Visiting Cilincing

Cilincing is an area in the very south of Jakarta. It is a fishermen area, a swamp area, a very very poor area. HOPE organization just started a "Saturday Academy" there. Saturday academies are schools put together for children whose families can not afford to send them to school. There is no public school here in Jakarta. Every school, you have to pay to send your child. The more expensive the school the better education you get. Some people can not afford any school for their children. And some families need their children to work in the day with them. So HOPE began a Saturday Academy for these children in the poorest of areas. I am teaching English to these kids once a month. Now this sounds extremely simple, but you haven't hear the rest of it all.

It took two hours to get to Cilincing by bus. It didn't seem that bad. We took the "Mikrolets," these are the little blue buses, I'm used to taking. But of course mostly only locals take it. So I'm always the entertainment on the bus. It was raining, so we got pretty wet. One of the people I went with has been going to Cilincing for a while. He says it is hard for them to get volunteers there. He said, its a true testement when a volunteer comes back for the 2nd or 3rd time. He said they are usually scared away by the drive to cilincing. I guess typically it is hot and sweaty and such a long uncomfortable ride. He says he usually takes another shirt with him, because by the time he gets there he is drenched in sweat and has to change clothes. I'm not looking forward to that after rainy season. Also there is so much traffic! But when you get to the school and see the kids, your heart totally melts.

When I say, "school" I don't mean they actually have a facility. People in the village volunteer to give a room or a porch of their house for a class of kids to meet in. Now when I say room or porch, the space is about 6 feet by 12 feet and they crame 25 kids into this room. I will take pictures next time I'm there. Cilingcing is a little village with mostly fishermen. The village is many feet below sea level, so any time it rains, this village gets flooded. It's quite sad. The Satuday Academy does not have enough supplies for all the needs, and the volunteers do not get any training in how to teach. The good thing is, the kids are broken up into grade levels, yet the teachers just follow a workbook, and do the best they can. Coming from a teachers perspective, I can't imagine how much these kids are really learning. But they enjoy school so much. I've never met so many kids happier to be at school and learn! It is incredible to see their little faces light up.

They have no sort of English program set up at all. So I'm trying to put together something for them. I'm going to research books and activities and set up a little program. So far, I'm the only one willing to teach the English course. The thing is there is not enough general teachers for all the kids, that its better to get the general classes filled first. However, I can not teach that, since I don't speak fluent Bahasa. So they are just happy that I come! I'm setting up the program for grades 3-4 and then for grades 5-6. I teach 3rd-4th grade for one hour and then 5th-6th for another hour. Its only once a month. But its better then nothing. If they can get the foundation of some English words, then they can move up in the world. I'll only be here for a few more months, so I'm trying to prepare the rest of the teachers for this. Its so exciting to be a part of this project!

The next thing is... setting up some training sessions for the volunteers. Before I leave (probably sometime in June) I'm going to set up a few training sessions for the volunteers, and help them get a better idea on things to do with the kids. I'm not an expert, but at least I went to college for this kind of thing. Maybe I can do a little bit of good here. Please keep this in your thoughts and prayers.

Chinese New Year!

February 7th was the first day of Chinese New Year. Some of you might be familiar with this holiday. Well, I, love this holiday! It is awesome for kids and for single people! I really think this should be a national holiday in the States!

Keep in mind, I will be telling you about the Chinese-Indonesian way of celebrating Chinese New Year. This holiday is not celebrated the same in every country.

Chinese New Year is a National Holiday here in Indonesia. So technically every person is supposed to have this day off. However, because my staff is all foreigners they voted to work this day and have Friday off instead, for a three-day weekend. Everyone was happy with this idea except my co-worker Kelly (her husband is Chinese) and I. Because most of my friends are Chinese-Indonesians, so they were having a big party! Most Chinese go back to their families houses. It is a family holiday, similar to Christmas.

