Followup Pictures

Julie driving Buzz.

A good day for a walk.

Out for dinner with our house helpers family and Stephanie

I should have stayed out of the picture as this broke the camera, okay maybe not really :). 

The keys are going to have to hidden better from now on :).

?

Buzz's older bro getting it's morning workout.

The rest of the pictures are from my couple adventures up the mountain last weekend.

The house is maybe 20 feet in front of me and I think my feet are roughly the same elevation

Looking down at the valley full of rice fields.

 

Soon to be a banana tree grove I think.

This is where I started the bike in 1st gear.

Berita Dari Jauh (News from afar)

Good morning.  I've been struggling with what to write about these past few days as I know we are pass due on getting something posted again.  Some of the difficulty I think lies in the fact that things have started to normalize a bit more making our daily life just a normal routine, even thou things are still vastly different from that of back home.  That and we haven't been doing a very good job at taking pictures lately, sorry.

Probably one of the more news worthy things in the last couple days is Julie has started to drive a lot more on her own meaning we were having to share "Buzz".  When it comes to vehicles I'll be honest I like a little child that doesn't what to share his favorite toy.  So for the last couple weeks we have been looking around a little and discussing whether another set of wheels would be a prudent purchase or not.  Couple of the exciting things that help make our discussion is well Julie can drive now fairly well and to go anywhere as a family is two trips.  Also I'm finishing up unit 3 now in language school and typically from what we've heard unit 4 is in the afternoon which means I could no longer pick the kids up from school.  And know that we have one set of wheels the thought of going back to walking just was going to be a hard pill to swallow.  Well maybe not that bad but any way I started to look at some other new bikes as I was wanting something with bigger tires and more clearance as I've heard that the roads in Papua are more suited for an off road style of bike.  That is probably my only complaint with "Buzz" is the low clearance.  When we are fully loaded with 3-4 of us on the back of "Buzz" I usually have to almost stop and stand up and walk over speed bumps to keep from dragging bottom.  Opps I digressed again anyway to shorten the story, a friend of ours here in Salatiga that helped us with our first purchase "Buzz" had a family member selling a used bike.  It wasn't what I was originally wanting because it was on the small side only 125CC but after we saw it and heard the price we felt that I could learn to live with less power.  We haven't name this one yet but probably will, as we had fun naming "Buzz".

This pass weekend was also filled with some fun adventure mainly for just me.  Saturday morning I had the hankering for an explorational bike ride.  So I start out towards Solo from home and made it about 30kms down the road to about Boyolali I think.  It's hard to tell here when one town stops and the next starts.  Its was here the the thought came to me to try and find the geocache that Isaac and I tried to find a while back.  So I turned around and head back to the place where Isaac and I had abandoned our search.  So about 30-45 mins later I arrived close to the spot.  Traffic is slow here and when there is no traffic the roads or streets are small and full of speed bumps so 50km/hr is fast here.  The streets were getting very narrow at this point and very steep.  So it was time to park "Buzz" and set out on foot.  I started by just pulling of the side of the road and parking but some locals that were working on a roof of a mosque nearby insisted that I park closer to where they were working so I did, which is a good thing but I'll get to why later.  The Javanese people are very social people they like to visit, which means that they really appreciate if you briefly stop and greet them, they usually ask where your going.  In this case I was just out for a walk. probably about 20 mins into the hike during one of these brief conversations I thought maybe I should ask the name of the mountain I was hiking up. It seemed that this hike to the top of the mountain was taking longer than the description for the geocache.  And low and behold I was on the wrong mountain.  The mountain with the geocache was the next one over.  Things were starting to make sense now why I was getting conflicting info from my GPS.  Well I'm already a good ways up the mountain I mite as well keep going. It wasn't to far after that I came across a road again.  I'd been hiking on a trail/street for a while by this time.  As I'm hiking up the road I pass a few people working along side the road and a few caring their work on their backs up/or down the hill.  I eventually caught up to 3 men walking the same direction so I walked with them for a while and visited sort of.  They talked fast and so I didn't catch a lot of what was said oh well.  Eventually a truck came along and they all jumped in.  I could have too but I was already a long ways away from "Buzz" and I had no idea how far they were going.  Then after a quick call home to see how things were  Julie express her desire for me to return so she could have a turn driving "Buzz".  So down the mountain I went.  Things look different going down.  I was doing pretty good up until the just before the house I made the discovery of being on the wrong mountain.  Things didn't look quite right so I went a little further taking the slightly wider path to the left.  Rounding the next corner I knew I had made a wrong turn but where, Ahh!!  And as usual the people standing outside their house asked where I was going.  But this time okay I know I'm a little lost how am I going to ask for directions.  So in my broken Indonesian I was able to describe that I wanted to go to a mosque nearby that was getting a new roof.  I'm so glad I parked there now, made for a great point of reference.  So then the gentlemen kindly walked me back up the hill maybe 200 yards or less to where I had made my wrong turn, wah now things looked familiar again.  I made back to "Buzz" and headed for home.  It was a lot fun.  Then yesterday on the new bike I went back to find the road that I hiked on because according to the Google maps the road circles through and around  both mountains.  This time I didn't have to ask for directions but I did stop and pull my phone out once in a while to see how lost I was getting myself this time.  It was a beautiful ride I would love to take Julie or one of the kids along but I'm scared with the sharp corners and the incredibly steep grades that it might not be a good idea for a while.  To illustrate the some of the steepness of the grades.  It was after stopping briefly to take some pictures I was able to start the bike back up letting roll a few feet down the hill in 1st gear and it started.  Typically a start like that you need to be in the 5th or 4th gear.  Maybe next weekend I'll try getting lost somewhere else or maybe try and find the road from the other direction.

