what's that noise?

so somebody is going to be staying at my place part of the time that i'm gone over the coming couple weeks.

and since ibu hasn't worked for like a week and a half now and there have been 3 cats living in my house, i decided it was time for a good clean.

first step, kick the cats out. they're old enough now. i put a sarong in the bottom of a box and put it in a place that will stay sheltered and dry in the alley behind my house. i'm not entirely coldhearted. and it was christmas, after all.

then the cleaning started. and as i was cleaning, i kept finding curious little sticky yellow puddles under, beside, and behind everything i moved. (yes, mom, i even clean behind things!) my house didn't actually smell like cat pee until i cleaned it. and then i couldn't get rid of the smell no matter how much deodorizer and floor cleaner i used. i swept and then mopped three times. then i used a rag and hand scrubbed the floors. i finally ended up having to use a toothbrush to bleach the floors then open all the doors and windows and turn the ceiling fans on. that seemed to do the trick. my house is really really clean now.

i was getting ready to start cleaning the bathroom when i heard what sounded like voices outside my house. at first, i thought it was a couple of the guards stopping for a chat on their rounds. but it sounded like they were singing. sometimes the guards do sing... but it wasn't them. it was call to prayer! so i checked the clock. definitely 4 AM. wow, i got really into cleaning.

in retrospect, that was kind of funny. i had gone to sunrise service that morning in town. at 4 AM. so on the biggest Christian holiday of the year, i both woke up to and fell asleep to the 4 AM muslim call to prayer.

leaving for the islands in less than 12 hours. i haven't even packed yet.

vaca-what?

so sometimes vacation doesn’t seem like much of a vacation. but it is always full of blessings, big and small. and parties. oh, the parties.

we had a half day of school friday, and thanks to my intense desire to be done with school, i had all my grades turned in before the final bell even rang. i was so ready to get out of there. and then the principal announced over the PA that all teachers needed to report to the auditorium for staff lunch. i was pretty bummed about having to stay longer. but turns out, this staff lunch was put on by the parents of our students. and it was a whole christmas spread, including three golden brown turkeys and homemade cranberry sauce. wow.

that night, i had not one, but TWO parties to go to. the first was a chili cookoff. i don’t want to brag or anything, but i’m pretty sure i unofficially won. then i went to some other friends’ house to watch cloudy with a chance of meatballs on the projector while laying on pillows in their backyard. awesome movie. watch it. really.

saturday i went to semarang with some friends to see new moon. awful movie. don’t watch it. really. i fell asleep after the first 20 minutes and woke up in time for the very last line. that is what i call good timing. after that, we went to yohanes’ parents house for a huge get together with his entire family and college friends. i started to feel a little awkward when i noticed that several of the men in yo’s family were coming to stand surreptitiously “beside” me (sometimes that meant behind me, depending on which way i was facing at the time) while who i assume to be an uncle was taking “our” picture from the corner. found out later his mom has designs on me. and didn’t really keep it a secret. fantastic. (side note: yo, if you are reading this, it’s more funny than awkward. promise. i like your parents.) we went to an outdoor lounge afterward that was built on a perch overlooking the whole city. we sat there drinking awesome drinks (honey, milk, and peach and strawberry ice cream – new favorite drink) and talking and taking pictures for an hour and a half STRAIGHT (nobody takes pictures like asians). we definitely got home well after midnight. which was a good feeling. because one of the best parts of break is staying up late and sleeping in!

sunday, i went BACK to semarang with charles and marie. to buy cheese. and to help them shop for christmas for the orphanage. i found feta! mm mm mm. AND miracle whip! kraft products were banned until just recently. i also found cherry tomatoes, mozarella, chocolate banana bread, and real-ish milk. this was obviously an above average shopping trip. i felt a little extravagant buying all those things, but you never know when you’ll see them again… oh, and we got clothes for 16 boys. that was mostly marie though. i just held the baby. and told her if things matched or not. while eating lunch, we ran into a family from charles’ parents church in jepara. they are extremely wealthy and support his church a lot, so as we approached them, marie quickly whispered to me, “shake hands and suck up.” okaaaaaay. i tried to be as charming as possible in a language i don’t really speak. i sat next to a really old guy in a wheelchair who kept talking to me, but i didn’t understand a thing he said. (marie said later that she can't understand him either, which made me feel a lot better.) luckily, in typical indonesian fashion, he asked a lot of questions, and each question ended with “ya?” (example: this food is really good, ya?) so i just said “ya” and smiled and nodded a lot. i have no clue what i was affirming or might have been agreeing to. but he seemed happy, so that’s good. his wife decided i am too old to be single (i AM getting there in this culture), so she promised to keep her eyes out for a suitable match. maybe i should give her yo’s mom’s number. they can duke it out.

