Checking in from Jogja

4 nights in Bali, 3 nights in Jogja, 1 allergy attack on the beach, one 5 day dose of Cipro, 7 mornings of incredible breakfast buffets and lots and lots of rice fields. That is the short story. Mom and Dad Cohen are here and, despite one of them who shall remain nameless spending a couple days face down on a beach chair in Bali, we are all doing great. Bali is always a nice way to kick off a holiday with lots of fresh grilled fish and walks on sandy beaches (and yes more monkeys.)

Jogja has been a welcome change to the city life of Jakarta. The air is breathable, we have been eating well (fresh veggies are such a treat!!), and the one who shall remain nameless is back with a vengeance, eating again and not running to every available western toilet. We spent a day and a half wandering the city and then today rented a car and wonderful driver for a trip to Borobudur. Mom was "like a pig in the proverbial" today as we wandered through small villages and then the markets searching for the perfect gifts for everyone on their very long list. (Don't worry she did well!)

Pictures and better descriptions soon to come, but we wanted to check in, let you know we are all doing well, having fun and Howie and I will be sad to have our company leave and go back to our regular lives.....

Lots more photos at http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva/BaliJogjaTrip

Midas' magic touch

We had one of those weird “I thought I was starting to understand this place but I guess not” moments this weekend that I had to share. I am sorry no pictures accompany this post, but use your imagination, it will be fun.

This weekend was pretty low key in the grand scheme of things. We were in Jakarta and spent most of the weekend playing Settlers and Carcasonne (another game like Settlers that has take the Ultimate group by storm.) Before settling into board games and margaritas, at the suggestion of our friends Drew, Melanie and the recommendation of the Jakarta Javakini (source of all things cool in Jakarta) we decided to check out Midas, the “Magic Restaurant”. Supposedly Midas has magicians that come to your table and do tricks while you wait for your meal. Although something a 10 year old might like, since we were about to play board games and we would be coming from the local putt putt, it seemed appropriate. I think we were all expecting a bunch of birthday parties and cheesy pulling quarters out from behind ears and we were all interested in seeing the menu items supposedly named cleverly using magic trick names and famous magicians.

So, first off the bat, the place is clearly not meant for kids. I would describe the atmosphere as swanky. Everything is draped in red and it feels very NYC lounge style bar. Seated inside, it was just our table of 6 and another table of about 10 women clearly celebrating something. We ordered some apps and asked the waitress for the “orang magic” (magic person) who arrived right with the apps. (Hence making apps hard to eat, but we let that go.) He did a couple card tricks and it was cute and all, but that turned out to be the end of the magic. Food was fine, a bit on the pricey side, although that is what you get when you order things with (not so) clever magic trick names. As we were finishing up, we were remarking on the disappointing amount of magic. Suddenly there was a shrill whistle. Excited for more magic we look around…Where is the magician? Will he appear in a puff of smoke? Nope. But something did appear - from a secret spot behind the bar appeared a pretty close to naked woman who proceeded to dance on the bar….somewhat provocatively I might add. And there were 4 of them. Each taking their turn strutting their stuff on the bar, twirling on the pole….how had we missed that stripper pole at the end of the bar? All I can say is it was weird. Don’t get me wrong, the men did not mind, but even they seemed thrown off. It was all just so unexpected and out of place…

Perhaps the definition of magic got lost in translation somewhere? Or maybe after we left on of those women was sawed in half? I am guessing not…but maybe….

Frisbee and Fashion in Bali

Just wanted to report that a good time was had by all last weekend in Bali. My frisbee team finished 3rd our to 6 teams, behind teams from Singapore and Vietnam, but ahead of another team from Singapore, a team from Guam and another team from Jakarta. We played 7 games in two days and followed that up with a night or partying and a day on the beach. Needless to say, it's been a long week at work for both of us.

At the after-party we got to try out our fashions from last months fashion show in the real world, if you can call Bali that. 20 of us dressed in 'native' fashions walking down the street was quite a scene. Good stuff.

For more laughs... click here.

Howie's New Career

Sorry we've been such lazy bloggers lately. When that happens it is usually a sign of either our super-busy exciting lives that don't leave us time to blog or our boring lives that don't involve anything to blog about. This time it is the prior. Haviva's been doing a lot of traveling for work and I've been teaching at a new school that recently opened up here and is run by a friend of mine.

As you'll see from the photo, I've also started a new career as a fashion model. No, not really. One of the guys I play frisbee with is a fashion designer and he puts on an annual fashion show to help raise money for our frisbee tournament in Bali, which is this coming weekend. This year I was lucky enough to be a model. The photos scared my mother, but if you are interested (and I don't see how you couldn't be), more of them can be found here.

A successful second attempt

Sorry we have not updated in a while, I am not sure where this week went, but somehow it is almost over.

We spent last weekend in Pelabuhan Ratu. If the name sound familiar it is because it is the same beach we went to over New Years, where it rained for 3 days straight. Not sure why we tempted fate again, but this time we went with a group of people and came armed with Scrabble and Settlers. (A board game we were introduced to here by friends of ours from Howie’s Ultimate team and are now addicted to.) We also went in a bit more “style” this time, using a car and driver and staying at a private villa right on the beach complete with a maid to clean up the beer bottles after us. Really stunning place.

It was a pretty laid back, up for anything group so there was lots of eating of fresh fish, drinking Bintang and just hanging out. On the way down we stopped about 13 K outside Pelabuhan Ratu and white water rafted the rest of the way. The guides did most of the paddling and worked hard to ram us into as many rocks as possible, just to keep things interesting. Howie, who has been rafting before and claims to always be disappointed in the adventure, reports this to have been a good rafting trip with decent rapids. If nothing else, the view was stunning all the way, complete with giant sun bathing lizards, people fishing, naked kids playing in the water and quaint villages.

The one fault in Pelabuhan Ratu might be the constant waiting for food. At one lunch we asked what the best fish was to get and the reply was, “Well, whatever you order I will have to go out and buy,” which should give you some indication of the speediness of that meal. All tallied, we waited 6 hours for meals one of the days – 2 hours for breakfast (please keep in mind here that we all ordered the oh so complicated American breakfast that includes 2 eggs, hash browns, toast, coffee and juice), 1 ½ for lunch and a whopping 3 for dinner. Dinner we should have just walked out on – the food stank. Luckily everyone was is good spirits and we had cards. Had Howie and I been alone for that we might have killed each other.

