Getting to the end

Its been really busy around here lately as I'm rushing to finish stuff before I'm gone. I recovered nicely from the sickness and never ended up going to Bandung, which is ok. I ended up going back to Jakarta on saturday with Daniel. We went to a pretty westernized, upscale mall to kind of hang around and eat some lunch. It was the first time in months I've eaten raw vegetables in a salad format. It was good. I even had a bite of peanut butter and jelly yesterday and it tasted damn good. I'm not even a big pbj fan.

Andrea and I also went with Daniel to a traditional market where they were selling all manner of things. I bought one of those awesome rice hats that the farmers wear and wore it home. I'm very excited I got one as that was one of the priorities of the trip. Beyond that, I went to karaoke with the bros, this time taking home the high score. Take that amateurs. My mission not to eat western food is in shambles. In my quest not to eat anything remotely sketchy this week, I've twice been forced to eat at Mcd's. Its not any better here than it is at home.

I also did some shopping. I don't like shopping but the prices at the outlets are simply too good to pass up without picking up a couple things.

On Wednesday, I went with Rizaldi to the other campus of IPB. The bigger one where the majority of students are. The campus is very nice, with lush grounds. Not terribly well maintained, but very lush. All the buildings are open air, which is kind of cool. Some rooms have AC.

A center patio inside a building.

After my presentation Daniel took me over to this environmental event. There were white people. It was weird. I guess they were european mostly. I stayed to watch the first speaker who spoke about food source diversification. He was right on with all of his points. Indonesians eat too much rice and not enough vegetables and tubers for optimum health. At one point this old guy raised his hand and started ragging on the government which was awesome. I guess the government was mad about the international conference being held in English? What other language are they going to hold it in? The international conference of Indonesia in Bahasa?

More grounds. Many of the buildings appear to be pretty new. Nice campus. Still get lots of looks and greetings from people even on campus. Pretty fun. They also have lots of vendors on campus giving out free stuff. The greenfield farms ladies were handing out free chocolate milk.

Classrooms.
While at the outlets I happened upon this gem. First loon, now waterville valley. You can rest assured that if I find sugarloaf gear I'm buying. Btw, Kendall if you are reading this. DC gear is like $7. I'll go steez for steez with you when I get back.

Today I just had a training session with people from the office and a few others about using CPT (climate prediction tool). I'm pretty sure I bored them to death but thats ok. CPT bores me to death too so I'm just sharing. I axed the part with my data generation tool, that was too much for one day. My presentation followed Andrea's who already bored them with using an index insurance calculator.

Leaving to hike the mountain tomorrow bright and early. I'll be gone for a couple days, but I'll have pics when I get back.

Redux, Puncak and Sick

You might think that I'm just recycling old posts during a slow news cycle, but you would think wrong. Last Tuesday night at around 9pm the guys asked if I wanted to go hang out in Puncak and drink a few beers. I needed to be up for a 7am departure but I'm not one to miss out on a nice Anker or Bintang. The bros insisted it would be very cold up there, but I resisted bringing along a jacket. It was cool, but hardly anything out of the ordinary for a summer night.

Here is Moo freezing his butt off and hoping the small whisper of heat in his cigarette will warm him up. (didn't work)

Here is Arga with a slightly warmer article but not having any more luck staying warm in those freezing upper 60's temps.
Ronal doesn't need a jacket because he grew up in a high elevation city where it gets cool. The new guy is Claudio, visiting from North Sulawesi.
We could see the lights of the city stretched out below us and a crisp breeze blew up the mountainside. A number of other people were there with us enjoying the evening. Unfortunately, there are no garbage cans in Indonesia and there doesn't appear to be a culture of picking up trash and taking it with you. This is the tea field below the overlook. Sad.

The next morning I got a wake up call from Andrea, but I decided not to go to the World Bank meeting because I wasn't feeling so hot. I hoped perhaps I just hadn't gotten enough sleep. By 9am my fears were confirmed and I spent the day doing the toilet shuttle run. Fast forward to 7pm and things were not getting better. I was also starting to get dehydrated, so I made the call to see a doc. This time they were a little more concerned, perhaps since I was a repeat patient and they gave me an IV to pump me back up and a regimen of medications to put me back on my feet. I'm currently in day 2 of the banana, rice porridge and oatmeal diet and I think its about time I got back to some normal food. In any case, I can't get sick again so it looks like maybe a lot of western food in the next couple weeks. Bummer.

