how beautiful on the mountains...

I'm A Mean One

2012-02-09T18:42:00.000-08:00

Sometimes I think that if I were an innocent bystander who just happened to be bystanding in my own classroom watching a non-bystanding version of me teach, I would probably think that I am a very mean teacher. Especially if I happened to be bystanding while I am teaching 9th grade.

Take today, for example. Algebra 2 had a test. I helped them review yesterday and told them all the material they needed to study for the test. They should in no way have been unprepared. Yet the first 10 minutes of class went like this:

Me: This is the non-calculator part of your test, get out everything you need, but put your calculators away. *I begin handing out test*.
Fred: Can I ask a question?
Me: Yes?
Fred: How do we simplify logarithms?
Me: Too late. Should have asked that one before the test started.
Fred: Oh, man!
Gerald: Is this test open book?
Me: Nice try.
Gerald: Open notes?
Me: Shush. Bill, why is your calculator out?
Bill: For the test.
Me: It's non-calculator.
Bill: Oh. *doesn't move*
Me: Is there a part of "non-calculator" that you don't understand??
Bill: No. *doesn't move*
Me: Put your calculator away!
Bill: Oh. Right. *puts it away*
Me: Al, why are you sitting next to Joe? You know better. Move to a different seat.
Al: I was here first. Make Joe move.
Me: AL. MOVE.
*I finish handing the test out*
Aditya: TEACHER, CAN I HAVE A RULER?!
Me: SSSSHHHH! Where is your ruler?
Aditya: WHAT?
Me: Where is your ruler?
Aditya: WHAT?
Me: Never mind... *take him a ruler* Next time you know there are graphs on a test, bring your own ruler please.
Aditya: Mine got lost.
Me: Then get a new one.
Aditya: BUT..
Me: ...NO! I don't want to hear it now. Work on your test.
Elizabeth: For number 8 do we have to explain our answer?
Me: Does it say to explain?
Elizabeth: No.
Me: There's your answer, then.
Stan: Can I borrow a calculator?
Me: It's non-calculator!
Stan: I know, I mean for later. For the calculator part, can I borrow a calculator?
Me: Yes. Be quiet please.
Al: Can I have scratch paper to use??
Me: Use the back of your test so all your work is there.
Al: I don't want to.
*another student hands him a piece of paper*
Me: Does ANYBODY else need ANYTHING? You guys know that you need to have everything you need ready BEFORE the test. We have gone over this EIGHT TIMES BY NOW.
Aditya: This is only our seventh test.
Me: *dirty glare*
Ryan: For number 8, do we have to graph it?
Me: Did you read the instructions?
Ryan: No.
Me: READ. THE. INSTRUCTIONS.
Ryan: Ok, I read them. Do we have to graph?
Me: Do the instructions SAY TO GRAPH?!?
Ryan: No.
Me: Fine.
JiHyeon: Can I have some extra paper?
Me: NO!

Of course, this is the class that I had to teach to raise their hands if they have questions, to pick up all their garbage before leaving the room, to not turn in homework crumpled up in a ball, to not put rulers, calculators, pencils, etc borrowed from me in their mouths, to not eat in class, to not talk during tests, that "working together" does not mean "copying", which side of the paper is the front, to write their name on their work, to write in and on the lines, to bring a pencil and paper to class, and the list goes on.

Basically, every day, it is all I can do to not talk through clenched teeth with crazy eyes in this class. And would you believe - there are only 10 of them!

I have to say though, they have come a long way from the beginning of the year. This really is a huge improvement... So maybe I should be less angry?

Beautiful Words

2012-02-08T16:24:00.000-08:00

First thing this morning, a half awake angsty 10th grader stumbles into my room with a plastic bag and says, "Here's some cheesecake. My mom sent it for you."

JESSSSSSSSSSSSSS!

Cheesecake for breakfast on a Thursday morning. How much to I love today?

There's a note on the box that says, "This cheesecake was leftover from last nite's dinner - Hope you enjoy it."

I'm feeling a lot better today. Still a lot of coughing and sniffing, but my fever is down, and I slept 9 hours last night. I made it to school yesterday too, but had to take frequent breaks and definitely still had a fever. I didn't actually realize that at first though - I thought I was sweating bullets because it didn't rain all day so it was hot out. I didn't realize how wrong I was until like 3 different people commented to me about how ridiculously cold it has been all week. I'm like, "Seriously? It's cold? Aw, MAN! I thought my fever was gone!" Oh well. At least I'm not cold like everybody else. I really don't like being cold.

Sick Days

2012-02-07T06:23:00.001-08:00

Well, for the second time ever, I came home sick from work today. There’s something going around, and it hit me hard. I was up most of last night with major, major congestion coupled with a hacking cough, sore throat, and lots of sneezing. Today, my body ached so bad, I couldn’t stand up, so I was trying to teach while sitting in front of the white board. But I had enough of a fever, that I had goosebumps and was shivering for most of the day. I had a headache and a stomachache too, so I hadn’t eaten anything, which didn’t help. Basically, I was just miserable. I made it through two periods before I didn’t think I could take it anymore. All of our school administration was in a seminar today, so I couldn’t talk to my boss to ask permission to go home or to help me find subs. So before I could go, I had to make up sub plans, then hike all over the school trying to find people who could cover my classes. By the time I got all my classes covered and made it to the nurse’s office to ask for some medicine, my body was in so much pain that I just walked in the door and burst into tears. Good move, Abbie.

I’m extremely thankful for understanding coworkers. We’ve all been stretched thin this year, but I had to find four people to cover four different classes today, and not a single one hesitated to help out. I’m also thankful for an awesome school nurse who stocked me up on meds, prayed over me, then sent me home to rest. I’m also thankful for Ibu Sri who made sure my house stayed quiet all day long so I could sleep. Twice she offered me food and a massage, but both times I declined because I just wanted to sleep. I can’t believe I turned down a free massage… But I needed rest. I got home from school at about 10, went straight to bed, and slept most of the way until 3.

Aswan was sick like this last week. Thankfully, day 2 of what he had was the worst, and this was my second day of feeling crummy. By day 4, he was entirely healthy again, so I’m hoping that I’ll follow the same pattern!!

The Sermon

2012-02-05T23:41:00.001-08:00

Generally, I don’t write about church on my blog. One of the annoying things about a public blog is that you really have to careful what you write about whom because you never know who reads it. So I’ll just generalize my Indonesian church experience by saying that it requires me to be on my toes at all times, theologically speaking. I have heard sermons that I have really learned from, and I’ve also heard sermons that someone totally pulled out of nowhere (but definitely not from the Bible). Indonesian church always challenges me to really think through what I’m hearing and to ask myself, “Is this what the Bible says, or is it merely was this certain person happens to think it says?” And if it is the latter, then I have to ask myself, “COULD it say this, or did they just totally pull something that sounded good out of left field?” Because that happens a lot around here. Pastors say stuff that sounds really good in theory but might not always be entirely accurate. I tend to take notes and then file them away. I have a whole section of notes entitled, “The Blasphemy Files”. It is the largest section of my notes. Oh, the stories I could tell… Granted, not all of what I hear is out and out blasphemy, but some of it might come pretty close.

Here, I’m going to share my notes from yesterday’s sermon with you, and you can decide what you think about it. Use your Bible knowledge. Is this sermon sound or not??

Intro – 2012 is a very special year, numerologically speaking. This is because there were 12 tribes of Israel. And because Jesus chose 12 disciples. Not 11. Not 13. Twelve. Twelve is a very important number, so 2012 is a very important year. Therefore, let’s look at Revelation 12.

Revelation 12:1 - 5 -A great sign appeared in heaven: a woman clothed with the sun, with the moon under her feet and a crown of twelve stars on her head. She was pregnant and cried out in pain as she was about to give birth. Then another sign appeared in heaven: an enormous red dragon with seven heads and ten horns and seven crowns on its heads. Its tail swept a third of the stars out of the sky and flung them to the earth. The dragon stood in front of the woman who was about to give birth, so that it might devour her child the moment he was born. She gave birth to a son, a male child, who “will rule all the nations with an iron scepter. And her child was snatched up to God and to his throne. The woman fled into the wilderness to a place prepared for her by God, where she might be taken care of for 1,260 days.

OK. So. The woman is a symbol of Israel. And spiritually, I AM Israel.
The dragon is Lucifer.
The 1/3 of stars the dragon swept out of the sky represent the 1/3 of the angels that followed him in the beginning. He makes everything dark. There was a world created before the fall of Lucifer, but when he fell, he made everything dark and God had to start over. In the end times, by taking away the stars, he will once again make everything dark.
The child obviously represents Jesus.

Now look at Job 26:13.

Job 26:13 - By his breath the skies became fair; his hand pierced the gliding serpent.

Now jump to Isaiah 27:1.

Isaiah 27:1 - In that day, the LORD will punish with his sword — his fierce, great and powerful sword — Leviathan the gliding serpent, Leviathan the coiling serpent; he will slay the monster of the sea.

A leviathan is a type of dragon. We just entered the Chinese year of the dragon. CORRELLATION!

Now look at Psalm 89:8 – 11

Psalm 89:8 – 11 - Who is like you, LORD God Almighty? You, LORD, are mighty, and your faithfulness surrounds you. You rule over the surging sea; when its waves mount up, you still them. You crushed Rahab like one of the slain; with your strong arm you scattered your enemies. The heavens are yours, and yours also the earth; you founded the world and all that is in it.

Rahab in that passage is not the same Rahab that Joshua knew. Flip back to Isaiah.

Isaiah 51:9 - Awake, awake, arm of the LORD, clothe yourself with strength! Awake, as in days gone by, as in generations of old. Was it not you who cut Rahab to pieces, who pierced that monster through?

So here is what we can learn from all of these verses:

Dragons are bad.
This is the year of the dragon.
Hence, there will be many natural disasters involving water this year.
In Hebrew, the word Rahab means pride. Lucifer fell from Heaven not because he stole something but because he was prideful.
In 2012, God will deal with people’s pride.
Pride means an inability to confess your sins or to apologize and ask forgiveness.
Since dragons are good in Chinese culture, many children will be born this year. It is believed that children born in the year of the dragon are stronger and will be prosperous.
This will be a year of blessing.

Furthermore, here are some more correllations and conclusions we see:

The dragon mentioned in Revelation 12 is a red dragon.
In Jewish tradition, the color red represents the North Pole.
Hence, global warming will be a problem this year.
Expect the melting of the polar ice caps, disastrous floods, and tsunamis.
Look back at Revelation 12. Women receive salvation because they give birth.

Now look at Matthew 16.

Matthew 16:15 – 18 - “But what about you?” he asked. “Who do you say I am?” Simon Peter answered, “You are the Messiah, the Son of the living God.” Jesus replied, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah, for this was not revealed to you by flesh and blood, but by my Father in heaven. And I tell you that you are Peter,and on this rock I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not overcome it.

Peter in Greek is Petra, which means “a safe place”. God’s kingdom is a safe place.

In the margins of my notes, I have scrawled other random things he managed to insert.

I DECLARE FINANCIAL BLESSING UPON YOU!!
If you’re searching for a church that is a good fit for you, you’ll find that no church fits BECAUSE YOU’RE THERE. (Basically, if a church stinks or if you don’t agree with that church, then it’s because you have the wrong attitude about it.)
Basically, we are all going to die in 2012.

An Epiphany

2012-01-31T22:52:00.000-08:00

I haven't written anything solely for the sake of helping me process something for a long while. So here's one of those posts. We'll see where I end up.

I've always had great relationships with my students. Always. Great. It's one of the things I love about working here. I can go hang out with my students in the coffeeshop on the weekend. They spend an hour after school with me doing homework and hanging out in my classroom. They come early to school to talk. I get asked to chaperone just about every student led event. I get invited to their birthday parties.

But this year has been different. I feel like I have no kind of relationship with any of my students outside the classroom. Even students that I used to hang out with a lot rarely spend time in my room if they don't have to. And I don't know what changed.

Today, I communicated with two different sets of parents of students who are struggling in one of my classes. One set I met with in person; the other was via email. But both of them said the same thing - they know their children are struggling, and they know they need help, but their kids don't want to come to me for help because they think I am too busy.

Now, it is no lie that I am busy, in school and out. But where along the way have I communicated to my students that I am too busy for THEM? That was never my intention. I moved here for them. I stay here, through thick and thin, for them. Why do they think that I don't want to help them?

It took an incredible amount of will power not to burst into tears in front of the second set of parents when they told me their daughter would rather try to get help from one of her friends than from me.

On one hand, I'm proud of my students for being sensitive to my workload and understanding that maybe it would help me out if they could try to get help from someone else before coming to me. But on the other hand, WHEN DID I BECOME THIS PERSON?!

And more importantly, how do I fix it?

I admit, there are days when I am extremely exhausted and grumpy and possibly don't want to answer 15 questions that I probably already explained at least once during class time. But I have never and will never turn away a student who comes to my door needing help.

However, the fact remains that obviously I am somehow communicating that I am too busy to help. What are my students picking up on that is leading them to this conclusion?

And even more worrisome - what will next year be like? We will be losing 6 teachers at the secondary school and gaining 2. If my students think I'm too busy to help them this year, what will they think next year?! I'm going to be a monster next year!! WHAT IF ALL THE KIDS HATE ME??!

Now at least I see where this writing-to-process deal has led. To utterly preposterous conclusions. This has not solved any of my problems. Maybe I just need to think about it some more.

Um. No.

2012-01-31T16:48:00.000-08:00

Yesterday during 6th period, the yearbook class was in my room (because it was feeling particularly arctic in the computer lab) brainstorming class questions. These class questions are basically supposed to spark humorous answers from the students, especially in the elementary grades, that can be included on their yearbook class photos page. We give the questions to the teachers for each class, they have the students write out their answers, then they turn them all in to the yearbook staff.

So yesterday, the staff was able to come up with suitable questions for each of the secondary classes - those classes usually tend to have more serious questions that the whole class writes a 2-3 paragraph answer to together. But they still had no questions for the little kids. They wanted to steer clear of the typical, "What do you think your teacher does after school?" and "If you could be any animal, what animal would you be and why?"

One especially sarcastic 11th grader whom I love dearly partly because he lets me play with his ipod touch a lot was incredibly unhelpful in this process. His suggested questions for K - 2 included:

1. Is homosexuality a sin and why?
2. What is your ideal man/woman?
3. How do you feel about ethnic minorities? Are you racist?

Always good for a laugh, that kid...

*edit* - During lunch today, we decided to test out these questions by asking them to a first grader.

Q: Are you racist?
A: Uhhhh.... I'll race you!

Q: What is your ideal woman?
A: I don't know, but there's two girls who hug me in PE a lot! *big smile*

We skipped the question about homosexuality. I just really liked the answer to the racist question.

One of Those Days

2012-01-31T07:00:00.001-08:00

It started raining yesterday at about 1 o’clock in the afternoon. And it rained. all. night. long. And rained and rained and rained. So I drank some tea. And it was still raining when I woke up this morning. It was so dark out, I hit snooze a few too many times. When I finally woozed out of bed, I had about 15 minutes to be out the door. So I threw on the first shirt I saw that had long sleeves (I don’t have many, but it was chilly this morning). Then I realized that part of my shirt was coming loose. It has this decorative… uhmm… stuff around the collar (I wish I could take a picture of it, but a friend borrowed my memory card on account of his wife took both of theirs out of the country this week), and a piece of it was sticking out funny.

I didn’t feel like looking for a new shirt, because that would take me longer and I’d have to find pants to match and I was already dressed and any other long sleeved shirt would be on the bottom of the stack and would probably be moldy anyways. So I did what anybody who grew up in my house would do.

I superglued it. I actually superglued my shirt back together. At 7 AM.

Then I went to school. That shirt was new for Christmas, and I hadn’t worn it to school before. Based on the comments I got, I’m not sure yet if I’ll wear it to school again or not.

“I like your shirt. Now you actually look like somebody’s wife.” – Yohanes

“You look younger today. I think it’s that shirt. Are you in a bad mood?” – 9th grader

“OHMYGOSH! YOUR SHIRT IS SOOOOOO CUTE! *squeal*” – 10th grader

“You don’t normally wear shirts like that.” – more than one person

“You look so casual today. Like me. I’m wearing slippers.” *sticks foot in my face* – 9th grader

And it proceeded to rain. and rain. and rain some more. It was still raining when I came home from school. And now that I’m about to go to bed, it sounds like it finally stopped. We’ll see how long that lasts…

Also, as an interesting side note, I'm pretty sure black cat threw up an entire chicken neck on the floor this evening... Pleasant.

We Now Return You to Your Regularly Scheduled Program.

2012-01-29T18:00:00.000-08:00

Rainy season is baaaaa-aaaaaack. *cue scary music*

After 5 blissfully sunny, windy days, rainy season is back in full force. It rained off and on all afternoon yesterday. The electricity at my place was also off and on. In other places in town, it went off at 8:30 last night and still hasn't come back on. It was cloudy and drizzly and dark when I woke up this morning, and it still hasn't burned off.

I was really hoping that rainy season was ending early. That would have mostly made up for it not ending at all two rainy seasons ago.

Oh, well.

At Work. On A Sunday. Sigh...

2012-01-29T02:49:00.000-08:00

Last week, Geometry class did a multi-part proportions project. For one of their tasks, each student had to calculate the actual distance from their current location to their place of birth by first measuring it on a world map I laid out on the floor, then by using the scale factor given on the map to set up a proportion to solve. They had to fill out a worksheet that gave their current location, their place of birth, the distance between the two places on the map, the proportion they used, and then the actual distance. It was interesting to read through their lists of places of birth. In this class of 21, there are 7 different nationalities represented - Korean, American, Indonesian, British, Swiss, German, and Malaysian.

But the list of places of birth went like this:
London
Jogjakarta, Indonesia
Kathmandu, Nepal
Jakarta, Indonesia
Seoul, South Korea
San Antonio, Texas
Bandung, Indonesia
Orlando, Florida
Semarang, Indonesia
Bismarck, North Dakota
Pusan, South Korea
Singapore

But the funny thing is that several students weren't even born in their passport country! In this class we have Koreans and Germans who were born in Jakarta, Indonesians who were born in America, Nepal and London, Americans who were born in Singapore and Indonesia, and the list goes on!

I guess that what I'm trying to say is that even after all this time, it still amazes me what a melting pot this place is...

Untitled

2012-01-28T23:54:00.001-08:00

Is something still technically untitled if I entitle it “Untitled”? It’s like our goat, No-Name. We couldn’t think of a name, so we started referring to her as No-Name. It stuck.

Anyways, I was looking through some pictures from this month, and as I sometimes do, I am posting all the cool ones that weren’t noteworthy enough to earn their own blog post.

