If you can't go back, where the hell do you go?

So, it's been kind of/almost/nearly/vaguely-ish a year since I've written in this dusty little blog spot. I feel sort of obliged to address what's been going on in my life since I last wrote, since I left a lot of promises hanging, tossed a lot of half-baked ideas out there, and because, of course, nothing went according to my meek lil plans and I think it might be fun to tell you guys about what I've been up to.

The last summer of high school did not send me out of those four years with a youthful bang: for the most part, it was full of minimum-wage slavery at McDonald's. Blah blah blah, I got to bypass airport security every day in order to contribute to factory farming, global over-excess, the general ill-health of Idaho's soon-to-be-departed (from the state, at least). But that's okay because I don't work there anymore, and also because working so much, making those dolla billz, meant I got to go to Europe!

(I also had the opportunity to spend a lot of time in Washington, D.C. with the best humans in the world doing my favorite thing, learning and growing as an AFS'er! But I already wrote that part out to perfection so I will publish it right after this.)

I wrote a blog post addressing all of this before I left for Europe in November, actually, but in typical fashion I decided to "let it sit" for a bit so I could edit and then publish it. Said editing and publication never happened, and my once-loved blogging habit has fallen so far by the wayside that "blogger.com" doesn't even autofill in my browser anymore.

From Versailles back to Paris

So... Europe? Yeah, Europe. A month of my life spent hanging out in Paris, Barcelona, Madrid, Lisbon, Seville. A month spent wandering around cobblestoned cities, joining the human rivers through foreign metro systems turned ever-so-slightly familiar, rubbing fallen orange leaves in Seville to dab the citrus on my neck. A month of becoming more myself: that little speck of effervescent weirdness, with those bangs, those glasses, those dusty Dr. Martens, carrying around her fat Moleskine notebook full of receipts and business cards and doodles.

I couldn't sufficiently sum it up for you guys even if I really tried. There's just too much. So much of life, crammed into such a little space. I haven't actually sat down and written about my trip, come to think of it, and all that comes to me are these little snippets, these snapshots of people, snatches of warm and odd feelings I still keep close to my heart.

Bubbles in Barcelona

Take Keith, for example. I met Keith at my hostel in Barcelona. He wore a Star of David over his muscle tank and spoke pretty fluent Hebrew, though he fit every other idea of "American white boy on vacation from his study abroad" to a T. Keith opened a bottle for me, since I hadn't quite gotten the whole corkscrew thing down yet, did a backflip off the wall in the Metro station without breaking his neck, and kept talking about how drunk he was about to get. But, for all his douchebaggery, he also held my hand after I made room for him next to me on the train, in a way that felt profoundly innocent, despite how much he'd been trying to tell me about his kissing prowess (I never did find out if said promises were empty or not).

"You know, it's nice to just sit here, and just, like, hold hands. Makes you feel a little less adrift in the world."

La Rambla, Barcelona

"Adrift" is an incredibly accurate way to describe how I'd felt in the days since Paris, those ten days I spent as a part of the AFS Centennial Prep Team. The Centennial was actually my whole reason for going to Europe. Spain and Portugal happened as a side note, a "well, I'm already there, why not just wander around a little?".

During those ten days, we thirty-some multinational AFSers pulled off events of seismic proportions: a World Congress, a youth symposium, a gala with a cocktail reception. We became a family, bonding over cold sandwich boxes, late nights at the enormous Palais de Congres, our collective lack of sleep and near-manic desire to help whoever we could, however we could. I have never experienced such warmth and positivity, heard "I love you" from so many new people, been so useful and so pleasantly busy in my life.

The Alcazar in Seville

I felt the emotional numbness that had built up over my six months of working at McDonald's wash away during that week-and-then-some. No matter how close you can get to another human being, nothing quite replicates the immediate intimacy between two AFSers - the fact that, if nothing else, you've both had the same indescribably life-changing experience. Combine that innate bond with the fact that the Prep Team just happened to be composed of the coolest, sweetest people on planet Earth, in one of the aforementioned planet's most extravagantly beautiful cities, and you can fill in the rest.

John Green would be shitting himself over all these potential metaphors.

Leaving broke my heart, duh. I sat on the floor of my new hostel, waiting for my room to be ready, crying and writing in my journal while an Italian girl fried some ham. Deciding that I needed to do something more Romantic (with a definite, Bronte-esque capital R, because I don't play with any kind of romanticism that doesn't involve the supernatural and hyper-meaningful weather patterns), I wandered out to cry in the Louvre, a cemetery, the biggest mall in Paris. Listening to my favorite break-up band, The Vaccines, and watching old couples walk hand-in-hand through the graves, I felt a kind of wonderfully gothic inner peace.

