Photos

When I went home with Aswan for Lebaran, I asked his mom if she had any pictures of him as a child. She told me about two pictures she knows of - one of boyfriend by a Christmas tree at church with his older sister and one of her holding boyfriend in her lap when he was a baby. She didn't know where the photos were though, as many of her things have been destroyed over the years by humidity and flooding and others have been lost while moving from one house to another.

Later, boyfriend told me that he actually has those two pictures, so he dug them up and brought them to show me, along with several others from when he was in his early twenties and had a mullet. Um.. Ew.

But I love love love the two of him from when he was little. In the baby picture, his mom is holding him, his older sister is standing beside, and his mom's younger sister is behind. My boyfriend was a fat little Chinese baby!!! Awwwww! As he's gotten older, he's gotten more and more Javanese looking. Most people can't tell that he's half Chinese. Even by the time the second picture was taken when he was 4-ish, he doesn't look so Chinese anymore. I treasure these two pictures, as they are the only physical view I have into boyfriend's childhood!

Toms

When I lived in Kenya in 2007, my flatmate, Megan (only one of the most amazing people in the world), wore Toms shoes basically every day. If you don’t know what those shoes are, it’s OK. You’ve probably seen them on some hipster walking down the street before and just didn’t know it. When I visited her this summer, she still had the exact same pair. She made me try them on so that I could see for myself how comfortable they still were after all that time. She also told me that I should invest in a pair to take to Indonesia with me. They’re not really my style, but they are cute and lightweight canvas shoes, and with a recommendation like Megan’s, how could I resist? So I looked at them in the mall. And realized that there was no way on God’s green earth I could afford these shoes. Oh well… No tears were shed.

A few days ago, I saw an Indonesian friend wearing Toms. Basically, anytime you see something you like and ask the person where they got it at, the answer is one of the following: a) America, b) Korea, c) Singapore, or d) Jakarta. So I asked my friend where on earth she got a pair of expensive American shoes. She said, “Oh, right here in town at that store called Marvel!”

So that night, I told Aswan I wanted to go over there and look at shoes. He said, “Me too. I heard they sell Crocs there too. I want Crocs.” I tried to smile through my dry heaves as I calmly asked him, “You….. Like….. CROCS?!” He went on to explain that he likes the shoes they make for men – NOT the rubbery things with holes in them. Don’t get me wrong – I see the usefulness of Crocs. But I just can’t get over how ugly they are. And almost everyone has them here. They seem to be a pre-requisite for living overseas. “You MUST own Crocs in at least 3 colors.”

Anyways, long story short, we went to the store and I bought 2 pairs of Toms for $20 and boyfriend bought his Crocs for $10. Based on the cost alone, I’m assuming that the shoes have to be fake, but they all came with original tags… And when I researched fake Toms online, the ones I bought don’t have any of the telltale signs. Oh well, I don’t really care. I’m just happy to have new shoes! Because what girl isn’t?!







*EDIT* So I've noticed that pretty consistently every week, the number one most read post on this entire blog is THIS ONE! There are visitors coming almost daily after finding the photos above in Google image searches for fake Toms. So if you're trying to figure out whether yours are fake or not by reading this post, let me conclusively tell you that the Toms shown here are FAKE.

Here is how I know.

1. The V on the top of the foot is a lot wider than on real Toms (I put mine next to a friend's who bought hers from a legit shoe store in America. The V on hers looked tiny in comparison).

2. The writing on the inside of the shoe has a typo and no punctuation at all, which I didn't even pay attention to at first. Pretty sure the manufacturers of the real ones can spell.

Call me morally bankrupt if you will, but I have absolutely no problem buying fake Toms. I don't consider it to be stealing shoes from needy children when I would never have bought a real pair anyways - they don't even sell them in the country I live in. And obvious fakeness aside, I think I'm getting my money's worth out of these shoes. They've held up well, and I'm not the easiest person on footwear. Also, they didn't mold at all during rainy season, which is more than I can say for my more expensive shoes I bought in the States.

