Halloween

I decided to have a Halloween party for my kids at school. I taught about it all week, spent a lot of money on candy and decorations, asked permission to teach about it and to have the party. The day before the party I was told that the party would have to be changed to another day or be canceled. I was a little flustered about changing it. The next day I got a text message from a 3rd party who knows people at my school saying that people are concerned because they think it is a religious holiday (they said halloween sounds like halleluiah?) and that they were nervous that the Muhammadiyah Ulama would be upset if I had this party, and so on. I became veryyy upset about this misunderstanding, mainly because I was never approached about it and only came to know about it from an outside source. This came at the end of a not so great week. Earlier that week, my friend Erica found a massive scorpion in my house, I got a ticket (it was my fault, but very scary---I later found out that what I paid was not a ticket, but korupsi), got a flat tire, and my pipe in my bathroom was somehow leaking into my neighbor's house and flooding it.

Then came the Halloween fiasco. I had a breakdown about this, I do not know why but it was really upsetting to me. So I talked to Nelly from Aminef, and she had Pak Parto, her friend from Universitas Muhammadiyah Malang explain to them that it is not celebrated as a religious holiday, etc. So everything got smoothed over very quickly, and I got to have my party a week later.


It was so fun! The kids bobbed for apples, played pin the tail on the spider, did a candy jar guess,and carved jack-o-lanterns. Cultural misunderstanding has been fixed :)

Idul Fitri

It is almost December... that is crazy. Well I am way behind on this thing, so I have to go back long way to Idul Fitri, which was in October! For the actual holiday, I was in Singosari. But the day after Idul Fitri I took a train to Solo (Central Java) to visit my friends Putut and Elin. Putut and Elin both just finished their Phds at Ohio University in June and moved back to Indonesia. They live outside of Jakarta, but for Idul Fitri everyone goes home to their hometowns, and Putut's family is from Solo. It was really cool to be there because he has a large family (like 6 brothers and sisters I think) and it was the first time they had all been together at the same time in like 6 years! There were so many children running around, it was great. I went to a Wayang Orang show in Solo, and we also went to Gunung Lawu (Mt. Lawu).
Elin and I (above) Some future bobcats (below)

We also returned to the traditional Javanese house that Putut's father grew up in so that they could take a family photo, it was a really cool house.

After Solo I went to Yogyakarta for a day. Solo is not too far from Yogya and a few other ETA's were there, so I decided since I was so close I should stop by.

When I came back from Yogya (on an 8 hour overnight train ride--yuck), I went around to some of the other teachers houses at my school. It is a traditional Idul Fitri activity to go around and visit your friends or neighbors. You ask their forgiveness, because during Ramadan you are becoming closer to God, so after you have God's forgiveness you ask forgiveness from your fellow human beings. You say "Maaf mohon lahir dan batin" (or it is Mohon maaf lahir dan batin...I always forget haha). Anyways, what really happens is you stop by their houses, they make you eat lots of treats, and we did this at aout 10 houses. I was so terribly full, but everytime I tried to refuse food I was told I must at least try it because it is rude not to. I think I ate 800 cookies that day :( it was funny.

The last month

I have not been good at keeping up with this thing over the past month! A lot has happened, time kind of flies by...

I went to Bali for a week at the end of September and that was so much fun! My friend Matt is an ETA there, so I visited his school in Denpasar, and one of is students is an Indonesian friend from OU's little sister!

Talk about a small world. A few of the other ETA's were in Bali too, so it was really nice to hang out with everyone. We went to a city called Ubud for the Ubud Readers and Writers Festival which was nice, and then we hung out at Kuta Beach for a little while.

<-- this is a pic of me and my friend Eka's sister! Kuta Beach->













Rice Terraces in Ubud



I also cut my hair very short when I was in Bali!





After Bali my friend Danielle came to visit for a week, while she was here we went to this place called Taman Safari 2. It is awesome! We went with 2 of my other friends, and what you do is you drive through this park/zoo in your car, like a safari and see all of the animals. When you are done you park you car and you go to a walking zoo, and there is an area where you can hold baby lions and tigers!!! I also got a kiss from an elephant!


Ramadan, the Muslim holy month, also just finished up. Muslims do not eat or drink during daylight hours (it is much more complicated and religious than that). I will write about my post Ramadan and Idul Fitri (the big day that ends Ramadan) experiences next time.