Lisbon

Barcelona, a few days later, was playing with bubbles and watching tropical parrots in the trees of Parc Guell, taking walking tours and journaling on the very steps that saw Christopher Columbus. Madrid, a lot of coffee and misadventures with my Australian friend. After Madrid, I hopped on a night train to Lisbon and met with Maria, the Portuguese lovely I met during the Centennial. We ate a lot of cereal and made bad jokes about salted cod. We explored a castle, took hella pictures of a sunset, took naps, and ate even more cereal. Cities are made not by the quality of their gastronomy or their picturesque vistas, I think, but by the people you experience them with, and though Lisbon could quite easily stand on her own I think begin there with Maria made it perfect. I can't wait to go back.

(Seville? Seville was a noisy hostel and keeping mostly to myself, reading a cheap book and stumbling upon a men's kazoo choir while lost and looking for a flamenco show. Lovely and storybook-pretty, but more of a denouement than anything.)

Now I'm back in Boise! Huh-zzzzzah. I stayed awake through my entire flight from Reykjavik to Seattle, saw the Northern Lights through my frosted plastic plane window and watched a lot of Icelandic travel shows.

The castle in Lisbon

I've felt, in equal amounts, incredibly motivated by my travel, and bogged down by the reality that I have to sell my labor and the precious hours of my youth in order to survive, because, y'know. Capitalism. It's not bad, though: I get to sell makeup, I make slightly above minimum wage, I'm saving my money for when I leave for college in the fall. I'm going to the University of Montana to study something or other (French, International Development, Cultural Anthropology, Drawing), because I want to. Because I can. I am floating in this sea of possibility and it is warm and good and I cannot wait. Drifting ain't such a bad thing, once you've got a handle on who you are, once you know you've got hands to hold, people to bring you back to the surface, back to the shore. It is, really, even though it might not feel like it all the time, so good.

“I can never be who I was. I can simply watch her with sympathy, understanding, and some measure of awe. There she goes, backpack on, headed for the subway or the airport. She did her best with her eyeliner. She learned a new word she wants to try out on you. She is ambling along. She is looking for it.” - Lena Dunham (I got her book in Paris, and I so am that kind of girl). 

 

And it goes on

The difference between American adventures and Indonesian adventures is so striking. Indonesian adventures were nearly always urban and always kinda spontaneous; half the fun was walking around being pelted with 'hello mister's, trying mystery street foods, interacting with intimidated young children. I miss being able to board a bemo not knowing where it was going, even though that nearly always ended very, very badly.

American adventures involve a lot more trees, a lot more quiet, and a lot more climbing over fences (without being caught by ever-present security guards). Now, I can drive and I even have my own car, which is nice but much less conductive to spontaneity. It's a bright teal Dodge Neon that sputters when I try to start it up, that rides so low to the ground that driving my mom's Jeep feels like I'm taking the wheel of a tank. I haven't named him/her yet. It'll take a while. Maybe I'll go with something chunky and respectable, like Agung or Putri or Wedyawati.

Speaking of adventures, I decided not to go out of state for school next year. Really, if it was up to me I wouldn't be going to school at all next year, but if I'm not in school I have to pay rent to live at home, which I'd rather not do! So I'm going to take a few classes at the local community college and spend the rest of my time working, saving up the dolla bills to go WWOOFing or volunteering through HelpX. I already found a farm in Sicily that makes organic makeup, but who knows where I'm going. Partly because I'm really bad at saving my money.

I'm just really excited to not be in high school anymore, to be graduating despite some enormous struggles (with chemistry especially). We finished the senior edition of the newspaper and it looks really, really, really good - I designed the biggest, most info-heavy pages of the issue and I am SO EXCITED to see them in print.

In general, my life feels a lot less constipated now that I'm about to get my diploma. Later in June I'll be off to DC for some YES Abroad/AFS-related events, which will be career-building and epically cool; I even have some free time in DC which I plan on spending hanging out with other alumni, and wandering the Smithsonians at will. The only time I even got to set foot near the museums was during WJMC last summer, and having limited time meant that some friends and I just ran in, bought dinosaur pens, ate, and had to run out again without really seeing anything. I'm excited to spend some time with dinosaur bones and old documents. We're gonna have a grand old time.

