SUMMER

For my first trick this summer, I will be spending four days snorkeling in the Karimunjawa islands. I went there roughly one month after I moved to Indonesia, and I haven’t been back since. As I was looking through old blog posts to find the appropriate one to link to this post, I realized that I NEVER POSTED about that adventure so many years ago. So I’m going to post some pictures here that I took last time I visited the island paradise I will be spending this weekend at.

 

Can you tell what that last one is?

Right and Wrong

 

You’re doing it wrong, horse.

That was better.

 

PS – I figured out how to get my point-and-shoot to do 3 fps.

A Day at the Ranch

There was a horse dressage and jumping show/competition just outside of town on Saturday and Sunday of this weekend. I spent all day both days there working concessions and wandering around during the not-so-busy times and taking in the shows. Basically, I could care less about dressage, but jumping was fun to watch. Pictures to come...

I've been to the ranch that hosted the event several times since that is where Aswan works. They have some absolutely beautiful horses, most of which are imported from Australia and Europe and cost upwards of $250,000. Yes, that's US dollars. The daughter of the man who owns the ranch goes to our school, so I've met him a few times both at school and at the ranch. Yesterday, he approached me, and we had the following conversation in a curious mix of Indonesian and English (we both speak both).

Him: So I hear you're quite the rider.
Me: Not really... My family had horses when I was growing up, but I've never ridden competitively or anything. I like being around horses, but I'm not much of a rider.
Him: Well, feel free to come ride here sometime. In fact, I hope you will. We could use an athlete like you around here.
Me: Oh, I'm definitely not an athlete, but I'd love to ride sometime. The only problem is that I don't know how to ride English. I've never tried it. I'd have to learn.
Him: How do you ride then?
Me: Where I grew up, most people ride western. I usually didn't use a saddle at all when I rode, just in the fields around my house.
Him: Western? Like rodeos?
Me: Well, kind of. They ride western in rodeos, but they're not the same thing.
Him: We'd like to get into some other areas of horse riding. Can you train our horses for rodeo? That would be great.
Me: Um. Probably not. Your horses are already trained to be ridden English style for dressage...
Him: Oh, there's some half trained ones back there I'm sure you could use.
Me: Well, I've never trained a horse before. And you don't have any western saddles here. Or any of the right tack....
Him: But you have all summer off! You can come and work on it.
Me: ....Or any horses that aren't warmbloods or thoroughbreds.
Him: These ones'll be just fine.
Me: I've never ridden in a rodeo. I don't know how.
Him: I bet you could learn!
Me: Um. Maybe.
Him: So you'll do it then? Great! I look forward to it!

Apparently, "you had a pony as a child" = "you are a professional horse trainer".

As I was thinking about it though, I realized that I could probably figure out how to train a horse to do stuff like barrel racing and pole bending and that thing with the flags. Knowing the culture, I bet Indonesians would really be into something like that. Of course, I've never done any of those things myself. And there's still the problem of there not being any western tack or quarter horses in this part of the world. But when you have 250 Gs to drop on a horse, how difficult can it be to get those things?

Summer

7:24 AM in Central Java.

8:24 PM in small town Indiana.

This is how I know it’s summer.

Summer Resolutions

Here is my summer to do list.

