I closed up my house and left it March 15. It was
really cold in Beaver, PA that early morning but looking on the bright side, I
was heading west to warmer weather. I spent a couple of relaxing days with Jim
and Barb Eychner before they took me to
the hotel in San Francisco where I met the other 63 people who were
going with me to be Peace Corps Volunteers in Indonesia. The flights to Tokyo,
Singapore and Surabaya, the largest city in East Java, Indonesia were just
long. But, on the bright side, Surabaya was wonderfully hot. We spent a couple
of days getting over jet lag, being injected for a few unique to Indonesia
illnesses, were told the rules of our ten weeks of training, met our language
teachers and the Peace Corps Indonesia staff and got to know each other a
little. We were then off east to Batu, a
suburb of Malang, East Java. Twelve of us were then sent to Puten, a village
outside of Batu. Each of us was assigned to a host family with whom we lived for
the next ten weeks during Pre Service Training. Yes, ten, six day weeks of eight
hours a day of 1) between four and eight hours of language training 2) learning
how English as a foreign language is taught in Indonesia 3) cross-cultural
adjustment techniques, 4) how to deal with a) health issues b) eating healthily
c) safety concerns d) the billions of Peace Corps rules, regulations and
requirements that have multiplied since I was a Volunteer last.
Looking on the bright side, the family I lived with
was a treat. The father took me to a wedding party within hours of my arrival
in their home. He kept up including me
in things he was doing. The wife was an amazing cook who delighted in feeding
me a couple times an hour every hour I was awake. She packed me a lunch every
day for when I was out of her sight and no doubt hungry. The daughter was a
midwife and the only one who really spoke the language I was learning. She often helped me with my homework.
All of that ended on June 2, 2014 when the American
Ambassador to Indonesia swore me into the Peace Corps. He was so impressed with
it being my third time that that night he tweeted a picture of us each holding
up three fingers.
The next morning 28 of us left East Java for the 16
hour train trip to Bandung, West Java. The others stayed in East Java where
most of the PCVs serve. The bright side of that long train trip was that
another of the PCVs downloaded onto my external hard drive about 350 books.
Another bright side was that we went to a hotel in
Bandung, the second largest city in West Java. June 4 I had my first hot shower
since March 17. My next hot shower wouldn’t be until October 12. We spent three days in the hotel meeting our
headmasters and counterparts. Then it was off to our sites.
Garut is about 3 hours (when there is NO traffic and
about 6 when there is) south of Bandung. It is a large city. Google says there
are 400,000 people in Garut but that’s only the city proper. To give you an
idea of how big Garut is, there are 600 Islamic boarding school in and around
town. The bright side is that with a little walking and a lot of questions I
can find everything I could need or want right here in town.
All PCVs live with host families the whole time they
are in country. My Garut host family is really only a man and his wife. Both
are retired. Both are younger than I. Their three children as well as two
sisters of the mother and their families all live in houses built around the
pond that our house sits in. Yes! My house is built ON a pond. Fish swim under my bedroom. The bright side
of this (as if this wasn’t bright enough) is that the fish (and bats) eat the
mosquitoes (but not the ants, cockroaches, rats or snakes) saving me from
worrying too much about Malaria. The host father is forever building or
renovating some part of a house around our pond. The host mother is another
very good cook. After six months of feeding me every meal, she realized that retirement
means she can visit her sisters in Bandung for as long as she wants as often as
she wants so is no longer providing me with meals. The bright side of this is that I get to roam
around town finding new places to eat. It’s just the first two weeks of this
new plan but looking on the bright side, I have already found a bunch of really
good places to eat wonderful street food. AND I will probably gain back the 30
pounds or so I lost having had amoebic dysentery in August and September. The
bright side of having the form of dysentery I did was that I had had the same
kind (much worse) in Madagascar so I have some antibodies to the strain.
I have been assigned to be an English Teacher
Trainer at MAN1 Garut. Madrasah Aliyah Negeri #1 is the biggest, oldest and
best known Islamic high school in Garut. The bright side of this is that as I
walk around town getting lost often, all I have to do is ask anyone where MAN1
is. Everyone knows it. My house on the pond is only five minutes’
walk from the school.
Garut is famous for being the coldest place in
Indonesia. I sleep every night under a top sheet and a big heavy wool blanket
doubled. It sure isn’t the hot place I had wished for. The bright side is that
along with the fish the temperature keeps down the mosquitoes that seem to
plague the rest of the country.
I have not been well received at MAN1 Garut. I think
what happened was this: The headmaster heard about Peace Corps and the free
foreign teacher. He told an Assistant Headmaster (who happens to be a GREAT
fellow and my closest friend at the school) to fill out the paperwork. Peace
Corps came to inspect the school and talk with the headmaster and English
teachers. The later would say ‘Yes” to anything the headmaster wants however
the truth is that they want no part of
1) a foreigner 2) an old man when they could have had a young woman 3) someone
telling them new ideas to make their teaching more effective. The bright side
of this is that I can pretty much do anything I want. I can have no effect on
English classes but since the school doesn’t hire substitute teachers, all I
have to do is walk around, find a teacher-less class and promote English any
fun way I can.
A couple of weeks ago the new president lifted the
subsidy on gasoline. Within two days, the prices of everything went up about
20%. Peace Corps living allowance did not get a cost of living adjustment last
year and will not get one until next year.
I had just enough money to live within my PC means before the cost of
living went up and am feeling the pinch now. The bright side is that I am
learning again that there are many many things I don’t need. I even seem to
want less. I found a seven story
supermarket – department store in Garut last week. I walked around each floor.
(OK I didn’t walk around the women’s or kiddy’s clothing but everywhere else.)
I walked out of the place empty handed. There was nothing there I felt I needed
or wanted. (That I could afford.)
It has rained some part or parts of every day since
November 10. It is going to continue thus until sometime in March or
April. The bright side (and it’s hard to
find a bright side when there’s no sunshine) is that the flowers in my little
plot of garden are all blooming. The little thicket of bamboo that was planted
just before I came in June is now twice as high as it was.
December 21, The Longest Night of the Year, is
officially the first day of the school’s semester holiday although we have not
had classes since December 5. I’m so close to the equator that there is little
difference between lengths of days and nights.
Christmas is on a Thursday this year but it’s just another Thursday here
in this very conservative Islamic city. The bright side of these days will be
my thoughts of you. I will be wishing you a Happy Longest Night of the Year and
a very Merry Christmas, I understand people set off fireworks at midnight for
the New Year. If it’s anything like the fireworks at the end of Ramadan, that
will be a very bright side of life.
The fish add their Christmas greetings.
JAY
