First Day of Class

It's nice to know that students are the same the world over.  My first lecture was today, starting promptly at noon.  At 12:30 pm ten more students wandered in because 'someone' had told them that lecture started at 12:30.  The registrar just figured out that I have to get the 30 lectures that are normally given over the course of a year squished into a semester, so I have to teach twice as much as they were expecting.  It is actually pretty much then our typical T/R format so it is not a big deal to me.

Labs are a completely different matter.  They have nothing.  I asked about Munsell books and I finally got one old ragged copy that is in Chinese.  Literally.  One for 30 students per lab.  I have 60 students in the course.  I think we'll be out wandering the countryside a lot, looking at soil.  They have no way to determine soil texture, but I did see a pH meter.

The winter weather is rainy and in the 70s (F).  It is chilly and the laundry will not dry, since it is all hung to dry in the house.  The good part is that it will only get warmer and I suspect in October I'll miss this weather.

To provide an idea of the cost of living here:

1 US dollar is roughly 30 rupees (Ru)
My rent is 20,000 Ru/month, or about 700.00 US.  By Mauritian standards that is a lot, but I wanted clean and safe.
Food is very comparable in cost, and it can all by purchased very fresh at the market (as in watch them kill the chicken fresh). We got KFC as a treat the other night (KFC is the only American fast food I've seen) and a 12 piece bucket was 376 Ru, or about 12.00 US.   A Coke is 50 Ru or about 1.25 US.

The traffic is so horrible I cannot imagine driving, so we've hired a driver.  Mike (a retired policman who now taxis' folks around) and I negotiated a cost of 3,000 Ru (100.00 US) per week to drive us back and forth to work each day, plus any stops for groceries, etc.  The drive is only about four miles but it took 1/2 hour today!