Grocery Shopping

I went to the grocery store earlier today. The one and only supermarket we have in our town of 180,000 people. It's usually a crowded place, and today was no exception. I got the few things I needed and headed to the cash register. Thankfully, they almost always have one line that is designated "no carts". I had a basket of less than 10 items, so I waited in that line. There were three people in front of me. Well, four, if you count the lady who carried two papayas to the bagging area and shouted for the cashier to check her out next. "I ONLY HAVE TWO. CAN YOU SEE? I ONLY HAVE TWO." Crazy old bat, waving her papayas around in the air. Like she just don't care.

It was probably only a five minute wait, and I was entertained by the cute baby in line in front of me. I mean, she was with her parents. But now I have a vision of a 9 month old in a jilbab carrying a basket of groceries. It's pretty funny.... Speaking of which, I did get rammed from behind by a three year old with a shopping cart, because some parents think it's acceptable to let their kids do whatever they want. The mother only laughed at me. Even after I gave her the death look that I generally reserve for really naughty students.

Anyways, back to the cashier. She rang up all my items. But the last one was giving her problems. She could scan the bar code, but for some reason, the system wasn't reading it. It was just packets of dried ginger to make hot drinks with. She entered the code manually. Still nothing. So she called over a security guard and asked him to go write down the number. She bagged all my other items, but the guard wasn't back yet. So she asked me to stand at the end of the conveyor belt while she rang up everyone in line behind me.

TEN MINUTES LATER, the security guard came back and said he couldn't find where I'd gotten the stuff from (this store is not THAT big). So I offered to go show him. We finally made it to the correct aisle (after tripping over one small child and getting hit by an old lady's shopping cart). "Oh, so THAT'S where you got it from!" Yes, with all of the other ginger based drinks located in the only hot beverages aisle in the entire store. He wrote down the code on his hand with a pen, and we headed back to the cash register.

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, the cashier was ringing up people who weren't even in line yet when I had checked out. We had to wait for her to finish ringing up someone who thought it would be cool to stuff FOUR baskets with groceries in order to avoid the long cart checkout line and then pay with a credit card for which the processing machine was located two registers away from ours.

Once that ordeal was finally over, the guard showed the writing on his hand to the cashier, who tried to enter it into the cash register FIVE times. The same number. Over and over. Still nothing.

So she turned to me and said with her best smile, "Sorry, you can't buy this."

And this is why I love/hate grocery shopping in Indonesia.

Quiz

Let me just start off by saying how much I love that I can now blog from home once again. Thank you, new laptop.

Here is the point of this post though. I just took one of those silly online quizzes. You know, the kind all your friends are doing, but they feel like they shouldn't be doing, so every time they post the results, their comment begins with, "I never do these quizzes, but..." Let's not kid ourselves. These quizzes are pretty amusing, and even though we have a thousand other more important things to do at any moment, at least own up to your guilty quiz taking pleasure.

Anyways, there is this one doing the rounds where you're asked to answer 20 simple questions, and then they tell you who you are. According to several of my friends who have taken the quiz (even though they "never do things like this..."), the results are "creepily accurate".  So obviously I HAD to take the quiz.

The questions ranged from fairly typical get-to-know-you questions (What is your favorite food?) to kind of bizarre (Do you enjoy the experience of eating corn on the cob?). I answered each one accurately.

And these are my results:

1. You are male.
2. You are still a teenager, but won't be one for very much longer. 
3. You're in college and are already worried about finding the perfect job that will be both fulfilling and will pay well. Your future worries you more than you'd like to admit.
4. You have beautiful, silky brown hair and big eyes. 
5. You know that if you'd only believe in yourself more, things would be much easier for you. Yet you still doubt your instincts more than you should, instead of trusting them every time.

This explains so much...

Some Little Big Things

I feel like the last couple of weeks have been full of new/big things. Three different sports seasons are currently under way, so there is never any shortage of after school entertainment around here! Our school also changed its name last week after a mandate from the government stating that no school in the entire country is allowed to use the word “International” in its name (this in response to a child molestation case at another international school… What is the connection, you might ask? Well, your guess is as good as mine…). We didn’t do anything drastic, we just dropped the word “international” from our name. So now in our school name’s abbreviation, there is no longer a vowel, which makes it hard to say. But oh well, what can ya do? Now comes the process of changing our website, our letterhead, all of our signs and banners, our official documentation, our visas, our sports jerseys, etc… I’m glad I am not a part of that process because it sounds no fun.

