Tuesday, September 23, 2008

Amaris and J.R. the dog





Amaris can't wait to go to school and see her friend, J.R. Also, a shot of Clark and Amaris at school

Wednesday, September 10, 2008

The CUC Song

"The CUC just cut off my power. I won't have it back for a few hours. I can't do my homework or watch T.V. or surf on the net or do washee washee. PLEASE CUC turn on the power! PLEASE CUC turn on the power!"

Tuesday, September 2, 2008

Saipan Disgrace

What is the word?
The Four “s’s” of Saipan
YouTube Video

The recent Power outage disgrace on Saipan has now reached what can be technically referred to as “Medieval”. Basically, you have power for 12 hours and no power for 12 hours. The situation is called Load Shedding. To find out what this is all about you have to go to the complete source of all knowledge. Of course, I am talking about Wikipedia. I might get in trouble, but I am putting what the “W” said about it.
A rolling blackout, also referred to as load shedding, is an intentionally-engineered electrical power outage. These blackouts are normally in response to insufficient resources and inability to meet prevailing demand for electricity. For information about accidental blackouts that are not intentionally engineered, see power outage.
In many African and South Asian countries – e.g. India, South Africa, Cameroon, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Nigeria and Zimbabwe – a combination of aging electricity generation infrastructure, and the inadequacy of the supply of electricity to the ever expanding demand, has made rolling blackouts a staple of daily life.
Well, that about says it all. To all of our friends in India, The Congo, Nigeria, and Zimbabwe, we feel your pain
We can call the situation many things. My son calls it “Disgusting”. He is only six and he likes the word for lots of things. Actually, if you take all of the emotionally charged words out the simple word is: Substandard. We have a substandard existence on Saipan now. With the standard being the USA Mainland who would disagree. Yes, I think the word Substandard will do nicely.
THE FOUR “s’s” OF SAIPAN
First: Let’s Sit. Nothing else to do when the power is off.
Second: Let’s Stare. Stare at the streetlights to see when they come on. Stare at the walls. Basically, just Sit and Stare.
Third: Let’s Sweat. No Air con (who are we kidding; we couldn’t afford air-con even if we had power, but we like to live the dream). No fan. That’s it. Just Sit, Stare, Sweat.
Fourth: Let’s Stink. See Sweat above. The unholy square of living in a concrete house that protects you from a typhoon, but becomes a sauna during the day.
Add them all up and you come up with another “S”. I hope you have been paying attention. Substandard. (Two “S’s” in that!)

New YouTube Video
Besides the four “S’s” you can do other things. I put together a great YouTube video. I call it “4pm”. It’s about the wacky exploits of an “island family” that only has power for one hour per day- 4pm-5pm. Share in their zany everyday antics including the following:
• Here the four year girl talk about her heat rash- it’s cute as she says “Heat Wahsh”
• Here the whole family sing the “Walk it off” song. This is when you hit things in the dark.
• Watch the unbridled joy and celebration as the lights come on at 4pm and the kids try to watch TV and do Internet at the same time.
• Watch their little faces turn to wonder at 5:10pm as daddy tells them about a place far, far away where people have light and water all the time and they actually can use the air conditioning all the time. They ask me where this wondrous place is. I tell them it is where their mother grew up, a progressive place called the Philippines.
Well, that’s about it. If you see me (you will probably smell me first) please say hi.