30 July 2012
Sorry it has taken me so long to post an update. I haven’t
felt like I was far enough ahead for school planning that I could justify
spending time typing this (I already wrote it in my journal, but it wasn’t
edited or typed). Well, enough with
the excuses, here is what I have been up to. Be prepared for another post of randomness after the story
about Bandung, which dates back to the weekend of July 21.
Here goes…On Friday, July 21, our driver picked us (Danna,
Nicole, Kristina, and I) up at our hotel in Bandung (a city that is about 2
hours from Jakarta) at 9 a.m. Hold
on, back up, how exactly did we find ourselves in Bandung on a Friday? We had a
holiday for the first day of Ramadan, so we had taken a bus from Jakarta to
Bandung. None of us had made any
concrete plans to go out of the city for the long weekend, and as the week
began, we had been talking to some of the teachers at school. When one of the teachers at school, who
just happens to have lived in Bandung and whose husband currently lives there,
heard we wanted to go for the weekend, she took care of everything. She told us
we could buy bus tickets at Central Park, the mall we live by, and that’s where
the bus arrives and departs, very convenient! After school on Thursday, we bought our bus tickets, but
when I say bus, I really mean a van with 6 seats in the back plus the passenger
seat in the front. It was a great
deal, though. We paid 75 000 Rupiah for a one-way ticket. The teacher from school asked us if we
had figured out a place to stay or any specific plans we had, and when we told
her, “not yet” she asked us if we wanted her husband to book us a room in a
hotel she knew of and hire us a driver for the weekend. So, basically, there was no planning
involved for us, besides we looked in our guidebooks and took people’s
suggestions of places to go and sites to see.
So, back to Friday morning, with our driver, Jamal. We told him we wanted to go to
Tangkuban Parahu, one of the many local volcanoes. First of all, we had mainly come to Bandung to get away from
the crowded, smoggy city of Jakarta, so we had planned on hiking around in the
green surroundings. Unfortunately,
our driver spoke little to no English, so instead of letting us hike up to the
volcano, so he ended up driving us to the top. It worked out fine, though, because the clouds/fog started
to roll in as we were leaving the top of the volcano. We walked around the top ledge, looking down into the
steaming and hissing crater of the volcano, which had imploded in on itself
years ago. There was no lava, or
anything, just steam. There were
quite a few tourists on this side of the crater, but as we walked further
around to the other side, the crowd thinned. We continued walking to the opposite side, where we came
upon the second crater. This one
was not steaming or hissing, and it seemed very calm and dead compared to the
other. It never would have crossed
my mind to walk down into this crater, except that there were a bunch of words
and messages spelled out with rocks in the crater. So, we thought, why not? Danna followed a few guys down the hillside (and by
hillside, I do mean the side of the volcanic crater). There was no trail to follow down, just a bunch of loose
rocks to halfway slide down. It
was a bit treacherous at times, but fun!
We took a bunch of pictures while in this crater, because, let’s face
it, we were standing in a volcano!
We made it out of there safe and sound, and we made our way back around
to where our driver had dropped us off.
We came back around a slightly different way, so we walked up the street
lined with the souvenir shops.
Danna and Nicole bargained for a tshirt for Danna. She didn’t think it was a great deal,
but she was proud of her bargaining and using numbers in the Bahasa Indonesian
language.
On our way down the hill (and by hill, I do mean volcano),
our driver took us to an Outdoor Adventures place where we thought we could zip
line. Turns out they call zip
lining the flying fox. We had seen
a billboard and brochure, so we wanted to at least check out the facility and
price. For a mere 20 000 Rp each
(about $2) we each got to do the flying fox. It was fun, for what it was, but no comparison to the time I
went sky diving, or the time I will have when I do something else crazy here,
like bungee jump or cliff dive. J
After the fun of flying through the air, we told the driver
to take us back into the city. Kristina heard about a traditional show that was
happening, and the driver knew where to go. Unfortunately, we were a little late for the show, and the
tickets were 100 000 Rp. (about $10) each, and once again, we were too cheap to
actually want to pay that much money for a show we knew little to nothing
about. We decided to wander around
the gift shop while we listened to the show going on next door. It sounded funny and interesting,
but I don’t think we missed too much.
