last Indonesia post - volcano day

Our last day in Indonesia we visited a volcano. It was really neat. And beautiful. But, like many days in Asia, nothing ever seems to go as planned.

We got all loaded into our rented SUV wagon and drove approximately three feet before realizing the tire was flat. Argh. We pile back out, roll the car back down into the garage, and the guys start figuring out what to do.

In the meantime, we're attracting a bit of attention and people are slowing down as they drive past (the distance between the garage and the street is about a foot and a half). So, the third or fourth person to pass by on a motorbike stops to check out the situation. Turns out he spent two years in Japan in a Toyota training school, learning how to repair cars. And guess what? Our car is a Toyota, and this man is way overqualified to change the tire. Another neighbor is running around trying to find a jack while the guys locate the spare tire. Within an hour we were back in the car, headed towards the volcano.

On the drive up (the volcano is at about 6500 ft) we passed through a pine forest - it was pretty weird, to be driving on a tropical island and smelling pine trees. I think the pines must grow well there in part because of the elevation, in part because of the way the volcano has affected the soil composition? Not sure, but it was pretty interesting to drive through a pine forest while vacationing in Indonesia.

Once we got to the top the views were pretty amazing. We could stand on the "rim" of the volcano and look down into the crater below. There was a small lake in the crater and the deepest point of the crater was smoking. Whoa.

The landscape was quite rugged, very rocky, and absolutely beautiful. It is possible to hike the entire rim, but we only made it about 2% of the way around.

Alas, our little ones are not hikers - yet! But the brief time we spent 'hiking' made Matt and I nostalgic about the "pre-kid hiking days" and eager to get our kids on the trail when they are old enough to walk farther than a mile or two.

I loved this volcano day, and though it is highly unlikely I will ever be back in Bandung Indonesia (since Krisanne and Paul are moving to another island this summer, when their language school is complete) if I ever do find myself in Bandung, Indo again, I definitely want to hike the entire rim!

scenes from Indonesia

While the best thing about our time in Indonesia was DEFINITELY seeing Krisanne and Paul, we also really enjoyed experiencing a new culture and visiting a new place.

Matt and I have been in the "Asian world". And we've spent a bit of time in the "Muslim world". Indonesia is a mix of the two.

The call to prayer is broadcast on loudspeakers throughout the day. First one is at about 4:30 am. And yes, it is loud enough to wake you up! The first night I think I was awake for the entire thing. I didn't look at the clock, but I guess it lasts about ten or fifteen minutes? It seemed long. After all, it was 4:30 in the morning.

But after a few nights, I got used to it. Most mornings I would wake up and realize I had slept through it. Or wake up only long enough to think "that's the call to prayer" and then fall back asleep.


Another thing that really struck me? Indonesia is FULL OF MOTORBIKES! Oh my goodness, they are everywhere! It's really a great way to get around - gas is cheap, traffic is bad, and some 'roads' are too narrow for a car to navigate.



The town Krisanne and Paul live in is in the mountains, and some of the scenes are just beautiful! The view from their dining room windows is incredible. It seems that one of us jumped up from our meal to take a picture almost every night during dinner :)

This is what you see from their windows.....



Right behind their house is the beginning of a really steep incline... houses are built right on the side of the mountain. One afternoon we walked down into the neighborhood below theirs and saw the river rushing through the valley bottom and rice paddies on the banks.

Climbing back up the hill I was on my tiptoes, pushing Isaac in the stroller, using every bit of strength in my calf muscles. I looked kind of like this man. Except I am a woman. And I have white skin. And I was pushing a stroller, not carrying baskets on my shoulders. I guess I didn't look much like this after all, but you get the point.... the hills are steep!

I also loved the laundry flapping in the breeze. The ladies must get up early to do the wash, because it was always on the clothes lines by breakfast. The sun is nice and bright, so it dried fast, often before the mid-afternoon rain started.