Kindly Pointings

As my father kindly pointed out, I have not written on my blog for awhile. This is largely due to the fact that talking about everything happening in my life lately on the internet would make me a gossip. We have a new superintendent this year, and with new leadership comes a lot of change. I'm trying to be a good example to my more change resistant Javanese co-workers, but if I'm being completely honest, I am having a very difficult time respecting the majority of the decisions of my new boss. I've been praying about this and would appreciate prayers as well. As usual, I am in the thick of things because I am close to the Indonesian staff AND the foreign staff. I hear all the gossip from both sides about most everything that happens around here. A lot of it I'm sure I shouldn't know and it's hard weed out what is fact and what is fiction. Suffice it to say it's been a dramatic and stressful school year so far...

Other than that, uhmmmmm.... I am enjoying teaching middle school less and less. Well, I take that back. Half of it. I love the 8th graders to pieces. They are adorable and always do their best and crack me up a lot; however, the 9th graders are a different story. This particular class needs to go back to 4th grade and try high school again in 5 years or so. They seem to be unable to bring basic things like paper and pencils to class. They also appear incapable of holding in their belches and farts DURING class time. This, in turn, renders them unable to listen to a word I say, generally. I have had classes twice this large before, but I have never in my life had such classroom control issues - even in America! Aduh. Trying to come up with clever strategies to get these guys rolling...

Boyfriend is great and amazing and wonderful, as always. I went home with him for Lebaran (Idul Fitri) because his mom insisted that we come. She isn't Muslim, but even Christians travel to the homes of friends for times of feasting and forgiveness. I have lots of pictures of those 2 days that I need to upload. I met boyfriend's grandmother for the first time. And because she is half blind and I spoke only Javanese to her, we are fairly sure she has no clue that I'm white. Oh, and I also met boyfriend's older brother that he never told me he had. I was kinda mad about that one at first until I realized that he also had two other siblings that HE never knew he had (they died when they were young - before boyfriend was born). That led to some interesting front porch talks with boyfriend and his mom in which she explained her life story. That woman never ceases to amaze me.

So random tangent - when boyfriend was 4, police stormed his house and took away his father. They never saw him again. Aswan remembers that night clearly. You don't forget police kicking down your door and dragging your father away. His mom, who had never worked a day in her life because she got married when she was 17, went to work to feed her 3 kids. She opened a stand on the sidewalk selling pecel, a rice and vegetable dish with peanut sauce. She works there to this day, making $60 - $70 a month. Boyfriend and his 2 sisters went to work in elementary school to pay their way through middle school and high school because they knew they wanted to make something of themselves. That is the life boyfriend has always known.

Here is what we found out together on his mom's front porch last week - she was one of 9 kids (Aswan only knew of 3 aunts and uncles), but 5 of them died before reaching adulthood. His mom got married young and quickly got pregnant with her first child - a boy. When he was 3, he got typhus and died. That same year, she gave birth to her second child - another son. Because of some Javanese tradition that states that when your first child dies, you should give the second one away for its safety, she and her husband decided to let their neighbors (distant relatives who were unable to have children of their own) adopt the second baby. Shortly after that, they moved away, leaving their second child with his new parents. A year later, she gave birth to a baby girl. She died of a high fever when she was 2 months old. Then over the next six years, she gave birth to three more children - Aswan and his two sisters (but not in that order - one is older and one is younger). When their youngest child was 2, her husband died.

The strange thing is that Aswan's mom shared openly with us for the first time about her two children who died. But for his whole life, his mom has never talked about her husband's death, only brushing questions off with "He was sick". Seeing his mom being open, Aswan took the opportunity to ask his mom, "Mom, what sickness killed my dad?" Something shifted in her eyes, and she said, "I forget". "Where is his grave?" Aswan asked. "Lost" was the one word answer we got just before his mom stood up and walked into the house, leaving us on the porch wondering about everything she hides in her heart.

So yup, that was our Lebaran. Lots of traffic and heat and opor ayam (food). We visited 10 houses in 4 cities in 2 days. But life is back to normal as far as the mosques go.