Misc. and Yogyakarta

some of my students (the girls really outnumber the boys)

Things have been going well. Ramadan is underway so the pace of things is a bit different over here. Since the Muslims are fasting, there has been a special schedule for school. Basically they are not supposed to put anything in their mouths from sun up until sun down. Most people wake up at 3am for breakfast (and then go back to bed until they need to wake up). Then they are not allowed to eat again until 5:30pm when the sun starts to set and they hear the call to prayer. Many businesses have special hours and close early during this time.

Teaching has been going well. With the special sched. this past week, I had class from 7:30 til 10:30 everyday, they called it "English Club". I had one group of students do skits about tv shows or movies, and one group picked Tom and Jerry (tom and jerry and Spongebob are pretty big in these parts). The cutest little girl (jilbab and all-jilbab is the head covering), she's such a peanut, was Jerry in her skit. The skit was going really well, until the end...she ran up to Tom, flipped him her middle finger, and said f**k Tom! And then they continued their skit. No one in the class flinched when she said it, the other teacher did not even seem to notice. At the end we applauded the group, and I had the tricky task of explaining that we don't use that word haha, they were like "ohhh". Another funny thing was I was asking them about what they did during their time off last week (they had some vacay for the start of Ramadan). They kept saying they went to the mosque, but they were pronouncing it mos-q, like mos and the letter q. I was confused, because the Indonesian word for mosque is masjid, but I thought maybe it was another Indonesian word. No, it is how they thought mosque was pronounced. So I have been working on mosque with my students (and teachers), I say that it may look like mos-Q but it sounds like mosk. English is so weird.

Last week I went to Yogyakarta! That was really cool, Yogya (also sometimes spelled Jogjakarta) is supposed to be like the cultural capital of Indonesia. It was really fun because about 15 of us ETA's were able to go there to meet up! I went to Borobodor (below).

One of the main streets is Yogya (for tourists anyways), is called Jalan Malioboro (Jalan is the Indonesian word for street, it is also the word for walk...). There are many street vendors lining the street and wanting you to buy stuff from them, there is sooooo much cool stuff! You have to bargain with them though, which is no easy task. I think I am pretty good at bargaining now though (either that or I just think I am and I paid way too much for my gifts). It was really nice to hang out with the other ETA's for a few nights and compare experiences so far. While in Yogya, I was also able to meet up with my friend Chozin's sister Monic (Chozin is a friend from OU who is from Yogya), it was fun going around with her also.

these are becaks (pronounced bay-chak) lining the street, they are little carts pushed by bicycles attached to the back, they are all over Indonesia. The drivers sometimes rest and sleep inside when they are not peddaling around, it is hard work I think. They are pretty fun to ride, a little slow, but I think everyone should ride one at least once. I also would like to ask a becak driver if he will let me drive his becak...I think driving one would be quite an experience also.

Other than all of that, I have officially begun riding a motorbike on my own! Don't worry I have a helmet, it is pink :)

have added more pics on facebook:

http://ohio.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2165708&l=1e0d6&id=12311763

Things are still going well. I have started teaching, it is very fun and frustrating at the same time. Some of the classes are as large as 54 students, they are awesome but they love to talk. Last Thursday my friend Tam came to visit from Pandaan (about an hour away from me), and we went to breakfast with the consular general from Surabaya, so that was pretty cool. She also came to school with me. We got my one class playing the guitar and singing us some Indonesian pop songs! Tam got it on video, I will try to get that up soon. On Friday my friend Amanda came down from Probolinggo and joined us, so it was a nice not so lonely weekend.

On Friday night I took the two of them to meet the head of my neighborhood and we had to go copy their passports for him (strange I know). On the way to copy the passports, Tam and Amanda kind of screamed and started running, so I did too. There was a crazy monkey on a chain growling at us and really seemed to want to take a bite. I had been thinking about getting a pet monkey, now i no longer want one.

On Sunday morning my neighborhood had its Independence Day celebration (they celebrate for like a month here, no joke). It started around 6am, so I let Amanda and Tam sleep and ventured out there myself. I did a pretty good job blending in for a while, until the two DJs on stage saw me and made me come up. They tried to get me to sing a song, but I told them I was "malu" (shy) so I got away with only saying Dirgahayu Indonesia, enampuluh dua, Happy 62nd Bday Indonesia.

