Hi! I’m back again. I hope that all you dutch readers enjoyed Hugo’s blog. He’ll try to do it regularly so that if you don’t understand much English you can still follow along with our adventures.
We have completed the first week of Unit 2 and it is a lot harder than unit 1. Less singing and more homework. But at least we don’t have to introduce ourselves every morning any more... And we are learning a ton of new words.
The rainy season has officially begun. We have been dumped on a few times already. And when it comes down, it comes down. It’s really rather torrential. We can just about surf down our gong. Time to get some poncho’s…. We still have a serious water shortage. Apparently it can take a month after the rainy season begins before the water reaches wells…
There are some old wives tales here in Indonesia which are really rather well, humorous. I don’t want to belittle the people or their culture as they are great and we love living here, but some of the things they believe to be true are really rather silly. One of the things is that wind is BAD. It will make your lungs sick, apparently. Therefore, whenever riding a motor bike one needs to wear a jacket or a vest; which strongly resembles a bullet proof vest. For the longest time I wondered why people wore those vests… Also, while riding an angkot, no matter how hot it is all windows must remain closed as wind is BAD. The air we breathe otherwise is fine, but if it is moving fast it is BAD. I guess the makers of the (bullet-proof looking) vests would like people to continue believing this….
We have made good friends with our neighbours now. There are two different families that we talk with regularly. There are four of us families living in a circle here. Like a mini cul-de-sac you could say. The one couple is Opa and Oma of the one family. The other family is mom (her husband died 4 years ago) with two sons and her married daughter (who is pregnant) and husband and child. They live in a house with one window. That window is in their tiny front room which is where they usually visit with guests. It’s quite humbling when your neighbour says that her house is “jelek”(old/ugly) compared to yours and here you were getting periodically down because your house is not nearly as nice as all the other MAF families houses. Quite humbling…. I have to say that I’d rather live where we live than in one of the other houses because we have great neighbours and hardly anyone comes to our door selling stuff. The other people, because they live in a more open area, get a lot more people coming to ask for money or trying to sell stuff. Anyways, because these neighbours are so happy to talk with us, we are getting in lots of language practice each day.


This completely unrelated photo is of a horse and cart that we often see on our way to school in the morning...

Nederlanse Post...

Beste allemaal

Hier dan mijn eerste poging to bloggen, ik zal proberen het regelmatig te doen als zal het niet zo vaak zijn als Erica.
Deze week hadden we drie dagen vakantie dit omdat het dinsdag Idul Fitri was. Idul Fitri is het feest na de Ramahdan, dit feest begint eigenlijk de dag er voor om 19:00. Om 18:00 begint de mosque met het gebed voor het einde van het vasten dit duurt ongeveer to 19:00 en dan begonnen de trommels te trommelen en de mosque’s een kort gebed te zingen dit duurde to 4:00 s’ochtends. De luidspreekers van de mosque en de trommels waren lekker dicht bij dus konden we ze goed horen. Maar gelukkig vielen we rond 22:30 in slaap en werden we wakker gemaakt rond 6:00 door onze Brynne.
Dinsdag hebben we bij onze Indonesiese vrienden gegeten en de kinderen konden daar een video zien. Woensdag zijn we naar de “Bandung Salju” geweest ,zie foto’s. Bandung sneeuw show. We zijn zeer blij met deze vriendschap, dit stel hebben we ontmoet in de kerk en we hebben regelmatig kontact, wij kunnen onze Indonesies oefenen en zij kunnen hun engels beoefenen. Ook zijn ze van goede huize en hebben dus geen financiele hulp nodig, dit is een van de vele problemen dat de andere MAF families hebben met hun vrienden of buren, zij worden regelmatig gevraagt om geld te lenen wat brengt de moeilijkheid met zich mee, wat de achter grond is van hun vriendschap? Donderdag en vrijdag moesten wij en de kinderen weer naar school, Hugo is Donderdag gegaan en Erica heeft op de kinderen gepast en vrijdag visa versa. De kinderen hebben het zeer naar hun zin op school en Marc en Brynne vermaken zich met de Ibu’s en de buurjongetjes. Brynne begint eindelijk weer op Brynne te lijken na dat de Bacterial huid infectie eindelijk over wonnen is. Ze is altijd zeer blij geweest maar nu begint ze echt meer te “praten”. We hebben Donderdag ook onze eerste echte regenbui gehad ik moest de kinderen met de motor ophalen van school, we kwamen dus behoorlijk nat aan. De regen was goed want we hebben al een poos problemen met onze water voorziening.