(totaling up the last of the clothes for the orphanage)

monday was a staff christmas party at our superintendent’s house. and as much as i love hanging out with my fellow teachers, a better opportunity presented itself. a family who serves on another island was visiting and they were having dinner with some friends of mine that night. so i went there. the place where they live is very strongly muslim. but the husband was explaining to us that even more than that, this place is very strongly under the hold of satan. they are muslim on their ID cards, but they are more concerned with the spirit world than they are with the koran or with prayer. to witness to these people, he said that he often has to get them to be muslim FIRST, and then use that to lead them to christ. he also said that because he regularly reads the koran and is well known and respected in the area, people there will often say, “i wish i was more like him, he is a good muslim.” they were an awesome family, and i’m glad that i got to spend some time with them.

tuesday was the international school staff christmas party. all the indonesian staff get together and put this on for all the other staff. this year, i got to be designated photographer. in the auditorium. with all the lights off except for stage lights. ugghhhh. i think i did alright though. in a dress and high heels. i even understood the christmas sermon! well, most of it…

wednesday, GT and wiwik FINALLY got married! again, i was designated photographer. i was a little nervous about this one. i really had no idea what i was getting into. indonesian weddings are very different from american ones. and this wedding was particularly unique in that it was entirely planned in 10 days. also, the inside of the church was neon lime green. at the reception, there was a catered buffet, but NO tables or chairs! that was gt’s decision because he didn’t want people to linger. it worked.

today is christmas eve. i prayed a couple weeks ago that my christmas boxes would get here on time. God answered with, “what is christmas, really?” so i thought about it and came back with, “Christmas is about You. but You know how important it is for me to have that connection to my family when i am so far away. it means a lot to me.” and God said, “of course i know. your boxes will come.” so every day for two weeks, i’ve been bugging the office staff to see if my boxes came. nope. and school offices were closed today. so i asked charles to take me straight to the post office (i didn’t know where it was) so that we could check there. he did. they checked their incoming package log books for my name (yeah, records here are kept on paper. in ledger books.), but i wasn’t in there. then the man remembered, “two boxes came just a few minutes ago. we haven’t had time to process them. wait here.” he came back with two boxes that had my name on them. way to pull a last minute trick, God… though i already suspected that would be the case since it usually is. i got my boxes. and i’m really happy. and i’m being a very good girl and waiting until tomorrow to open them. also, the guy at the post office asked if charles is my dad. this is funny for two reasons. 1. he is only 10 years older than me, and he is pretty young looking. 2. he is 100% indonesian. i really don’t know how anyone could possibly assume we were even distantly related. i’m going to call him dad from now on, rest assured.

tomorrow, of course, is christmas day. sunrise christmas service in town and then i am apparently spending the day with charles and marie and another family that lives here. marie says if i don’t, she is telling my dad. i told her that he wouldn’t care. she said he would care that i was spending christmas day all alone. she might have me on that one. not really sure. how about it dad?

saturday… there is something going on saturday, but i totally forget what. hopefully it will come to me before then. or else get cancelled.

and then sunday… we take a bus to solo, a train to surabaya, a plane to lombok, a taxi to the northern point of the island, a boat to gili, and then a horse and carriage to our hotel. we like to use as many modes of transportation as possible. keeps things zesty. i am looking forward to getting away. majorly. and a lonely little beach island sounds perfect.

right here is good too though. my three cats are curled up in one giant ball sleeping beside me on the couch, and christmas music is playing through my speakers. oh, and don’t forget about the half eaten dead rat outside my door that was on my couch when i woke up this morning. festive.

and this thing was in my yard earlier. sorry, had to share.

Tis the season

One more day of finals!

I was a little bored today… I was giving two finals. And by “giving two finals” I actually mean “watching a DVD on my laptop and knitting while students took the final.” I figured since there was only one student in each class, I don’t need to watch them like a hawk to prevent cheating.

I think the rain thought the final school bell today was a starter’s pistol. It started pouring right as the bell rang. So now we all get to go home in the rain. Now there is what sounds like a 2 year old sitting outside my window yelling, "STOP THE RAINNNNNN NOW! STOP THE RAINNNNN NOW!....."