Hello again?

Rebounding is weird. Have I mentioned that? It's true. It's weird. The inside of my brain constantly feels like the abrasive white noise of an indie rock intro where there's drums and guitar and the lead singer wailing and everything is just like AAAHHHHH WHAT IS HAPPENING!

Rebounding is... coming home and suddenly the State Department doesn't pay for your flights anymore, and you're responsible for more than just getting to school at least a couple of times a week so your visa stays valid and your program stays off your back, and your friends aren't the multicultural band of nitwits you used to bitch about everything with, but they're the people you know and love but who get tired of the dumb stories that, like inside jokes, they can't understand.

That isn't to say that my friends at home are any less than my exchange buddies, because they absolutely aren't, but being home and having to stifle this huge thing that happened in my life is difficult and deeply isolating. There are plenty of exchange students and rebounds in Boise, and I'm even involved with AFS here, but through a bunch of weird circumstances I've landed in this position where I'm not actually friends with any of them. Lame, I know.

It's been a while since I've last blogged, and I both missed it and haven't. On one hand, there's SO much left that I can, and want to write about, but the venn diagram of what I want to say and things people probably don't want to hear about anymore is a circle. It feels absolutely pathetic to recount stories that I neglected to tell while they were actually happening to me - like my experiences aren't authentic anymore, because I've had time to brush a heavy layer of nostalgia all over them.

And it's true. My memories have become distorted, by my brain which heroically ignores the pain and heightens everything else. I miss bemo, and the constant conversations with random people, and the malls, and nearly everything else I hated so much about Indonesia while I was there. I can still whinge about Asia with the best of them, but it'd be half-hearted now.

Sometimes I'm just sitting there minding my own business, and then the INDONESIAAAAA pangs hit like a sudden kick to the gut. I'll want more than anything to be back on the busy streets waiting for the bus, or to be lying with Avery watching Skins on her laptop - just to be in the middle of my exchange again.

I'm always grappling with the feeling that I want more than anything to just re-live my exchange as I am now, a happier and brighter version of myself, at the same time knowing that exchange was what led me to this point. A lot of memories of how my depressed self acted are cringe-worthy now, and I've been beating myself up about things that I excused so easily while I was an inbound. There are a lot of regrets involved in being a rebound, and a lot of them are really stupid, like my intense desire to go shopping in Surabaya again.

(Sometimes I remember things that happened, and see pictures, and I think. Holy shit, I LIVED IN INDONESIA FOR A YEAR. Like did that even happen? Whaaat? And that's jarring too. Feeling things is weird. Nachos are better.)

On the other hand, I have some pretty ambitious plans for the future that involve blogging. Like majorly ambitious. I don't want to reveal too much now, because said plans are in their infancy, but I'm looking forward to taking my penchant for blogging and sharing things with people and turning it into something of actual consequence. Rest assured you guys will hear about it when things become clearer.

Otherwise: life. Astagfirulllaaaaaahhhhh is all I have to say. It's been real. Being thrown back into American life, and high school, and the inexorable process of rebounding with no safety net and no convenient handbook has been crazy. Applying to college and financial aid? There have been so many points where I was like, ALRIGHT, WHO DECIDED TO PUT MY ENTIRE FUTURE IN MY HIGHLY IRRESPONSIBLE 18-YEAR-OLD HANDS?

I've gotten into a couple of colleges already, despite some hiccups in the process, but I'm holding out for Lewis & Clark College in Portland. Not only because I've fallen in love with the show Portlandia, but liberal arts college just sounds right for me and Portland is my forever girl, so why not put both together? Just don't ask me what I'm going to major in, cause I don't know myself. Maybe hopefully International Relations or English.

I'm also editor-in-chief of my school's newspaper, despite only spelling chief properly about 20% of the time. Putting it all together is such a rush and I love holding the finished product in my hands, getting to see the ultimate result of so much effort from so many different people. I do love me some journalism; it's absolutely in my future. Watch out, TIME. I'm comin' for ya.

We have excellent taste in covers

This post didn't have a particular point, other than I've missed blogging and rebounding has been kicking me in the ass. I'm sorry to those who looked forward to reading my writing, and such, if there's any of you left. Here's a rebounding/my current favorite songs playlist because procrastination is the word of the day, and I really don't want to read any more of Huckleberry Finn. 