1. Finish curriculum maps for school by June 18th.
2. Clean out and reorganize the filing cabinet in my classroom to make it more efficient to use.
3. Teach Kohl how to play piano.
4. Get access to a piano and practice it at least once a week as well as guitar.
5. Have a picnic on top of a mountain.
6. Climb to the top of the Beringin tower (the tallest building in town) and spend an afternoon looking at the rooftops of the city.
7. Go on drives/walks with the express purpose of taking pictures at least 3 times.
8. Finish season 1 of Downton Abbey with Melanie.
9. Read at least 100 chapters of the Bible.
10. Drive my motorbike to Solo. Talk to the homeless man at the stoplight north of town.
11. Go swimming and get a tan.
12. Stay at a local hotel once just for the fun of it. Order room service and try not to notice that the fried rice probably costs five times as much in the hotel as it does on the sidewalk in front of the hotel.
13. Go to Semarang to have lunch with Vartika at least once before she moves to America.
14. Read and translate at least 10 Indonesian fables (I have a whole book of them).
15. Learn to make grilled stuffed burritos with all local ingredients.
16. Find a good tailor and take the pile of slightly-too-large hand-me-downs that has been building up for a year in to be altered so that I can finally wear them.
17. Leave the island once. Ideally, leave the country once - to Singapore or KL.
18. Go on dinner dates with Liz.
19. Re-learn calculus so I can teach it next year.
20. Don't avoid goodbyes. Spend lots of time with people who are leaving, even when I feel like I should be accomplishing something else on my list.
21. Exercise. At least once. All summer.
22. Read the books I own that I haven't read yet, and don't download and watch seasons of TV shows instead.
23. Be intentional about learning more Indonesian. Read the dictionary.
24. Take a vitamin every day.

I'll try to blog about at least some of these things as I accomplish them. IF I accomplish them. That remains to be seen. From here, summer seems like two vast months of empty space, and I should be able to finish this list in like the first week. But it never works out quite like that...

Jobs

I think that most people probably think their job is the hardest/most exhausting/most emotionally draining/highest energy/toughest job. But let me make a case for teaching at an international school.

In what other profession do you spend 8 hours a day trapped in a small room with 60 - 100 hormonal teenagers attempting to teach them something that they generally don't want to learn in a language that is not their first?

In what other profession do 25% of the people you work with, live with, and interact with every single day move out of the country each year?

In what other profession do you pour everything you have into others until you have nothing left to give, all the while knowing that the end result will be those people moving halfway around the world to start new lives and possibly never even seeing them again in this lifetime?

In what other profession do you do all this and get paid less than half of the US poverty line?



This has been an extremely hard week full of many tears. I said goodbye to 15 seniors that I've taught since my first year here. They were freshmen back then. I've seen them grow up, and I've grown with them. I know their families, I've been to their homes, I've gone to their birthday parties, we've had sleepovers together, we've gone on class trips to other islands, I've hiked mountains with them, I've gone on adventures with them, and I love them so very much. They are going to America, to Korea, to England, to Hong Kong, to Holland. All around the world. This was the hardest class yet to say goodbye to. On top of that, nearly half of my coworkers are leaving. Both of my neighbors are moving away. Those who aren't moving away for good are leaving for the summer. By June, I will be the only single teacher left in Salatiga.

It's not all sadness though. Bittersweet is the best word to describe springtime around here. There is much sadness, yes. But there is also an understanding that I have to grieve these losses, and then I have to move on. Because life does. It brings new coworkers, new friends, new students, a new class of seniors. There is also joy. Joy because I know that my students will change the world. But they have to leave this small town first. They need to go out on their own, to be independent, to have their own experiences. Away from their families. Away from their teachers. Away from their high school friends. To find who they are and what they are capable of. I think I see much of who they are, possibly more than they do at this point in their lives. And I am overwhelmingly impressed by the men and women they are becoming. They will move mountains.

In May, my heart breaks with every goodbye. It is a hard job I have. But there is no other job I would rather have, because no matter how many goodbyes I have to say, I know that goodbye is not forever.

I can't believe the last day of school is here...
Bittersweet.

The Hard Drive Saga

I have reason to believe that the hard drive on my less-than-one-year-old laptop is malfunctioning. I download lots of movies and shows, so I've been saving up money for a 1 terabyte external hard drive that I can transfer all of those files to in order to keep my laptop's drive more free. In light of the issues my laptop has been having, I decided to buy the hard drive sooner rather than later to back up ALL of my files. Little did I know what I was getting myself into...

A few months ago, a friend was visiting from Papua, and while she was in civilization, she wanted to buy a 1 terabyte hard drive. The first few computer stores we went to told us they would have to order it, but she was leaving the next day, so that wouldn't have worked out. We were thankful that at the third or fourth store we tried, they didn't only stock 1 terabyte hard drives, they had 3 different brands and models to choose from!

