Travels -- this week and developing summer plans

Our summer plans are slowing taking shape. We now know that Marc will need to go to Cairo (Egypt) , Addis Ababa (Ethiopia) and Gothenburg (Sweden) before meeting up with Shuwen in Singapore at the end of June. Shuwen will attend a Health Economics conference at Duke the same time Marc is in Sweden, so too bad, no Swedish meatballs (köttbullar) for her. Marc has also scheduled a proposal defense date for April 28th -- wish him luck!

An update on our Karen friends: The-Blay has been improving with hard work in his daily PT sessions and can now move himself to be able to sit upright in bed. With a few more weeks of hard work, he should regain enough arm strength to move himself from a bed into his wheelchair. This is incredible progress given the original grim diagnosis, so he has been in good spirits. Meanwhile, his family is being moved to another apartment that will be on the ground floor this weekend.

So it turns out Shuwen had mono as well, though she did not appear to have too much trouble with it -- some headaches and fatigue, but nothing like what Marc went through. She headed off to New Orleans for the Population Association of American (PAA) conference today. Of course she will make sure to enjoy some yummy Cajun and Creole meals. Apparently there is a difference!
"In broad terms, Creole cooking is city cooking, based on French traditions, but with influences from Spain, Africa, Germany, Italy, the West Indies, etc. Cajun cooking is peasant food, the cooking the Acadians (from Canada) developed as they learned to live in the south Louisiana swamps. Creole food is more refined and subtler. Cajun food is pungent and more highly spiced." -- http://www.ochef.com/.
Of course, one should not forget the beignets!

We will meet up in Boston (Shuwen gets in early Sat AM, Marc gets in Sat PM) where Meg & Aaron will be kindly hosting us in Somerville, near Tufts University. We will get to celebrate Passover with them on Saturday and then plan to catch the Women's marathon US Olympic Trials together Sunday morning. The trials has an awful course that requires the athletes to run across the Charles river 8 times (it's windy!) yikes!

Monday's Marathon/Patriot's day in Boston, which will be an interesting experience of both of us as Marc tries to have a decent run despite his mono and Shuwen attempts to stay a few minutes ahead of him from Hopkinton to Copley Square! Go # 27!