Saturday, left Depok at 6 to catch a flight to Sumatra. Got there waaay too early, and sat around playing cards for a few hours till I could get in. Then, the flight was delayed, twice, and I was finally able to board, 2 hours late. A friend picked me up at the airport, and we went to Lily's Cafe for a few beers. Went back much later (2 a.m.) to the same place to watch England kick France's butt in the rugby championships.

Sunday morning I caught the tail end of game 2 Boston vs Cleveland. What a disappointment, the first time in a long while of being able to see the Sox, and they lose it in the 11th inning. Later that afternoon I got a ride with Banzai, and he took me to the Sunday H3 run. It was just up and down this mountain, through some of the muckiest terrain I have ever encountered. I nearly lost my shoe in 2 feet of mud. There were a few children who washed everyone's shoes for about $0.30. So anyways, I got pretty hammered that night.

Monday, took a bus (actually a minivan, about $8) to Prapat. 5 hours in a minivan is not fun, btw, and I got a pretty mean sunburn from leaving it outside the window.

The first 2 nights were at Samosir Cottages, but moved to Hariara for the rest of the vacation.
The first night there was very fun.



As was the second...



I rented a motorbike, and got horribly lost in the middle of the jungle




And that was the good part. It just got muddier and rainier from there. I was in the jungles for over 4 hours. Not good. Anyways, more pictures coming up!

Weekend of 10/7

So, Friday David Chrys, Megan and I went to Eastern Promise in Kemang. I had the "All-day breakfast special" with real bacon and sausage. It was excellent, and is sorely missed. There's no IHOPs here, and normal breakfast is noodles or bubur ayam, a chicken porridge. Next time it's the pork chops. So later, we had beers and were out of there by 3:30.

Saturday I got up around 10, had some water, and fell back asleep, finally waking up for real around 4?? I went to Senayan City, got a book for my vacation and ate lunch at Burger King. It was just as good as America, but you couldn't substitute onion rings for fries. Have it your way, indeed! But it was the first real "big" burger I've had since I've been here. McDonald's only has Big Macs and regular burgers, so forgive me for going off on a tangent about Whoppers. Also stopped at an international grocer and got some Doritos and Dr. Pepper.

Today, Sunday, went to the stables with Chrys, it was the owner's wife's birthday. Had way too much wine, grapes, cheese, etc. Megan finally got some medicine for her kittens' ear mites. That's about it for my weekend. This Saturday, I leave for Toba in Sumatra for a week, relaxing on the beach. See you later!

Weekend of 8/30

Hi all! I know these are becoming more irregular, but not a lot happens around here save for the weekends. On Saturday I managed to convince Chrys, Meg, and David to join me on the Hash. It was in Cibinong, some place out in the boonies between Depok and Bogor. Very beautiful run, through 8.5 km of Cassava plantations, rice paddies and villages. It was interesting to see the different stages of production of the Cassava root, from growing, to harvesting, peeling and mashing to a pulp, and the big tubs of processed Cassava starch at the end.

Running through the villages (David was with me), we passed a big group of kids who had apparently never seen a white guy before. They called me "putih sekali" very white! I guess I need to work on my tan...

About 2/3 of the way through, we met up with the hashers that took "the long run", which was 19km! And these old farts ran right by us! We had the on-in, an hour and a half circle-up, the virgins got initiated, and we got dinner at the nearby restaurant. Container offered us a ride back to Kemang, to Eastern Promise, a local hasher's hangout. Chrys went home early because she was feelink icky, but the rest of us stayed till closing, around 2:30.

Chrys missed an excellent fight, between some Brits and Indonesians. I'm not sure who started it, but it was a fight about the pool table; I heard a crack, turned around, and there was a broken pool cue, some scuffling, and the Indonesian guy being dragged out, shouting "Get out of my f------- country!"

Sunday, no hangover, but a little sore. I rode my first horse at the stable (scary as heck!) and celebrated the stable owners' birthday with wine, cheese, and a traditional Indonesian dinner.

Yesterday I saw the Bourne Ultimatum; hadn't seen the previous movies, but it was full of action.

Well, that about sums it up! Catch ya later!