So when I wanted to buy my own hard drive, being American and enjoying instant gratification, I went to the store that stocked terabyte hard drives first. Just three months ago, they had multiple models available. But alas, no luck for me. I would have to pay over $100 and wait at least 3 days. I explained to them that my laptop's hard drive was unstable and I needed a large drive fast and asked if they could point me in the right direction. They suggested Redline, a newly opened store just down the street. So I headed there. A very friendly girl who appeared to know absolutely nothing (based on the fact that every single time I asked her a question, she went and asked the same question to someone else to get an answer to give to me) told me that the hard drive would cost less than $100 and that they could have it in 2 days, 3 max. Again, I explained my situation and asked if there was a store in town that stocked them or if there was any way to speed up the order. After she asked 2 other people who worked there, she informed me that no store in town that they were aware of had hard drives of that size in stock. This was by far the cheapest place I had been to, so after asking a few more questions about the brand, warranty, etc, I placed my order and went on my way expecting to have my hard drive within a week, because let's face it - "two or three days" NEVER means two or three days.

They surprised me when, true to word, they texted me on the third day (last Tuesday) to let me know that my hard drive was in and ready to be picked up. Tuesday was a hectic day and I didn't get home from school until after the store was closed, so I went on Wednesday after school to pick it up. The girl who took my order was not there, but an equally dazed looking young man was there to help me. I showed him my invoice AND the sms saying that my hard drive was there and I wanted to pick it up. After much confusion (I don't know how "I want to pick up my order, please" is confusing), he reached into the glass counter that separated him and I and grabbed a 1 terabyte internal hard drive and said, "OH! Here it is!" I pushed it back across the glass countertop toward him and said, "Um, this is an internal hard drive. I ordered an external hard drive. It says right here on the invoice. See?"

After much mumbling and shuffling of the feet and confused poking around, he made three different phone calls to ask if anyone remembered "the white girl who ordered a hard drive on Saturday" and to ask if anyone knew where it was. Finally, whoever he called on the third try remembered me and told him the hard drive was in the glass counter. He explained that I ordered an external and that was an internal. It didn't take them long to realize they had placed the wrong order. When he got off the phone, he explained to me that they would have to re-order my hard drive but that since the next day was a holiday (Ascension Day), the earliest it would get here would be Friday, Saturday at the latest.

It's Sunday. No hard drive. I ordered it over a week ago now. I went there after church today to put a little pressure on them, but they were closed. Welcome to trying to get things done in a third world country.

Church

Things I learned in church today.

• The English word "proof" is pronounced like this: proop.
• If you would like to be baptized in June, you can sign up now to "choose how long you want to be drowned for".
• America allied with countries like England and Europe in WWII, and together they nuked Japan.
• Indonesian (Bahasa Indonesia) and Malay (Bahasa Melayu) are very similar with a few distinct differences. For example, the word "butuh" means "need" in Indonesian. It means the same thing in Malay, but with a sexual connotation. So if you ever preach in Malaysia, don't ask people to kneel at the altar if they butuh Jesus.

I take impeccable notes, as you can see.

Just Another Day

Come home from church.
Find an extremely large scorpion dead in the street in front of my house.
Just another day on my side of the world.

9th Graders

Daniel: Hey. I have a joke for you. How do you make Taein laugh on Friday?
Me: Um... I don't know.
Daniel: Tell him a joke on Monday.
Me: Hahahaha!
Taein: I don't get the joke.
Daniel: That's the POINT. You'll get it in a few days.
Taein: But why is the joke about me? Why not Peter?
Daniel: Because Peter GETS the joke.
Taein: So?


*next conversation*

Peter: Hey, have you watched the movie Dear John?
Me: Yeah.
Peter: It reminded me of your brother.
Me: What?? Why?
Peter: Because he goes to war then gets shot.