The beach itself was perfect. The water was clean, the temperature of bath water and there were just the right waves for frolicking around and not getting sucked into the ocean (although I might have lost my bathing suit a couple times…) It only rained one day (but that was the day we spent waiting to eat) and I got a re-enforcement of my tan without burning, which always makes me happy. It was a great long weekend and we are already planning another trip down – perfect ocean, gorgeous house, good food only 4 hours away. It would just be silly not to.

Organic veggies come with pets in Indonesia!

Last week we signed up to have veggies home delivered from an organic farm an hour or two away (near where I went paragliding, actually). We get an SMS (text message on my phone - everything here is done by text message) each Monday with the available veg and can either order specific stuff or just ask for a grab bag, which is what we'll do unless we start wasting too much stuff. Not only has the veg been really good, but it's for a good cause - the farm takes street kids from Jakarta, houses them, educates them and teaches them how to grow crops.

Last week we received a big bag full of lettuce, fresh peanuts, basil, mint and scallions, plus a special bonus - a big snail which I promptly put into the turtle tank and named Norman. Seemed like a fine idea at the time. Norman, Ernie and Burt lived happily together for a few days but it turns out our little pals are carnivores and they were just feeling out Norman to see if he'd fight back when they tried to eat him. Who knew? Norman had quite a scare and lost a little bit of his hindquarters (and maybe an ear), but I was able to yank him out of there before too much damage was done.

I'm happy to report that after a few days Norman is back to full health. It was touch and go there for a little while, but last night he crawled down from the roof of his new home and ate some broccoli greens, so we're ready to officially declare him a member of the family.

This coming weekend is a long one, so we're heading back to the beach we went to for New Years with some friends. Let's hope we have better weather this time. The rainy season is nearing its end, so we might.

Soundshine '07

Saturday afternoon we attended the Soundshine ’07 festival at the Nikko Hotel downtown. We had only a vague idea of what it was going to be when we signed up – a music festival with 4 bands: 2 Indonesian Indie Rock bands, 1 Swedish band called Club 8 and a Norwegian singer/songwriter named Sondre Lerche (who we discovered has the #1 album on WERS in Boston right now). That much seemed like our thing so, despite the high ticket cost by Indonesian standards (and even US standards, really) we could not pass it up.


Outside of knowing the bands involved, we really had no idea what were getting into. The hotel is quite a swanky one, but the entrance to the venue itself (or standard hotel ballroom as it turned out to be) was through the parking lot. Once on the top level the parking area had been converted into the Dunhill Lounge. For those of you not up on trendy, expensive cigarettes, that is what Dunhill makes. The lounge was swanky with couches and little coffee tables complete with Ikea looking ashtrays and Dunhill brand extra long matches for the taking. There were Dunhill girls walking around selling cigarettes (they confiscated all the cigarettes that were not Dunhill upon entry) and a small array of snack stands including pizza cones (pizza dough shaped into a cone and filled with what seemed to be mostly cheese, but a neat idea) and Cinnabuns. Any other crowd would have been drunk and/or stoned and really enjoyed it, but this crowd was pretty focused on the cigarettes. There was little alcohol around, outside of some terrible vodka drink they could not even give away.

The most shocking thing about this event was the lack of foreigners. It was definitely the hispster neuvo rich with a spattering of expats, but really not more than that. And the locals were certainly into the music. It was fantastic to look around and see everyone singing along in English with Club 8 and Sondre Lerche. They could not have been more excited. It seems that MySpace contributed to the popularity – both foreign bands thanked their MySpace fans for helping them come to Indonesia and both Club 8 and Sondre Lerche seemed a little shocked at the amount of love that was in the room. It was, for lack of a better term, a powerful vibe. (And not one influenced by drugs or alcohol making it feel all that more genuine and fabulous.) We really had a great time and we highly recommend both of the foreign bands, especially Sondre Lerche.

Haviva Feeding the Residents in the Monkey Forest

Ahhhhhh Bali

Sadly I write this entry from our couch in Jakarta. After a weekend in Bali, reality of city and work life, can only be talked about with a hint of sadness. We now know what life could be like and it only took a few minutes to miss it.

When we arrived in Bali Thursday night it was pouring and we really thought the curse of our last beach weekend had followed us. Luckily it had not and although it was a little overcast, I still managed a nice tan, Howie (despite spending all his time under the umbrella) has some bright red legs, there was snorkeling, beach side reading, swimming in the amazingly calm waters outside our hotel, a few hours on a motorbike to see a cliff-side temple and quite a few dunks in the pool. We enjoyed delicious fresh seafood (that had been appropriately bathed in Balinese spices and then perfectly grilled) right on the beach with the water lapping almost at our toes.

We milked the 4 days for all they were worth and even managed to make it to Ubud - the hippy/artsy community in the hills of Bali known for wonderful shopping, great food and the monkey forest. Yes, more monkeys and these were very up close and personal hanging out around temples. Semi- wild these guys were definitely here first, but stay for the tourists bearing bananas and rambutans. Loads of fun.

If we have not made you too jealous, you can take a look at our pics here.

Off to Bali for the weekend, but before we go...

Yesterday was Haviva's birthday. We celebrated with humus, falafel and shisha at the fancy Lebanese restaurant near our apartment. On top of a birthday trip to Bali she also got a purple Buddha painting that had caught her eye at the local 'pop art' shop.

This hasn't been a terribly eventful week. Mostly we've been counting the days until our 4 night weekend in Bali which starts tonight. In one of Haviva's favorite moments of the week she convinced me to eat a deep fried item that ended up being brain. I took one big bite and was pretty sure that was what it was. Looked just like you'd expect a deep fried hunk of brain to look. Tasted a bit like a hard boiled egg. No idea what variety of brain it was - the bill just said 'otak', which means brain.

