To Borneo and Back

One week ago we boarded an eight meter boat for a three night, four day excursion into the Tanjung Puting National Park in the Indonesian part of Borneo. Todd and I and our crew of three snaked down the Sekonyer River mid-morning on Saturday. A few short hours later we found ourselves watching orangutans (from 'orang' which means 'person' and 'hutan' which means 'forest') emerging from the canopy of trees. We fell silent listening to the sound of their arms grasping branches or their mouths chomping into a banana. It was awesome in the most profound sense of that word.

We met some characters throughout our stay in the park. There's Pedro who chased down two females to mate with in the short time we watched him at Camp Leakey. On the dock we met Siswi who was in poor condition because she found some soap and ate it. We saw the suds on her arm. There's Tut who likes to hang out below the dock. See she is older and quite comfortable in the shade there. Princess and her two kids, Putri and Percy, are known as the genius family. Princess can row a boat. And, if you ask her what she wants she will tell you (with her hands) that she would like some water. Then there's Tom. He is the dominant, uncompromising king of Camp Leakey. Everyone knows when Tom is coming because the other male orangutans run the other direction.

These friends put a face to the forest. Sadly, Borneo's forests are rapidly disappearing. A UN report predicts that 98% of the orangutans natural habit will be destroyed by 2022 as a result of illegal logging and palm oil plantations. Deforestation accounts for 20% of the world's green house gas emissions. In Indonesia it accounts for four fifths of all carbon emissions. In addition to articles on deforestation in Borneo, you can also check out the Orangutan Foundation International website for more information.

Here's a slide show of photos from our trip, during which we also celebrated Todd's 30th birthday. The crew celebrated the end of Ramadan, Idul Fitri, aboard the boat.

Beautiful digits

We passed a date with a beautiful number: 09/09/2009. Before it's a distant memory, let me just say if it was a hand phone number here in Indonesia, it would cost a bit more than your average sequence of numbers. A nomor cantik (beautiful number) is placed in a premium category, where the numbers are more appealing for the repitition, the order, the ease with which they roll off the tongue. It's not a huge difference in cost to buy a beautiful number, so it may be worthwhile for the one who will want to turn heads in hopes of hearing "Hey baby, those are some beautiful digits you have."

Ramadan in Photos

As Todd said about a week ago, “It’s time to get our Ramadan on”. Ok, so no we are not fasting for the month, and we’re not even sure we will make it through one day, but we are experiencing Ramadan here in the world’s most populous Muslim country. Ramadan began on Saturday and will last through late September. Fasting during Ramadan is one of the five basic tenants of Islam. Muslims forego eating or drinking between the hours of approximately 4:15 am and 5:45 pm. One should be finished eating by the time the call prayer comes in the morning, which is around 4:30. People eat around 3 am and then again around 6 pm and following. It’s a wonder to me that so many people can go without eating or drinking for so long each day over the course of an entire month, in a tropical environment no less. My amazement probably has a lot to do with the fact that I am an American, and well, as you know, that just wouldn’t fly where we come from.

Interestingly, while one would think that if all the country’s Muslims are fasting, the demand for food would be at its lowest level of the year. But, last week a newspaper surveyed people in the 10 largest cities in Indonesia and found that most people spend more money on food during Ramadan. I would be interested to know if that was the same for villages. The survey seemed to show people buy more nutritious foods like fruits, vegetables, and snacks to sustain them during the day.

Some restaurants and streetside, portable eateries called 'warungs' do not open during the day. They adjust their schedules during Ramadan. One of our coffee spots opens at 5 pm rather than 3 pm and they serve dates (customary) and fresh juices for people to break the fast, or 'buka puasa'.

I’ve gone to campus to see how students break the fast. It’s a great scene—lots of stands are set up along the roads and there are people selling iced fruit soup and iced fruit drinks with rice. Hundreds of students park their motorbikes and meet to break the fast together. I saw some people waiting with bowls of ice fruit soup in front of them waiting for the evening prayer to come.

Here's Ramadan in photos:

Man selling Pisang Ijo ('Pisang' means banana, and I believe 'ijo' is a shortened version of the word for green or 'hijau')
Students selling donuts with ice-cream and sprinkles on top

I also came across a striking group. The majority had bleached hair and looked shall we say, alternative, for Indonesia. They were very friendly and insisted on a photo. As it turns out, this is the staff of Yogya’s most happening night club, Hugo’s. They were also breaking the fast together.
It is considered disrespectful to be seen eating or drinking while people fast. So if restaurants decide to open they often have strategically placed curtains, such as Starbucks in the mall.

We use the gym facilities at a local hotel. I’m amused by the camel scene they’ve created. Much like our winter wonderlands or manger scenes, I believe this is a reminder that we are in a special holiday season. I don’t think it’s worth overthinking this benign camel, but it is a little out of place seeing as the deserts of Arabia are a far cry from Indonesia's tropical landscape. But, then again, it doesn't really snow in San Diego either.