*next conversation*

Gary: Can I start calling you Mrs. Winarto?
Me: Not yet.
Gary: Oh. Then can I call you Auntie?


*next conversation*

Ani: Is your brother in the American Army?
Me: As opposed to....?
Ani: I don't know. The Israeli Army?
Me: Why the Israeli Army?
Ani: I don't know. You've mentioned that you have German heritage.
Me: Well, technically, he's not in any army. He's in the Air Force, but yes, it is the US Air Force.
Ani: Don't a lot of people retire from the Air Force and become really really famous?
Me: For what?
Ani: For being commercial pilots.
Richard: Can you even BE a famous commercial pilot? Is there such a thing?
Ani: Yeah, if you save people's lives when you're crashing, you get super famous!
Richard: But that means that you crashed the plane in the first place, so......

Sudden Realizations

I just taught my last lesson of the 2011-2012 academic year. From here on out, it's test reviews, unit tests, exam review, and then exams.

All unit reviews and tests are written with answer keys made. Exam review materials are prepared, and all exams have been written, proofread five times, printed, and sent off to the copier.

Hallelujah! I AM DONE!

COME ON, SUMMER!

And It's Only Tuesday

One of my juniors is out for the rest of the year with dengue fever.
I spit on a front row 10th grader while saying "point symmetry" in geometry class today.
I currently have a hair stuck between my two front teeth.

Yeah, it's been one of those weeks.

After Four Years

It still amazes me how far my money goes here. Just got back from town. Here are my purchases:

The computer store – $98

• A 1 terrabyte external hard drive (not shown because I have to go back to pick it up next week)

The craft store – $1

• Two bags of beads to use as eyeballs on some felt owls I made
• A bag of silver glitter because I like glitter

The baking store – $4

• Two bricks of unsalted imported French butter. REAL butter.

The apothecary – $2

• A bottle of hydrogen peroxide (I hope. Is that what H2O2 is?)
• A bottle of rubbing alcohol
• A tube of medicine that I use for every skin related ailment

The grocery store – $3

• A month’s worth of toilet paper
• A liter of pineapple juice
• Half a liter of apple juice
• 2 milk boxes. Like juice boxes, but not as sweet.

So if we ignore the nearly $100 I spent on the hard drive, I bought everything in this picture for right around $10. And almost half of that was just for the butter. The lengths I go to for real butter around here…

Celebrity

When I first moved here, the instant celebrity status was a novelty. I thought it was funny when people took my picture or wolf whistled or shouted, "I love you, Mister!" longingly as I walked by. And it was a nice change from living in Kenya where the locals mostly mugged foreigners and we had to drive everywhere with the windows rolled all the way up, doors locked, and a machete under the front seat. Indonesia is definitely much more hospitable to foreigners.

But as with all things, the novelty wears off. The marriage proposals, the declarations of love, and especially the photo taking that they think is oh, so inconspicuous serves only to remind me that I am an outsider. I don't fit in here, and I never will.

I remember last Idul Fitri at a mall in Semarang, I was standing in a long line of holiday shoppers trying to buy some clothes for some village kids, and everywhere I looked, people were staring at me, pointing me out to their friends and small children, talking about me in hushed tones. I was the only white person in the entire mall, and I was nearly in tears. Maybe I was PMSing or something, but I just remember feeling such an overwhelming sense of despair as I thought about the last 4 years I'd spent here trying to make this place home, building relationships and learning languages - all for what? To STILL be an outsider. And I realized that to them, I will always be an outsider.

I know, I know - this earth isn't my home. I'm a stranger in this land, and all that. Valid. Very valid. But not always reassuring. Not in a mall full of people pointing and staring at me like I have two heads.

Feeling like a pariah every time I leave the house is only one side of the story. There are also the people that put me on a pedestal and give me the extra special treatment. Instead of sneakily trying to take a picture of me with their camera phone, they boldly walk over to me, tell me I'm pretty, and ask to take a picture WITH me. This usually involves at least 4 different poses. Others ask for my phone number, Facebook name, email address, autograph, etc. Yet others want me to be on a panel of judges for some event or to come speak at their school or to meet their friends. This also serves to remind me that I'm not one of them - if I was, they wouldn't be talking to me at all. Which is why I consider it to be racism (a bold statement, I know). Because really, they are treating me differently solely because of the color of my skin. If it were any other color, nobody would give me a second glance.

