Days go by...
...and yet Christmas still seems really far away. My initial homesickness was "I don't get anything here, I'm so tired and confused" homesickness. Then things got better, for the most part, and we started to settle in. Then, honest-to-goodness, full on homesickness hit me like a truck Friday evening. I literally hit rock bottom, I think, and I wanted to be anywhere but here. Absolutely anywhere. I hated this place. I hated the food, the language, the pollution, the heat and humidity, how nothing is reliable, nothing happens quickly...all the things I'd previously either just accepted or found fascinating before suddenly just sucked. I did not want to spend one more second in, as I called it, Indo-freaking-nesia. Too bad for me-I'll be here until December.
A good part of my mood this weekend probably had to do with how I was feeling physically. I guess when you move to a new country, your immune system has to rebuild itself against a billion new flu and cold strains. This is what the other expats working here tell me, at least. Apparently it's very common for the expat teachers to be sick a lot of their first year, whether it's from their stomachs adjusting to Indonesia in general or random colds and flus. I think I've heard before, too, that teachers a lot of times get sick more than usual in their first years. At any rate, I was an unhappy camper this weekend. I'm feeling better, though, about up to par as far as my health goes. The homesickness will come and go. It doesn't seem like it'll get better right now, but I know it will. All the expats here have gone through it, and they all say it has gotten better. So I guess it's a matter of time.
On a better note, Sunday afternoon was fun. Murray and Astrida were celebrating their wedding anniversary (thirty something, they said), so we all celebrated together at this five-star hotel in Jakarta. I have never been inside a five-star hotel before, so this was quite an experience. We had brunch in the hotel's (of course) five-star restaurant. The brunch was all-inclusive, and involved an amazing buffet loaded with cheeses, seafood, pastries, all manner of fruit, fancy desserts (desserts I'd only seen on shows on the Food Network) and a ton of other stuff. All of it was incredibly fancy, and just as incredibly tasty. Brunch also included a menu with appetizers and main courses (in case the buffet wasn't enough food), and there was an endless supply of champagne and red and white wine. We had a private dining room and all sat around a huge table. The crystal was real-we knew this because we got the glasses to sing, and it was all just really unbelievable. The hotel itself was nothing short of amazing. The weirdest thing was the price of the buffet-for as fancy as it was, and as definitely located in a five-star restaurant and hotel as it was, the price for one person was comparable to the price of a mediocre steak and a beer at an American steakhouse. Hence why we teachers were able to go. Being in a place like that was a little unreal. Again, it comes down to the "white people are rich people" mentality that's a little unnerving. The brunch was fun, and if anyone comes to visit us we will most DEFINITELY go again, but when it comes right down to it-give me Cafe on the Square with Steph and Lorri or Old Chicago with the gang from college any day. I felt like I had to be waaaaaaaaay too much on my best behavior in this hotel. I'm a nice girl with nice manners (I hope!), but five-star establishments are definitely a bit much for me, at least on a highly regular basis.
I'm off to Singapore this Friday. I think I mentioned this before-the head of our HR department is as qualified to do her job as the gecko chirping on our back porch is. Therefore, my visa is a housewife visa (yeah, I'm standing in the kitchen with bare feet as I write this) and I need to go back and get a new one. In Singapore, apparently. Something got screwed up with my contract, as in I didn't have one actually signed until a week ago, so that's why I'm going now and couldn't do this when we landed in Singapore on our way here a month and a half ago. So anyway, off I go. It's an hour-ish flight, and I'll go in the morning and come back in the late afternoon. There's a Borders bookstore located in a great shopping district there, so I'll spend the day hanging out rather than teaching. Sounds good-though I wish Travis could come with. Grrr...damn HR department. Oh well, I'll have a fun time. Wonder if I can get the pilot to make a stopover in Nebraska? Hmm...
A good part of my mood this weekend probably had to do with how I was feeling physically. I guess when you move to a new country, your immune system has to rebuild itself against a billion new flu and cold strains. This is what the other expats working here tell me, at least. Apparently it's very common for the expat teachers to be sick a lot of their first year, whether it's from their stomachs adjusting to Indonesia in general or random colds and flus. I think I've heard before, too, that teachers a lot of times get sick more than usual in their first years. At any rate, I was an unhappy camper this weekend. I'm feeling better, though, about up to par as far as my health goes. The homesickness will come and go. It doesn't seem like it'll get better right now, but I know it will. All the expats here have gone through it, and they all say it has gotten better. So I guess it's a matter of time.
On a better note, Sunday afternoon was fun. Murray and Astrida were celebrating their wedding anniversary (thirty something, they said), so we all celebrated together at this five-star hotel in Jakarta. I have never been inside a five-star hotel before, so this was quite an experience. We had brunch in the hotel's (of course) five-star restaurant. The brunch was all-inclusive, and involved an amazing buffet loaded with cheeses, seafood, pastries, all manner of fruit, fancy desserts (desserts I'd only seen on shows on the Food Network) and a ton of other stuff. All of it was incredibly fancy, and just as incredibly tasty. Brunch also included a menu with appetizers and main courses (in case the buffet wasn't enough food), and there was an endless supply of champagne and red and white wine. We had a private dining room and all sat around a huge table. The crystal was real-we knew this because we got the glasses to sing, and it was all just really unbelievable. The hotel itself was nothing short of amazing. The weirdest thing was the price of the buffet-for as fancy as it was, and as definitely located in a five-star restaurant and hotel as it was, the price for one person was comparable to the price of a mediocre steak and a beer at an American steakhouse. Hence why we teachers were able to go. Being in a place like that was a little unreal. Again, it comes down to the "white people are rich people" mentality that's a little unnerving. The brunch was fun, and if anyone comes to visit us we will most DEFINITELY go again, but when it comes right down to it-give me Cafe on the Square with Steph and Lorri or Old Chicago with the gang from college any day. I felt like I had to be waaaaaaaaay too much on my best behavior in this hotel. I'm a nice girl with nice manners (I hope!), but five-star establishments are definitely a bit much for me, at least on a highly regular basis.
I'm off to Singapore this Friday. I think I mentioned this before-the head of our HR department is as qualified to do her job as the gecko chirping on our back porch is. Therefore, my visa is a housewife visa (yeah, I'm standing in the kitchen with bare feet as I write this) and I need to go back and get a new one. In Singapore, apparently. Something got screwed up with my contract, as in I didn't have one actually signed until a week ago, so that's why I'm going now and couldn't do this when we landed in Singapore on our way here a month and a half ago. So anyway, off I go. It's an hour-ish flight, and I'll go in the morning and come back in the late afternoon. There's a Borders bookstore located in a great shopping district there, so I'll spend the day hanging out rather than teaching. Sounds good-though I wish Travis could come with. Grrr...damn HR department. Oh well, I'll have a fun time. Wonder if I can get the pilot to make a stopover in Nebraska? Hmm...
posted by Erin @ 8:11 AM
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