Happy New Year!

Last night we got back from South Dakota just a few minutes before the ball dropped in Times Square. We had a great time at home and now we're feeling rested and ready to reset for another busy year. But first let's recap the last few hectic months.

Last month I finished my first semester at UNC. I did pretty well on my three courses - Ecology and Evolution, Socio-cultural theory, and Anthropology of Design - and I think I did well on the teaching side as well. Class seems about on the same level as those I took in Wageningen. The biggest struggle is managing time and taking time out to work on my own research and projects. The courses this semester gave me a good foundation of anthropological theory (from both the human evolution side and the social theory side) and some new and very interesting material to work on (from the design class). Teaching was really pretty easy and a very interesting experience.

Now I'm working on making changes to a paper for publication and working on a few grants for research this summer. I'm still planning on conducting research in the Midwest for a couple months and then going to Brazil for three weeks to speak with American farmers there. 

Amanda is staying busy at her job in Cary. After a few months of being the breadwinner I'm once again relegated to a bread eater. 

Our break in South Dakota turned out to be fantastic. Amanda was commissioned to take farm pictures at both farms and we rode horses at another. Definitely a cool experience for a couple East Coast city slickers. We also test drove a couple cars in Sioux Falls and surprise bought a new Prius. The tricky part now is getting it out to North Carolina. Why buy a car in South Dakota? The price difference from South Dakota to North Carolina was about $6000! 

Enjoy...

Procrastinating my paper today and I found this gem from Wageningen. Pure Dutch.

In other news, I've taken the anthropological world by storm with a game-changing paper on quinoa in Bolivia. Fine, not game-changing, but I thought it would be fun to use to cliches in one sentence. If you want a copy, let me know.

http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1548-1417.2011.01062.x/full

I have another paper in the works which I've been invited to make minor revisions.

Thanksgiving in Paradise

We just reluctantly returned from Thanksgiving in Litchfield, SC where we spent the holiday with Andrew's aunt and uncle and their friends.   We had a great time meeting new friends, eating far too much delicious food  and walking on the beach.   The weather was perfect the whole time with not a cloud in the sky.   

Below are the views from the condo's balcony which overlooked the ocean  

and the condo from the beach.

We got to taste a 1500 year old Sicilian cake recipe called Cassata.  It was super rich but very good. 

We definitely missed everybody at home but we couldn't have asked for a better Thanksgiving in SC.  We feel very fortunate to have family close by that have made us feel at home.  

We also took a day trip to Charleston, SC since it was only about an hour away.  We had a great time walking around the downtown area and seeing the beautiful architecture.  Its definitely a place we hope to visit again.

A visit to the Chairman's...

Actually I was just at the Raleigh flea market where I met the chairman who, as you probably guessed, sells lots of chairs.  Unfortunately, for him we don't need anymore chairs.  The flea market is held every Saturday at the fairgrounds in Raleigh and is equally good for people watching as it is for buying antiques (err, junk).  And of course no trip to the flea market is complete without a stop at the local diner which happened to have an egg and pork brains omelet on the menu - just in case you want to make a trip out and need to get your fix you now know where to go.

In other news we are finally ready to start brewing beer after peeling the labels off a LOT of bottles. 

And here are a few pictures from Halloween which can get pretty crazy around Chapel Hill.  A couple of years ago 80,000 people crammed themselves into the two blocks of downtown.  This year wasn't quite so bad but there where plenty of police just in case and even a helicopter.

Life Lately

A couple of weeks ago we posted pictures of our new apartment.  This pictures weren't very accurate.  Our apartment in fact usually looks like this because we are never home:

We really didn't have very high expectations of what life would be like in NC.  People talked about how wonderful the weather is and how great the community is in Chapel Hill but we never expected to like NC as much as we do.  In fact we LOVE it.  A few months ago we were discussing how great it would be if we could combine the small town, close knit community feel and and  of Wageningen and  the cultural environment of Boston.  If that were possible you'd probably end up with something close to Chapel Hill or Carrboro - where we actually live.  No matter what night it is there is a concert somewhere in town.  There are at least five Indian restaurants, a great local food co-op, public transit and hiking/biking tails among many other things that make us love this area.  We've had many moments where we've asked ourselves if we were still in NC.  For example we stumbled upon a weekly music festival in a town of about 200 people where they had converted an old mill into a theater/music venue: 

Really!  A town of less than 200 people has a weekly, free concert and people come from all over to spend the day outside (or inside if its raining).  The sense of community is wonderful and its really changed our view of living in a small town.

We also spend a LOT of time outside.  There are so many great hiking trails within a couple of miles of our apartment and the weather has been fantastic.  This weekend we checked out the NC Botanical Garden and the surrounding trails. It was a peaceful little hike and at one point we were about 20 feet away from a deer running through the trees. 

 

The Blue Ridge Parkway and a glimpse of Asheville

The first school break came at the perfect time to take a little day trip into the mountains and drive down the Blue Ridge Parkway.  We drove over towards Boone, NC and took the Parkway south until Asheville were we spent the night before heading back.  

The Parkway was built during the Great Depression as part of the rural revival program.  Along with the building the highway, the New Deal also included funding to start programs aimed at keeping mountain craft traditions alive such as weaving, woodworking, and pottery. There are many small mountain towns and historic buildings to visit along the Parkway and many sell traditional crafts.

Just last Monday temperatures were in the 80s, but Thursday brought in a cold front and temperatures dropped into the 50s.

Asheville

Asheville is a gorgeous town set just inside the Appalachian Mountains.  The town is known for its food, bluegrass music and artistic scene along with being the home to the Biltmore Estate.  Since we were only in town for a few hours we focused on food and music.   We saw the weekly  Bluegrass jam at Jack in the Wood....

and ate some chocolate.