This past weekend, however, was LOTS of fun. Some friends and I planned a trip to the beach, and we stayed overnight in Jogjakarta, the arts and culture capital of Java. I always enjoy visiting Jogja, and I feel like I’d like to stay there for a longer period of time someday and just experience the city. Maybe during a break or something. Here are just a few snapshots I took with my phone.

 

There is a song called “Indiana”, and the first verse was running through my head while I was sitting in the sand, just watching the waves come crashing in.

“I’m glad I never lived next to the water,

so I could never get used to the beach.

And I’m glad I never grew up on a mountain,

to figure out how high the world could reach.”

Indiana may be boring and full of cows and corn, but at least it taught me to appreciate the mountains and oceans of Indonesia!

While we were in Jogja, we ate dinner at a fancy Mediterranean restaurant. We don’t often get international food where we live – it’s mostly all rice and veggies – so having a nice dinner like this is always a special treat. While we were there, one of my friends pulled out a bag of fried grasshoppers and dared everyone to eat one (what are we, in third grade??). I’ll eat anything once, but I didn’t want to volunteer too quickly. Like the shrewd businesswoman that I am (ya, right), I wanted to see what I could get out of the deal. I got him to agree to buy me creme brulee (on the menu there!) for dessert if I downed one whole grasshopper. I definitely got the better end of that deal!



While in Jogja, I also bought a new (drumroll please…) LAPTOP. The hard drive in my last laptop crashed in March, so I’ve gone 6 months without one. I was partly saving up money and partly also challenging myself to live without the technology. It was doable. But I’ll be honest - it was a looong six months. If I needed the internet, I either had to open it up on my phone or come to school to use a computer. I also don’t have a TV, and my laptop was my only way to watch shows I had saved on the hard drive. So I’ve gone half a year with very limited internet and TV use. In that time, I’ve crocheted two and a half blankets, read four classics, and spent more time painting my fingernails than I ever thought possible. I’m a child of the late 20th century. I’m ready to have some technology back in my life.

Unfortunately, this being Indonesia, all the software that was installed on my new laptop was pirated, including the operating system. Thankfully, I work for an awesome school, and I can get things like Windows 8 and MS Office for free through the school’s license! So hooray for little victories like that!

It’s time to head home (I’m writing this on a school desktop while waiting for our IT guy to finish installing all my legit new software), so I’ll leave you with this conversational gem a friend of mine had with another friend’s 3 year old son recently. A little background - this whole conversation took place at yet ANOTHER friend's house while we were all hanging out. And the kid is being raised in a Muslim home.

Kid: Where's my mom?
Friend: She left you.
Kid: No! Where is my mom?!
Me: Calm down. She went to buy milk, she said.
Kid: You're mean! (punches friend in the leg)
Friend: Who do you trust? Me or her?
Kid: I trust my mom! Where is my mom?
Friend: No. I think you should trust in Jesus.
Kid: No. I only trust my mom.
Friend: Do you know who Jesus is??
Kid: No! Yes!
Friend: Who is Jesus?
Kid: He's a zombie.

And this is funny to me because, if you think about it, he's not that far off... I mean, Jesus did come back from the dead...

Directions

Senior: Miss, can you help me give my life some direction?
Me: Uh..... Like what? North?
Senior: No, like what should I major in?
Me: Well, what are you interested in?
Senior: Rapping.

Lavender Scones

I've been on this lavender craze lately. I've been using it for everything I possibly could use it for. My most recent adventure was to cook with it. I made some lavender scones last night. FYI, if you want a delicious smelling house, bake something with lavender in it.

Anyways, the recipe ended up making way more than I thought it would. More than I can eat myself. So I brought them to AP Calculus class this morning. I only have 8 students in the class, and I like to treat them when I can. I mean, it's a tough class. I put their brains through the wringer just about every day.

I warned them ahead of time that this would be a different taste because there were actual flower parts baked into the scones. Everyone was brave enough to try at least one bite. Follow up comments included...

Did you put toothpaste in these?

My burp tastes flowery.

This is a taste that I have never tasted before. But I think it's good.

When I first tried it, it was not good. But then I kept eating it, and now it's good.

Is this even healthy?

Oh! This tastes like my shampoo!

Mmm... My mouth smells so nice now.


So I guess that maybe I should bake them some weird stuff more often. Makes for a good chuckle in math class and a very nice smelling house.