Next on the agenda was Amanda’s Bakery, which had been recommended to
each of us separately by different people who heard we were going to
Bandung. We walked in to find
boxes stacked on all of the counters, about 6 boxes high. Having no idea what to expect, as per
usual in this country, we assumed there was an assortment of baked goods,
including brownies, in each box.
As we looked more closely, we realized each box was a big ‘loaf’ of
brownie. There were a bunch of
different kinds, including strawberry, which I bought. It was worth the whole 20 000 Rp (if
you’ve been paying attention to my conversions thus far, you could’ve figured
out that’s only about $2) for the equivalent of a pan of absolutely scrumptious
brownies. Of course, each of us
bought a box to try and share with everyone else…but that still left us with an
entire box to eat ourselves. We
(Nicole and I) decided workout when we got back to Jakarta, because it requires
too much self-control to turn down brownies when you’re on vacation. After that, we were out of ideas for
places for the driver to take us, so he dropped us off at our hotel. We showered and decided to venture out
to find some real dinner (apparently brownies don’t count). From riding around, we noticed our
hotel’s location in relation to a famous street with a ton of factory outlet
stores with superhero-themed stores and decorations. In the guidebook, this area is referred to as Jeans St., and
it was entertaining to walk around.
It was quite late, especially for it being the end of the first day of
Ramadan, so the shops closed relatively early (not that we really wanted to do
any shopping, anyway). We saw a
small restaurant/bar on a side street and decided to check it out. As we walked in from the street, a
hostess greeted us, and Danna asked if they had beer. The hostess told us yes, and then asked us how many. Assuming she was referring to how many
people in our party, we replied four, a few minutes later, the waitress showed
up at our table with four bottles of Bintang (the local beer). Apparently, the Americans had walked in
demanding four beers before even taking their seats. The best part is that Nicole and I don’t like beer, so there
were already two beers a piece for Danna and Kristina. We thought it was entertaining, and not
the most inconvenient conversation that had been lost in translation.
Saturday morning (21 July) our driver showed up at 9 a.m.
again, but this time his name was Hendra.
He spoke much better English than Friday’s driver, so we were talking
about America and his family. Our
goal on Saturday was to enjoy some hot springs and maybe a waterfall. Well, both of those goals were an epic
fail, as it turned out. Hendra
drove us to the Maribaya hot springs that we read about in our guidebooks…bad
idea. The water was really dirty,
and it definitely was not a tourist spot.
As we’re asking Hendra where we can swim, he tells us that even HE
wouldn’t swim here, and then he follows that statement with, “I told you not to
come here.” That’s when we decided
that he knows the area better than we do, so we told him to take us to wherever
he recommends. He took us to
Ciater, which had hot springs and pools, but it was still not what we had been
expecting and at this point, after driving around in search of this place, we
were all annoyed and disappointed at where we had finally arrived. We stuck our feet in a small
fountain/pool where we didn’t have to pay money (once again, we’re cheap,
especially after already having paid to get into the park to simply walk
around). We found out later, from
my friend Nathan who has been living in Bandung since January, that a good time
to go to Ciater is late at night because they’re open all night. That’s on the list for our next visit
to Bandung! We made an attempt to
pick strawberries on our drive back into the city, but all of the places were
either closed because of the Ramadan fasting or had already been picked
through…bad timing, once again. I
finally made our driver stop by a roadside stand selling pineapples, because we
hadn’t eaten since breakfast and it was mid-afternoon by this point of the day. Fresh pineapple was one of the
highlights of the day, especially since everything else had been such a
disappointment.