Puncak at last

The last week has been pretty quiet. The girls are in the districts and I'm hanging out at the office chugging along on my modeling. It seemed that half the office was gone, so this place has been like a ghost town. I spent a lot of time hanging around with the bros. I also learned something very important, that I should have figured out from the start. Eat where the locals eat. This is more important here than in America, since there are seemingly no health inspectors. Since I figured this out, I've been eating only where recommended by Ronal or Gito. This has been huge. You can't just walk into any old roadside tent and expect decent padang.

On friday night we held a little celebration in favor of Wesley's birthday. Happy 21 wesley! Naturally, we upheld the "#5 Taman Malbar official birthday tradition" by tying Wesley to a telephone pole, pelting him with eggs, then pouring water all over him. We also came up with a new idea to put him in a big bag and pour water in. Here is all of us after bagging wesley. Hardly a fair fight. Its a careful match of not getting tackled by an eggy wesley but also getting close enough to bag and/or pour water on him. Good times had by all.

Saturday was mostly uneventful. I believe I went to the grocery store and perhaps took a nap. However, on saturday night we went to a karaoke place, asian style with private rooms. I knew this would be a tall order as Indonesians love to sing and I was with a very musical crew. Despite a rough start I briefly held the high score until Yoga brought down the house with this number.

Ronal and I belting something out. This was the dream team combo until the aforementioned Yoga/Wesley duet.

The next morning at 5am it was finally time to make a run at Puncak Pass, the mythical cold tea plantations in the mountains. While it was tough getting up early and 45 min each way on the motorcycles made me a bit sore, puncak was worth it. Its a very beautiful area high in the peaks. Most of the rolling hills are cultivated with tea.

It was hard to say how cold it was at 6am. I was in short sleeves and briefly wished I had long sleeves before I thought better of it. It may have been in the upper 60's? Hard to say, but the Indonesias were dressed for this bout of extreme low temperatures. Beanies, jackets, gloves.
Here is me at one of the overlooks.
Here is Ronal and Eric on a "tea walk" to watch the sunshine. I'm embarrassed to say I was out of breath after that short jaunt uphill. This does not bode will for my 2 day hike in 2 weeks.
Looking back towards the road.
They will plant tea anywhere. No slope is too steep. Although with 4 feet of snow these tea fields would ski nicely. Below is a good example of the roads. (Not pictured: motorists ignoring traffic laws)
Waiting for sunrise with Eric and Reza.
Sun starting to come over the ridge with Mt. Iforgotthename in the background.
The reason you have to come this early is because the traffic is so bad by 8 or 9am. By then this road will be stopped traffic and bumper to bumper. It also can get brutally hot on exposed slopes later in the day.
Tea-time, pointing out something interesting in the distance.
An example of the peaks nearby. They were capped by on again, off again fog banks.
More tea. Its quite the operation they have going on up here with roads for trucks, motorbikes and footpaths criss crossing the hills.
Ronal leading us to the "extreme" route down. It was intense.
Sun finally revealing the eastern slope.
We took off down this dirt road for some breakfast and a great view. The breakfast was strange... Ginger tea soup stuff that was sweet, spicy and gingery at the same time. It also had some sort of neon pink gelatin fruit, soggy bread and nuts in it. I'm glad I tried it but I didn't want another bowl.
The lookout spot, populated with young couples.
Reza scoping the gnar in the distance.
Hanging out at the lookout. That cool pack I have is courtesy of Eric. Thanks pal!
On the ride back at about 10am we watched the endless traffic jam going in the other direction. Why anyone would even try to go at midday is beyond me. We also stopped to try some red cassava which I was suspicious about, until I realized that it was just baked yams. mmmm....

After taking a nap for the afternoon, I woke up and played soccer with the guys. Nobody was too sharp after not playing in a month but it was a lot of fun anyway. I didn't massively overheat myself which means I am adjusted to the temperature.

After the game we went to this place to grab some mie ayam bakso. Literally noodle chicken meatball but its different than it sounds. Again, listen to the locals and eat what they do. The food was great and cheap. This is pretty typical of one of these roadside tent/restaurants although this one is bigger than most.
All in all, a great weekend with the bros. I should have listened last weekend when they told me not to go after 7am or so. The sunrise is also very nice and the place loses some magic the later in the morning it gets.

Here is Eric, very excited about the sunrise.