I learned a little Indonesian too. So if you ever need anyone to translate 'gecko', 'thank you', or 'be careful' into Indonesian, just let me know. For all other Indonesian translation needs, I would definitely direct you to Paul and Krisanne. Not that I am in any position to decide who speaks good Indonesian, but it seems to me that theirs is really good!

I actually enjoyed not understanding a lot of what was happening around me, especially when I knew people were talking about me or my kids. After years of living in a culture hearing (and understanding) other people talk about me, I was grateful to just smile in ignorance.

our day

This morning we woke up in Bandung, Indonesia. Tonight we are in Bangkok, Thailand. About two hours into the day I decided to get out the camera and start taking pictures. I want to remember days like this :)

7:15 We're rolling! Leaving Bandung, headed for Jakarta.... we're quickly through the morning's rush hour traffic and on the toll road. It's all downhill to Jakarta and the temperature outside is rising as we loose elevation. Thankfully, our van is nicely air conditioned and we're comfortably cruising along.

8:45 We pull off the road for a quick rest stop and potty break at Dunkin Donuts (can you believe it? Dunkin Donuts in Indonesia!) Shortly after we're back on the road I decide to document the day. Too bad I've already missed the donut picture.

11:05 Just when I'm beginning to think we'll never get there, our van pulls up at the international terminal.



Matt and I have done this airport scene a few times, and we've worked out a pretty smooth system. I am in charge of kids, my carry-on, and the girls' backpacks. I've usually got one kid on my back, on in the stroller, and one holding my hand.


Matt takes care of his carry-on, checked luggage and all documents (passports, tickets, reservation numbers, etc).


11:30 We're checked in and through immigration. We find a little snack bar and grab seats by the window so the kids can airplane watch while we eat lunch.



12:40 We're through security and waiting at our gate. The big windows provide plenty of entertainment :)



1:00 We take advantage of pre-boarding for families and get settled into our four seats (Isaac is still considered a lap infant). There is an empty seat across the aisle and halfway through the flight Julianna moves over there to watch a movie on my laptop and free up a seat for Isaac. At 1:20 we takeoff for Bangkok (20 minutes late).

4:35 Wheels on the ground in Bangkok. We exit the plane and head towards immigration. Ideally we could complete the trip in one day, but the flight schedule meant we needed an overnight layover in Bangkok. Not the best set up, but do-able.

5:05 Through immigration and customs and at baggage claim. Next stop: the airport shuttle for our hotel.

6:00 Matt is checking in and the girls are romping around the lobby. We *almost* break one floor lamp and a flower vase. Thankfully, nothing (and no one) suffers permanent damage and we're headed towards the elevators for room 214.

In the elevator I tell the girls the room number is like our family..... Lydia is 2, Isaac is almost 1, and Julianna is 4. 2 - 1 - 4. Our room number. I think it's clever.

Lydia corrects me, "I'm not 2, I am 2 and a HALF." Nice try mom.

Once in the room I start figuring out where all the weary heads will lay. Isaac is sitting in a corner eating crackers and the girls are standing on the desk when Matt realizes there is no Thai food on the room service menu. He and the girls head out (on foot) to find some Thai food (seriously some of the best cuisine in the world) and I stay back to feed Isaac and put him in the bed. Since he napped a grand total of 47 minutes today, I figure an early bedtime won't hurt.

Final bedding solution? Isaac in the hotel crib. I get an extra pillow and blanket from housekeeping and put Lydia on the floor by the curtains at the far end of the room and Julianna on the far bed. Julianna and Lydia have shared a bed before, but this one seems narrow, and I'm not willing to risk it. Matt and I are in the closer bed. Not sure this room was designed with us in mind, but it works!


Sure enough, Isaac is sleeping by 6:30 and shortly after Matt and the girls return - they found a mini mart and some street food vendors. We get some plates and silverware from room service....Dinner is served. Since Isaac is already snoozing in the room, we eat sitting on the floor in the atrium area at the end of the hall. [Correction: Matt and I sit. The girls mainly run around like they are at an indoor picnic.]


