More Health Issues in Heaven on Earth

Okay Joel, this one’s for you!

And thanks very, very much to everyone who takes the time to read my dribble. I’m glad I am sharing this crazy experience with you. If only I could get smell-o-vision for the Internet. I’m sure there is someone at ESRI who can figure that out, right? Topographic information, temporal information, and now, how things smell,..(rhinographic information? Hola!) Anyway. I digress.

And thanks to Teri’s friend who wrote to me – I can’t respond directly because Blogspot keeps the information on who sends messages (But I KNOW WHO YOU ARE,.. Jim). Thanks for making my day!

Yes, I know I need to update more frequently, especially since I keep forgetting my password to edit this site. That is a sure sign I’ve been a big slacker in the ol’ keeping things current department.

Ah yes, spring. Or if you are an expat living in Indonesia, dry season. The mosquitoes seem to have gone away for the most part. The murky swamps that had overtaken empty fields between houses have evaporated leaving mounds of garbage and vast spaces for fort building by dirty little blond California boys (mine.)

Our efforts to become healthy keep getting undermined. I spent the last month attempting to get rid of a nasty bout of bronchitis that finally resulted in a plane ride to Singapore to get fixed. The lengths I will go to for a little shopping, eh?

We are very fortunate to have SOS health insurance. We’ve always had them in the past, but never used them. I’ve made up for lost time, calling them at every opportunity for Dengue, Malaria, eye infection and now this. If I weren’t living in Banda, I’m sure they would think I had some sort of Munchausen syndrome.

I did find it curious that we had to argue with the doctors about evacuating kids – they were ready to send the Lear jet down the minute I mentioned Jared’s eye was red when I called on the last round of “Guess who in the Richardson family has an infectious disease!” – but when I called about sounding like a gas furnace every time I breathed – for an entire month - and many prescriptions of antibiotics not working, all I got was a ‘Drink lots of water!’. Hmm,.. I know I’m not a nubile little kid. I realize I am a woman of a certain age. I do however think I have some worth to my family and they might want to see me fixed up. Instead, I felt like the British doctor on the other end was ticking off the box entitled ‘Send to glue factory.’

I tried getting fixed on my own. I started seeing various doctors; the first at a clinic next to our house. I took Rob’s engineering department translator to ‘run interference’ for me. Since I also brought a couple kids with me (foot fungus and coughing troubles, might as well get my money’s worth) we of course had the usual small crowd of looky-loos in the examining room. The male doctor apologized profusely for having to touch me but did the examination anyway.

As we were driving home, the translator asked me, “Do you feel like throwing up after you cough like that?” I answered yes. She agreed saying, “I remember right after the tsunami crying for hours and that made me want to throw up, too.”

Okay, WHOA! Not the same thing. I have a bit of a cough. Here is this amazing, resilient woman trying to draw a point of commonality between us. She is describing so matter-of-factly being in her family house on the second floor when the wave hits. Watching her mother and sister loose their hold and get washed away.

What do you say to this?

What do you say in your broken pig Indonesian when you are hanging out in the kitchen and your ‘janitor’ tells you about loosing her six year old child in the wave? She is so thankful that her family (one more boy who is 14 and a husband) were the recipients of a house from another NGO in the area. She is not angry and tells me how much she loves working at my house because of the kids. Oh, and she wants CRS to build her house now because CRS houses are big and her house is so small it doesn’t have a kitchen. (She’s bringing a letter to request Rob rebuild her house.)

What do you say when the man who is installing your new bathroom sink matter of factly lets you know his wife died in the tsunami?

My second doctor here in Banda was a lung specialist who spoke wonderful English. The translator took me to the clinic where the receptionist wrote my name down on a list, gave me a registration card that cost 6000 rupia (80 cents) and told me to come back that evening. I came to the clinic myself (Rob, serving as my driver that evening was charged with dropping off my work computer at the local computer store; it too had a bug).

The only expat in a sea of hundreds of Indonesians; I was terrified. It’ll take forever, I thought. I’ll actually finish this new Michael Crichton book I had to black market a kidney to afford at the Jakarta airport.

I found my room down a dark, dirty hallway full of people. Paint peeling off walls. Trash pushed aside next to the walls. Concrete floors and walls. Lo and behold, the man sitting at a little wooden desk outside the doctor’s office actually had my name on his list. He gestured for me to take a seat on a wooden bench in the hallway and wait my turn. I tried reading between little kids sneaking over and staring. I’d look up, smile and they’d run shrieking away. I know the haircut I got in Bali wasn’t the best, but really,.. (My friend, who we will call Michelle because that is her name, told me “You may be past the age where you can pull off bangs.” Ah, the French; so honest.)

Within minutes I was being seen. One of the first things this doctor said to me was ‘thank you.’ Thanks for coming to Indonesia and helping Aceh get back on its feet after the tsunami. It was so nice of him. Embarrassing, actually.

Then he evened out my karma by sending me on a scary adventure to have my lungs X Rayed in Banda Aceh at night.

He instructed me to go to the General Hospital and give them a little piece of paper in an envelope. I thought for sure Rob knew where the General Hospital was. He didn’t. First on the call list was my friend who happens to be the director of another NGO. He basically gave me a talking to for not opening a case file with SOS (I subsequently did) and refused to tell me where the hospital was because he wasn’t certain it would be safe. Next person on the call list was a local engineer from Rob’s work.

We found the hospital. Not easy; they aren’t as obvious here. Not many lights, not a lot of activity.

Walked in to the front area which happened to be the emergency room. People on gurneys crane their necks to look at us. Man in a white shirt says he’ll take us to radiology. He speaks English, has on a white shirt (white is an official hospital color, right?) We follow him. He leads us to an open hallway with mosquitoes, murky lighting and more peeling paint. He says a few Indonesian words to some people who seem very busy and tells us to wait. He disappears.

I’m beginning to feel like I am in all the horror movies I have ever seen. Hanging out in a run down hospital with people you can’t communicate with. I’m afraid I’m going in for an X Ray and coming out without an appendix.

It reminded me of getting my face X Rayed in Cairo (sinus infection there. Beginning to think I shouldn’t be living in these types of places.) While they had me draped in a lead apron about six feet away from me in the same room were a bunch of workers doing remodeling. And smoking.

All of sudden, the busy people started to lock up. Rob grabbed the last of them; a man with a plaid shirt who had a handful of keys. He tells him our plight. The man gestures for us to follow him. We start the trek back to the front of the hospital. Then, the man starts to walk across the parking lot,.. Away from the hospital

At this point I grabbed Rob arm and told him, “On Oprah they say if you are ever abducted never to leave the area where you were first captured.”