Have you seen the story in the news about the baby orangutans and baby tigers that are friends (here)? That's not the zoo we visited, but the 'safari park' that is about an hour from here. We're hoping to get there some time. Nice to see some happy news coming out of Indonesia once in a while.

A little Schmutzer on the weekend

This weekend Howie and I went to visit the Schmutzer Primate Center inside the Jakarta zoo. The zoo itself costs about 50 cents and the animals in it seem to be treated that valuably. There are chained elephants available for riding just to give you an example. We did not spend any time in the zoo itself, except to walk to the Schmutzer center. The Schmutzer Center is the complete opposite of the zoo in care and only costs an extra 50 cents to enter. Only housing monkeys (and maybe a loris but we only saw pictures of that) it is pristine. The habitats are large and clearly well made with the animal's best interest involved. They even check you bags for food before you go in and there are no snacks for sale once inside. They took away our water, marking it neatly with Howie's name and returning it to us on our way out.

And the monkeys, wow. we spent most of our time in the orangutan habitat watching the mother and new baby you see below. Although the video is short, I think we spent about 30 minutes there. The other monkeys were pretty amazing too - swinging around and showing off for us clearly used to being on show, but not bothered enough to stop grooming each other. While we are not fans of most zoos and we actually made a point of saying we were not going to go to the one here, the Schmutzer Primate Center is well worth the visit and pictures of swinging monkeys will make us smile for some time to come.

More photos here.

A breath of fresh air

The beginning of this week was pleasantly spent in from Jakarta (less than that if youSukabumi - a small town about 3 hours have a crazy driver who weaves in and out of lanes at about 100 miles an hour.) I had a training for local teachers and Howie decided to come along for the ride. I was trying to convince him to go to the cheese factory I read about, but Howie was more in for the cool mountain and air and a break from city life. And a break from city life it was! A small town nestled in the mountains, the air is a bit cleaner, the sidewalks are actually walkable, and it is cool. (There were several moments when we regretted not bringing any warm clothing and for the first time in a long time, we slept without AC.)

Although I did not see too much of Sukabumi (I really worked those trainees to the bone!) what I did see, I have to say, gave me the warm fuzzies about Indonesia. While it might seem like a gross generalization the people are incredibly sweet. They do not see foreigners often and yet I did not feel harassed when I walked down the street. I went to real local holes in the wall for lunch with the trainees (I mean real local joints where I thought to myself "Well, what is ruder - telling these people I do not want to eat with them or vomiting during training??" I chose the risk of vomit) where I ate delicious food, for less than 50 cents (you heard me, a whole meal for less than 50 cents!!) and was not looked at like that freaky foreigner. Did I mention it was delicious?? It was an absolute pleasure. We were even able to walk around town a bit in the evening - something you just cannot do comfortably in Jakarta. (Jakarta is notorious for not being a walking city.)

Howie did get to see the sights a bit traveling like the locals, there are no taxis in Sukabumi so it is either little minibuses or motorcycles, to a lake, a tea plantation and some small hill town he is not sure the name of. The most fun part for Howie was the multicolored minibuses ranking Sukabumi highest in city organization.

Charming little place that Sukabumi.

Happy Chinese New Year!

Chinese New Year was made a national holiday in Indonesia a few years ago, in part to improve strained relations between ethnic Indonesians and Chinese-Indonesians. There's a large Chinese community here in Jakarta and there are celebrations planned all over the city.

What makes this particularly interesting this year is that the new year is the Year of the Pig - kind of a tough one for the pork-free Muslim government to celebrate. They just issued a set of 12 commemorative stamps celebrating the holiday and managed to leave off the pig.

We celebrated by going out for dim sum. We were hoping for a big bustling restaurant filled with Chinese people, but the place we went on the recommendation of a co-worker of Haviva's was empty. At least the dim sum was delicious, with the exception of the pictured dish, which was called "Salad Spring Roll". I assumed that meant they were some form of vegetarian spring roll. I guess that was the case, but the filling was a bit of a surprise - mayonnaise mixed with fruit salad.

Water gone, smelly mud left

On Sunday I went back to the area near our apartment that Haviva and I visited during the flooding. The flood waters are mostly gone but they've left a nasty mixture of mud, sewage and trash that coats pretty much everything. The cleanup has started and people are slowly moving back in, but it's going to be a while before things are close to normal. The kids we play frisbee with took me to their school, which had been almost completely submerged and it's hard to see them being able to use it any time soon.

Follow this link if you want to see more pics. They're in a folder together with the ones taken during the flooding so scroll down to see the new ones. http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva/JakartaFlooding

For those who are concerned about us, please don't be. We're fine. To be honest, we could go about our daily lives without ever seeing the effects of the flood if we didn't go looking for them. We're taking the usual precautions - we washed our hands often and didn't drink the water before the flood and that hasn't changed.

Indonesia 1 The Maldives 0

I'm sure it was headline news around the world but, in case you missed it, Indonesia defeated the soccer powerhouse Maldives 1-0 in a 2008 Olympics qualifier the other day and I was there to witness it (along with 7 or 8 other people). It was held in the giant stadium near the city center and the small crowd made a surprising amount of noise. Indonesia dominated the game, but only eeked out the win with a last minute goal.

Update on the flooding

Still no sign of flooding in our immediate neighborhood, but just a mile or so down the road is some of the worst flooding in the city. Frisbee practice was canceled on Sunday due to the flooding, so we donated what we would have paid for the field rental to victims of the flooding in a neighborhood where a lot of the kids we play frisbee with are from. In the afternoon Haviva and I went with one of the frisbee organizers to deliver some medical supplies and food that he had bought with the money.

The video is from a high spot on Jalan Casablanca, the road we live on. Our building is the one poking up from the trees with the funny looking roof. In the other direction is a low area called Kampung Melayu that is completely filled with water. We toured the area with one of the locals that we play frisbee with. Pictures can be found here:
http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva/JakartaFlooding

The government is now reporting that the flooding has left some 400,000 people homeless. We were told that the area we visited would take about 3 days to drain and a couple of weeks to clean before people could move back into their homes, but forecasters are saying that they expect heavy rains over the next two weeks so it may get worse before it gets better. Many people displaced by the flooding are staying in shelters set up in mosques and schools. The neighborhood we visited had a number of aid stations set up by local civic, religious and political groups and I’ve got to say that it seemed pretty well organized considering where we are and what’s going on.