Rain!!

This afternoon we had a big dump of rain. It was just pouring. When Hugo picked up the kids from school on the motorbike they came home absolutely drenched to the bone. We are soooo thankful!
Today Hugo went to school and I stayed home with the two youngest as our helpers are off until monday. I actually enjoyed doing some house work inbetween telling Brynnie not to try to eat the garlic and raw potatoes on the bottom shelf in the kitchen... Later I visited with one of the neighbour ladies. It is tradition here that after Idul Fitri you visit all your friends, neighbours and relatives and everyone has lots of cookies and cake. So she invited me in for a visit. I was given the choice of many different types of cookies. Some were very much like we would make around Christmas. I was also given a cup (with a saucer) of incredibly sweet orange juice like tang. I said a little prayer that it was made with safe water before drinking. This was my first time in the neighbours house. It's kind of a big deal here to actually go into someone's house. You need to know them first.
Hugo is currently out for coffee with a guy from church. It's hard to keep up with learning language if you don't have much opportunity to speak it with someone so Hugo is planning to meet with Ricky regularly.
Some of you expressed surprise that Bandung would have such a large mall. Bandung is one of the biggest cities in Indonesia. It is a bit of a rich man's playground. Indonesia is a huge country with about 17,000 islands-give or take. I would guess that this is the only island with malls such as this. The thing about Indonesia is that there is an enormous divide between the rich and everyone else. You are either fabulously wealthy, or struggling to get by. Many of those who are very wealthy are actually originally from China and own textile businesses. On our way to the mall we passed by families that spend their entire day in the median of a busy road begging for money. There are little children like Brynne and Marc that spend their entire day surrounded by smoke belching cars, trucks and motorbikes. There are also women who borrow babies to use while begging because a child always elicits sympathy. You just can't think about it too much because there isn't much you can do. If you give them money, you only help them with their next meal, not with their living situation. Our church has programs to help train street kids so there is some help out there. But there are so many in that situation that many will live their entire lives that way.

Wow, today was a busy day. After getting some laundry done, I headed out to the local mall with Mikah, Christiaan and Aidan. They played at the Jump’n Gym and I hung out with the other MAF ladies at Starbucks. Hugo stayed home with the two youngest and finished the laundry (thank you hon!). After lunch our friends David and Santi picked us up and we went to Bandung Super Mall. It is a monstrosity of a mall. Quite a different layout than West Edmonton Mall. More up than out space wise and we parked underneath it… A little frightening if you think about it too much… There we met Santi’s family and hung out with them for a bit at a juice place and the kids played with lego at a little place that was selling toys. Then we went to the Egypt exhibit in the mall. After that we went to the fantasi place. It’s kind of like a small version of the entertainment park at West Edmonton mall. There Mikah rode the roller coaster and the boys did the bumper cars. After that we had supper at Popeye’s. Then we went to the feature attraction, Snow World. Thankfully Santi’s parents had bought our tickets ahead of time so we didn’t have to wait in line for them. But we had an incredibly long line to go through before we got into the exhibit. (see photo) Thankfully it moved fairly quickly. As we were the only buleh’s (whites) in the crowd we were again the object of much interest. Before going into Snow World we were all given winter coats to put on. Inside it was actually quite cold and there were many ice sculptures. There were Disney and zodiak themes. The funnest thing was the slide. Going down pure ice is pretty freaky! It was hilarious because everyone wanted their photo with us and our kids. We felt rather like celebrities except that no one asked us for our autograph… After that we dropped Santi off at home and checked out her parent’s house. It is really interesting to see how differently people here live than we do in Canada. The ride home from there was also very interesting. We went down an incredibly busy street with wall to wall cars and little warungs on each side selling all different kinds of food. We saw a couple that sell frog… yummm… It was like a scene from a movie of an asian city. Except this was real and we were experiencing it! WOW!