I found some books in English and Toms shoes for sale here locally. The Toms are probably knockoffs, but at least they had the decency to come with original tags. I paid $20 for 2 pairs. I have pictures to post someday, I just never seem to have time.

I got a new layout for my blog, so if you're reading this on google reader, you should look at it.

I've been healthy for 2 weeks now - a record!

There is a lot of gecko poop on my wall that I desperately need to do something about.

I only use the right shift key, never the left one.

I have been writing random things here in an attempt to distract myself from wanting to watch Criminal Minds late at night because I know it will give me bad dreams if I do.

It is after midnight and I have church tomorrow morning. My pastor is in America until the end of the month. I like it when the elders take turns preaching. I also like it when Aswan is the drummer for the worship team. Because I think it's cool that my boyfriend is a drummer.

And... ummm... oh yeah - in the past 2 weeks, boyfriend has been asked in 2 different public places if I am his a) wife and b) sister. Sister? Really? Both of us were stunned at that one.

OK, I think I'm finally tired enough to not want to watch an episode of CM, so I'm gonna go to sleep. Goodnight from Java!

Someone else's thoughts

So I just found the following as part of a "Things to do for 4th of a July" blog post that I was reading because it came up in a search I did on Google for something entirely unrelated, and it made me feel glad to hear an American say this....

"Think globally. What? A little strange, I know. July 4th is supposed to be about wearing American flag t-shirts and openly hating soccer! It’s the only day of the entire year we can freely say to the rest of the world, “USA! USA! USA!” and not feel bad about it! Right? Right? Well, maybe not.

You see, I can’t help but think of my American friends in Asia, some with young kids who have never stepped foot on American soil, who are living out an oddly-normal July 4th today. The reason? They simply caught the vision that, while it is a nice place to live, America is not the center of the universe. Life actually goes on beyond the purple mountain majesties.

My point? Chill out on how we treat those who are figuring out a new life in this country. Your way of life is comfortable but that doesn’t make it imperative. Recognize the complexities of the world we live in and next time you interact with someone who is new to this country, someone who’s story is more tangled than you can imagine, don’t [complain] about the fact that his English is poor. July 4th celebrates the very thing he is working hard to achieve. Remember the poem written by Emma Lazarus? The one you learned in middle school civics class? It’s etched inside the Statue of Liberty and reminds us that America began as a country by offering freedom to the, “tired… poor… huddled masses yearning to breathe free.” I tend to believe all that stuff is still true about this country. The only difference between you and the guy you can't understand is that your ancestors did the hard work for you. So, no, he doesn’t have to learn English if he wants to live here. Get over it."

- http://ericepperson.blogspot.com/

A Great Man

A great man died today.
His name is Titus Boggs.

Unprecedentedly (Is that a Word?)

Three things.

1. Boyfriend has not had running water at his house for four days now. Last night, a guy was supposed to come fix it at 5. By 6, when he had not shown up, boyfriend went looking around the neighborhood for the guy, found where he lived, went to his house and asked him, "Dude?" (You know how guys do) The guy said he got busy and that he would come the next morning (this morning) at 8 to fix it. It was absolutely blazing hot today and boyfriend does not own a single fan. So I braved the Idul Fitri traffic (which, incidentally, I made multiple short videos of the other day when we drove to Semarang and back, but I am unable to upload a single one, sorry) to take him fresh juice popsicles I made this week packed in a ziploc bag inside an insulated lunch box packed with frozen pecans. I felt bad for him - no fans, no running water, and it was pushing 100 today. The popsicles were still frozen by the time I made it across town, so hurrah for that! Anyways, by the time 5 PM rolled around and we finally finished watching Never Say Never Again (Sean Connery, anybody?), we decided the guy was probably not coming to fix the water, so we scoured town for ANYPLACE that would serve us dinner (most are already closed for the holiday). Ended up with fried rice and dumplings. Not bad. Most of this is completely mundane, but it was a fun day, getting as much skin as possible to come in direct contact with boyfriend's tile floor in order to stay cool while watching oooold James Bond films. I love not going to work.