1. One late night toward the end of Christmas break, I was trying to find a way to keep my hair out of my face. The following resulted. In these photos, all of my hair is held in place with exactly ONE bobby pin.

Yes… yes I did just take an over the shoulder backwards picture of myself in the bathroom mirror and post it on my blog.

2. The sky from the toll road on the way to Semarang about two weeks ago.

3. Cat testing out the blanket I started crocheting. I have since ripped it all out because I can’t for the life of me make the stupid edges go in straight lines. At least cat got to enjoy it once.

4. Here are my stealth photography skills at work. A group of us went to Solo over the long weekend a week ago, and while we were in a donut/coffeeshop located in the mall, these two girls came and sat down near us. I couldn’t resist taking their picture, for what I think are obvious reasons. They reminded me of something that either my dad once said or that I once read in a Far Side cartoon (sometimes the two aren’t far off), “Fashion is a competition to see who can look the most like a retarded clown”. But I feel awkward just taking random people’s pictures (because I hate it when random people do it to me), so I “pretended” to take Leah and Liz’s picture and just innocently happened to catch the clowns… er… other girls in the background.

5. That same day in Solo, we were waiting for the rain to stop, so we went into Matahari, an Indonesian department store, in search of grammatically incorrect and/or awkward T-shirts. The best ones are always at Matahari. That day we found some gems, including, “Scream. I like it”, “If you know what I mean…”, “I am so shy”, and this gem…

Of course I bought it. But now I’m not sure where to wear it to…

6. The amount of stuff left ON THE FLOOR in my room after ONE CLASS of 10th graders. It never ceases to astound me how being raised in a home with helpers seems to retard the part of the brain that controls the development of personal responsibility. On this particular day, about 75% of the class left garbage and/or personal belongings behind.

7. I saved the best for last. Mostly because it is the most recent picture on my computer. But also because it is fantastic. I got a box from my lovely friend, Em! And it came full of BOOKS IN ENGLISH! I cannot even tell you what a luxury that is and how excited I am! She also sent along some other fabulous odds and ends like fabric quarters and fall-ish scented candles and mousse! Thanks, Em!

One more thing before I go. Number 5 reminded me of the best shirt I have ever seen, and I’m not sure if I ever blogged a picture of it. It was, of course, seen in a Matahari store (but not the one in Solo). I think I might actually pee my pants laughing if I ever see someone wearing this shirt.

WHO COMES UP WITH THIS STUFF?!?!?

My Morning, Photodocumented

2012-01-26T21:01:00.001-08:00

This morning, in an unprecedented move, I suddenly decided to document my walk to work. At this time of day, I have been awake for approximately 20 minutes. I have not yet eaten, and I have not yet spoken aloud.

I am NOT a morning person, and my bed is hard to leave every morning. Especially on dismal, cloudy mornings when I wake up to a room as dark as this. On sunny mornings, light streams through those curtains and wakes me up before 6.

Right outside my front door. The strong winds we’ve been having for 3 days now have knocked down 1.5 of the wooden blinds that hang in front of each of the three apartments in my building.

This sidewalk comes perpendicularly to my house. I have to walk to the end of it to get around the cement wall. There are two large trees here, and every day I’ve been cleaning off all the branches and sticks from the sidewalk. This is how many fell last night.

Looking back at my building. My apartment is the one on the right. I’m the only one who hasn’t lost any blinds yet!

At the end of the sidewalk, I have to turn 180 degrees, go up these steps, and onto the soccer field and track. It’s faster to cut across the field (I’m headed toward those big white buildings in the background), but the field is sopping wet with dew in the morning, and I hate having wet pants cuffs for 2 hours. So I take the long way around on the track. Red dirt!

Our illustrious soccer field. On the left is a jungle which produces many snakes near my house. Straight ahead are our two gyms.

I spotted some blue sky while I was on the track! This means it will probably clear up soon and be a sunny morning after all!

Looking back across the soccer field at my house. All those buildings used to be our elementary school. Now the one on the left is my house and the buildings toward the right were sold several years ago and turned into a language school. The building right next to mine is the one with the noisy roof. My cats were also born in the ceiling of that building, and sometimes I look out my back window and catch them just hanging out on the roof over there.

Across the soccer field now, I jump on this little walkway which leads to the gym parking lot. This may seem like an insignificant little bunch of cement pavers, but I love them. They were a gift from the graduating class of 2009. Everyone thought it was a stupid idea, but anytime it rains, this little stretch of grass turns into a swamp. For my first year here, I used to have to walk home through a shin deep puddle of water most days. Not anymore, I tell you!!

On clear days, I can see the mountain from the gym parking lot. Today you can just see the base of it above the trees there. For reference’s sake, I’m including a picture I took on the way to school earlier this week.

I didn’t take any pictures in the gym because it’s boring and dark in the morning. Fun fact – once I make it to the gym, the rest of my walk has a roof over it. All the buildings at our school are connected by covered walkways due to the rains. Also, in the gym is usually where I make my first utterance of each day. Most days I pass one or two of the groundskeeping and/or maintenance staff on their way out to the storage shed by the soccer field, and we always say good morning to each other. This morning I didn’t pass a single person.

After the gym, I pass between the locker rooms on my left and the elementary playground on the right. I call it the Swiss Family Robinson jungle gym. There are usually kids out here playing tetherball when I pass by, but not today.

After I round the corner of the locker rooms, I go up a set of steps, then walk along the elementary school for several meters.

Round the corner of the elementary, cross the drop off zone, and I’m in the pavilion. This is where I eat lunch every day.

Through the breezeway. I like my tunnel. It might be my favorite part of my walk each morning. Once I get spewed out the other side, I’m officially in the secondary school. Sorry the picture is blurry. I actually took it while walking.

Once I’m in the secondary area, I usually drop by Yohanes’ office first to tell him good morning and discuss what we dreamed about last night and how many 9th graders I might potentially murder today. This morning, I found him just outside his office and this was his default face when he saw the camera in my hand. Silly boy.

Down the “hall” and to the right, there’s my classroom. Every class opens to the outside. Another fun fact – to lock or unlock a door in Indonesia, you have to turn the key 720 degrees (2 complete turns!). One time I opened the door and found a cobra waiting for me on the floor. That was 2.5 years ago. But still, every time I open my classroom door, I do a quick snake check. Recently there have been lots of baby geckos (about 1.5 inches long) hanging out in my room that scatter when I come in. But no snakes.

My classroom before students come in and the Great Desk Migration begins. By the end of the day, these desks somehow end up scattered all over the room. I really wish I could bolt them to the floor.

Once I’m in my room, I power up the old laptop and check many things. Contact with the outside world is initiated. I have learned a great deal of joyous news at this exact place at this approximate time. Sometimes I also get sad news.

And thus my day begins.

Updates

2012-01-25T16:33:00.001-08:00

1. We are now in our third day of major wind but no rain. Lots and lots of trees and branches down.
2. The language school next door did not fix their roof yet AND some other neighbors are having a wedding which means obnoxious karaoke in the street until two in the morning for up to three days straight. Last night was the first night.
3. JESS IS FREE!
4. There is a nasty bug going around. My TA threw up 21 times yesterday. According to him, he made it to the bathroom for 19 of them! The first miss was all over the hallway at school. He was sent home at roughly that time... See? When seasons change, everyone gets really sick.
5. School starts in 1 minute. 7/13 students are currently present. Ugh...

PUJI TUHAN!

2012-01-25T03:51:00.000-08:00

Best news I have heard THIS YEAR!!!

Read HERE and HERE.

Tis the Season and Winds of Change

2012-01-24T18:19:00.001-08:00

(I couldn't decide on just one title).

Tis the season for all the young men of Mountainview to begin awkwardly inviting the young women of their fancy to the spring banquet held in April. Typically they don't start this early, but this year is an exception. For the first time ever, there are about three times as many boys as girls at our secondary school. Competition is fierce, people. Some girls have already received 3 or more invitations. There have been bended knees. There have been flowers (although that poor girl had to give her flowers to a friend because she was scared to take them home due to an overzealously protective father). And today? Today I had a nervous 10th grader come to me 20 minutes before school started and hand me a lovely handwritten note that says, "Will you go to banquet...", (I assume he meant "with me"). Lest you think he was inviting me (which has happened before. Every year, in fact.), he went on to ask, "Can you give this to Brittney in Geometry? But don't tell her it's from me." Eyeing the remaining stack of invitations in his hand, I asked, "How many girls are you planning to ask. Got a few fall backs there?!?" He laughed shyly and said, "These are all for her. I made one for each of her teachers to give her throughout the day. Then after school I'll tell her it's me and I'll ask her for real. So make sure you don't tell her it's from me. It's a secret." I love that I get to be a part of it! Now I just have to make sure I actually remember to give it to her.

As for winds of change, I now finally understand that phrase. In Indiana, winds usually mean a storm is coming. Might be a blizzard. Might be a tornado. Might be for no reason at all. But things don't really change all that much. Here the winds mean the season is getting ready to change and everybody will probably get really sick for a few days. Ever since yesterday afternoon, it has been really windy. One of the sheets of corrugated steel (or whatever it is) the language school right outside my bedroom window uses as roofing material came loose during the night. At approximately 2:26 AM. I didn't get much sleep after that point because every time I'd start to drift off, I'd be jolted awake to what I thought were several small bombs going off inside my house. Over and over and over. But really, I love the wind. And even though rainy season is supposed to last until April and it's the year of the water dragon and hujanuari and all that, maybe the season is changing early? Because it never rained yesterday. And it hasn't rained yet today. That would be just perfect! An early end to rainy season!

Two days ago, I grabbed my black skinny jeans out of my wardrobe thingie. The entire back of them was white and fuzzy. I have never in my life seen such a large quantity of mold growing on an article of clothing. I'm still waiting to see if they have serious mold damage or if they will be good as new after they get washed. Dry season may be hot, but at least there's no mold.

Gasps of Horror

2012-01-24T01:20:00.001-08:00

In honor of Aswan’s new job, we decided to go to Solo (twice in one weekend for me!) to go to Payless to buy him some quality shoes yesterday. Luckily, he found a pair that he liked right away. Sadly, we got a flat tire, but amusingly we got to watch 4 old drunk guys try to fix it for us! Between the four of them, it took 20 minutes, half a pack of cigarettes, and half of what appeared to be a beat up water bottle filled with paint thinner (at least that’s what it smelled like) that they passed around. They were basically like the 4 stooges. Good for laughs, but I’m skeptical about this tire tube they patched. We’ll see how it holds up…

Anyways, we found out that they just built an Ace Hardware (which is more like a really upscale Wal-Mart in this country) there, so we decided to check it out. I’ve been looking for some cute bins or baskets to organize my under-the-bathroom-sink cabinet which, for the last two years, has mostly been a big mess of unused rolls of toilet paper, bottles of lotion, shampoo, nail polish remover, mousse, more lotion, medicine, tubes of toothpaste, new and used toothbrushes, band-aids, etc with no rhyme or reason to it. I can never find anything under the bathroom sink without digging through a pile of bottles and tubes. So long story short, this country apparently provides nothing in the way of cute organizational materials. But I finally did convince the nice Ace sales lady to sell me part of a display they had – 2 bamboo baskets. Score. But that wasn’t enough for my organizational needs. My only other options were cheap neon colored plastic containers with Hello Kitty shaped holes in them. Pondering what to do, we wandered into the kitchenwares department. And I found some really cute breadpans that were reasonably priced. So yup. I now store most of my hygiene supplies in breadpans.

I mean, THEY ARE GREEN! How cute is that?!? Besides my severe lack of organization, my under the bathroom sink cabinet was having another issue. Over the past year or so, it’s been accumulating a lot of dirt. Like, a LOT of dirt. Like, an embarrassing amount of dirt that I never cleaned up because it’s the under the bathroom sink cabinet and who else even sees it? I’ve been wondering for quite some time now where all the dirt has been coming from. I assumed it was somehow from ants. I see ants in my bathroom a lot. You can’t fight them, so you just learn to live with them. Or at least that’s my excuse for never cleaning up all the dirt. Again, long story short, I was wrong. As I was rearranging and organizing things, I pulled a tube of Arm and Hammer toothpaste that mom sent me for Christmas out of its box so that it would take up less space in the breadpan. And guess what came out with it?!?

THE CULPRIT – ALL THAT DIRT WAS COCKROACH POOP!!!!

As I started going through other boxes of stuff – Immodium, hair ties, Benadryl, bobby pins, Claritin, first aid kit – I found that nearly EVERYTHING was full of COCKROACH POOP!!!

Needless to say, I gave everything a THOROUGH cleaning and lit several candles. And I’ve already checked three times today to see if I see any more cockroach poop anywhere. Fingers crossed that it was only the one (now laying dead somewhere in my front yard) and he doesn’t have 75 ugly little step children hiding out somewhere…

Lunar New Year

2012-01-22T19:21:00.000-08:00

Gong xi fa cai everyone! Or in other words, selamat Tahun Baru Imlek!

In English now, happy Lunar New Year! The year of the rat is officially over, and the year of the dragon has begun. Technically, it's the year of the water dragon, which people are saying accounts for all this rain we've been having lately! Most days for the past month, it's started raining around lunch time and gone well into the night. A couple times it's gone all night and on into the morning. Each day we're guaranteed at least an hour's break in the clouds, but sadly, it's almost always when I'm teaching. People have dubbed this month Hujanuari, a cross between the Indonesian word for rain (hujan) and January (Januari).

I know I've been quiet for most of January. It's been a hard month. I don't really know who reads my blog, so without being terribly negative or naming any names, I'll just say that after a few very disappointing and hurtful situations at Aswan's place of work, he chose to leave after 11 years of service and will begin his new job as an accountant for Arrowhead Horse Ranch tomorrow. Does anyone else find it ironic that my boyfriend got a MATH JOB on a HORSE FARM?? He's a media and communications major who grew up in a major city. I think it's hilarious! But we would definitely appreciate prayers for this new job and his transition. He's going to have to do some serious training first. He served as our church's treasurer for several years, but other than that, he has no accounting experience. We're so glad though that he was able to find a new job and leave the old one so quickly!

Work hasn't been a walk in the park for me either this month. Last week, our principal of 20+ years tearfully announced her decision to resign and return home to the States to care for her elderly mother. That was a shock to me. When I first started working here, I always said I couldn't imagine having better bosses. I was referring both to Bill, our former superintendent who left last year, and Lisa, our secondary principal. Lisa has the toughest job because she is the enforcer. She's not the most popular person on campus in the eyes of the students, but she always does her job with grace and humility, and I have the utmost respect for her. And trust me, kids are kids, no matter what line of work their parents are in, and I've had some very not fun situations to deal with, but for the last 3.5 years, Lisa has ALWAYS had my back. Seeing her leave is going to be very difficult. Within days of her resignation, our new superintendent announced her replacement - a friend of his, a staff member who has only been here for 1 year and has no teaching experience. This is a person who I enjoy conversation with and a person who very much does have a heart for youth. But because of a variety of reasons that I don't need to get into right now, I am struggling with the thought of him in a position of leadership over me.

It was also announced this month that in order to save money, the school will not be replacing 4 of the 9 or so teachers who plan on leaving after this school year. That was a tough blow for me also. Last year we lost 6 teachers and gained only two new ones. We were already short staffed at the beginning of this year. Then in November, we lost our K-12 art teacher, and two other teachers are currently abroad having babies. All of us here are overloaded, stressed and burning out already. There's been a couple of days already this semester where I've come home from work and gone straight to bed. I have serious concerns about next year.

OK, now that all the sad stuff is out, I'd like to announce that Payless Shoe Store opened a branch RIGHT HERE IN CENTRAL JAVA! Since this is a 3.5 day weekend, I got to go visit on Saturday! It's about an hour away by bus. We also found that in the same mall, a brand new movie theater that shows Hollywood films opened up! Way closer and cheaper to get to (and more posh) than the theater in Semarang! So hooray for little surprises even in sad months!

Final Update (I Think)

2012-01-13T08:20:00.000-08:00

Good news - Ibu Sri's husband was able to return to work again today! Ibu said that the area around his eye is pretty messed up, and I'm assuming that he'll have some long term scarring there. But once the eye was cleaned up and the swelling went down, they found that his vision wasn't affected by the injury!

Ibu says thanks to everyone for prayers!

Yet Another Update

2012-01-11T04:40:00.001-08:00

Thanks to everyone who prayed for Ibu Sri's husband! When they got home from the Dr.'s appointment, she sent me this sms:

SEGALA PUJI BAGI TUHAN! dokter bilang mata baik tgal penyembuan luka saja dan tdk perlu ke dokter budi smg kmi terimakasih utk doanya.

(EVERY PRAISE BE TO THE LORD! the doctor said that the eye is ok, we just need to wait for the wound to heal, and we don't need to go to doctor budi [a specialist] in Semarang. We are thankful for the prayers.)

YAAAAY!!

Vacation Days

2012-01-10T20:44:00.000-08:00

Ibu Sri and her husband should be at the doctor right now. Praying hard!

In other news, I was just doing some lesson planning and after consulting the school calendar, I realized that this week is a 4 day week, next week is a 4 day week, the week after that is a 4 day week, and the week after THAT is also a 4 day week. Then we have three normal weeks, then another 4 day week. After that comes a normal 5 day week, then spring break - no school for a whole week!

After spring break, we have a four day week, a regular week, two more four day weeks, followed by five normal weeks (that's gonna seem like a long stretch with no breaks!), finals and graduation on the 24th of May. And then summer break!!

Teaching in a foreign country is the best if you're looking for lots of vacation days. We take off American holidays (bc we're an American school), Indonesian holidays (bc we're in Indonesia), Muslim holidays (bc many of those are also Indonesian national holidays), quarter breaks, semester breaks, fall break, spring break, Christmas break, summer break, Chinese New Year, athletic tournament breaks, and more! Now we just need to get on board with the Hindu and Buddhist holidays, because we have some of both at our school. So out of respect to them, I mean, we should really look into it.

And oh yeah - when I taught in Kenya, sometimes the president would randomly declare, "Tomorrow is a holiday! Nobody go to work!" So we would all stay home. It made planning kind of hectic, but who doesn't enjoy getting to randomly sleep in on a Wednesday?

Update on the Update

2012-01-10T07:00:00.000-08:00

I caught Ibu Sri today when I got home from work. She was on her way out the door but stayed to chat a bit with me. She is taking Wednesday off to take her husband to the eye doctor for a more thorough checkup. She said that yesterday, his eye (praise God, only his right eye was affected) was completely swollen shut, so there wasn't much the doctor could do besides clean it the best he could and bandage it. He told them not to take the bandage off as it would be very easy for the eye to become infected. Regardless, Ibu took the bandage off last night after the swelling had gone down a little bit to find out if her husband could see. He said that he can see light but that he can't make out shapes or focus on anything.