Rob gives me a weird look, but asks the man to stop and explains again that we need an X Ray. The man chuckles, nods and gestures for us to follow him across four lanes of traffic. No wait, this is Indonesia. No one actually travels in a nice queue,.. there are about seven lines of traffic including one for chickens and goats.

Rob tells me, “It’s okay. He’s got keys. He’s official.”

We play real life frogger and come to another little store front where there is a bevy of human activity and a big X Ray machine. I pay my money and wait my turn, striking up a conversation with a nice gentleman from the States who had some little chest pains and came to this X Ray toko to ‘have it checked out.’ I’m seeing white noise again. I want to dig in my purse and thrust all my rupia at him screaming, “Get out! This is your HEART we are talking about for God’s sake!”

I get my X Ray and the man in the plaid shirt with the keys turns out to be a radiologist who takes a look at the film and determines allergies are my problem. Very helpful. (Not)

By the time I’ve been through three more doctors in about two weeks and find myself in a lab trying to hack mucus up into a little cup in front of EVERYONE in the waiting room (I am FEMALE. I do NOT do those things. I also can’t burp the ABCs like the four men in my immediate family and I am proud of this.) I decide “UNCLE!” I sit in the truck and call SOS on the handphone and tell them I can’t continue like this anymore. I am sick of feeling like a martyr not caring if I live or die. I want to LIVE! I insist they find me a real doctor. They oblige and start the wheels turning to ship me to Singapore.

Which, as Paul Harvey used to say, is the “rest of the story.”

It's A Jungle Out There

Lest we forget, we are in the middle of the Sumatran jungle, now all I need is a good story about an Orangutan.



This is all from a local Aceh newspaper, translated into English from local staff, which if you don't find the articles humorous, you may at least get a chuckle from that.



Maybe this is why my copy for work has been lacking in the grammar department; I'm starting to speak modulated English,...

The elephants problems are reducing; Tigers turned to madness Jeuram - The actions of tigers in several villages in Sub-district of Seunagan, Nagan Raya are getting mad. The Chief of Pante ceureumen village, Sub-district of Seunagan, Nagan Raya, Alfiansyah said that for the last few weeks, the actions of tigers in this area have created the restlessness in the society. "Many villagers' livestocks were eaten by those tigers. We hope to the authorities to handle this matter," he said. Meanwhile, reportedly, wild elephant actions that has create the uncomfortablity among villagers in Bukit Jaya, Aceh Barat had been calmed down after a team from Natural Resources Conservation Agency (BKSDA) Aceh succeed to catch a male elephant. Since a year, the elephant caught by BKSDA team always disturbed villagers. Besides destroying villagers' farm, this elephant also destroyed dozens housed in this village. Apart from an elephant caught by BKSDA, there are still some elephants that have not yet been caught.



Locals caught a python Sigli - Villagers of kampong Panjau, Sub-district of Kembang Tanjung, Aceh Pidie found a python in a duck's cage. Locals who were sitting in a security post heard noise from chicken near the post on Sat (31/3) midnight. Then, they came to where the noise came from and they saw a python was eating chicken and locals immediately caught that snake. T Wahyudin, a local, said that this python has eaten four goats owned by locals. "This snake also has eaten locals' ducks and chickens. We predict this snake has its female pair, but unfortunately, its pair has been escaped," said Wahyuddin.

FORAK 2 - It ain't Woodstock

Last year, a FORAK demonstration at BRR (the local Indonesian government branch responsible for the reconstruction here in Aceh) took place over a two week period in September. With up to 2000 demonstrators, a riot broke out and the FORAK leader was arrested and thrown in jail. He is now out on the streets and will undertake another ‘notified’ demonstration this Monday. That means we’ll be battening down the hatches and not visiting the area near BRR. To give you a little of the drama from last year, here is a news article taken from AcehKita.com, (I'd provide the link, but it's all in bahasa Indonesian) September 20, 2006: (Thanks to Salmasteier for actually researching this information; I am doing nothing more than transferring data)

Banda Aceh, about a thousand of people who confessed themselves as tsunami victims last night (19/6) moved into Lueng Bata area. Last night, they even took Kuntoro as ‘hostage’. According to our reporter on the site the riot started when the protesters were forced to pull back by the police from the BRR compound. ‘Intifadha war’ then broke out. Police personnel chased the protesters. The Police were supported by their tactical vehicles equipped with water canon which were was used on the protesters. The Protesters blockaded the road of BRR with rocks and wood logs. People around the area then shut their shops and kiosks as they worried the protester might unload their anger. One car that was parked inside the compound was damaged. Roads were blocked by the police and the mass of people flooded in front of BRR’s office, they included women, children, and teenagers. Information received by Aceh Kita mentioned that it was organized by the Forak, Inter-Barrack Communication Forum, they tried to not allow Kuntoro to go home until their demands were fulfilled. M Yusuf the coordinator of the action said that in principal Forak’s demands were fulfilled by BRR such as: speed-up building houses, economy recovery. The Protesters also wanted the Forak coordinator to be part of BRR plus a financial incentive. According to Yusuf, the letter was signed by Kuntoro, however, they were not satisfied because they want the letter to be signed by both parties. “But BRR are disagree with it and still don’t see any middle way,” he said. “We are still want the letter to be signed by both parties, if its not happening, the crowd will stay and it is possible for mass will get larger” he said.

Banda Aceh, Director of Forak, Dr Raden Panji Utomo, main suspect of the organizer of rioting in BRR Office on Wednesday (19/9) has been reported as being in contact with police through the Chief of Banda Aceh Police mobile phone. In their conversation, Panji asks more time to prepare lawyer, and then hand over himself to police. “He has contacted me through my mobile, he will hand himself to police after he gets a lawyer,” Chief said. Meanwhile, six from eight people whose names are mentioned in the police’s letter has gone to police office for interrogation, as they were involved in the demonstration. Murniati, Darmawan, John Efendi, Pasmi Ilma, M Isa, and M Yusuf. “We’ve been called as the witnesses in that action,” M Yusuf said. However, there were seven supposed to be here, “one letter addressed to Irwandi we have no one named Irwandi but Irwan Jalil. But we don’t know which one is meant by them,” he said. Meanwhile, Chief Police of Banda Aceh, Zulkarnaen said that his side has questioned five people from Forak plus one from BRR. He explained that these people were questioned, as they knew what happened during the riot on the demonstration organized by Forak. Regarding Panji’s request to give time to prepare lawyer, Zulkarnaen told that police would do it based on the procedures. “He is not to be afraid to hand himself over to the police. The police are not going to do anything that people might feel worried about. The main thing is he needs to be responsible for his actions,” he said.

Keep the faith close, no closer, no closer still,...