When the novelty of being ushered to the front of the line or having my picture taken in the grocery store or being introduced to people's children while clothes shopping started to wear off, I was hesitant to do or say anything about it because I was afraid to seem rude. I think I spent about a year and a half grudgingly taking pictures with random people on the street just to be nice. I rarely smiled though, so I guess I showed them!

Lately (as in the past couple of months), I've been feeling more and more like I can't keep silent. I've started building up resentment towards those people whom I perceive to be hell bent on making me feel strange or different, though I do know deep down in my heart that their intentions are completely innocent. I don't want to feel resentful about it, but I know that nothing will change if I don't step up and do something about it. So the last few times somebody has asked for my phone number or if they can take a picture with me, my response has simply been, "Why?" Usually people think I didn't understand their request, and they repeat it LOUDER and slooooowerrrr (it's not only the stereotypical American tourist that does that, thank goodness). And again, I ask, "Why?" I want people to think about why exactly they feel like they need to take my picture. What are they even going to do with it? They don't even know my name!

See, the thing is, nobody will come right out and say, "Because you're white". And besides that reason, they have no other reason. Usually the person hesitates for a moment, dumbfounded, then just walks away in disbelief, confused and possibly slightly upset because the bule (white person) didn't want to take a picture with them. The last time I did this, I felt like I owed the guy an explanation. I think he might have been dared to come ask to take my picture, and all his friends were watching, so I didn't want to completely shame him. I simply told him, "You want to take a picture with me because my skin is white. But under my skin, I'm the same as you. I'm not famous or special, so there's no reason to take a picture of me. Sorry."

I think it's a line that works, and I might stick with it. Because I don't want to get my picture taken with strangers. I don't want to model for your photography studio. I don't want to be Santa Clause at your church for Christmas. I don't want to be the speaker at your school's English conference. I don't want to sit in the front row. I don't want to take the only empty seat on the bus when 50 other people are standing. I don't want to pay $20 for something that everyone else is charged $3 for. I don't want to be treated differently from everybody else just because of the color of my skin.

What I want is to finally feel like I am home.

I haven't felt that way for four years.

In Other News

As I was locking up my classroom yesterday, a friend showed up and was all, "Hey! Wanna go dirtbiking? Right now?" So I said I would go if they would let me go home first to change out of my school clothes.

We went with a couple of my students who have massive dirtbikes. The two of us rode while they drove us all over the mountain, through rice fields, over 1 foot wide bamboo bridges over waterfalls, through little mountain villages, etc. Pretty much everywhere except roads. There were a few parts where the girls had to get off and walk or help push the bikes up some really steep, rocky bits. We had some precarious moments and we got a little dirty, but we all made it back safe and sound.

Then when we were back in my front yard, the guys taught us how to drive their bikes. I've never driven a manual bike (mine is automatic), much less one of that size, so it was pretty sweet. I only stalled it once. Shifting and braking with your feet is a strange feeling.

It was a brand new adventure that I was thankful for.

The Vengeful Teacher

I will be the first to admit that there are probably no teacher of the year awards coming my way any time soon. When someone misbehaves in my class - especially when they are repeat offenders - my tendency is to teach them a lesson rather than directly address the behavior. For example, I have a student who has a habit of leaving old homework assignments and notes and other papers all over my classroom. I've talked to him before about this and asked him to clean up after himself, but over the course of three days this week, he managed to leave 12 papers wadded up around my classroom. Since that particular class has a seating chart and I know exactly where he will be sitting each and every day, AND I have a planning period right before that class comes, I took those 12 papers and cut every single one of them up in to a zillion tiny pieces and sprinkled them all over his desk with a note reading, "Please clean up your mess". When he came to class, it looked like a snowstorm had hit his desk. And he wasn't allowed to leave the room until every tiny scrap was in the garbage can. He hasn't left a paper in the room since then.

