Happy Independence Day, Indonesia

Hello everyone, and happy 17 August! It's Independence Day here in Indonesia, and it's raining pretty hard. Not much has happened here in a while, though I did give a speech on learning English effectively yesterday at an open house for the school. It was a great speech, but I was nervous as hell. Anyways, here are some older pictures for you all.



Here I am at the beach in Pelabuhan Ratu, early March.


Chrys and I with Sarah and Connor, her niece and nephew, at Assiniboia Downs in Winnipeg.


At the Museum of Natural History in Winnipeg. An old snowmobile for exploring.


I just thought the picture was funny.


BUFFALO!!! RUN!!!


Chrys on the Greyhound bus, on the way to Boston from Winnipeg. We're waiting at the crossing for the train, which took forever, and we had to cross paths several times. This is the same area where a few weeks ago, some guy decapitated another passenger for no reason.


Ok, so that's about it for now. Hope everyone is doing ok, and thanks for reading!

Random pictures

A few random pictures from our trip to Singapore about a month and a half ago.


This guy is so cool.


Here is what you see when you arrive in Batam. A mall.


At the Jurong Bird Park


I am terrified of these birds, their little claws on your hands and their dry tongues licking up juice from a cup.


I think this was on the edge of Little India, it's a Hindu temple, I think.



I think that Singapore is a bit like a really big city in some places; it's like downtown Boston on Orchard Road, and there's a seedy area in Chinatown, and Little India has a lot of neat shopping. It's weird that for such a small country (270 square miles), there's so much diversity, and so much to see!

Here's a big cruise ship in the Singapore ferry terminal.



I was really excited that Singapore now has a Taco Bell. I've never seen a 3-in-1 KFC-Pizza Hut-Taco Bell.


Chrys and I in front of the school in Batam



All of the teachers at our school. From left: Nelly, Anthony, Chrys, Me, Roger, and Berlian.



I'll put up more when I get 'em! More coming soon.

Big news!

Hello everyone! No pictures today, but I do have exciting news. Chrys and I have been officially promoted! I am now the Director of Studies at REAL Batam, and she is the Assistant Director. We are overwhelmed with work now, and working 55+ hours a week. Tomorrow we get a little break though, as we will be in Singapore for the day. We're going shopping at IKEA and Borders Books, and looking for a guitar.

Things weren't great when we got here, and staff morale was very low. But we have gotten rid of a few problems, and though everyone's working more now, we all can focus on our work and enjoy ourselves.

If we take any interesting pictures, we'll have them posted up this weekend.

Later!

Last weekend, Chrys and I went to the beach on the last island, Galang, connected by bridges to Batam. It was pretty cool, and we stopped by a Buddhist temple and a Vietnamese Refugee camp from the 70's.



Not much to see here, folks



Good sandcastle sand



Yoshi got a new bandanna


So, that's all for now. Bye!

New update - From Batam, Indonesia

Hello everyone! I'm back in Indonesia, on the island of Batam, just a short ferry ride away from Singapore. Chrys and I have been here for about 6 weeks already, and we are settling in fine. We have a really nice house, and a cute little Pomeranian named Yoshi. He's 4 months old, and quite a handful.



We have been really busy recently with painting the house, and keeping monkeys out of our garbage, so we had to hire a maid to take care of laundry and housework.



I work a lot now, and it's not easy. I only really have time off on Saturday nights and Sundays, and the school I work at just lost a teacher, so it's not getting easier. But there are a lot of exciting things coming up, and a lot of new contracts in the pipeline. A local radio station has contracted us to do a weekly call-in show to answer questions about English and grammar, so that's really cool. Well, new weeks starts tomorrow, so I gotta get to bed. Good night!

24 April, 2008

Hello, been about 2 months since my last post, but I just kinda run out of things to talk about, you know? In 1 week I'll be on a plane heading back towards the States. Depok's been fine, you know, but I'm ready for a change. And around June 1st, I'll be back in Indo, this time in Batam, an island a short ferry ride away from Singapore. I had the opportunity to go there for a weekend and check out the area, and I think I'll be happy there for the next year; we'll see. I took some pics of the beach area there.

Pics from Pelabuhan Ratu

Some pictures from my Xmas vacation on the Southern coast of Java.




Huge gecko that lived in my room. Kept the mosquitoes down, though!


Nice shot of me watching the waves



4 baby lobsters for 5 bucks! I ate 1 before I got out my camera :-p


Hot springs in Cipanas. Taken from inside the hot pool area.

Ok, so I'll be updating this more regularly now. Only 2 more months till I come home and visit!

Pics in Bali

Pictures today! more later.


Me with an elephant in Taro, at the Elephant Sanctuary



Rice field terraces in Ubud




Ronald surfing in Kuta

Computer down

Hey all, I'm just posting to let you know I'm still here. A while back, lightning hit the building I work at, and fried the power cord to my computer (which, thankfully, wasn't plugged into). So I haven't been able to get online much lately. I'll post some new pictures after I get back from holiday.

