Saturday, July 30, 2011

Letter from Ashlyn

Friday we went to Cairns to Rusty's Market.  Food here is very expensive.  Eight papayas were $25.00.  Small bananas were about $1.00/each, and the larger bananas were about $2.00/each.  Small mangoes were $3.00/each.  I got my sugar cane drink at Rusty's.  I'm so addicted to them.

On the way home we stopped in Smithville to visit John's travel agency, Flight Central.  The agent that booked my flights was named Chris.  He lived near Atlanta for a while as a student, so he liked my southern drawl.  I got all my flights booked for the September Australian tour for  $720.00.

We had to drive to Kunandra for John to pick up his new bank card.  Kunandra is  in the Kunandra Rain Forest...quite a tourist town.  I plan on visiting it again during September.  Maybe I'll take the tourist train up and ride the cable car back to Cairns.

I got a sweet letter from Ashlyn.  She sent me a beautiful strawberry ornament that she made for me.  It's hanging on my window.


I slept until 7:00 on Saturday.  It feels good to get to sleep so long.  I'm having dreams about everyone I know.  Sleep is different here because I fall asleep in total darkness with no television/radio/music and wake up when the sun comes up.

We have not had 240 volt power much of the time.  There hasn't been enough sun to charge the battery.  My time on-line has been short.  Since I couldn't play on the computer I cleaned the toilets, my Lugable Loo, and did my hand laundry.

Jonathon, John's son, came by for a few minutes.   We talked about the big party going on next door.  People started arriving last night in vans and cars with backpacks, sleeping bags, pillows, etc.  We are a bit upset that we didn't get invited!  There is a large tee pee set up.  So far they have been quiet, so we are not sure what is going on.

I cleaned my room, studied my lesson on the digestive tract, and started a new lesson on vaccination.  I am reading a book called The Restoration of the Peasantries by G. T. Wrench.  Commercial farming interests do not farm the soil, they mine the soil.  Large land-holdings  cannot be farmed intensively, and they fail to return to the soil what was taken from it.

History shows that great nations spring from an agricultural citizenry made up of small family farms.  The citizenry become more urban as commercial interests find a way to drive the families from the land to the town (through taxation and debt), which in turn leads to moral and physical weakness.  The condition of the soil is related to the condition of the nation.

For lunch we had papaya, mango, banana, avocado, and coconut.

Consultations at 2:00.  Karen is on Day 8 of her fast.  I asked the doctor for the official line on hair color.  He asked me if I wanted to lose my hair.  He had a patient who had lost her hair after dying it for many years.  He put her on the healthy lifestyle and her hair grew back.  Guess what she did then?  She dyed her hair!.  Her hair came out again and never grew back.  The doctor's recommendation is to grow old gracefully.

It was a lazy afternoon of reading and studying.  I looked at a book of photographs of some Old Order Amish and finished the peasantry book.

Supper was lettuce leaves and celery leaves from the garden, chopped up tomatoes, topping made with mashed avocado, some chopped tomatoes and tomato juice and sauerkraut juice, sauerkraut, pecans, and dates.   I practiced flute, put on pj's and spent the rest of the evening reading/studying.

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