Today we went to Bandung Electronics Centre to get a new modem. This place is wild. It’s about 5 floors of electronics, cell phones, computers and gaming equipment. Anyways, we started out asking if people were selling PCMCIA modems for laptops. Everyone we asked said that they were out. Until we finally came to a store where they told us that they don’t sell those any more as they are old fashioned but they do have another external modem that you can buy or you can get something like a PCMCIA card that you plug into your computer and it has a special little chip that you put in it and it gives you internet minutes. So basically it acts like a cell phone, including antennae, and you can access the internet that way without using your phone line. Wow! Didn’t know that existed. It is so typical of people here not to suggest an alternative if they don’t have what you want-uugghhh! Anyways, the external modem was 175,000 rups and the other fancy doodad was 1.2 million rups so that sort of settled that whole decision post haste. So I’m very excited to announce that we are now able to surf the net again. Whew, it’s tough to go without a modem for a number of days. That is how we connect to the outside world!
Yesterday we studied pancasila (pronounced panchaseela). Contrary to what most of the world believes, Indonesia is not a muslim state. This was big news for me too. Pancasila means panca (five) sila (basis). These five basis form the philosophy of Indonesia. In 1945 when Indonesia became its own country the president at that time, Sukarno, decided this was how it was going to be. The five basis are:
Belief in the one and only God
Just and civilized humanity
The unity of Indonesia
Democracy guided by the inner wisdom in the unanimity arising out of deliberations amongst representatives
Social justice for the whole of the people of Indonesia

Of course which one and only God you believe in is up to you, but you must choose one of the six officially recognized religions. You must not lie. There have been people who’ve become Christian and who didn’t change their religion on their I.D. card. They were questioned by the police because that is considered lying to the government and it is the governments business here to know what your religion is. Back home that’s considered an invasion of privacy….