Poor guy didn't get a chance to rest much yesterday as family, friends and neighbors were coming over to check on his condition all afternoon and evening.

Back the story up now. Way up. Ibu Sri was raised in a Muslim home but was allowed to go to sunday school with friends. From what I gather, she was pretty ambivalent about religion in her high school/early adult years. She got pregnant out of wedlock, and in her fear, tried to abort the baby on her own (abortion is illegal to this day in Indonesia). She didn't succeed, but her baby was born mentally handicapped along with some other physical disabilities, including a vision impairment. Ibu Sri and her husband got married (obviously) and are both now living for the Lord. Yesi, their daughter, is now in her early teens and is learning at a 3rd grade level (if I remember correctly) at a school for mentally handicapped children. Ibu Sri understandably places a lot of blame on herself for her daughter's disabilities.

Earlier today, Ibu Sri told me that last night when everyone left their house, her husband just started crying, and he kept saying that now he feels like Yesi, now he can't see - just like her, now he knows what it feels like. I think that broke Ibu Sri's heart, because she started crying when she told me about it. Then she went on to say, "But it's OK. I can be strong for both of us. I think this happened to my husband because of my sins. I made a mistake. I didn't go to church this week."

I was floored. This woman carries such a sense of guilt with her! All I could think to say to her was, "Ibu, Tuhan kita ga seperti itu!" (Ibu, our God isn't like that!)

So here's where we stand now - Ibu Sri needs lots of prayer to be at peace with this, to not blame herself, and to be a rock for her husband. Her husband definitely also needs prayers as he currently can't work and therefore has a lot of time on his hands at home alone to be processing all of this. I know they are very anxious about tomorrow to hear what the doctor will say - he might be able to regain his vision as his eye heals, or he possibly never will. If the doctor sends them to Semarang (the big city) to see another Dr., they'll know it's bad. But if he doesn't, it means that the damage isn't too severe. She asked me three or four times to be in prayer for the appointment tomorrow morning - in case anyone wants to know, it's at 9 AM here, which would be 9 PM Tuesday night for all my Indiana kin.

Other than that, one day of school down, 99 million more to go...

Update

2012-01-09T06:18:00.000-08:00

Ibu Sri's husband is currently at home resting. When I asked Ibu about his eyes, she said she didn't know much because he can't open them and they're all bandaged up. She's planning on coming to work tomorrow (Tuesday), but I'm leaving her a note to let her know she can have Wednesday off, as her husband has to return to the doctor to get the bandages taken off and his eyes checked then. Please continue praying!

And as a testimony to how amazing and hardworking Ibu Sri is, I'm copying a translation of the note she left for me on my counter today:

"Good afternoon, miss. I'm sorry that I went home early today because my husband is in the hospital. Because while he was at work, his eyes got sprayed with metal shards while he was welding on a broken machine. Thank you for the presents you brought me from Bali. And I'm sorry that all my work isn't finished today. I will finish it tomorrow. Because I really want to find out how my husband is. I am very, very worried. Please pray for me, OK? I'm sorry, I'm so confused. On one hand, I have so much work to do, but on the other hand, I really need to go be with my husband. I'm so sorry. Ibu Sri."

Lest I sound like a slave driver who beats my help into submission, rest assured that most of this letter stems from a cultural fear of upsetting someone. She is very worried that we will be disappointed that our apartments aren't spic and span when we get home from work, so she will apologize 15 times to make up for it. It's the Javanese way.

I'm leaving a note for her tomorrow that basically says, "No matter what, your family is more important than your work. We understand that you are very worried, and it is better for you to be with your husband than to be here cooking or mopping. Don't be afraid to take time off this week if you need to be with your husband. We are all praying for you and your husband so that he will be healed quickly and have full vision!"

And I cleaned the whole bathroom and kitchen today so she hopefully won't feel like she's way behind or has too much work to do to take any time off to be with her husband. See? Not a slave driver. : )

One More Post

2012-01-08T22:45:00.000-08:00

Hey guys, on my way to lunch earlier, I found out that my helper's husband was in an accident at work this morning and was rushed to the emergency room. She also went to be with him. All I knew at first was that his eyes were somehow damaged. She just smsed me and let me know that they were able to bring him home from the hospital this afternoon because he's not hurt severely, but that he's going to need to go to an eye doctor "karena terkena cairan kimia n serpian logam" (for my friends who will understand Indonesian better than my translation). Basically, he was at work and somehow got chemicals and shards of metal in his eyes. I'm not really sure how bad the situation is, but please be praying for healing for his eyes and no loss of sight! Thanks!

Surprise…

2012-01-08T21:08:00.001-08:00

I spent a good part of the weekend cleaning up after being gone for so long. Funny how a house can get dirtier while you’re gone, huh? It’s true though. Ibu Sri, my helper, was on vacation too, so there was nobody there to keep mold from growing all over the shower, to keep ants from chewing their way through anything plastic, to move the clothes around in my closet so they don’t start to smell musty, or to scrub the gecko poop off all the walls. Ugh. My big project though was cleaning the mold off of all my shoes. I first noticed these:

My favoritest pair of scrunchy ballet flats that my mom bought for me this summer! I was all, “Oh, no you didn’t, mold!”

So then I started looking through all my shoes and found that most of them had mold growing on (or in) them too. They all got thrown in the little alley behind my house for a good scrubbing.

Even my rubber flipflops had mold growing on them! EEEEW! It’s days like this when I realize that just cleaning up after nature in my house is a full time job!

About an hour later, I was ready to set all my freshly scrubbed and cleaned footwear out in the sun to dry. But of course by then it was raining.

It’s a vicious circle.

SCHOOL!

2012-01-08T21:00:00.001-08:00

School starts tomorrow. I’m finally spending some (administration mandated) time in my classroom today getting ready for what is to come… I’m teaching my four math classes this semester (Algebra 1 for 8th grade, Algebra 2 for 9th grade, Geometry for 10th grade, and PreCalculus for 11th and 12th grade) as well as Batik making (9th – 12th grade art) and Yearbook (11th – 12th grade elective). Full full full schedule! I get one planning period per day now, which is kind of scary with six classes! All I can say is thank goodness for an awesome TA who comes to make photocopies and grade homework for me four days a week! That boy is a lifesaver…

A Natural Progression

2012-01-08T20:52:00.001-08:00

Usually my helper, Ibu Sri, buys a bag of dried minnows at the market, chops them up, mixes them with rice, then feeds that to my cats throughout the week. Nobody can say my cats don’t eat enough carbs. They are very used to this diet. This is the diet of most Indonesian house pets – dogs and cats alike. Even Indonesian animals live on rice! In fact, if I ever try to feed them anything else, like a saucer of milk or some chicken scraps – things American cats would love, they usually turn up their noses and look at me with slightly distrustful eyes, like they don’t believe they should actually be eating that stuff. Bags of dry food can be found here, but only at very specific places, and usually at a relatively high cost.

Before I went to Bali, I was in a local grocery store and happened to find boxes of dry cat food for only $2 (cheapcheap)! And since our helper was on vacation and my neighbor would be taking care of the cats, I thought I’d simplify her life and buy a box. I had no idea if the cats would eat it or not, but my neighbor is definitely not the type who would mess with stinky fish if she could avoid it, so I figured that dry food was better than no food. And for the record, I bought the fish flavor. Anyways, when I got home from the Bali trip, the box of cat food was left inside my front door with very little of it used. I assumed the cats didn’t like it, and I stuck the box by the back door.

Later that night, my cats came inside and were sleeping on a chair in my bedroom. Then they spotted the box of food. The following ensued.

Then they both cried for some food, so I poured them a bowl. Pretty sure it was gone in seconds… Finally! I found a food my cats really love!

Traditions

2012-01-06T09:59:00.001-08:00

Tradition number 1. No matter who else comes to Bali with us, Yohanes, Peco and I will always be together for New Years. We are the only three people who have been there every year for the past four years in a row.

New Years 2009

New Years 2010 (We never actually took a picture of the 3 of us together that year, but I promise I took the following picture of the two of them, so that is proof that we were all three there!)

New Years 2011

New Years 2012

Tradition number 2. The first two years I had this great tradition of taking a picture of the first sunrise of the year. It worked well for those two years, then it all went to heck.

First sunrise of 2009 (taken from Sanur)

First sunrise of 2010 (taken from Gili Air over Lombok)

First sunrise of 2011. This was the year that we saw – not exaggerating – TWO HOURS of sunlight during our 10 days on Bali. I set an alarm for 4:30 on New Years Day, woke up, looked out the window, saw that it was pouring down rain, and went back to sleep.

First sunrise of 2012. I already broke the tradition last year, so why bother? We were on the west side of the island anyways, so it wouldn’t have made for a good sunrise photo.

Tradition number 3 (kind of). I like finding Happy New Year signs and taking pictures of them. I’ve done this a couple times, so I think I’ll make it my new tradition. I like it because I don’t have to wake up at 4:30 to accomplish it.

Any good suggestions for other New Years traditions out there??

Bali – Leg 3 – Sanur

2012-01-06T09:44:00.001-08:00

After two days in Jimbaran, we moved back into civilization a little bit, and found ourselves in Sanur. The rest of our group had come there the day before (after spending one night in Denpasar), so even though we were staying in two different hotels, we were all together again most of the time. It was cloudy and rainy both days we spent in Sanur, so I don’t have many pictures. On our last full day there, I did go down to the beach in the drizzle and haze and snap some pictures with my point and shoot. Enjoy!

The sand down by the water on this beach was pretty cool. Instead of being very fine grains of sand, it was more like little balls of rock and slivers of shells and coral!

Bali – Leg 2 – Jimbaran

2012-01-06T08:52:00.001-08:00

On New Year’s Eve, six of us made our way to a location new to all of us – Balangan Beach, just outside the town of Jimbaran. It was way out in the boondocks, which worked out well, as we were trying to avoid the mad drunk tourist crowd which usually swarms the beaches of Bali for New Year’s Eve. On our way there though, we stopped at Hard Rock Café for our token ridiculously expensive meal.

Why, yes… Yes I did spend $40 for nachos, a burger, and a bottled water. But I tell you what, that’s the best meal I ate all year, and it’s the best I’ll eat until the next New Years in Bali. I justify the cost just this one time a year. It’s so worth it. Red meat. And bacon. And cheese. And real tortilla chips. And oh my goodness I need to stop talking about it or I’m going to go crazy.

So back to Jimbaran. Speaking of back to Jimbaran, all six of us crammed into one taxi for the 30 minute ride back after dinner because it was the only transport we could find on New Year’s Eve on Bali. That alone was an adventure!! So anyways, the six of us stayed in this awesome open air bungalow that I didn’t get many good pictures of.

This place also had an open air bathroom, but no hot water. That ended up working out well because it was basically blazing hot the entire time we were there.

After we got back from dinner at Hard Rock, we decided to hike down to the beach. It was a bit of a walk in the pitch black darkness, and as we discovered when Sam stepped in something warm and slippery, the field we had to walk through is actually a pasture for local cattle known as sapi Bali!

It was fairly quiet down at the beach until a little closer to midnight when some drunk Australians thought it would be a great idea to come down and shoot off fireworks. They didn’t really seem to be paying attention to what direction the fireworks were pointing, and they ended up shooting toward us, at buildings, straight into the water, and sometimes even up into the sky! That last one seemed to take quite a bit of concentration and effort though… So I took a picture to capture their momentous feat of brilliance!

We don’t actually know when the new year happened. There is no ball that drops in Indonesia. And at that beach, there is barely electricity anyways! There is a small village located along this beach, but the electricity is pretty sketchy, so power kept flickering on and off, and nobody really had any clue what the real time was. I think we heard about 8 different countdowns from different village houses and groups of people on the beach. About 10 minutes after the last one, we decided to really confuse people, and we started our own countdown. Besides that one moment of immaturity, the rest of our ringing-in-the-new-year time was spent talking about what God has done for us this past year and what He has been teaching us, hopes and goals for the new year, and just encouraging one another.

Besides awesome friends and uplifting conversation, the best part of the night was being able to lay back in the sand, listen to the waves crash against the shore, and watch all the airplanes take off from nearby Denpasar and fly overhead. So peaceful. Until we realized that it felt like we were in an episode of LOST.

On New Year’s Day, we got to visit with our friends who used to live in Salatiga but have since moved to Papua. They are expecting a baby any day now and are working with a midwife here on Bali, so they flew in for the occasion. Obviously, I wore my Sunday best for lunch with them. Actually, our bungalow was too small to unpack anything in, and I was having trouble finding clean-ish smelling clothes in my duffel bag.

This was outside the Italian restaurant where I made my New Year’s post from my Blackberry. It was super fun to see them and to get to spend time with the kids. We spent almost all day with them around town and at their small rental house.

The next morning was all about the beach though. It was about a 7 minute hike from the bungalow, through the cow pasture, down a cliff, and through a tiny village.

But it was a beautiful hike, and the beach was definitely worth breaking a sweat to get there.

HARDLY ANY TOURISTS!!

One of the best parts of this day was watching an old man walk his (wait for it…) MONKEY down the beach. Like with a leash and everything… Then the guy decided to go swimming, so the monkey simply crawled onto the guy’s head! WHAT?!

Do you see the airplane that just took off? Do you?!

Do you see it now?? If not, you should probably get that checked out.

Happy New Year!!

Bali – Leg 1 – Ubud

2012-01-06T08:05:00.001-08:00

Our group this year was 10 people total, but we didn’t all stay in the same place at the same time. Though we kind of fluctuated a lot, we all started out together in Ubud for our first leg. Well, I guess technically those of us who rode the bus for 26 stinkin hours (as opposed to flying) ended up coming a day and a half later than the rest… Won’t be doing that again if I can help it. But anyways, Ubud is a traditional place for us to stay each Christmas. This was our third year in a row to stay at the T-Houses, located just outside of town. Basically, we love it here. Ubud has some of the best food and culture of anywhere on Bali. And if you recognize the name, it might be because it’s where Elizabeth Gilbert spent time for her whole Eat, Pray, Love deal. If you watch the movie (not a strong recommendation), you’ll see how beautiful Ubud is! In fact, Ketut Liyer, the traditional medicine man she worked with, lives just around the corner from where we stay! The only downfall is that there is no coast/beach in Ubud. This is nice around the holidays though, as it tends to keep the tourist levels down. This was our rest and relax leg. The guys did lots of yoga with an instructor they found in town. The girls spent lots of time hanging out by the pool and getting to know our neighbors from around the world who were staying in the other guest houses. And trying our best to figure out if our neighbor was a topless woman or a very gay man in a speedo. Conclusion: he’s French!

(The house all the girls stayed in)

(One of three bedrooms in the girls house)

(My favorite part of the T-Houses – outdoor bathrooms!!)

(Note – always check to make sure nobody is harvesting coconuts before you strip down!)

Every night we got dressed up and went out to dinner together. We had some awesome Thai, Mexican, organic, Italian, and Cuban food. That last one proved interesting. In the Cuban restaurant, I was sitting with my back to the door, and halfway through the meal, a friend across the table from me casually said, “That’s Tyra Banks”. I turned around and looked, and sure enough! – Tyra Banks had just walked in the door and was making her way to a table across the room! (We googled it later and found out that she is there for some kind of spiritual retreat after her breakup with her boyfriend, someone-or-rather.) Other than one creepy stalker-ish bald guy with a camera, I was pretty impressed by how low key her being there was. (Question: How come I can’t go to the grocery store without getting my picture taken 25 times and comments, proposals, and wolf whistles thrown at me, but Tyra Banks can walk into a restaurant and nobody bats an eye?!) As we were eating, a salsa band started playing, and turns out our waiter, Karma (the name he was born with – we asked), was also a salsa dance instructor! He got everyone out on the dance floor, and we ended up staying there a good 4 or 5 hours, dancing the night away and working off all that rice and beans!

Sam, our Mexican friend (though you wouldn’t know it to look at him), left a note on the wall after we were finished. It was fun to go around and read all the other things people had written over the years! And it was nice to find that even though I can’t speak Spanish anymore, I can still read it pretty well!

(A sweaty Sam after hours of salsa dancing in dress clothes)

(Peco, me, and Yohanes – we have spent every New Years together in Bali for the last 4 years)

One other big thing we did in Ubud was go see a Kecak dance.

(The program for the dance, which tells the story of the Ramayana - Indonesian Romeo and Juliet, Rama and Shinta)

In case you need more information, you can read the following excerpt from the program which we all found amusing. Please pardon its French.

On Java, when they perform the Ramayana, it is accompanied by traditional Indonesian instruments called gamelan. The Balinese version is accompanied solely by voices. The 100 men *sit* in three concentric circles and kind of beatbox the rhythm of the story while the dancers act it out. There is also one guy who sings/tells parts of the story in what we think was a Balinese tribal language. There were some other minor differences in the story which were interesting to spot. A big part of why the traditional story varies between the two islands might be that Java is predominantly Muslim while Bali is almost entirely Hindu.

We had to go to a temple at night in the pitch black to see the performance. I have a few pictures, but not a whole lot.

(First step – lighting the candles in the center of the “stage”)

(The singers come out and form their concentric circles centered around the fire)

(Eventually, the singers sit down, and the dancers come out, dancing the story. The one dancer you can see above is Shinta (Juliet))

(A part of the show where there were no dancers. All the sounds you hear are voices – there are no musical instruments used in this performance. Pretty cool, no?)

And I leave you with a few more pictures of the beauty of Ubud.

Vacation from Vacation

2012-01-04T18:12:00.001-08:00

Home and semi well rested. Pictures to come.

happy new year!!

2011-12-31T21:44:00.000-08:00

Happy January first, 2012 from jimbaran, bali!! I'm actually writing this from my blackberry while using the wifi at an Italian restaurant here. Can't wait for my berry smoothie and pizza! The food on bali is definitely a highlight after a year of rice and chicken. I get to eat lunch with 4 friends who now live on papua as well as two others who currently live and work on another island in the archipelago. I have to say, this year is off to a great start!

We rang in the new year laying on the beach and watching airplanes take off and fly overhead. Several drunk people were in a particularly celabratory mood and were setting off fireworks in all directions. It was less than safe, but fun to watch!

We'll be headed back to java in 3 days. In the meantime, we're just enjoying the beach life, swimming a lot, hiking a little, getting a nice tan, visiting with friends, living in an open air bungalow, eating lots of delicious food, learning to salsa dance, and sleeping in! I haven't taken too many pictures (sorry dad), but I'll post as many as I can when I get back!!

It’s the Most Unusual Time of the Year

2011-12-25T19:34:00.001-08:00

Let’s start with Christmas Eve. That was my first busy day of this holiday season. I’d been taking it easy and watching lots of Gilmore Girls up until this point when I realized I needed to crack down and get something done. My to do list (because I always have one) included these items: Do laundry, make Christmas cookies, clean out fridge, feed and worm cats, pick up bus tickets to Bali, go to market and get apples and aluminum foil, repot plants, bake an apple pie, wrap gifts.