Another news note worthy item probably, one that is old news already but I think we have failed to communicate to most people is we have had a house guest now for just about 2 months.  Her name is Stephanie, she is a retired school teacher that has come to Indonesia to teach English and music at a school in Papua that helps tribal kids transition from the bush to life in the classroom and then on to higher learning.  She will be staying for us for another month yet while she completes one more unit of language.  She is hoping to finish the first 3 units before heading to her assignment for the start of January's semester.  We have enjoyed having an adopted grand-mom for the kids.  They have enjoyed having Aunt Stephanie live with us.  It has also allowed Julie and I to slip away for time together and running errands around town.  Our family has grown in away since coming here, but it's soon to shrink again with Stephanie moving to Papua next month and us moving across town leaving Tina (dog) behind as the owners return to claim their house and dog back.  Speaking of which this up and coming move has been a dark burden on me not sure why really.  I ask for prayer in this matter that my heart is softened to the move, it has also driven a wedge between Julie and I a bit.  I should maybe close out this blog post here as it is starting to get long.

Blessings
Greg

Getting to know the Neighbors

Greetings again from the tropics.  Below are a series of pictures that we have taken since our last post.  Things have been very "sibuk" busy.  As a family we have been to an 88th birthday party for a lady that attends our church. This was an exciting opportunity to learn a little culture (the kid's weren't too thrilled) but I felt it a pretty big honor to be invited.  However, I think that it was also an honor to the family that we came, not to sure about that yet?  

Along with the invitation to the birthday party I had the privilege of going with our neighbor to a daily prayer gathering.  I won't get into to much detail however it made me think of what the early church in Acts might have looked like.  The gathering started around 7:30 a.m.with prayer and the occasional song thrown in.  This lasted for about 1.5 hr and in the middle of this snacks and teh (tea) were served, it's starting to happen that I throw out and Indonesian word or two now without even thinking about it.  That might be a good sign that the language is starting to take root.  After that we shared communion, then read a large portion of scripture, everyone shared a pengalaman "experience" from what we read from or another experience they may have had recently about God.  I hope you don't mind me mixing my Bahasa's, it feels a little strange right now as some words are coming easier in Indonesian then the English right now.  Any way back to the prayer meeting, so as I'm watching and listening to the ladies on the other side of the room one by one give a pengalaman I'm thinking oh boy if this keeps going the way it's going my turn is coming.  Not to mention that one of the ladies right across from me that I had met at our neighbors house a few weeks back was trying to communicate something to me which I wasn't quite tracking with except that it probably had to do with they were going to want me to share too.  Earlier they made sure I got a turn to pray as well which I did my best mixing my languages together doing as much in Indonesian as I could then switching to English when I got stuck switching back and forth.  Thankfully they didn't expect me to give a three point sermon on what we had read earlier as they allowed me to just introduce myself and talk a little about my family.  Which fortunately we had covered in unit one of school.  After all the sharing we ate lunch together and then went home.  Because of my long windiness a couple things to point out in summary from this experience.  We sat in old Mennonite fashion ladies one one side and the men on the other.  The gathering started at 7:30 a.m. and yes we ate lunch together which means we finished around 12:30.  And the part that shocked me the most is they do this 6 days a week.  Wow!! Amazing to see the commitment and passion they have for corporate worship and communion.  Sorry got way more detailed than I was going to get but hey it was a great experience I look forward to when I can join them again for a morning or two during our next break from school.

