Ahoy Matey!

So we went and saw this huge boat. OK, really it was a remake of an old ship like the ones used by Europeans to come to SE Asia and pillage the area and steal its natural treasures and spices, etc. But this one is just a museum. No real pillaging here.

It was amazing to see the size of it and think of folks going so far in the 1500s. It made me thing of two things:

1)  The USA has very little history. 1776 is pretty new compared to the rest of the world
2) Pity for the people who have never been out of Temple Hill (as awesome as it is)
Some cheeky monkeys.  Very into posing.  It was our first real day of driving and they still had a sense of humor.
Hudson was not fond of how this guy looked.  The hair was especially weird.  Touching it seemed to help.  Him, not me.  It looked to nappy for me to touch.  I am not sure if the statue is supposed to look Portuguese or not.  He seems asleep at the wheel, though.

Hopelessly Devoted To You

Sudah Pulang

Well, we made it home from our trip.  As usual the worst part were the roads coming home!  But we are safe and sound and headed to bed!!!!!

Something stinky this way comes!

One great experience we had was eating with a local family.  After dinner we went to someone's house where they broke out a fruit that is a favorite in SE Asia.  It's called durian and it has a very distinct aroma.  Only once had Craig come close to trying it (an ice cream sample) but this night there was no getting around it.  Its actually so strong its not allowed in our hotel at all.

The word "enjoyment" just can't convey it!  Its actually not so bad if you can get it in your mouth quick enough.  The stuff smells like a person sauteed garlic and onions ... then put it in a garbage can.  Out in the sun.  For a month.  Check out Uncle's eyes.  He is TOTALLY digging it. "MMMMMMmmmmmmMMMMMmmmm, now THAT is good!"

Caleb even tried it!

The hardest sell, though, was Angie. We ALMOST had to resort to the "Eat it! Eat it! Eat it!" chant.  But in the end cultural expectations won out and she shoved it in and got it down! YEAH!!  Notice Hudson's reaction to his proximity.  Like his Daddy his face rarely hides his feelings.

Our friend said the problem for most people was the fruit's texture.  Angie disagreed.  She said it was the taste and the smell that made it so bad.  What a trooper.  Some other shots of the evening:

Incredibly awesome folks who know a lot more about hospitality than we do, (they couldn't believe we were staying at a hotel and not with them).  Man what a great opportunity we are having to do stuff we never dreamed of doing!

We're still out here

Just know many folks are wondering, we are still out here and OK!!  The hotel internet cost $4 an hour and many of you know how Craig is ;-).  We are at a restaurant with free Wi-Fi now.  Woo-Hoo!!

At any rate we are house hunting and the men spent 12 hours in the car yesterday cruising up and down streets.  Angie and the kids had slightly less but still a bunch.  

Angie got her first invitation to someone's house on Wednesday and we got to watch American Idol (although it was on from 10-11:30pm).  Tough stuff but sometimes people have to sacrifice for things they like (i.e. Angie and Caleb stayed up and the rest went to bed).

We'll update again when we can.  Tonight we'll be at a new hotel so maybe we'll have better access then.

Continuing Trip News

For those of you interested in small details...on Saturday Angie made it to IKEA (shout out to the Booth's and Abby) but unfortunately Craig and the kids had to miss it. They went to a mall close to where we are staying and hit the local TGIFridays. We were pretty blown away they had free refills (even of Diet Coke) and the kids ate free with an adult meal. Another shocker--McDonald's does free refills here, too. In our city you can't even get a free refill of water normally.

After we left TGIF we found a ToysRUs, which was pretty cool.

For Easter breakfast we had an egg and bread concoction with fish curry. YUMMY! Then after worship and lunch we rode a couple of trains into a nearby city and took the kids to a park.

It had fountains where kids were playing and a ton of playground stuff. As you can see Hudson was not allowed to get his pants wet.

This is a picture with some random strangers who wanted a picture with the girls. Angie was almost on some sort of TV program but the people didn't actually have permission to be taping so while they discussed it with security, we took off.

It was BLAZING hot, though, and so the playing was cut short for some ice cream instead. Hope your Easter is great!!

Eww...Honey I think there's a leech on me!

This is where we were standing the first time I ever heard my wife say those words. Right under that shelter. And you know what? She DID have a leech on her. Now had another person not already pulled one off her kid maybe we wouldn't have known right off what it was. But it was. And it was something ... squiggly like a worm and hard to catch and kill! Now there was some discussion about whether or not the same leech got ahold of two different people. I am undecided. I know this sounds cliche but all those leeches look alike to me.