There is a lot of tension in Aceh after 30 years of being closed off from the world. Many Acehnese are concerned about non Muslims coming into the area and evangelizing. In some instances it has been warranted, one faith-based NGO was kicked out of the area for distributing leaflets. (This happened before we came here). Maybe not such a bad thing; (I’ve contributed to this particular organization in the past), but they were specifically told that while the aid is welcome, the Amens, so to speak, are not.

It has gotten so bad that there are news stories about villagers finding ‘cross-shapes’ on candy and requesting that the distributors of these candies take them back. A bunch of fake Korans were found and confiscated, fearing that some Christian-based foreign group was trying to teach falsehoods. A group of tweeners pillaged their middle school when they found references to Christianity in their history books and requested that these Indonesian, printed in Jakarta (where there happen to be quite a few Christians) books be returned. (I guess history is in the eye of the beholder,..?)

As part of a faith-based organization, we are particularly sensitive to this. CRS, however, does firmly believe that there should be no strings attached to the aid and money that it generously donates. There is no weird flicking of the holy water or slipping a crucifix in the pocket that some might think happens at this Catholic organization.

Some actions CRS takes might be a little too much on the politically correct side (for me), such as CRS not distributing its annual calendar in the office, as it contains a biblical saying and might offend some workers.

Another NGO in the area (not faith based, just not-for-profit) had to put the kibosh on Christmas music being played at worker’s desks because it upset the non Christians.

CRS was also very careful to only put the chairman of the organization (a lay person) on the faceplate for the downtown park, fearing that the religious title of the actual director would be offensive.

So, in light of all this paranoia, this new problem really isn’t such a shocker. It seems that the chairwoman of a local kindergarten called CRS very upset because the design on the top gable of her school building looks like a cross in this year’s school picture. While this is only a gable and is the same color and material as the rest of the wall, the light catches this structure, and, since you know, the CRS name contains ‘Catholic’ and the money used to rebuild the school is from Catholic people, many parents have interpreted that CRS has started to evangelize. To minimize the situation, CRS is immediately helping get pictures back from the students’ families and put a piece of plywood over the gable.

This after the new mayor of the city of Banda complained that the roof of the park’s main building was too pitched, apparently similar to certain other architectural buildings, like, you know, churches. Forget the fact that Acehnese architecture very frequently has steep pitched roofs with gorgeous carved wood.

Well, what do you expect from an area where an ex-GAM member was imprisoned, was able to escaped from his cell after the tsunami and became the province’s new governor?

Tropical Diseases R Us

Ho ho ho and Happy New Year, err I mean Happy St. Valentine’s Day,.. no! Wait! Happy St Patrick’s Day! Whew! I might actually get this posted by then,...

We have survived another year and are in the midst of life changing events, with one kid turning 10 and the ‘baby’ turning one. I can’t believe we are old enough to have a child in double digits. I also can’t believe my ‘baby’ is no longer a baby, and she keeps reminding me at every turn. She won’t eat anything mushy; it must remind her of baby food. No one can feed her; she must do it herself. Her toys aren’t good enough any more; she wants the boys’ toys, especially if they have an ‘on’ button and require expensive software, have lots of small breakable pieces or can stain.

In January, a mother’s worst nightmare happened and the ‘baby’ contracted malaria. Before anyone freaks out, she is fine, she will be fine and she won’t have any residual problems from this infection.

The most frustrating part of this is I feel like we live in DefCon 4 already. We spray the house; we spray the kids; we keep the doors closed; we sleep under bug nets; we take anti malarial medication. What more can we do? I’ve instilled curfew, like any good dictator should. No going outside after 4pm unless mom puts you in a DEET dip. Believe me, the leaving option is in the back of my mind every day and I’ve threatened both my loving husband and the CRS director that I’m going to go off the deep end and move to Singapore.

I’ve been on Dengue Fever watch ever since the family we spent Christmas afternoon with came down with it, including all their house help. Every morning I ask about aches and pains, headaches, and I take the temperature of Drama King (Jared). Everyone has been fine. Amazing considering it is rainy season and the UN doctor here has confirmed 43 cases of Dengue Fever in the Expat community just during December.

Sabrina’s malaria happened just as I was returning from a luncheon at a friend’s house. I was on cloud nine, thinking how nice it was to connect with some other adult ladies, get out of my house, leave my kids for a couple of hours and relax. Not 30 minutes later the nanny rushes in with Sabrina telling me she is ‘panas’ – hot. Indeed, she is, and taking her temperature we find it is 103 degrees. I have a funny feeling and call the UN nurse who confirms my suspicion that we should take her in to see the doctor and have her blood tested.

Not two hours later we have a lab slip in our hands and are walking in the local hospital. I look at the sheet and see we are testing her for dengue, salmonella and malaria. My first thought stupidly is ‘Why are we testing for malaria? What a waste of time!’ (Thank goodness I’m not in the medical field, and I’ve learned to never trust most of my initial instincts, like ‘Renting movies? Who’d ever do that?’ and ‘Yes, we should buy stock in Sprint – it’s a real winner!’)

We come back an hour later; talk politely to the pasty, sweating Frenchman with multiple tubes sticking out of his hand, as he has just been unhitched from his IV in order to check his battle with Dengue.

The nurse comes out waving a paper and smiling. “Positive for malaria!” she says cheerfully as she hands it to me.

I always have the same response when something traumatic happens; I see white noise in my mind. Everything goes blank and I can’t think.

We sit for an hour in the UN doctor’s office as he doses Sabrina for what Rob calls the ‘shock and awe’ malaria treatment. No kiddy doses here in Banda, so he needs to figure out the proper amount of terribly toxic chemicals to kill the parasite that is invading my baby’s body. I am unbelievably not polite. In fact I’m downright bitchy as I take one look at the pills and written directions and then look sternly at Rob announcing, “You deal with this. I don’t trust that he has the doses right.” And stomp out of the room. It’s embarrassing how feral you become when your concern is your baby.

Remarkably, after three days, she is absolutely fine, as her second blood test confirmed.

The next weekend Kyle wakes me up at two in the morning complaining of a headache. I sigh and feel his head. HOT. I know already what the blood test will confirm in the morning; dengue fever. Three days later, Jared falls to the nasty little virus that has no cure. You just wait it out, drink lots of liquids and monitor fevers.

What some of my more nontraditional, less pampered friends call the ‘Banda Flue,’ I call a horrible tropical illness carried by nasty little mosquitoes. My friend’s son has also come down with it. We plot via SMS and the Internet to move our broods to Medan where they spray frequently, we have access to better medical facilities and can at least wait out this awful mosquito season. Our family goes so far as to visit Medan for a weekend, look at houses and tour the town. Each time I see the UN doctor he looks at me disgustedly and asks when we are moving to Medan.