We survived!!

We have survived our very first authentic Idul Fitri. (It's not nearly such a big deal in Papua) The drums and praying went on for quite a while, but unlike some of the other MAF'ers, we were able to sleep through it. Except this morning our little neighbour boy decided to blow his horn, something like we Canadians might blow at a hockey game, at 6am... Nice... Thankfully the kids slept through it, but the parents unfortunately didn't...
After spending quite a lot of time folding and ironing the clothes I washed yesterday, I draw the line at ironing underwear, unlike our helpers, I will not do that, we had lunch and went with some Indonesian friends to the mall - Istana Plaza. One of them needed to drop off her broken cell phone so we took the opportunity to show the kids the indoor skating rink. After that we went to their house for supper. Wow! What a place. It's actually his parents house of course. It is really quite large.... The kids didn't know what to do with so much room to run around both inside and out. Unfortunately the projection player on their home theater system didn't work so the kids had to watch their video on a 52 inch flat screen tv... bummer... We had a nice meal of nasi goreng with them and then they brought us home. Tomorrow we plan to go out with them again to the Bandung Super Mall (also fondly known as Bandung Super Mahal (mahal means expensive in Indonesian)). At the mall there is an ice sculpture display that we plan to go see.
It's a quiet night and we hope that there's no blowing of horns at 6:00 in the morning, but it's Indonesia so one never knows for sure...

It's started!

Well, the party’s started here. There has been non-stop calling over the loudspeakers since 7:00. It started out with drums and firecrackers too, but thankfully that has now stopped (although, for all we know it could start again at any time). We are settling in for a night of constant prayer to Alluah. From what we can hear there seems to be a lot of people at the mosque echoing the prayers of the one calling out. You can also hear all the other mosques around us echoing over the city. It is quite the sound. They are basically repeating the same thing over and over and over.... Tomorrow will be a day of feasting as the time of fasting is now over.
This afternoon we went to the pool again. I spent the morning doing laundry as our helpers have the week off. Wow, what a lot of work laundry is here. It sure makes me appreciate Ibu Tati even more.
I sure hope we can sleep through all the noise tonight… The drums are starting again....

Selamat Hari Minggu!

Happy Sunday to you all! It's still dry as a bone here and we are running seriously low on water. So we made a trip to the local pool yesterday to get in our saturday showers. Aahh, a hot shower. I can't tell you how much I miss those! Bathing Indonesian style just isn't as rewarding or relaxing....
Thursday evening we went our for dinner with our friends David and Santi. We went to a new cafe just down the hill from us. Too far to walk though... For $10 CAN we all had a meal, fresh fruit drink, and split two orders of chicken sate! It is so cheap to eat out here. Santi shared with us that her parents are Buddhists. Although not devout, they aren't showing a whole lot of interest in learning more about Jesus. This is very difficult for her and she needs our prayers.
Today we attended church again and the evangelist spoke so fast that we heard it was difficult even for the Indonesians to follow... Thankfully, David translated for us again....



This photo is of Brynnie (wanting to be with Mommy instead) with Ica (short for Veronica) at church. All the girls at church want to touch or hold Brynnie...









This photo is of the room that we have church in.











This is the building that the room is in...

Today was a quiet day at home. I showed my Ibu how to make my chicken enchilada recipe. She has in the past worked mostly for Korean and Indonesian people and loves to learn to cook new things.
Our neighbours never get sick of playing with and talking about our kids. There is this absolute fascination with our white skin. I’ve actually got darker arms than one of the neighbour ladies. But they are always careful to stay out of the sun. They are also very fascinated by Aidan and Brynne because they are so much bigger than Indonesian kids are. One of my Ibu’s is very proud because her husband has very white skin and so her daughters do as well. In fact the name that they call us, buleh, actually means “white skin.” The other main fascination is how much things cost. They are always asking us how much things in Canada cost and how much we paid for some of the things we’ve bought here, how much we pay to rent our motorcycle that sort of thing. Well, there’s always something to talk about…
Today our other neighbours got their son-in law and friend over to help them dig their well deeper as they haven’t had water for over a week. What a messy business! Those guys were covered in mud from head to toe! But they were able to get to some more water. See photo (before they were all dirty)… The second photo is of Brynne and the nieghbour girl Sri. The third photo is of Brynnie learning to walk, with Ibu Tati, down the gong to our house...

