well, today was an interesting day. the first day this week that i didn't take benadryl before bed last night, and i was so wired and awake and refreshed and accomplished about 34087t54 billion things. however, i was also stuffed up and sneezed all day. but i've scouted it out and found some indonesian drugs that work well for allergies and don't have the drowsy side effects like benadryl. now just to buy them.
i have to say, i really love having internet at home. i waste time so much more entertainingly this way. my new best hobby is to play with google's autocomplete feature. i type in random things like "God is" and i get results like "God is an astronaut". or try "Bill Clinton was" and you get a hit reading "Bill Clinton was the first black president". Wow.
while googling chuck norris, i got this.
BAHA! what?!
on a slightly more serious note, i had to go to the bank today to get some business taken care of. you see, there is either a thief or a ring of them that has been targeting atm machines, gaining access to people's accounts, and taking EVERYTHING from them. so far, they have not been caught, and i don't know if the police even have any leads. i don't know how this all works except that the thieves have been able to sneak surveillance equipment into the atm kiosk places and have gotten people's sensitive information through that. and of course, the one bank they have targeted is my bank. this hasn't yet happened in salatiga, but because of the worsening situation, the bank is taking major precautions. it's been great to see that in a country where i feel like there is so often little to no efficiency or logic used. but it meant that i had to make a trip to the bank today to get a new atm card and change my pin number. the lady there told me that EVERYONE is getting a new atm card. and it's the biggest bank in the nation. wow.
they told me i HAD to come today before 3:00 to do this and that i couldn't use my atm card before then. fantastic. i'm leaving for madura tomorrow, i had $7 in my wallet, couldn't access the rest of my money, AND had to teach almost all day. i do have one period in which i don't teach, so i snuck away then (with the help of my lovely translator, ibu dewi) and made it to the bank. i was praying that the trip would be quick (last time i was there was to withdraw a large amount of money to buy my motorbike. it took 1 hour of standing in line for one window, filling out withdrawal forms in front of the teller, then taking those and waiting thirty minutes in another line to actually get my money), and i was dreading it. but my dread was all for naught - i was in and out in about twenty minutes. that may seem like a long time to my american friends, but i was thanking my lucky stars today. i was also really happy that i did all the talking in indonesian and i didn't need my translator! i was glad to have her along though, for sure.
i was intially told that i would have to wait 2 - 3 weeks to get my new atm card. that really won't work given my weekend travel plans. but then they said that if i wanted my card to make the atm be in indonesian, they could give it to me today and i could use it right away. and i was like, "what? there's a language option on the atm cards? my atm has ALWAYS been in indonesian! that's how i learned the only money/banking words i know!" apparently, you can get a card that causes the atm screen to translate to english for you. and that was the one you had to wait for. well, duh... i got the one in indonesian... no change for me. and i got my card, my new password, and enough money for the weekend right away! (thanks, God)
on the way back to the school, there was a HUGE mass of people in the road and there were pink flower petals all over the asphalt. so i asked bu dewi, "oh, was there a wedding today? so pretty!" to which she replied very matter-of-factly, "no, someone's dead." whooooops. once we navigated our way to the front of the parade-like crowd, sure enough, there were 4 guys carrying a bizarrely shaped casket down the road on their shoulders. they were walking to the graveyard to bury the guy. and there was a girl walking in front of them, jubilantly flinging pink flower petals everywhere. that was a first.
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