As bad as the situation is a mile away from us, we are remarkably unaffected. We’re just lucky to live on high ground. The shelves at the grocery stores near us are getting a little bare, but we are able to get everything we need. The roads from our apartment to the city center were open and clean on Sunday and we were able to get downtown without a problem.

Fear not, we will be eating chili on Superbowl Sunday

We won't actually be watching the Superbowl until Monday morning, but Sunday night we are going to celebrate with Haviva's famous Halftime Chili. She may not have been able to follow her recipe to a T but we were able to find a can of Chili Beans and some taco seasoning, which seems to have done the trick (as usual, it's been cooked a day early because it's always best reheated). You'll also notice that the usual secret ingredient, a bottle of Sam Adams, has been replaced with a bottle of Bintang, the local brew.

Sideshow Bob, meet the other Sideshow Bob

Soggy Jakarta

I just returned from three days at the spa (no just fun, I was there for work, but yeah, it was kinda nice with the facials, massages and all) to find a large part of Jakarta under water. It was raining when I left on Wednesday and continued to do so basically the whole time I was gone. On the drive back we passed whole neighborhoods displaced by thick sludgy water up as high as your chest. We were stuck in some pretty awful traffic since many main roads had flooding that forced traffic in all directions. All along the way we saw families walking, somewhat aimlessly with plastic bags clearly containing all that was left. Some areas of the city are simply blocked off all together and my co-workers (many of whom were headed to various hotels and friend's houses since their homes were flooded) said this is the worst flooding Jakarta has seen since 1996.

Having spent the last few days being pampered, today was a sobering reminder that we live in the developing world. Boy am I glad we live on the 32nd floor in that developing world.

The day I became a celebrity...

A Celebrity Fitness member that is. It seems my never ending search for a good yoga class ended at the mall on Sunday when Mumu, a fine Celebrity Gym salesman, lured Howie and me into the gym with the promise of cheap membership rates and the best gym in town. The tour and "sell" lasted about an hour and included such highlights as pointing out every other white person in the gym and an analysis of my workout motivation and several questions about my goals. Mumu informed me that after 6 months I can look like J.Lo. Before I go any further, I must remind you that going to the gym is a new fad here in Indonesia. Most people who walk through the door have never been to a gym before and have no idea how to use the equipment or what it means to go to the gym, other than what they have seen in the movies. This place is what you see in the movie and while Mumu was not lying and they do have the most modern machines in all of Indonesia, you could not help but get that cheesey 1980s feeling. On the plus side, there are tons of machines and everything is new. The locker room is gorgeous and clean and there are nice showers, a steam room and a sauna. There are literally about 75 classes to choose from and that includes a plentiful amount of spinning and yoga. And they gave me a free gym bag.

On the negative side the gym is filled with the most intense pounding techno music. I am talking overpowering cannot listen to your iPod loud. And then there is the glass. In the vain of letting people know you are wealthy enough to be a gym member, the gym is encased in glass and wraps around the second floor of the mall so anyone heading from Starbucks to the Hard Rock Cafe on the escalator can watch you on the bike, treadmill or even in your downward dog. Call me prude, but I prefer a more private setting when I am trying wrap my legs around my neck in yoga.

And, for the record, the name is a lie. The only celebrity I have seen is Ali G who runs the hip hop dance aerobics class and uses moves that puts the Fly Girls to shame. I could stay on a machine for hours watching that class.

For a good chuckle, check out the website: www.celebrityfitness.com

More Movies and Eating

Another weekend, another movie and another evening spent searching for a new restaurant...

Not sure if it made the news anywhere else in the world but an Indonesian film maker just released a film called Long Road to Heaven, based on the Bali bombings, that's been reasonably big news here. As you can imagine it is a pretty controversial topic here. The Indonesian censors had a few things to say about the intertwining of religion and terrorism, but what was left was still pretty contentious. I wish I could say differently, but the movie really wasn't very good. It had a bad TV movie feel, complete with bad acting and a pretty thin script.

After that we attempted to try a Middle Eastern restaurant we had read about but found it to no longer exist. A nice woman in the place that replaced it sent us nearby to a whole street of Middle Eastern restaurants where we had delicious humus and baba ganoush at Al Jazeera restaurant. Just the change of pace we were looking for.

Hi Mom

My mom complained to me about the recent dearth of blog postings, so here goes...

Nothing much to report, really. Most of our excitement comes in the form of planning weekend getaways and finding new places to eat. We've also started doing some more cooking. Our local Carrefour grocery has a nice fish counter so we tried the salmon the other day and are planning to try the tuna next. Not cheap - about $8 a pound for the salmon - but quite tasty. They also sell a decent fresh pre-cooked pizza dough, so we've been making some homemade pizzas.

The other day we made a trip to the fancy grocery store that carries lots of imported stuff that we can't get at the Carrefour and came home with tortillas, enchilada sauce, Heinz ketchup, cheddar cheese and white wine among other goodies.

Went to see Babel over the weekend. I guess it was good, although spending two hours thinking horrible things are about to happen to anyone who is on screen isn't really all that enjoyable.

Yes, I did get to watch the Patriots game live at 6AM on Monday morning. Good game but not a good result. I'm sure I'll watch the Superbowl, too, but it'll be a different experience with a bowl of frosted flakes and a glass of orange juice rather than a bowl of chili and a beer.

PS The photo comes from our wanderings around Chinatown. We had high hopes for finding some good Chinese food there and we did, but it was at a big chain restaurant, The Duck King. It's a sad reality of eating in Jakarta - we end up eating a lot of meals at chain restaurants and in malls, but there's actually good food to be found there. It's not "mall food" as we think of it in the west, but good quality food that you'd find at a stand-alone restaurant elsewhere.

