I spent the morning visiting all of the villages doing my jewelry. One of the villages had done a lot of work; thankfully, because they have a lot to do… the majority of the 1000 pieces. I only had a few changes to the work in progress. The other village had done very little over the past week as he had a lot of preparations for ceremonies. There are a lot of ceremonies this time of year. Hopefully he really gets cracking this week as it is making me nervous. I took 50 pendants from him and reassigned them to another worker. The third village (one that I worked with years ago) was still trying to get a handle on my designs and textures. Once the design is approved I hope she also gets busy as she has a lot of rings to make. John said he feels comfortable with her ability to complete her share. I am amazed that I will be able to complete all of my designs as 1000 pieces is a big jump from 600 in the same amount of time.
It was a beautiful day when I got back so I took off for a country drive planning on taking back roads to Tempak Siring where I have some carvers making some little chickadees and wings to use with my copper nest necklaces. I did a drawing of what I want and i found an artist with great skill at detailed work so i hope when I go to see the sample today that they are what i am hoping for. I ended finding the right back roads but there where many unmarked intersections so each time I just picked a direction my internal compass was very off as the roads wind and turn so much. I drove and drove and drove until my butt was very sore. Eventually I came around a corner and saw two huge looming volcanoes and knew I was far from my mark. I did not care, as the adventure was part of the goal for the day, so I drove some more before finally stopping for directions. After three stops for assistance I was back on the road to the bone-carving village of tempak siring. I stopped in to see my carvers and my little chickadee and mini wing samples were very cute and exactly like I wanted and better than I expected. Weee!
Just as I got ready for dinner tonight it started to rain hard. I decided to read my seventh book and let the rain die down a little as I wanted to take my laptop to upload stories and photos. I finally ventured out to the restaurant and once I got my food the rain started again… this time pouring, raining cats and dogs, thunder clapping…. The floor in the restaurant even flooded. I was just told today that the rains would be lightening up because it always rains less after Chinese New Year. Stranded in the restaurant I met a girl named Marla from Portland who is traveling on her own for two months. We shared many stories as well as hotel choices and cool hangouts. She was a little rattled because she wrecked her rented motorcycle today. She was not hurt badly but the damage on the motorcycle was about $100. I told her that she was lucky as in America it would have cost her a lot more and at least no one was hurt.
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