Defcon 4 seems to be working again, since I had the Mentor Program NGO come back out and fog the yard, go through a bottle of bug spray a night and constantly bug spray the kids. We’ve had a nice R&R, we have another scheduled in 6 weeks and then the kids and I get to land back in civilization for a couple of months. I can handle this. Really.

I'm Goin' Ta Bali!

Well, we are off to Bali. Forget tropical paradise and mysterious temples. I’m just excited to go to a place where I can buy tampons and a good bra. Sorry to all you faint hearted men out there, but these are important items in any modern western woman’s life and sorely missed when they are not available.

I’ve been a good sport about making bread from scratch for every meal. My family has been very accommodating as well since I’ve found one recipe that works well in the Betty Crocker Easy Bake Oven. Whether it’s shaped like a biscuit, roll, hotdog or hamburger bun or breadstick, they all taste familiar.

I’ve also been happy enough to wear flip flops everywhere along with my jeans and long sleeve shirts in 90 degree humid weather. But a good foundation is necessary and now that the baby is weaned and all the ten pounds I’ve managed to get rid of since her birth seem to only be from my chest, something new is required. I’ll leave the other comment as it stands.

One other mystery of life I question before I sign off; why is it that even though Rob will only get to play one round of golf while we are in Bali, he has to take his golf clubs? Why can‘t he just rent?

Ciao!

House Turnover in Banda

These are pictures from one of Rob's house turnovers. It is such a great experience to witness this and you feel very humbled to think that these people have been living for two years without a house. You go to the community building where the village chief says a few words, the local Imam says a prayer, the keys are handed over and you have a little snack together. Women and men sit on opposite sides of the building.

Here is where some of these people were living.



Here is a brand spankin' new CRS house. Very nice.



Construction



Some happy kids at the house turnover.

Christmas 2006

Oh it's a slippery slope! Sabrina's first barbie and boy does she love it!


Santa DID find us!!



Counting the booty



The race to the 'tree' in Banda.

Christmas Eve Dinner Aceh Style

Thank goodness for great friends! Between hoisting forks to our mouths and phone calls to the office to figure out logistics for the floods in Northern Aceh, we had a great dinner together.




Sabrina enjoying her first big shin dig and sitting at the big kids' table!

Okay, it's been a month (or two) from hell, so my blogging has been remiss. To appease you, here are some images from our street. Here comes the icecream cart!




Laundry



After school snacks

Tsunami Recovery, CRS Featured on Morning Edition, NPR

NPR: Two Years On, Tsunami Recovery Lags Promises

Morning Edition, December 26, 2006 .

The Asian tsunami of 2004 killed more than 170,000 people in the Indonesian province of Aceh alone, washing awaytens of thousands of homes, schools and businesses. Two years later, reconstruction is underway, but the recovery effort is not as far along as many had hoped it would be.The provincial capital Banda Aceh is booming with new stores, restaurants and hotels. There's something else new -- and not at all welcome -- in this once-sleepy city: traffic jams. All of it seemed unimaginable just two years ago, says Paul Dillon, who is with the International Organization for Migration.

"I arrived two days after the tsunami and have been here ever since," Dillon says. "And I'm constantly amazed to see the extent to which reconstruction occurred. That said, there remain major challenges when it comes to housing and infrastructure, and those are going to persist for years to come."

Families Crammed into Small Barracks

A gaggle of children greet a visitor in the muddy courtyard outside their temporary home in the town of llokgna, several miles up the coast from theprovincial capital. It took just a few minutes for the tsunami to leave a half-million homeless in Aceh.

Two years on, some 70,000 are still living intemporary wooden barracks like this one. Entire families -- sometimes more-- live in a single 10-by-20 room. Marzuki, 28, is a fisherman and widower who shares his room in the barracks with two other families. He wants to get on with his life and start a new family to replace the one he lost, he says. But he can't -- not while he has to live in such cramped conditions.

"They tell me I have to be patient," Marzuki says. "But they won't tell me when I'll get help to rebuild. It might be a few months, it might be longer. They just tell me I have to wait."

The United Nations recovery coordinator for Aceh, Eric Morris, hears Marzuki's frustration. He says things should be better.

"I would say a B+ for effort, and something less in terms of actual accomplishments for stated targets," Morris says of reconstruction efforts.

Early Promises Proved Hard to Keep

No one disputes that the initial response to the tsunami was extraordinary,and extraordinarily successful. The reconstruction phase has been less so --in part, Morris says, because of promises made early on that proved impossible to keep.

"Many of the targets -- particularly with respect to permanent new housesfor tsunami survivors --most of those targets were probably unrealistic,"Morris says. He says there was an insufficient awareness of obstacles in terms of procurement, construction supplies, logistical constraints and other issues that have prevented early expectations from being fully met. Competition between aid agencies has sometimes gotten in the way of cooperation, Morris says, as non-governmental organizations rush to build houses with money generously donated by governments and ordinary people from around the world.

"There are different ways of going about rebuilding these settlements and these communities, some of them very effective and some of them less so," says the International Organization for Migration's Paul Dillon. "And as aresult, what you have is a mishmash of different qualities and styles of construction, and that can be very problematic."

The town of Peuken Bada offers a good glimpse into the progress and problems so far. Only a handful of buildings were left standing after the tsunami. More than half of the town's population was swept away -- 10,000 people gone in an instant. Pueken Bada is on the mend. Construction crews are busy rebuilding hundreds of homes, which have sprouted like mushrooms among the marsh grass and tidalpools near the shore. Some, built early on by a south African charity that'ssince left, are so small and poorly built that they sit empty, with residents refusing to move in. Others are bigger and better.

Waiting to Start a New Life

One of the people we've been following over the past two years is Mursalin. He is the proud owner of a new house. It sits just a few feet away from the crude, one-room shack he built last year on the foundation of his old house,which was swept away -- along with his family -- when the tsunami hit. Mursalin gives a tour of his nearly completed home, one of 200 built in Peuken Bada by Catholic Relief Services. It has two bedrooms, a living room and a bathroom -- more than enough space for Mursalin, his new wife andtheir 8-month-old son.

"We were supposed to move in a few months ago," Mursalin says, "but now they tell us there's a problem with the contractor."

Mursalin says he hopes they'll be able to move sometime in January. But Catholic Relief Services Aceh Director Scott Campbell says that's not going to happen.

"We're having certain issues with the contractors based on the houses they're building," Campbell says. "CRS [Catholic Relief Services] is committed to making sure that the houses we build are structurally sound. And when those quality standards aren't met, we have to take certain actions to ensure that contractors in the field are building to a certain standard."

Campbell says it could take five or six months more to retrofit the houses in question. Mursalin is disappointed but still grateful. When it is finished, he says, it'll be a good house -- better than many here. He just wishes it would happen sooner.

