The Way Home

Format

The layout of my blog is still terrible. However, since my knowledge of html and template fiddling is limited to making things in italics without using the italics short cut key or inserting a picture I think this is as good as it's going to get. Want me to edit your thesis? Translate something from French to English? Talk about Hannah Arendt? I'm your girl. Writing code, not so much. Unless it makes it harder to read somehow, I think I'm going to leave it as is for the moment.

The Way Home

I tend to think of the strangest things on the way home from work. For the past week or so, I've been imagining what it would be like to be in some sort of accident that would give a person retrograde amnesia, meaning they would be unable to remember past events (as opposed to short term memory loss). To be honest, I've been imagining what it would be like to go through my situation in Korea with retrograde amnesia. It is an interesting prospect and is perfect for amusing myself with for the 15 minute commute home. Of course, Wikipedia informs me that most amnesia lasts for less than 24 hours which kills my fun a bit but I can ignore that. Apparently, you remember motor skills but I wonder how deeply it has to be ingrained to remember. Would I remember how to speak French or Spanish? Could I still touch type? Tie my shoes? On the other hand, thinking about it so much has made me think that I should give my parents a list of friends to contact in case I ever did get amnesia and the people I keep in touch with around the world wondered why I wasn't responding to any emails. (Since obviously I wouldn't remember any of my email passwords.) Is it morbid to imagine things like retrograde amnesia or simply, very strangely, curious?

This weekend is the Battle of the Bands at Psycho. I love Psycho. I love the special events that Psycho hosts. However, I hate events like Battle of the Bands almost as much as Open Mic Nights. Even though I can't sing on key or play guitar, I have a trained ear (somewhat trained anyways) and every wrong note jars my senses. I am going for the usual reasons, a friend's band is playing. There is only one way to survive a Battle of the Bands: go with a mocking partner and be prepared to drink a fair amount. What is a mocking partner you ask? Someone who not only won't mind your merciless commentary about the music but makes for interesting repartee about the matter. I have to think of something nice to do for myself on Sunday to make it up to my ear drums. Maybe a pedicure...with my ipod to drown out the pop music playing at the salon.

I'm a spaz

Sorry for the awful new blog layout. In trying to spruce mine up on my own I failed miserably and am having trouble getting it to go back to boring. Will attempt to fix it before the next real post.

Being a Bibliophile is Contagious

Today I had an epiphany: my kids love reading. When I first arrived in September I had to cajole them into reading their story books. But soon I introduced my favorite childhood books (care of the most expensive care package ever--thanks Mom and Dad!) and had them reading along with me. Then they were begging for their favorites. When they have free time to color or play board games in class (all cleverly disguised learning games) I always read a book. Since everything I do seems to be the height of cool to my six year old kids, reading a book became very cool too.

A scene from earlier this week:
Student: Alex teacher, What are you reading?
Me: Shows them the book and reads the title.
Student: ....No pictures?
Me: Look, no pictures but Lots of words. You make up the pictures in your head! Use your imagination!
Student: Huh.
Me: It's fun!
Student: Maybe...*scurries off to play with friends*

Today after lunch, I said what I say everyday: "After you brush your teeth, you may read, color or play." They almost always choose to color or play. One of my little boys (who used to hate reading), looked bored. So I asked him if he wanted one of the class books. He told me no but could he have "Going on a Bear Hunt" instead. I hesitated because my private stash of stories lives in my desk since they are all between 20 and 30 years old and not holding up so well. However, "Going on a Bear Hunt" is in pretty good shape and it's not often a little boy Wants to read when he doesn't have to. Soon, everyone was clamoring to have their favorite and working through them on their own or with a friend. Somehow, I managed to transfer not only my love of books to these kids but also, how to treat them because as I'm always saying "books are special." Not a single page got torn or wrinkled.

I think I may buy some more kids books. We just got a library at the school but it doesn't have all the classics. I can always save them for my kids (or my brother's kids). How can I not want to help their passion for reading? It's something that will carry them through their life. I'm obsessed with the written word and it's hard not to want to pass on that passion. I'm being a bit cheesy but it doesn't make it less true.

