Jakarta Smells and Other Ramblings...

So I guess you could consider me really bad at this. As much as I want to be good at telling you about our lives, intentions are all I've got. I will now proceed to blame it on a number of things that we can all fall back on when discovering our shortcomings. Take notes!

Tired- I come home and the last thing I want to do is think. Let's all say it together...Work is draining the life out of me. Plus, lately we have been completely enthralled in watching the Six Feet Under series. Everytime we get a chance we put an episode on. The problem with buying show series' is that you cannot stop watching them until you are done.

Lazy- I admit it. Blogging is really easy. Emailing is really easy. Skype-ing is really easy. Uploading pictures is really easy. I have been pretty lazy lately. Soooooorrrry!!!

Jobs- Yes, we do work. I know it seems like vacation 24/7 but in between the pictures we actually have to encourage kids to do better than they did the day before. Right now it is report card time again. This is seriously the worst part of teaching. I have over 180 kids to write about and Leah has 14 kids with about 6 or 7 subjects to write about each. Remember this is not a complaint (as this is probably heaven compared to what teachers have to deal with in the states), I am only telling you facts so that you know more details about our lives.

Anyway, I am just smart as I have always been, meaning, right when something big comes up...say report cards...I come up with some insane and daunting brilliant idea that has nothing to do with any of the finishing the previous task...for example, I also decide to create this game that will wrap up a music history unit that I have been teaching. However, true to form, it is about the most intricate game on the face of the planet and it only took about 100 hours to put together. Some ideas are better left ideas. After I showed the game to the kids and they understood how it worked they seemed to like it a lot. That made me feel a little better about what seemed like wasting a lot of time. To top it off, today I was looking through the filing cabinet in my room and I found a folder titled Music History Unit. I was absolutely frightened to open it fearing what was inside. Luckily, it was only a bunch of games and activities that the unbelievably organized teacher before me had so kindly bundled together. Had I only known that the big silver box next to my desk held things that were actually useful, I would have looked sooner.

One last thing about school. Besides having this huge game and grades take up all of my time, I am fortunate enough to be the music teacher. I am the one required to put on all of these silly little concerts that are somehow supposed to represent the brilliant entity that is the NJIS Music Program. Every six weeks I have to put on another of these wonderful events so parents can come and see their little stars in action. That means that my life has now been metered off into fine incraments, that allow me to almost predict, as if it is a weather forecast or when the stars will aline, the days where I will completely panic in front of staff and students, the days where I will completely blow my cool at the kids, the days where I give up all hope and assume myself a failure. Finally I can then know for certain, the day where I can start the count down again. Its not so bad I guess. It is making the semester go by really fast.

I must change the subject...



Last weekend Leah and I headed for the beautiful city of Bandung. It is about a 3 hour train ride west of Jakarta. In fact it is the capital of the western province of the island of Java. Jave is broken up into three provinces; East, Central and West with Solo, Jakarta and Bandung as their capitals, respectively. Jakarta is also the capital of the country of Indonesia. This was our first time in Bandung, although we had heard quite a bit about it. We were terribly shocked, when we woke up the next morning and felt a cool breeze, smelled fresh air and saw blue skies. Jakarta is sadly, the butthole of Indonesia. I remember thinking Decatur was bad. Not even close.

We went to Bandung because Leah had signed up for this conference about turning your classroom into a creative learning environment. I think the only thing she got out of it is remembering how boring being a student can be. I went just to enjoy the hotel, paid for by the shool, and get caught up on work and other things, such as blogging and photos. The first moring I had room service bring me up a nice cappucino and was really excited to get started when I realized that I had forgotten my plugin charger for the computer. I didn't panic, I figured there has got to be something I can do. So I found out about an electronic store that is kind of a one stop shop. Indonesia and maybe Asia in general have this crazy concept of shopping. Everything must be a huge mall and must be kind of a shady ordeal. For example, these electronic super malls have everything under the sun but you never quite know where it came from. Whatever, they are not illegal (because the Black Market here is a whole other story) although all of the software and CD's seem to come in unoriginal packaging and look strangley like a photo-copy.

So I am at this mall and I look everywhere and there are no Apple computers to be found. I feel upset but then someone tells me that there is another electronics super mall that has an Apple Center store. Great! When I arrive they look at me as if I am crazy for actually expecting the store to carry items that you may want to purchase. The shopper's attitude is equally as weird as the mall concept. It is "lihat-lihat" which means "just looking". No one really buys anything but they love to look. Long story short, I got absolutely nothing done and sat around the hotel waiting for Leah to get out of the conference. It was a nice train ride and I did get to walk around Bandung a bit. I didn't take any pictures because you can just look at the pictures I posted of Bogor and they will look the same.

Speaking of pictures...I promise, promise, promise (janji, janji, janji) I will get them up after report cards are done.

The last thing I want to talk about is actually the reason I got so excited to Blog in the first place. I was walking home with a friend of mine tonight and the craziest thing just happened. This is a lesson for those of you who think (or say) "Indonesia...Oh my...there are so many Muslims...is it safe?" There is a gate that we usually cut through to get to our neighborhood. I lliterally live four houses down from this gate and the only other way in is too walk really far down the road and then come back almost all the way to the same gate. Often times we jump the gate or sometimes a security guard will be around and open it up for us. Tonight I decided to try a different method. There is a church immediately next to the gate. Mind you a church, not a mosque. There were some guys standing in front of it. This is not uncommon because the church always has people around and I think they are the band that plays during services. Oh yeah...the church is a contemporary christian church that comes complete with a rock band and all. Anyway, I talked to a few of the guys and then asked if my friend and I could cut through since the gate was locked. They said "Tentu" and "tidak masalah" (sure and no problem). They opened the door for us and we proceeded to walk through. We got to the other door when all of the sudden a man comes out and starts yelling at us. He was very upset. Obviously he didn't want us there but I asked if he would let us pass. He refused. Anyway, my friend got upset and told him he was a bad christian. The guy didn't understand any of the words but continued screaming at us. We tried to calm the guy down and the other guys that let us through were confused as to why he was so upset. He kept telling us that we needed permission from the office. He seemed to be the man in authority at the time so we just asked if he could give us that permission. Denied. Typical Indonesia. Anyway we left and had to take the long way around. This is why I was so excited to write though. After a few minutes of talking about how he was such a bad christian, I realized that I had just argued and understood everything that happened in that situation. None of it was in English.

It made me feel pretty good...

Until next time. Sampai Jumpa.

Love,
Grant and Leah (Sorry the stories are so one sided. I keep telling Leah to post something. See third paragraph.)


P.S. here is a peaceful and slightly relatable picture of our wonderful new nephew Kade Jeffrey McClearn.