My Alibi

While our friends, Liz and Charlie, were tying the knot in Nashville, we were climbing a mountain on Java. Of the drawbacks to being abroad, missing events like their wedding ranks at the top for me.  

So this is what I could come up with: 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=avzkUzQ2kOc

Guess work

Admittedly, experimenting with foreign recipes in Indonesia is becoming a bit of a hobby. I realize it’s not at all sustainable if I need to buy (or ask people to send) imported ingredients. In the case of these Lemon Ricotta Cookies, I bought imported lemons, but the other ingredients are from Java. Go figure. I love the fact that the task requires reliance on intuition (in the absence of measuring tools) and openness to small-scale risk (much like learning a language, except a less public one).

It was earlier this year that I tried this recipe from Giada and I loved it. Since our new place is equipped with a pseudo-oven, I wanted to try to bake something. I asked my landlord to come up to our place and show me how to use the contraption. I didn’t realize that it was as straightforward as putting the box on the burner and then turning the burner on. That’s pretty much all there is to it.

While I had all the right ingredients, I lacked a mixer, measuring tools, a zester, and parchment paper. So in place of such I items I gave the batter a good stir, relied on my best judgment, zested with a sharp knife, and lined the tray with foil. After a few minutes of testing the pseudo-oven, I found a creature baking on one of the sheets. So I gave it another good cleaning before lopping on the ricotta dough.

The end result: zesty, undercooked, lemon pancakes! They typically are much more pillow-like. The pancake-like attribute of this batch probably owes itself to the pseudo-oven. I suspect it does not heat to 375 farenheit, but I’m only guessing.

All Aboard

When my language teacher invited me to what sounded like her destination wedding a few months ago, I eagerly accepted. For starters I really enjoy my teacher, Fina. I also really enjoy weddings. As it turns out, what I agreed to attend was the second wedding reception in her fiancé’s home town around three hours from Yogyakarta. So that meant I could attend the reception here in Yogyakarta given by her family, as well as her husband’s hometown celebration. All the better—more occasions to celebrate.

What can I tell you about Javanese weddings? Well, I’ve only experienced a few, but I can say that for those who prefer the kinds of weddings where you can eat and run, I think you’d enjoy crashing weddings here. First, the ceremony is very much optional. For Muslim ceremonies, even the bride does not attend (so really if the bride is not there, who is going to notice if you aren’t there?). Then comes the reception (often much later in the day). First, you arrive and sign a guestbook, collect a favor, and drop off a gift. Then you proceed to the stage where the couple and the couple’s parents await your arrival. You greet them and keep on walking down the steps straight to the buffet. Then you sit or stand and watch other people greet the bride and groom while you listen to the band and eat sate and bakso. Then, you are free to go.

So for those who like to mingle, dance, watch people dance, compete for the bouquet, or blow bubbles on the newlyweds, you may find Javanese weddings leave you desiring something more. That is, unless you participate in the procession to the reception site. Since I was staying with the bride and groom, the bride’s family, and her friends in Temanggung, I relied on them for transport during our getaway. I assumed we’d ride in the same cars we took to the town. So you can imagine my delight when I learned we would proceed to the reception by way of a miniature train (below). Our procession included the bride and groom, who traveled by decorated Jeep, and then some family members who perched in two horse-drawn carts. Our train brought up the rear. There was the ice-cream man on a bike who followed us there and a few men on motorbikes who had walkie talkies. We rode through town to the tune of a car alarm (I never identified which component of our procession was responsible for this). I recorded our ride on the love train in the video below.

Enough

Tonight Manchester United was scheduled to play a friendly pre-season game with Indonesia’s team in Jakarta during their Asia Tour. In the last month we’ve passed billboards featuring Manchester United players with the line “Mau?” (“Want?”) beneath it. TVs ads brought the same players asking the same simple question. A few weeks ago, after a half a dozen trips to a sponsoring store, I purchased tickets to the match. While the tragedy of the recent bombings surely does not lie in the fact the game was canceled, the billboards and unused tickets serve as a bitter reminder of what could have been.

On Friday morning I was negotiating a price for a motorbike ride around Malang in east Java. Just before we left, I received a text about the bombings from one of my language instructors. The messages continued throughout the morning and ranged from “It is not humane. We denounce all violence and terrorism. I hope you are always well” to “I’m so sorry, so very very sorry.” While on one hand the attacks were indeed directed at Westerners in light of the choice of hotels and timing, in many ways this feels equally to be an assault on Indonesians.

Just last week I posted about our day at the polls and the relative calm surrounding the election. I was not alone in my optimism regarding Indonesia’s presidential election. As the details of Friday’s bombings surface, it’s not entirely clear to what extent they are related to the election. But, many feel they were a desperate attempt on the part of extremists to call attention to their agenda, an agenda that appeals to few in this country, as the elections have shown. The majority of Indonesians continue to favor secular political life much to the dismay of those who would rather see Indonesia turn away from its history of pluralism toward an Islamic state. To some extent, I suppose the terrorists have succeeded in drawing the attention of the world, yet they don't have what it takes to gain support through legitimate means here. Enough is enough already.