Instant Culture

A new supermarket opened in Banda Aceh and I went to check it out. There’s only one chain of supermarket operating here and it’s called Pante Pirak (silver beach). The drivers are always confused when I say, “I want to go to Pante Pirak” because there are like 5 Pante Pirak supermarkets and the street the biggest Pante Pirak is on is conveniently called Jalan Pante Pirak. So now, I always have to say, “I want to go to the Pante Pirak near…

Anyway, this new place is pretty big (we’re talking Aceh standards here, not Safeway or Whole Foods standards, but it is bigger than the Soviet Safeway on 17^th and Corcoran, for those of you who live in DC). In the store, there are about 2 aisles designated to mie instan, better known as instant noodle! There are packets and packets in red, green, and glittery packaging. But essentially, it’s all the same stuff - skinny curly noodle with a packet of seasoning and a packet of silicon-whatever to keep it dry (my Dad once mistaken the silicon-whatever as seasoning and mixed it into the soup. The soup became rather gelatinous but he still made me eat it!*)

Back to the mie instan. Indonesians LOVE, and I mean LOVE instant noodle. There’s a guy in my office who eats pretty much only instant noodle, even for breakfast. When driving around, there are many food carts that sell mie goreng (fried noodles), but they make the fried noodle out of packets of instant noodle! I had an interesting discussion with one of my teachers at the language school about the “instant culture” in Indonesia. She confessed that when cooking noodles for her family, instead of adding veggies and meat to regular noodles, she’ll prepare the veggies and meats but add it to packets of instant noodle. Her theory was that Indonesians are obsessed with instant stuff because it’s a status symbol. Another good example is Nescafé. When the archipelago produces some of the world’s best coffee beans, well-to-do people will prefer to drink instant Nescafé.

*Actually we both ate a couple of bites and realized something was wrong and dumped it out. That's what happens when mom leaves us alone for dinner.

Photos from Yogya

I've posted a bunch of photos from my 2 weeks in Yogya.

Enjoy.

Friday Photos

Rebuilding
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The traditional bird market in Yogya. We decided to visit this place before the bird holocaust.
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Old lady going to the market
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dua puluh enam

My coworkers got me a 15-in used TV. I found it on my desk this morning when I arrived at the office. I was pretty surprised as I thought only the Office Manager knew it was my birthday (but I guess it only takes one person to rally the entire office). Now the TV is sitting in my room and my project this weekend is to get it connected somehow and also find a way to plug it in (all my electric plugs are on the other side of the room).

Overall it was a pretty good (Aceh) birthday, went to 3 meetings and delivered some school supplies and sporting equipments to an orphanage, had a nice dinner with a couple of friends and then capped off the night with a good piece of carrot cake and a cappacino from the new coffee shop.

Thanks for all the birthday wishes sent via Amazon, phone, IM, and email. Wish you were here!

HUH?

DC in Yogya? Looks familiar? No sushi or Lillian playing cocktail waitress in this joint.
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Buka Puasa

Got back to Aceh Saturday evening. Was quite disappointed that I wasn’t able to do the midnight climb up Mt. Merapi with my 2 friends from language school because my flight was moved up to 8am. But it may have been a bless in disguise, as I woke up with a pretty bad cold Saturday morning, and later found out that the climb was “the climb from hell,” but the sunrise was suppose to be stunning.

Anyway, it’s still Ramadan (kind of forgot about that being away from Aceh). Sunday night, we went to one of our staff’s house for buka puasa (breaking of the fast, literally meaning opening fast). Tonight we went out to our favorite village – Lamteungoh – for buka puasa. We arrived at the village a little before sunset and chatted a little with the villagers before entering a temporary shelter – made of wooden planks with a tin roof – for dinner. In Achenese fashion, we sat on the ground and ate with our hands. As we ate, the rain and the wind picked up. The house was shaking a bit and the rain made conversing hard. The tin was chiming up a tune as the rain drops started beating down harder and faster. I can’t even imagine living in a place like that day after day for nearly a year.

Most of you know that I don’t believe in ghosts or anything like that. On our way home, we were driving through this field that was a densely populated village. We drove through tall grass that had grown over where houses used to be. Our headlights created strange silhouettes from the tall grass bowing in the wind. It was hard not to feel like I was surrounded by spirits of those taken in such an untimely manner.