This is a picture of our dear children in the leech-infested water. Don't worry this was taken AFTER the leech removing. This is safer than you think it is. Really. We don't think it was leech "infested" actually.

After the leech and lunch (then we moved to a new spot). Then we had the wading/swimming. THEN after some Good Friday reflection time we had an Easter Egg hunt with some eggs the kids had colored at a friend's house.


But you guessed it. A bunch of monkeys showed up and tried to make off with the eggs. One little guy actually DID find an egg and get ahold of it. It was one of the easy eggs, though, like for Hudson. I wasn't very impressed. What did you think I was going to say, "It started raining" or something?!?

I'm too sexy for my shirt...

Angie got a haircut on Friday. She was going to have her eyebrows waxed. That was the whole point of going to the overpriced salon we went to. They said, "We will cut your hair while the wax warms up." So the lady cuts her hair. Then the hairdresser explains that she is not comfortable putting that hot wax so close to Angie's eyes and offers to do it with a razor blade instead. A razor blade like you use in a box cutter Angie tells me. YOUCH! I'd rather have a unibrow than either of those treatments!

Anyway, all the while I was reading "The Nutcracker" which someone sent to us in a package. After the haircut I was explaining to her the differences between the book and the ballet and she explains to me how very UN-MASCULINE it is for me to be reading The Nutcracker. Seems she got a lot of freedom from that haircut. She was honest with herself ("it looks horrible") and honest with me ("its kind of fruity that you are reading The Nutcracker").

So, she has a new hairdo and I have started reading only BowHunter magazine (actually I just look at the pictures, I don't even read it)!

Thanks Cubbies!!

We got a great box this week from the AWANA cubbies at Calvary! You guys are AWESOME. THANK YOU so much!!!

Back up to 24

Good news--one bootleg movie store was back open today and they had the second season of 24 IN STOCK for just $6.

Even BETTER news--this is just one day after we finished downloading our four missing episodes from iTunes at a grand total of $8.

Oh well.

Language Helper

Now Hudson can watch TV with Mom and Dad and everyone is learning something. Notice at the end Hudson says, "Mickey speaks English." And he does. Just not on that show.

And the rain rain rain came down down down

This week we have learned the meaning of "rainy season" as it has rained everyday. Sometimes HARD, sometimes steady for hours. But it has rained. Everyday. Monday night we went out with our classmates to celebrate the end of Unit 4 (we all passed). When we got home we found the roof leaking and tik-tik-tik (that is the sound of drip-drip-drip here) right onto our bed. OUCH!



We pulled back the covers to find only the bedspread was wet. Then we yanked off the mattress, did this Laurel and Hardy thing trying to get it out our bedroom door and plopped it in the living room floor. However, Angie decided the mattress on the floor was a little too close to things that crawl around in the dark, so she chose to sleep on the couch. Later a friend helpfully reminded her that the roaches here can fly.

At any rate, Craig spent the night in the floor and Angie on the couch while the tik-tik-tiking continued on our box springs. Our new theme this week has been THANKFULNESS and so here is what we found to be thankful for as we missed our bed--At least it started leaking BEFORE we went to bed. How bad would it be if it started leaking 15 minutes after we got to sleep?



This action shots somewhat how Craig looked at 4:30 when the prayer call woke him up (you can't hear it in our bedroom).

On bugs and things

Today we asked a couple of people about using flour that had bugs in it. One lady said she would thrown the whole bag away--like many of you from the States recommended. Another said, "Throw it away. No wait! If you could sift it somehow and it's not expired, I'd use it." I told her how we sifted it with our spaghetti strainer and she agreed it was a fine idea. Throw away nothing if you can help it! Now you have raised some interesting questions about eggs that could have been in the flour and our eating them. Which I guess we answer the same way--throw NOTHING away if you can. And deworm your family every six months.

Kami sudah senang sekali!

Tadi pagi kami ada evaluasi untuk Unit empat di sekolah. Dulu, saya sedikit kuatir tetapi kami percaya mereka mau kami bilang dengan baik. Jadi, kami dievaluasi oleh para pelatih dan waktu kami selasai, mereka berkata kepada kami bahwa kami berdua boleh naik ke Unit lima. Pasti kami senang sekali dan kami pergi ke bioskop untuk traktir.

Translation: We passed our evaluations at school today and get to go to Unit 5 on Monday. We celebrated with a movie! WOOO-HOOO!

