August | 2012 | not all who wander

|on writing|
I apologize that this is so long coming. But I’ve written a mountain to make up for lost time…

|on living|
I’ve been here two months. Already a third of the way through my time here. I feel settled. Although, to be fair, I felt settled almost at once. Almost before I left. I’m used to feeling out of place, so to suddenly be in a place where I very obviously don’t fit, I felt instantly more comfortable. I’ve woven in and out of culture shock, but so far at least, only very mildly. Where I am is such a strange mix of so many worlds. Everyone has a smart phone, but you can still buy live chickens on the street. I came and was just here. This was my new reality and it was cool. Not earth-shattering, or horrifying. It just was. Not without challenges, to be sure.

|on challenges|
Our running water shuts off about once a week for a few hours, or a day or so. Once for 4 days. Our drinking water runs out about half that often (less so now that Pak Adi [our villa “caretaker” of sorts] has adjusted to 5 people living here instead of 3.) None of this water is ever hot unless we boil it. Not for “showers,” for washing dishes or food or clothes. The weather where we were up the hill in Cisarua (I guess it would count as a “suburb” of Bogor) it’s never hot enough that a cold shower is anything other than miserable. So most of us will boil water in a kettle and a pot to dump it into a bucket, which we then scoop over our heads: “showering.” As far as laundry is concerned, my clothes are fine, but I’ve scrubbed holes in my fingers and I’m working up Popeye arms.

Traffic is a living nightmare. Better now that the school holiday is ended, but still dicey. Cisarua has one main road. One. Two lanes, although most drivers seem to have agreed that 4 or 5 make more sense and drive as such. Traffic “laws” here seem to really be more casual suggestions. During the holiday, without warning and without any recognizable pattern, at any time of the day, someone somewhere up or down the hill would just shut off all traffic going one direction and the road would become one way for an hour, two hours, or indefinitely. If you happened to be moving (or desiring to move) in the other direction, you had no choice but to wait.

We travel mostly by angkot – little blue or green mini-bus van/things with one open door, and benches lining the inside and an elevated floor (which makes it *impossible* to enter or exit gracefully.) They’ll pick you up and drop you off wherever you want along their route, and it costs 20 or 50 cents depending on how far you go. They can be a little death-defying depending on the age/upkeep of the vehicle and the sanity of the driver (and the other drivers on the road at the time) but they’re very convenient. Occasionally a little crowded. I would estimate that about 8 full grown adults can fit comfortably on one. I was once one of 13, and I’ve heard someone say they counted 15 once.

|on food|
everyone seems very interested in what I eat, but it’s not very interesting. We mostly cook for ourselves so I’m limited to the things I know how to make and the things I can buy groceries for—so mostly pretty boring western food. When I eat authentic, it’s nearly always nassi gorang (“fried rice,” the most ubiquitous Indonesian dish other than “IndoMie”—instant ramen.) from a little street vendor 2 minutes down the street from our villa. We call him “The Nassi Gorang Guy.” He makes it the best I’ve tasted it. One portion is 8,000 Rp. (about 80 cents) and is enough for two meals.

|on teaching|
I love teaching. I love my classes. I love my students. I do not love lesson planning, but that’s to be expected. (that’s…actually what I’m supposed to be doing now….) Teaching combines everything I loved about ministry (making kids laugh and telling people what to do) and excludes everything I hated (the emails [oh god, the emails] the recruiting [oh god, the recruiting] and the trying to get people to like me.) My schedule is very light and manageable since our space restrictions limit the number of classes we can hold. I teach one one-hour class of 9-13 year-olds twice a week, two two-hour men’s classes once a week and two two-hour computer classes once a week. I adore my Champion class (the kids.) There is a sweetness to them that most US kids have lost by 10 or 11. They’re not “too cool” for anything. They’re just the very oldest, most creative children. Their spoken English is good enough that we can play all kinds of fun games and most of them think I’m hilarious, which is totally fun. They bring me little gifts and draw me pictures and write me notes in very poor grammar (we’re working on it,) and I swoon.

My men’s classes are also wonderful but for completely different reasons. Their English is much lower than their children and the curriculum is not very well suited to their needs, but they’re such hard workers with so much focus. They are a joy to teach. We power through despite frustration on both ends.

The other day, Kevin (who teaches the Men’s classes with me,) told me he could probably get me a paid teaching job in Jakarta at an international school. That’s what his girlfriend does and many of the headmasters of the international schools are part of his church that partners with us. I laughed, but it’s been in the back of my mind ever since. I don’t really want to live in Jakarta, but I also don’t NOT want to live in Jakarta…

|on Bali|
We had a week off a few weeks ago, so the four of us US teachers who live in the villa went to Bali. There’s another World Relief team there, and, well…it’s Bali. The Bali team put us up the first night and made us pancakes in the morning and asked us how we all found ourselves here. They, it turns out, all came together. They’d become friends in grad school at Fuller, realized it was cheaper to rent a big house together than to live in campus apartments. Then after living together a few years just all decided to move across the world together. They were a delight to be around. It was oddly fitting that more than one of them were named “Joy.” In their company I came to the clearest understanding of “community” I’ve ever had. (Which is both ironic and tragic considering my recent history.)