What a feast! It's so true when they say, "save for a year and spend it in a month."
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Funnies

Sorry about writing a non-Aceh related posting, but I thought this was extremely funny, especially after spending 2 weeks with 2 Canadians at the language school and always talking about Canada's inferiority complex.

This is an actual radio conversation of a US naval ship with Canadian authorities off the coast of Newfoundland in October 1995. Radio conversation released by the Chief of Naval Operations, 10-10-95.

CANADIANS: Please divert your course 15 degrees to the south to avoid a collision.

AMERICANS: Recommend you divert your course 15 degrees to the north to avoid a collision.

CANADIANS: negative. You will have to divert your course 15 degrees to the south to avoid a collision.

AMERICANS: This is the captain of a US Navy ship. I say again, divert YOUR course.

CANADIANS: No, I say again, you divert YOUR course.

AMERICANS: This is the Aircraft Carrier US ABRAHAM LINCOLN, the second largest ship in the United States Atlantic Fleet. We are accompanied with three Destroyers, three Cruisers and numerous support vessels. I DEMAND that you change your course 15 degrees north. I say again, that’s one-five degrees north, or counter-measures will be undertaken to ensure the safety of this ship.

CANADIANS: This is a lighthouhuse. Your call.

Week in Review - Yogya

I’ve been in Yogya for a little over a week now and have had a fantastic time. Learning has gone very well. My level of vocabulary has increased, but a lot of improvement has been on speaking-feeling more confident-as well as getting a good grasp on grammar. It’s always funny to find out just how little I know about English grammar and grammar in general. What the hell is the different between a transitive verb versus an intransitive verb?!? I will be grammar queen by the time I leave here.

Aside from school, I’ve definitely been making up for lost times-bowling, dining out, shopping, playing tourist. It’s been great.It was a pretty action packed weekend. Friday evening, I went to the ancient Prambana Hindu temple for the Ramayana ballet, depiction of a traditional Indonesian/Hindu story. The entire ballet is separated into 4 episodes and each being about 2 hours. The ballet was held at an open air theater with the silhouette of the ancient temple in the background. Very nice.

Saturday morning, I met a few other students at 7am to go to Borobudur temple. The temple is the largest Buddhist temple in the world and was built in the 700s in the middle of the jungle. It was rediscovered by a Dutch in the early 1900s and since then have been taken apart block by block and rebuilt. It’s a pretty amazing piece of architecture. After touring the temple, we ventured to Hotel Amanjiwo in the hills above the temple. Amanjiwo has 35 individual suites. Some suites have its own swimming pool and most have a gorgeous view of the temple. Prices start at $600/night. We had a nice lunch there and then got the staff to give us a tour of one of the suites. Very nice indeed. We found out that some posh American is renting out the entire hotel for Saturday night. All 35 rooms.

Saturday night was spent dining with fellow students from Australia and England. We debated whether men’s & women’s underwear should be referred to as ‘knickers’, ‘pants’, ‘underpants’, ‘panties’, or by some other name. Then had an intellectual discussion about the proper definition of ‘oatmeal’, ‘porridge’, and ‘muesli’.

Sunday was spent at the Kraton – the home of the Sultan of Yogyakarta. The Sultan is still the mayor of Yogyakarta. He’s the 10^th Sultan. They’re having a little tiff because this Sultan only has 1 wife (the previous one had 5 wives and 41 children) and Sultan-10 only has only daughters. Who will be the next Sultan? Will Yogya have a Sultanese? Not sure if they’re that progressive yet.

Then we walked through the traditional bird market. I wondered if I should stop breathing.

An interesting picture from the Ramayana
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There's a buddha inside each bell shaped stupa. 2 buddha statues are left uncovered.
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Temple from a neighboring hill
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They couldn't figure out where these pieces belonged to when they were rebuliding the temple
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Friday Photos

Bowling Alley in Yogya.

View of Mt. Merapi from my plane to Yogya. I think we're climbing this guy next Saturday.

Who Needs a Tan Anyway?