2. A few weeks ago, I was talking to an American friend about my troubles with buying work clothes while I was in the States. Try as I might (and I did!), I could not find a single secondhand thing that fit me in terms of profession/work wear. I looked at JCPenny, but even their sale SHIRTS were $30-ish. I bought a couple dresses I can wear to work, but I didn't come back to Indonesia with a single pair of dress pants or a dress shirt. I did bring back plenty of plain V-neck type shirts which are acceptable to wear, but I was hoping to actually find some legit professional looking clothes this summer. I mean, I'm 25. It wouldn't hurt. Anyways, said friend was telling me that before she moved here just a few short months ago, people already living in Indo told her that she would wear dress clothes a lot, especially for language school. So she ended up bringing lots. But as it turns out, she basically just wears jeans every day. So she gave me a whole bag of dress clothes today. We have slightly different styles and she is quite a bit taller than me, but every single thing she gave me more or less fit, and I like at least 75% of it! So hurrah for blessings!

3. Here is the weirdest thing of all. Ever since the beginning of fasting month, Idul Fitri (the end of the fast, and the biggest Muslim holiday of the year) has been slated for the 30th of August, aka tomorrow. So tonight, everyone broke fast at 5:45, as usual, and people, having successfully completed their month long fast, began preparing for the next two days of feasting and festivity. Women spent ALL DAY cooking delicious meals, men constructed floats and rehearsed marches for the city wide parade (that should have been) held tonight, grown children traveled to their hometown, kids set off lots of really loud fireworks, people cleaned their best prayer clothes for the community sholat (prayer) held at the town center at sunrise, etc. And then at about 7 PM, the government said, "JUST KIDDING, EVERYONE! Unless you stand in EXACTLY the right place in Block M (the scariest part of Jakarta, I'm convinced, since I got stuck there alone under a bridge one night), the sun is in the wrong position by 1.5 degrees and we cannot celebrate Idul Fitri. Hence, you have to fast ONE MORE DAY, and Idul Fitri will start on Wednesday instead, Ins'allah!" The island went into a state of uproar. Within 20 minutes of the proclamation, I received several jokes about the situation via text/facebook/bbm. And everybody's plans changed. Some feasts that have already been cooked now have to be delayed a day - in a country where most people don't own refrigerators. Some will still happen tomorrow, but nobody can eat - except the Christians. Lucky for me, only one of the four feasts I was invited to tomorrow got moved to Wednesday. So I still get to spend most of the day stuffing my face with delicious food. My hosts, on the other hand, get to watch me eat all the delicious food they have cooked. But tomorrow night, all the festivities will begin, hopefully. I am really craving cotton candy and a parade. Oh yeah! The parade! Every neighborhood makes some kind of float or march and they travel around their area of town, then eventually make their way to the town center, which is an open field with a road circling all the way around it. They all go around the circle a few times, then back to where they came from. It is great fun to be waiting at the center of town and to watch all the people go by while eating lots of unsanitary foods. I asked a few friends if something like this has ever happened before, and they all said that it hasn't in their lifetime. I mean, how difficult is it to calculate a month of fasting? Apparently, way more difficult than one would think!

Anyways, it's past midnight now, so I should probably go to bed. It's the last chance I have for a few days to sleep without rockets going off loud enough to rattle my cement walls or all seven mosques within earshot blaring until 2 in the morning. Also, I've got to party hard tomorrow, so I clearly need my beauty sleep!

Selamat Lebaran dan minal aidin wal faidzin!

Tempayang and Selasih

After watching Aswan do it for me once, I was able to successfully make 2 more mugs of the seed-becoming-jelly water stuff tonight. My throat did feel better today, I have to admit, but still coughing up stuff. Gotta give it a few more days.

Also, I really love chewing the basil seeds slowly between my front teeth. After they turn into little jellies, they just have the weirdest texture! You should try it some time. Just drop basil seeds into hot water and eat them!

Good Morning

 

I’m not sure if the noisy mosque quieted down after the first few days or if I just got used to the noise and slept through it. But I didn’t stand a chance this morning… I think they must have had a different guy doing the wakeup call for the past few weeks, because this morning, Mr. LOUD was back. At 3 AM. I was so wide awake that I had the presence of mind to video the last 10 or so seconds of it.