BISCUITS

Sunday night Craig had the brilliant idea of having biscuits for supper. No problem. Well, maybe one or two. First we had to finally make the "master" mix (sounds like a rapper doesn't it?) that mix makes the biscuits easier. But when we opened our flour we found lots of little bugs. So we "sifted" 5 pounds of flour through a strainer normally used for hamburger or spaghetti.


Then we got to the biscuit making. Hudson was a BIG help and most enjoys the cutting part, of course.


Just an example of how different making stuff is. No canned biscuits that is for sure. I thought we were a big deal ... real Emeril types when we used cornmeal or Bisquick. Now I feel like someone's grandmother with my cream of tartar making my own buttermilk.


Here is little different perspective on the work. The table from Hudson's eyes.

more fun with leopard

Oh hurray! It's, uh, those things

The kids got these in their party bags Saturday. We have no idea what they are. If you think nuts, cereal-type, popcorn, or caramel corn, its because you live in North America. I refuse to open them since they are more likely shrimp crackers. Mmm. Crackers that smell and taste like shrimp. How can you resist?!?

Mau ke bowling?

This weekend we took some family time and went bowling. That kind of thing always gives us a great chance to use a weird mixture of English and our new language. So we go in and say, "Ada bumpers?"

Where else can you say, "Maaf, kami perlu the sweeper thing untuk memindah pin itu."

One great thing about this bowling alley was that it was on the third floor. So after we climbed all the steps through the back, dark alleys of the building and came in through a closet or something we saw the elevator. Its sort of to the side of the front door so we walked right past it.

Another great thing was that we got to see that "serious" bowlers are the same everywhere. You know the kind of guys who have the hand brace, a rolling bag full of balls, and they are bowling ALONE. I have seen movies alone, taken long road trips alone, shopped alone, eaten alone in fancy restaurants (and dumps). But I've never BOWLED alone. Seriously, if you are bowling alone ... its time to admit you have a problem. And you can take that piece of advice from an 88 bowler right to the bank!!!

Notice from the photos that Bethany and Hudson had to bowl in socks since they didn't have shoes that small. We have some better action shots but you know all the great bowling pix involve looking at someone's backside. I spared you. You're welcome.

We got Leopard

This is one of the cool new things our Mac does. It makes Angie kiss me.

A Thousand Words

In separate bathrooms we were taking the same photo! What good this is supposed to do in English I am not sure. It seems to me the folks who speak English would have the least difficulty in this area ... but maybe not. I know the restrooms at every McDonald's in the USA is nasty!

Oh it was a party alright

Bethany got invited to a birthday party Saturday and man was it ever something! They had the biggest play place we had ever seen, a bungee-bounce thing and a TON of food. They had special meals for the parents and meals for the kids. While the kids lined up at the buffet picture the kid's dad told me, "These are just snacks because the kitchen is behind. The food for the children will be done soon." Yikes!

Some of the parties folks have are over the top. Emcees, food, great big gift bags for all the kids. It blows us away. The time was something, too. I was ready to go 2 hours after the party started then found out the kids could play until 4 (it started at 11). It sort of took the air out of my grumbling about having to drive an hour from our house to the party place. I couldn't say, "We spent more time on the road than at the party."

Package Week

This week we received THREE packages in two shipments. Needless to say, packages make us slightly excited. The first box had some neat stuff including raincoats for Craig and Angie. One the day it arrived a horrible thought occurred to me ... what if they sent the EXACT same jacket in two sizes. We'd look so corny in our matching coats that Craig's would NEVER see the light of day. Thankfully the colors are different and so both jackets not only fit but can be worn. We tried to look like some models from a K-Mart ad but I am not sure how well we did.

The next shipment had 50 pounds worth of stuff!! Notice in one photo of Craig doing the work of customs and inspecting the cookies upon arrival. That is how he keeps his girlish figure.

You can see all the staples people need: Kool-Aid, Pop Tarts, Little Debbies, and other incredible treats. We have a restaurant here that is exactly like Arby's except they don't have Arby's sauce. Folks here eat hot sauce on EVERYTHING. Pizza comes with ketchup and hot sauce, so does McD's, and of course, the "Arby's". So when the box arrived we placed a delivery order for the Arby's-like place and the kids were quite happy!!



One great thing was we missed the UPS guy and he left his cell number so when we got home we called and he actually came back to the house to deliver the packages. The fact that he had 50 pounds of stuff on his motorcycle could've influenced him, I guess. He was ready to get rid of it. Also notice how well we fit in ... Caleb is wearing a sweatshirt at the equator!!