is equivalent to about $11.25 US. Now, tell me... when is the last time your cable bill was that low? Come to find out, that the reason cable is so cheap is that it is completely stolen. Meaning, they just point their satellite (or whatever) and those that they can pirate off for free, they get! Pretty cool (in a completely illegal sort of way), huh? Though it's interesting because this means your t.v. channel viewing doesn't always stay the same. For example, when I first got here, we got SyFy channel, which we no longer have. :( Because apparently they found us out and encrypted it. Grrr! Also, one day NBC will be on channel 26, and the next day it'll be on channel 40 (this I haven't experienced yet, but am sure that when I do, I'll be utterly confused).

But getting back to my DVR, the stupid networks have completely screwed me over this t.v. season! There are 3 shows at 8pm and 3 shows at 9pm on Thursdays that I watch (and can only watch one of them!), and no way to record them (VCRs are so 10 years ago). I'm sure you're thinking, "Come on Kristjan, just go online and watch them!" See, the US has a monopoly on that too. You can only watch the shows off their respective channel websites (NBC.com for example) if you live in the US, and also Hulu.com only works in the US. That sure does narrow it down! Luckily, I am surviving. SurftheChannel.com actually works, so I've been able to watch my shows at a later date (as long as the internet is actually on and isn't playing the "let's see how slow we can be today" game). But at least I'm fully caught up on Bones, Grey's Anatomy, ANTM, and only one off on Supernatural. So the moral of this story is, be glad for what you've got (though in reality, life would be so much greater if we all just threw the t.v. out the window!). Until next time...

On a clear day...

So you know how there's this old play/musical/now a movie called "On a clear day you can see forever." Well, it's hard to imagine how true it is here in Dominica. The other night there wasn't a cloud in the sky, so the stars were amazingly bright! You could actually see the Milky Way! That slight opaque white color swirling through the stars. It reminded me of being in the Outback of Australia. Absolutely amazing. If you've never experienced darkness like that and skies so clear, then you're really missing out.

Now during the day, being clear brings an entirely new meaning. Dominica is situated in between to French islands, Guadeloupe (and Les Saintes) in the north and Martinique in the south. Since I'm on the northwest end of the island, I can generally see Les Saintes (small island group thats a par of Guadeloupe) in the distance. However, on a clear day when there's no clouds or haze, you can see not only Les Saintes, but also the towering island of Guadeloupe behind it. I'm not exactly sure what the distance is between Dominica and Guadeloupe, but it takes an hour by high speed ferry to get there. If it's a clear day and you're standing on the southern most tip (Scott's Head), you can see Martinique. Also, since I'm living on an island, the ocean goes on and on and on. It's cool to look at the horizon and see nothing but water, but to also see the curve of the earth.

This whole place and the atmosphere lends itself well to being able to go all philosophical, however, I'll spare you that misery, bc philosopher I am not (even though I have a doctorate of philosophy~ hardy-har-har!). Anyway, I just hope everyone one day gets a chance to appreciate what I have had the opportunity to appreciate. Until next time...

My new home...

So, I promised pics of my house and here are some. There are more on facebook, so if you're my friend, check them out! I have a two bedroom, one bath house (actually the second floor of a two house~ the first floor is rented by a couple from England who are in the process of building their own house near here) (also the bathroom is split, so the toilet is in one room and the shower-that may or may not have lukewarm water- is in the other with the sink outside in between two, with no mirror). I've got a pretty great view (you can see the Caribbean ocean and Cabrits National Park from my place) and its quiet (at night almost all you here are crickets and such). Since I live a decent ways from campus, I get to catch the bus in the mornings with all the locals (a bus is supposed to hold 12-13 people, to give you an idea of how large a bus is). Good times! So whenever you guys want to come visit me, let me know! I've got an extra bedroom and a decently comfy couch!

Wagging war against the mosquitoes

So I really like my new place. However, I DETEST the amount of insects that it contains. It's nice up on the hillside, however, sometimes there is a lack of air flow through the house. Unfortunately, since I have my kitties, I am unable to open the doors to help the air flow bc there are no screens on them and I don't want them to run away! Though the windows do have screens, which is nice, there just needs to be more ventilation (I'm looking into getting a fan, however, getting it to my house is a logistical nightmare without a car).