Merry Christmas!!!

Dragonfruit!!! And vacation news.

Ok, so I got a dragonfruit the other day, and was really cheap (about 50 cents, normally 4 or 5 times that) so I decided to take some pictures for you, since I'm sure most of you have never seen one before.

Yes, it is really that color naturally, inside and out. I would describe the texture as like a kiwi, maybe a little firmer, and really crunchy because of all the little seeds.

The flavor is very mild, a little hint of citrus, and maybe pear. Eat it with a spoon, and scoop all the goodness out!



So Christmas vacation is going to be a surfing holiday, I'm going to be staying at the Ombak Tujuh villas (7 waves) near Pelabuhan Ratu. For New Year's I'm going to Bandung for a few nights and staying with a friend/partying. Bye for now!

--jared

picture update 12/2

Hello, I have some pictures of recent stuff.

These are some Indonesian swimsuits. Notice the lycra jilbab, which affords the beachgoing Muslim woman maximum comfort, while preserving her modesty.


This hole was caused by the massive flooding a few weeks ago. Look at the second picture, it goes down about 2 feet.

Bunny!

Ok, so a few days ago, I came home from work, and saw a creature dart into the garage. I thought it was a rat or something, but the next day it was on the driveway. So, now in addition to the stray cat, we have a bunny. It somehow knows to go to the bathroom door whenever it poops. Real cute.




Oh, and for Thanksgiving we all went out on Saturday night to Hazara, a really nice Indian restaurant in Menteng. Too bad we had to work on Thursday and Friday. Well, I'll try and get some more pictures up here soon. Ta ta!

My wish list

Hi guys! I have started my wish list for Xmas, please follow the link!






11/17

Just saw a movie last night, "Enam", a typical Indonesian horror film. Now, I've never walked out of a movie before, but it was just so horrible that after about half an hour I just had to. The plot was that there was a group of amateur filmmakers who rent a house that burned down a few years ago, to film their debut. They're going for a "Blair Witch" type of film. Anyways, the guy that rents it to them warns them of a ghost or curse or something.

Anyways, the ghost looks like just a woman in a sheet, it's not scary, and just like every other Indo movie, it's shot with a handicam or something. When I told the office girls at work, they're like, "oh, what do you expect? It's an Indonesian movie." I've never seen such apathy towards movies, and that's why nobody Stateside has ever seen an Indonesian movie. They all suck.

Well, tonight is David's going -away party at Toscana, a REALLY nice Italian restaurant in Kemang. I went there a few weeks ago, and they have a to-die-for spaghetti carbonara with REAL bacon, not smoked beef.

11/13 A video clip of Margonda

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wev0jdbLrjQ

A neat little video someone shot aboard an angkot. He starts at roughly across the street from the entrance to my complex, and drives down Margonda towards Jakarta. At about 1:30 you see Mal Depok on the left. On the right is where the new ACE Hardware opened, with an Index Furniture store.

About 2:02, on the right is Apotek Melawi, a big drugstore. You'll notice that the angkot (that's the little blue minivans) stop pretty frequently to pick up passengers. This causes all sorts of traffic jams. They will stop anywhere that there isn't a cop and pick up of let off passengers. The charge is only Rp.1,500 (9,000 is a dollar, for reference) and that can get you down the road a few kilometers. Longer distances charge more, but I don't know how they calculate it.

At 2:56, on the left, is a warung tenda, a tent food stall. Very cheap food, but you run the risk of getting some sort of stomach bug because the hygiene isn't very good.

Around 3:53, traffic stops; It's near the entrance to Pesona Khayangan, the other side of my complex. You can see the Pizza Hut sign on the right at 4:25. The motorcycle turning around, that's the break in the median that lets you cross the street to go into the complex.

At 4:37, you can brielfy see on the right, the windmill for Holland Bakery, a bread and cookie shop.

At 5:21 (blink and you'll miss it) on the left corner of the screen you'll catch a glimpse of a pink building, that's DC Billiards. Then you see an arm go in front of the camera, that's someone paying for his fare.

Well, that's as far as I got before my connection died. Anyways, if you keep going, there's a traffic light and a road that goes to the right, but keep going straight, and there's Detos on the left and Margo City on the right, with TB Gramedia (book store) just after Margo City. A little further down, and U.I. (the Univ. of Indo.) is on the left somewheres, and work is on the right. Well, gotta get going, planning classes and whatnot. Bye!

More vacation pictures

Ok, so more pictures from vacation. This is out front of a Batak museum (Bataks being the native people here)


Same area, me in front of the King's Grave



Me posing by a waterfall



More to come. Also, Halloween Party pictures!

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!