I have some weird rash or reaction or something on the top of my foot. The school nurse said just put hydrocortisone on it, but that really doesn’t do much. So I started rummaging around and found something that an Indonesian friend bought me when I burnt my leg and it got all infected. The label says it’s good for exzema, minor burns, rashes, irritation, etc. So I started using it. And it’s clearing up. Then I read the label. It’s 10% placenta. Fantastic. Twice a day, I’m rubbing placenta all over my foot.

My kittens are vampires. They were in the ceiling of the building next door for their entire lives thus far and so now they are scared of the light. They won’t come out from under my bed, which is where all my luggage was stored. That got relocated to under my desk for fear of my duffel bag filling up with cat pee. So far they’ve been very well behaved, going in the litter box and sleeping soundly all night long. I usually can’t believe that I have 3 cats living under my bed because I can neither hear or smell them. That is good news.

I've been working on filling out a recommendation for MIT. Thee MIT. As in Massachusetts. Intimidating. They ask all kinds of questions. But it's for a student that I really love and respect, so no problem giving a glowing report. I just feel like I have to do so perfectly. Because it's MIT.

Some students were complaining yesterday that my classroom smells like death. I couldn’t smell it. Until today. In one certain spot. So I searched my room, pulling books off shelves and everything out of drawers. No luck. I noticed that it smelled worst right in the middle of one wall. But there’s no way for anything to die in the wall – they’re solid cement. Weird. So I recruited Casey to come help me. He’s considerably taller than me and couldn’t even smell the stench. Until I convinced him to squat down. Then he almost immediately traced the smell to an electric outlet. He went to get a screwdriver, and sure enough, a poor gecko had electrocuted himself to death in there. It was very gruesome and smelly.

Casey pretty quickly decided he didn’t want to touch it, so he called one of the maintenance men to come do it. (“That’s why I hire employees.”) Poor guy replaced the whole outlet for me. Once he knocked the gecko out of the old one, it fell on the floor and started wiggling around. A miracle? We might have thought so until larvae and maggots started crawling out its stomach. I’ll spare you that photo. It was kind of like watching a small scale horror movie. With real life stink.

Humor for today:

Jose: Can I go to the bathroom?

Me: Jose, there’s like 7 minutes left in class. Can’t it wait?

Jose: It’s an emergency.

Me: Do you have diarrhea?

Jose: No.

Me: Then it’s not an emergency and you can wait.

Jose: It’s an emergency. Pleeeeeease let me go.

Me: A real emergency?

Jose: Yes, I think my water is about to break.

Me: Uhhhh… I doubt it.

I don't know why stupid blogger double spaces things sometimes. I can't make it undo that. Sorry.

stranger than fiction

i had a very odd moment in the school bathroom today.
the facts are these:
i had just come out of a stall and walked across the room to one of two sinks.
above the sinks is a long mirror, typical in a girls bathroom.
i watched as i walked toward myself, or rather, toward my reflection.
i was contemplating my hair.
more specifically, why it was sticking up in that manner.
as i neared the sink, my hands instinctively reached for the handles to turn on the hot and cold water simultaneously, thus resulting in warm water.
my right hand found what it was looking for.
my left didn't.
i stopped looking at my hair and shifted my gaze to my hands instead.
i realized that there was only one handle on the sink, now within the grasp of my right hand.
there had only been one all along.
i felt a bit silly as i realized that having two handles was a british convention and that the last time i used one of those was when i lived in kenya, exactly 2 years ago.
but then i remembered that my bathroom sink at home in america is like that too, and so surely the british must not have a monopoly on dual-handled sinks.
so maybe i'm not crazy after all.
not so fast: i don't have a bathroom sink at home in america.
so then, the kitchen sink.
does it have two handles or just one?
i think one.
the kind you lift and swivel to control the temperature.
or maybe two.
by this point i was very confused and mildly agitated.
water was just running into the sink.
and i was just staring at it.
then the startling realization hit me.
i have been gone so long that i can't remember anymore.

btw, mom, if you could email me sometime and tell me how many handles the kitchen sink has, i would appreciate it a lot. or maybe send a picture. thanks.

wonders never cease

as usual, the weekend proved to be the never ending adventure that it always is.

1. in a total lack of foresight back at the beginning of the quarter, i assigned quarter projects to all be due the friday before finals. i totally forgot that i would be writing finals and giving last chapter tests all right around that time. so on top of everything else that made last week hectic as all get out, i had to grade 36 quarter projects, a book, and 2 portfolios over the weekend. ugghhhh. guess who spent all night on friday at the coffeeshop with a stack of papers to be graded?

