It doesn't seem to matter how big a house is, or how many people are in it–restlessness can strike, making a well-intentioned 4-day lockdown a bit more...colorful than you'd expect.

Anticipating street demonstrations and protests over the weekend of the presidential election, our ground team of staff and volunteers decided to close the office last Friday and Monday and keep everyone at our house-in-the-hills, the Gro Kay Disko ("Disco Mansion"): a rather large concrete castillo that nevertheless keeps our crew humble and happy.

So I called our Maison last night for the routine weekly update, thinking catching Stacey's ear would be easier now than ever. But she wasn't around. Nor was anyone else for that matter. I would find out later the entire hosue was engaged in some kind of Seismic-design-workshop-meets-Pirate-party. I feared the worst–daring not to imagine 20 designers talking about "SHEARRRRR." At least some folks had regained their wits by today. I connected with Stacey at the office in Pétionville. Lockdown and Pirate parties had ended, but not before several crazy notions plundered the minds of our idle architects (our kind...needs the smallest excuse to get inventive).

Stacey related some of these achievements, as documented on the Gro Kay Disko facebook page. There are clips of bucketball and techno yoga–the very latest in patio athletics–as well as stills of the crew getting home-style haircuts and some needed R & R. Last Thursday everyone enjoyed a wonderful Thanksgiving dinner, where not a single dish included goat.

The elections having passed (though the team will not go into downtown Port-au-Prince for another few days), things seem to be getting back to routine, or as routine as Haiti can be. Thanks to a little time off though some team members could upload a few facets of life at the Maison, bringing us a little closer to the humans behind-the-design.