Woo!!! Hoo!!!

Yeah!! We have officially naiked (indoglish for risen) to Unit 2! Whew! One down, 8 more to go. So to celebrate Hugo, Marc and I went to Istana Plaza. This is the mall with the skating rink in it. We didn't have much time there last time we went so we wanted to look again and get some bread from the bakery there. We had yummy french bread with our supper tonight... On one of the levels of the mall you can ride around the loop on a large motorized animal... While steering it with a steering wheel... If you should so desire....
On our way home we went to the Eiger store. Before coming here I had no idea what or who Eiger was. It is a company that manufactures and sells outdoor gear. You can even buy a Coleman canoe at this store should you so desire... I was looking for a smaller backpack as the one we have is quite cheap and quite big. Found one and it was less than $20 Canadian. On our way home we got soaked as there was another downpour. Yeah!! We so need the rain...
In two days we start Unit 2. Looking forward to getting it over and done with...

Well, we’ve had a smattering of rain today! Just enough to dampen the dust though. The ground is so parched it would take a deluge to really make a difference right now. I don’t know if we want that though. I heard that when that happens that we could surf down our gong…
Saturday we walked to a nearby pool. It’s about 15 min walking. This pool is mostly used by expats living here and is quite nice. There’s a large pool with 2 diving boards and a smaller pool for little ones. Both pools are heated which is also nice. Around the pools are tables and chairs and there’s also a big grassy area where you can play soccer or baseball. It’s a great place to hang out for the day. Also a very social place as you often meet people you know there. This was our first time going there as a family to swim.
Today we heard a sermon about the Jesus quest. The preacher spoke about how there is a modern trend in the theory as to who Jesus was. There are those who write about there being a difference between historical Jesus and Jesus of faith. He also spoke about the Da Vinci Code. The preacher emphasized that Jesus was both man and God and needed to be to redeem us. If he was only man than he death would have been meaningless.
We are still in the middle of Ramadan here. That means that the mosques are “broadcasting” more often than normal. Thankfully we are all sleeping through the 2:30 wakeup up to eat your last meal before fasting call and then the 4:00 it’s time to pray call. I was talking with our pembantu’s the other day, and Ibu Misyah said that she doesn’t go back to bed after eating at 3:00. She stays up and then naps for a bit when she gets home from work. My other Ibu hasn’t been feeling well lately so she hasn’t been getting up at all to eat. Her husband gets up and warms up food for him and their little daughter and Ibu Tati’s mother who lives with them. I don’t think that this whole fasting thing and getting up in the middle of the night is very good for your body. It takes away from the normal routine and in this heat it is so important to drink lots of water. There are a lot of people sick right now because of Ramadan. However, there are loopholes. If your doctor says that you are sick and need to eat and drink, you may break fast. If you are pregnant or menstruating you also do not need to fast…