Continuing our pledge to listen to the driver for the day,
we asked him to take us to a place to get cheesecake (once again, it had been a
suggestion from someone before we left).
We each had a slice of cheesecake that was delicious, and, once again,
the food did not disappoint. I was
feeling guilty about our driver being around all of this food, because he had
been fasting all day (he didn’t even drink any water), so I suggested he take
us to a restaurant to try a local Bandung dish. On our way to the restaurant, we stopped by one of the
famous buildings in Bandung where he said people always have their picture
taken because of the architecture.
I don’t know what was so special about it, but our driver wanted his
picture taken with us, since we were his first international customers. It was hard to miss the tents and two
stages set up across the street, so we decided we had nothing better to do
except check out the commotion. It
turns out there was a concert, in the one-block area, called The Pink Plop,
which had a tagline of ‘What Woman Wants’. There was a stage on each end with tents of vendors in
between. Danna and Kristina
decided to rollerblade when the walked by the Roller Universe tent, so many
local onlookers were entertained while they both rolled around. Before leaving, we stood by a stage to
catch some of the music. None of
us could hide for long before pictures were being snapped of us watching the
show, but the best part was when Kristina was playing air guitar with one of
the songs. That had also not gone
unnoticed, because the mc of the show ended up talking to her later and asking
where she was from, which drew more attention and pictures to us. We left the Pink Plop around 5:30 in
hopes of getting to a restaurant by 6:00, in hopes that Hendra could break his
fast (when the sun went down) and then join us for dinner. Well, it ended up being all for naught,
because Hendra didn’t want to eat with us anyway, he just drank his bottle of
water, and Danna was the only one hungry enough to eat a real meal (we were
still full of sugar from pineapple and cheesecake).
Later Saturday night, I called my friend Nathan, and we met
up with him and his girlfriend at a local restaurant. They both have been living in Indonesia since January, and
they were very helpful with all of my random questions and concerns before I
moved here. It was fun to get to
know them a little better in person, and they even showed us around their
neighborhood, which is, by the way, located down a long, dark alley surrounded
by rice paddies as you get closer to their house. We sat around their house for a few hours talking about
traveling, teaching, and such.
They offered to show us around a street market on Sunday
morning, and then take us on a hike.
We gladly accepted the guidance, since we were out of ideas for
activities. Kristina was especially
disappointed that there would be no Ram fights on Sunday morning, like usual,
because of the Ramadan holiday.
The hike in the great outdoors was, by far, the highlight of the
weekend, only after the volcanic crater.
31 July
Now, more recently, I have been teaching, teaching, and
teaching some more. Last week was
the first time for the CCA (co-curricular activity) that I’m in charge of. Yes, I’m in charge of the Badminton CCA
each Tuesday. There is one hour
after school for the 3rd and 4th grade students, from
2:00-3:00, and then the 5th and 6th grade students have
their CCA from 3:00-4:00. I don’t
have to do anything like know anything about the sport, thankfully, because
there is a professional coach who comes to the school. I just take attendance, keep kids from
messing around too much, and I even practiced with a few of the students today,
which was fun.
I am a chaperone for a Maths competition on Thursday
afternoon in Jakarta, so another teacher and I will accompany 18 students to
the competition. I lead a few
practice sessions with four 5th grade students, and they definitely
made me feel stupid about most of the math problems they were solving. I could figure them out, usually, but
it just took me twice the time.
Working through a packet full of word problems made my head numb J
I will be flying to Singapore on Friday to get my work visa
taken care of. It has to be done
soon, since my current visa expires soon, and I need my passport returned to me
by mid-August. We leave for Bali
in two weeks!! Yay, vacation soon!
This Saturday, we have a morning of Parent/Teacher Conferences. I’m not sure what to expect for those,
since we just found out about them last week. I’ll let you know how it goes…
Sorry again, for the ridiculous amount of stories at
once. I really need to get better
at this. Also, you can check out
the pictures from Bandung on my facebook wall (Danna tagged me in her
pictures).
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