Introducing Burt and Ernie

Introducing Burt and Ernie – the newest additions to Casablanca Mansions! We had seen turtles being sold on the street when we first got here, but these little guys were rescued from a tank at the Carrefour a couple weeks ago. Treated like kings, they reside in our extra bedroom, in a large Tupperware bin. We think they were a bit traumatized in the store – they seem to burrow in the rocks when they hear us coming – but with the way Howie spoils them, they should soon learn we are friend not foe. They have a ton of space in their Tupperware toy box home, with large Jakarta rocks to sun on and plenty of room for swimming laps. There are even nooks to hide in. These guys live the life! We could not be prouder parents. Enjoy the show!

Yoga in Jakarta

Ever sweat so much that when you bend down to tie your shoe, sweat drips on to the ground? Yeah, I thought I would never experience that either, but this week I went to my first yoga class in Jakarta. Yoga has not quite taken Jakarta by storm, but in the south of the city in an area called Kemang, the foreigners have rallied and opened a couple small studios. Finding a class for me was hard as most of the westerners who are attracted to yoga here are the wives of men that work and have the maid cook dinner and the driver take them shopping, i.e. they have a lot of time on their hands and take classes at all hours of the day that us working people cannot make. Finally I found Studio 42 that, although they specializes in Bikram (hot) yoga, has a Power Yoga class at 6:45 PM. Somewhat reasonable for us working folks and I have done Power Yoga before so I felt like I knew what I was getting into. It took a while to get there and find the place, but once there it was a little yoga oasis. Soothing music and all. Classes are not cheap, being centered in Jakarta costs a pretty penny, but they give out plenty of towels and free mats, so I was in. After about 5 minutes on my mat waiting for class to start I realized what the 42 in Studio 42 stands for – 42 degrees and that is 42 degree Celsius (for those of you who are not experts at the conversion to Fahrenheit that is really freaking hot.) Since this was Power yoga, they cooled the room to a comfortable 35 (still freaking hot) but I had not done one downward dog and I was already sweating. 90 minutes later I looked like I had spent way too long in the shvitz. My tank top was drenched and my yoga pants looked like I put them on after getting out of the pool without drying off. Totally gross and and next time I will have my own mat (lord only knows how many people sweat like I did that day on that mat) but there will be a next time. I might have been sweaty, stinky and horribly dehydrated, but I was centered and that was the point…wasn’t it?

Weekend Recap

Nothing terribly exciting to report, but we did have a nice weekend. Saturday we explored one of the more upscale suburbs where we found a great English bookstore and some good restaurants. Sunday we went to one of the huge indoor/outdoor markets where Haviva bought herself a new bag for about two dollars and then we went to the plant market where we got ourselves a beautiful orchid plant and a nice houseplant for about $10, including pots. Our apartment is starting to look a little more lived in.

A Quick Trip to Singapore (aka Londasia or Epcot Asia)

Sorry for our absence - Haviva's been busy at work and I've been in Singapore getting my permanent visa. It was only supposed to be a day trip, but the second I landed and turned my phone on Haviva called to tell me that there was a 'misunderstanding' and I'd have to overnight. Would have been nicer if I had brought more than my camera with me, but at least I got to explore the city.

Singapore is an interesting place and a nice change of pace from Jakarta. Definitely made me remember that Jakarta is "developing". It's a great walking city, which is something we really miss in Jakarta. Nice wide, tree lined avenues with crosswalks and drivers that yield to pedestrians - all things you don't find in Jakarta. 75% of the city feels like you are in London. The other 25% is divided into an Arab area, Chinatown and Little India, which make you remember that you are in Asia, but in a weird Epcot kind of way.

Singapore is famous for its food and it didn't disappoint. I made good use of my 30 hours and had a great dinner in Little India, a good breakfast of noodles and dim sum at my hotel and a delicious bowl of noodle soup in Chinatown for lunch before taking the nicest subway ever to the nicest airport ever to fly home.

Paragliding Outside Jakarta

Last week I headed a couple of hours south into the hills around Jakarta to go paragliding with a guy I met playing frisbee. We each went tandem with the instructor, who runs a paragliding school on site. Because it is the rainy season there wasn't a whole lot of sun to produce the updrafts that can keep you in the air for hours, so it was only about a 10 minute glide over some tea plantations. Quite nice, but I'll have to go back in the spring (and take Haviva, who wasn't happy that she had to work when we went).

Learning How To Land

Haviva on the Local Bus

Here we are on the first leg of our journey to the beach - 3 hours on this bus got us from Jakarta to Sukabumi, where we caught another bus for a couple of hours to Pelabuhan Ratu.

Happy (soggy) New Year

Please don't be alarmed. Lots of bad news coming from our part of the world in the past week but we have thus far avoided crashing planes and sinking ferries and plan to continue avoiding them in the future.

For New Years we headed to the beach town of Pelabuhan Ratu, on the south coast of Java, where it apparently rains even more than here on the north coast. Our plan was to spend 3 nights, but after 3 straight days and nights of rain we woke up to sunshine on the morning we were supposed to leave so we extended our stay an extra night and enjoyed a full day of good weather (after making it all the way to the bus station before realizing staying was a much better plan).


The beach was nice but it is not someplace we're rushing to return to. For one thing the food was pretty horrid. We had high hopes for the seafood, but were routinely disappointed. We get much better seafood around the corner from our apartment in Jakarta. We did enjoy some time at the local hot springs during one of the rainy days and we celebrated New Years Eve like the locals... by sitting on the beach along with maybe 10,000 of your friends until it starts to pour at 11:15 and you all run for shelter or try to find a ride home. We ended up celebrating the stroke of midnight in the back of a shared minivan taxi. Good story, I guess, but not all that much fun.

The site isn't cooperating right now, so I can't add pictures, but they are up online at http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva.

Back to the Stone Ages

Not sure if you've heard, but that Taiwanese earthquake last week knocked out internet to much of Asia. It seems that the most affected areas at the time of the quake were northern Asia, especially Japan, Korea and Taiwan, but now it seems that those wealthy and important Asian countries have managed to reroute their internet traffic by cutting off their poorer neighbors down here in SE Asia. Anyway, they're telling us that we may have to put up with little or no internet for the next couple of weeks, so don't be alarmed if you don't hear from us. Right now the only thing working is Google for some reason, and luckily Blogspot is owned by Google.