So imagine this going off SUPER LOUD from just a few buildings down the road.

Old Wives Tales

So as you know (because I am good at complaining), I was sick last week. It’s mostly gone now, but one time in college, I got really sick and had a hacking cough for 5 months and so now pretty much any time I get sick, I have a residual hacking cough for anywhere from a few weeks to a few months. The flu or whatever it was that seems to be going around school only lasted for 3 days, but now I’ve got the cough. A guy in church happened to overhear me coughing and we struck up a conversation Sunday after church. He mentioned an Indonesian herbal remedy that involves a type of seed that is hard as a rock being soaked in hot water until it turns into jelly. Then you just drink the water and it is guaranteed to make any cough disappear within 3 days. He said he’d buy me some seeds at the market this week.

The goods arrived tonight. I have 8 of those seeds, which are called biji bunga tempayang. Not sure what that translates to. It’s the seed of some flower though. Pak Fil also sent a lot of selasih, which, when translated, appears to be basil seed. I asked what that is for, and Aswan told me it reduces your “panas dalam”. Inner heat? Best guess is that it’s for fever. Aswan explained that if your inner heat is too hot, it’s hard to get better. Sickness just festers. So you have to treat your inner heat in order to treat any other ailment.

Before I get to the pictures – and trust me, this foray into the world of Indonesian wives tales was thoroughly documented – let me just preface this by saying that I am normally a moderately daring person. If I’m reasonably sure it won’t kill me, I’ll try anything once. Brains, guts, chicken feet, etc. But it really sealed the deal when a) Pak Fil said he was buying, b) Pak Fil claimed that this stuff has no flavor, c) I realized how often I get sick here, so what can it hurt to try? d) rock sugar was included in the deal to sweeten the supposedly flavorless water, and e) the rock/seed thing turns to jelly! How could that not intrigue me??

Here you go:

(The something-flower seed and the basil seeds)

(Here they are in their bagged form)

(Hot water and rock sugar added. By the way, I was thrilled to find that the rock seeds float, thus enabling me to more efficiently photo-document this adventure.)

(Within seconds, the rock seed started expanding. It was like those capsule things you throw in hot water and watch them grow into sponges shaped like animals. Those are the best.)

(The basil seeds also turn into little jellies that look kind of like frog eyes or something! Who knew?)

(You look like you need a close up of what is going down in this mug)

(I forgot to mention this earlier, but boyfriend is the one who made me this concoction. Because he is the best. According to him, after about 5 minutes, you have to stir it to make it look like tea. Notice the water is brown now, not clear.)

(By this point I COULD.NOT.WAIT to try my drink. Aswan kept telling me to be patient and just keep taking pictures.)

(FINALLY ready to drink!!)

(I got boyfriend to document the first sip for me.)

(Not bad for medicine! Really all I could taste was the sugar, but that just might be because I’m still a little stuffed up.)

(The flower seed turns into this. Appetizing. I chose not to eat mine.)

(EYEBALLS! OK, not really….)

(The seed thing before and after.)

Boyfriend says he’ll make me another mug of it tomorrow. Now to see if it actually works. If so, I am so sold on this remedy. It is cheap and easy and tastes sweet. Also, it looks like I am drinking tiny eyeballs and that is so cool.

Furniture

I got really into making things in the past year or two. I don’t like my hands being idle, so when I’m watching a movie or just sitting around, I’m always almost knitting, stitching, cutting, gluing, painting or just generally creating something. I don’t have a whole lot to show for it since I usually give everything away.
Anyways, I bought a bunch of craft stuff over the summer in America to bring back with me. It’s hard to find a lot of things here like yarn, knitting needles, cross-stitch fabric, skeins of floss, etc. I did learn that felt and fabric scraps are in abundance though!
I like my things to be organized, so in a desperate attempt to classify and store all my craft things, I constructed a crude shelf out of 5 cardboard boxes. One for knitting things, one for needlework things, one for painting, drawing and coloring things, one for paper and pictures, and one for broken things from around the house that I’m convinced I can repurpose. Like old guitar strings and pane of glass that broke in half.
When Aswan saw my sad little cardboard boxes, he gave me *a look* and said, “Let’s go visit my friend Deny. He can build something for you. Out of….. wood.” So we went to visit Deny. I really had no clue what I wanted because I so thrilled with my cardboard box construction. But Deny talked with me for like an hour and we came up with a plan. And 5 days later, I had my first piece of custom built furniture!

