Birthday Overseas

I turned 40 last weekend. I feel confident that the festivities around my birthday reflect the energy and excitement of the past decade and set an auspicious beginning to the next.  I still feel like there has been a math error somewhere along the way, but I am just going to roll with it and model the adage that you are only as old as you feel.

L-R Me, Elizabeth, Pari, Carin, Ash, Arjun

Stage 1 of my birthday project took place about 5 weeks ago. Shortly after arriving in Yogya, I learned that 2 other women in my house were also October babies... and we would all be entering a new decade, 20's, 30's and 40's. Unfortunately, our travel schedules had us in different places on any of the birthdays, so we started early. It was decided that a suitable celebration for three such worldly, wise and fascinating women would be a trip to a breakfast buffet to stuff ourselves silly. So, we gathered our best housemates, put on our finest elastic-waisted clothing and headed to the remarkable buffet at a fancy hotel.

We play in a band... a gamelan band

We enjoyed gorging on cheese and bread (not commonly found here) and thoroughly confusing the guy manning the juicer station with our odd juice requests (I tried to recreate apple, kale, ginger juice using Indonesian ingredients). It might have been our indulgence in too many lattes (also rarely found here), but we got a little adventurous and asked if Ash, one of the birthday girls and a student of gamelan, might sit in with the players. Unfortunately, they had retired for the day, so it was up to the rest of us to back her up (much to her mortification), but the staff seemed to enjoy the spectacle of foreigners ineptly jamming.

After lunch and jamming time, we wandered around the hotel garden, feeding the fish and waiting for our food stupor to subside. It was a lovely relaxing afternoon with wonderful friends... the kind of day I can't get enough of. It was topped off by a surprise cake from Elizabeth who had hidden it in the warung next door because the birthday ladies were always around and she couldn't get it past us.

Feeding the fish and letting them grab our fingers

Wait. What? Who is turning 40?

Stage 2 of the birthday celebration was not really a celebration, but a trip that I wanted to take. I had thought that it would be great to celebrate my birthday by taking a houseboat tour to see orangutans in Tajung Puting National Park. As it turned out, there was a long weekend earlier in October, so several people from ASRI decided to take the trip then. I invited myself along. Seven intrepid volunteers and one esteemed staff member made the journey to float through jungle rivers and take occasional walks to see orangutans. Look for a future post with more details... Although my fellow travelers did not consider this trip part of my birthday celebration, we began to discuss the final stage of the celebration and hatch plans for the actual birthday.

You know that this guy knows how to party

I'm on a boat.. with my friends. (Jesse, Hotlin, me, Shannon,
Sophie, Jaelin, George) Photo credit: Karen

Stage 3, my actual birthday was spent in Sukadana. I have met many people with my birthday or days adjacent, and here is no exception. October 25th is the birthday of Dr. Ronald and this offered me the opportunity to witness some Indonesian traditions. Indonesian tradition is the opposite of the American. If it is your birthday, you treat everyone... and in Indonesia, when you have a party, everyone is invited. This was a little intimidating for me since I haven't gotten a paycheck since August. The other tradition... much to the dismay of Ronald... is the throwing of flour and eggs.

Ronald embracing his flouring as Nur, Hotlin and Jesse gloat
and Etty hides... her birthday is coming up!

So, I had that to look forward to...

My actual birthday didn't start out so well. I was happy to get a phone call from my mom, who had figured out how to call me at the right time in Indonesia to be the first to say happy birthday, but I realized that I was not feeling great. Hotlin had planned a brunch, and I really didn't want to disappoint, or admit that I was sick on my birthday. Upon emerging from my room, howeve, I was greeted by a smiling Hotlin who had procured beautiful hibiscus flowers. My day began to brighten. I made a big mug of strong coffee and inquired about getting a massage. I was very pleased to hear that the "pijat" or local masseuse/healer/chiropractor would be coming to the house to treat one of the other brunch guests so it was likely that she could see me as well. And the day was a little brighter.

Brunch!