I have been practicing riding a motorbike, but am still too scared to drive on the real road :). Thats all for now.

pic links

i was in jakarta this weekend and was finally able to upload a bunch of pics!

http://ohio.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2151393&l=acd33&amp;amp;id=12311763>

http://ohio.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2158240&l=755b8&id=12311763

I took this pic from the airplane today

this is a pic of me and chozin (an OU friend) from today, he was stopping through Malang on the way to Jogya so we got lunch, this little outdoor restaurant behind us is quite close to my house, I have a feeling I am going to become a regular.

so since i was in Jakarta, we stayed at a hotel, and on saturday night me, jess, jamie, and jen stayed in the same room. apparently i was talking in my sleep....in indonesian haha,"tidak bisa, tidak di sini" or something like that jess said.

on friday in Jakarta we went to a lunch at the AMINEF office with the House Foreign Affairs Committee, so that was pretty cool. We also pulled a cliche tourist move and went to the Hard Rock Cafe friday night :)

one whole week

ok I am going to try and put some pics in here, but this internet conection is really slow so I do not know if it wil work. I have been in Singosari now for a week. Sometimes I get lost, like I take the microlet (public tranportation thingy) too far and have to get off and take one going back the other way; or one of the first few days I forgot exactly where my house was and my taxi driver and I drove up and down the street looking for my street quite a few times. Don't worry though, I've got it down now. My power at my house goes out sometimes, the first 2 times I got really freaked out because I was not prepared at all, but I am ready for it now. Lots of candles and a flashlight. I am at the internet cafe right now and have just noticed that where is the love by the blackeyed peas is playing in the background. It is also funny how often I hear Britney Spears songs when I am shopping and stuff.

this is my house! the only pic that would upload right now, I will try to get more one later.

Singosari/Malang

I promised pics of the volcano (tangkoban perahu) and the hot springs (Ciater):


a lot has happened in the past week or so. The rest of orientation was good, everyone became good friends, so when orientation was over we we head out to dinner, go shopping or go out (yes there are places to go out in inodnesia).

(me, catherine, and samson in the background)


I would love to put up pics but my brilliant self has misplaced (aka lost) the cord that connects my camera to the computer. hopefully I will find that soon.

SO I moved. I am now in Singosari, it is right next to Malang. We flew here on Wednesday (Jen, Tam, and I had the same flight--thank goodness). The airport was hell (sorry for the language but there is no better adjective for it). First of all, it is only supposed to take 2 hours to get from Bandung to Jakarta, where the airport is. It took us FOUR hours. Almost all of us were on the bus, most people got their flights pushed back, but we couldn't because there is only one flight from Jakarta to Malang everyday, and it leaves at 1pm. So we get dropped off a little after noon, each of us have 2 luggage and 2 carryons, all weighing a ridiculous amount. We are trying to check in, struggling profusely to speak Indonesian to the guy at the counter. We all have to pay extra because for domestic flights there is a 24kilo limit per bag, and mine weigh at least 25 each. We finally got it figured out with the help of a super nice Air Sriwijaya employee and end up making our flight (it actually was delayed 40 minutes, freaking out for nothing haha).

When we got to Malang, my counterpart Bu Youni, two other teachers, Bu Elfi and Pak Tiks, and my headmaster, Bu Sri, picked me up and took me out to dinner. They are sooo nice! Then they took me to my house, my very own house! It is so nice and it is also big (anyone want to visit?). It has two bedrooms and a living room in the front. Then there is a door that opens to the back which is a large open space without a roof over it (it is pretty cool). Off of that there is another living room, a bathroom, and a small kitchen (those have doors and roofs, don't worry). There was no AC or western shower there, so I inquired about it (because it is a requirement in our contracts) and they were so nice about it! Within 24 hours I had a shower and an AC. I have yet to sleep at my house though (I have only been here two nights). My friend Jen lives like 15 minutes away so I have stayed there, we have both been a little nervous to sleep alone at night, plus it is easy to get homesick when you are by yourself. Last night we got super lost trying to take the public transport, Mikrolet, from my house to her house. We totally passed where we were supposed to get off by at least 20 minutes. We got home though :) Her counterpart freaked though and had her headmaster pick us up at her school haha, we were like 2 minutes away from Jen's house.