Jakarta again, more Bogor

Not many updates lately as my internet has been intermittent. My plan has expired but somehow I still have access, although I have to connect 3-4 times before it goes. I've also been busy at CCROM. I've realized I only have 3 weeks left to finish the myriad of projects I'm on. I have enough work to last me through this time next year, but I'm just going to have to ax about 80% of what I could do.

I did get out of the office this week to go to Jakarta. Every time I go there it gets worse. Hotter and smoggier. As usual it was humid, 95 and like breathing two-stroke motor exhaust.

I was there for a couple meetings, one with FIELD Indonesia and another with BMKG the Indonesian weather service. The meeting with FIELD went alright. I was pretty tired from staying up to watch the semifinals so I don't remember much of this meeting. It wasn't really important for me anyway. All I really recall is that they were talking about running a climate field school where they teach the farmers to measure crab hole depths in the sand to tell when the rains are coming. At least they were on the mark when the mentioned that when they do anything with the government, they get out about half of what they paid for so they try to avoid the local officials. (smart move if my experience in Indramayu is any indication). While waiting an hour to take a train across town we sat and enjoyed the overpacked trains roll past with indonesians sitting on the roof, hanging out windows and jammed into doorways like sardines. I also took a stroll through a traditional market. They sell everything there, chicken heads, fish, furniture, toys, tissues, school supplies, car parts, you name it.

During the afternoon we met with some nice fellows from the met agency. They aren't running a too sophisticated system when it comes to climate right now, but they are expanding and getting better quickly. Climate only became one of their main missions in the past year. I got quite a bit of information from them on what they use to make their monthly and seasonal forecasts. They were also receptive to some feedback we had about how well their forecasts were making it to farmers. (hint: not well)

Later in the week the skies cleared up around bogor to expose this magnificent view. The colonel really likes it too. I never knew this mountain was there between the fog, clouds, humidity and smog, but I guess it all came together on this morning for a great view.

Front of the IPB building.

Traffic with mountian.
IPB lawn with mountain.

Stew rabbits.
This weekend I attempted to go to Puncak pass, a high elevation area with a lot of tea plantations. Despite being warned, I decided to go anyway. Bad idea. After 2 hours of sitting in the corner of a minibus interspersed with walking we gave up the mission. 2 hours of tailpipe breathing and heat exhaustion. We made it about 2 miles out of the 15 we needed too. Just too much traffic. I've never seen traffic like this, its just stopped for miles and miles. Its not an accident, its supposedly like this every day. It took me 2.5 hours to go 30 miles from jakarta to bogor a few weeks ago. Upon returning, we decided to just go to the pool. Daniel's aunt has a membership at a club, so we tried to detox there. The pool was quite nice with 2 little islands in the lagoon and a waterslide.

To get there we paid some guys who weren't doing much to take us there on their motorcycles. It cost a buck. It was pretty fun winding through the streets of bogor.

On sunday I played some soccer with the bros and hung around. Walked to the outlets that are selling super steezy jackets and pants for 20 bucks and designer jeans for $5. I might have to swing by there before I leave and stock up. The selection of everything is extensive. After that I put 2 bottles of beer on Spain and won. Thanks Ronal!

Jakarta and Taman Mini

This weekend I went to Taman mini, which is an epcot center type thing in Jakarta. It has a building from each of Indonesia's 34 provinces and a pond with man-made islands in the shape of Indonesia. I went with Daniel, his sister Monica and Tamara. We stopped by Daniel's aunt's house before going and lo and behold... Two maine licence plates! His family is have worked at diplomatic missions around the world and were in the United States for awhile. That is one thing I never thought I would see in Indonesia. Nobody knows where Maine even is.

We took a bus to Jakarta. There were no seats left on the "air-con" bus so we just stood in the aisle. That is normal here. The bus also doesn't stop where we (and half the bus) needed to get off, so during a big traffic jam, you just open the door and jump out of a moving bus then try and avoid traffic as you run to the side of the multi-lane road. I guess it is a bus station but busses don't stop? The crowd of people here are in the middle of the road and are either getting on or jumping of moving busses.