I've had some trouble getting onto Blogger, hence the lack of posts for a couple days. Not a whole lot new to report anyways. Yesterday evening we had a smattering of rain, but not nearly enough. We still have water but only because we are being very careful.
Brynnie is improving a lot. She is a very happy girl, for which we are very thankful. Aidan hit his head yesterday and later threw up. Not sure if he was already getting sick before he hit his head or if he got sick because he hit his head. I think he was getting sick before. But he's fine now.
Today was our last day of Unit 1. On Monday we have our official evaluation. It's basically a time where they kind of test you, they've actually already decided whether or not you've passed, and then talk with you about what you need to work on the most. It sure feels good to have one unit under the belt.
It's great to be able to talk with people about a variety of topics. However, today we had some guy come by for the second time talking about our garbage. We understood that he was replacing the guy who used to get our garbage. He of course, wanted money. We didn't have a clue about any of it. I guess we didn't realize that we are supposed to pay for garbage pickup ourselves. Anyways, I got into contact with the head pembantu and she went to our landlords house and there was a big discussion about the issue. I thought I knew Indonesian... Apparently they were speaking Sundanese, a different dialect/language... Then she went and spoke with our neighbour, again a big discussion... Turns out this new guy figures that because we're white we should pay more than anyone else for garbage pickup. The head pembantu was having none of it and insisted that there is a standard rate for all MAF families and that is what we would pay. Whew! I'm so glad to have a local person who I can count on to speak up for us. It is quite hilarious how much discussion goes on about even the littlest issues. Getting straight to the point is just not cultural. You have to beat around the bush until the other person gets what you are saying... That'll take some adjusting to...


This completely unrelated photo is of part of our lunch yesterday. I explained to my Ibu that I do like squid but only when it's deep fried and doesn't actually look like squid anymore.... This was in a dish with clear noodles, carrots, green onions and that browny purple stuff-a kind of mushroom...

A belated Happy Thanksgiving to you all. I have to confess that we had white rice, mixed vegetables and chicken sate for supper. Yesterday afternoon I went to the doctor again with Brynnie for a follow-up visit. This time I went to his practice which is much closer to where we live. I tried to be there a bit before he opened so I would be close to the front of the line. No such thing as making appointments here. It’s on a first come first served basis. I was number A9. This office was significantly nicer and newer than the other one. I sat on a plastic covered couch while waiting and chatted with a couple of ladies also waiting. This gave me a great opportunity to get in my experience for the day. Each morning we have to recall one of our conversations of the day before with the class. I also got asked if I wanted to have molds made of Brynnies feet and hands to be bronzed. On the wall they had samples hanging. One of the samples was of a little boy’s baby bottom and the front parts as well… Whatever strikes your fancy… Anyways, after waiting about 50 minutes, my number was called. The doctor checked Brynnie out and told me that I could stop the antibiotics (I read the bottle and I was only supposed to give it to her for three days…). Of course most Indonesians would want to continue until the bottle was empty… Anyways, he said that things were looking pretty good. Then this morning Brynnie woke up with a swollen eye lid. Then after her nap she had a rash all over again and a swollen forehead. She looks rather klingon like (for those of you who have seen Star Trek…). Not real pretty as she still has quite a few red spots on her face. It seems that she may have inherited Hugo’s slight allergy to mosquito bites. Mikah also had it when she was young. Wherever she was bitten, that body part would swell up. Thankfully I did bring 4 bottles of Benadryl with… At this rate though we’ll run out in no time.
School continues to go pretty well for Hugo and I. We have now only three days left of unit 1. Then next week we will have an evaluation supposedly to determine whether or not we can go to unit 2. We have been told by others that this is a mere formality, they already know by week 2 whether or not you will need to repeat. We have learned so much already. It’s great to be able to have conversations with our neighbours and helpers about a variety of subjects. We will sure be ready for our little break next week though. Unfortunately the break is a little shorter because the following week there are three days of no school due to Idul Fitri. So our break is split in two this time.

Faith...

