So if you’ve been reading Jim’s wall, and it seems most people do. You will have seen the photos of wheat fields all over the mountain side. While he was gone they began harvesting, and one afternoon on my way to get water at the neigbor’s Masha showed me how they get a tasty snack out of the freshly harvested wheat. I thought, “You know, if Fletch was here he’d be taking photos of this to show everyone,” so I ran to get my camera.

The weather has changed dramatically in the last few weeks. We’ve had one rain that lasted for about 30 minutes and sunny days other than that. This means, there’s no water in the stream outside of our house; it’s dried up until the rainy season comes back. Clouds and fog no longer obstruct our views of the mountains, but now we see them through a dust haze. Likewise, we’ve got “fields of gold” the likes of which Sting can only imagine, all over the place. Some nights we don’t even bother to light the stove because it’s not cold enough. I think summer is here. And with it, people sit out in the yards over little fires and toast the fresh cut wheat grain on the shaft. They rub it between their hands, to loosen the toasted grain, and sift it between their hands blowing at the loose grassy bits. In the late afternoon kids and adults are seen eating handfuls of green, toasted wheat grain. It’s slightly soft and sweet. I think it’s kind of good, but as is the way with wheat, it’s a lot of work for such a tiny amount of snack. Somehow I don’t think that bothers anyone here.