We then hopped in with this wild-man. He is supposed to be driving a specific mini-bus route but for a extra 50 cents or so you can just charter the whole bus and he will drive you where you need to go. He keeps his wad of bills in his hand at all times. He told Andrea that she was very beautiful but hadn't paid attention in school so he couldn't say it in english. Stay in school kids unless you want your day job to look like this.
This is inside Taman Mini. I believe this building is from a provence in Sumatra.
This is some intricate carving on a wall inside the Kalimantan building. Several of the buildings were on stilts 40 feet in the air with a ladder carved out of solid wood. They put them up that high because some houses are built in swamps and its too high for the tigers to find a way in.
This is me in the Papua tent with a statue of a native warrior. As you can tell it was REALLY hot in Jakarta. By the end of the day I felt ill and dehydrated from heat exhaustion despite drinking a lot of water. Brutal. I can't survive in Jakarta beyond a few hours.

This is Andrea, Daniel, Monica and Tamara sitting with me for lunch. This low table and rug-seating is pretty standard, but not very comfortable for me as I am far to big to fit near the table.
They also happened to have a gondola you can ride around in. It doesn't go anywhere and would probably be put to better use at Sugarloaf. In the background is the Magic Kingdom. Oops. I mean the children's play castle. I resisted the urge to go in and get my picture taken with the Princess.
This is the pond in the middle with the man made islands. Papua is on the left. The cluster of small ones in the foreground is Maluku, with Sulawesi and Kalimantan on the right and Java in the back left. You might be able to make out Sumatra in the distance.

Here is Blizzard Beach. Oh... I mean Snow Bay. I have to remember to get these names right.

After recovering from Saturday, I took a lazy 4th of July, played a little 1v1 with Ronal and prepped for the BBQ. This is Mo-Mo and Ronal playing. Earlier in the morning I collected my laundry which was delightfully cleaned and folded. $1 for laundry service. Done. After the laundry I took a stroll through another section of town with streets about 3 feet wide and houses built on really steep hillsides. Nobody there spoke english and it was a bit less well off than other areas but it was a lot of fun. There are great views of the city and you can get lost in the little streets. People were very friendly and kept trying to give me directions back to Bogor but I wasn't lost. Eventually I made it to some farmland. It reminded me of favelas in brazil but without the crime. I forgot my camera but I will go back and get some pictures.
The BBQ worked out pretty well. It took some getting used to; cooking with coconut shell charcoal but we had a small crowd (10-20) who celebrated the 4th of july. The hot dogs here are red so it made me feel right at home. Ronal brought his guitar and like every Indonesian party, singing commenced for a couple hours after dinner. Oh yea, there was also a huge snail (6in long) that celebrated with us. I briefly entertained tossing it on the grill but decided against it. Would have fit in a bun perfectly. Good times.

Edit: Found a picture of the BBQ. Andrea put it on her blog. As a disclaimer, this was after a particularly frustrating 30 min with the coconut charcoal.

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_xLLykiXWqU8/TDG0FQ1L-3I/AAAAAAAAAIM/gu3VwwGg1OQ/s1600/IMGP1045.JPG

Finally, Gumati Cafe

This place is like El Dorado. We had heard about a nice restaurant overlooking bogor from several people and had set out on an expedition to find it Tuesday, only to turn back due to poor weather and eat at Texas Fried Chicken. We had a map from Daniel and the correct Angkat (minibus) route to take, but we still could not find it. On Thursday we set out again determined to find it and meet Tamara and her friends there for dinner. We found it and I guess we turned back about 10 yards from the parking lot on Tuesday. But the rain was coming down in sheets and it was dark and we had our umbrellas pulled low.

The view was quite nice from inside, overlooking the city. I ordered a triple lobster for 6 bucks although the lobsters were like half pounders if that. I was also surprised to see that they grill lobster here instead of boiling it. It tasted as well as can be expected of a non-Maine lobster. Certainly better than some funky clawless rock lobsters I've eaten elsewhere. I guess they catch them around the island of Sulawesi here. They looked like real lobster, only smaller, and almost had the right taste, just not quite sweet or tender enough. I also had a spicy deep fried corn blob that was pretty tasty. Decent meal.

We also met some brits in the restaurant who were not at all interested in talking about the world cup. They had come to bogor to interview Peter O'Brien, a british guy who starred in a number of terrible 80's Indonesian action films. I guess they are cult classics now in the UK. These guys run a website about the films and they were getting footage for that. They hoped to show the interviews before a screener of one of the old films in London. On another note, one of the guys used to travel with Insane Clown Posse (music group) and he spent some time in Detroit with them. I bet he has some stories from those days. They were in an epic mission to find a bar so we directed them to one locally. They couldn't believe it was so hard to find a beer in Bogor. Its pretty tough unless you know where to go.

Back at the office today... might plan a 4th of July party sunday with the bros.