Most of you who have traveled in Asia (especially you gals out there) know what I'm talking about...

When walking through the cosmetic aisle of the supermarket or mall, you're inundated by whitening products. From lotions that promise whiter skin in 10 days to serums that will whiten and brighten your face. Women in Asia really really want to be as pale as possible. Forget tanning lotion and fake tan in a bottle! When I ask my male Acehnese staff what qualities they look for in a girl, they all say (aside from the other typical stuff) that they want her to be white and pale. Partly because it is a status symbol, women who are whiter are considered to be from a richer family and better educated since they’re not dark and tan from working outdoors.

Anyway, so I was walking around the IGA supermarket in Yogya this afternoon and came across this…

Taking whitening a little too seriously?

Let the Learning Begin!

I arrived in Yogya last night and started my Indonesian course this morning at 8am. The Realia school is in a large converted house, 12 classrooms with a lovely garden in the middle. This week, there are 6 of us. A girl from AusAid (Australian equivalent of USAID), a guy from CIDA (Canadian equivalent of USAID) and his Japanese wife, a Swiss guy who worked for the World Bank but is now working on his phD dissertation, and an Australian Defense guy. The Swiss and the Aus Defense guy are long-termers, one staying for 8 months, the other for 1 year. The rest of us are here for either 1 or 2 weeks. It’s a nice group of people. I’m planning to go out to check out the silver factory with the Aussie girl tomorrow.

Classes begin at 8am and there are 3 classes each day. For each class, I have a new teacher (all classes are 1-on-1). The teachers are really talented at writing upside-down since we sit across from each other and they write new words, definitions and instructions down for me, so they have to write upside-down. It’s pretty neat. I will have 5-6 teachers that will cycle through every 2 days or so, this way, I don’t get tired of looking at the same face day after day and am exposed to different speech styles and accents. Classes are from 8-10, 10:10-12, and 1-3.

I’m staying in a hotel that’s in the middle of town. There’s a shopping mall right next door and some good restaurants around. I’ve discovered this place called Thai Express. I think I’ll be going there for dinner quite often! There’s also supposedly a driving range on the hotel roof, still need to check that out…

Puasa

Puasa means fasting. You hear that word a lot these days.

Ramadan started on October 5 and will end on Hari Raya which is November 4. Muslims-which is like 99% of Aceh-will not consume water, food, and cigarettes (the hardest part for some people) between sunrise and sundown. People get up at around 5 am to eat their morning meal and to pray. My staff have been coming in early and leaving around 4:30 to go buy food and groceries for breaking the daily fast.

This is a pretty harsh month for the restaurant/food stall business. They're closed except for between 4-6pm and some open again from 9-11pm. All stores are closed during the evening praying time which is between 7-9pm.

This is the first Ramadan after the tsunami and my staff have indicated that they've noticed some differences. For one, during 4 and 6pm, the main streets use to be packed with people shopping, now it's much quieter. Another difference is due to the non-Muslim invasion of Aceh, there are a couple of restaurants that remain open all day. That never happened before. But, these restaurants must cover their front windows so other people can not see in. I went out for coffee this afternoon and drank behind a butcher paper covered window.

I'm off to go learn Bahasa in Yogya tomorrow. Should be much more happenin' there since Aceh is about as Muslim as you can get in the Archipelago. I should have a decent Internet connection at the hotel.

Choices

Life ain't bad here in Banda Aceh compared to some places where my friends are living or have lived. I can pretty much fulfill my basic everyday needs. But the thing is, I like having choices, and that's something I don't have much of here.

If you want bread, ok, you can have bread, but only soft, white, pillowy, Wonderbread-like bread. If you want chocolate, ok, you can have chocolate, but either $5 imported Ritter Sport or disgusting local chocolate (so I end up splurging). If you want socks, ok, you can have socks, but only polyester socks with flower designs around the ankle. If you want books, ok, you can have your pick from 20 books, but only books in Indonesian, and most are about Allah. If you want to go to the movies. Sorry. No movie theaters in the province.

Shake Shake Shake!

Earthquake #10

Magnitude? 5.7
Date? Wednesday, 6 October, 15:46:41 local time
Epicenter? 20 miles SSE of Banda Aceh or 5.234°N, 95.481°E
What was I doing? Working at my desk.