Laundry went well. Our ghetto washing machine (which I’m thankful for because it was free and we don’t have to wash all our laundry by hand anymore) didn’t clog up or ruin or lose any clothes. I even got about 30 minutes of sunshine to let the clothes hang out in before it started monsoon-ing. I had my sister send me mom’s recipe for Christmas cookies since I haven’t had those for four years by now. I whipped it all up and tasted the dough (just like mom always used to let us), and it tasted so much like Christmases of my childhood! So I rolled the dough out and was getting ready to cut out shaped when I remembered – I don’t own a single cookie cutter. So I tried cutting some shapes out by hand, but that was getting messy, so I improvised. These became my cookie cutters for the day:

But I still love my hand carved Christmas tree!

But the red food coloring I bought was actually kind of maroon. Sadness…

While the cookies were baking, I cleaned out the fridge, gave all meat items to the cats, and repotted some pepper and cilantro plants I had planted a few weeks back. They were getting big enough that they each needed their own separate pot.

And I also wormed my cats as they were having a rare moment of tranquility.

Aswan ended up going to pick up the bus tickets and buy the things from market while I was at my friends’ house wrapping presents. They both are living here studying language, and this is their first Christmas away from home. We had all gotten packages from our parents in the mail, so we all traded boxes, locked ourselves up in separate rooms of their giant house, and wrapped the contents of the boxes so that we could all open up actual presents on Christmas morning, not just USPS flat rate shipping packages. I left all my presents there because Aswan and I were already planning on spending Christmas with them – our little family. We didn’t get a chance to make that apple pie, but we did stay up til 11 watching Rudolph (the oooold Burl Ives one), which Aswan was less than thrilled about.

So skip ahead to Christmas morning. Our friends wanted to experience the town Natalan (Christmas celebration) which is an annual sunrise service on Christmas morning. So after going to bed at midnight, we all woke up at 3:45ish and walked to the Pancasila, the field at the town center. When I first woke up, I had to pee as always, but I wasn’t ready for the florescent lights to be on yet, so I didn’t bother turning any on. I did my business and went back to my room to get dressed. Then I went BACK to the bathroom to brush my teeth and put my hair up. For that I did turn the lights on. And when I did, I found a surprise on the floor right in front of me:

He then tried to hide by forcing his way under the sink.

“Merry Christmas to me” was my first thought. Then my second was, “WAIT A MINUTE! I was in here with no lights on earlier! How did I not step on this?!” I call it my Christmas miracle that God kept me safe in the dark that morning…

Anyways, we eventually made it to Natalan where it was really cold and damp.

We sang Christmas carols by candlelight and marveled at the beautiful Christmas tree they had set up. The marvel ended when the sun rose and we realized it was made out of corn husks…

Can you say classy? Anyways, after all that was finished, we went back to our own homes to rest and freshen up. Aswan and I made that apple pie we didn’t get to the day before. We made one for his mom last year for Christmas, which was the first time I ever met his family. She’d been hinting lately about how much she enjoyed it. She’d never had one before. Indonesians don’t really do pie. So I really wanted to make her another one this year. After we finished that, Aswan went home and I got to sleep another 2 hours before we headed over to our friends’ house to open presents. They had made crepes and a breakfast casserole. Silly me didn’t bring a camera, but here’s a really rough phone picture of the tree (which is actually a potted plant from their back yard) that we spent the last week making decorations for.

Beautiful, no? It’s way more fun to open presents like that than from a box! I hope that these particular friends are super dumb so that they will still be here studying language during Christmas next year!! Hehe…

After Christmas there, we left to go spend Christmas evening with Aswan’s family in Semarang. For part of the trip, we followed this truck, which I was super happy about!

Christmas with Aswan’s family was really nice. We all went to church together. The singing was a bit crazy with jumping and screaming and eardrums nearly bursting. But the sermon followed the national Christmas theme of being light. The pastor spent quite awhile talking about darkness and light and the world’s need for light. He even made the point that a tiny flame can make a huge difference in a dark room. And it was at about that time that all the electricity went out in town. So we all lit up the tea candles that we had been saving for singing Silent Night at the end. I was a little worried that the church was gonna burn down with all those candles lit, but it ended up being a great illustration and a very peaceful Christmas service. I enjoyed it immensely.

I forgot to mention one more thing I did this weekend – I started packing!

I’m leaving later this afternoon and will spend the next 10 days in Bali! Aswan says I’m bringing way too much stuff for 10 days, but I say that as long as it all fits in the bag, I’m doing OK! : )

Merry Christmas and happy New Year everyone!!

update on me

2011-12-22T02:58:00.001-08:00

SCHOOL
IS
OVER

Six more Christmas parties/dinners/get-togethers.

Then...

BALI!

Breakfast

2011-12-17T01:25:00.000-08:00

For some reason, I couldn't fall asleep last night until 2 AM, and I didn't crack an eyelid until 10:30 this morning. By then, I was pretty hungry since I never ate dinner last night (up til 2 and never got hungry! so strange) and I really wanted pancakes. But I had no syrup.

So what did I do?

I made syrup from scratch!

To go on my fluffy pancakes that I made from scratch.

LIKE A BOSS.

(Lest I become prideful, I did use store bought butter.)

Rain, Rain, Go Away

2011-12-17T01:16:00.000-08:00

The first of many Christmas parties to come is tonight. It's been raining and thundering all day long and out any window I look, I can see at least one coconut tree. It doesn't feel at all like Christmas. I was feeling kind of mopey about that and wishing for some better weather until I opened up my browser to write this post and read the headline on my homepage, "At Least 180 Dead After Storm Pummels Philippines". I bet that's the storm we're catching the tail end of...

Tropical storms killing people doesn't really put me in the Christmas mood either, naturally. But after reading that, I do feel blessed to be safe and healthy this time of year, and I'm thankful that my family can say the same.

Bizarre

2011-12-15T18:45:00.001-08:00

The (Indonesian) father of one of my (Indonesian) students has the same first name as my mother. Blows my mind every time.

Rotten Milk

2011-12-13T17:44:00.000-08:00

YES. Rotten milk. In my mouth. My only indication? - It tasted like mothballs. So maybe rotten is an exaggeration.

Here's the story. On Sunday, I bought a carton of milk at a brand new import store just down the road from my house. Funny that I have to go to an import store to buy milk, but it's true. Indonesians just aren't down with the dairy. They don't even use butter. They use lard instead.

Anyways, I digress. I love milk in the morning, so I filled a thermos with cold milk on Monday and brought it to school with me. It tasted like mothballs. It was the weirdest thing. But I'd never tried that particular brand of milk, and some brands here definitely do have an off flavor, so I thought it was just the brand and drank that whole thing down. Yesterday (Tuesday) I got home from school and was craving a tall glass of milk again, so I pulled the carton out of the fridge. As I was pouring it into the glass, I remembered the mothball taste from the day before, stopped pouring, and set the carton down on the counter. I sniffed the glass of milk carefully as I pondered whether or not I really wanted to drink it.

Then the expiration date on the carton caught my eye.

22 11 11

That's right. My milk expired almost a month ago.

So last night I went to the store to tell them about it. I found a bunch of other cartons in their fridge that were also expired. Like I said, Indos don't do dairy, so they didn't know that you shouldn't drink expired milk. I wasn't upset or complaining or asking for my money back or anything. I just wanted to explain to them that you can't sell expired milk, especially not to a bunch of white people - their primary sales demographic. They were super nice about it and apologized and thanked me profusely for telling them about it. Then they gave me my money back, which was super nice, since I didn't have a receipt or even the bad milk with me to show them.

That's me. Saving the world, one import food store at a time.

Ideas

2011-12-12T20:15:00.000-08:00

I just got this message from my friend, Liz, who is from Jakarta but goes to college in Salatiga. It made me smile, and as you read it (unedited by me - straight up copied and pasted), marvel at how amazing her English is, y'all!

"ok so I couldn't sleep last night. and i came up with this brilliant idea. I found you and mas Aswan a great business project after you guys get married. it's selling Salatiga post card!!!!!! first, there's no Salatiga post card available yet (as far as I know) and two, since you are really good at photography, bet you'll make a very awesome post card with awesome Salatiga views in it. "the post card that actually shows the true identity of Salatiga" third, it'll be perfect for the Mountainview community, since you guys send letter and packages to home/sponsor, right? people are longing for it. Salatiga post card--that's the dream. ah it's so perfect! so what do you say?"

So besides the fact that it's kind of weird that my friends think about my future as they try to fall asleep, I kind of like the idea! It would be a fun thing to do - and she's right, there are no Salatiga postcards yet. This is going on my list of future jobs! Thanks, Liz!

December in the Tropics

2011-12-12T06:46:00.001-08:00

Yup, so that was my Saturday. How was yours?

PS – See that person in the water over by the rocks? I went exploring over there and found lots of jellyfish, sea urchins, crabs, fish, and TWO octopi! They made my day.

Projected Costs

2011-12-11T07:06:00.001-08:00

Aswan and I were just talking about college. College for our kids, which are as of yet nonexistent. He wants two or three kids, I'm shooting for four. We'll see how we feel after the first few. But worst case scenario, we pay for 4 kids to go to college. I looked up a state school in Indiana and we calculated that to send four kids to a four year university twenty years in the future will cost a minimum of about $700,000 (because they most likely won't be residents of any state, and possibly even listed as international students, for which the costs are higher). Our total combined annual income is currently $8500. If we save EVERY penny at that rate (which is likely to go down considerably, because I eventually won't work for an international school anymore most likely) and spend no money for the next twenty years, we will have $170,000. This is bleak.

The options we came up with are:

a) Pray that our kids are super smart and/or athletic and get really good scholarships to really good schools.

b) Move to a village, start a family cult, and never educate our children so that they have no chance of going to college.

Obviously, option a is the ideal one. It's always good to have a plan b though.

Teaching

2011-12-08T22:52:00.001-08:00

Well. Next semester should be an adventure. I'll continue teaching my four math classes every day, which means grading homework for four classes every day. I'm pretty sure that math teachers have more work than other teachers, but I might be biased. Also, the yearbook teacher is in America until March due to his wife giving birth (and wanting to do it stateside for legal/processing reasons), so since I "taught" that class last year, I'm subbing for him for two double periods per week. Our art teacher left in November (I bought his desk, remember?), and since he was the only art teacher we had for K - 12, we've been trying to come up with ideas for art classes next semester. After much thought, the administration finally settled on offering a graffiti/street art class, choir, and batik making (taught by a local Indonesian) for the 9th - 12th graders.

At this week's teacher meeting, the batik class was brought up, because at that time, nobody had met the person who was going to be teaching the class, so nobody knew if he/she spoke English or had ever even taught in a school before. It was recommended that another teacher sit in on the class to help translate, to enter grades in the system, and to try to maintain some semblance of classroom order. Naturally, I'm not busy enough, so I offered to help. I like batik, and it would be sweet to learn how to make it! So for the first half of next semester, I will be teaching 6 classes, and I will have one prep period per day. Aish.

This morning, I met the man who will be teaching it, Pak Agung. He's an older man, VERY soft-spoken and reserved, and doesn't speak a lick of English. Absolutely perfect for teaching a class of 20 rowdy foreign high schoolers. Or not... So we'll see how that goes...

If you are reading this and you have no clue what batik is, I've linked the Wikipedia link HERE, so check it out! It's really cool!

Stats

2011-12-08T07:17:00.001-08:00

I just happened to notice that blogger now has a “stats” feature. Of course, I clicked on it, curious as ever. Found some interesting things such as which pages of mine are most viewed and what sites viewers are referred from. Then, at the bottom of the page, I found the stats about what people are searching for online when they stumble across my website. Here’s the list:

This makes me feel like I have an incredibly varied blog. I’ve got everything from “pacuan kuda” (horse race) to “penguin classics” and “abercrombie” to… umm… “suck out marrow”? Do people really do Google searches for “suck out marrow”?!

Insect Invasion

2011-12-06T23:40:00.001-08:00

I went to brush my teeth last night to find what I can only assume was the beginning of mass suicide emerging from beneath my sink.

Are they ants or termites? I don’t know. Either way, I was kind of freaking out, so I left the bathroom light on and shut the door tightly, hoping they’d stay in there, attracted to the light. It must have worked, because only one made its way inside my shirt during the night. The rest were scattered around the bathroom this morning when I got up to take a shower, mostly dead. I mean the bugs were mostly dead, not me. Although one might be able to consider me mostly dead as well at 6 AM. Live ones were crawling up the walls and in the towels on the shelf and inside the toilet, but they were moving really slowly like they were drugged. It was bizarre. I didn’t take a picture this morning though because a) I was mostly dead and b) all my available powers of concentration were geared toward not stepping on the dead insects all over the floor.

I kind of left them there, hoping that Ibu Sri would know what to do about that when she came into work this morning. I’m still at school and won’t find out for a few more hours, but hoping for pleasant results and no more night raids.

Meet Soon

2011-12-05T23:06:00.001-08:00

His name is Soon. He’s my student, he’s in the 10th grade, and he’s Korean. He has given me a few reasons to smile this week. The first was when he nonchalantly showed up to school yesterday “wearing” a moustache for no apparent reason.

Also, I was introduced to his YouTube channel this week. He is a fantastic musician. He’s posted a bunch of covers he’s done on his YouTube site. My favorite is probably the Bob Dylan one. Not a favorite (or terribly wholesome) Dylan song, but still – a 17 year old Korean singing Dylan? Awesome. And he plays all the instruments himself. So check it out HERE.

The picture below is a little off topic, as it was not drawn by Soon. I found it drawn on the bottom of a PreCalculus quiz I graded this morning and it made me smile.

So in case you haven’t heard, I’m engaged! : ) Here’s a rough but real picture of the ring…

And here’s how he did it…

Things and Things

2011-11-29T21:40:00.001-08:00

Thing 1. This was our Thanksgiving evening.

Thing 2. As of November 27th, as close as we can figure, Aswan and I have been dating for one year! I spent the whole day working on my TESOL final paper. Seventeen pages, baby! Turning it in today. Anyways, unbeknownst to me, while I was working on my paper all afternoon, boyfriend went all the way to Semarang to buy me a pizza from Pizza Hut because a) he wanted to do something to celebrate our anniversary and b) he knew I was a little homesick because of not being able to be with my family on Thanksgiving.

Thing 3. I just found this bug outside the girls bathroom. At first it seems insignificant. But then it begins to seem like some kind of mutant scorpion bug. So I took lots of pictures.

Boxes

2011-11-25T03:35:00.000-08:00

I have this tradition of sorts that mandates that any package received after Thanksgiving must be saved for Christmas. Usually it's only my mother who mails such packages, but I know a couple other people have recently sent things as well (HOORAY!), so I just want to check and see if there is anything in the aforementioned packages that needs to be extracted immediately. This might include things that will break down into a puddle in extreme humidity or might otherwise go bad and/or melt if left to sit for a month.

So if you mailed me a package recently, could you kindly comment and let me know? Terima kasih banyak (many thanks)!!

Holidays

2011-11-23T17:26:00.001-08:00

My five favorite holidays are:

1. Fourth of July

2. Thanksgiving

3. New Year’s Eve.

4. Pi Day

5. Idul Fitri

I’ve only ever spent three Fourth of Julys away from home, but this will be my fifth Thanksgiving overseas. It’s hard to feel like it’s really the Thanksgiving/Black Friday/Christmas season when you wake up sweating at 6 AM to this:

It was so bright and sunny out! My room just filled up with curtain-filtered sunbeams, and it was all but glowing when I got up this morning. I like waking up on sunny days.

On a side note, remember how my camera broke? Well, I gave it to Hotjaga, because he is the master of fixing everything broken (even the Christmas lights that my cats chewed through). It took him about 4 days, but he was finally able to fix it completely! Good as new! He gave it back to me yesterday morning when I was on my way to school. He had originally told me that he was giving up and giving it back to me, so I thought it was still broken. Then he told me to open it up, and it worked!! So I took his picture and almost gave him a hug before I remembered that he’s a married Muslim man and I probably shouldn’t, even if he is my good friend.

Indonesians hardly ever smile with their teeth, but when I took this picture, he was laughing at my reaction to my camera actually being fixed, so I got a real smile! He must have taken a few pictures himself while he was working on my camera, because I found a picture of my apartment on it, taken from the vantage point of the jaga post at the gate.

See what I mean about it not feeling holiday-ish? It’s so GREEN!

Anyways, happy second best holiday of the year, everyone!!!

The Spot. I am on it.

2011-11-19T23:15:00.001-08:00

There is this one worship leader at my church who really likes to sing songs 8 times in a row. And I'm not even exaggerating. Verses, chorus, bridge... all of it. Over and over and over. Sometimes it drives me nuts. This morning we were on the 6th round of "Dimuliakan, ditinggikan", when I started to feel really queasy and short of breath and my vision started going black around the edges. So I sat down and lip-synced the next three rounds. At least that song isn't a long one. Then pastor got up front and burst into a rendition (in English - I have no clue why he does this, because most people in my church don't understand or speak very much English) of "Jesus, I believe in You" as he does EVERY TIME HE PREACHES. So I sat through that too, and by the end of the song, I was thinking I was going to throw up (not because of the song, though I am pretty sick of it) and had a pounding headache. So pastor finished his super emotional rendition of the song (three times through), and then started preaching.

The sermon was on the power of thanksgiving. Right as soon as he said that, I remembered that I was supposed to call my family while they were at Thanksgiving dinner at gramma's house before I went to church. I must have been starting to be sick last night because I left a candle burning all night long on accident. I get really forgetful when I don't feel good. Anyways, right then, I grabbed my phone to text dad to ask if they had already left gramma's house. As I was texting, I felt Aswan jab me with his elbow. I looked up and realized that everyone in the congregation was looking at me expectantly, including the pastor.

Know how even when you're not paying attention to something, your mind kind of backlogs everything that's going on around you, and if you think for a second, you realize that you actually did just hear what was going on? Well, I am happy to report that just in the past couple months, I've been able to do that in Indonesian. It used to be that I had to really, really focus on everything that was being said because the second I spaced out, I would miss everything. But now I can kind of be half focused and still keep up. So anyways, I realized that pastor had just asked me what the population of the US is. Uhhhh.... I have no clue, and I told him so. So he asked me again. Yeah, I still didn't know. Not even ballpark. So he went on with what he was talking about (which was how all Americans have a whole holiday for giving thanks). Aswan whispered, "How can you not know the population of America?" So I replied with, "Do you know the population of Indonesia?!" He said, "Of course." And then he told it to me, but I forget.

