There might be hope for the world after all…
I was just reading through one of the blogs I have in my Favorites, TravelingCat.com, and saw an article posted about an organization called One Laptop Per Child. It’s amazing! They want to give laptops to children in developing countries, and they’ve designed really rugged laptops that can run on solar power, foot pump, or pull string. Sounds too good to be true, doesn’t it? According to this article on the BBC site, Haiti is going to be one of the first 4 countries to benefit from the program. For some reason just reading that brought tears to my eyes. My experiences so far in Indonesia have been so different from the couple of weeks I spent in Haiti several years ago. I just haven’t seen as many impoverished children here, and the idea of poor children in Haiti being given something that could help them flourish makes me really happy! You can read more about this on the website for XOGiving.com.
As I was reading about the laptops, Billy received an email from our friend Sarah in San Diego about another program trying to make a difference in the world. This one is setup to give loans to people in developing nations, and you can loan as little as $25 and decide exactly which person you want your loan to go to. It’s really cool! They even have little journals that give updates on the businesses. Here’s some info from their site about how it works:
Kiva partners with existing microfinance institutions. In doing so, we gain access to outstanding entrepreneurs from impoverished communities world-wide. Our partners are experts in choosing qualified borrowers. That said, they are usually short on funds. Through Kiva.org, our partners upload their borrower profiles directly to the site so you can lend to them.
Filed under The World | Comment (1)Lost in Translation… Part 1
I imagine I’ll have more of these the longer I’m here, so here’s the first installment of things lost in translation…
When I’m teaching I often play games where there’s a time limit. I’ll give the students a 30 second warning, and when it gets down to 10 seconds I’ll do a countdown. At the end of the countdown I usually make a loud buzzer sound, “Ehh-Ehh”. Well, I did this in one of my classes last week, and the students started laughing. I thought it was just because it was a funny sound I made… But… No. Apparently in the local dialect “eh eh” is the word for “crap”. You can imagine just how embarrassed I was when my students told me this. One of them even commented that my face looked really red. Ugh! I checked with some people in our local bar that night, just to make sure my students weren’t pulling my leg. They confirmed the meaning.
Some people in our local bar also informed me not to play the “I’ve got your nose” game with children here. The hand gesture that we do when we pretend to have a child’s nose is a gesture used for porn here. Man, am I glad I haven’t played that game with any of my students, or kids in our neighborhood.
Bandung Time
I added another little feature in my sidebar that shows the current time in Bandung. I know that sometimes it’s hard to figure out what the time is on the other side of the world. 
Bandung Weather
I added a little thing to my sidebar so you can see what the current weather’s like in Bandung. Thought it could be fun, and give you a little better idea of my current part of the world.
Feeling creative
I’ve been feeling rather creative and decided to make some jewelry this weekend. I have a really hard time finding supplies like I used in Seattle, so I’ve had to just make due with what’s available here. One of my students heard that I like making jewelry, so she gave me a few stones that she had. I wasn’t sure quite what to do with them, but I found some tiny glass beads at the bookstore by my school, and decided to give it a go. After about 7 hours, here’s the result with one of the stones in the center of a pendant I made:
I also made a bracelet using some seeds from a plant that grows outside our house. It’s not a great picture, but it turned out pretty cute.
Our house
Many people have asked for pictures of our house. I’m sorry it’s taken me 5 months to share some pics with you, but here they are:
This is the front of our house. There’s the patio, and the balcony.
When you walk in the front door, there’s a little sitting area (the front door is on the right in this pic). If you turn to the left, there’s the front staircase.
There’s one bedroom on the first floor, and our pembantu (maid) has strung up clothes lines in it for drying our clothes.
Also on the 1st floor, there’s the dining room.
The door off the dining room leads to the back stairs. A few steps down, and you’re in our kitchen. As you can see, the kitchens here are a lot different from the states. The blue tanks you see are gas. One is for our hot water heater/shower, and the other is for our cooker.
The bathroom is off the kitchen.