Yesterday we had a very interesting seminar about the muslim faith. We are learning more about it and about how it is similar and different than ours and what is the best way to deal with muslims. We were surprised to learn that they believe quite a few things the same as we do. Of course the most important aspects of our faith are very different. They believe that Jesus was just another prophet. They also have great difficulty with the Trinity. They also talk a lot about fate. Fate determines where they are placed in society and what burdens they are given. So if they were born poor, they just stay poor instead of working hard to get out of it. We were also surprised to learn that the Koran comes mostly from the Bible. The rules about daily life come from other books called Hadiths. It is in these books that rules like the rule about head covering for women are found. There are actually to different types of muslims here. One group is a catholic type of muslim and the other like a reformed type of muslim. The one is very strong in following the hadiths and the other is not. Muslims do not believe in original sin, but believe that they are saved by following the rituals as laid out in some of the hadiths and through the Koran. So at this time of year there are many frustrated muslims because it is very hard for them to follow everything to a T. It was also interesting to learn just how intertwined the culture and language of this country is with the muslim faith. There are actually different levels of Christians here. They are defined as C1-C5. C1 being a Christian that attends a Christian church foreign to the muslim community in both culture and language. This is the type of church we attend. We sit on chairs and we sing accompanied by a piano etc… C2 is C1 in form but speaking the language used by Muslims though their religious terminology is distinctively non-muslim. C3 is a C2 but uses non-Islamic cultural elements (e.g. dress, music, diet, arts). C4 is C3 with some Biblically acceptable Islamic practices like prayer posture, sitting on the floor while worshipping, fasting etc... They are the first group to refer to themselves as Followers of Isa instead of Christians. C5 is C4 with a “Muslim follower of Jesus” identity. They remain culturally muslim but accept scripture as God’s divine revelation and Christ as saviour. C6 are secret believers who may or may not be active members in the religious life of the muslim community. They identify themselves as privately “Christian”, or “Follower of Isa” (Isa being the name Jesus in “muslim-friendly” language), or “Muslim follower of Jesus.” It is extremely difficult for muslims living here to join a C1 church. So that is why the other categories have come into being.
We were also told that it is better to refer to ourselves as being Nasrani (follower of Jesus) than Kristen. The term Kristen has a lot of baggage attached to it relating to Dutch colonialism. We never realized just how important language and terminology is when dealing with muslims.
As there are Muslims here actively searching the internet for information about Christian activities with the intent to jeopardize them, I must be very careful not to write any places or names. Please do the same in the comments section. Please also pray for those muslims that are making their way over to Christianity. It is very difficult for them culturally. We all live close together and as soon as someone changes the way they live, everyone notices. There are also areas of this city where there is active persecution. Please pray that the believers here will continue to be strengthened in their faith and not discouraged.

Update on Brynne - Brynne has now received all three doses of zithromax and now we wait. It is a more powerful antibiotic so you need to administer less doses but it still takes about 10 for the full affect to show. The swelling on her cheek and feet have gone down a lot. Her hands are still a bit swollen, but better than they were. She still has a tremendous amount of energy!



This completely unrelated photo is what you get when you mix a bucket of markers, two boys and no adult supervision....

The adventure continues...

Wow, what a day. Today we had school as usual, learned some new stuff. Then went home and had lunch-deep fried prawns-yummy! After lunch Hugo brought me to the grocery store so I could do groceries. So I did my groceries and this time had to hail my own cab as the parking lot guys were very busy directing cars in the parking lot, it was a bit zoo-like. On the way home I picked up the kids at school. When I arrived home I saw that Brynne had a very swollen cheek, swollen hand and foot. That morning she had also woken up with a rash on her body that was hot to the touch. I immediately gave her Benadryl but noticed that nothing changed. We were supposed to go out with David and Santi tonight, but I sms’ed them that we would have to cancel. They offered to take Brynne and I to the doctor. So I accepted. David is very fluent in English and knows his way around Bandung very well. So we first went to a hospital, different than the one I went to before, to see if the pediatrician was in. He was already gone. But, they said, there’s another children’s doctor on the second floor and he’s good. So we went up. We didn’t have to wait at all, which should have given us a clue… We were ushered into his office by a nurse. The fact that he was very obviously not busy should have been clue number two. He looked at Brynne with his milky eyes and listened to her heart and breathing with his deaf ears and agreed with us that she had chicken pox and a slight fever. He used a flashlight to look at some of her scabs. He didn’t answer any of our questions but was very happy to talk about his wife who is from Yugoslavia and his daughter who is very beautiful and is a doctor there. We paid our 65,000 visit fee and threw out the prescription he wrote. David and Santi figure that he has been put in the hospital by the government and that he probably doesn’t actually do much work. Then we went to the office of the first doctor that we missed. Well, we missed him again, he had already moved to his third practice. So we drove again, by now we were in South Bandung and not by using the toll roads. We arrived in one piece at this third practice. Thankfully we didn’t have to wait very long at all. Maybe because I am a buleh, because there were other people waiting. Dr. Kelly is supposed to be one of the best pediatricians in Bandung. Not that this means anything, but he has an extra thumb growing out of the thumb on his left hand. He looked at Brynne and asked me how long she had “chicken pox” and if she’d had a fever at all. He told me right away that he thought it wasn’t chicken pox and that he wanted to do a blood test. So Brynnie gave some blood and we waited. After about only 10 minutes the results were in. Brynne has a bacterial skin infection. He prescribed four different things for her. An anti-biotic, which we had with us from Canada, a cream for her open sores, a cream for her red bum, and some anti-histamine/anti-itch drops. Wow, I’m extremely thankful that I decided to take David and Santi up on their offer and I’m extremely thankful for their persistence in finding a good doctor. We do need to return in four/five days though… That might be another adventure…
BTW we are still pretty much without water, just a tiny bit for dishes and sponge baths...