It's 8:07, the girls are asleep in their beds, Matt is headed back out for ice cream and I am enjoying the fastest internet connection I've experienced in months on the hotel's wireless connection. Only problem is, with a roomful of sleeping children, space is a bit tight. I'm left with.... the bathroom.


Luckily, it's a super nice hotel, the floor is clean, and I am not above sitting next to the toilet! Best news yet? We leave here tomorrow on the airport shuttle. We're not home yet!

Krisanne and Paul.... We miss you already and the time with you was worth EVERY CRAZY MINUTE of our day!

leaving indonesia

Tomorrow morning we leave for Jakarta where we'll catch a flight to Bangkok.... our time in Indonesia is ending and our journey home is starting.

Our time here has been so incredible! In some ways it feels like we just got here, in other ways it feels like we've been here for a long time. We've just loved being together.

This morning we drove up to a volcano (still considered active and proving itself with small puffs of smoke). We did a bit of 'light' hiking - I have gobs of great photos to post, so hopefully I'll sort through the pictures and do some Indonesia highlight posts in the next week or so. It was a great "last day in Indonesia" activity.

all of us at the beach

vacation photos

We are back at Paul and Krisanne's after a SUPER FUN week at the beach! It was a perfect place to vacation.... we loved every minute. The drive was insane, but it was worth it :)

[Side note: Our kids have definitely won the "amazing kid travelers of the year" award. I am so impressed with how well they have done - of course, now that I say this we'll probably have a disastrous trip home. But still, I must brag on them and say they are super duper travelers! Anyways....]

Paul is such a fun uncle. Julianna loved scouting the beach for sand crabs with him.


This was our view. Pretty nice, huh?


Our bungalow had a big porch and the entire front wall was doors that opened into a living room, dining room and kitchen.


The kids spent lots of time on the porch (the girls are modeling the swim suit cover ups I got made at the last minute before leaving home).


This is definitely one of my favorite photos - Matt and Isaac walking in the yard at our beach bungalow.


We're settling back into semi-real life, no more daily trips to the beach and pool and the girls are wearing sundresses instead of swimsuits. But it's not too tough - tonight we went to dinner with some friends and Matt enjoyed steak - a rare treat for him.

We have four more days here in Bandung before we head home. I hope to post more frequently, now that I have internet access again :)

Pelabutan Rata

We are here! Right now we're in the midst of a week long stay at the beach in West Java. (Side note: West Java is known for great surfing waves, beautiful beaches, sunny skies, and the world's slowest internet connection. Photos will have to wait til we get back to the big city.)

The kids are loving all the time with their Aunt Krisanne and Uncle Paul. Julianna and Lydia were holding hands with Krisanne as we walked out of the Jakarta airport! Each morning they wake up asking for their aunt and uncle. It's really fun :)

The place we are staying is pretty incredible. It reminds me of the Wheel House. But it's in Indonesia. And it comes with a full-time house helper. The helper is a man, which is a bit weird to me, but his main responsibility is meal preparation and clean up, and he cooks everything on the grill, and grilling is apparently a typical "man's job" here, so that's how a man ends up in this typical female role. Anyways, we eat grilled everything! Chicken, lobster, fish, shrimp. It is so yummy. Having a cook who does all the dishes is definitely the "cherry on top" of a pretty perfect vacation.

We are here for a few more days before heading back to Bandung, the city where Krisanne and Paul live. The road between here and Bandung is crazy. I thought I had seen a lot of bad roads in Asia. Now I've seen another one :) Matt accurately described it as "not quite wide enough for two lanes of traffic, yet somehow handling three".

Anyways, I can't wait to get some photos loaded of our time here. The mountains run right up to the coast line, and there are rugged rocks jutting out into the ocean in some places. Julianna especially loves the beach. She and Paul have been catching little sand crabs. And yesterday Matt and Julianna found a coconut which we managed to crack open and eat.