 As the coffee kicked in, our friends started to arrive. Mary and Anto showed up with stuff for chai and Jesse brought fruit. Hotlin provided her famous steamed coconut cakes made with all local ingredients (coconut, rice flour, palm sugar) as well as coconut pancakes that we ate with jam. The laughter of friends and the amazing food brought me to the brink of health.

Chilling with friends on my birthday made me happy l-r Jesse
(who is looking at lyrics, being rude), Hotlin, Anto, Mary

The massage carried me the rest of the way. As the pijat relentlessly kneaded my muscles and pulled on my limbs, my friends began to make music. I was carried away to a state of bliss. Yes, the way to enter your 40s. A little more bliss... when I asked the pijat how much she charged, she indicated that I could pay what I thought was right. Apparently, the going rate in the city is $5, but our here it is $3... yes, $3 for a one hour massage.

After a steamy morning, there was a nice rain that cooled us down enough for an impromptu session of yoga on the beach. Flowing through asanas in time with the ocean was transcendent despite some intense gawking at the white folks doing weird things on the beach and the noises of a normal Saturday afternoon.

Yoga on this beach... there are worse ways to spend your day

The final event of the day... yes, it is still my birthday... was a party on the amazing deck at the house shared by Shannon, George, and Jesse. To avoid the financial burden of me footing the bill for everyone, we decided to make it a potluck... the food was amazing.

Shannon and the martabak cake

By far the most amazing piece was a bit of Frankenstein baking pulled off by Shannon. She prides herself on her cooking creativity and the cake that she made for my birthday was an exemplar of this talent. She made the cakes of martabak, a thick Indonesian pancake much loved by all who travel here. The martabak can only be purchased in the evenings when the martabak carts come out... they will not share their recipes, so Shannon tasked George with the job of obtaining the foundation as she made a delicious fudge-like frosting to hold the whole thing together. She topped it off with decorations that she had made. Delicious doesn't even begin to describe it. Even our Indonesian friends who were dubious of this Indo-American creation came back for seconds.

We sat around in yet another food coma chatting and sipping on whisky (another rare treat) way past bedtime here in Sukadana (usually 9pm). Eventually, as is wont to happen here, the electricity cut out and we headed home.

Nur, Asnat and Nomi enjoying the martabak cake

George with and empty plate and Ronald with no flour

As I crawled into bed I had two thoughts. First, the only thing that could have made the birthday any better was the inclusion of my friends and family from home. Second... how did I get away without being covered in flour and egg?

I gave myself over to being 40 shortly after I turned 39. My 30s had some great events but, as is frequently the case with large emotional growth spurts, there was a lot of tough stuff too. All of this tough stuff leaves me entering my 40s with a better sense of who I am and how I want to travel through life than I have ever had... This is going to be fun! 

A month in Sukadana

About a month ago, I moved from the city to the town of Sukadana in the province of West Kalimantan on the island of Borneo. I am working as a volunteer with an organization named Alam Sehat Lestari (ASRI) that provides healthcare and other services in support of conservation in an around Gunung Palung National Park, home to approximately 10% of the remaining wild orangutans on the planet.

Sukadana is a large village tucked in between the ocean and the protected tropical rainforest of the park. It has two intersections and most of the roads are somewhat paved.

Village life presents a whole new side of Indonesia. For example, I have been wanting to post to this blog for a week, but when I have time, the power seems to go out... because it goes out every day for varying lengths of time. Village life requires a great deal of flexibility and creativity as residents take advantage when there is power, or water, or fruit... because you don't know when you will have it again.

Hiking through Gunung Palung National Park

The first weekend here, I joined several volunteers for a steamy hike into one of the camps in the national park that surrounds us. Unfortunately, our quest for glimpses of wild orangutans was unfruitful.








There was also a fire at the reforestation site that devastated 5 years of work. We rushed out to the site on a Sunday night to assist in the battle against the flames. We lost and the site was destroyed.

Crew fighting fire with small sprayer and sticks

Despite valiant efforts, the fire grew to this.