Above the bathroom and kitchen, there’s a weird little storage room. Up 1/2 a flight of stairs from the storage room is a door to our living room, but if you continue up another 1/2 flight of stairs, you end up on the roof.
I forgot to take pics of our bedroom and the other bedroom that we use as a walk-in closet. They really aren’t very exciting, anyway.
Woohoo!!! No work for a week!
So, this is our first Ramadan in Indonesia. It’s been interesting, but I’ll be really happy when it’s over. During Ramadan Muslim people fast from sunrise to sunset, then have feasts at night with their families. They get up at about 3am to eat a heavy breakfast before the morning prayer, and don’t eat anything until the sun sets. The idea is that nothing is to pass their lips… no food, water, or cigarettes. This lasts for a month. It can be quite difficult to find any restaurants that are open during the day, and when you do find one that’s open you need to be discreet about eating. The open restaurants will usually have curtains pulled over the windows, so hungry people can’t see you stuffing your face. Some of the local teachers I work with have been fasting, and I honestly don’t know how they can do it. I always have to have a bottle of water with me when I’m teaching. I think that would definitely be the most difficult part of fasting… no water. Especially when it’s a hot day.
With Ramadan a lot of our entertainment is limited, too. All pool halls, bowling alleys and karaoke bars are closed. Even some of the restaurants that serve alcohol are closed because Muslim Extremists make things difficult for some of the restaurant owners if they stay open. Fortunately our little neighborhood bar, Erla’s Mexican Cafe, has managed to stay open. Last night a lot of us teachers met there after work, and had the place to ourselves. There were 3 Englishmen, 1 Canadian, 3 Americans (including us), and 2 Indonesians. Erla’s cat had kittens recently, so there are 3 adorable little kitties that run around the place, and I had one curl up on me a couple times to take naps last night. There was a lot of beer consumed, and we had a great time. Erla also suggested we take home a kitten… so maybe we’ll get one while we’re here, though we’re still undecided on it.
This week is the end of Ramadan, and we get 1 week off work for it. We had 3 days of work this week, and we’re off from today (Thursday), returning to the office next Thursday. I’m so happy to have some time to relax. My current schedule has me teaching 4 classes 3 times a week, 3 classes 1 day, and Fridays only 2 classes. A couple of my classes go until 9pm, so I’ve had some long days these last few weeks. It’s been really nice though only having 2 classes on Fridays, and not starting to teach until 4pm. Friday mornings I’ve been able to sleep in, and have a really laid back day. But Mondays and Tuesdays have been especially tiring for me. I really needed this holiday.
We were planning to go to the beach again for Idul Fitri, but after talking to a lot of people we decided that it would be too crazy this time of year. It’s normally a 6 hour drive to Pangandaran beach from Bandung, but we’d been told to expect around 12 hours each way with the Idul Fitri traffic. Ugh! So, we decided to stay in Bandung for the week, and we bought a new bed to make it more comfortable here.
Our old bed was horrible, but the landlord left it for us, and it’s been better than trying to sleep on the floor… Though the springs are pretty shot, and some of them dig into my ribs sometimes, so I have to reposition myself between the pokiest springs. Not exactly conducive to a good night’s sleep. Our new mattress was delivered this morning, and cost us around $250. Not really cheap, but well worth it.
Oh, I also found out this week about the time off we’ll get for Christmas. We’ll get 11 days in a row off!!! FANTASTIC!!! We start our holiday on Saturday, Dec 22, and don’t return to work until Wednesday, Jan 2! My Mom arrives in Bandung on Dec 23, and flies back to Seattle on Dec 30, so we’ll be off work the whole time she’s here. I’m really looking forward to seeing my Mom, and showing her around our new city. I’m sure so many things here will just blow her mind.
Heard about Mack Strong today, and hope the Seahawks will be able to still compete without him.
Wow, this post is really all over the place… Hope things are good for everyone back home.
Filed under Living in Bandung | Comments (3)