So since I had been here (all of three nights), I was getting eaten alive by mosquitoes. I counted around 40 (I stopped at that point bc I couldn't see anymore) just on my arms, shoulders, hands, and upper chest area (bc those are the parts of me that are sticking out of the covers at night). Finally my neighbor told me about this bug spray you spray in your house to kill everything. I purchased some yesterday, then proceeded to fumigate my house. That stuff works, let me tell ya! No new mosquito bites last night, plus all the little bugs (gnat like things) were gone too! Yeah! So it appears I'm starting to win this battle. We'll see how long it lasts however, bc if they survived while the dinosaurs died, I think they'll probably prevail. :-(

Moved in...but I'm HOT!

So I have officially moved into my new house (or top floor of a house to be exact). The business of moving is crazy here. They finally out-sourced my move to one of the locals bc it was going to take at least another week if I had waited for the Ross people to do it (and it had already been sitting on the docks for a week!). So I get a call telling my they're on their way to my house, meanwhile I'm still sitting in my temporary housing and have to somehow get to my new place (which is a 20-25 min. drive and I have no car). Luckily I ran into a taxi guy that I had used that morning so he took me up there. Yeah!!! The movers moved all my stuff in and actually helped set up some of the larger things (my bed, kitchen table, bookcase, desk, etc) which I was totally stoked about bc I definitely couldn't have done it myself! I spent all day Saturday unpacking boxes and setting everything up.

And today, I moved out of my temporary housing (with all my suitcases, things I'd acquired over the last two weeks, and my kitties) and into my new house. Now, I know you're itching to see pics, don't worry, they are coming. I want to make sure all the boxes are gone and everything is in its place before I take any to post. My kitties are settling in, but they (as well as I) are RIDICULOUSLY HOT!!! I got this place bc it was cooler (temperature wise) and there's usually a nice breeze. Well, today there wasn't. My poor babies were panting like crazy! Now, I know at this point you are wondering..."Why don't you just turn on the A/C dummy! You do have A/C don't you?" Yes, I do have A/C units in both of the bed rooms. However, it's really expensive to run them (electricity wise). Oooo, on a side note, the way the electricity works here is pretty cool. It's a pay-as-you-go type deal (think pre-paid cell phones, that you buy minutes for and when they run out, you can't talk anymore). So basically I figured it out, that its a dollar an hour to run your A/C (steep, huh?). I've definitely gotta invest in some fans (now if I could only figure out where to buy them...). But back to the cats. I shut them in my bedroom and ran the A/C for a few hours so that they could cool off and start to acclimate to the new temp/place.

Anyway, now that the sun has gone down, it is cooler (about 82 F), but I'm still sweating like crazy. I'll have to get used to this. I'll definitely be glad when cooler weather comes around! (Besides the fact, that I'm gonna freeze my ass off when I come back to the states in December!)

Animals Abound

One of the interesting things about moving to Dominica is all of the random animals roaming on the side of the road. It's not uncommon to have a cow in the middle of the road as you're driving along. Take for example, the campus of Ross. There are multiple dogs running around the campus. Island dogs as people call them. They are very sweet and just want you to rub them and of course, if you have leftover food, they are glad to take it off your hands (though they are pretty good about not begging incessantly for it). There are also cows on campus (as pictured above). I don't know exactly who the cows belong to, but they just kinda chill out and munch on the grass.

Now, at my house, there is this open hill opposite from my front door that is apparently the grazing area for random goats and sheep. They are bleating at all hours of the day. The chickens and roosters also hang around and I think by the time I come home for Christmas I'm gonna be sick of hearing the stupid rooster crow! (There's also a random cow down the road)

So the moral of the story is, when you move to Dominica, be prepared for all the animals running around wild (cows, sheep, goats, chickens, dogs, cats, etc) and drive carefully because they run around in the road too and just take their sweet time moving out of your way.