The next high light involves the same neighbors, in fact most the pictures involve them in some way or another if not directly.  Sunday afternoon before I started my most recently language unit.  Our neighbors guided us up to Kopeng a small town about 20-30 min. scooter ride up the hill from Salatiga.  The ducks and green pumpkins were Jaclynn's high lights from the trip I think oh ya and the ride on the horse, not sure how we forgot to take of picture of that but we did.  The horses are a little smaller here.  We joked in class Monday morning that if I had taken a ride the horse would have become a 6 legged horse :).  The family had a green house for flowers I'm thinking my mom would have enjoyed this trip seeing all the flowers.

Our neighbor loves Jaclynn and so far Jaclynn has been a little hesitant but she is slowly warming up to them.  Hopefully they don't take offence in the meantime.

The boys missed out on a great trip.  Still not sure where to fit the 5th person on the back of Buzz yet?

 The extended family of our neighbors living in Kopeng.

Last Saturday the neighbors came over again and they helped harvest some coconuts. Brave young man!!! I will say thou that my taste buds are corrupt.  I still enjoyed the fresh coconut but I will be honest and say that I prefer the old ones that fall from the tree.  Maybe over time I'll readjust my taste buds.  

Not really sure how tall the tree is but its up there.

Franklin Playing soccer with some local kids.  It was nice to watch him enjoy playing with others.  He has gone back a few times now on his own.  Hopefully, through this he will find some friends and maybe start learning some language.

Minggu Libur

Yep week off from school, for the whole family almost.  Julie still has her tutor coming in a couple times this week and Franklin is working on some work left over from last week.  So far we gone swimming a couple times at one of our favorite spots.  Isaac and I tried but failed to find a geocache nearby, we'll blame the equipment.  I forgot to turn on the data service on my phone and didn't have the info downloaded for offline search.  Next time I will be ready either-way data or no data connection. Maybe tomorrow or the next day we try again.  Today we also watch the locals sacrifice and butcher some sapi (cattle), we missed the kambing (goats) they did them earlier in the day.  Yes you did read that correctly today was Eid al-Adha.  I think if I understand things somewhat those that can donate a goat or a cow and then they kill it and cut it up and divide the meat up for the poor in the community.  And you can't have a party with a lot of extra singing from the mosque.  Last night they had some technical difficulties with their loud speaker at our neighborhood mosque so we got relief a little sooner then some in town.  Tomorrow we should be back to the basic calls to prayer.

I also had a couple small victories today in the language department.  I was able to navigate ordering a karangam bunga (bouquet of flowers) for Julie in Indonesia.  I also was able to buy some sekrup (screws) from a local hardware store.  I did have to use a picture for the bracket I also needed for the chalkboard but the fact that I was able to request screws and get what I was looking for pretty much was exciting.  Then to top off the day we all went to Stasiun Susu for milkshakes and crepes.

The rest of the week should be filled with some-other exciting times as well. We have an invitation to a fellowship dinner thing Thursday evening and then Friday we have an invite to an 88th birthday party of a friend's grandmother.  We hope to hit the pool one more time, get Julie some naik sepeda motor time.  She wants to give driving the scooter a try in a local soccer field.  Traffic works pretty good here however it is very different from home, most of the rules are more like guide lines rather than hard and fast rules.  And if time allows maybe some more touring around the area after I get the oil changed.  Ya wow 500km already on the scooter and that is when they recommended the first oil change.  Maybe tomorrow I will try and navigate requesting an oil change for the scooter.