I would never choose to live in Bogor if I had not committed to it, but I would spend the rest of my life in Bali. I could describe it, but I’ll just post some pictures below. We wandered quite a bit, sleeping somewhere new almost every night. One night for $10 we slept in tiny bamboo rooms built above the little ramshackle Warungs (restaurants) built right into the sand. It was like camping, but with a real bed, and with the sound (and sight) of waves seeping through the cracks in the bamboo walls. At least once a day, usually while we were doing something particularly spectacular—swimming in crystal clear water surrounded by cliffs, riding a ferry from one island to another, eating at a table placed just above the tide line—Evie and I would look at each other and say in unison, “We’re in BALI!” It doesn’t seem a place you could ever get used to.

|on beauty (and existential crises)|
I know this will surprise all of no one, but in the states, I never realized how much of my identity depended on feeling pretty. And competent. I’m not attractive here. I’m too tall and thin to be feminine, especially with the sports bras and size-too-big tshirts. I brought clothes for function not fashion. My hair has grown into funny animal shapes, and due to the water and air quality, my skin is a battlefield. I get stares everywhere I go, but not the “good” kind. Also, I’m terrible at everything. Clumsy, confused. I only know a few useful words of the language (despite my solid 5 days of study) and I only barely know my way around. Now. After two months. Thankfully, most Indonesians are incredibly friendly and helpful. Many of them know at least enough English to say hello and ask a few basic questions, and (most wonderfully for us) to give directions. Just now on my way to this mall (it has a Starbucks with semi-reliable wifi, so even though it’s an hour and a half away [depending on traffic,] we come here to get work done,) the angkot drive blew past the mall, and I obliviously continued to stare out the window listening to my headphones. Thankfully, an Indonesian girl had heard me say where I was going when I got on, stopped the driver and got my attention to get off. I have no idea where I would’ve ended up if she hadn’t. In Bali, we were driving past some rice paddies and I was inside my head staring out the window, and I saw this guy in one of those hats and he had a bunch of green… rice, I guess—it looked like grass, and he was beating it against something, like you think of old wheat farmers “threshing,” and I realized, “Good God, I don’t know *anything*! I don’t even know how to grow rice!” It was a very good, and helpful thought. Needless to say, it’s been really healthy for me to be odd looking and useless for a while.

|Things Indonesia seems to love|
–       Shawn the Sheep
–       Angry Birds
–       little plastic shoes
–       KFC (they even have a knockoff version: CFC. No idea what that stands for)
–       malls (seriously. They’re everywhere and they’re HUGE.)
–       motorcycles
–       durian (God knows why)
–       smart phones
–       covering American pop songs
–       drinks made from avocado and chocolate (I have yet to try one. I’ll keep you posted.)
– smoking (indoors, outdoors, in angkots…)

|on absence|
I miss my friends. I have incredibly vivid dreams here, but I dream exclusively about people I’d like to forget. I miss too many others to be wasting the brainspace. I miss Gio any time I hear any English Top 40 song ever. I miss Kristi any time I have an off-handed sarcastic comment to make under my breath. Claire got me into Project Runway and one of the designers looked exactly like Mark. I miss Jenna (and Alie) every 14 minutes when I realize I’m hunching my shoulders to appear shorter. I miss Nate every time I read Game of Thrones or play Dragonvale. I miss Isaac every time I miss American Spirits, and Blake whenever I miss scotch. I miss Patrick every time I’m on an AirAsia flight since their “radio” only plays that one stupid song (the one Bryce Larkin sings with Gay Luke on Glee.) I miss Ashley every time I put on my sunglasses or have an existential crisis. I miss Luke…just always. I think the Bali team had it right. Absolutely nothing about this would be hard if I had brought all of my people with me. How about it, people? Peace Corps?

|Things I miss about home…|
(other than people)
–       Hot. Water.
–       showers
–       dependable running water
–       washing machines
–       dryers
–       chipotle
–       bacon (oh god, bacon.)
–       feeling pretty
–       my bed
–       feeling clean
–       eavesdropping
–       toilet paper in all public restrooms
–       grocery stores that don’t smell like durian
–       my mini fridge
–       lettuce
–       occasionally being healthy

|Things I will miss when I leave here…|
–       Nassi. Gorang.
–       the cost of public transportation
–       Ika
–       Bali
–       my students
–       the ability to carry on a conversation in pubic without fear of being overheard
–       the cost of movie tickets
–       the availability of wifi
–       perhaps a little being “the highest Miss”
–       the fruit
–       the friendliness and helpfulness of strangers
–       angkot rides
–       cimory yogurts and lychee flavored mizones (vitamin waters)
–       tiny children in motorcycle helmets
–       feeling justifiably out of place

|on photos|
Here are a few…

Welcome to our villa

Oh yes, did I mention our address? (We have a field day with this one every time the water shuts off)

This is our common room, and where we teach our computer class.

Kitchen!

This is Bogor! The view from our favorite restaurent, Cimory

A closer view…

Tiny motorcycle helmet! (never stops being awesome!)

Nassi Gorang Guy!

We were invited to a birthday party for the mother of some of our students. (It happens a lot.)
This is Anu. He coined my nickname, “Highest Miss.” This is not Anu’s baby.

This kid was there. He’s my favorite person I’ve met so far. In life.

While he and I shouted at each other in 3 different languages and spooned spicy snack mix onto each other’s plates, his parents told another teacher what a miracle it is that he’s alive. He’s 4 now, but at 2, he barely survived the 2 month long boat ride from india since they ran out of food and water after a week or two.

Here are 3 of the four teachers with two students. On the end is Ika, our Indonesian “house administrator” I guess would be her title. She scares away creepy post office guys who text us by pretending to be our fiance.

Baby!

And here at last are a few from Bali. They don’t do justice…

Balangan Beach: the first place we stayed

I sat here a while one day, listening to music and laughing/being jealous of surfers.

This puppy came and sat with me a while.

Someday, I will live in this house.

One night we had a picnic on the hill overlooking this beach, so here’s the aerial view at low tide.

We stayed a few nights in this bungalow.

I slept in the loft in perhaps my favorite bed I’ve ever slept in.

This was the shower

and this was the pool

We took a ferry to Lombok

We bought snacks for the ride from the vendors. They had carved these little pineapples into pretty shapes. The yellow part was just a little bigger than my fist.