A neighbor...
Up the road...











Down the road...

Landlady's porch, beside my unit...



























The wind came up over that first night, and kept up at reportedly gale force gusts thru out the next day as well. In fact, when the winds died off in the evening, they seemed to quit all at once, and it got so quiet it was almost spooky. The breezes blew in much cooler temperatures, and I was glad for the jacket and scarf that I wore into town Thursday (and Friday).

Thursday I found a free internet cafe, but one could only use their equipment (nice new Macs, big screens, fast connection), not my own laptop, ergo the relative silence. I spent time there Thursday and Friday; they are only open M-F, 10 til 4, as they sit in the lobby of Cable and Wireless, one of the communication utility companies. Hamilton runs to its own Apple store, staffed with friendly kids (Jason, a 22 year old graphic designer by training, is an Apple freak and geek, and would love to meet Trevor - his eyes lit up with the idea of someone sort of his age working as an art director.) The prices - well, we got an external harddrive at the Durham Apple store for I think $140 - here it was $350, (or so - the memory is already fogged. But the point is, for film, camera stuff, computer stuff - buy it in the US, it is very pricey here. Again, not a surprise!)

Called the bosslady, she asked me to come on into the office to pick up some papers and such, so I did. Met the gang, saw my cubicle, picked up the papers, got the address for Transport Control Department, where I go to get the manual to study for the drivers license exam, that sort of thing.

I realized I brought the wrong 'standard' cable for the camera to download the pictures to the computer, so Friday was in part spent hunting a card reader. I have one that reads pretty much anything out there now - visitors, please note! - for $30, a product I found between that price and nearly double that.

The gov'ment has 4 options for 1 bedroom apartments right now; I am to go see them next Thursday. These run $1700 - $2500, with a/c and w/d, furnished. I meet some local owners tomorrow to look at their units in the same price range tho semi or unfurnished. We will see...

Checked a couple of gyms, pilates studios and such, and a couple of language schools. And one of the highlights - met with the woman who set up the farmer's market here in Hamilton, tho she stepped out of it a couple years ago. In that weird serendiptious way things have , she had gone to MPC in Monterey, had lived in Pacific Grove, has a degree in ceramics/pottery (fine arts) with work in a couple small museums doing ceramics restoration work, her thing being majolica (which is what I worked in, ceramics-wise)...a number of parallels. She reminds me rather of Vonda, only a rounder Vonda - passionate about her interests, a gardener and teacher, with chin-length silver hair and dark eyes and strong opinions.

Enough for this one. I will add a photo of the other neighbor on the next posting...