 The first few pictures are from the swimming pool mentioned above.  After all the pictures of the kids swimming is the family well most of the family heading out on the scooter to Stasium Susu.  I haven't figured out where to fit Julie yet?  We really need to get Julie driving and comfortable with the traffic here so we can lighten the load for Buzz (Jaclynn's name for our scooter).  Down the road we plan on purchasing a second set of wheels and then Buzz will become Julie's ride.  The last two fotos are from Isaac and my attempt to locate our first geocache.  The pictures don't really do it justice but we are climbing a small mountain call Gunung Gajah (sleeping elephant).  I would have to guess that the grade was similar to that of a 12/12 pitch roof (45degrees).   It was only a couple hundred feet into the climb and Isaac was telling me how tired he was and he didn't think he could make it.  We did give a few people some humor, I'm not sure what exactly they thought was funny?  But something about two white people out of place walking past their house was funny?  Maybe someday I will understand but for now I greet and smile back and hope I don't have food all over my face.

PS:  I thought the milkshake was a good end of a good day.  I was wrong what is even better is having neighbors over for a visit for the first time and breaking out in song and then closing our time in prayer. Wow it's amazing to see diversity brought together in unity.

More Front Yard/Side Yard Wildlife Sightings

This morning Isaac found a nice surprise in our yard.  Between the back side of our house and our fence we have a narrow path and on it Isaac discovered this nice looking beast.

Yes I think it's a tarantula.  Yikes!  Fortunately it was dead just like all the recent scorpions that we keep finding.  It's been a week or so since we've seen any more scorpions.  I have lost count but I think we were up to 5 or maybe 6 scorpions?  So far though God has been taking good care of us as they have all been dead.  And I have no idea why?

On the more friendly side of wildlife I saw this next guy trying to climb our front fence the other day.  These creatures seem pretty cool and are fast bright green with a brownish black tail that is longer then the rest of him.  I don't know what it's proper name is.

And this last picture is of another cool creature again I don't know it's proper name.  It is hard to see as he matched the tree pretty good.  I tried several times taking pictures of him.  He had a bright light blue neck fin thing that he would flare out.  But my timing was off and I just got a lot of pictures the same.

Micky D's

Well I never thought I would say that I enjoyed eating 3 nights in a row at McDonald's for supper but I did.  Our family along with 2 other families had to venture to Jakarta for a couple days to renew our passports.  Yep it's been almost 60 days already in country and our temporary visas came due.  Couple of the big high lights beside eating at McDonald's was having A/C in the hotel rooms and for Julie best of all they were ant free.  As well the kids loved eating at McDonald and in all honesty I enjoyed it too.  The passport renewal procedure was pretty painless as we had an amazing MAF team there that help us go through the process.  We also navigated taxi rides, shopping malls, airports with using our new basic language skills and managed to accomplish our goals and return safely home.  Some of the surprises or down sides of  the trip was that we had four twin beds in two different rooms for our family so we were short a bed.  Julie was the hero and shared a bed with Jaclynn.  The city was crazy busy for this Canadian farm boy.  But I guess when you are in a city with possibly more people than all of Canada things will be busy and crowded.  I was glad to get back to Salatiga where life moves a little slower.

I wish we were better with the camera as we saw so much and took so little pictures sorry.

Okay this wasn't Jakarta but it was our first care package from home :)

One of our rooms in Jakarta.

View from our window.

Cattle hauler Indonesian style.

 Basicly it was a small pickup truck with some side rails and they tied the cattle in place.  Saw a couple that were a bit bigger and had four cows in those ones.  This one only had 2.

Enjoying Pizza Hut for Lunch.

On the scooter side of things I can hardly believe that in essentially 5 days of driving we put just over a 100kms on it already wow.  My feet are very thankful for the wheels.

New Found Freedom of Sorts

Well it finally worked out to buy a set of wheels.  When we set out from Canada we're hoping to manage without.  But we soon discovered that we were just to far away from somethings, mainly school.  To purchase a bike it's not quite as straight forward as back home either.  We still don't have the correct visa for the long term, which also means that we can't own property like vehicles, houses and the like.  So we got help from a good friend of MAF (local of Salatiga) that was willing to put the bike in his name for the time being.  I wish I thought of taking a picture of the odometer sooner but I didn't think of it till 10kms in, as we likely won't have another one is with only 1.3kms.  Currently we can't go to far from home as we don't have plates for it yet but we still managed to put 40+kms in a day and a half.  I think we should get some better gas mileage as well.  It only holds 3.6L from what I gathered from the owners manual which came in one language and it wasn't English :).  And with a liter of bensin ranging from $0.55-$0.70/liter roughly I'm thinking our gas budget will be a little lower here which will be nice.  Multipule trips will however be in order as 5 large Canadians just don't quite fit on a Vario like 5 Indonesians would.