Stuck in Surabaya (one of the few cities in the world of over 3 million people that you have never heard of)

Eric and Neil Acsend to the crater at Mt. Bromo

About 2 weeks ago, the travel muse hit me. With a four day holiday approaching, a colleague, Lance Wheatley, sent an email around asking if anyone wanted to climb Mt. Bromo (an active volcano). After clearing it with Janet and securing an extension of the invitation to include Eric and Neil, the idea was consummated with a keystroke at AirAsia.com.

Nothing like a steaming bag of hot instant coffee in the morning

(complete with straw to drink it with)

Our trip was to include a trip to Surabaya, driver, guide, and two nights in a homestay and lots of great memories and photos. While certainly living up to its billing, our hasty planning failed to take into consideration a couple key concepts:

Bathroom at our homestay

No time to follow recommendations on places to stay. Our homestay was a disaster. Grinding into the mountain village of Probolinggo after dark, we were presented with two dirty rooms, which included bathrooms with no running water or sinks and an abundance of dirt, smells and bugs. In conclusion, it’s not that I can’t stay in such places, it’s just that I refuse to pay $35 a night to do it! The highlight of this part of the trip was seeing a HUGE (4 inch diameter) live elephant beetle.

Eric, Neil and I with craters in the background

It's a wee bit chilly at 7,000 feet (even if you at the equator)

What is there to do in Surabaya? Thursday evening- driving up the mountain. Friday morning- sunrise over the volcano followed by a hike up to the lip of the crater (starting at 3:30 AM till around 8:30 AM). However, this ended our planned activities with 30 hours before we were to return home. After a refund from our guide for the lousy accommodations, we decided to drive back down to Surabaya to enjoy the big city. No problem in a city of 3 million, right?

Neil and Lance (with two craters in the background)

The TV in our hotel only spoke Bahasa Indonesia and there was no pool, so we headed off to the local mall where we took in a movie, shot pool (while watching people smoke hookah) and enjoyed some pizza. This worked for the rest of Friday. Saturday morning, we still had a 7 waking hours before our plane left. Our guide first took us to the Surabaya Zoo where Neil and his curly hair was the main attraction.

As a last activity our guide said she was to take us to a “secret” factory. This sounded funny to us and we even joked with her about it (“Is that where all secrets are made”). In the mean time, we waited to see what she meant by “secret.”

After getting there, we found out that what we were hearing as“secrets” was really “cigarettes”. I’m not sure how she got the idea that 2 adults who don’t smoke and 2 boys would enjoy a cigarette museum and factory. Oh well it was something to do. The company we toured ( http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sampoerna ) is one of the largest Indonesian cigarette companies and was bought out by Phillip Morris in 2005. They were very good at putting a shiny face on their product.

During our trip we also made a quick stop at a mud flow. Check out the following link to read about this human made disaster: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sidoarjo_mud_flow

Hope's ballet recital

Here are a few pictures from Hope's ballet recital:

Beating around the Bush

The ring returneth (cue dramatic music)

My ring was found!

For those of you who didn't hear (and will read below), I lost my wedding ring playing frisbee in the rain about 2 weeks ago.

After 10 days without it showing up, I mentioned to the PE office that I would like to offer a reward. The next day and before I could announce an amount, I received word that the ring had been found. Then, around an hour later, the following email appeared on my school account:

“Dear Mr. Stephen,

It wasn’t easy to find the ring on the yard. Pak M. ( our outsourcing gardening Spv ) felt responsible and has instructed all his staffs to be honest and full responsible.

He has used a special tool to find the ring and they have tried so hard to find it .

Finally, they found the ring . We will give the ring back to you. When you are available to meet us ? Can you come over to GA room ? The person who found the ring will also meet you.

Please let us know as soon as possible. Thanks”

Obviously, the meeting mentioned was regarding the reward I indicated. However, having never been prompted with a fair amount to offer, I didn't want to go to this meeting without money and a good idea of what to expect or offer.

I sought out two sources for advice:

The first stop was to speak with the western expats in the staff lounge. Their response was quick and to the point:

Bruce: “sounds like extortion to me”

Kara: “ I wouldn’t pay more than Rp.100,000 ($10)”

Judy: “ How can you put a price on love?”

The next stop was to speak with an Indonesian man in the PE office named Pak Gideon. After explaining my confusion of what to pay and asking his advice, he just smiled and shrugged his shoulders and said “don’t underestimate the time and care needed to find the ring”.

“What kind of answer is that?” I thought and after an awkward moment and a conviction that 100,000 rupiah was way too low said, while wincing “300,000 Rupiah? “($30).

He smiled for a long while and with a nod of the head said “200,000”. We then arranged for the meeting to take place.

After rustling up a bit of cash (which involved a quick trip to the ATM because the bank was unexpectedly closed), the reward was paid (in a beat around the bush Indonesian way) and the ring is back on my finger.

markets, parties and lost rings

Confession: The life of an expat in Indonesia can be sheltered. We exist in this English speaking bubble of work, home and a few “safe” other places (big western style malls, movie theaters showing Hollywood’s latest and familiar restaurants). We move between these places in air conditioned cars playing our favorite music on the CD player. The biking and walking we do is usually confined to the development we work in which is patroled by security gaurds, called satpams.