Biggest earthquake since I've been here. We ran out of the building but I made 2 mistakes:
1. I ran to the door that was in the next office, when there was a door within 10 feet of me.
2. Grabed my keys instead of my cellphone.

I'm such an amature. Oops!

Time to Put My Learning Hat on

The boss has finally decided. I'm off on Sunday to go to Yogya (short fo Yogyakarta, sounds like Georgia but like Jo-gia) on the island of Java for the next 2 weeks to study Indonesian. For those who are not familiar with Indonesian geography, below's a map of the island of Java. Yogya is known to be the cultural capital of Java, as well as a shopper's haven, with lots of batik, silver, and furniture. Everyone in the office is predicting that I will come back loaded with goodies.
I will be enrolled at Realia. Classes begin at 8am and run through 4pm with a 1 hour break. That's 7 hours a day, 5 days a week, for 2 weeks. I think the classes are mostly individual lessons with field trips to practice with the locals. It's going to be an intensive 2 weeks. I've never learned languages this way before.

For the weekend in between the 2 weeks, I'm planning to go to the 1,500-year-old Borobudur Temple, its built from two million blocks of stone in the form of a massive symmetrical stupa, wrapped around a small hill.

Shake Shake Shake!

Earthquake #9

Magnitude? 5.3
Date? Tuesday, 4 October, 19:23:24 local time
Epicenter? 75 miles W of Banda Aceh or 5.522°N, 94.250°E
What was I doing? Having Meugung dinner with Chris and my friend Minha. Celebrating with Tacos. Mexican Meugung, so appropriate.

Midnight Visitors

Remember those 60 kids who went off to the vocational training program? Well, after being away for 3 months, they're back! They left Riau last night and were suppose to arrive back at our office to be picked up by their families at 7am on Monday, but instead, they showed up at the office just now, 11:15pm on Sunday. 60 of them!

I just spent the last 30 minutes locking away computers and offices and moving chairs and table in order to accommodate 60 kids on our office floor.

I'm anxious to see how much damage they will do to the office...

UPDATE (Oct 4):

We had a ceremony at 8am where we handed out certificates and then loaded them onto pick-up trucks and sent them back to their villages. The office was pretty dusty and kind of smelly. But after a thorough cleaning, the only long term damage was a missing stapler.

Making Headlines

It all started with the government hiking fuel prices. For the past 40 years, the Government has pursued a policy of making sure that Indonesians have access to cheap gasoline. But as the global oil market reaches record highs, this approach has pushed the government to the brink of fiscal crisis. The government is paying more than $1 billion a month in fuel subsidies through the state-run oil company, in order to maintain $1/gallon. Currently fuel subsidies account for a third of the federal budget. As of yesterday, the national price for gasoline went up 87% and price diesel doubled and kerosene tripled. This have fueled multiple protests across the archipelago.

Then there are the disease. Bird Flu and Dengue Fever. Bird Flu is making headline news these days with the UN/WHO predicting for a pandamic that may kill upward of 150m people worldwide. Indonesia is at the center of attention because the most recent fatal cases have been in Jakarta. There are also many many traditional markets where live birds and chicken are sold. The sanitation standards at these markets are pretty horrid and could act as a potential breeding ground for the disease.

The case of Dengue Fever has doubled and tripled in Singapore and Malaysia. With the proximity of these countries, Indonesia could be next. This guy I know at the UN just went home to Italy yesterday to recover from the Dengue.

Unless you've been living in a hole, you've surely heard about the latest bombing in Bali. The Australian government has issued a travel warning for Australians traveling to Indonesia. I'm sure the US State Department will be issuing their warning soon. It'll probably say something like this: Department of State continues to warn U.S. citizens to defer all non-essential travel to the country...terrorist threat in Indonesia remains high...Americans should avoid Aceh...

Then there's the Aceh Peace Accord. That'll merit its own blog entry. Maybe later this week. Stay tuned.

As for personal headlines:

1. As of October 1, I have been in Aceh for 4 months.
2. Congratulations to Karim and Kristi, they're getting married today!
3. Go Bears, they're 5-0.