There have been happier outings with the staff. We all drove 2 hours to the largest town in the area to attend the wedding of one of the nurses from the clinic. Indonesian weddings are confusing but basically, the bride and groom and parents form a living tableau and sit there all day as friends come and go and eat food in front of them while staring at the tableau. The group of foreigners added an interesting twist to the event.

Members of the ASRI staff greeting the wedding party.

Kids at the wedding thought the white folks were pretty cool

But the real adventure has been more internal and hard to capture with exciting visuals.

Being a foreigner in a village is an entirely different experience than being a foreigner in a city. I am rather fortunate that the nature of the organization with which I am volunteering provides a small cohort of other Americans to share my cultural missteps and general cluelessness.

In the village, I am an oddity that is treated with an unearned amount of respect and fragility. On a recent trip to a field site, some unplanned events required that the conservation director (also and American and rather new to the organization) spend the night at the home of the site manager. Initially, he was very embarrassed to have us. His house is simple. The furnishing consist of a table and a tv. There are no chairs, no beds, no dressers. The bathroom is an uncovered wooden platform outside the back of the house with a tarp for some privacy. Our host did not want us to judge him by his living conditions. He didn't want us to see how little he had to offer because he didn't want to appear to be a small person.

His wife had to request food from neighbors to feed us. The village is remote and you have to plan the week's meals carefully. Several people gave the little that they could spare and we enjoyed a really nice meal.

This experience gave me even more respect for our hosts. They are able to live on so little yet work so hard. Our host has been working for ASRI for 5 years. He was once an illegal logger but became a conservationist in charge of a reforestation site. Now, this man is no saint and he should not be idealized. He is a normal human being who works hard and makes big mistakes. In some ways we are all so different, but in others we are the same.

Dragon fruit juice is favorite

Life in Sukadana has given me a lot of time for some deep reflection. There are very few after work activities. Basically you can choose to go to the beach and drink juice or go someplace else and drink juice. Occasionally, there is an outing for martabak, but that will be a post of its own. When the sun goes down at 5:30, it is really dark... no street lights, few lights in houses... and most folks start getting ready for bed. We are so close to the equator that the day length doesn't really change. The shortest day of the year (which is in June) is 11h 49m and 47s. The longest day (December) is 12h 25m 6s... A difference of about 25 minutes compared to the difference between longest and shortest days in Colorado is about 6 hours.

My daily schedule starts by 5 or 6 am when I get up and try to get some exercise before the oppressive heat swells. By 7am, it is time to start sweating, so I bath using a bucket and a large tub of water (called a mandi) and eat breakfast with my roommate Hotlin. We work from 8-4 and then try to find some evening activity... often trying to catch the sunset. Bedtime is 9pm.

Weekends are long. ASRI provides housing to volunteers and staff. Each house has a "pembantu" or helper who cleans, cooks and does laundry. While we are 'all capable of taking care of ourselves, it is expected that people with jobs employ other people in order to enhance the economic well-being of the community. With our basic maintenance chores attended to, we have a lot of leisure time. Entertainment is generally simple as there are no theaters, music venues or bars. Each weekend someone puts together a soccer (here it is called 'futsal') game and the rest of the time we enjoy simple things, like watching baby goats or hanging out in front of a fan. Occasionally, we risk severe jellyfish stings and take a swim in the less-than-crystal-clear ocean. Of course, I also have a lot of work to do too! Fortunately, part of my work is to build relationships and you can't do that while tethered to a computer!

These baby goats have been a source of amusement for hours on end.

A Sunday afternoon game of "futsal" on the beach with staff

Quick update

Sunset beyond the temples at Prambanan

Modern sculpture near the Javanese Sultan's
Palace and the Dutch era Post Office Building.
World coexist.

Today I move from Yogyakarta (Java) to West Kalimantan. It requires taxi, bus, taxi, airplane, airplane and finally car. Knowing that calling life unpredictable in Indonesia is being overly generous, I took at 6 am bus, so that, about 4 hours later, I arrive 3 hours early for my flight. Fortunately, the airport lounges are lovely and I am making use of the time by updating about the first month in Indonesia.