2. coffeeshop was pretty fun though because my old friend, parjo the barista was back in action! haven't seen that guy for a few months, but he's back behind the counter and still remembers my favorite drink!

3. it came out friday night (because all the good action goes down at the coffeeshop) that some threats have been made against our community. i don't want to go into too much detail because at this point, i don't really know what should be said and what shouldn't. but there's a fairly high ranking military man who approached a man in our community and demanded that he give him a white woman to have sex with. obviously, this presents a few problems. first of all, mr military man is married, and nobody in our community is going to help him have an affair. also, no white woman around here is even remotely similar to whatever his perception of white women is. that was explained to mr military, and he became irate. he threatened to kill one member of our community specifically, and then he went on to say that he has anti-american friends in the military who would love to have an excuse to do something to our community. we don't really know whether to take this guy seriously or not. is he just talking big to get what he wants? we are being more cautious though. not going anywhere alone, dorm kids have to be in by 8 now, etc. the problem is that we can't go to the police; the military are above the police. i'm not sure what's being done at this point, but we would appreciate your prayers for safety and for a quick resolution for all of this.

4. after all of this friday night, i FINALLY learned how to play dance dance revolution! also, i'm really, really bad at it. i attribute that to being middle class, midwest, and white.

5. saturday i realized how spoiled i've become when i went to babysit for charles and marie. besides having a dorm with 10 pre-teen and teenage girls, they also have 4 kids of their own. luckily, the oldest, joshua, was gone. unfortunately, bethanie, the 5 year old had 2 friends over. and they were wreaking havoc. they kept trying to eat cookies out of the kitchen, the baby had just woken up and was crying, and sammy, the 1 year old wanted to go outside and he is now tall enough to open doors and let himself out. so in the middle of holding a crying two month old, trying not to slam doors shut on sammy's fingers while attempting to keep him inside, and controlling three screaming 5 year old girls in pink dresses, i finally just shouted, "WHERE HAVE ALL THE IBUS GONE?!" there are normally 4 of them there. 2 working in the dorm, 2 taking care of the kids. they do everything. they keep us sane. and they had ALL gone home. rough. we managed. by the time charles and marie got back, the girls had been fed and were playing what appeared to be some rendition of hide-and-seek, baby was almost back to sleep, and sammy was playing happily outside with one of the dorm girls.

6. i got informed that my church is no longer having church. rough. so now i need to find a new church, i guess? and unfortunately, i have very little motivation to do so.

7. that night we had our last solafide (fellowship) of the year. it was a christmas party! we even had kind of a band going on... 2 singers, 2 guitars, and a piano! yours truly played the piano... i was amazed that i still could. it's been 7 years since i really played. i could tell i was rusty, but we made it through the evening without making any epic mistakes. it was fun, but i was pretty peopled out. so i spent a lot of time afterwards laying in the yard talking to mel and tiff and ariel. it was good times.

8. then i went to linegars and stayed there until midnight just being cozy and eating ice cream and watching movies under the watchful protection of the christmas tree.

9. i woke up sunday morning to the sound of my cat howling outside my window. but there was another cat making noise too... a much smaaaalllllller sounding cat. so i jumped out of bed, threw open the door, and standing there was my cat - and a kitten! she brought kitten inside and deposited it in my bed where it immediately began burrowing tunnels in my blankets.

a short while later, cat left again and returned over the back wall with a kitten dangling by the scruff of its neck from her mouth. she tried to stick this one inside a duffel bag under my bed, but i wasn't too keen on that. so that one went in the bed too. while momma checked on the other baby, she let me cuddle with the new one.

they're basically adorable and already going in the litter box. one of my students asked to have one of them a long time ago, and she was so excited when i told her this morning that the kittens are finally home! so there's a good home for one of them... not sure yet what i'll do with the other. for now, i'm just enjoying their cuteness. oh, but they got kicked out of the bed once i found fleas on them. so did all my sheets and blankets. sick sick sick.

10. i went to play more ddr with ariel and mel. we had lots of fun switching the level to expert while the person playing wasn't looking. i apparently look like i am trying to line dance to every song. ariel looks like he's at some kind of hiphop hoedown. and mel kicks our butts every time. then i rode my motorbike home in the pouring rain and spent the afternoon snuggled on the couch eating cheese and watching the office. oh, and reading a book in indonesian that ariel gave me. i made it to page 12 yesterday. incredible.