No Water...

Well, the time has come. What we dreaded has happened. We are virtually out of water. Our well pump is sucking up more air than water right now. Our landlord said that we were welcome to go to his house with a bucket and fill it up... thanks... At least drinking water isn't a problem. At least not now it isn't. We're not really sure what's going to happen. Apparently our landlord is going to look into other water sources tomorrow. Maybe we'll join the other folks up the hill and add a little hose to get mountain water... (see photo from a couple days ago...)
Today Hugo and I went to a place called Istana Plaza. Hugo had seen cheap soccer cleats there before and as he is now a member of the Imlac soccer team, complete with fake Adidas blue and white uniform with shorts that would fit Aidan, he figured it would be better to use some cheap cleats than his good running shoes. Anyways, we first went up to the food court for lunch and ate our lunch beside, you won't believe this- I didn't until I saw it with my own eyes-an ice skating rink! Pretty wild huh? I guess they're trying to do the West Edmonton mall thing here. Except this rink is shaped in a circle. You can rent skates but they're all figure skate, no hockey skates... Anyways, this place is a shoppers paradise, actually all of Bandung is a shoppers paradise. We even found Lego, at 2.5 times the price it is in Canada... Hugo found some soccer cleats and they even happen to be the same colours as his uniform, but the best part is that they were 50% off!! The big first game is tomorrow...

Birthday party...

This evening Mikah and I went to our very first Indonesian birthday party. The party was to start at 6:30 pm and it was for the 5th birthday of the daughter of one of the evangelists from the church we attend. We were picked up by another evangelist and his family and brought there. The family lives in South Bandung and we live in North Bandung. So it took about one hour to get there (Bandung is an enormous city of about 5 million people). Part of the way we went on a toll highway, which at night reminded us very much of home. There was even a cluster of lights on one of the mountains reminding us of Cypress mountain back home. Except these lights were on cell phone towers. This family has one child and they live in quite a large roomy house with a yard. Birthdays here are very formal affairs and there were rows of chairs set up in front of a room that was a step higher and served as a stage. On the stage was an enormous Strawberry Shortcake cake. It was real, but sure looked fake… We all sat down and the master of ceremonies prayed and got us to sing a couple songs, accompanied by a girl on the keyboard, then the mom of the birthday girl spoke, we sang again and then Evangelist Eric (the one who gave us a ride) had a speech about our ultimate calling here as parents. He also talked about Samuel and his life as a child. He also prayed with us and then we sang again. Then we sang happy birthday and a song that sounds like the dutch song “Lang zul ze leven (sp?)” Then the birthday girl in her princess dress got to cut the cake and have her photo taken while doing so. Then someone else prayed again and then we got to eat. Knowing that it would take ages before we ate, Mikah and I had had supper already at home… There was kroepoek, lumpias, cap cai (Chap Chay), mie goreng, bakso (meat balls with some kind of paste around them swimming in a broth-never tried it and don’t really plan to…) chicken strips with shredded cheese on top, and some kind of really fatty pieces of pork/bacon (not like anything I’ve ever seen before…) and a fruity yet spicy fruit cocktail and oh yeah, how could I forget, white rice. In Indonesia you have to eat white rice with every meal. After that the cake was cut and we all got a piece. There were also these other fancy little incredibly sweet pastry things and a fruity cocktail drink with actual fruit in it handed out.
The long drive home gave me the opportunity to ask some questions. I practiced my bahasa, but thankfully Ev. Eric speaks quite good English. He told me that the church we attend is an outreach church. I think it is on our hill because there is the university there. I asked him if the Christian churches here were threatened at all. He said that the people of North and South Bandung are tolerant of Christians, but that the people of East and West are more extremist. That is where many churches have been burned down. Thankfully they always ask the people to leave first. Ev. Eric told me that two weeks ago he preached in one of the secret churches in West Bandung. He said that they have to sing and preach quietly. They always have to meet in houses as their church has been burned down. Makes one thankful for the freedoms and opportunities that we do have back home.