Another example would from Tuesday when I gave a test to the 9th graders, and more than half of them turned in a test so full of scribbles that I could hardly grade some of them. I thought we were beyond that. They all own erasers, but they insist on not using them. So I graded their tests, wrote their grades at the top, then scribbled them out. Then when they asked me what their grade was, I replied, "Hmm... Wow, it's tough to see, huh? I guess I should have erased my scribbles there. You might have been able to read it then."

Or yesterday. Geometry was reviewing for a test they have later on today. I gave them ample practice problems and a study guide for the chapter, and most of them were working quite diligently. Except one boy who fell fast asleep. Like into a deep sleep. Some of his friends thought it would be humorous to draw "tattoos" on his arms that consisted of my name inside of a heart. While I am a big fan of the keep-your-hands-to-yourself policy, I make exceptions from time to time. And if you are going to sleep that deeply during a test review, I have absolutely no problem with letting Sharpie tattoos be the consequence. I was about to drop a math textbook on his desk when I realized that he was leaning forward in such a way that caused his jeans to gap in the back leaving a nice space for many a thing to "fall" into (thankfully he was wearing boxers underneath). Realizing the prime opportunity that fate had just handed me, I proceeded to pass office supplies out to a few of his friends and motioned for them to drop them down the back of his pants. They managed to get 3 paperclips down before their stifled giggles woke him up. By that point, about half the class was watching, and he was a little panicked because he didn't know WHY everyone was giggling and looking at him. He was convinced that someone had drawn something on his face, and he kept trying to wipe it off, which just made everyone laugh harder.

Kids on the far side of the room who hadn't seen what happened knew something was up, and they started asking around to try and get the scoop. Nobody wanted the newly awakened sleeper to know what was going on because they were waiting with bated breath for his reaction, so hushed whispers were going around the room as witnesses explained to those who hadn't seen what exactly we did to sleeper boy.

That turned into a bad game of telephone though, because by the time the information reached the culprit's friend in the far corner of the room, the story had changed dramatically. In fact, his friend, mortified by what he had just heard, saw fit to yell across the room to culprit boy, "DUDE! She (pointing to me) touched you inappropriately while you were sleeping!"

Thankfully, I had 20 witnesses in the room who knew that I never left my desk, so we got that matter cleared up right quick. But somehow, those 20 witnesses managed to keep the paper clips in the pants a secret. Then when the bell rang and they all stood up to leave, culprit boy started dancing and shrieking like a little girl because he thought he felt bugs crawling on his legs inside his pants. It was just the paper clips falling out.

Call me a bad teacher, but my passive aggressive consequences are always oh, so satisfying in the end.

Those Children

As I was teaching about the normal distribution in PreCalculus class this morning, I noticed a note being passed. Yes, teachers really do notice those things. I generally don’t mind because it rarely happens, so when it does, I give them the benefit of the doubt and assume that they are asking a very important question that they are afraid they will forget to ask in person later, and I can respect that. I’d probably do the same thing. And I’d rather them pass a note than holler something across the room to the person they are needing to talk to. This morning was different though. I didn’t see who wrote the note, but I knew it had come from the very back of the room and was working its way forward. It was causing a bit of commotion. Every time the note got handed off, there seemed to be some confusion as to its destination. I heard a few kids asking, “REALLY? Are you SURE?”

At the exact time the note reached the second row from the front, I had two simultaneous realizations.

1. The note had to be stopped. I could not allow this distraction to continue.
2. The note was for me.

I quick scanned the back row and found the one kid with one eyeball pointed down at his textbook and one eyeball pointed up at me, waiting to see what my reaction would be. He was the culprit. A student in the front row said, “Um, Miss, I think this is for you?” and passed me a folded up square of paper. I couldn’t help myself. I opened it up, and sure enough, it was written in my suspect’s handwriting.