Yesterday I went to my school for the first time. It is called SMK Muhammadiyah 3. They introduced in front of all the students (I think there are about 500) after the morning announcements. They gave me flowers and then made me talk in front of EVERYONE (those of you who know me well know that I do not fair well with that, things like twitching normally occur--luckily none of that popped up this time).

Today was Indonesian Independence Day (Hari Kemerdekaan). 62 years. Bu Youni picked me up from Jen's on her motorbike, I think I need to get one--I love those things--and we went to school. They had a elaborate flag ceremony and then I helped give out prizes for games that they played the day before. I just hung around with the other teachers, ate rice for breakfast haha, and got to know some of the students. I keep meeting so many people I will never remember all of their names. I think my Indonesian is improving though, I am able to hold conversations with people and get my point accross and understand their points.

My friend Layne from OU taught in Malang last year and has left some helpful contacts for Jen and I. I think her friend Win is going to help us get set up with the internet tonight, so then I will be able to Skype, AIM, and keep up with this thing.
my address here is:

Jalan Perumahan Bumi
Mondoroko Sederhana
blok F3
Singosari
Indonesia

That is enough for now I think, hopefully I will be able to get some pics up soon!

Getting Here and First Week in Indonesia

It took a long time to get here, and it was not very fun. It was definately worth it though. Saying good bye at the airport was hard, and the long flights ahead did not make it much easier. The flight from Charlotte to Chicago was a few hours, Chicago to Hong Kong was 15 HOURS! ahhhh. I'm not going to lie, I cried more than once on the plane. The Hong Kong airport was pretty cool, we had a four hour layover. Most of the other ETA's arrived in Hong Kong, then we met the rest in Singapore. We spent the night in Sinagpore and then we arrived in Jakarta last Sunday. I am now at the Hotel Jayakarta in Bandung. It is very nice. Bandung is the 4th biggest city in Indonesia, it is HUGE.

Orientation goes pretty much everyday from 8 until somewhere between 4 and 5. We break for about an hour for lunch between 12 and 1. We have been doing things like learning about all the really bad things that can happen to us, what sicknesses we can get, where in the country we aren't allowed to go, how to teach, different teaching methods, and the we have a little bit of Bahasa Indonesia lessons everyday. We only have a half of a day of orientation on Saturdays and we are off on Sundays.

I have gotten to do some pretty fun things so far. One day last week, my Indonesian friends from Ohio University came to Bandung (well Lewina lives here) and we went out to dinner at this awesome place called the View, it overlooked Bandung.

Also, a friend of a friend from OU who lives here in Bandung and has a radio show, Anggie, asked if I would come to her station and talk on the radio, I said only if I could bring 2 friends. So me, Jen , and Erica went to an Indonesian radio station and talked on air! They asked us if we knew any Indonesian songs, and I said I knew KKEB. They asked if I would sing the refrain, and I said only if the one DJ, Una, would sing it with me, so we did. After we finished the show Anggie and her friends took us out to dinner at another cool restaurant, Cafe Conggo, that over looks Bandung.

Yesterday, Lewina took us shopping and I bought a bunch of tunics that I can wear while I teach, and then we went to an Indonesian mall to meet up with Adila (another OUer who is home for the summer).

We did school visits last week. They split us up into different groups and took us to schools in Bandung that will be similar to the schools that we will be teaching at in our cities. We sat in on classes and got to see the Indonesian teachers teach English. They were very excited we were there. Jane and I went to one class together and one boy asked us if we were married yet haha. The next class I went to was with Nenny Babo (one of the Aminef staff) and a boy came up to me and gave me a piece of candy that said "I love you". It is very funny the attention that we get when we walk around here because there are not very many Americans here so we are kind of a spectacle.

Today a bunch of us booked a tour and we took a bus out to a volcano, and then we went to some hot springs and had lunch. I will post pictures of it, but I am having trouble uploading, and I think I have written way too much for this posting!

almost there

I am leaving for Indonesia in 10 days! I will be gone for a little over 10 months. I never thought I would be a blogger, but it is the easiest way to keep people filled in. I leave on July 27th, I will fly from Chicago, to Singapore, spend the night in Singapore and then arrive in Jakarta (INDONESIA) on July 29th. Once there, the other English Teaching Assistants (ETA's) and I will be taken to Bandung, where we will have a 2 week orientation. After that I will go to Malang, East Java, where I will teach. I will try to keep this updated as much as I can. Next time I write I will be in Indonesia! Sampai nanti (that means until later).