Anyhow, I worked in the morning/afternoon and then my friend, Angel, came and picked me up on her motorbike. I transformed from my typical American Teacher-Self, to a Bule Gila (Crazy white girl). I hopped on the bike and went over to my friend Mantju's house. Mantju is Chinese-Indonesian. She had all of us over for food and kareoki! I told you they love to sing here! After hours of fun eating and kareoki we walked to a married couple house (also friends of ours, actually the church interns). They had prepared more food, and angpow! "Angpow" is a little red envelope filled with money. Now you must give an even number of money in the envelope (you can't give three dollars, it has to be two or four). It is given to children and any single person, by married couples. It is considered good luck for the married couple or family to give angpow on Chinese New Year. So our married friends prepared angpow for all of us! Hence the reason I think this holiday should be celebrated in the States! With all my married friends, I could make bank! HA!

Chinese New Year starts with the new moon on the first day of the New YEar and ends on the full moon 15 days later. The last day of the New Year is called the lantern festival. This is celebrated at night with lantern displays. (In Indonesia this is not hugely popular, but still happens). Fire works on the New Year Eve are shot off to celebrate out with the old year and in with the new. Typically during these 15 days schools will celebrate with Lion or Dragon Dances in assemblies. I experienced both at NJIS. During the lion dance you are supposed to feed the lions "angpow" for good luck.

The last day of Chinese New Year I went to Mantju's Chinese Restaurant and ate steam boat. If you don't know what steam boat is: basically you pick your meats and vegetables and put it in a pot of boiling water. Everyone cooks it together in front of you at the table. Then when its cooked you take it out and eat it with your choice of sauces. It was quite delicious!

I was told that you can give angpow through the entire 15 days of the New Year. So I prepared envelopes with angpow and gave it to all my single friends on Sunday. Well, I was the laughing stock at church, because only married couples give angpow. I knew this, but I wanted to participate in this holiday, so I just told everyone I was married to Jesus. Then my minister preached about this "bule gila" in the Sunday lesson! So after church everyone came up to me for angpow! What did I get myself into!

I had a blast the entire holiday!

Floods in Jakarta!

Hello Everyone!

Some of you might have heard about the flood here in Jakarta. Well, I know I told you not to listen to everything you hear on the news about Indonesia, but this flood did actually affect me. It was such an excitement! Only a "bule gila" (crazy white person) would say that! HA!

Friday morning it down poured. Around 10:00am I received an email from my Principal saying that if this continues until 12noon, then we will dismiss kids early. At 11:10am parents were called and we began dismissing kids and started our "Emergency Flood Evacuation Plan." Only in Indonesia do you have plans like that! It was extremely disorganized and hectic. The teachers were not staying calm for the kids sake. (At least most of them were not). I, of course, had no idea what was going on. I continued on with my day as normal until parents came to pick up their kids. By 1:00pm I still had two kids left. The floods were getting extremely high and it was very challenging to get anywhere in Kalapa Gading (my area). So parents were having a hard time getting to their kids at school. All the teachers were supposed to stay at school until all their students were gone from their class. However, at 1:00pm, my "Lower School Liason" (she is like my supervisor) came to me and said, "You have to go home now. We are sending all the people who live in Paladian (my apartments) home now, because your area is worse!"

So I hopped into the school bus with my other co-workers who live in my apartments. The water on the street in front of the school was about knee deep, and the second we turned onto my street the water was up to my hip. Water started seeping in through the doors and the vents of the bus. Because cars were trying to get through on both sides of the street it created waves in the water on the road and the waves went up over the windowshield and over the entire bus! It was such an experience to remember. It was like driving through a river. At one point the bus almost stallled, and we all gasped, because we knew we'd have to get out and swim from their if that happened. But luckily it kept chugging along! We made it safe and sound to our apartments. There was a foot of water inside the bus, so we didn't quite make it dry! But we didn't have to swim!

If you remember I'm on the 18th floor, so I didn't have to worry about my apartment getting flooded. And if the electricity was turned off due to the hight of the water, then we would just use the generator. So as long as I stalked up on food and water, I was good for a few days. The only think I was worried about was rats and cockroaches. Because as the water comes onto land, the only place the rats and cockroaches have to go is up! So I taped up my drains and doors with ducktape, to make sure they didn't come to my apartment! My friends laughed at how paranoid I was about this!