To all of those with the November blues

I had this post all planned out in my head. I was going to write my heart out, make fancy allusions to the struggles I had while abroad, and most of all pump encouragement into all current and future exchange students. It's that magical time of year, as we head into the holiday season, when even the most hardy exchangers are beginning to slump.

Then I sat down to write said post, and all I could think was Jesus Crispies, not this s#!t again. If I have to write one more motivational post, (basically regurgitating things that have been said thousands of times,) I will barf all over everything. 

The logic here goes something like, 'if I don't want to write it, then nobody in the world could ever want to read it.'

So instead of rambling on and on, here's something so much better. Amy Poehler is my newest personal hero, and the heroine of my current drug of choice: Parks and Recreation, the show about a dysfunctional local government in the charming town of Pawnee, Indiana.

I saw this gifset while on Tumblr and it just so happens that every single one bears relevance to exchange. And life. I might have been a little misty-eyed while reading them, because who doesn't want Amy Poehler being their own personal cheerleader in life? Besides, so many of these are things I've needed to hear. I hope they help some of you, too.

*ALL CREDIT FOR THESE GIFS GOES TO TUMBLR USER LYCECK. I found the original post here.

ALHAMDULLILAH

There's just something about what I call the 'Allah' words that cannot be replicated in any language but the original, nor their flavor in the context of any culture but an Islamic one.

The 'Allah' words are just that - Arabic words that praise Allah, or invoke Allah, or forbid in the name of Allah. They're the Islamic equivalent of 'Oh my God' or 'Jesus Christ' or what have you that Americans spit out on the daily. And like those little phrases, in Indonesia you'll hear an 'astagfirullah' or 'alhamdullilah' about every couple of sentences, if not more frequently.

Astagfirullah is for situations when you want to remove blame from yourself, taunt a friend for their ungodliness, or hopefully forbid something from happening altogether. Alhamdullilah is a prayer of thanks to God, while masha'Allah expresses more specific joy and appreciation, while protecting from bad luck and preventing jinxes. Finally, insha'Allah tells you that something will happen - but on God's time, not necessarily yours.

There are many, many, many more Allah words, like Allahu Akbar (God is great), and subhan'Allah (the closest translation might be 'hallowed is thy name') but, at least in Indonesia, none are quite so prolific as the main four.

I love these words because they're powerful. An 'alhamdullilah' can be drawn out on nearly every syllable. 'alhaAAAAAAMMMDUUUUULLIILAAAAAAHHHH' - screaming it when I found out that a scholarship application I was worried about was due 15 days later than I thought was so much more satisfying than going for a 'thank God!', or even a 'SWEET BABY JESUS, THANK YOU, OH LORDY', although the power of the second can't really be denied, and I can't exactly say I haven't used it before.

There's just something about them. Maybe it's the novelty, or the little reminder of Indonesia every time I get shoved in the hall and think 'astagfirullah', the way I always think back to my friend Farah when the word 'masha'Allah' comes to mind.

All I can say is that I miss hearing the 'Allah' words and being understood, not given weird looks, when shouting them to the heavens.

"Indonesia's Transsexual Muslims"

As someone who admittedly didn't do all that much to further education about all of Indonesia while in-country, today while browsing documentaries I saw this one pop up on the sidebar and had to see what it was all about. 

I know banci (the kinda dirty word for men who dress as women) from the jokes and jibes of my friends in class, and the fact that according to Avery's host dad there's a forest where all of the banci in Surabaya like to hang out. The Banci Forest, if you will. So there's that.

This 20-minute documentary is fascinating. In it we meet Mariyani, a man turned woman who once sold her own body for a price lower than that of a bowl of bakso - about RP 4500, less than a dollar. She runs a religious school for Muslims like her, who might not be accepted elsewhere, in the otherwise rather conservative city of Yogyakarta, Central Java. 

Don't mind the preview image and give it a look! 

Indonesian Rivers

Scene: David and I, outside some hotel in the center of Jakarta, December-something 2012, walking alongside a river at the seamy hour of about midnight. The sidewalks ahead are washed in a glow of dull yellow lamplight. Everyone else is out and I feel terrible, physically and emotionally.

The river, snaking alongside us without seeming to be moving at all, smells like an open toilet. I observe as much.

"You wanna know why that river smells like crap? 'Cause people crap in it!"