A New Home Worth the Wait

A few hundred yards away, another house is nearly completed. This one will be home to Samiruddin, his wife Rohani and their two children. We've been following this family since the tsunami first hit. When their house was washed away two years ago, the family fled to the home of Rohani's mother, several miles further inland. Samiruddin is nearly done building their new home, with materials and some labor provided by Uplink, a German NGO. It has taken a while, Samiruddin says, but the wait has been worth it.

"Our old house was a little bigger, but this one is stronger," he says."It's all concrete. And the walls are much thicker than our old house, or even those new houses that CRS is building over there. So I'm pretty happy with the way things are going."

His trucking business is going well, too; Samiruddin says he has more work than he can handle. Samiruddin's 11-year-old son, Yusran, is also eager tomove back.

"This is where I used to live," he says, "so I'm happy to be coming back. I'll be able to walk to school and play more with my friends who've also come back."

Yusran says he's no longer afraid of the water, as he was immediately afterthe tsunami. His mother, Rohani, is. She's been reluctant to move back from the beginning, and is no less reluctant now.

"I'm still afraid," she says, "but not really. I'm afraid in my heart that the water will come again. I know my husband and my children want to move back. But if it were up to me, we'd just stay with my mother."

But many survivors don't have a choice. They will continue living with relatives or in barracks for some time to come. Initial estimates put recovery time for the battered province at three to five years. Officials now say it may take a decade -- and even that depends, to a large extent, on whether a post-tsunami peace agreement between Acehnese separatists and the Indonesian government continues to hold. Most Acehnese hope it does. Between that decades-long conflict and the tsunami, they reckon they've suffered enough.

Christmas is Coming and the Chicken Turkey's Getting Fat!

Tomorrow is Christmas! Even our little corner of this island is starting to feel festive. We found a ‘tree’ at a nursery and that helped the spirit quite a bit. Then we found ‘chasing lights’ to put on the tree. Basically, your every day Christmas tree lights, but the package says ‘chasing’ instead of ‘Christmas’ here in Sharia land.


We made a couple of ornaments out of homemade salt clay. It’s so humid we had to leave them out to dry for days. After awhile you forget about them. By the time we remembered they were on the floor on top of a piece of cardboard, there were only a few left, thanks to Sabrina and the dog sampling them. So, whatever the dog and Sabrina didn’t eat we put on the tree.

I made a garland with some fuzzy white yarn left over from my never finished scarf I was attempting during Jared’s football practices, and some sequins. We cut out snowflakes and made an angel out of a toilet paper roll. Very high brow!

Then on to the kitchen. Christmas to me has always meant baking and cooking, but here with my Betty Crocker Easy Bake Oven and a house full of boys, I’ve realized I have to adjust my wants to meet my reality. In this household a few batches of homemade red and green playdough and some red and green frosting covered cupcakes fit the bill quite nicely.

I did have high hopes. I scoured the Internet and found a fudge recipe not requiring marshmallows (very hard to find and when you do they will put you back about $8 US a bag.) that turned out quite nicely. I did the cooked eggnog so as not to show up at tonight’s holiday party with a “Merry Christmas, would you like some rum with your Avian Flu punch?”

Rob thinks the eggnog is much better with the rum than without as it cuts the flavor of the UHT milk. I think rum makes pretty much everything taste better.

Tonight’s Christmas Eve party is all about not eating rice and rendang, but recreating the best we can the foods we are familiar with. I am in charge of the traditional if not kitschy green bean casserole. My friend who is hosting the party called me up excitedly to tell me a package from her sister in law just arrived and is complete with the Durkee French Fried Onions. Now that is the sign of a good Christmas.

Next is my traditional fruit salad inherited from my mother. She discovered it while living in Alaska when I was a baby. It has everything in it a grown up person isn’t supposed to eat; marshmallows, cream cheese, canned fruit. The story I got from her is it was so hard to find fruit in Alaska way back in the late ‘60’s they relied on the canned variety and spiced it up a bit. My thought is, if the cans of fruit cocktail needed ‘spicing up’ by being smothered with cream cheese and marshmallows, I question the intelligence of eating them in the first place. At any rate, now I’m addicted and I too must have the fruit salad.

I’ve replaced the walnuts with cashews, since there aren’t any walnut trees anywhere on the island. I couldn’t find the canned pineapple, but I did find a can of tropical fruit and picked out all the weird gelatinous white fruits so they wouldn’t mar my memory of the coveted fruit salad. Canned papaya? Fine. Canned chewy fruit de cacao? Nope.

I tried to make marshmallows. Twice. All I can say is it’s impossible with a cooktop that goes from hot to hotter, no electric mixer and no candy thermometer. My second attempt looked promising; the sugar water/gelatin concoction was starting to turn white and grow. But just as my shoulder was starting to burn from the frenzied fork whipping and I excitedly called Jared into the kitchen, the froth of sticky whiteness collapsed in a heap of escaped steam and I was left with sugary sand stuck to the bottom of the pot.

I don’t know what kind of chemical reaction happened in my kitchen, as I am an Arts major, but I won’t be attempting that again any time soon.

So, yes in the spirit of the holidays, I sucked it up, bought the $8 US bag of marshmallows and admitted I am no Martha Stewart.

The cupcakes took five hours since I could only cook about eight at a time in the Easy Bake.

It is kind of funny how much food matters, especially living in stressful environments. I’ve done this all before; boiled down enormous squash to make ‘pumpkin’ pie; snuck ham underneath my underwear in luggage destined for other Muslim countries; traveled three hours by hot van just to find spegettios for my children. I’ve thought nothing of going over the weight limit on the airplane if it meant bringing back a few extra jars of peanut butter. I’ve been known to pay $15 US for pop tarts.

That, I must say, is the true test of honesty in a relationship. Do you confess to your spouse that you were idiotic enough to pay that much for some lousy pop tarts? You’ve got to really love somebody if you allow them to eat a pop tart when they are $3 US a piece.

Our language instructor asked what we were eating for Christmas. I told him turkey, which translates to ‘kalkun’ in Indonesian. Here they call them ‘ayam kalkun’ which means ‘chicken turkey.’

This discussion of course digressed into the various types of chickens you have here on the island. You have the ‘ayam pudong’, which is the big, white chicken. (Know as the KFC chicken, or as I joked, the bule ‘foreigner’ chicken).

Then you’ve got the ‘ayam kampung’ – the ‘roaming chicken’ which here could be called the ‘garbage eating chicken’ but in more polite societies we’ll call it the ‘free range chicken.’

Then of course, you have your ‘ayam kampus’ or ‘wandering chicken’ which translates to the loose woman of the village.

At any rate, we’re happy to have found not only a chicken turkey, but a friend who does not have an Easy Bake oven. It is, after all, the simple things in life that make you happy. Merry Christmas!

