{"id":3148,"date":"2014-07-12T20:33:23","date_gmt":"2014-07-13T02:33:23","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/?p=3148"},"modified":"2014-12-29T20:35:51","modified_gmt":"2014-12-30T02:35:51","slug":"tick-tock","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/?p=3148","title":{"rendered":"Tick tock"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_3157\" style=\"width: 209px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/DSC_17971.jpg\"><img aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-3157\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/DSC_17971-199x300.jpg\" alt=\"Siem Reap Temple\" width=\"199\" height=\"300\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-3157\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/DSC_17971-199x300.jpg 199w, http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/DSC_17971.jpg 425w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 199px) 100vw, 199px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-3157\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Siem Reap Temple with special tour guide<\/p><\/div>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\">Since we returned from Cambodia late Monday night, I think it&#8217;s starting to hit me just how short our time is here in Pakistan. It&#8217;s a bit overwhelming! New work keeps piling up while I&#8217;m trying to get my desk cleaned off for the transition to my successor and pack-out day is looming in the near future! And throughout it all, we&#8217;re trying to spend time with so many people who have become a part of our lives before we all go our separate ways.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\">We spent one such night this week to say goodbye to Joseph, along with Debby and Zia, at the French Club. It was a really nice evening, made more impressive by the massive storm going on outside. I had a wonderful view over the pool watching an incredible lightning show that went on for an hour or so &#8211; and when the rain stopped and we walked outside, it was gloriously cool! Wonderful.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\">We had Brad, Mike, and John W. over for pizza and beer last night since Brad and John W. will be heading out next week. We spent several hours laughing it up and teasing each other. I&#8217;m really going to miss working with them and hope we can stay in touch.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\">There&#8217;s also pressure to get last-minute shopping done! It&#8217;s been difficult lately since we&#8217;ve been pretty locked down due to security. This weekend we were able to get out a little (albeit in armored cars) and we went to a carpet shop we&#8217;ve been trying to go to for some time. The guy is very knowledgeable and is known for his tribal carpets. We bought two lovely ones. The house still looks like a carpet shop &#8211; we have a bunch here from the two recent carpet parties that we&#8217;ve been trying out. We&#8217;ll have to make some final decisions soon about what to keep and what to return.<\/span><\/span><\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_3151\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/DSC_1969.jpg\"><img aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-3151\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-3151\" alt=\"Herat Carpets\" src=\"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/DSC_1969-300x199.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"199\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/DSC_1969-300x199.jpg 300w, http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/DSC_1969.jpg 640w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-3151\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Herat Carpets<\/p><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<br \/>\n&nbsp;<br \/>\n&nbsp;<br \/>\n<span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\">We have a little kitten that lives outside here at the house that we&#8217;ve been feeding and watching. He&#8217;s so cute and like to mess with Flavia through the front window. She is not amused.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_3149\" style=\"width: 209px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/DSC_1374.jpg\"><img aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-3149\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-3149\" alt=\"Flavie and the little cat\" src=\"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/DSC_1374-199x300.jpg\" width=\"199\" height=\"300\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/DSC_1374-199x300.jpg 199w, http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/DSC_1374.jpg 425w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 199px) 100vw, 199px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-3149\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Flavie and the little cat<\/p><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<br \/>\n&nbsp;<br \/>\n&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\"><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\">The heat here is pretty awful. We&#8217;ve been around 108 every day with 40% humidity &#8211; heat index of 120. It&#8217;s the month of Ramadan for the Muslims, which means they awake around 2AM to eat breakfast before sunrise and prayers, then they fast all day until sundown, around 730PM. They only sleep about three hours each night &#8211; and even then, I&#8217;m not sure if they are able to sleep: it&#8217;s so stiffling hot and they don&#8217;t have the big generators like we do to run fans or air conditioning. I can&#8217;t imagine how very uncomfortable they are.<\/span><\/span><\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\">Here&#8217;s a shot of one of the places where they can (supposedly) get drinking water.<\/p>\n<div id=\"attachment_3150\" style=\"width: 310px\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/DSC_1971.jpg\"><img aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-3150\" loading=\"lazy\" class=\"size-medium wp-image-3150\" alt=\"Filtration Station\" src=\"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/DSC_1971-300x199.jpg\" width=\"300\" height=\"199\" srcset=\"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/DSC_1971-300x199.jpg 300w, http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/DSC_1971.jpg 640w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-3150\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Filtration Station<\/p><\/div>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><span style=\"font-size: 14px; line-height: 1.5em;\">My daily routine is to go to the gym around 515 each morning. The highlight of the week is our spin class that Meghan runs &#8211; it&#8217;s a great workout. And it&#8217;s introduced me to a couple of super nice folks, like Monica! A special hello to her mother-in-law!\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Since we returned from Cambodia late Monday night, I think it&#8217;s starting to hit me just how short our time is here in Pakistan. It&#8217;s a bit overwhelming! New work keeps piling up while I&#8217;m trying to get my desk cleaned off for the transition to my successor and pack-out day is looming in the [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[4],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3148"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3148"}],"version-history":[{"count":8,"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3148\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3161,"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3148\/revisions\/3161"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3148"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3148"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/www.criplomats.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3148"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}