We're heading to the beach for a few days of R&R over the long weekend. We hope everyone has a safe and fun New Years and we'll check in with you soon.

A Merry Christmas in Jakarta (but probably not for the animals)

For Christmas in Jakarta we mixed traditions from home (namely Chinese food and a movie) with some exploring of the city. We slept in, played some tennis, went for a swim and then set out to for a couple of markets we has heard about.

Our first destination was the exotic animal market. We knew it was going to be a grim place, but we had to see it for ourselves. The majority of the vendors were selling exotic birds, which wasn't all that traumatic - pretty birds in nice cages. The big cages stuffed with rabbits weren't so bad either. We steered clear of the chickens and ducks. The cages with bats were strange, but not so disturbing. Eventually the guys selling the rare animals found us and led us to their corner of the market where we found baby monkeys and loris' in tiny cages. Needless to say, Haviva fell in love and decided we should turn our spare bedroom into a wildlife sanctuary. If there was any chance the US would let us bring a loris home with us then I'm pretty sure she would have bought one on the spot.

Our next stop was the flea market. It was mostly wood carvings and other handicrafts from all over the country. We didn't buy anything, although we were very tempted by the hand-carved sculpture of a monkey talking on the telephone.

From there we headed to the mall for some Chinese noodles and Casino Royale. The noodles were so-so, but we quite enjoyed the movie. While walking to the mall we passed by a mosque with a herd of goats and a few cows out front. It took us a minute but we realized that they were selling them to slaughter on Eid ul-Adha, which by chance falls on Dec 31st this year. We knew that was the tradition, but we didn't realize quite how it works. Apparently the government is trying to get people to have their animals killed at slaughterhouses, but they're meeting quite a bit of resistance.

Howie leaves Jakarta

Merry Christmas! Here in Indonesia Christmas is more of a Western concept than a religious one and although you really could not tell tonight from any other night, there was something festive in the air. We returned from Bogor this evening and went to dinner at the seafood place down the street. It was packed and you could just tell people were celebrating, many of which were obviously not Christian.

Bogor. A great place. Took the express AC train down, which was a pleasure. Actually not overstuffed and the perfect temperature. We found a hotel easily and spent the afternoon on Saturday wandering around...oh who am I fooling....eating. Wandering really from place to place finding the perfect place for lunch. We found it. The Bogor Permai, which was recommend by all the guide books. It was delish, and attached to a bakery, which only made it that much better. The one non-food find of the day was the "puppet factory", which is in quotes because it is actually the puppet makers home, nestled in the valley of Bogor. It was a great little neighborhood with small winding streets only wide enough for two people to walk side by side. Everyone knows the puppet factory though and once we were there, we could tell why. The puppet maker is a pleasant man, missing his front teeth and with glasses that might be coke bottles. The puppets were very impressive, hand carved and painted, dressed in batiks. No two exactly alike. Of course, we came back the next day and bought two.

As soon as we left, it began to absolutely pour. Rain is one of the things Bogor is famous for, which is why it has the lush botanical garden it is also known for. Rain continued for the rest of the night. We hit the gardens early so we could pick up our puppets and make the last train and the timing worked out well since the rain started a bit on the earlier side today. The gardens are lush and tropical as you might expect and the few hours we spent were well worth it. A gorgeous orchid house, a crazy "Mexican Garden" full of the same cacti that Howie's parents have in their backyard and some bats that really impressed Howie with their crazy wing span. The garden's only flaw was the hoards of students screaming, "Hey mister! Can I ask you question??" It was cute at first, but there were so many of them and they all had a list of about 20 questions given to them by their teacher that they could barely read and that they did not even begin to understand the answers to. Had we actually answered all of them, we never would have seen the garden. We learned their uniforms quickly though and we able to duck behind trees and run the other direction when we saw them coming.

We put some more photos of Bogor online at http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva

An Ode to the Martabak

We've discovered that one of the best martabak (or murtabak) restaurants in Jakarta happens to be in our neighborhood, Martabak Kubang. For those of you not familiar with martabak, it is a type of pie that comes in two delicious varieties: savory and sweet. Martabak Kubang specializes in the savory variety but there are a few street vendors that sell the sweet kind on our street.

The savory variety is made by folding a very thin dough around any number of meat, tofu and veg fillings, then frying it on a griddle. It comes with either a curry for dipping or a fantastic sweet soy based sauce.

The sweet variety shares a name with its savory cousin, but that's about it. It is made by pouring a pancake-like batter into a hot skillet then coating the cooked pancake with chocolate, peanuts and sweetened condensed milk (and about a stick of butter) and folding it over. It is sickeningly sweet and ridiculously dense but really good. We can't eat a whole one so we bring the leftovers back to our building and give it to the security guys out front.

Our Apartment

A quick tour of our apartment.

Haviva's Day Out

Well, it took a while, but it finally happened - I had a day off!! After a lot of running from city to city, I was pooped and decided to take the day off on Monday to sleep in and actually see Jakarta. It was fabulous not to set the alarm and after a yummy frozen lasagna lunch we hit the city. With Howie as my tour guide, we headed as north as we could go to Jakarta harbor. Like most harbor areas, it was a bit stinky and was a far cry from the shopping malls and endless traffic of the city that we know. The boats were not what we expected in that they did not look hefty or sturdy enough to be carrying what they were. I think we were expecting more fishing boats and the like, but these boats were hauling lumber and concrete, weighing them low into the water. I suppose we should have been happy not to see fishing boats - the water was filthy.

After a walk down the main docking area we headed into the local village, winding through the nooks and crannies filled with local food stalls and vendors selling everything from underwear to prayer mats. With every step we got the typical "Hello Mister!" (for the record, someone taught the nation of Indonesia "hello mister" and forgot to mention that it only applies to men. not a "hello miss" to be heard) and the occasional "How are you? I am fine!" We made a quick stop for a fried delish snack - I have become addicted to these little fried bites of cabbage...sort of like deep fried sourkraut, which may sound gross, but it really is good.