It's getting late and I'm heading back to the bungalow. Goodnight from Pelabutan Rata!

101 reasons to love the tailor shop

In the past four days I have visited two different local tailors for a few last minute travel goodies.

After seeing a friend's super cute Kindle cover, I decided to get one made for myself. You know, so while Matt watches the kids play at the beach I can kick back with a few good books. Didn't want my Kindle getting sandy :)

So I walked into this shop and explained what I wanted.


She let me pick through her scraps basket and choose the silk I wanted. There was a large scrap of jacket-lining material to add some padding to the silk cover. She charged me 70 cents. Perfect.

The next day I realized I didn't have three good beach cover-ups for the kids, so I headed out again. This time to the local "supermarket" where I picked up some 4 dollar light weight bath towels. Then I walked down the block to a different tailor, where I explained that I wanted them folded in half, a hole cut for the head, and the sides stitched up leaving room for arm holes. Total cost for his workmanship: 2 dollars.

They turned out great. The girls wore them around the house one morning, and now they are packed deep in the duffel bags, waiting for the beach.

I think sewing is a great talent. And I'm glad that our neighborhood tailors make up for my ignorance in this area. If we ever leave Asia I'll have to figure out how to do all this myself!

We're off to the airport in just a few hours! Next update from INDONESIA!

the travellers

This morning the girls played another round of "going on a trip". It is one of their all time favorite things to play.

I love that they play so well together, but I sometimes dread the clean-up from the various versions of the "going on a trip". They tend to pack a LOT of stuff, and the creation of the buses/airplanes/boats that they need for their trip usually involves some furniture moving.

Today "going on a trip" looked like this:


Later on I heard muffled voices and found them on the futon under a pile of blankets with the curtains closed, lights off, and a flashlight.

"I thought you were going on a trip" I said.

"We're going to America. But we have an overnight stop in Bangkok."

My gracious.

And just how many countries have our little travelers visited? Julianna definitely tops the list - Indonesia will be her 9th country. [This is legit countries visited, not airport transfers, but places where she transited through customs and immigration.]

(in order of appearance)
China
Thailand
Germany
Egypt
Syria
Turkey
the United States
Peru

She hit all those before her 6 month birthday. We've slowed down since then, and I'm hoping no one in our family has plans to hit 8 more countries in the next four years!

the pre-dinner entertainment

Waiting for poolside pizza delivery.....







Good times :)

packing up, heading out

I'm packing.

We leave tomorrow morning for a 5 day retreat, then come back home for 4 days, then head out again for two weeks in Indonesia!

It takes a bit of coordination to get this family off the ground. He he he. Actually, it takes a LOT of coordination.

In addition to loading up the gear, I'm trying to close down the fort here at home. It makes for some interesting meal combinations. Like the scrambled eggs and peanut butter crackers we had for lunch.

So, I realize this is random, but my head is swimming with last minute packing details and wondering when we will move our sofas in preparation for the carpet cleaners who come Monday morning.

Last night Matt and I realized that up to this point Isaac has spent his entire (10 month) life in one country. He's never left his country of birth. Beginning with next week's trip to Indonesia (including an overnight layover in Thailand) he'll start adding stamps to his fairly empty passport.

Sometimes it surprises me how much travel is part of our family's DNA. All three of our children flew at least once before they were two weeks old. Lydia flew across the Pacific when she was 4 weeks old. Julianna visited Thailand for the first time as a 6 week old. Isaac is definitely slow on the uptake, but he's got a few big trips on the calendar for this spring, so he'll catch up. Good thing he is approaching what I consider the absolutely most difficult age for travel (12-18 months)... holding Isaac on an airplane is similar to monkey wrestling. [Not that I've ever wrestled a monkey.]



Anyone got a guess as to how many countries Julianna has visited?

can I get a little help around here?

Can I get a little help around here?

And the answer is....... YES!

