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.