The most important thing to note is that it feels like I have been here for 3 days. It has flown by. It has flown partially because I have been having a blast with some great people, and partly because each errand that I run takes days longer than expected.

Yogyakarta is a fascinating place. It is very international, but also very homey and friendly. While waiting for a computer at an internet cafe, a young Indonesian woman introduced herself. We had a nice chat about her

life (just graduated, looking for a job in computer programming, fluent in self-taught German and English and no interest in going to the States ever). While walking between two touristy areas of town, a man pulled us aside to warn us that we should not buy batik from the tourist vendors on Malioboro St. (a tourist mecca) because they are not real batiks. I am accustomed to a warning like this being closely followed by an offer to drive me to his "friend's" shop to check out "almost free" goods... but this was not a hawker, he was just a nice guy who was excited to meet 2 foreigners with somewhat passable bahasa Indonesia.

In the same area of town, on a Sunday afternoon we were surprise when a bunch of guys in military uniforms (see pic below) marched noisily down the street accompanied by a chorus of mopeds racing their engines in time with the marching. The stopped at an intersection... and... of course... broke out into a choreographed dance routine. Grown men. Uniforms. Dancing to... what was it? Robin Thicke? And they seemed pretty happy about it too.

Kids with chickens

When I was not studying, at the gym or in search of food, I spent a lot of time walking around the narrow "gangs" (alleys) and being surprised at most turns. One day I came upon a bunch of children playing with live chicks who were dyed vivid colors. I wanted to take a picture of the chickens (these would really brighten up the micro-farming trend in the U.S.), but the kids wanted me to take there picture too, so you get to see both.

Chickens, ready for Easter (in the world's most populous
 Muslim nation)

And then there were the outings with friends. In my first week, we discovered that 3 of us have October birthdays. We are each a decade apart. Carin will turn 20, Ash will be 30 and I will be 40. When there was general agreement that I do not look or act 40, I knew that these were friends for life and we began to plan a way to celebrate our birthdays before I left. 

Wuv... Is what keeps us together
when hitchhiking on an intercity bus.

I think we did it fairly well.... Part 1 of Operation Birthday celebration was attending the Ramayana Ballet at Prambanan. The ballet is more of a traditional Indonesian dance performance that tells part of the Ramayana, the Hindu epic. It is performed at night with the Hindu temples of Prambanan, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, as the background. Carin and I headed out early to see the temples before the performance. The entire experience was awe-inspiring. One of the highlights of the evening was being stranded about 30 minutes outside of town unable to get a cab to come pick us up. Eventually, we were able to hop a "direct" intercity bus that brought us close enough to home that the promise of a hefty tip secured a cab for the rest of the way. Terrifying, but fun when you have a group of friends including several who are fluent in Indonesian!

The ballet with the temples in the background

We decided to chow down at a fancy breakfast buffet at a nearby hotel. The highlights of the buffet were real lattes (not from a packet), real cheese (the cheese they sell here is designed to not melt in the tropical heat) and a juice bar that would make any kind of juice you wanted. After lunch, Ash led us in an impromptu jam session on the gamelan, which seemed to entertain the hotel staff immensely.

Jamming on the gamelan.

The final part of the celebration was brought to us by Elizabeth. She found a bakery, got us a cake, and, when she was unable to sneak the cake into the house past us, recruited the owner of the neighboring warung to hide the cake in her refrigerator.  Her valiant effort was a bit tweaked when the warung owner came over to ask us when we wanted to cake, but Carin and I remained clueless, so it was a lovely surprise. I don't have any pictures of the cake yet, but I will post a picture for Elizabeth...

Air Soda from Yogya in the Semarang airport lounge

So, off I go to the field portion of my trip. The next 2.5 months I will be in a rainy area of West Kalimantan volunteering with an organization that uses health services as an incentive for conservation. I don't really know what to expect, but if the last month has set any precedent. This is going to be AWESOME!

