Out and About in Indo

I didn't realize how long it had been since I last updated folks on the goings on in my latest adopted country, Indonesia. Things are going well here. I've got myself into a more stable state of affairs that both keeps me busy and (well) fed. I've started striking out into the vastness of unexplored Indonesia starting with the less adventurous, less natural wonders, Taman Mini and the Zoo. Taman means Garden. Taman Mini is a sort of park where there are exhibits of things from different parts of Indonesia.

A really cool thing happened there. While we were snapping pics all over the place I shot one of Fitri riding a pig and Michael taking that pic, and Michael shot one of Fitri riding the pig and ME taking that pic. Cool eh?
Fitri is one of the wonderful people I worked with at Wall Street English when I started teaching here in Indonesia. Now we've both made our way up to our new jobs since Wall Street has been disallowed by the government to issue any further visas. We arranged to do the Taman Mini trip on the weekend and I told Fitri I could bring some gin and tonic. So I did. Gin, tonic, ice, lemon, the whole works. But I didn't bring glasses. So that is why Devon, (Fitri's hubby), and Fitri are drinking from PB & J jars respectively. It worked out great though cuz the lids kept them from spilling in the van on the drive there.

A whole bunch of family came with. And a good time was had by all.

I got to ride the pig too!

The next weekend, this weekend, I had plans to go to Taman Mini with my student, Rica and her son Gabriel. She saw my pics of Taman Mini on my computer and said that we should go to the zoo/safari park instead. There was Rica, her friend Egy, Gabriel, our awesome driver, Nowo, and Gabe's helper. I'm not sure of her name. I say the driver was awesome because if you saw the traffic we had to crawl through, both ways... I'll never even get a motorbike licence in this country. Anyway we picked up Egy pretty close to the place where the zoo is. But by the time we got there it was lunch time. So we ate some traditional Indonesian food at a realy cool restaurant. It had ivy covered walls and a huge coy pond in the middle. We sat on floors that we could see the water through. Gabriel enjoyed feeding the fish rice for a while. They'd sometimes put their faces right out of the water and he'd scoop rice right onto their mouths. Little did they know we were eating their relatives. In fact I threw a piece of fish or two over the rail and they ate THAT too the little cannibals. I thought all the food was great but both Rica and Agy told me it wasn't that good.

Rica ordered the food and paid. (Thanks, Rica ;)) You can see in the pics we had duck, chicken satay, goat satay, a few different kinds of fish, rice and a sort of spinach called kangkung. Then there was peanut sauce for the chicken satay, sweet and spicy black bean sauce for the fish and goat satay, I just pigged out! Then because of the big meal, and watching the Sydney Swans destroy North Melbourne the day before to make it to the grand final, I was yawning all the way around the zoo. But still had a great time!
We had just stepped out of the restaurant when, wouldn't you know it, it started to rain. But we weren't deterred. The road to the zoo was lined with carrot and banana vendors. You can feed all sorts of animals in the park you see. So we got some from the enterprising young gent you see in rain gear loading up a bag full of carrots for us. I brought my own carrots. Organic! I thought I'd see if the animals could tell the difference. Nope.

The cool, green van is actually a local bus from the area. Anyway once we got to the zoo a good time was had by all.

We stayed at the zoo pretty much until nightfall. The thing I liked the best was that the animals did not get stuck in cages. They were wandering around huge areas and didn't seem depressed at all. You can tell how close we were able to get by the pics of the bear, lion and hippo. I discovered that zebras, deer and llamas like carrots better than the other animals. There were a few animals that were brought into the people so that they could be photographed holding a lion, tiger, monkey or whatever. I didn't enjoy that part. But mostly the zoo and safari were great. And there are signs all over saying that proceeds from the business go toward helping local wildlife. I hope that's true.

I'd say the highlights for me were the tigers and the big, red orangutan. Incidentally orang means person in Indonesian and utan means jungle. This jungle person was hilarious. He just sat thre lounging by the water trying to get people to feed him. There was a big sign that said not to but he was a rebel. He'd slap his hand then hold it out almost demanding zoo gooers to disregard the sign and throw some food. One guy had some food and he opened his mouth and said, "Ah," and the orangutan did the same. The dude threw some food and the orangutan caught it in his mouth. He was awesome! And the tigers were amazing too. My third favourite was a red panda but he was one animal that looked really unhappy so I didn't include a pic of him in here. Or her. I also noticed that one of its eyes had a cataract, which made it extra sad. But overall it was a great zoo! Lotsa fun!

So anyway we left late and the carrot/banana stands lining the road on the way up had been converted into barbecued corn stands. Man did THAT smell good! I didn't try it though. We made an attempt to drive to the top of the mountain for the view but there was just too much traffic. "Machet terus." This means "always traffic." It can be said at least once a day here. But even though there was a lot of traffic it was an outing to the country. Life was more like the holiday Indonesia out by the zoo. Not the work Indonesia in Jakarta. It was just really nice. I'm really glad Rica was nice enough to take me!