Dad replied to my SMS saying that they'd already left, so then I had a stomach ache, a headache AND was feeling bummed that I forgot to call my family for Thanksgiving dinner. Laaaaame.

Pastor was still talking about how about 250 million Americans (he made up a number and went with it) celebrate Thanksgiving every year and how great that is that they all love God enough to have a whole holiday just to thank Him. I'm thinking, "Mmmhmm... That's what the holiday is about these days... The whole population of the US thanking God. Riiiiight..." And of course, right at that moment, he said, "Abbie, can you please come up to the front and tell us about Thanksgiving? In Indonesian, please". And he stands there, smiling, holding his microphone out to me expectantly. I asked if I could do it from my seat, but he told everyone to cheer for me to get me up to the front, so you know I had to go to the front then. Peer pressure and all that. So I'm thinking he's asking what Americans do for Thanksgiving. But no, I get up to the front, and he says, "Tell the people the history of Thanksgiving!"

So I did. And I made it through explaining how people came from England and lots of them died because of how cold winter was and because they didn't know about the crops and animals there. And I talked about the Indians and how they helped them and there was a great feast and all that. There was one other white person there too, and I got her to come up front with me and feed me information. Because like I said, when I'm sick, I forget stuff. And I'm not fluent in Indonesian. So it was a lot easier to have this girl (who is new here and doesn't speak much Indonesian) feed me stuff in English that I could just translate instead of having to remember the story and form translatable thoughts on my own. She's studied a lot more history than I have too, so through her, we got to share about how George Washington made it a national holiday, then Abraham Lincoln reinstated it as a holiday after the Civil War.

When we finished, I asked Aswan if he understood it, and he said it was really clear and that we'd done a great job.

So today I had my first experience speaking to a congregation in Indonesian. The funny thing is that I don't get nervous about speaking in front of large groups in Indonesia the way I do in America. You'd think I would, Indonesian being my second language and all. But it really doesn't bother me so much. So there's an up-side.

So This is Still Happening

2011-11-18T20:54:00.001-08:00

Went outside to take some pictures of all the red ants that have moved into my front yard. I am praying for hard rains today.

Oh, what’s that last one, you ask? Well, that is the picture that my camera somehow took by itself when red ants started going inside my boots and I accidentally dropped it. It broke.

(Don’t worry, dad, it wasn’t the Nikon.)

Bugs

2011-11-18T18:42:00.001-08:00

1. The red ants are still out there. All over the sidewalk and the yard. I guess I didn’t sweep their nests far enough away. I feel like I can’t leave my house. Also, they are doing military exercises with a helicopter over my house. They do this a few times a year. It kind of weirds me out, because the helicopters fly over really low 5 – 10 times.

2. I happened to find THIS picture on a website last night, so I spent some time today trying to track down what on earth kind of bug that is on the right. I found one in my bed (see photo below) when I lived on Sumatra last summer, but nobody knew what on earth it was.

Anyways, through a long (5 minute) tedious process, I found THIS website. Apparently, it’s a Malaysian Orchid Mantis, the most sought after mantis in captivity. Gee, I missed my chance to make money off the stuff I find in my bed. Awesome internet searching skills come in handy once again…

So This is Happening…

2011-11-18T08:10:00.001-08:00

So in case you can’t tell from the pictures, a red ant nest fell out of the tree in front of my house. I walked home in the dark. And I got ants in my pants. LITERALLY. Red ants in my pants. My legs are burning.

So of course I attempted to take a flash light out there and take pictures of them all, but they are swarming the entire sidewalk area, the lawn chairs, the LAWN, and everything else in the nearby vicinity, so I quickly aborted mission. Then I came back inside and tried to think of a safe way to get the ants away from my house. And I decided that maybe if I could sweep the fallen nest off the sidewalk, the ants would also leave the sidewalk. I didn’t want any ants getting in my pants again, so I found the shortest pajama shorts I own and put those on. Then I dug out my green rubber snake boots that I haven’t worn in forever and I cleaned them out real good and made sure there were no scorpions living inside. I donned those, grabbed a broom and a camera, took exactly one picture, and flung the nest out into the yard. While screaming and hopping from one foot to another, violently shaking whichever foot was airborne in order to knock off any ants that might be on it. All that, and the ants still made it to my thighs. I am such a martyr. I just hope the jaga didn’t see me.

Prayers for Cousins

2011-11-17T17:33:00.000-08:00

Last night, I was getting ready for bed when a Muslim friend texted me and asked, "Did you go to sleep yet?" I replied that I was reading my Bible but was going to bed soon. He replied, "I have to drive to another city right now and it's about to rain. Can you please pray for me so that it won't rain?"

Maybe he meant nothing by it and I am way overthinking it. But it was significant to me for two reasons. One, just because he asked me to pray for him. He's never done that before. And two, because the concept of prayer is so different between the two religious. Muslims pray 5 times a day in the mosque with prayers memorized in Arabic. Allah isn't exactly an approachable god for day-to-day needs. So it's odd to me that a Muslim would ask me to pray for something so seemingly mundane.

But he did. And I did. And it didn't rain at my house until after I went to bed. I don't know about the rest of his trip though. I'll have to ask him later.

Pictures!

2011-11-15T23:33:00.001-08:00

I wrote a story earlier this week about how I learned some new vocabulary while teaching English in the desa (village). And just now I remembered that I took some pictures last time I was there, so I decided to share them here!

This is the main road through the village. It’s just big enough for the car to get down! They don’t have a whole lot of cars come through there…

The room of the village elder’s house where we teach all the children. We get upwards of 40 kids K – 6 in here during the hottest part of the afternoon, and I can feel sweat dripping down my back as I teach! It also gets REALLY loud with that many kids, but we do what we can with the space we have!

I don’t have many pictures of the kids because they are still pretty shy around me. They don’t know any other white people besides the ones who come teach them – me and one other man! I did take this picture of three of the girls after English class – first thing, they ran outside and up the guava tree for a snack! The one at the top was shaking the tree so the two underneath could pick up the fruit.

A traditional Javanese village house. The houses aren’t really attached to the ground too much. They have wood walls, windows with no glass (just shutters), and dirt floors. The village leaders’ houses are usually the exceptions because they are more well off – they probably have some kind of tile for the floor.

The village mosque. There are no Christians in this village.

You Know You're Not in America When...

2011-11-15T23:17:00.001-08:00

...students miss several days of school due to dengue fever.

Time Flies

2011-11-15T06:50:00.001-08:00

I've been going to bed later and later lately, and I haven't really been able to figure out why. So tonight I sat down and wrote down all the extra things I do after I get home from school. Things outside of regular engagements like teaching piano and guitar, choir practice, teacher meetings, church, Bible study, etc. Here is the list I came up with...

1. Practice guitar. I've been working on some new songs. Ready to take this show on the road! Or maybe not... But I lead worship fairly regularly for one fellowship and sporadically for other churches and things, so I like to keep my skills up.

2. Crochet. I'm teaching myself how, and it's been an arduous process. But I'm getting there, and I think it's a skill worth having, so I've been putting time into that.

3. Exercise. Granted, I don't do a lot of this, but I've been trying lately. I might go for a walk or do some stretches or just do 50 situps before bed.

4. Read. I am always reading something. It might be a good book or a devotional, or it might be something totally lame like a stack of out of date US Weekly magazines that my friend gave to me. This is probably the only 100% relaxing thing on my list.

5. Learn language. Trying to add to my vocab. I might read a book or the Bible in Indonesian, looking up and making lists of all the words I don't know. Or I might just peruse the dictionary to find new words to learn.

6. Dinner. A girl's gotta eat. Sometimes I go out, but most times I just reheat whatever my helper cooked earlier in the day. This usually involves cutting the chunks of fat and bones out of it (because Indonesians are not at all discriminating about what they eat), heating it up with whatever method works best, and steaming rice to go with.

7. Clean up after myself. I know I have a house helper, but I try to make a point of not leaving a huge mess for her to have to clean each day. She does the dishes, laundry, and cleans the floors, but I pick up after myself, keep everything where it belongs, wipe up spills, throw dirty clothes in the hamper, rinse/soak dishes, and the like.

8. Shower. And even that doesn't happen every day. Sometimes it takes some work to get the hot water to work and who has the time?

9. Boyfriend. Spending time with him is definitely important. But no, I don't see him every day. In fact, we hung out Sunday, but that's the only day I've seen him since last Wednesday. Sometimes I forget we live in the same town.

10. TESOL. I will be finished by the end of this month! Working on two massive papers that need to be turned in by the 30th in order for me to receive my certification.

11. Online. I have a rule that I'm not allowed to be on the computer after 10 PM. This means I need to go like now. But I just want to point out that when you live 12,000 miles away from half the people you know and love, it does take some serious internet time to keep up with them all. Also, I have a tumblr, a pinterest, a blog, a facebook account, AND a twitter account to peruse as often as possible...

Now I guess it's no mystery why I can't go to bed early!!

Finally

2011-11-14T23:28:00.001-08:00

Do you remember right before I went home to America at the beginning of June? And something really bad happened to our community here right at that time? And I couldn't really talk about it because not everybody knew about it because nobody was really supposed to know? Well, partway through the summer, the affected family released details about what happened and gave their permission for the event to be known. I've just really never talked about it because I haven't wanted to. I still don't want to. Because I don't know how to process it, so I haven't. And I cry like a little girl every time it gets brought up. But I found something today that I want to share with you, and in order to do that, I need to explain what happened here at the end of May, so here it goes.

My (former) boss is an amazing guy. He lived and served in Indonesia for 13 or 14 years before deciding two years ago that he would move his family back to America this year. They have three children, all of whom I have taught, and their second graduated in May. Their reasoning was that by then, 2/3 of their children would be in America, so it was time to return. Only things didn't go as planned. During her junior year, their oldest daughter, Lainy, got extremely sick, but nobody could ever explain why. She saw doctors in various countries, but not a single one knew what was causing her illness. It got to the point of where she would be in bed with a migraine and throwing up for days. Other days, she would be fine, but then would pass out randomly, falling and bruising her body. She came to school on crutches regularly and often had black eyes. She basically looked like she was being extremely abused. She was only able to come to school one or two days a week for most of her junior year and had to retake some of her classes as a senior. By her senior year, she was on medicine that helped control some of her symptoms, but still nobody knew what was wrong. She was on the basketball team, but rarely played because she was too weak. She couldn't even stand for long periods of time. She also lost feeling in her arms and legs. She did manage to graduate and she went back to America with plans to start college at a small Christian school in Indiana. But she was just too sick, so her mom (our science teacher) went back to be with her in October of 2010. They stayed there together, seeing various doctors and trying different medicines, until December, when they both moved back to Indonesia. During that time, doctors discovered that all her symptoms were related to a type of parasite that is transmitted by snails (who knew?!). So she was being treated, but the healing process can and will take years.

At the end of May, the family had 3 weeks left in Indonesia. They were planning on going to Australia for a family vacation before heading back and settling in to their new home in the States. One day, during our finals week at school, Lainy was home alone and feeling good, so she decided to go for a walk near her house. While she was out, two Indonesian men attacked her with a knife, forced her off the road and raped her. In broad daylight.

Three weeks short of the completion of more than a dozen years of service to this country. This.

There are people in this community who have known Lainy since she was in Kindergarten. That's how old she was when she moved here. We have all seen what she has gone through the last three years, and we have all heard her amazing testimony. She hates being sick, but she knows that God is doing something big in her life. But to see her have to go through this was almost more than we could all bear.

Anyways, I'm writing this because I found something today that I thought was really, really neat. Lainy's younger sister, who graduated high school two days after her sister was raped, recently wrote and recorded a song dedicated to Lainy. I just happened to come across it online. And you should listen to it. This song alone is a great testimony to Lainy's amazing faith. Click HERE to listen.

New Vocab

2011-11-14T16:19:00.001-08:00

On Saturdays, I go with some friends into two local villages to teach English to the kids there. The first village is smaller and has two or three Christian families living there. Only 5 - 10 kids come to learn English in that village, and we teach them in the tiny one room church they have. One time I asked the kids how many people come to that church, and they told me 11. The second village is 100% Muslim, and we usually have 30 - 40 kids come - all elementary age! Depending on how many teachers we have, we split them up into groups by age/grade and teach them on the floor of the village elder's house.

Last week, we were teaching them family words. Father, mother, sister, brother, aunt, uncle, cousin, grandmother, grandfather, niece, nephew, etc. I had the third and fourth graders. We learned all the words, talked about how to spell them, played some games, worked on memorizing the words, then worked on a little bit of simple present tense. We still had some time left, so I taught them how to ask, "How many ___________ do you have?" (filling in the blank with a family word) So we took turns asking each other, "How many sisters do you have?", "How many grandfathers do you have?", "How many cousins do you have?" and so on.

We ran into a problem though. It all started when I asked each of them in turn, "How many fathers do you have?" Of course, they all said "I have one father". I made a joke about how it would be weird to have two or three fathers. Very seriously, they answered, "Yes, but lots of people have more than one mother!" So true in Muslim society. Later on, when I asked, "How many sisters do you have?", the first little girl got confused and asked, "Anak kandung?" Anak means child. Kandung means uterus/womb/fetus. So I thought she was asking me if I wanted her to count an unborn baby as a sister, like if her mom is currently pregnant. I wasn't sure though, so I asked her what she meant. The explanation she gave me went something like this, "You know, anak kandung. Like the kids in your main family. Not the kids that you take from the road or anything like that." OK, I was really confused then. I ended up telling her that she could count however she wanted.

Later on, I asked one of the men to explain to me what it means, and he told me that anak kandung means children from the same womb or mother. So if a man has two wives, and the first has 3 kids and the second has 2 kids, if I were to ask a child from the first wife how many anak kandung siblings they have, they would only count their mother's two other children as their siblings. But if someone were to ask them how many children were in the WHOLE family, they would count all four siblings from the same father.

Good to know. And strange that I live in a society that has such language for multiple wives with multiple children.

Walt Disney Wants Me.

2011-11-11T16:40:00.000-08:00

Following is an email I opened less than 5 minutes ago. I'm posting it here, because it is all kinds of crazy. Disney? Education? China? Where did they get my name??

Hi,

During a recent recruiting search, your resume came up as meeting our criteria. Based on your qualifications we would like to inform you about career opportunities with Disney English.

Disney English, the Education segment of The Walt Disney Company, is looking for the best and brightest educators to instruct children ages 2-12 in an intensive program at our Language Learning Centers throughout China.

Foreign Trainers will follow an innovative and immersive Disney inspired program, leveraging state-of-the-art technology as well as Disney's beloved characters and stories to provide students with a highly engaging and effective premium learning experience.

Language Learning Directors are responsible for managing the foreign and local trainers, ensuring consistent excellence in our overall program delivery and ensuring that Disney English is a highly effective and unforgettable classroom experience for our young language learners.

Please reply to this email with an attached resume if you or someone you know is interested in our program. To qualify, candidates must:

Have a Bachelors degree
Have 2 years or more after graduation work experience (at least 1 year must be teaching)
Be a native English speaker

Regards,
Asha Bates
Consultant, Disney English

GRANOLA!

2011-11-10T19:22:00.000-08:00

I got hooked on granola when I lived in Kenya. I didn't have a house helper there, but my neighbors did. Their helpers would make granola and they would share with us. There wasn't a whole lot of milk or yogurt available (unless you like camel milk sold in a plastic bag), so I learned to just eat it plain. When I got back to America, I found that granola is stinkin expensive, so I never really ate it there other than the occasional granola bar on the go. Then I moved to Indonesia. And I got a house helper. And I found out that she can make granola! So I have her make it from time to time.

Apparently, I got Aswan hooked as well, and a few weeks ago, he wanted to learn how to make it himself. So we made a batch ourselves during fall break loosely based on a recipe I found on the internet. It came out not very crunchy and a little odd tasting. I chalk that up to the fact that my brown sugar had fermented and the honey was 3 years old. We still ate it all.

Wednesday, boyfriend came down with a nasty cold. Thursday he had to get up at like 5 AM to drive some people to a conference in Surabaya - the second biggest city on the far East coast of Java, about 7 hours away. So what did he do Wednesday night? He drove his bike to my house. In the rain. And asked if we can make some granola because he really wanted to eat granola. Apparently granola is now his comfort food. He was so wet and sounded so sick, so of COURSE we made some! He wanted to make his own, and since we had made it once before and knew what was good and what needed improvement, we both made our own batches, no recipe involved. He wanted his crunchy. It ended up turning black and tasting kind of burnt because he left it in the oven for like an hour. But mine came out great! Boyfriend was gonna take his to Surabaya with him so that he would have something to snack on while driving, but I put my foot down and made him take mine. There was a little that didn't fit in the container, so I ate that much. And it was GOOD. So Aswan was like, "You need to write down how you made that so we can make it again". So I wrote it down the way I remembered it, and here is my recipe for really good granola. It's easy!

Ingredients:
1/4 kg oatmeal
1/2 a stick of melted butter (real butter)
3 giant spoonfulls of brown sugar
quite a bit of cinnamon
a tiny bit of nutmeg
several squirts of vanilla extract
a handful of flax seed
a handful of sesame seeds
1/10 kg dried shredded coconut
the rest of a bottle of honey
like 5 spoonfulls of sunflower seed oil or any other vegetable-type oil

Turn the oven on to some arbitrary temperature. Mix up all the ingredients in a bowl then press them onto a cookie sheet and bake until it smells like it might start to burn soon. Take it out and let it cool. Then you can cut it up into bars or crumble it up in chunks.

Alternatively, you could just dump the mixture onto the cookie sheet and spread it out fairly evenly. Get it out and stir it up every 10 minutes so the bottom doesn't burn, and then you'll have cereal-type granola. That's what we did last time and what boyfriend did this time. He just kept deciding it wasn't crunchy enough and putting it back in for 10 more minutes. As it cools, it tends to get crunchier though...

I like granola because you can throw in just about anything you want. Dried fruit, sunflower seeds, chocolate chips, nuts, a brisket. The possibilities are endless.

Quote of the Day

2011-11-07T17:29:00.001-08:00

After reading a quote by Voltaire written on my chalkboard...

11th grader: Who is Voltaire?
Me: A French philosopher who lived in the 1700s.
11th grader: Oh. Is that who they named Volt energy drink after?
Me: Uhh.... I don't think so.

2011-11-07T05:03:00.000-08:00

Before you read the conversation below, you should know that pretty much all Indonesians take two baths a day - once when they first wake up, and once in the afternoon. But never after dark, because you will get sick and die. It may be a third world country, but you can rarely accuse an Indonesian of being dirty. In fact, all my friends think I'm gross because I only bathe about three times a WEEK! I say if you're not sweaty and dirty, why waste water? Bathing twice a day every day seems excessive to me. But anyways...