Attempts to become more active

Yesterday, I decided that one self indulgent blog entry was enough. After work I went back to my apartment, got some gym clothes and jumped on a bus into downtown Anyang. It only took me 10 minutes to buy some running shoes with my Konglish (Korean/English mix). The shopkeeper actually spoke decent English which made it a lot easier. Not to mention she knew American sizing AND Korean sizing (which is good because I can't quite count that high without really thinking about it). Anyways, I have them cut off the tags, throw out the box and stashed them in my backpack. Then I pulled out my hand drawn map that a coteacher gave me with 3 gyms within walking distance were marked. It seemed foolproof. After 40 minutes of wandering around the city, I gave up and went to get some fried chicken. It was a good consolation prize but probably as far as I could get from spending a couple of hours at the gym rehabing my ankles and doing low impact cardio. Why didn't I call the friend who gave me the map in the first place? Because yesterday morning he was in a car accident when his crazy cab driver lost control and he dislocated his elbow (and oh my, does that sound painful) and threw out his back. Me, I would be at home today, doped up on the pain killers and trying not to move. Him? He was back at work today, moving stiffly and a bit quieter than normal but here none the less. I was baffled. His take was, he wasn't dying, someone else shouldn't have to cover his classes because he was in a bit of pain. Of course today had to be the day we went on a sledding field trip which was a lot of fun but not exactly what someone who has been in a car accident should be doing. The Korean work ethic is admirable, but really, go home! Get some rest!

Tomorrow I will attempt to find the gym again. Anytime it's below freezing my ankles give me problems. I need to strengthen them more before I can safely climb. Off to teach toddlers!

Stasis

Lately, I feel like I don't do much of anything and the feeling definitely reflects reality. After work, I laze about my apartment until I summon the energy to go out for dinner and then I laze about some more. On weekends I alternate this schedule with tutoring Spanish (why am I teaching Spanish and not French?!) and going dancing. I read a lot. I should be going and touristing but it's cold out and I hate the cold with a nice, fiery passion. A poor excuse but it's true.

I'm joining a regular gym tonight to do more rehab exercises with weights and such but I realized that I need to buy running shoes first. Who moves to a foreign country without running shoes??? To be fair, my exercise is usually only rock climbing and I do have all my rock gear here. Luckily, I have small feet and there are plenty of shoe stores near the gym. [No, I shouldn't be going dancing but I take it easy and consider it light cardio exercise. I also wear my high tops for extra ankle support.]

There isn't much to write about because I'm doing very little with myself. However, if you want a fantastic book on the United States' foreign policy read Noam Chomsky's Failed States: The Abuse of Power and the Assault on Democracy. Absolutely fantastic. I didn't love the first 35 pages or so which really just make up the intro but if you hang in there for a little bit it gets Good. The beginning just has an overly alarmist tone that is slightly irritating, even if what he is saying is true. What follows is a brilliant piece of scholarship and is accessible even for people without a political theory background.

I still have some more Indonesia pictures to post but I'm writing this entry from work where I obviously don't have my pictures.

COFFEE!

Random: On blogs of note from this week I found a blog called...THE COFFEE MESSIAH!!!!!!
http://coffeemessiah.blogspot.com/

It makes me so very, very happy. If you are as addicted as I am, or just amused by your friends' coffee addictions, click click click and look at the pretties. Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm.

Indonesia, Part 2

Samboja

Samboja is an orangutan and sun bear reserve about an hour and a half from the Chevron oil compound. Since the mid day heat, even in winter, is fairly intense we got up early and were on the road by 7am. Why yes, I did stumble around like an idiot until I guzzled 2 cups of coffee, why do you ask? And why is it that I always think things like cookies and marshmallows will be a fabulous idea for breakfast food before coffee?? This is why I try to keep them out of sight and leave out breakfast foods for myself so I actually eat something that has nutritional value and won't make me feel sick in half an hour. We actually had a caravan of SUVs and accompanying chauffeurs to get out to the reserve because just about everyone who had kids visiting for the holidays wanted to come.


Our caravan! The orangutans were more interesting to watch but we couldn't get too close since they are being trained to go back into the wild. Also, they had just gotten a vaccine or something the day before and were Very shy. When we were watching their feeding we had to crouch down in the grass because they wouldn't come near the food with everyone watching. The mother and baby wouldn't come near but the other orangutans snagged some food and shared with them.

One of the orangutans kind of snuck down to the food, grabbed a coconut and then leaped off with it. He spent awhile at the top of one of the "trees" smashing it open before bringing his booty to his friends. This process was repeated a couple of times until everyone got some. They really do use their feet and hands interchangeably.

The sun bears are fairly small but there were signs warning you that the only bear you should be getting close to is your teddy bear. These were accompanied by rather intimidating picture of their claws and teeth. They may look cuddly but overall Big Ouch as my six year old students like to say. Very big ouch.