Julianna is super proud to be making her own bed! One morning this week she came prancing out of the bedroom and said "Mom, come look, I made my bed all by myself".

I walked into the kids' bedroom and this is what I saw. Needless to say, I ran for the camera.


We have never before talked about bed-making, and honestly, I pretty much assumed that she didn't even notice that I did it. But it's amazing what your children are learning even when you aren't intentionally teaching and training!

Julianna is such a little leader in our home. She might only be four years old, but she is one sharp cookie, and she's a HUGE help to me in a ton of different ways. Now I can add "makes her own bed" to the lengthening list of ways she lightens my load.

Of course, it's not all sunshine and made-up beds. I should definitely add that Julianna is perhaps the most-easily-distracted clothes changer of all time. In fact, this whole bed-making thing went down while she was supposed to be putting on her clothes for the day. It's amazing what that child will do when she's supposed to be getting dressed!

calculus?

I simply must record this, mostly so that when Lydia figures out calculus I can congratulate her on how far her reasoning skills have progressed since the early years.

Because right now, well, sometimes her reasoning baffles me.

I simply cannot convince Lydia to hold the sleeves of her shirt so that they don't get all bunched up when she puts on her sweater or jacket or fleece or whatever. Cannot. Convince. Her.

[Granted, I realize there are lots of bigger problems in today's world. And for a child who wears her panties backwards at least once a week, bunched-up-sleeves probably don't amount to much in the inconvenience department, but still.....]

Her logic? "I'm bigger now, so I don't need to hold my sleeves anymore."

Huh?

No amount of reasoning will talk her out of her stance. We've tried everything.

"Daddy is big, and he holds his sleeves."

"Watch me put on my jacket honey, see how I hold my sleeves?"

Even Julianna chips in.... "Lydia, I am 4 and I am big and I hold my sleeves. It's more comfortable."

She won't fall for it. She is convinced. She is "big". And if that means anything, it means that she certainly is not a sleeve-holder.

So how did I get the picture? Easy. "Lydia, show me how you used to hold your sleeves. You know, before you got bigger."

Like I said, calculus is going to be a bit of a leap.

book fest

What's one thing we just can't get enough of?


Books!


While Mom was here she did a lot of book reading and I enjoyed a bit of a break. Not that I don't like reading to the kids, but sometimes I get weary. And the girls have basically perfected the art of asking to be read to at the least opportune times. So I am switching laundry, or changing a diaper, or sweeping the floor and a little voice behind me says "can you read this to me?"

Sometimes I am glad to drop what I am doing and read. Other times, like if Matt is home, I'm quick to say "go ask Daddy" :)


And, like most book lovers, sometimes Julianna falls fast asleep with a book in her hand.

One thing I can't wait to do when we are in the States is GO TO THE LIBRARY! We've been blessed with lots of books here, but I think the kids first glimpse of a library might still be a tad bit overwhelming! So many books in one place :) We can't wait!

talking to Matt

We ladies love to talk to Matt on the phone. [Isaac loves to chew on the phone, which means we keep him at a distance. As soon as he hears Matt's voice on speaker phone he starts hollering and scrambling to get closer.]

We had plenty of opportunities to chat in early January when Matt was traveling.


The girls clamor for a chance to talk to Daddy and they always have plenty of very important news to share.

Then, after both girls have had their chance, its my turn to talk. You can probably imagine that Matt and I enjoy all kinds of nice long chats with this audience surrounding me :)


I seriously wonder what percentage of my day I spend within arms' reach of all three of my kids. I'm sure it's high. It's like I'm wearing a sign that says "everybody get really close to Mommy".

And to clarify about Lydia and the armadillo..... No, we have never seen one. They are not native to this area. They are mentioned in several of our books and kids magazines, but I cannot remember the last time Lydia and I talked about armadillos, nor have we ever considered buying a pet of any kind, and certainly not an armadillo. I have no idea where her comment came from. She's very creative and has a wild imagination. Obviously.