Two Faces of the Season

Happy Holidays from our little elves!

Merry Christmas!!!
From the Richardsons
Banda Aceh, Sumatra, Indonesia

December 2006

This was so darned funny, I had to steal it from my Canadian friends, the Virginillos. Thanks Brenda! Of course, with a bit of a more American bent : )

For our liberal friends

Please accept with no obligation, implied or implicit, our best wishes for an environmentally conscious, socially responsible, low-stress, non-addictive, gender-neutral celebration of the winter solstice holiday, practiced within the most enjoyable traditions of the religious persuasion of your choice, or secular practices of your choice, with respect for the religious/secular persuasion and/or traditions of others, or their choice not to practice religious or secular traditions at all. We also wish you a fiscally successful, personally fulfilling and medically uncomplicated recognition of the onset of the generally accepted calendar year 2007, but not without due respect for the calendars of choice of other cultures whose contributions to society have helped make America great. Not to imply that the United States is necessarily greater than any other country. Also, this wish is made without regard to the race, creed, color, age, physical ability, religious faith, or sexual preference of the wishee(s).

By accepting these greetings, you are accepting the aforementioned terms as stated. This greeting is not subject to clarification or withdrawal. It is freely transferable with no alteration to the original greeting. It implies no promise by the wisher(s) to actually implement any of the wishes for herself/himself/others, and is void where prohibited by law and is revocable at the sole discretion of the wisher(s). This wish is warranted to perform as expected within the usual application of good tidings for a period of one year or until the issuance of a subsequent holiday greeting, whichever comes first, and warranty is limited to replacement of this wish or issuance of a new wish at the sole discretion of the wisher(s).

For our conservative friends:

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year

Belum, Tidok bericara bahasa Indonesia

Belum, tidok bericara bahasa Indonesia (No, I don’t yet speak Indonesian)

Jared, Rob and I have been taking language classes for the last few weeks. While I do feel like I am improving a bit, I need to accelerate the process. The worst part of the whole enlightenment of finding out what Indonesian words really mean is realizing how ‘Tarzan and Jane’ I’ve been speaking.

The second worst part is realizing that I’m getting old and it is starting to affect me. Case in point; I made flash cards for us in order to study. Rob and I were ‘flashing’ each other so to speak when Jared walked in the room. We made him join in on the game. The first round he didn’t know a single word. The SECOND round, he knew every one by rote. So unfair. Rob and I must have been 15 minutes into flashing each other 20 different words and we still got at least two or three wrong every time.

It would also take several seconds to figure out what the word meant. I have a terrible memory. Where Rob can remember his phone number from when he was seven years old, I’ve already forgotten my work extension back in the home office.

I also have to make weird, murky connections in order to remember any words. For example, in order to remember the word ‘to cook’ – ‘memasok’, I need to think of Michael Jackson, then I need to think of the song that has the refrain ‘mama-say-mama-so-mama-ku-sa’ stuff in it, then I remember the Indonesian word sounds kind of like that, then I mouth the Michael Jackson song until I remember the right word is memasok, not memakusa. By the time I say it, the person I’m trying to converse with has usually moved on to someone else who doesn’t act like they have some sort of mental problem.

Up there in my worst things about learning a foreign language top ten list is having several half learned languages (sometimes I think English is part of that pack) bouncing around in my brain; Arabic, French and now Indonesian. This has gotten me into trouble recently.

For some reason, as I was looking at a container of yummy UHT milk (ha!) I saw the word ‘bebec’ and assumed that word was for milk. In my mind it was the closest sounding word to the other ‘milk’ words I know, like ‘leche’, since it has that hard ‘k’ sound in it. Never did I think it was actually ‘susu’, which to me sounds like ‘sugar’.

We run out of milk one morning. I don’t have access to a car and I don’t feel like flagging down a bechek (sidecar taxi) to go to the closest semblance of a grocery store. Instead, I hoof it to the nearest little ‘toko’ (store) which in my neighborhood usually is made out of plywood and serrated tin roof. There is usually a light bulb in the shack and a dirt floor. There is nothing but the essentials; bags (yes bags!) of oil, cleaning liquids and water; bags closed with rubber bands (yes, bags with rubber bands!) of flour and sugar, two full isles of cookies and sugar crackers and big plastic jars of candies. I looked around for milk. No milk. So, I asked the store owner, “Anda mapunya bebec?” I think I’m asking for milk. He says no. I insist that he perhaps he does have ‘bebec’ and he has forgotten. He consults with a young guy, probably his son who brings me some margarine. “Tidok,” I explain. (“no”). “Saya mau bebec.” Again I think I’m asking for milk. I try and make it clearer. “Anda tahu, bebec, bebec chocolat,..” I think I’m telling him “You know, milk, chocolate milk,..” Finally I locate a little carton (in the shape of a bag!) of milk in his fridge and shake it in front of him. “Bebec!” He just laughs and takes my money.

It isn’t until my next language lesson that I find out I was actually asking him for a duck. You know, a duck, a chocolate duck,...I find this out in the middle of the lesson when I interrupt what our great teacher Benny is trying to teach us (“Oh yeah! And what is the word for,...”) I have Benny laughing so hard he is crying. He can not believe he is trying to teach bahasa Indonesia to some American woman who goes to a store and asks about purchasing chocolate ducks.

Benny takes a deep breath to gain control. He closes his book, clasps his hands and looks at me. “Now, Ibu Karen, what other words do you need to know?”

Pictures!

Pictures!

Wow, I actually exceeded the word limit of my blogger, so for those of you in the dark, the last two letters in the previous post were 'en.'








He looks too relaxed, eh? And this is day 1 of the Perth Park Tour 2006!















Yes, Sabrina actually has enough hair that she gets 'bed head' like everybody else!
















Just another crazy family ,... livin' the dream!























Here is Sabrina's snorky face - I keep telling her it's going to be hard enough to get a date with some hot highschool hunk with three older brothers and she should really not do the snorky-scrunch the nose up-and-smile thing, but she won't listen to me,... Or else she's practicing to replace Jack White's sister in the White Stripes band,.. maybe we should be listening to more Nursery Rhymes on the car radio,...















Okay, say it with me, "Wow! That's one fat Wombat!"

Apa Kabar? FAQ Number 2

Egads. I am way behind in my journaling, so I’ll just get you all up to date quickly and in random order, much like I live my1ife.

School

We have finally put the kabosh on the ‘endless summer.’ The school supplies made it out of Indonesian customs and I am in the midst of cramming 200 pounds of academics into the brains of Zach and Jared. We have completed day four. Yes, it is now November and we have only now been able to start school.

