That is why Friday was a long and slow day of work for most of us at the office. It was hard to get things done when the electricity got cut off twice in one day. However, a solid day of work it was, and some progress was made in testing this voltage regulator. In short, the device worked fine with an input voltage between 6.7 and 5.78, but anything below that it failed to charge the mobile phone. This has led to a reconsideration of how the charger was made, mainly because the batteries that EcoSystems uses come in user boxes with some complicated circuits in them that affect how the appliances we plug in function.
This user boxes are interesting to comment on. A very simple design: a wooden box, with a switch and a small light on it. The user box will disconnect the battery from the circuit to prevent over draining, thus prolonging its life time. The little light on top will indicate the user if the battery is empty or if there is something wrong with the userbox-appliance interaction. At the office there are a bunch of this user boxes connected to LEDs all over the place, just draining batteries 24/7 in order to test the batteries, the LEDs and the user boxes. One of the problems of doing this is that if the lights empty the batteries in the middle of the night when there is no one around, we would not be able to tell exactly how long that light was on for. For that reason I used some of that spare load shedding time to plug in "my alarm clock" to a solar panel so that when the LEDs go out the clock stops, telling us how long the light was on for.
The end of the week came with an afternoon in Asan were Mike and I got a new transistor and 20 new light sensors. We used the opportunity to take a look at some mountaineering gear in Thamel before heading home.
Saturday was too epic for me to survive, but surprisingly enough I made it out in one piece. We decided to attend the HASH (a run that happens every Saturday, read my 2 post for more details or go to http://aponarch.com/hhhh/) but this time Mike and Brendan thought that riding bikes would not satisfy our desire for physical activity. Instead I was convinced to go on what would be a 30min slow jog to the meeting place. To our misery it turned into a 50min sprint up a mountain because we thought we were going to be late.
This week the HASH was absolutely astonishing. It was all going very well for the first 90min. Good pace, good views and fairly flat. Until the paper trails started to lead up the mountains. And these are not rolling hills from Ohio or nice looking Autumn New England mountains, these are pre-Himalayan steep painful mountains. So in a short time we gained incredible elevation and lost our breath. The reward though was to be able to see the snowy peaks in the distance across the valley of Kathmandu. Luckily we got a ride home, saving us a 50min run home after an intense 4 hour work out. A convenient ride I must say, because Mike got to fix a friends motorbike by changing the spark plug on the spot, earning him his new nick name: Sparky.
Then the festivities came up and we met up with the hashers at a small festival going on near our flat. Here we tried the local spirits, Roxy (or at least it is pronounced that way) which is made out of rice and tastes like a light tequila.
Sunday came with no rest and the Roxy did not make it easier. Having eaten only a cheese and egg croissant, we spent the whole day in Thamel getting all the gear we need to sustain ourselves for a month in the mountains. A very didactic task it was too, because we spent a lot of time talking to people about the trekking areas and particularly an Australian mountaineering veteran who convinced us to buy his gloves with a beer in one hand and a cup of tea on the other.
HASHers across the fields South of Kathmandu with the city at the back
Mike and I tasting the local spirits at a festival with fellow HASHers
Local festivities by a small Temple and surrounded by a large pool
1 comment:
Mike, smack Mana for me. Mana, smack Mike for me.
Hope the work goes well, good luck guys.
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