Being the "bule gila" (crazy white person) I am, I went down to the road and took lots of pictures of the flood. I just stood in the rain watching the cars and vans get stuck trying to drive through. I walked through the flood just a little to get the the other side of the street to take more pictures. People were floating on different things in the water, trying to salvage their buisinesses, and bring food with them. It was sad to watch, but I was happy I could give them some entertainment! They loved to laugh at me, as I walked through the flood taking pictures! And now they have a story to tell their friends and family, about the crazy bule who walked through the flood taking pictures.

I was concerned for a while about some of my friends. Some of their houses got flooded and some were stuck in different places. One of my friends (Angel) got stuck at her work. But luckily her work is very near to my apartment so she walked through the floods to my apartment and stayed with me for the weekend. It was so nice to have a buddy! I was stuck in my apartment, but at least I wasn't stuck alone! It was actually quite relaxing. We just watched T.V., talked, slept, and ate all day Friday and Saturday!

Sunday the water went down quite a bit. Sunday morning the water on the road in front of my apartments was only at knee level. Therefore I braved the floods, and took a taxi to church! Of, course my friends warned me that if I leave my apartment I must bring extra clothes and shoes with me, just in case I get stuck somewhere. As we drove to church we kept running into road that were blocked off due to the flood. At one point we had to turn around on a one way road and go back against on coming traffic! Like I said, driving here is ridiculous! Can you imagine us driving the opposite direction of all the other cars, and they are just honking their horns and, not even slowing down for us!

Finally we found a route we could take to church. We drove by one of the poorer areas and saw all the houses flooded. Then shortly after passing the houses, I looked out my window and saw crowds of people gathered together underneath the toll road laying on blankets with baskets of food around them. There were babies, and young children screaming and crying and all the adult faces staring at the cars go by with the most devestated faces! I knew that these people were the ones who had lived in the area that I'd just seen, flooded out of their houses. They had brought the things they could save with them to this little area under the toll road. Oh, my gosh, I can't describe the devestation in the air. It was absolutely humbling. And then to imagine that this wasn't even the worst of it all. This was just the beginning! There are supposed to be more floods coming. Some of my friends could have been these people. Luckily the church I go to takes care of everyone and will put those in need at someone elses house. Please keep these people in your thoughts and prayers.

As I got to church, I found out that my area was one of the worst areas for the flood! I came to church with flipflops on and my pants rolled up high. Everyone else was dressed normal and didn't even look like they'd come from a flood. Of course of that is because they are used to this craziness. They went on with the day like normal. Some of these people at my church had come from their houses with inches of water in them and changed clothes when they got to church and then went right into singing and praising. I was shocked at how encouraging they all were after what they had been through! It was extremely convicting to see. Back home I hear complaints about getting our hair wet as we walk through the drizzling rain of Tacoma!

When I got back to my apartment after church all the water in front of my building was gone!

Let me tell you that this was quite the experience! I left Tacoma wanting to experience the culture here, and wanting to learn more then what I could just by visiting, and you know, I definitely feel like I have! These are the types of things you only learn and experience if you live in a different country, not just by visiting. I feel so grateful for my opportunity here in Jakarta! You may think I'm crazy for feeling this way directly after a flood, however, I have never felt more grateful.

I hope this doesnt give you a bad impression of Indonesia. Because I am the one who has lived through this whole thing, and it has only greatened my perspective of Indonesia now. Please keep in mind that this is not an everyday occurance and that there are devestating things that happen in America and lots of things that we disagree with in our Country. Its really no different. Natural disasters are a way of life, that is why they are called "Natural" disasters.

Flood!

This motor bike is braving the waters. However he is on the shallow side of the street. He wouldn't have made it through if he was closer to the trees.









This is taken from my apartment looking down. The Canal overflowed into the street. You'd think the whole thing was the canal, but the part where the cars are stuck is actually the road in front of my apartment.