To complete the illusion that I do actually take the education of my children seriously, I am having playground equipment installed into the backyard. This required hauling one of the drivers to the steel shop to translate. Thankfully the shop had an order book and I could point at what I wanted; a steel merry-go-round, a rope climb and monkey bars. So far we have two of the pieces in the backyard. Now to find someone who has cement so we can ensure no small child is crushed while playing on the equipment,...

Otherwise the boys have been playing soccer with the guards and have taught a few of them baseball. Unfortunately, our front yard isn’t too big and the boys keep hitting the ball over our cement wall into the neighbor’s yard. Our neighbors are very nice; the dad is a becheck (motorcycle taxi) driver and they have four small children, so they don’t mind the balls coming into the yard. The problem is they have a flock of ducks and a duck poop swamp in their yard (at least during rainy season). The last time we ran over to get the ball we watched it float on the surface of the poopy water and then,.. sink. You can’t find baseballs in Banda Aceh very easily! We are now down to two. Needless to say, we are being very careful with these last ones!

Halloween

I now realize how American the Halloween holiday really is. No one else celebrates it. I scoured Autralian Kmart and grocery stores, and nary a chocolate eyeball, candy corn or orange and black M&M did I find.

Of course, this didn’t stop us from bringing the tradition to Indonesia in our crafty way. As usual, I didn’t pay any mind to the fact the lady selling me fruits and vegetables in the market thought I was absolutely crazy for buying seven pumpkins. I needed them for the party my friend agreed to throw for any and all expats with children who might like to celebrate Halloween.

There really is nowhere to buy Halloween costumes, obviously, so the boys were left to their own devices. Jared and Zach put on a huge football jersey and became a two headed monster. Kyle put on the dress up plastic knight armour and rode on Sabrina’s toy Zebra. Rob and I put on snorkels, masks and swim suits. Sabrina wore a pretty batik outfit Rob had bought for her before we moved to the country.

Since we don’t have a vehicle, we instructed the guard to flag down two bechecks to carry all of us, seven pumpkins, Halloween candy and the necessary camera equipment to the party. We were quite the sight!

The party was a success – my friend made home made pizzas, then the kids bobbed for apples (Kyle immersed his entire upper torso into the water bucket) and made ‘ghost’ shakes by painting scary faces on the inside of a glass with melted chocolate then filling the glasses with vanilla ice cream. Then the adults had ‘grown up shakes’ complete with fresh pineapple and contraband rum.

Each family got to carve a pumpkin, even though the Tajikistani family couldn’t really comprehend the significance. Rob, being the engineer, had the boys draw out their faces and then took loooooooots of time making sure the carving was an exact replica of the plan. Then, he got quite miffed when someone stole the top of his pumpkin and cut it to fit their own. Foreigners just don’t understand the horror of pumpkin top abduction.

Finally, we set up ‘trick or treat’ stations at all the doors leading to the outside of the house and attempted to explain the whole ‘trick or treat’ concept to people from Tajikistan, Pakistan, France, Indonesia, Australia and Japan.

For the actual Halloween night, we celebrated by having a scary dinner complete with ‘worms for brains’ (spaghetti inside an orange pepper carved to look like a jack o lantern) and chocolate cup cakes with gummy rats on top. The boys wrote scary stories during ‘school’ and read them by candle light after dinner. Maybe not the ‘bring a pillow case to heft all your candy back to the house’ trick or treating they’ve been accustomed to in California, but they had a good time!

Zach Turns 7!

We survived our first kid birthday party here in Banda. I am not a fan of kid’s parties. If I have my druthers, I’d prefer to buy the kid off through the copious purchasing of massive amounts of birthday toys. However, since deep down inside I know this is the wrong way to go about it, and the kids need to have face time with other kids, I orchestrated a birthday party for Zach.

Zach turned seven on November 5, so to celebrate we threw him a party. Can you believe we actually scrounged up eight other expat boys to invite to the party? We had them all come over to the house first and planned to drive everyone to the party venues.

We reserved a car from CRS the night before. What do they send over? Not the van we’d asked for, but a pick up truck. I met the driver in the street and instructed him to go and switch cars. Unfortunately, none of the vans had gas, so I gave him the equivalent of five bucks and had him go fill ‘er up.

Finally, with a van at the ready, we and one of the unsuspecting dads drove eleven excited boys to the local supermarket, ‘Pante Pirak’ where there is a ‘Funland’ in the basement. It’s a little busy on the weekends, so between Rob, myself and one of the other dad, we had our work cut out for us keeping a head count during the hour we were there.

Of course, upon arrival we realize we don’t have enough money to keep the kids going for a whole hour, so Rob is dispatched to the ATM. The moment he leaves, a mother’s worst nightmare happens; the power goes out! Total darkness and I’ve got eleven little boys spread all over Funland. All these parents trusted me not to loose their children and now this happens,.. Thankfully the power comes back on after a few seconds and after a quick head count I find I still have eleven little boys.

An Indonesian man sees our little group as I’m yelling instructions at the bouncing boys. He asks the dad who accompanied us if these were all his children and he tells him ‘yes!’ The Indonesian man winks at him and gives him a thumbs up.

After an hour of sensory overload and feeling like some sort of mafia don as I dole coins out of a bag to all these little boys, we drive to Pizza House and have lunch. The boys eat their body weight in pizza, sing happy birthday and eat the chocolate cake that has taken me three days to cook in my Indonesian version of a ‘Betty Crocker Easy Bake Oven.’

I found powdered sugar and made actual frosting, but then I decided to get fancy and color it green with some local food coloring I found. Unfortunately, the food coloring is also flavored. The green color happens to be melon flavored. Not too bad, but not the taste your American tastebuds are expecting. Half the kids like it and the other half don’t. At least the actual cake turned out okay and was edible. (not a small feat for me!)

Zach had his best birthday ever, as one boy brought him a couple of turtles and another brought him a BB gun. So, for a little boy who was crying in his bed a few weeks previously because there “aren’t any toys in Banda Aceh” and he “doesn’t have any friends,” the day turned out pretty darned good!

Now We're Cookin' with Gas!

Well, I have come to terms with my cooking arrangement. It basically consists of a two burner cooktop hooked up to an ominous looking bottle of gas and a small toaster oven affectionately known as the ‘Betty Crocker Easy Bake Oven.”

I have no cookbooks. I have no Internet connection, so I can’t readily go to a Web site and grab whatever recipe I’d like. I am able to run over to my Tejekistani friend’s house and puruse her recipe books.

I have no measuring devices either. In lieu of a measuring cup I use a baby bottle. Instead of real table- and tea- spoons I use whatever spoon I have on hand. Or, I use my favorite kind of measuring; guessing!

The only bakeware I can find that will fit inside the BCEBO are square shaped rickety metal pans. They do sell nice glass bakeware, but it won’t fit in my oven. It’s too long. This means the only breadpan I can fit in there is a mini loaf pan. Do you know how long it would take to bake a bread recipe using only one mini loaf pan? A long time.