(Before and after)

Even though we never talked about it, Deny went ahead and made all the shelves removable and made each side look paneled (or at least that is the word I would use to describe it. I don’t really know what the correct term is). It only cost $40. It is made of mahogany. I think I’m in love. 

Telemoyo

Neither boyfriend nor I particularly enjoy planning for large groups. And small groups in Indonesia always turn into large groups. You can invite 5 people to do something, and before you know it, all 5 people have also invited 5 people and it just goes downhill from there. However, boyfriend and I did decide that we should hang out with friends more. Not that we don’t ever hang out with friends. We do. A lot, actually. But most evenings if we’re going out for dinner, it’s easier if we just go out for dinner alone than to have to try to arrange a time that is convenient for 75 people, not to mention a restaurant where they’d all fit!

Anyways, in the spirit  of doing things in groups and wanting fresh non-city air and taking the two new teachers on an adventure, I got a group together to go up Mount Telemoyo, which is one of two dormant volcanoes we can actually see from campus. Telemoyo is my favorite mountain to climb because you never actually have to set foot on the ground. A lot of internet and cell phone companies have towers at the peak of the mountain, so there’s a service road all the way to the top! Granted, the “road” is only barely wide enough for a car, drops off steeply to the left, and is washed out in a lot of places. But still, the view is amazing! You can see six mountains from the top. When it’s not completely covered in clouds like it was when we went up. It was still beautiful though – and a really fun drive!

We ended up with 13 people going. I was a little apprehensive because some of those going have only recently bought motorbikes and have never driven on scary mountain roads. Also, it’s easy to burn brakes out coming back down if you don’t know how to drive downhill for extended periods of time. But everyone did really well! We were slow and steady and took lots of sightseeing/photo breaks since it was completely clear up until just below the peak.

Here are some pictures I took!!

(The chicken manure truck we got stuck behind on the way to the service road – you can see a bit of Telemoyo in the background)

(A view of Telemoyo from before we actually started ascending it)

(Entering the service road)

(The next mountain over – Gunung Andong, which I’ve also climbed! That one you actually have to hike)

(Picture time with Yo, Kari and Pita)

(Stopping for pictures just below the peak)

(Some of the many towers at the top)

(Not much of a view from the top. But we could spy on the people coming around that bend in the road!)

(On the way down. This is the only picture I have that actually has everyone in it! We did take one group picture at the top, but unfortunately, it wasn’t with my camera.)

(Back down at the bottom)

NEWSFLASH!

Boyfriend’s roommate finally cut off his mullet!!!!! I have been waiting for this day. And waiting and waiting and waiting. I’m gonna chalk this up to the recent addition of his first girlfriend in his life.

Also I am sick. School always makes me pretty consistently sick, every year. Boyfriend spent all day with me yesterday (because it was Indonesian independence day so we didn't have to work) and gave me a leg massage. It was fantastic.

And when we went to get lunch, we wanted to eat at a new-ish restaurant outside of town. But it was closed (due to the holiday). So we were a little ways outside town and then we got a flat tire so we had to push the motorbike to a tambal ban (tire patching place) in the desa (village). A one legged man who lives in a clapboard wood house fixed the tire for us while his baby duck came and sat down in the dirt by my feet and the neighbor kids came out and stood by their well to watch me shyly. I didn’t even care that I felt like death or that it was 2 o’clock and I was ridiculously hungry. It was so quiet and peaceful and just sitting on a bench in the one-legged man’s dirt yard with all his poultry cackling about made me so happy my eyes actually filled up with tears. It was a beautiful day.

Happy independence day, Indonesia. But don't confuse independence with freedom.