Boyfriend: What time are we going to Val's house tonight?
Me: Whenever, no set time.
Boyfriend: Good, because I want to take a shower first.
Me: OK.
Boyfriend: I didn't mandi (bathe) yet today.
Me: WHAT?! Are you even Indonesian?!? No mandi this morning?!
Boyfriend: Yeah, I haven't mandi-ed in the morning for a long time. One mandi a day is enough for me.
Me: Seriously?
Boyfriend: Yeah, I'm turning into an American. I mean, if you mandi at night, it's useless to mandi in the morning too, because you didn't get dirty since the last mandi.
Me: Oh my goodness... Finally, somebody understands me...
Boyfriend: Americans. You people are pretty smart.

Idul Adha

2011-11-05T17:51:00.000-07:00

Today is Idul Adha, the second biggest Muslim holiday of the year. It is the day on which they commemorate the time God sent a ram to Abraham so that he wouldn't have to sacrifice his own son. Of course, they believe that son was Ishmael, while the Christian Bible states that it was Isaac, the son through whom the blessing was to come. They mark this day by staying up all night the previous night having parades and marching around town chanting, "ALLEHU AKBAR!" It's pretty loud. Then on the day of, they go to the mosques and sacrifice goats and cows and pray a lot, then after all the blood has been drained out of the meat, they cut it up and divide it between themselves, any other friends who have come (including white people who are there watching) and enough to give the poor. On this day, everybody eats meat.

Anyways, I want to ask prayers for one man. He's the friend of a friend, an older Javanese man, and he recently became a believer. They don't call him a Christian, just a believer. He's been reading his Bible a lot lately, and he's really felt convicted about the verses about feeding the poor and also, "what you did for the least of these, you did for me." So on this day, he, as a believer, is going to butcher several goats himself, then take the meat to some different parts of town and give it all away to the poor while sharing his testimony and the fact that he didn't have to sacrifice these animals to Allah, because his God already sent the ultimate sacrifice.

Telling people about Jesus in the biggest Muslim country in the world is never easy. In fact, proselytizing is illegal. And through his actions, he could very easily face persecution on a large scale. Pray that his words would fall on open ears and ready hearts and that God would protect him! He's already put his plan into action as I type this, so as soon as you read this post, get praying! : ) Thanks!

Seriously?

2011-11-04T17:39:00.000-07:00

Apparently the language school next door is either building a house or possibly just pounding lots and lots of nails into a piece of wood. 10 feet from my bed. At 7:30. On Saturday morning. Guess who's awake and cranky about it? Yes, that would be me.

Updates, Because I am Generally Bad at Them

2011-11-03T08:16:00.001-07:00

1. They have still not caught the Afghans running loose around here.

2. My friend is still kidnapped by pirates. She was able to get word somehow to her org in Denmark that she is alive and well. That's all that we know though.

OKTHEEND.

600th Post!

2011-11-02T20:45:00.000-07:00

Our school orchestra, which is made up of people ranging in age from 5th grade to 40s, wants to play Vivaldi's Gloria for the school Christmas concert in December. They asked for people willing to sing. So I joined choir?

The practices are only one hour a week, and now that rainy season seems to finally have settled in, it's usually raining after school, so I might as well stay an extra hour on that one day anyways, right? First practice yesterday worked out well - it was pouring when we started, but the rain was over when we finished. So practice was especially beneficial to me since I'm not yet in the habit of bringing an umbrella with me to school.

So now... I teach piano and do math tutoring on Mondays, give guitar lessons on Tuesdays, have teacher meetings and choir practice on Wednesdays, lead worship for English language fellowship on Thursdays, and work at the coffeeshop on Fridays. Now I have a matching set of full evenings, thank goodness. My Wednesdays were feeling naked.

2011-10-31T19:34:00.001-07:00

"You look two years younger today. Or actually.... You look like someone's mom."

Thank you, ninth grader.

Afghans on the Loose

2011-10-31T17:22:00.001-07:00

Not Afghan hounds. Not Afghans like the ones your great-grandmother crochets. I'm talking about passport holding Afghani people. Twenty-five of them, to be exact. Illegals. Here. In my town. Here are the facts as they were related to me:

Twenty-five illegal Afghan immigrants landed in the coastal city of Semarang a few days ago. Their final destination was Australia, but the Indonesian government caught wind of them and arrested all twenty-five. Their plan was to drive them to Surabaya (the second largest city in the country) and put them on a boat back to Afghanistan. The road from Semarang to Surabaya passes through my town. And it was while they were in my town that the twenty-five Afghans hatched a plan. They were all riding in a bus with a police escort, and apparently Indonesian law mandates that you cannot handcuff people unless they are criminals. Because these people were only illegal immigrants, they were not bound or restrained in any way. So they ganged up on the bus driver and his friend. Friend got thrown off the bus into a field and the driver was tied up and gagged. All twenty-five Afghans ran for it. The police escort managed to recapture twenty of them directly. But there are still five on the loose.

I don't know what neighborhood exactly they were in when they busted out. But the toll road they were on runs about a kilometer from my house. So the police have told us all to be on the lookout for anyone "with an Arab face". You know, brown eyes, dark skin, dark hair. JUST LIKE EVERYBODY HERE. That should be easy.

In other news, my friend Jess who was captured by pirates a week ago today was able to get word to her org to say that she and her coworker, Poul, are alive and well. Praise God for that! Now to get them out of there...

You Will Never Guess...

2011-10-30T07:48:00.000-07:00

I've only been going to my current Indonesian church regularly for a little over a year now. I started when I felt my Indonesian was good enough to actually get something out of the sermons. Something I've been a little surprised about are the ways that Indonesian churches (mine and others) celebrate Christmas. For example, two years ago, before I even started attending an Indonesian church, an (Indonesian) acquaintance of mine (who happens to attend one of the top 3 biggest churches in town) came to me one day in early December and asked me, "Abbie, are you free on Christmas Sunday? My church needs five white people to dress up like Santa for our service". I flat out refused. So he asked, "Well, could you ask some of your white friends?" Again, I flat out refused. What CHURCH needs five SANTAS?!? And why do they need white people?! (Answer: It's a status thing)

Anyways, back to last year - I started going to Indonesian church. Indonesians really like themes and dress codes. My first Christmas with my church was themed, "Green Christmas: Heal the World". The congregation went around town planting something like five hundred trees. Everyone took 4 or 5 and planted them wherever they thought they'd look nice, then met back at the church for lunch. That happened a couple days before Christmas Sunday, and sadly, I had prior obligations and was unable to attend. The Christmas sermon was all about being good stewards of the earth. And at the end, instead of the traditional "Silent Night" while holding hands around the sanctuary that I'm used to, we all sang (did you guess it already?) "Heal the World". Yup, the old Michael Jackson classic, complete with heartfelt amens and hallelujahs. I thought it was a little ridiculous. Oh, and we were all supposed to wear green. Or red if you had no green.

So in all fairness, I should have been prepared for this year's theme, announced at the end of church today.

Some churches just have quiet Christmases, members of the congregation exchanging gifts and cards with each other. In some, little kids perform songs they've practiced for months. Some do skits or whole plays. Some go the whole candlelight service route. Others like to get more involved and do clothes drives or open soup kitchens.

But not my church. Oh, not my church. God forbid we do anything normal like hold candles or sing traditional songs*. Oh, heavens, no... My church? My church kicks it up a notch.

The theme for this year's Christmas is (did you guess it yet? If you actually did, I'd probably give you a million dollars. If I could. Because you'd deserve it)....

MASS CIRCUMCISIONS!

That's right. Mass circumcisions. And I don't even mean that figuratively, however that could be meant figuratively. We are really reaching out to the community with this one. Too poor to pay for your teenage** son to get circumcised? No problem! Father's House Community Church will do it for free! FOR CHRISTMAS! And by "FHCC", I actually mean "a doctor". But he's not doing it for free - we have to pay him. We'll just arrange for him to be ready at the church with his scissors sharpened, then we'll serve you some snacks when the doctor is finished with you! Because you know you're gonna wanna eat as soon as you get part of your body cut off. So come one, come all, young and old, and don't forget your bullet to bite down on! Free circumcisions to all, and to all a goodnight!

(At least there's no dress code. I hate to think what it would be. Can't wait to hear the Christmas Sunday sermon though...)

*These things, by the way, are also considered normal in Indonesia. I'm not being totally ethnocentric here.

**Most Indonesian boys are circumcised between the ages of 10 and 14. It's a big sacred ceremonial becoming-a-man thing. The whole family/village comes to watch, and the kid gets lots of money and a sarong to wear for the next week.

Neighbors

2011-10-29T17:22:00.000-07:00

So apparently the Scroggins family is moving into the dorm next door. Scroggins? Really? I thought I stopped being neighbors with Kentucky three years ago.

Real Life Pirates

2011-10-28T08:06:00.001-07:00

Hey. So a super neat lady I worked with in Kenya got kidnapped by pirates on Tuesday. Like REAL pirates. Somali pirates. THOSE pirates. They are holding her and one other man for ransom. This same group killed a French woman they had in captivity earlier this month.

Her name is Jess, and that’s her in the middle, right next to me. Every single person in this picture makes the list of the most amazing people I’ve ever met and will never forget, but Jess takes the cake. She has chosen to be obedient to God and to serve in what is currently the most dangerous place for foreign aid workers worldwide (according to one article I read). Please, please, please pray for her…

For more, you can read THIS ARTICLE.

Happenings

2011-10-28T07:55:00.001-07:00

1. Black cat brought a dead rat inside tonight while I was watching a movie with boyfriend (on a related side-note, boyfriend LOVED Swiss Family Robinson. He sat all leaned forward with his elbows on his knees for most of it). She took it under the kitchen table and attempted to play with it. The rat didn’t seem too into it. Boyfriend almost peed his pants.

2. I had a whole conversation with an Indonesian today about arm hair. They are truly fascinated. The conversation ended when he asked if he could have some of mine.

3. I mailed a Christmas box to my family today. That is truly amazing. Christmas shopping in 100 degree heat in October. Who ever heard of such a thing?

4. Boyfriend and I cooked dinner tonight – an impressive Indo version of taco soup. It only took 3 of us. I sent my helper to the market earlier with a list of fresh ingredients while I hit up 2 different import stores to find tomato sauce and a can of black beans. Then we met back up at the house to wash and prep all the fresh stuff. Cooking is tough when you don’t have canned/frozen items readily or cheaply available. Do you know how long kidney beans have to boil for before they’re soft enough to eat?? A WHOLE DAY! Ah, well, such is life. And at least I’m eating semi-organically. I left all the chopping and dicing for boyfriend to do when he got came over after work because he dices like a guy selling knives on an infomercial. It is truly amazing. Also, I can’t chop onions without sobbing my eyes out, so I definitely left those for him. But the bottom line is that the soup was delicious; however, I overshot the amount of ingredients (it’s really hard to know how many ears are in “1-10 oz bag of frozen corn”) and we have LOTS of leftovers. So tomorrow we’re making tortillas and chips to go with it.

5. I consider my week off over today since it is the last official day “off”. Tomorrow is Saturday, then comes Sunday, which I would normally have off anyways, so it’s not special anymore. I’ve made several things this week which include the following:

6. Besides Christmas shopping, I also did some shopping for myself this week. That includes supplies for most of the crafts above. I actually found a very limited and highly controlled selection of paint cards that I used for the calendar. I swiped as many as I thought I could while a store employee stood over me watching. I also found a store that sells wool yarn, one size of knitting needles, and BOLTS of cross-stitch fabric. Fun, fun! I think my most useful purchase of the week though was this:

Which is a definite upgrade from this:

I don’t even know what happened to that one on the right. It just turned brown one day. None of them cut worth a darn. That’s what I get for buying 40 cent knives at the open air market. So I splurged a little bit and got a knife set with a block. I’m a big fan already. So was boyfriend earlier with the chopping and dicing. I fear for his fingers.

7. Lastly, here is proof that you can get a sunburn in the shade in Indonesia. No joke. These pictures are from last weekend. Two days in a row of sitting under a tent watching a soccer tournament. It was ridiculously hot, and the only time I wasn’t sitting in the shade was when I was walking 20 seconds to the food tent or 30 seconds to the bathroom. I even wore sunscreen the second day and got burned AGAIN!

Obviously, I am awesome at self-portraits.

OK, that’s all for now. Bye!

Cats...

2011-10-27T08:46:00.001-07:00

Black cat is methodically searching for something in every single nook and cranny of my bedroom. She's made it about halfway through everything. She even got her entire body under my pillow to make sure that all is well on that front. Now she's climbing the shelves of my lemari (wardrobe thingie) and wedging her face down into the piles of shirts and pants. She also climbed my hanging clothes to check those out top to bottom. That was after climbing into the dirty clothes hamper to make sure nothing in there could eat me in my sleep which immediately preceded crawling inside a folded up blanket on the floor. Earlier, she was on the desk using her paw to move around all the pencils and pens in their jar as she peered down into it. I really wonder what goes through their minds sometimes.

She's been rather quiet ever since I got about halfway through writing this. Let's see where she is...

Hmm... Oddly enough, nowhere to be found. And not coming when I call. Maybe she caught a lizard and ran outside to play with it.

These cats. I regularly find them sleeping on top of a stack of pants, inside the luggage under my bed, underneath couch cushions, inside my backpack, etc. They're a little crazy, but somehow I feel safer having them around. Also, no rats!

Foodfoodfoodfood

2011-10-19T21:02:00.000-07:00

This has been a fabulous week, culinarily speaking. Monday, boyfriend and I ate at one of our favorite sidewalk stands, nasi bakar. GRILLED RICE! Delicious. Then on Tuesday, we attempted to make granola for the first time ever. It is quite delicious, if I do say so myself. Boyfriend was super excited, as he's been craving granola for days. We had to go out in the rain to three different stores to find the ONE ingredient that I didn't have (vegetable oil), and then we had to wait for about 20 minutes to let the hundreds of terrified ants evacuate from the oatmeal. But it was worth it. Cinnamon honey granola. Yum. Wednesday, I had Indian food. Like authentic Indian food made by the mother of one of my students - an Indian. So delicious. Today, the Java Dorm is bringing me a grilled stuffed burrito for lunch as a thank you for dormsitting. And as I've mentioned once or twice before, they have the best food. They even use cilantro, which is mostly nonexistent in Indonesia. For dinner, I'll have another grilled stuffed burrito (leftover from lunch, because I can only eat one - they're so huge!). And tomorrow, it's fajitas and probably a treat from the coffeeshop.

Then this weekend is the huge international soccer tournament which also means international food stands! Grilled hamburgers and hotdogs and Korean food and Indian food. This week has been the next best thing to eating in Bali, and all right here in Central Java!

This may not seem exciting to you, but when you eat some variation of chicken and rice twice a day EVERY DAY... Well, little treats like these aren't so little anymore!

These Things Happen

2011-10-18T00:52:00.001-07:00

So I was gonna take a shower last night before bed, but then I wrote my 2 most recent blog posts instead and ended up taking a shower this morning. Which means I wore my hair down to school since it was wet when I left the house. And it is BLAZING hot this week. So I have resorted to this in an attempt to keep somewhat cool:

Yup, that’s right. I pile my hair on top of my head and twist it around itself to keep it in place. My students have gotten used to it. I taught like this. I look amazing.

Also, now I can share what on earth I was talking about last night about asking for prayer for the one family facing a difficult situation. Remember how I was last minute dorm-sitting? Well, the dorm parents came back to Indo yesterday afternoon with the news that their sending org is calling them back to the States. They have TWO WEEKS to sell everything, pack up what’s left, and get the heck out of Dodge. For the kids in school, they are leaving mid-semester and are going to have to get put into public schools in the States. They have no jobs, no house, no transportation, no income in America. They’ll have to leave their two dogs and the vast, vast majority of their belongings behind. They’ve spent the past 10+ years building their life here. Their kids have spent most – or all – of their childhoods in Indonesia. They are involved in so many areas of ministry here – as dorm parents, at our school, in various Bible studies, at their church, they even started an Awana program here. And now they have 2 weeks to say their goodbyes, tie up all their loose ends, and leave it all behind. The dorm kids have no place to stay anymore. Those who are employed there – 5 Indonesian staff – no longer have jobs.

I don’t know the whole story or all the reasons why they are being called off the field, but from what I do know, it seems like a very unjust overreaction to an accidental misunderstanding. It makes me really glad that I am not here through any org or sending agency. And it infuriates me to see the way people are being treated in this situation. My heart especially breaks for the kids. This is the only life they’ve known. They’re great kids, and I know they’ll adjust, but already today, I’ve seen them make the first of many tearful goodbyes to come. It’s always hard to see people go, but it’s even harder when they haven’t chosen to. Please continue to pray…

Things and Things

2011-10-17T08:27:00.001-07:00

Got these this week – funny that they showed up in my mailbox on the same day given that I get approximately zero handwritten items per year apart from my birthday and Christmas and this month contains neither of those.

They totally made my day. I think the Indonesian guy who saw me find them in my mailbox must think I’m crazy. Looks like I’ve got some letter writing to do!

In other news, we are hosting a huge soccer tournament for all the international schools on Java and Bali this weekend. And then… NO SCHOOL FOR A WEEK! And for the first time ever, I’m NOT TRAVELING during the long break. I CANNOT WAIT.

In other other news, watch THIS. The most awesomest version of the Doxology that will ever fall upon your ears. Just do it.

Funny How Quickly Things can Change

2011-10-17T08:24:00.001-07:00

Well, over the past week, not a whole lot has changed other than that I got a little better at pool, thanks to the pool table in the Java dorm. Today was a different story though. Boyfriend had a job interview this morning in Semarang, and if he gets the job, he could be moving an hour and a half away from my house, as opposed to 8 minutes. That’s a hard thought.

After school, I was over at the dorm when the dorm parents suddenly came home, unannounced – from America! The kids and I didn’t even know they were coming home today – we were just hoping they’d be home by this weekend. So I suddenly packed up a week’s worth of stuff and moved back to my own house. It’s a nice change, but it seems too quiet.

There is a family leaving in November due to health reasons, and I bought several picture frames and their massive desk, which was all moved in while I was gone. So I spent a good part of this evening repainting picture frames and organizing my life in my new desk.

It was originally painted black, but I had Mas Deni (the guy who made the bookshelf-now-craftshelf on the left) sand and stain it to match the bookshelf. This desk is awesome – I was able to get rid of my little dorm desk and my crappy wicker-ish bookshelf that I’ve had for three years. I was thankful for those things, but it’s nice to actually have two pieces of furniture that match! I guess the four chairs around the kitchen table all match… but they don’t match the table! The spaciousness of the rest of my room was sacrificed for this desk though. My room is in an L shape – the short leg of the L is occupied entirely by the above 2 items, and now the long part looks like this:

Why, yes… yes I do have a door straight to the outdoors in my bedroom. Don’t you?