This Saturday morning, we asked Ibu Warshi (our maid) to take us to the small traditional market near our house. She has taken us to other larger traditional markets in Jakarta, but always by car. This market is close enough to walk (a mile one way), but feels a long way away from the familiarity of Lippo Village.

Here is a few photos and descriptions of the trip:

Walking to the market along a drainage ditch

(be thankful you can't see or smell the sweat dripping off me)

Eric in front of the market

Hope and vendor following a 30 cent sticker purchase

Ibu Warshi barters for fresh fruit

(she is wishing she left us at home about now)

Eric crosses narrow bridge on the way home

Neil and Ibu Warshi as we get closer to home

(Yes, Neil is taller than her)

End of the year party. As I am writing this, my year 12 students are one week into IB exams. On our last regular day of classes, we celebrated with food and games. I thought I'd share some of the fun:

Is it too cliche to play Monopoly at an Economics class party?

Consider this flavor for your next Super Bowl party!

I lost my wedding ring last Sunday in a story I'll let our friend, Kim White, tell in her blog. Just click on the link below:

http://trisandkim.blogspot.com/2009/05/ultimately-wet-sunday.html

Have a great week!

Mea Culpa

Following up on the blog entry regarding sports…

I never knew the phrase “Go San Jose!” could draw intense reactions. (see comments for Sports entry)

It wrote it because my fantasy hockey team of 10 players contained 4 players from the San Jose Sharks. By the way, those players were chosen for me by a Canadian and justice was served. San Jose was upset in the first round. However, I still have 5 players in my pool, including Eric Staal, a dutch kid from Thunder Bay, Ontario (not Ontario, California).

Yogjakarta

For our Easter break 2 weeks ago we visited Yogjakarta. Yogja is in south central java and is about 300 miles from Jakarta. It is an artsy, university town and is the center of Javanese culture. I haven't posted anything about the trip till now, but below are a few pictures from our trip.

Yogja has two 1000+ year old temples: Borobudur is the largest Buddhist temple in the world (at times, it has been listed as one of the 7 wonders of the ancient world). It was built in the 7th century AD and people from around the world journey here to see it. In the picture above, we are at one of the hundreds of buddhas found around the temple. Notice the slight outline of the volcano in the background. Java is full of volcanos, many of them active.

The other famous temple is Prambanan, a Hindu temple from the 8th century. While not nearly as massive or impressive, it is still an important stop in Yogja. At this temple we also saw a ballet of the Ramayana (ancient Hindu story).

Our guide at Prambanan.

Yogja still allows becak's (pronounced Bey-chucks), or pedicabs (many cities don't allow them any longer because they cause more congestion). We had fun being cycled around the city. Some places we saw:

• Sultan's palace (Yogja is actually a sultanate, or ruled by a Sultan)
• bird market- Many birds and exotic animals for sale (most illegally unfortunately)
• Taman Sari- ancient palace
• Malioboro- Shopping avenue full of local handicrafts

We also went to a hand made batik workshop. While we spent the hour there talking, laughing and listening to descriptions of how it is made, the woman in the foreground quietly worked and hardly noticed us. Batik is traditionally done by women before they marry and is supposed to teach patience, which will assist in marriage.

I think she is ready.

Election good and bad news:

• good news- Elections went smoothly and the ruling party won decidedly.

• bad news- There were many voting irregularities which have led to simmering problems such as negative press articles and threats of boycott's in the July 8 Presidential elections.
  
  

Sports

Guys in general are more verbally challenged than women. It’s harder for many of us to strike up a conversation about much of anything. On top of that, I struggle more so in the conversation department. Fortunately, Janet covers for me much of the time (nice way of putting it ;-). For guys like me, the saving grace of conversation is….sports. If there is an uncomfortable silence… mention sports.

Here’s the rub. The sports I like and follow a bit (American college football and basketball, NBA and maybe Major League baseball), no one pays attention to here. In other words, when I say… how bout them Lobos (referring to the University of New Mexico’s mens basketball team), all I get are blank stares!

While we get ESPN here, the coverage is completely different and includes some of the following:

Aerial sports: racing planes and skydiving competitions.
Soccer: mainly South East Asian Teams (from Thailand, Australia ect…), also Premier League from Europe.
Rugby: mostly from Australia and New Zealand
Motor sports: Formula 1 GP (Grand Prix) and A1.
Cricket: From South Asia (India, South Africa and Australia)
Winter sports: Snow Skiing from Europe
Xtreme sports: from North America
Badminton: not on ESPN, but often on other channels. It is the Indonesian National Sport.

There is a Major League Baseball, NBA basketball and college basketball on periodically. However, I had to watch the NCAA tournament online.

Therefore I have embarked on an odyssey of new sports discoveries. The following occurred this week alone:

I am in a hockey pool at SPH for the NHL playoffs. While hockey itself is not popular at all in Indonesia, there are enough Canadians on staff here, that hockey is now spoken here. Go San Jose!

It’s 2AM Wednesday, April 14 and what am I doing? Watching Liverpool take on Chelsea in quarterfinal action of the Champions tournament in the Premier League. I still managed to miss every one of the 8 goals scored in the game! I watched from the 28th minute through halftime and then went to bed!

Other key insights learned this year:

* Formula 1 GP is different than Formula A1.

* There is a difference between Rugby Union and Rugby League.

* If you are talking to an Australian, “football” is soccer, “footie” is Australian Rules Football and “american football” is football.

* Cricket is incredibly boring to watch.

Have a great week!