This little guy is in quarantine from the other bears until he proves he is disease free. The yellow spot on their chests is where they got the name 'sun bear' from.
This is the view into the larger bear pens.
To keep the bears active (and the agression down) the caretakers hide honey and other sweet treats around the pen and they spend most of the day looking for it.
How many bears do you see? There were quite a few in each area. One of the problems with rehabilitating the animals is that there often isn't anywhere to send them in the wild since their natural rain forest habitat shrinks drastically each year. In the areas that do exist, they are likely to be captured, hunted or injured again at human hands. This goes doubly so for the orangutans who are often captured for use as exotic pets. You could tell the subject was depressing for the caretakers and scientists when they talked about it.

After lunch back at base camp we headed back for Balikpapan. On the way though, the driver of our car suggested that we stop at this crocodile place on the way. My companions motto (and mine too): Why not? And also, COOL. Me: I will finally be able to tell the difference between alligators and crocodiles if I've seen one!


Hello big guy. This guys head was probably as big as my 4 year old students. The door to his pen was wooden and had a kind of flimsy looking padlock on it. We backed away rather quickly.

Baby crocs!


Why do crocodiles just chill with their mouths open? They seemed to do this a lot. I can't decide if it's to be unnerving or so that unsuspecting birds will fly in...

A whole row of really huge crocs.

The html code of this entry is less than happy at me for all of the cutting and pasting I'm doing and every time I add a new picture I have to do more and more fixing so I'm going to end Part 2 here and leave Balikpapan night life and other fun stories for Indonesia, Part 3.

Indonesia and life

So I know that I should have posted the Monday I got back but I had some drama in my life and wasn't sleeping as much as I would like and nothing, nothing makes me less likely to want to update my blog as sleeping 4 hours a night and then teaching my kids all day.

Life in the Other Camp

Indonesia was amazing. Balikpapan isn't really a tourist area. If you read the guide books, they pretty much all say the same thing: Balikpapan is an oil rich area full of oil expats. Good night life, not much touristy goodness. That being said, I had a fabulous time. I was craving a more mellow vacation anyways after my first 4 months of teaching kindergarten. My first day in Indonesia I ended up having lunch with the family I was staying with and then just lounging by the pool on the compound. Did I mention I was staying with said oil expats? The Chevron oil compound no less. It meant that I needed to be careful discussing politics (ie don't) but other than that it was fine.

A gorgeous pool that was pretty much always that empty. My preferred method of entry: the slide. So much fun. I can't believe I was scared to go down it the first time. Pool snacks were also absurdly cheap, 45 cents for french fries. Chevron really subsidizes the expat club which made ordering french fries and freshly made lemonade everyday very affordable.

There was this crazy turtle statue...I'm not really sure if turtles ever chill like that in real life but it was entertaining enough as a sculpture.

After the first day, we got a routine down. Do something touristy in the morning. Have lunch, either cooked by the maid of the family I was staying with (who was the most fantastic cook, ever) and then go lounge by the pool with the other expat kids visiting for the holidays. Seriously though, the food was incredible. I never thought I'd say this but the maid could give my mother a run for her money. Everything was to die for. I even got fresh rolls made (without milk or butter) just for me!

At night we generally went out to dinner and then J. and I (J is the friend I was staying with) would go out with the other kids our age to the clubs or bars and hang out.

Some food highlights:
Satay: A very Indonesian dish. Usually chicken or beef cooked in a peanut sauce. A little bit spicy but more rich than anything. This was from a hotel dinner we went out to but the stuff we got at home was just as good only it's a little odd to whip out your camera in someones home and take a picture of dinner so my food pictures are only from restaurant excursions.
Frog legs! I kid you not, I tried fried frog legs and they were DELICIOUS. I ate 3 of them. My mom says they taste like chicken but personally I thought they tasted like a white fish fillet. Maybe Indonesian frogs are different from frogs in the states. Who knows. Pigeon was also on the menu but I'm not That adventurous. Also, pigeon is definitely an avian rat, at least in Asia, which made me much less inclined to want to try it.

What sort of touristy things you ask?
Well I went to a market and bought some cool jewelry and trinkets one morning. Another time I went to an Orangutan and Sun Bear reserve in Sambrosia. That was amazing. Imagine walking through the jungle to get out to where the animals are and then getting to observe them on acres of land instead of a depressing zoo cage.

...I think I'm at my picture limit since it isn't letting me insert any more. Next post: pictures of orangutans, bears, crocodiles and night time excursions.