School Days

Well, we're halfway through the third day of school. And I gotta say, I love these kids way more than I expected to. I really don't enjoy middle school aged little people, and this year I have 9th grade AND 8th grade (and 10th grade and 11th grade). I still have bad dreams about 7th grade three years ago. So I was somewhat dreading teaching middle school again. But really, they are awesome. Way more awesome than I thought.

Yesterday, we were going over unit conversions in 9th grade, like converting miles per hour to kilometers per hour. And we got into a discussion about why they have to learn American units of measurement instead of just using metric all the time. The entire class is Asian except for one American who was born and raised in Indonesia. None of them use the American system for weights and measures. I concur that it's pretty stupid when compared with the metric system. But they gotta learn it, so I provided several valid (or so I thought) reasons for learning the American system: they might someday go to college in America, it's good to learn how other people in the world do/measure things, being open-minded is a positive thing, because their textbook and teacher are both American, because I say so, etc.

On their homework assignment, one problem asked them to compare the weight of a bumblebee (given in ounces) to the weight of a whale (given in tons), meaning they would have to convert either the bee's weight to tons or the whale's weight to ounces. The first part of the question just asks them to convert one to the other. The second part asks them to tell how many times heavier the whale is than the bumblebee. And the third part asks them to explain another way they could have worked the problem. Suggested answers are, "convert the whale and bee's weight both to pounds and compare" and "instead of converting the whale's weight to ounces, I could have converted the bee's weight to tons".

One Indonesian student came up with a unique solution.

"By converting the weight to the glorious master race metric system."

My poor grader had no clue what to do with something that in no way resembled what was in the answer key, so he asked me to look at it. I told him not to mark it wrong and laughed kind of a lot.

Sleep cometh! Finally!

Kept myself awake all the way until 10 last night! Only marginally woke up for sahur and prayers, but otherwise slept straight until 6:30. Teacher meetings start today at 8. Oh boy... can't wait...

A Dire Miscalculation

Well, I made myself stay awake ALL THE WAY until 9:30 last night. WOW! By that point, I was just about sleeping on my feet. But even though I woke up for sahur this morning again, I was able to fall back asleep after. When I did wake up, for some reason I looked at my phone to see what time it was. 3:15. Yesterday I said I woke up at 4. I was wrong. Sahur starts at 3:15. Wow. Well, I guess if they can start their day at 3:15, so can I. Right? Ugh.

After I fell back asleep, I woke up for call to prayer. This new mosque is gonna be a challenge, I am realizing. But then I fell back asleep again! All the way until 6:30 when some people were walking on the track nearby my house talking REALLY loudly.

So now I'm gonna go make some delicious mom's potato salad for the school "family reunion" later this afternoon. Have a great day!

A Glimpse into Ramadan (for my American friends)

I stumbled onto this online and thought it gave some pretty good insight into what the month of Ramadan is actually about for many Muslims. I think a lot of Americans don’t really understand why Muslims fast for a whole month – it’s not necessarily about physical deprivation as a means to earn a place in Heaven (which I feel is the skewed perspective that most people get), it’s more about purification and refocus. I’m not Muslim, so maybe I’m stepping out of bounds by saying this, but from my experience here, I think there are quite a few Muslims who fast because they hope it will earn them points with Allah and they forget the true meaning of the month. But on the flip side, I have Muslim friends who truly LOVE this month and almost mourn when it ends because it is a time of forgiveness, a time of love, a time of peace.

Ramadan

I was thinking yesterday as I was riding my motorbike through town that me being in America feels like a dream, like I was never really there. It feels like I never left Indonesia.

Indonesia isn't a country that makes big changes in short amounts of time. I mean, the new toll road around town has been well under way since before I got here 3 years ago, and it's STILL not done.

Basically the only things that changed over the summer go as follows:

1. My apartment got a lot cleaner (thanks Ibu Sri).
2. A new cafe opened in town.
3. Aswan lost weight.
4. Fasting month approached.
5. The mosque down the street got a new - and incredibly loud - PA system.

