Mosquitoes

I forgot that I was back in mosquitoes infested area until I saw fresh wound on Tamara's ankle.
and then I began noticing that almost everyone had insect repellant and even o they have been bitten. poor things.
I think the mosquitoes know I am almost local (read : they will be dead if I caught them partying on my blood)
anyway people, black attracts mosquitoes so wear light coloured clothes and yes, please apply insect repellant. and if you still got bitten, do not scratch. I know from experience that it itches (stm like hell) but if you start, you cant stop and scars arent exactly the thing you want especially when you are a girl/woman.

Fruit

Part of my childhood was filled with waiting with cousins under the mangosteen tree for my older cousins to drop the mangosteen (or the empty shells) down, or eating young mangoes dipped into the super hot dip, or slurping fresh young coconuts on the beach or chomping down rambutan. oh yeah and feasted on durian with my family. That's the most tropical we can get on Penang island.

But Jogjakarta is wonderful. wonderful I tell you.
they sell salak (english name is snakefruit) by the roadside. and them people bought the fruit so we all get to taste it. yums!

err, excuse her, u dont eat salak with its skin. hihi. credit : organizer

and they have free flow guava juice anddddddd soursop juice. soursop. this one fruit is very hard to grow from where I come from.

soursop. credit : Mr Google

and whenever I drop by the supermarket when I was in Jogja, I wish I could spend more time ogling the produce section and the juice section. Jakun mannnnn.
Who wouldn't be when the fresh produce sells melons, papaya, guavas, machang or whatever it name is (it's the sibling of mangoes) and maaaany moore tropical fruits at a fraction of the price that I can get in Europe or in Penang even.
I am in heaven I tell you. in heaven, until I realise I have no chopping board nor knife.
so I proceed to sway away in front of the chilled racks. rows and rows and rows of fruit juice - pink guava, white guava, mangoes, litchi, soursop... and yes, nata de coco. since I cant eat much during farewell dinner due to the kebaya (never wearing that to dinner again!) and everyone is busy taking photos and dancing, I went to fish almost all the nata de coco in the fruit cocktail bowl and savoured it in.

Imagine eating nata de coco and watching flamenco. in warm Indonesian evening someomore. credit : Vini Chumaira

nata de coco, tu me manques!

Food

It was Ramadhan during the programme and food was awesome (ps : I am Asian so I may be biased)
Breakfast and sahur is on the house.
Sahur were always full Indonesian meal. and I mean rice everyday. with 3-4 dishes and soup of the day and cuts of tropical fruits. and yes, the krupuk was always there. The only thing you have to do is go down before Subuh. and subuh was at 430am. way later than subuh in Czech republic (half past 2am).

Breakfast was Western (well, I could not be sure about this because I have only been to breakfast once). one selection of bread - loaf, superwhite and crustless. sobs. and if I remember correctly there was a little bit of Indonesian food at well. perk of breakfast is that you can order your egg anyway you like it (again, I couldnt be sure about this. but you can try your luck and ask for egg benedict *wink*)

Before lunch, we were given mid morning snack. I call it my happybox/treasure box. My tummy was always giddy at the prospect of having them for iftar. there are 2-3 savoury and sweet Indonesian snacks inside These snacks are delicious but a hassle to make yourself. plenty of them by the road in SEA but is too exotic for European market (read : not sold in the Europe)
and since lectures are sleeping pills, there were always sealed cups of water (you drink it through the tiny straw that u stab through the plastic cover) and freeflow coffee (I so know just the very person who will be happy to have free flow coffee)

Lunch was always boxed.

Lunch. and look at how beautiful is their faculty.

the thing I noticed when I was in Jogja is that they tend to put every single thing into every single package. I find it inconvenient but they saved my happy box contents when I dropped my happy box, so I was happy.
Well, one thing you must be reminded is that 90% of the time you are in the programme, you will be eating rice. unless you are a true blue Asian, you will definitely miss the bread/potato/pasta. I had no problem because
1. I am an Asian dunked into European
2. I always share my lunchbox with the ants. it seemed that they always get there first before I do (I had lunchbox for moreh.hihi)

apart from rice (obviously), the lunchbox contains 2 dishes, 1 vege dish, krupuk (krupuk is everywhere), a piece of fruit. once or twice we had sth else ie spaghetti

dinner is the only meal we have to pay and you can opt out of it.
almost all of us always go to dinner
and almost all dinners were at posh places (it was not fine dining so you dont have to worry about dressing up for dinner)
I would say that the average price every evening was 40k-50k rupiah. that is 3-4 euro. which is dirt cheap by European standard and since I am Asian, I had to sell mukerna to repair the hole in my pocket

predinner ritual. translating the menu. I needed help myself sometimes. Indonesia is so diverse.

happy tummy after dinner. p/s : Pecel Solo is number 1 restaurant. I super like their decoration.

Taman Lampion

We had dinner at another posh place i have no pocket left after this programme. they have been burnt i ordered the whole gurame (that is ikan kaloi for my fellow Malaysian) that comes with hot sauce and since I am Asian, I called for rice after a few spoons of only fish. and lalapan segar (that is fresh ulam/green for you guys).

and after dinner we went to Taman Lampion. It is a place full with lanterns.

and by lanterns I mean those that look like this

Cool right?
We basically had the place all to ourselves.

