Kamryn Update

On the 23rd we took Kamryn for her yearly visit with her specialist. There is really no change, one side was still at a 2 and the other went barely to a 1--not significant. When we started this process 3 years ago there were three options, take medicine and see if she outgrows, out-patient surgery and then surgery. We talked about it then and decided we would give the medicine a couple of years and see if she outgrows, well it has been 3 so we are moving to option 2. We are going to call the doctor to get it set up to do the diffusion (I believe that is what it is called), this is the out patient surgery. They are going to insert a gel that will move the tube from her kidneys to her bladder to an angle like it is supposed to. Once she has the surgery she will only have to take medicine for one more month and then no more taking medicine every night. Also, she will need to do yearly ultrasounds but no more VCUG's unless she gets another UTI. The VCUG is that horrible procedure she has to go through with the catheter--this is what I am looking forward to. We don't have a date set up yet, but wanted to give a quick update on what we are doing next.

Okay, all the shopping is done, most of the baking and I will get to the little decorating later--so I can post some of the pictures.

Lets start with my seat on the long flight, or actually my "pod". If you are ever going to travel for a long distance and you have a chance to fly Singapore Airlines Business class--do it, only way to fly. Below are the pictures of our seats, we basically had our own little area to ourselves and the back of the seat would pull down and then you had a flat bed to sit on--they even turn off all the cabin lights for the "lights out" period. After they feed you like a 4 course meal. I also had lots of movies, shows and music to choose from.

At the hotel they had this big train presentation set up. It was really nice, we were sort of surprised about all the Christmas decorations and festivities we saw over there. There were 3 train tracks that went around the gingerbread village--I would just watch it sometimes when I was waiting for my co-workers.

Here is a view from the hotel, some of the days were overcast. Overall the temperature wasn't too bad, it was not quite as warm as Houston in the summer, but believe it or not--more humid. There was only one day there that we had a lot of rain, otherwise dry just overcast--we were working overnights too, so we mainly just saw the evenings.

One of the girls that traveled with us is from Iran and had explained to us the "squatting" toilets, but until you see one--won't know what to expect. Below is one of the squatters, not really what I thought it would look like. You actually stand on it and go to the bathroom, it is safe to say--this is the closest I came to it, never got brave enough to try using it. They also use the hose on the right to clean off when done instead of using toilet paper. Just a different way of doing things I suppose. We learned when we were out in public, the first few stalls were the toilets we are used t0, the last few were the squatters--we learned to avoid. The picture below is of one of the squatters at the office.

One one our days "exploring" the city we went to China Town and Central Market--this is where you can bargain and good deals, realized we weren't not much of hagglers. We did find this new fish therapy. For 5RM (which is roughly $1.50) you can have these fish eat the dead skin off your feet for 10 minutes--we decided what the heck. Well we realized why so cheap, takes 8 minutes to actually get our feet in the water. Felt really weird and we did a lot of giggling, it really tickled. Below is me and one of my co-workers (Nooshin) that was traveling--we both did the "treatment".

Nooshin and Me

Our feet in the water

Downtown there are these 2 towers, they are called the Petronas Towers and at one point in time they were the largest buildings in the world, now they are like the 4th largest. There is a bridge between the two towers to walk across, we never got a chance to do that. At the bottom of the towers is one of the malls in town. One thing we learned while there is they like to shop. I think there were shopping malls everywhere. We went to like 4 and we found out there there were more.

Below is a picture of the towers with the mall at the bottom. We had to go out of the mall across the park and to a bridge to try and get a picture of the whole towers. They were massive and we were told beautiful at night, but didn't get a chance to go down there at night, maybe next time.

The trip was very nice and I would go back again--it was such an experience and even though I missed my family incredibly--I would never change the fact that I had this experience. The only thing I wish I could change is be able to experience with my family.

Greetings from Malaysia

Good day from the other side of the world. No pictures yet need to wait to get home to my personal computer--but I wanted to say Hi and give an update of my experiences. So, lets see--I have apparently eaten sardines and then I did willingly try squid rings. The food is interesting here, but I am a bit confused why Asians are so small--they fry almost everything. They also don't believe in boneless chicken or deboning before cutting. I have also had ice cream with beans and corn on the bottom. But all in all been a good and fun experience. Another thing apparently they enjoy here is shopping. We have been to at least 3 very large malls and apparently we are missing more. So you know I am loving this. But are you ready for it ..................................... I had fish nibble at my feet. Yes, you read correctly--there were fishing nibbling at my feet. There is this new fish therapy where you put your feet in this tub of water and there are these fish that nibble all the dead skin. It cost 5RM for 10 minutes (which is about $1.50). We realized why it was so cheap--takes 8 minutes just for us to get over the tickling, but once you get passed that it was actually pretty neat--and our feet were softer afterwards. I have successfully taken the trains and not had panic attacks--yes Zayne no attacks at the train station. We took the train into town and saw the towers, we didn't get to go up--but they are just awesome enough from the outside. There is a mall that sits in front of the towers and then there is a park in front of that -- was really pretty. Getting a bit sleep deprived. Last week we worked 10pm to 7am so we can work US hours--then we tried to get on Malaysian time to go sightseeing. Then Monday and Tuesday of this week we worked 10pm to 7am and then on Wednesday we worked 3pm-midnight (after getting off work at 7) then tomorrow we work 8am to 5pm, just in time to go back. Not that sleeping during the day is hard enough to begin with, but tack on construction work. There is all kinds of drilling and banging going on all day. So, that is why I am getting extremely sleep deprived. So that is about all for now--I will try to post pictures when I get back!