Food

The food here is frightening and inspiring. One of the first things that I learned in Indonesian was "Ada makanan vegetarian?" (is there vegetarian food?). Most of the time I am told that there is nothing, but when there is, I order it. It is an adventure each time. Indonesians like food that is either so sweet that you soon begin to sweat sugar from your pores or so spicy that you find yourself briefly praying for death to end the pain. I have spent time in Mexico and Thailand, so I am no stranger to spicy food, but here I find myself looking around for a cooler full of icy water in which to submerge my blistering lips on a fairly regular basis.

Takeout (they use paper, not boxes) from our favorite vegan place

The next thing that I learned to say regarding food was "sedikit pedas" (a little spicy) which is still alarmingly hot.

$1 Japanese food at the mall

Food here is ridiculously inexpensive... I have mixed feelings about this.Knowing the poverty that pervades the agricultural landscape outside of this city, I wonder how farmers can survive when I am paying less than a dollar a pound for the most important staple. This price also reflects price manipulation by middlemen and vendors. On the other hand, I am mainly eating where Indonesians eat, and Indonesian city dwellers are not rich either. Affordable food is essential. So, I eat cheaply too.

This is what $10 (total) buys you at a warung... Fed 6 hungry ladies

I eat at "warungs". These are tiny restaurants that have a very limited menu and food is cheap. Most warung owners cook a bunch of things in the early part of the day and serve it from a display window until it is gone. Most warungs specialize in a particular kind of dish. One of my favorite places serves lotek and gado-gado (variations of steamed vegetables and peanut sauce). The entire menu of the place is lotek w/or without rice, gado-gado w/or w/out rice and lotek with sauce on the side.Generally, my meals consist of vegetables of some sort, rice and tempe or tofu.This is the land of tempeh, and there was a nationwide panic recently when tempeh producers went on strike.

Then there are the odd things.
They serve fish finger pizza at Pizza Hut too

Rice is such an essential part of a meal that, when you go to a "warung", they ask you "pakai apa". "Pakai apa?" means "with what?", and they are asking what you want with your rice... not the other way around. If you don't have rice with your meal, Indonesians don't consider it a meal. Bahasa Indonesia has a lot of works for rice. It is one thing when it is cooked, another when it is raw, another after it is harvested, another while it is still on the plant. I find it fascinating that the language reflects the central place of rice in this culture.

Then there are the special meals out. We eat out a lot because grocery stores are few and far between. The traditional markets, where one would buy vegetables and staples are open at hours that don't work well with my schedule. So, there are lots of fun outings. Occasionally, we splurge on western food or other ethnic food. An extravagant meal runs about $10 per person.









One night was pizza and beer...

A NOTE ABOUT BEER. As many of you know, beer is one of my favorite things. However, this is a Muslim country where drinking is not common. When a restaurant does have beer, it is about as expensive as it is in Fort Collins. I have had a total of 3 beers since I got here. The locals drink kombucha or "tape" (fermented taro root, dyed green and served in soda water. Yes, it tastes just as good as you would think it would) to get a buzz.

So, eating has been a central component of my life in Yogya. While it is a biological necessity, it is also frequently a bonding experience. I am leaving Yogya tomorrow and I will miss laughter-filled meals with my friends here. However, I have a few pounds to shed and I hope that I will be able to do that in Kalimantan as I explore the rainforest. Stay tuned!

Riding in the Desa (sung to the tune of 'Running with the Devil")

So, yesterday, I got to naik sepeda (ride a bike) in the desa (village) with a big chunk of new friends. The outing was generously organized by Wisma Bahasa (my language school). The obtained bikes for everyone, and at 6:30 on Saturday morning, after a nice little box breakfast of savory pastries, rice (in Indonesia there is ALWAYS rice) and a donut, they loaded us into vehicles and brought us out to the country.

My apologies for the poor quality of the pictures... I tool them with my cell phone and mostly while I was riding!

Getting ready to ride!