And one more shot from over by my bed…

Aaaaah! It’s just so nice! I’m loving it. Organization makes me happy. And see that ugly green plastic thing to the right of the desk? I got everything in that to fit in the desk tonight, so now I can get rid of that too! Next on the list is a matching lemari (the wardrobe thing). The one I currently have is owned by the school, and appears to be 80 year old plywood covered in paper made to look like wood. Again, I’m glad to have it. But I think that my realization that I’m going to be here more than 3 years is manifesting itself through me buying real furniture of my own.

Oya, when I was moving my books off my old bookshelf, I realized that some ants had moved in…

Wellllllllcome to Indonesia…

On another note, I talked to some friends today who are facing a super tough situation. I’m not sure how open they’ve been with our community about it, and since I know there are people within this community who read my blog, I better not say too much for now. But I know they’d appreciate prayers!

Watching a Soccer Game with a 3 Year Old

2011-10-11T03:35:00.000-07:00

"Let's go Eagles, let's go! Let's go Eagles, let's go! Go yellow! Go yeeeeellllllllllllllloooooooooooow! SANTACLAUSESANTACLAUSESANTACLAUSESANTASANTASANTA!!! SAAAANTA! SIAPA MAU BERDOA?!?"

(Siapa mau berdoa? = Who wants to pray?)

I Love Living in the Java Dorm

2011-10-10T17:32:00.000-07:00

I was the only one awake in the dorm for breakfast this morning. When I came up to the dorm kitchen/dining area, I met the helper and we had this conversation:
Her: Can I make you some breakfast?
Me: Sure! What's on the menu?
Her: Omelettes.
Me: Great!
Her: Do you want it with bacon?
Me: Yes!
Her: Cheese?
Me: Yes!
Her: Tomato?
Me: A little bit.
Her: OK. *starts cooking*

After I had finished eating, she asked me, "Do you need me to clean your room today?"

Wow. I mean, I have a helper who cleans my room and makes my bed every day. But the omelette was the real kicker. With REAL cheese. And BACON. Do you know how rarely we eat pork products in this country?! Pork is forbidden for like 94% of the people of this island. It is a delicacy. And a great way to start my day. Also, the real cheese didn't hurt. : )

Well, This Explains a LOT...

2011-10-09T19:48:00.001-07:00

A fellow teacher emailed out an article about spotting illnesses early. The article began with this:

We found the top ten virus and bacteria facts that teachers have to know (even if you don’t want to).
1) Top spot for classroom viral presence: student desktop [1]
2) Top spot for bacteria presence: water fountain toggle [1]
3) Most germy job: teacher (Are we surprised?) [1]
4) Germs build up throughout the day. By the afternoon, 50% of classroom surfaces have the flu virus. [1]
5) Teacher illness-related absences average 5.3 days a year. [2]
6) 622 million school days are lost each year in the US due to the common cold. [3]
7) The cold season starts in late August and lasts until April. [3]
8) Forty percent of parents have sent a child to school sick. [4]
9) Seventy-four percent of teachers believe they have missed school because of illnesses picked up from their students. [5]
10) Germs can survive on surfaces for up to 72 hours! [1]
Sources: [1] Study by Charles P. Gerba, University of Arizona, 2005; [2] It’s a Snap, Clean Hands Statistics, [3] Centers for Disease Control and Prevention [4] June 2006 Clorox Survey, [5] 2005 Scholastic.com survey

So that could explain why I'm so sick all the time. However, I am proud to report that I'm now on my third week of NO SICKNESS! The year started out rough with the flu, food poisoning and a gum infection all in the first month or so, but going strong now! Woohoo!

Lost in Translation

2011-10-09T07:24:00.000-07:00

1. I'm watching Hidden Cities on the History channel right now, and this episode focuses on Indonesia. The host is butchering the language. He's in Jogja right now talking about the grounds of the 16th century sultan's palace. I've been there. Its name is Kota Gede. He's got the kota pronunciation down, but he's struggling with gede. It's pronounced kind of like guh-DAY. He keeps saying GAY-day. In the time it took me to write that, he moved on to Mount Merapi. Butchering that too. OHMYGOSH! If you're going to use local words, learn to pronounce them before you go on international TV! It's not that hard!

2. We had an American (Todd from Idaho) sharing at church this morning. It was a pretty good sermon. For a group of intellectuals. But not when someone half your age who has no theology degree is trying to translate what you're saying into one of the most bare bones languages in the developed world. I mean, Indonesian uses the same word for anything that is pleasing to any of the 5 senses. If it tastes good, it's enak. If it feels good, it's enak. If something is comfortable, it's enak. If the view is nice, it is enak. If something smells nice, it's enak. And so on. The poor translator, bless his heart, did an AMAZING job. But things like, "God has infused us with zillions of bits of His own DNA, and so our task here on earth isn't to go to church, it is to BE the church" just really don't translate. (The translator didn't know the word "infused", zillions ISN'T EVEN A REAL WORD, nobody understood how we can have pieces of God in us, and the concept of "church" doesn't translate well either, especially not when people ARE the church. Add to that the fact there isn't a common usage form of the verb "to be" in Indonesian.) Todd from Idaho used a lot of idioms, figurative speech and abstract language too. It took more than an hour to get through the sermon, and by the end, everyone was pretty confused...

3. Earlier, a white friend offered me some food at her house. I declined, saying that I was staying in the Java Dorm (known for having the best food in town) and that I'd had two fajitas and a bowl of chili for dinner already. An Indonesian friend, on overhearing, got confused and interjected, "WAITWAITWAIT.... You had two fetus for dinner?!" Bahaha...

Sudden Change of Plan

2011-10-08T07:19:00.000-07:00

Well, the dorm parents for the Java Dorm got suddenly called back to the States by their sending org. And by suddenly, I mean that they were told on Wednesday that they needed to be in Richmond THIS WEEK. So they asked for my help. The thing is that though there are 5 kids living in the dorm, only one is technically a "dorm kid". The other four are the children of the dorm parents. Since dorm rules are pretty strictly laid out (there have to be TWO adults at ALL TIMES in the dorm), the one dorm boy went to stay with a friend, so I'm here in the dorm with the four other kids ranging in age from 10 - 17. They're great about looking after themselves. They just need an adult presence here, especially since this dorm is a popular hangout spot for lots of other kids. I mean, there's always pails of popcorn, a pool table, ping-pong, foosball, an X-Box, a Wii, wireless internet, two dogs and two TVs with cable. So why wouldn't this be one of the most popular after school hangout locations? I mean, there's like 15 middle and high schoolers here now watching the first and second Harry Potter on one of the TVs. Also, this place is HUGE. There are 110 doors in this dorm, each with its own key. I got left a box AND a basket of keys. Aish.

Anyways, since it's only the dorm family's kids here, they know the drill, and I'm pretty free to come and go as I like. I could just about throw a rock at my house from here, which is convenient. My house is on the school campus, just inside the gates. This dorm is just outside the gates. So I still have my ever handy jagas around. In fact, hotjaga stopped by earlier to drop off something of mine that he fixed for me and to make sure that everything was going OK.

The dorm parents don't know when they'll be back. Sometime in the 2 week window. Could be a little less, probably won't be much longer. One good thing in this is that their oldest son (they have 7 kids) is graduating top of his class from Marine academy or some such thing that I don't know the proper terminology for on Wednesday, so they might actually be able to see him graduate!

So anyways, that's what's going on with me. What about you?

Funny Jaga

2011-10-06T08:02:00.001-07:00

I just got home from Bible study, and the guard at the gate greeted me with, "Silakan masuk, yang putih."

Come in, white one.

Clever man.

Recommendation Season

2011-10-04T18:52:00.000-07:00

It's that time of year again - time for writing recommendation letters for high school seniors. My first year here I got off pretty easy. I was still just building the foundation of my relationships with my students and hadn't known them all that long yet. Also, I didn't teach any of the senior class that year. The only recommendation I had to write my first year was for a 9th grader transferring to the top international high school in China. She had to have a letter from a math teacher.

My second year, I wrote a handful of recommendations, including one to MIT. Theee MIT. Intense.

My third year, I wrote a few more recommendations, because by that point, I'd taught several of the graduating seniors in previous years. I even wrote one for KAIST, the top engineering school in Korea (and 21st in the world).

I know I'm going to be inundated this year. I've taught every single person in this year's senior class a minimum of 2 years in their core math classes, but I've also taught some for longer and some for multiple classes in multiple years. Right now, I'm writing a recommendation for Stanford. I've got two more pending when I finish this one.

I hate writing recommendations. Especially to ivy league schools. It is a tremendous amount of pressure. Siiiigh... But I love my students. So I'll do it for them.

Fall

2011-10-04T07:34:00.001-07:00

Fall is undoubtedly the season that I miss the most. I can’t miss Summer because it is Summer half the year here. And I can’t miss Spring because it’s all rain and mud here the other half a year. Not a chance on earth I’ll ever miss Winter. But Fall… Fall has my heart. The smell and the crunch and the feel of the air and the mugs and the scarves and the sweatshirts and the jeans and the bonfires and the hayrides and the pumpkins and the harvests and the deer hunting and the Carhartts and the fair. I love it. It’s been hot here lately. Like really hot. Hot enough that all the grass is brown and crunchy and leaves are falling off the trees, which has been somewhat reminiscent of Fall. But not quite there.

Tonight it got pretty chilly though! I was trying to teach myself how to crochet something other than a hot pad earlier. For the second day in a row. But as it turns out, I don’t understand any of the abbreviations those old ladies use. It’s like Yo, dec 6 then ds3, skip 1, fptr and repeat. Anyways, in the middle of that, the power went out. So I lit candles. Cinnamon candles. Then it got a little windy and my feet were cold, so I put on socks. The the lights came back on after about 20 minutes. Then it cooled down even more, so I put on a sweatshirt. Then I ate a bowl of chili that Ibu Sri made for my dinner while watching a movie curled up on the couch with boyfriend. Then HE got cold, so he grabbed the fleece blanket and wrapped up.

Anyways, the point that is that due to the cinnamon smell wafting about and the wind and the chill and the socks and the sweatshirt and the chili and the movie and the blanket, it was almost Fall-ish tonight. And I enjoyed it. Thoroughly.

So that is all and now I am going to bed. At 9:30. Because I want to snuggle up with my comforter. Goodnight!

Facts

2011-10-03T05:12:00.000-07:00

1. My favorite song today that I keep playing on repeat is Cat Power's cover of Wonderwall. The Oasis version was the anthem of my Sophomore year of college. Happy, happy memories.

2. The local coffeeshop finally found a barista to work full time, so now they are open daily until 8 PM instead of just 10 - 5 on Fridays! I am so much more productive when I have a coffeeshop to work in. Of course, I spend lots of money and will probably gain weight. But being there causes me to sit still and focus for longer than 20 minutes. It helps me be a better teacher.

3. I am so happy that I got an exacto knife this summer. I'm using it to make a triangle collage of Africa. Hmmmm... Try and guess what that is.

4. The junior soccer team (7th and 8th grade) practiced on my front lawn today. I came home from the coffeeshop to find half my potted herbs knocked over, a hole blown in my screen door and little bits of wire spewn 2 meters across my living room floor. My door got nailed with a ball. Good job, junior boys.

5. I learned Dutch geography and Costa Rican culture this afternoon. I love our international community.

6. I have now gone a full week without getting sick. Hurrah!

7. I really really really wish that I was the kind of person who was awesome at long distance communication. But I am not. I really kind of stink at maintaining relationships that are right in front of me. Relationships are one of the most exhausting things for me. Life as an introvert is tough.

8. I shook hands with the Indonesian minister of education earlier today. Then he proceeded to take my picture. He came all the way from Jakarta to check out our school.

9. Had a nice talk with my boss earlier about my intentions for next year. I told him that I am planning on staying here for at least another year. (!!)

10. As of today, I have sold 6 handmade scarves, two of which were custom made in the last two weeks. Too bad I can't buy yarn here. I'd make a killing.

OKBYE.

Random Midnight Post

2011-10-01T10:02:00.000-07:00

So it's midnight on a Saturday night. And I'm not tired yet. I just read my journal from Kenya because I was trying to remember a word in Swahili. Got it. Lots and lots of good memories. And lots and lots of hard memories. It still amazes me that I was there for only two months. The things I saw... I feel like I was there for years. At one point I wrote, "No-one will understand". You can't understand what happens in Africa until you are willing to see it for yourself, really see it.

Today I went to two villages to teach English with some friends. In the first village, we taught 6 kids in a church. I asked around (it is amazing to finally be able to ask just about anything to just about anyone in Indonesian) and found out that there ARE Christians in that village. Usually the small villages are 100% Muslim. That particular church has 11 people in its congregation and the pastor comes from the city every Sunday morning. In the second village, we taught about 30 kids in the front room of the village leader's home. I never saw a church there, and when I asked, I found out that there are only 2 Christians in that entire village - an old man and his wife.

Sometimes I have this crazy thought that I just want to walk away from the life I have now and move into a village. Leave all my American-ness and my American things and my Westernized house here in the city and go live like a villager. No laptop, no Blackberry, no shower and no toilet, no fridge and no stove. I would have wooden walls chewed up by termites and dirt floors. I might have $70 a month if I get a full time job. I'd sleep on a thin pad on the floor. No tampons. No mousse for my curly hair. I'd bathe in my underwear at the village well in buckets of freezing cold water. I would only eat meat on special occasions. I'd cook on a propane burner if I ever cooked at all. And of course, I'd have to learn Javanese if I want to have any chance of surviving out there.

I was thinking about that again today while we were teaching. White people go out into some of those villages and teach English and do what they can. But let's face it - rich white people coming in their expensive cars for 45 minutes every week or two doesn't reach people or change hearts.

Sometimes I get excited when I think about doing that. Then I think about the future. And kids. And I want mine to be able to Skype with their grandparents in America. So I'll need my laptop and wireless internet. And I want them to have a good education, so I'm going to need to cough up $4000 a year or so for them to go to an international school. And I want them to have Fred Flintstone vitamins and toothbrushes. And I want them to have a balanced diet and table manners and to know how to use silverware. I want them to be able to go to college in America if they want to. I already feel stressed when I think about how on earth I'm going to pay for that, just ask Aswan - he knows. I don't want to deprive them of what they could have because of a choice that they had no say in.

Maybe village life is for me. But I don't want it for my kids. So now I feel conflicted. At 12:18 AM. This is probably a sign that I should go to bed, right? Right. Goodnight 24% of full waxing crescent moon.

Pak Dumeri

2011-09-27T06:20:00.000-07:00

jahit = sew / penjahit = someone who sews
jahat = evil / penjahat = someone who does evil
pijat = massage / pemijat = someone who gives massages

I was just telling Aswan about Pak Dumeri (who you can read about in number 4 of the list found in THIS blog from January). He is famous as a horse masseuse but can fix any bodily ailment you might have in about 2 incredibly painful minutes of jamming fingers into the right nerves. Anyway, Aswan was asking where he is located at, and we were trying to figure out "sebelah mana" (next to what). And I made some offhand comment that went kind of like this:

"Ya, Pak Dumeri sangat terkenal sebagai penjahit kuda."

Aswan replied, "Hahaha! Salah! Dia PENJAHAT kuda!"

To which I replied, "penJAHAT?! What?!"

To which he finally shouted, "PEMIJAT!"

Basically, our conversation went like this:

Me: Yeah, Pak Dumeri is famous for being a horse tailor. (I meant horse masseuse. The words are similar.)
Aswan: Hahaha! You messed up! He's a horsey evildoer!"
Me: Evildoer?! WHAT?!
Aswan: MASSEUSE!

So basically, I used the wrong Indonesian word. Then Aswan used the wrong word while trying to correct my wrong word. Then I got confused about why he was calling Pak Dumeri evil, having never met him. Then Aswan realized what he had said and that we had BOTH used the wrong word. Then we just laughed a lot.

So This is Random...

2011-09-27T03:25:00.000-07:00

... but if anybody has a few extra minutes and bucks, could you go to a hardware store or Wal-Mart under the guise of wanting to paint every room in an entire apartment building a different color and get them to let you take about elleventy jillion paint cards and mail them to me? I'm not entirely sure why I want them yet, but I want to make something. With every color ever invented, including '79 Camaro.

Kotak Pos #142
Salatiga 50711 Jateng
INDONESIA

That would be amazing. Thanks.

Desk

2011-09-26T06:57:00.001-07:00

A certain family from our community is moving soon. I hate it when people leave. But I like buying things for cheap. For example, today I bought nine large, black, handmade picture frames from them for $10. Excited to see what happens with those. But what I am really excited about is the desk I bought from them. It is huge and has lots of compartments and shelves and places for filing things and locks and keys – basically everything that my secret organizational OCD self loves.

This is the desk in their house with their stuff. I’m sure I can find lots of things to fill it up. It is all mine in about a month. Now I just have to figure out where to put it in my tiny apartment…

In other exciting news, they were finally able to identify yesterday’s suicide bomber, I am feeling more healthy, boyfriend has a fever (he said he was cold but was sweating THROUGH his hoodie), and oh yeah – MY FRIEND RUTHIE HAD A BABY! Like an hour ago. Where would I be without Facebook? Clueless is the correct answer.

OK, that is all.

My Angel

2011-09-25T20:23:00.000-07:00

My angel of the day is hotjaga. I got some kind of mild (thank goodness) food poisoning in Semarang on Saturday morning at breakfast. I ate Padang food, which is usually fairly sketchy because they leave the food sitting out in dishes all day long and people come and just help themselves to however much they want. However, the restaurant I ate at was in the mall (seemed more upscale than someplace on the sidewalk), had just opened 30 minutes prior to my eating there (so the food should have been fresh), and I did not eat any of the meat (I never eat meat, on principle, at Padang restaurants). But shortly after, I was watching Rise of Return of the Apes with some friends, and as is my habit in movie theaters, I fell asleep halfway through. But I jerked awake at some point near the end of the movie when I felt my entire breakfast coming up. Luckily, I managed to keep it down. And then I (barely) managed to keep it down through the next 2 malls as well. Unfortunately, my heart was RACING, I was super hot and sweaty even in the AC, and I was dizzy and ended up sitting on the cool tile floors of most stores we went into, much to the amusement of many Indonesian people. The motorbike ride home helped a lot with all the air blowing on me and because I was able to sit down rather than stand. But by the time I got home, I felt pretty miserable and went to bed at 8:30 after making sure an ample amount of lights in my apartment were left on just in case any emergency dashes to the bathroom were necessary.