I gave the stern one-eyebrow-raised-what-is-this? look to culprit kid, who by now was about to burst with glee in his seat in the back row. He couldn’t contain his happiness at seeing his plan unfold and shouted out, “But that’s just between you and me!”

Janice, very studious quiet Asian girl who sits next to culprit kid, knew what was in the note, realized that I had actually READ the note, and immediately responded with, “Oh, NO! I PROMISE I didn’t say that! He is making things up!” Which, of course, I knew he was, because he is a goofball and he WOULD do something like pass a teacher a note during class just to say something utterly ludicrous.

The whole class was oh, so curious about what was in the note. But I will never tell my secrets. Unless they read this blog.

SRSLY?

Thanks to the stats feature on my blog, I can see how many people from what countries are visiting my blog each day, and I can also see what sites referred them to my blog. And if they came from Google, I can even see what they searched for that led them here.

Consistently, the number one most viewed post (and the post with the highest all time number of views on my blog) is the one about when I bought Toms a year ago and couldn't tell if they were fake or not. Apparently lots of people have that problem. This has made my blog so popular that if you search "fake toms" under Google images, a picture from my blog is on the first page of images that pop up. And there are over 1.5 million results. Crazy. I'm gonna just go ahead and say that I'm famous...

I'm used to my blog getting hits from certain Google searches such as "Bali", "Indonesia", "half Chinese baby", "fake Toms", "Bandung" and so on. But I got a new one today.

In the past 12 hours, I've had two visits from people doing a Google search for "beautiful naked woman". I'm not sure if they were doing a general search or an images search, and I'm not about to go check and see which one brings up my blog. I did find which of my posts they were directed to though.

The one I posted last week about the picture I found on Facebook condemning women who break the law of Allah by being attractive.

So I guess that'll teach them.


Aaaaand I just realized that since I have now used the phrase "beautiful naked woman" in this post twice now, I will likely be getting even more hits from that particular Google search. Bring it on.

Vehicles

I miss having a beat up old vehicle that I don't feel any compulsive need to take extreme care of.

When I bought my motorbike, I researched which make, model, and color had the highest resale value. The original plan was to drive it for two years and then sell it for a mere $200 less than I paid for it (the average resale value at that time) before moving back to the States after my 3 year contract was up. I figured $100/year for a brand new motorbike sounded like a deal. But of course, I had to drive carefully. No scratches, no dents, regular visits to the garage for maintenance, and regular wash and wax dates.

We're going on 3 years now, my bike and I. I've done a superb job of caring for it. I mostly consider this a product of my upbringing. If something is making a strange noise, I don't just ignore it. I get it fixed. And while most foreigners are intimidated by the idea of taking their vehicle to the shop, I'm quite comfortable there and have never had any qualms about going to a local bengkel (garage). I have a neighbor who has lived here 5 years and to my knowledge has never once taken her motorbike in for a tune-up. I'm also not sure if her bike has ever been washed. There is actually green mold growing on the underside of it.

Anyways, I digress. The point I'm getting at here is that for nearly 3 years, I have taken excellent care of my motorbike. I always slow down for speed bumps. I swerve around potholes. I keep it out of the rain and direct sunlight. When I find myself on rough, rocky roads, I drive like a 90 year old woman in a Crown Vic.

And after nearly 3 years of driving like this, I am starting to miss my '85 Silverado that was held together in many places by duct tape. I miss driving like a maniac on the worst of roads, because really, what more damage could I do? I didn't care about hitting potholes or how fast I went over speed bumps or driving through rivers of water running across the road after a heavy rain. I miss doing 60 over the railroad tracks and fishtailing down icy roads in winter. I miss not having to care where I park and not once ever washing or waxing my vehicle. I miss having a hammer under the seat that I used to beat various parts when they made strange noises or just stopped working altogether. I miss that 1 ton chunk of steel.

Keeping a vehicle nice is boring and altogether too much work. Some people are all about their fancy new cars. But I think beaters are the real luxury.