Riding through rice fields

Riding through a village

The group of riders included teachers, administrators, security guards and students of Wisma Bahasa. The teachers at this school continue to impress. They don't teach us like very foreign clients. They treat us like friends. It makes learning Indonesian a lot less like work.

Our point of departure and return was also our lunch restaurant. It is a series of open thatch-roofed huts linked by bamboo paths that wind around coi-filled ponds. We rode through small villages and even a market. Although the total distance was less than 20 km, we had plenty of rest breaks with snacks. One of the most interesting stops was at a cemetery that contains a memorial to victims of the 2010 eruption of Mt. Merapi, a nearby volcano.

View from my seat at lunch

The day heated up quickly and we were pleased when we returned to our oasis for a group lunch of fresh seafood, lotek (vegetables in peanut sauce) and lots and lots of spicy stuff (oh, and rice). After lazing about by the water in a post-lunch torpor, we were delivered back to the city and sent on our merry ways to bathe, sleep and await the cooler part of the day... and the drag show... but that is a story for another day.

And some folks got more adventurous!

Week 1... Indonesia is awesome

"Light of Heaven" streaming into a cave in the jungle.

I have been trying to put together some posts with themes, like "food" (which is incredibly cheap, tasty and spicy to a level that I have not experienced even living in Mexico and Thailand) and "my homestay"... It is taking longer than I want because I keep forgetting to take pictures, so I am going to just give an update about week 1 and entertain with pictures of part 1 of this weekend's activities.

I spend a lot of time studying Indonesia at a nearby language school. I hope to develop a post about them because they are amazing and they have really created a nice community of expats wrestling with Indonesia. I think that my language is coming along quite well. Indonesians are amazingly friendly and patient with "bule" (foreigners), so practicing Indonesian is fun.

Surface of the stalagmite

I finished my lessons around 3pm and would return to the homestay. Evenings have been spent either studying or with the other residents of the homestay... all of them are fascinating and kind. Other residents hail from America, the Netherlands, Slovakia, Turkey, Germany, Korea and Japan. We are 11 in total.

Part way down to the cave

Ashley hails from Florida originally, but she is studying through a university in Australia and has been in Indonesia for a while. Ash is extremely talented at organizing outings and inviting fantastic people. We have gone out to dinner, to the shopping mall and, this weekend, she rallied a group on a FANTASTIC caving adventure.

Yesterday morning, two cars arrived to drive 7 of us several hours to a cave that has been opened for tourists. The highlight of the cave is amazing light that streams down from an opening in the roof of the largest part of the cavern. To reach this spot, you are first lowered 60 meters off a cliff onto the jungle floor. This was a bit nerve wracking for all involved... but not nearly as nerve wracking as when they pulled up back up the same cliff using 10 local guys! However, the safety concerns seemed well-attended-to, so we took the plunge... literally.

Go jump off a cliff

We left the heat an humidity of the forest into the cool darkness of the cave. After a walk of about 200 meters, the cave opened into a beautiful cavern with the "Light of Heaven" streaming through the ceiling. After climbing a massive stalagmite, and becoming completely soaked by the water that formed it, we descended a steep and MUDDY slope down the the river that formed the cave.

Ladies on the stalagmite

We shed our harnesses and helmets and jumped, fully clothed into the water. I think from that point on we were pretty much soaking wet and filthy for the rest of the day. After a nice swim and slight de-mudding, we climbed back through the muck to the mouth of the cavern where a small lunch waited. We enjoyed the last cool air of the cave as we ate rice, sauce, and chicken or tofu.

"Light of Heaven"

"Light of Heaven" shining on the stalagmite

After we were hoisted one by one up the cliff, we decided that our adventure should not end there. We stopped at a nearby spot where we floated on tubes through another series of caves. We spent a glorious amount of time swimming and floating outside of the tubes as well. I honestly don't remember if I have ever been that relaxed.

We reluctantly climbed out of the river and returned to to the start where we were offered mie (noodle soup) and tea before our drive back to Yogyakarta. As we neared the city, the sky brightened and changed color as the sun set. It was a beautiful ending to an awesome day.

Me in the cave