Thank goodness no dashes were required. I slept soundly for nearly 12 hours but woke up Sunday morning late for church and still feeling pretty miserable. As long as I laid down, I was fine, but as soon as I stood up, I was sweating and dizzy. So that seemed like a pretty good excuse to stay in bed all day, reading Agatha Christie and watching movies. Aswan came over in the afternoon and helped me realize that I hadn't eaten anything since 10:30 the morning before and that I should probably get something in me. We discussed our options, which at that hour mostly included fried things. I finally decided I wanted soup, so he went to the market for me to buy garlic, carrots, potatoes, shallots and celery. I heated it up with some rice in some turkey stock I froze after Thanksgiving last year (I KNEW that would come in handy someday) and ate a little of that. I felt a little better.

This morning I was still feeling a little shaky on my feet and wondering how I was going to walk all the way to school. I figured that once I was here, I could find some way to teach sitting down if I needed to. But it was the actual getting here that concerned me. So I packed up my school things, left my house, and slowly started to walk down my sidewalk. And right at that very moment, who should pull up to the end of my sidewalk (with the sound of resounding trumpets and heavenly hosts singing hallelujah, of course) on his giant motorbike and ask me ever-so-suavely "Mau ikut?" (wanna ride?). My good friend, HOTJAGA! I told him I absolutely wanted a ride, so he drove me to school. Great timing. What a blessing.

There are few things the Javanese love more than some juicy gossip. They will go to great lengths to invent something good to talk about even if everybody knows it's not true. So of course, once hotjaga dropped me off outside my classroom and rode off into the sunset... er... sunrise, my Indonesian co-workers started to ask me, "Did he spend the night at your house?"

*forehead palm slap*

News

2011-09-25T08:08:00.001-07:00

Hey all. I don't know if you've seen anything about Indonesia in the news today or not. But just in case anybody saw and was concerned for my safety, let me just say that I'm OK. Earlier today, Sunday morning, a suicide bomber attended a large church in Solo and detonated a bomb at the end of the service as he was leaving. So far it has been confirmed that 2 people were killed - the bomber himself and an usher who was greeting him as he left - and several were taken to the hospital with injuries sustained from the blast. Right now, the president is saying that the bomber was a member of a terrorist sect from Cirebon, which is a city in West Java. So far that's all we know.

Solo is about an hour south of where I live. A little close to home, but I am safe. Local churches and Bali (of course, because Bali always goes on alert whenever there's any terrorist activity) are practicing tightened security now.

Right now a lot of Indonesians are disappointed by what has happened. I, frankly, am disappointed by the reaction of lots of Indonesians, which has been to smugly pass around photos of the suicide bomber's body - split open and laying on the front steps of the church. My friends don't understand why I refuse to look at it every time someone tries to show me on their laptop or Blackberry. It sickens me.

And speaking of sick, I got food poisoning for breakfast yesterday. Agaaaaain. Stayed in bed all day today and feeling better tonight. Hoping I can make it through school on my feet tomorrow!

Oh, Wednesday...

2011-09-21T07:53:00.000-07:00

Sometimes I like sharing about my day. So I'm gonna do that now.

6:40 - woke up 10 minutes late because my phone keeps changing the time.
7:00 - still made it to school just in time for devotions with the Indonesian staff. Managed to scarf down half a pineapple I found in the fridge on the way.
7:40 - PreCalculus, in which one boy sitting in the front managed to slowly steal all my whiteboard markers AND erasers and sneak them back to other classmates without me EVER actually seeing him do it.
8:35 - Algebra 1, in which I had to explain the concept of grade (in relation to incline) SIX times because nobody can listen the first time.
9:35 - Algebra 2, in which I gave them a critical thinking math activity and told them that they are not allowed to ask any questions about it until the last 10 minutes of class, thinking that this would keep them from asking mindless questions like they ALWAYS do. As it turns out, nobody did the project until the last 10 minutes of class in which I could not keep up with the barrage of questions. Epic backfire.
10:30 - Chapel, in which we had a praise and worship and prayer time and one senior girl shared her awesome testimony with all of us. I love having fellowship in English.
12:00 - Indonesian beef stew for lunch made without any salt or pepper. Yum.
12:35 - Geometry, in which I got told that I look like Beyonce.
1:30 - 9th grade teacher meeting in which we spent an hour discussing what on earth we are going to do to correct these behavior problems. We are going militaristic on them, because we know that is what it's going to take for this group. From now on, they raise their hand before talking. ALWAYS. And when they don't, they have to come to school 30 minutes early the next day and sit in silence. They must also pick up ALL their things (including garbage) when they leave. If the room is a mess when they go, they get 2 extra laps (almost 1/2 mile) in PE. Fingers crossed for successful implementation after meeting with the kids on Friday.
2:30 - madly grade homework for 45 minutes.
3:15 - teacher's meeting.
4:00 - open house at the new boss's house. I found two paintings of African jakaranda trees hanging on his daughter's bedroom door. I knew right away who had painted them. And that was confirmed when I read the name in the bottom corner. M. Mwangi. Martin, my Kenyan dad. And then I almost cried in front of everyone. As it turns out, nobody in my boss's family (they used to live in Kenya) ever even met Martin. They found the paintings in an empty house and kept them. So then I was one of the last to leave because we were all standing around reminiscing about Nairobi... It was really good, but it made my heart miss Africa.
5:30 - come home, realize that Ibu Sri cooked nothing today (because she was busy learning to make Indian curry at someone else's house! Score!) and a friend is coming over soon for dinner. Sit on the couch and check my email.
6:30 - drive to town and buy an awesome nasi bakar meal - rice wrapped in banana leaves and grilled, grilled tempe and chicken, crushed green chilies, and guava and mango juice, because I couldn't actually decide which one I wanted more.
7:00 - said friend comes over and we eat together while watching episode 1 of season 3 of Parenthood!
8:00 - sit around and talk about lots of things.
8:45 - friend goes home and I read one of the American magazines she brought to me. inTouch - December 2010. I am so up to date on my celebrities. Not. But the magazines go through July 2011. So maybe by Sunday I'll be more caught up.
9:45 - start to research places to stay for Christmas Bali vacation. Jealous?
10:00 - BLOG!

And soon, I will sleep. Fuuuuuuull day! How was yours??

Lelayu

2011-09-20T07:57:00.001-07:00

So I have this friend named Endah. She's not a super close friend, but close enough that when her older sister passed away last night, I felt that I should go to the funeral today. (In retrospect, the funeral was at the perfect time - I got to miss teaching 9th grade! They only had a test though, so it was easy to get a sub to sit in there and proctor for me.) I'd never met Endah's sister, Maria. I knew she'd been struggling with pretty serious breast cancer for most of this year and that she lived in a different town but moved back here in March-ish to be closer to her family while she sought treatment. I also knew that she was married and had no kids. Other than that, no info.

In case you haven't read anything I've wrote about Indonesian funerals before, let me just say that death is very raw here. There is no sugarcoating it. No funeral homes, none of those guys who prepare dead bodies whose job title I can't think of right now because my English is so bad, etc. The family cleans the body and sets it out somewhere in the house. They gather up all the plastic chairs in the neighborhood and set them all out in the street in front of the house and mourners sit there for the services and prayers held on the front porch/driveway, then they go into the house and look at the dead body - usually with the mouth taped or tied shut so stuff doesn't start coming out - and shake hands with each family member. Also, Indonesians don't really cry a lot relative to Americans.

So this morning, I went to the funeral. Sat outside on the green plastic chair under the canopy in the middle of the street until the pastor was done assuring us that she's in a better place. Then I went inside to look at Maria's body, this woman whom I've never met and now never will, and shake the hands of all the family members I've also never met. Imagine my shock when I got halfway through the shaking of hands and found myself face to face with a shaggy looking white guy with a British accent and very very red eyes. I politely shook his hand and moved on.

As soon as we were back in our chairs, I asked a friend why a white guy was inside. "That's Maria's husband. They used to live in England until she got sick." My first thought, of course, is, "Wait. Maria was married to a white guy?! How did I never know this?!" And then my second though was, "Why on God's green EARTH would you LEAVE England and come to INDONESIA to get treatment for cancer?!?"

Here's the story, as far as I've been able to piece together from different accounts throughout the day (I went back for a prayer service at 7 PM also). Maria and George (that's the British husband) lived in England until she got sick. She decided that she didn't want any traditional treatment, but rather herbal/natural treatment. Also, she wanted to be close to her family. So she moved back to Indonesia. George came back with her, but only for a month or two at first, then he had to return home to take care of business, I assume. He returned to Indonesia about a month ago when her condition continued to worsen. At that time, I am led to believe that she had neither breast left (they burst is the account I heard) and only about a quarter of her lungs, but was somehow still hanging on. Three weeks ago, George encouraged her to stop treatment.

I actually heard about that last part before I ever met George. It made perfect sense to me. That is the hardest decision one can ever make, I'm pretty sure, to let someone die rather than watch them continue to suffer, merely painfully prolonging the inevitable. But sometimes, in my Western mindset, it is the right decision. However, I also understand how that is not at all the right decision for most Eastern thinkers. So I was confused, having not met George and not knowing the color of his skin, that he would have made that decision. Once I met him, it all made sense.

Long story short, Maria's family is very mad at him. He took her away from them once when they moved to England. And he took her away from them forever when he told her to stop taking her medicine. For the family, it is George's fault Maria is dead.

They wouldn't even let him in the room with her when she died. They made him leave.

And now here he is. Alone. Living with her family who seem indifferent to him at best. No friends here with him. No family of his own here to support him. He speaks only the smallest amount of Indonesian. And the woman he loves died last night.

I am also led to believe that while Maria was a Christian, George is agnostic.

Tonight at the prayer meeting, George was nowhere in sight. Then several of us got up and sang "It is Well" (talk about a spontaneous singing group. I showed up and was handed the lyrics and told to get up and sing). George appeared. Later, after everyone else had gone home, we had a chance to ask him how he was doing. This is what he said - "Earlier, I was alone in my room. I didn't want to come out. I couldn't come out. Then I heard you guys singing 'It is well with my soul'. And there was something about those words... There was an energy I can't explain. I had to come out. I had to see who was singing. I needed to be here. I needed to feel that energy. It made me stronger. It helped me so much. Your presence here helps so much. I don't even know you guys, but I want to thank you so much for coming. It helped me. Thank you. Thank you for being here. Thank you..." And then he started to cry.

All day long, I've been thinking about George. He doesn't even speak Indonesian and he's here all by himself with nobody he can grieve with, nobody who understands him, nobody he can even talk to. I felt very strongly that I needed to let him know that he didn't have to be alone, so before I left, I went over and talked to him for a little bit. I said, "I don't know how long you're going to be here, but this group of friends (motioning to the mix of Americans and English speaking Indonesians standing around) hangs out quite a bit. So if you ever find yourself in need of some time out of the house or just someone you can talk to in English, Endah has all our numbers... Don't hesitate to call someone." He shared with me what a hard time he was having, because so many people want to talk to him and ask how he's doing, but he can't express himself at all because he doesn't speak Indonesian. He feels very alone. He said that having someone he could talk to would be really good. Then he asked when we have fellowship. So I told him when and where (3 houses down from the house he's staying in!), and he said he would really like to join us.

I guess I'm writing all this because George is very heavy on my heart today. I can't even imagine the situation he's in, and I can't imagine how it could be any worse than it is. But I don't want to forget about George and the things he said tonight.

I want to ask you to pray for him. He said earlier that this is a dark time for him, but that he knows the light is there and that he will see it again soon. Pray that the light that he finds is the True Light, K? Thanks.

My Breath Tells the Story of Your Love

2011-09-18T17:36:00.001-07:00

We sang a song called "Ajarku Berdiam" in church yesterday. It wasn't the first time I've heard/sung it. But it was the first time that all the words REALLY sunk in. I've been humming it ever since yesterday morning, and I'm pretty sure it's currently my favorite song. The lyrics are:

Ajarku berdiam (Teach me to dwell/stay)
Dekat di hatiMu (Close to Your heart)
Di saat ku berpaling (When I turn)
Temukan cintaMu (I find Your love)

Di sana Kau menanti (You're waiting there)
‘Tuk bawaku lagi (To take me again)
Bersekutu dalam (To fellowship)
Damai yang sejati (In perfect peace)

Ooh, ku damba hadirMu (Oooh, I yearn for Your presence)
Ooh, inilah rinduku (Oooh, this is my desire)

Hidupku hanyalah untukMu (My life is only for You)
Segenap hatiku kagum ‘kan kebaikanMu (My whole heart is amazed in the presence of Your goodness)
Nafasku menc'ritakan kasihMu (My breath tells the story of Your love)
Ajarku berdiam dekat di hatiMu (Teach me to dwell close to Your heart)

And just in case you want to, HERE is a link to the Youtube video of this song, for your listening pleasure.

Health

2011-09-18T17:14:00.000-07:00

I AM HEALTHY!

Thanks to some strong antibiotics, 12 hours of sleep Friday night, and even possibly the toxic nastiness my friend gave me.

In other news, I am becoming a jack of all trades.
1. I started teaching guitar lessons to one high school student.
2. I teach piano lessons to one elementary student and might pick up another this month.
3. I now take orders for knitting scarves. Delivering my first order today!
4. To finish off my TESOL, I'm going to be teaching English in some villages on the weekends.
5. I work in a coffeeshop on Fridays.

That's all, I guess. Happy Monday! Or Sunday night, depending on where and when you're reading this...

A Gift Horse

2011-09-14T06:43:00.000-07:00

An Indonesian friend gave me some medicine for my mouth today. He swears by it. It comes in a brown, glass bottle, Watkins style, and as it sat on my desk at school throughout the day, more than one student asked me why I had a bottle of liquor sitting there. It is called TCP Liquid Antiseptic. I am fairly certain that TCP stands for Toxic Carp Pits, but only because I can't think of anything else that sounds grosser. It hails from the UK and the label claims that it "soothes pain, fights infection for sore throats, mouth ulcers, cuts, grazes, bites, stings & spots". Based on the pungent, pungent smell alone, I was not excited to put this stuff in my mouth. Even in a glass bottle with the lid firmly sealed, I could smell the stuff throughout my classroom. Open the bottle and your eyes water.

But I forced myself to try it tonight with Aswan by my side getting all the things I screamed for. "WATER! OHMYGOSHGETMEWATER!!!! I AM DYING!!!! NO! THE WATER ISN'T HELPING! JUICE, GET ME JUICE!!! AAAAAHHHHH! GUM! I HAVE SOME GUM! TRY THE GUM! OH, MY FACE!!! MY FACE!!! IT IS DYING!" I even brushed my teeth and I still taste this stuff, 30 minutes later...

The up side is that after the initial pain in which I thought it might be burning holes in my gums, it made my whole mouth go numb. Numb enough that I actually COULD brush my teeth, which I just completely skipped over this morning due to the pain level (ssshhhhh.... brushing teeth is overrated anyways).

Also, Aswan took me to the apotek (the drugstore where you can get ANYTHING without a prescription) so I could buy some of the only antibiotic available in Indonesia that doesn't contain penicillin (I'm allergic). I'm sick of not being able to smile, whistle, drink hot or cold beverages, eat without pain or open my mouth wider than 2 fingers width. Gonna nail this infection any way I can - even if that means drinking Toxic Crap Puddles! Or whatever this stuff is called...

Rains

2011-09-13T17:26:00.000-07:00

Yup, it rained. The thunder was right. It rained so hard it woke me up sometime around midnight. And it was still raining when I woke up this morning. I remember it raining in the morning only 2 other times in the past 3 years. It doesn't happen often. It was so dark in my bedroom when my alarm went off this morning that I thought I'd accidentally set it for 5:20 instead of 6:20!

When I walked past the soccer field by my house on the way to school, I saw sprinklers out on the grass. I remembered that they had been running last night - I had been out walking in the dark and enjoying the pfft-pfft-pffffffft sound they made. So this morning, in my newly awakened state, I thought to myself, "Well, the sprinklers were redundant. Except that they were there before it rained. So I guess they can't be redundant. They were PREdundant."

Predundant: Redundant before the fact.

Wow. But it's starting to clear up a bit now. I wore shoes today to protect my feet from the 9th grade. And my mouth feels a little better. So this could be a good, good day.

Great Experiments…

2011-09-13T07:50:00.001-07:00

… In uploading videos. Let’s see if it works! So here are two videos I took a couple weeks ago during Lebaran week. Most everybody returns to their hometown for this holiday, so the roads are crazy mad. And Jakarta, our capital city, becomes a ghost town – as the majority of its population is comprised of people from other provinces seeking the… umm… Indonesian dream? Or maybe just a job in general. Boyfriend and I went back and forth to Semarang (the next town north from us) THREE TIMES during that week – once with a car, once on a bus and once by motorbike. Each time, it took us 2 – 3 hours each way. Ugh. So most of the times, I was bored. So I made videos. Now, let’s see if they upload properly…

For my first attempt, I will hopefully upload a video from our first trip to Semarang to buy clothing for all the village kids sponsored by our community. We took a car because I wasn’t feel optimistic about carrying new clothes for 31 kids on a motorbike in Idul Fitri traffic. This was actually the weekend before Lebaran, and it was the day that most people started traveling. The road was empty in the morning when we went to Semarang, but by evening, the people who had left Jakarta at 4 or 5 in the morning had reached Central Java and the streets were jam packed with vehicles with license plates starting with B (the Jakarta plate prefix). They weren’t all Jakarta plates though! We even saw cars and motorbikes from places as far away as Bali and Sumatra! In this video, you can hear the evening call to prayer start and boyfriend talking to people, telling them to get off the road and break their fast… Haha…

For my second trick, I’m uploading a video from when we were on the motorbike, just because I think it is cool. This was actually taken on the first day of Idul Fitri (which, by the way, is the same thing as Lebaran, in case that wasn’t clear. Two names for the same thing), so since everyone is already in their hometown, the traffic is actually better. The part of the video you see here is that part where we weren’t driving on the sidewalk to get around traffic!!

Welcome to Indonesian traffic! And I apologize in advance if you get dizzy. : )

Thunder?!?

2011-09-13T07:49:00.000-07:00

I hear thunder!!!

While I love dry season with my whole heart, I also love the very first rain of rainy season. It is like our 1 day of springtime, when things start to turn green again and the earth seems refreshed and the air stops smelling like dirt. Then the rainy season really starts... And hell hath no fury like the rains. My clothes grow mold and the grass is up to my knees and things flood and I get soaking wet every time I try to go anywhere on my motorbike and my hair is absolutely out of control due to the constant humidity and it is cold and miserable and flash floods wash away little kids never to be seen again and there are mudslides and things burn down and electronics explode from being struck by the lightning and last time rainy season started, it didn't stop for almost two years. TWO YEARS. And it is due to happen any day here now. Rainy season is supposed to happen in the months that have an "r".

The thunder is getting louder. Is it for real?!

Heyo

2011-09-12T23:29:00.000-07:00

Look, dad. ^^

I changed it again.