Otherwise, I can bake square bread.

I did make bread the other day, and it was not too bad. Unfortunately it was a rather large recipe, requiring 13 cups of flour. (It’s the only recipe I had at the time, AND it had the double bonus of requiring squash. Since I had a few extra pumpkins left over from our Halloween escapades, I decided to bite the bullet and go for it!)

I had to send my nanny/’real cook of the family’ out several times to procure plastic rubber-banded shut bags of flour before I had enough. I’d measure out the flour in my baby bottle, fish in my purse for another few thousand Rupia and send her back out to the local wood-shed-with-serrated-metal-rooftop that constitutes a store. She’d look at me in wonder and say “Tapung lagi?!?” (More flour?!?)

I found a very large metal bowl where I put all this bread dough, draped it with an old hand towel that has now become a kitchen towel since I can’t figure out which little store sells towels here in this city, and left it to rise. I came back to check on it after hearing the dog growling and barking in the kitchen. I found the dog growling and barking at my rising bread. Now, if that’s not a sure sign that I don’t bake enough, I don’t know what is.

At any rate, I baked my squash bread and it was fine.

I have since made friends with a German man who has built his own stone oven and sells bread and pretzels. Much easier to send him a little text message in the morning and have fresh, warm bread hand delivered to my door. I’ve been on a pretzel and whole wheat roll binge for the past few days. Needless to say, I’m finding it difficult to live in a country that doesn’t believe in bread and cheese.

I am doing everything in my power to stay away from the little store on the way to Rob’s office that sells fresh, hot donuts in the morning for the equivalent of ten cents each. I don’t think the treadmill would like that very much.

I joked around with my friend who threw the awesome Halloween party that I was so excited to see frozen turkeys at the Boulee store and I had an idea that if I cut the turkey into chunks I could actually cook one for Thanksgiving. Then I’d feel like I was actually on an episode of the hit TV show “Lost” because I’d have to keep going back every 50 minutes to turn the buzzer back until the bird was cooked through. (She has since arranged a very nice get away on the island of Pulah Weh for Thanksgiving to which we are invited, I am sure if for nothing more than to save my family from the chunked turkey I was planning.)
After this experience I don’t think the Iron Chef has anything over me. I’d like to see him come and cook in my kitch

Richardsons Down Under

As those who have traveled with small children know, vacationing with lots of small kiddies is never ‘rest and relaxation.’ True to fashion, we spent just enough time in our hotel room in Perth, Australia to pee, shower, sleep and heal Zach’s foot that swelled up to five times it’s size due to some untimely fire ant bites he received by hunting tree frogs in our backyard the night before embarking the airplane.

We did the necessary ‘Go to the wildlife park to feed the kangaroos, pet the koala bears (koala bees, as Zach calls them, along with his spice monkeys and chimparillas, see previous post), and hold the wombat (truly not a beautiful creature even up close),’ then it was the RICHARDSON PERTH PARK TOUR 2006.

Yes, dear friends, we hit every green space, swing set, beach side, park, BBQ pit and anything else that had any sort of turf laid down in the inner and outer limits of the city of Perth. We were wind burnt, sun burnt, abraised by the salty Indian ocean, and if that wasn’t enough, we bought a windsurfer so we could really live the ‘weigthwatcher vacations’ that Rob is accustomed to when he travels with me. (He usually keeps his girlish figure while dining on heaps of awesome food and lots of fermented beverages by hefting luggage and carrying children – usually one strapped to his chest, one on his back and one on his shoulders. I can’t do this, since I’m the navigator, and I need my hands free to point.)

We met a truly awesome bloke Mark, owner of SURF SAIL AUSTRALIA, (http://surfsailustralia.com.au ) who not only let us borrow a beginner board and accompanying hardware, but came down to the river bank to show us himself how to windsurf. We even were able to purchase a couple of sails for the boys, all of whom have had their spins on the board, and are now interested in owning surf shops when they grow up.

Now, I did windsurf in my youth, but as usual, 20 years and about the same amount of kilos later, it’s a little different. It is kind of like riding a bike, as when you finally do manage to stand up on the thing, heft the sail out of the water and point the board in some random direction, something clicks deep down inside the grey matter and your muscles fuzzily remember doing something similar a long time long before. Unfortunately for me it was ‘Oh yeah, I remember I could only sail in one direction and I’d always get stuck and have to swim back.’ But never the less, we gave it the old college try!

One question I’d like the answer to is, where in the world are the other beginning windsurfers in Perth? For that matter, where are the intermediate windsurfers in Perth? As we were struggling by the banks of the river to hoist the sail and keep our balance on the big ol’ beginner board, about 100 buff, suntanned Aussies came popping out of nowhere, whipped out their styrofoam boards, trotted to the shore, put one foot on the board and one hand on the sail and away they went, to the other side of the river. Never falling. Never even getting wet when they set off on the board. I wouldn’t be surprised if some still had on their business suits, they were so confident they wouldn’t even need to touch the water as they twirled in the bay at breakneck speed.

We on the other hand had bloodied our feet and legs from crawling back onto the board after being knocked off every 30 seconds, had to pull the seaweed out of our hair and wring out our wet suits. By the end of our time on the board, Rob had given our ship the customary lady’s name starting with a B, and I can tell you it wasn’t Betty.

We have since brought the big B to Banda and continue to bloody our legs and give the locals quite a spectacular show.

Hmm,.. what else did we do? We did drink quite the nice brews, and I must say my favorite restaurant had beverages listed as 'beer' and 'not beer'. Now, that' s talking my lanaguage. We visited the wine country where Rob put his snobby Californianized nose into the air and pronounced the whites not worthy of his sipping since they weren't 'wooded'. I, on the othere hand, said, 'who cares, it's wine and not whine.' and left him with four kids to eat ice cream at the vineyard's cafe while I sampled away in the tasting room.

What did we enjoy about our vacation the most?

1. sinks!
2. Not getting our feet wet when going into the bathroom to use the toilet, brush teeth or hair, or anything besides taking a shower
3. Western food! Even mexican food tasted good in Australia.
4. No mosque calls to prayer in the middle of the night.
5. The right for me to 'bear arms'! No high necklines or past the elbows shirts for me for 10 whole days! Yes, I was flashin' the clavicle in public again.
6. Power all the time. You could turn on a light switch and expect,.. light!
7. Water! Water to drink out of the faucet, even! The sacriledge!
8. The ability to buy alcoholic beverages without feeling like I was fakin' my age. Although it did make me feel like I was once again crossing the border to B.C. during college in order to consume legally,..
9. Being able to wear an actual swim suit to ,... swim.
10. Hanging out with daddy for the whole time.