Those last two - accompanied by jet lag - are absolutely slaying my sleep times. Ramadan, the Muslim month of fasting, actually started this morning. I was reminded of this when I got here last week (I forgot it was starting so early this year) and saw banners hanging all over town depicting a cartoon drawing of a baby Satan with an ever-so-inspirational slogan, "Don't let him grow up. Ramadan."

But the mosque... Oh, the mosque...

So during the fasting month, Muslims cannot eat or drink (the truly devout go so far as to not even swallow their own spit) from dawn until dusk. So they all wake up REALLY early to eat breakfast, then sunset brings with it a feast. In years past, in my kampung (neighborhood), the men take turns going down the street with a stick at 3:30 - 4 AM, banging gates and yelling "SAAAHHHHHUUUUUURRR!!! SAHUR!!!!" (Basically, "mealtime! mealtime!") to wake everyone up. After the first few days, I can sleep through that.

But the mosque... Oh, the mosque...

They got a guy with a totally made-for-radio voice to YELL and SCREAM through the brand spankin new PA system. And it wasn't just two seconds of "SAAHHUURRRRRR!!!" No, it was that, plus a welcome to Ramadan, the holy month, plus guidelines on what to eat at this time to maintain energy throughout the day, plus a bunch of other stuff that I couldn't understand on account of he was SCREAMING through an incredibly loud PA system with the volume jacked up as far as possible. That mosque isn't even the closest mosque to my house - there are 2 (maybe 3 - I've never measured) in the other direction that are closer than this one, but I COULDN'T EVEN HEAR THEM.

Really? Does nobody in this kampung own an alarm clock? Nobody??? Can we PLEASE go back to banging sticks on gates??

After that wonderful awakening, and once the neighbor's German Shepherd finally realized aliens weren't invading and shut up, I drifted back to sleep, only to be awaken about 5 minutes later to "ALLLLEEEHUUUUUU AKBAR....." Call to prayer.

So... yup, I've been up since 4:30. No hope for going back to sleep now. I did go to bed at 7 last night though, so there's a chance I'll be OK. But if I don't learn to sleep through this, it's gonna be a looong month.

Pensacola vs Bob Jones

Over the summer, we had some friends come visit us whose daughter just graduated and is planning on going to Pensacola Christian College down in Florida this fall. Now, like me, you might have just cringed. I mean, this school has a reputation as being a militaristic Christian cult. It is off the wall crazy with the rules. I asked said daughter about that, and she reassured me that the school is not at all like that and has loosened up in recent years. In fact, she claimed that Bob Jones wants nothing to do with Pensacola because they think Pensacola is TOO liberal! Whatttt?

So last night I did a little research. I couldn't find any current Pensacola rule books online, but based on pictures I saw on the website, it appears that they've loosened up on the dress code and the guy/girl interactions. When I got on Bob Jones' website, I did find their rule book. Nothing super surprising except for the following two rules that came together at the VERY end of the list of "Staying in the Residence Halls" expectations.

8. Residence hall students may not watch videos above a G rating when visiting homes in town and may not attend movie theaters.

9. All weapons brought to campus must be turned in for storage. Trigger locks are required for pistols.

Did anyone else laugh out loud when reading those two rules together? Or was it just me??

Back in Action

Well, 2 days and 5 airports later, I'm finally back at my house in Indo. I made it safely without any hangups at all along the way! Even my 50 minute layover in Tokyo was a breeze! Every flight took off on time (even the domestic Indonesian one - a MIRACLE) and arrived early, and my luggage made it intact. I even got to be with friends/coworkers on 2 flights!

Of course, I fell asleep at 6 o'clock last night, and now I'm wide awake at 3 AM, but we'll work on that. I've got 3 more days before I have to be anywhere.

Thanks to everyone for prayers!

How boyfriend fills his days.

Yesterday, boyfriend was searching for fish medicine. For a whole school of catfish with a skin (scale?) condition. He didn't find any, so he ended up renting them a whole pond in the hopes that the new location and clean water would expedite their recovery. Their owner will be relocating the school post haste.

Today, boyfriend is at a convent. When asked why he was going there, he simply replied, "The nuns make yogurt."

I don't know if I can handle all this spontaneity.