11. i ended the week by calling brian, newly returned from a tour of duty in iraq! it was awesome to get to talk to him, if only for a little bit. he was up fishin with the guys and didn't have good signal. i'll try again later.

i must be looking older

jordan: were there computers when you were our age?
luke: she's not THAT old, guys. the computers just stunk real bad.
me: well, you'll say that about your computers too 5 years from now.
*some silence*
jordan: were you alive during the holocaust?
luke: oh, my gosh. they ARE actually retarded... (*forehead palm slap*)
me: uhhmmm... do you know the actual dates of the holocaust?
david and jordan: yes.
me: my GRANDMOTHER was a child during the holocaust!
david: really? so when was your first dinosaur sighting?

http://edition.cnn.com/2009/CRIME/12/07/connecticut.chimp.attack/index.html?eref=igoogle_cnn

1. monkeys are never cute.
2. monkeys are never to be trusted.
3. even trained and domesticated ones.
4. but especially not wild ones.
5. under no circumstances.

places to go

glory: it's so hard to arrange a meeting with you.
me: why?
glory: because you have not much time.
me: and you have not much time.
glory: yeah.
me: and my not much time is not at the same time as your not much time.
glory: exactly. that's why it's hard.
me: so when do you have not much time?
glory: oh, i have a lot of not much time.

a present from Jesus

friday i was walking to my house when i spotted something shiny in the grass.
naturally, i went to see what it was, hoping for money.
i was not disappointed.
it was a quarter!
an american quarter!
how odd...
so i picked it up and looked more closely.
minted in 1986. same as me.

so there i was.
walking.
on java.
when i happened to find a quarter.
from the same year as i was born.

me: *looking credulously at the sky while holding said quarter in the palm of my hand* God? is that You?

and the best news!

in the craziness of the day, i have forgotten to say this:

KIM CAME HOME YESTERDAY!!!

and she is feeling so good after 2 weeks in ICU in singapore that after flying into semarang, she, clayton, yo, and gt spent TWO HOURS shopping and walking around the mall there.

i got to go see her last night, and she herself says that based on how she feels now, she can't believe that she almost died just 2 weeks ago.

God IS bigger!

paper

remember all those rules i put in place several weeks back for the rowdy 9th graders? one of them stated that if they slander, put down, or badmouth in any way anybody else in class, they have to write a paper on it explaining why they should not have said what they said, complete with Bible verses. i got a beauty from one student today entitled "Why I Shouldn't Insult People". It reads as follows.

"When I called Jose stupid it wasn't nice, even if it is true it isn't nice, therefore I shouldn't have said it. The Bible says to "love your neighbor as yourself", and I wouldn't have liked it if he said that to me. Also, I shouldn't have told Aditya to shutup. What Aditya has to say is important to [sic] therefore I shouldn't have said that. The Bible says to "love your enemies." Therefore I should love aditya and not tell him to shutup. Also, I shouldn't have called Kyuho a ho because obviously he isnt a ho because a ho is usually a woman, and obviously Kyuho has never done that."

well, i can see this student learned his lesson. ahem....

i found where my cat had her kittens at! and they are still alive! unfortunately, i cannot see them... i was out to dinner with some friends last night. one of them, andre, teaches indonesian at the language school next door to my house. apparently she had her kittens in the ceiling of one of their classroom buildings! so now during class, they can hear cats mewing and thumping around up there. oh no! dre assured me that they are no bother and that when they get bigger, if they are still trying to live up there, they'll have the guards get them down and bring them to me. whew! he replayed the following conversation for me from class earlier this week:

andre: oke, silahkan mengulang. (ok, please repeat after me)
cats: MEW, MEW, MEW!!!

he apparently thought that was hilarious, because throughout the evening, he repeated it 3 or 4 times.

visits from history

my skype has been real weird this week. it keeps sending me messages from the past. for example, yesterday, i thought katy was talking to me, but then i looked at the time stamp and realized the message was from the day before and that katy was currently offline. this morning, i got this one from over a week ago when the family + gramma drove to oklahoma to be with zach. this one made me laugh. and miss my family. love you guys!

18:36 - Love you
Have a wunnerful day - Mom

20:11 - You there?
20:11 - Hello Hello Hello
20:13 - Anyone there?

20:31 - Ijam going with your folks to see zach. am at your house right now waiting for the car to get here and your dad too. Deb took me to hicksville and your mom picked me up there wich was about half way .worked out very well. think the car is going to be loaded for bear with all the stuffweare taking.wished i could have gone to see you too but kn ew that was not possible. excuse the errors i am making.love you and take care .grandma