The strange part about this area of Jakarta is that it still has the Dutch colonial architecture. For some reason, to me it felt more like South American than SE Asia. You can tell at one time the area was beautiful, but now it looks a bit forgotten. We hung out in the square and had a TeBotol (iced tea in a glass bottle that can be found anywhere) hoping to reduce the sweat level, but as is life in Indonesia, that just did not happen. Maybe that is why the Dutch eventually left....

More Frisbee

Saturday afternoon I went out to a couple of private girls schools in far East Jakarta with a few other Westerners from the Ultimate Frisbee club to teach Frisbee and do some general mingling. (In truth, one of them was co-ed, having 457 girls and 4 boys enrolled.) We had a lot of fun and I think the girls were sufficiently entertained. The schools were quite nice and the students and staffs quite friendly.

You might notice from the photos that the majority of the girls at one of the schools were wearing head scarves (called a jilbab here) and very few were at the other school. Surprisingly (to me, at least) wearing a jilbab seems to have little or no bearing on a girl's general behavior. The girls in the jilbabs were just as outgoing and just as likely to strike up a conversation with the western men as the girls without them.

If you are interested in the photos they are at http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva

Happy one month in Jakarta to us!

Exactly one month ago today I got up at 6 AM and hopped on a flight to Medan, having no idea where I was or what I was doing. Ironically enough, found myself in Medan today, this time with slightly more a clue where I was and what I was doing. Slightly...

It has been a wonderful, exciting, exhausting and interesting month to say the least. Certainly the adventure we signed up for. I can only imagine what the next 11 have to offer.

In addition, Happy Hanukkah to all you out there to whom it might apply. Not much going on here for the holiday officially, but we feel we celebrate the miracle of oil each and every day with Indonesian cuisine. Never a shortage of fried goodies. As a treat for ourselves, we bought two show passes to the Jakarta International Film Festival and we are headed to see an Australian movie tonight and then a Chilean movie (I think Chilean, could be wrong) tomorrow night. Not the traditional gift giving, but much more our style and budget. Hopefully next weekend we can hit the beach and have a little vacation since I have Monday off.

Hope you all have a great holiday. Have a latke (or two or three) for us!

Comments Were Always Welcome...

... but now they should be much easier to make.

Sorry the blog settings made it a pain to comment before, but I think we've corrected the problem, so comment away...

Watching Leonard Cohen in Jakarta

Well, it may not be quite the same as reading Lolita in Tehran (or even reading Playboy in Indonesia, which is quite a hot topic here at the moment) but it was quite strange watching a documentary about Leonard Cohen in a theater filled (for a few minutes, at least) with Indonesians at the Jakarta Intl Film Festival last night.

Tickets were free (as they are for all documentaries at the festival) and, because you needed to get there a couple of hours before the 6:30 showtime to get them, the crowd was made up of mostly students who have come every day after school during the festival and seen whatever film they could get into. Therefore, of all the attendees I talked to while waiting in line, only one actually knew who Leonard Cohen was.

So we didn’t take it personally when most of the crowd walked out shortly after the movie started. I just don’t think it was their kind of music. The write-up in the festival booklet said that U2 was in it and people may well have been expecting music along those lines. (For our liking there was actually way too much Bono and The Edge yammering on about their love of Leonard Cohen.) The film did touch on Cohen’s religious background a little bit, but it didn’t seem to faze anyone who was left in the theater at that point.

All in all we quite enjoyed the film, which was a combination of footage from a tribute concert and interviews with Cohen and other artists. Pretty typical concert film, really, but the topic and the venue made it feel a bit different.

Oh yeah, and when the credits came on we discovered that the film was co-produced by none other than Mel Gibson.

Our New Favorite Restaurant

Haviva's back in town so that means we get to try the new restaurants I find while wandering around our neighborhood. Last night we went to the BBQ seafood place just down the street, past the rib place. Haviva did a fine job of ordering us one of the local specialties she had tried in Jayapura, a fish cut in half the long way, grilled and covered with all sorts of chillies, ginger and lemon grass. Fantastic stuff.

Tonight it is off to the Jakarta International Film Festival. Don't laugh, it's actually got quite an impressive lineup. We're hoping to see Leonard Cohen: I'm Your Man tonight, which we've heard good things about. Haviva's off again in the morning, but hopefully we'll get to see something else when she gets back.

Global Conference 2006

Okay, it was not really global - English First only has offices in China, Russia and Indonesia - and don't worry, not too many work details are about to follow. It was a little more exciting than it sounds from the title.

The conference was held here in Indonesia - those smart other countries have decided to take advantage of the only country where it is beach weather in December - about 4 and 1/2 hours outside of Jakarta at the lovely Kuda Laud Resort. This is not a place you can easily get to as a tourist; somewhat in the middle of no where, but absolutely gorgeous. Every day we ate our meals right on the beach and the walk to my villa provided beautiful views. Of course, we spent most of the time sweating inside a meeting room that was not quite as big as it should have been, as well as it lost power around 4 PM each day leaving us in the dark for the last 2 presentations of the day. Meetings ended at about 7 PM each day and the evenings were filled with karaoke, a band with dancing, and the drinking of liquor purchased at duty free. And there was some night wading in the ocean, although the nights were a bit too dark and the current a bit too strong for night swimming. I did get a couple hours the last day though to take a dip and enjoy the waves. The only real draw back were the over 50 some odd steps to my villa on the cliff (not the widest or easiest path to take each day, especially after that duty free liquor) and the creepy crawlies that liked to join me there. Killed some pretty big spiders - yes, after I squeeling like the complete baby I truly am - and learned to sleep through night despite the giant lizard in my wall that decided this week was the best time to mate. Never saw, but I heard him. (He did leave me little "present "each day though on the bathroom floor.)

Check out the pics I added to our album - http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva

and, just to clarify a little, the weird pictures on the stage are the very "interesting" performance by the Indonesian team (Jean and I were regulated to making the sound effectes on the side of the stage for some reason.) The sheep on the beach I just cannot explain.

Phones, phone numbers, etc.

Not the most exciting blog post, but I figured this was a good place to put our phone numbers in case anyone ever needs them. We just got our home phone hooked up today. It only took two visits by the phone guy and three holes cut in our ceiling trying to find the correct wire.

