Birthday & Bus news

You can’t get candied peel here, so Judy is making some for Christmas mince pies, etc. Oranges are plentiful and you can get lemons. She is also having a go at marmalade as local orange jam isn’t quite the same. Breakfast could be transformed.


A couple of weeks ago it was Andrew’s 60th birthday. Sadly, Anna, his wife, was not here to celebrate it with him, but they were planning to have an official birthday together a couple of weeks later when she visits him in Thailand. Chinese cake shops specialise in lavishly decorated cakes for every occasion so it was quite easy to get a personalised birthday cake. But what gave Peter and Andrew the most fun was the gadget which was supposed to light all the candles before opening out like a flower and playing "Happy Birthday to You". Actually, it didn’t work quite like that, probably because they didn’t read the instructions. But it was an interesting engineering challenge!

Andrew was able to take over 50 of the circuits which Peter has been modifying. In Thailand, the staff and children in the orphanage will assemble the UV light water purifiers for sending to the Irrawaddy Delta. The total cost of each water purifier is only a few US dollars. We were shown one recently which cost $6,000, although that did include solar panels. As well as the bicycle driven model which we mentioned earlier, Andrew has successfully used a treadle sewing machine to back drive the DC fan motor (cheap car spares) to produce the voltage. Most villages have a bicycle and/or a sewing machine even if they have no electricity. It seems likely that there will also be a demand for these purifiers here in Yunnan.


Kunming buses continue to mystify and frustrate. Peter had to wait at least 20 minutes for a no. 82 the other day. The waiting crowd (they don’t queue here) was getting restive as other buses came and went. Shortly after Peter gave up and moved away to catch a different bus, no less than six 82s came along together. And when Peter eventually got on a bus, the passengers were jammed in more tightly than sardines in a can. One way of getting closer to the local community!

This week Judy’s school will be celebrating Halloween in what they think is the traditional British way. (Actually it’s more American.) Anyway, staff and pupils are all expected to come dressed as witches, ghosts, etc., something which Judy is not keen on. But the other option is to come as a Disney character. No suggestions, thank you, about which character she is most like.