It felt more like an eerie theme park at first but 2 rounds on the trampoline erased that. yeah only 2 rounds or else I would puke out my dinner on that thing.

some went for the closed trampoline. man, they are good. backflips and all.

there was a band playing to nobody in particular and after much hesitation, I joined Sophie dancing under the stars. Too bad the band doesnt know that much english songs (you can request song from them). and not long after, the dancing lesson took place 

oh yeah, some of us raced on these. the perk of having the whole place to yourselves.

and after we walked around the park, I jumped on these out of the blue and we raced with it. Indonesian students are crazy bunch, never a quiet moment with them, which is good.

I would want to go again on the trampoline but the park was closing. yeah, we stayed until it's closing time. so we made our way back to UC.

P/S : all photos are from Chris collection. good stuff!

Water Rescue

we knew we are going to have a water rescue session but I have no idea we are going to have it in Indonesia's RAF base! yes, Indonesia's royal air force base. Well, to me, soldiers (army, navy, RAF) are not civilians, in a good way of course. they are different bred and it is a very rare chance to see them in their element in their own ground.



anyway, we got to the swimming pool. I blame the years spent scrubbing pool and pouring chlorine - let just say that apart from not getting myself into the pool, I tried to not touch the water.



It is a bummer though, because the session was really good. I have never participate in water rescue because me dad's certified in water rescue. the instructor instructed in Indonesian and Yana's translated for him. then a bit of warming up before jumping into the pool for a majority of us. I learned from dry land and did a lot of people watching after that from the platform. it was urm, very interesting.




We retreated to the mosque for Zohor and I went a bit jakun meeting the long lost I-dont-know-its-name plant near the mosque. God, it feels so nice to have praying facility available anywhere you go. The one inside the RAF base is open air concept. and filled with RAF personnels. after prayer, we went back to them bathsuit clads lads drying themselves under the equatorial sun and having their lunch. it was sunny and breezy. and we chatted about. the ghosts. of all the topics we can talk about, we chose ghost. and let me tell you, Indonesia's ghosts are no joke. luckily none visit me afterwards.

*all photos are from organizers collection.

Borobudur

I first came across Borobudur during high school. It is in the textbook of my favourite subject, History.
And then I was there, at the Borobudur itself.
For real.

Rumah Islam. Part 1.

I only have as much as heard of the name - Rumah Islam.
And I only found out few hours after arriving that I, am in one.
It still did not wash away my amazement of the concept before I know it is a Rumah Islam though.

First thing when I set eyes on the property, I ohhh-ed and wahhh-ed over their front yard. They have a fruiting papaya tree in their front yard. papaya! (excuse me, but I have been away from dear tropic for a good deal of time)
The next hour saw me being introduced to the house
- a massive hall overlooked by study room 1. its function is like common room. and when them girls are not there, they stow their scooters (no less than 5) in here.
- a praying room. where we prayed together and recite al-Matsurat together
- a kitchen.
- a room for clothes you wear at home. clothes, in all sizes you can find, even the size that fit me (I, am vertically prosperous by Asian standard)
- a room for clothes you wear when you go out.
- study room 1.
- study room 2.
- a bedroom. for all 14. "I beg your pardon?". I thought I heard wrong, but no I did not. My logic is, when you have so many rooms, why would ALL 14 of you sleep in one 3x4 room?
- 4 bathrooms

It took a while for me to register everything. They stow their books together. meaning the books are at everyone's disposal. Same goes to
- any food unlabelled on the tables or in the fridge
- almost all the clothes in those 2 rooms
- the toiletries and vanities
But then, how are you going to know which is whose?
You can see that I am not that bright to be wondering like that.
I mean why would people put their things mixed up together if they only want to use it for themselves and not share it.
You see, sharing almost all of your things rid you of your sense of strong ownership. it rid you of your selfishness. it nurture you to be the one who keeps giving, without any feelings holding you from giving what you have.

and the chores, which includes washing dirty laundry and fold them clean clothes, are divided.
on a side note, they have a backyard with clothes line (bless the tropic sun) and people, they grow their lemongrass. how rad can this house be!
and yes, up to this point I still have no idea I am staying in Rumah Islam.
But one thing I gather from the introduction is that I hardly need to open my suitcase before I move to University Club Hotel.

I went to help prepare food for iftar jamaie (iftar together. that evening, it means iftar together with other ~20 ppl. ~20 people that I have never known). In between meeting all new people and remembering their names and washing the chicken and raving about how fantastic it is that they are cooking tempeh and tofu (again, please excuse this Asian absents from Asia for too long), I told them that their living arrangement impressed me very very very much. Albeit the fact that I lived in hostel for 5 good years, I am now, a more individualistic person. thus the concept of the house is very humbling to me, about how people can give so much space and materials to share. and that is when Faramie said the sentence "kalau akak nak tahu, ini la Rumah Islam" ("if you want to know, this is rumah Islam"). And, I, asked the obvious question "like, really?". and she went on to explain the concept of Rumah Islam and I went on to be amazed by every single thing.

I was fresh from 3 days of travelling with my suitcases. and in those 3 days, I made a new acquaintance in Munich airport, layover in Dubai for 8 hours, overnighted in KLIA, had one hell of a morning in LCCT and landing in Indonesia for the first time in my life. and not to forget, skipped home that I have left since the previous summer. and it never crossed me that I will find myself in Rumah Islam, even more staying there. The ball really gets rolling, and man, I am ever so glad that I embarked on this journey.