Well, day one of our third week of language school down. I don't think I mentioned before that IMLAC, the language school we attend, is christian. Every day we open and close in prayer. We the students repeat after the teachers and so we are learning to pray in Indonesian. Very neat.
Today Hugo, Marc and I went by motorbike to a basket weaver guy who also makes furniture. We had bought a cupboard from an MAF family leaving for the field. This cupboard has a door on one side and three open cubbies on the other, perfect for baskets. So we checked out his stuff, having heard that he makes the best baskets. I decided on three that would fit and that I liked. I asked him the price, he said $40,000 each. I asked if it was okay if I menawar (barter). He said "Bisa." Which means yes you can. I offered $20,000. In the end I paid $30,000 each. Not bad if you consider that $7,800 Rups is $1 CAD. Then we had to figure out how to get them home on the motorbike. Well, the store owner tied the three baskets together and I put them behind me on the bike. They were resting on the little handle at the back of the bike. So that's how we went home. Marc in front of Hugo, me behind Hugo hanging on for dear life to these baskets. (Thankfully, they're as light as a feather...) Very Indonesian of us eh?



Some boys Mikah and I saw yesterday.

This is how the people at the top of the hill get running water. Note how gigantic the hoses are...

This is the infamous mosque near our house. Note the loudspeaker...

This is a rice field a little farther down from the mosque.

One of the houses we saw along the way.

2 Weeks down...

It’s been a few days since my last blog. That’s a symptom of getting used to living in Bandung. What was once strange and unusual is now just a part of everyday life.
On Saturday I made my way to Borma. There I purchased a stellar piece of audio equipment-a cassette player. Yes, even though much of modern electronic equipment is manufactured in Asia, they are still wild about cassettes here. You can buy CD’s here. They are, from what I’ve seen, a little cheaper than in Canada. But cassettes are super cheap. I think the problem is that CD players are too expensive for the average Indonesian to buy. I also purchased the latest Josh Groban and Enya albums on cassette. They were $3 each.
Today I went to church with the three oldest. Brynne still has chicken pox and Marc was complaining of a sore stomach. This church is really great. They are really making an effort to include us in everything they do. And there’s always someone willing to pick us up and drive us home so we don’t need to go through the hassle of finding an angkot. Today we heard a sermon about the virgin birth and how Jesus was both 100% man and 100% God. The sermons that we have heard so far in this church have been very good. We are very thankful to have been so quickly accepted into a church like this.
Later in the afternoon Mikah and I walked along the narrow road above our gong. This road winds its way up the hill. It is incredibly steep. Along with way I made a few photos. When we were at the top we had quite a view of smoggy Bandung. The pollution here is actually quite bad. You often see people wearing masks while riding their motorbikes.


This is a photo of Marni and Bobon and their little girl Sri. Marni and Bobon have been married for 3 years. They live in our kampung and have a little warung (store) at the top of our gong. They sell some snacks and their specialty is a kind of porridge-like dish called bubur. (never tried it and don't plan to...) I talk with them almost everyday. They love to help me practice my Indonesian.