The country code for Indonesia is 62 so from the US you'd dial 011 62... Our numbers are:

home - 21 3004 0584
Haviva's mobile/cell/hand phone - 0856 9183 0784
Howie's mobile/cell/hand phone - 0856 9722 7686

You'll notice that our mobile numbers are not at all easy to remember and don't have many repeating digits. That's because we're cheap. You pick your phone number from a giant list of numbers which are sorted by price. Indonesians tend to be quite superstitious, so having a good phone number is quite desirable. We paid about two dollars for the SIM card that gives you your phone number. Some of the 'better' numbers were going for upwards of 10 dollars.

What do I do when Haviva's not here? Good Question.

Haviva's been out of town since Thursday at a conference, so I've been filling my time with Ultimate Frisbee and wandering aimlessly. The Ultimate Frisbee 'club' plays for a couple of hours on Thursday nights and Sunday afternoons. It's made up of about 20 or 30 expats and a few locals, of which about 10 or 12 show up each time to play. Good fun and really good exercise. Thursday nights are nice but two hours in the sun on Sundays is pretty rough.

Today we followed the two hour game up with an hour or so at a local school playing with the kids. Some of the people I play with have started going around to a bunch of the schools as a way for the kids to meet Westerners in a way other than yelling "Hello Mister" to us from across the street. It's a lot of fun. Unfortunately Haviva has the camera with her, so I don't have any pictures, but you can see some at the Klub Frisbee blog.

In between playing frisbee I've done some good wandering around the city. No photo evidence to prove it, but I made it up to the North of the city where the harbor is. Quite interesting. I'll take Haviva there when she gets back and we'll take some pictures.

Anyway, Haviva's back in town Monday for a couple of days - then she's off again. I'm making a little progress on the job front. If nothing else I should be able to pick up some English classes as I'm meeting with a school director this week.

Next post should be Haviva telling us about her weekend at a beach resort with EF staff from all over the world...

Photos Are Online

Howie's spent more time playing with Google and his newest toy is Picasa, Google's photo software that has its own version of online photosharing. We put up some random photos from our first three weeks. Sorry there are no captions yet - it's a work in progress. We'll keep adding more as we go so you can check it once in a while to see what's up there. The link is http://picasaweb.google.com/howieandhaviva .

The Rainy Season Cometh

As you can see from the video it doesn't just rain, it pours. It's been a daily occurrence for the past few days and we're told it is the beginning of the rainy season that won't end until March. The rain isn't all that bad. It thunders and lightnings for a while, then pours for 30 minutes. But the traffic jams it creates are brutal. It was hard to believe the traffic could get worse but first, when it starts raining, the motor bikers all take cover under the overpasses, completely blocking them, then the streets flood bringing everything to a standstill.

Jayapura

Just returned from Jayapura. A small town (750,000 people) on the island of Papua. Right on the border of Papua New Guinea. There is about 4 blocks of city and the rest of the area is jungle and beaches. The area is predominantly Christian and tribal, and although most people never go to Jayapura, the missionaries do seem to make it. Very different than Jakarta. On our drive from the airport to the school, the morning church service blasted thru the radio and on about every corner was a church. In the mix are people with bones thru their noses (sorry no pics of that!) and clearly tribal influences. What I found most interesting was the influence of alcohol in Jayapura. As the people are Christian, they drink freely and drunk men seem to roam the streets in a way you just do not see here in Jakarta. After 9 PM the place shuts down and no one leaves their homes, except the drunk men who stumble the streets and sing karaoke. The school itself has a fabulous group of teachers and despite nothing to do in Jayapura (literally nothing - there is no movie theater, bowling alley, mall....nothing!) they have become part of this close knit community and enjoy being there. Very interesting place. If only you did not have to take an overnight flight to get there. The worst overnight flight ever by the way - what kind of red eye stops twice and makes you get off the plane at 2 AM???

View out our window at prayer time.

This is the view out of our 32nd floor (sort of - there's no floor #3,4,13,14,23 or 24 because they're unlucky) apartment overlooking the Central Business District of Jakarta. The video starts out facing northwest and ends looking southwest. You can hear the call to prayer from the mosque directly below our building and also from a number of other mosques, but the noise level doesn't bother us at night when we have the windows closed and the AC on.

Getting Settled

Sorry for our absence. We're in our new apartment but have been without internet until now. We're starting to settle in here on the 32nd floor of the Casablanca Mansions after numerous trips to Carrefour (the closest thing to Target to be found in Jakarta). Our internet connection (which bizarrely comes in through the electrical outlet) is okay at times and unbelievably slow at others, but when it is okay we'll post some pictures and maybe a video tour.

Nothing terribly interesting to report from the past week. We explored our neighborhood and found a fantastic restaurant just up the road. It is the first restaurant that at all resembles what we expected to find more of - it's not in a mall, but is also not on the street selling food that looks days old. It is a simple, open-air place that seems quite popular. One of the things that makes Indonesia very easy for non Indonesian speakers is their habit of putting pictures on menus, so it was easy to figure out that this place specializes in big beef ribs and skewers of beef, which were cooked in a spicy peanut sauce and fantastic.

We also explored another of our local malls, Pasar Festival. Nothing special, except that it has a bowling alley and an Indian Restaurant. At this point I feel obligated to report that not only did Haviva beat me in our second game of bowling the other day, but she did it in style. Going to the 10th and final frame we were tied but Haviva then threw 3 straight strikes (yes, a turkey to you bowling aficionados) to beat me good.

No big plans for this weekend. I'm alone in the big city as Haviva is on the road visiting a school in Jayapura, which is a 10 hour (and 2 stop) flight away near the Papua New Guinea border. Just got a text message from her reporting that all is well in the jungle. I've still got plenty of stuff on the list of things we need for the apartment, so that'll keep me busy (toaster oven tops the list because we don't have a regular oven and some sort of foam pad for our incredibly hard mattress follows closely).

Orchid_Garden.MPG

Here's our first attempt at a video blog. Just a little clip from our very sad visit to the Slipi Orchid Garden last weekend.