And - as stupidly obvious as David's observation is, I laugh, and laugh and laugh, remembering all the times I've seen old food peddlers squatting on the conveniently angled concrete banks, or seen children with their little brown butts just barely hanging over the edges of combined bridges/sidewalks over man-made canals. 

At that moment, I felt so far from Boise, where the river (which runs straight through downtown) is so clear you can toss a stone into the current and watch to see where it comes to rest at the bottom. 

Rivers in Indonesia are never clear, nor even a discernibly natural color. Maybe they're an earthy brown in Borneo or Sumatera or the village at least, but in human-infested Java cities, you'd be more accurate to describe a river's water as 'minty'. Whether or not they stink depends on the day, and probably the diets of the people whose houses feed into it, or squat over it. The river right near my house would get to stinking about every night at sunset; I affectionately dubbed it 'the s#!t ditch'. 

Rivers also serve as convenient trash bins, and the homes of skipping bugs, and tiny fish who are in constant danger of being fished out by boys with handmade fishing rods. They squat in neat rows at the river's edge, contemplating the water, slowly baking in the sun, the keenest observers of life going by. 

Don't be fooled by the greenery

Despite the filth and neglect, rivers still play an important part in Indonesian life and lore. Entire tent cities prefer to take shape along their banks, and certain people use the water to wash dishes, their hands, and their nether regions. It isn't uncommon to see boys and men bathing in the filthy brown waters, and their pure joy at playing around for even a few minutes out of the day overshadows the fact that they're doing their personal hygiene more of a disservice than anything.

Many times, I was told that a river in Surabaya was home to sharks and crocodiles, and that its waters, though nearly stand-still at first glance, were treacherous. The name 'Surabaya' happens to be a combination of the words 'suryo' and 'buaya' - shark and crocodile. Legend has it that a shark and a crocodile battled in the very river making its way through Surabaya's center, and their struggle has been immortalized in statues around the city. The most famous is in front of KBS, and aside from the hero's monument, it's the best symbol of Surabaya there is.

source

Definitely lore gone a little awry, but there are worse things to do than buy into a myth when living in Indonesia.

What To Do in Madura

While dreaming up a good angle from which to write about my trip to New Mexico, I was randomly reminded that I have yet to tell you all of my and Avery and David's adventures in Madura. And since David's birthday was a couple of days ago I want to remind him of our AMAZING ADVENTURES, so here you go.

Madura. The word evokes an image of men in red-and-white striped shirts, probably screaming at their beloved honey-rubbed racing cattle. They are a famously rough people, even rougher than Surabayans (shockingly enough). But, I say rough in an affectionate way. The Maduranese the type to grab your arm in their utter excitement to ask you where you want to go and forcibly get you there, while only ripping you off a little bit.

To those who don't know the difference between Madura and madu*, Madura is a teeny tiny little island that's about 15 minutes by ferry away from Surabaya. They're famous for karapan sapi, an epic bull race held every October where prized bulls are rubbed down with honey, beer, and flowers for good luck before they run. It's a huge deal there.

Madura is connected to Java by Suramadu, the longest bridge in Indonesia, which is much beloved. The name, a combination of Surabaya and Madura, is the product of Indonesia's fascination with abbreviations. Avery and I were asked multiple times during our year if we had been to Suramadu yet. You can find Suramadu adorning t-shirts, expensive batik, and all manner of other things; people will stop there for pictures as if it's actually a point of great interest.

It is not. It is a bridge. From what I hear, it takes less than five minutes and a toll of $3 to drive across. Not that Indonesia shouldn't be proud or excited about it, it's just... a bridge.

Or, uh, you be the judge of Suramadu's worth!

Cynicism aside, the week when David came, we all decided that a trip to Madura was essential. For the most part we all had never really had a chance to get off of Java, and even though Madura wasn't very far, it was still something. So we scoured the tiny section in David's guidebook for something to do once we landed, and set off.

 

I was really grumpy that day - but I was wearing my favorite shirt, so there's that! The ferry from Surabaya to Madura costs RP 4.000 or about 40 cents, but making up for the price over driving, there's an unending stream of people trying to sell you quail eggs and instant coffee while en route. 

The harbour is gorgeous if you ignore the floating trash and the questionable toothpaste color of the water. At one point you can see where the harbor water collides with sea water. Surabaya is a naval base, and you can see clusters of old ships everywhere along with the hubbub of shipping vessels marooned closer to each other and the land.

Our port of arrival in Madura was Kamal, a dusty port city which features a bemo station, a few dilapidated tent restaurants, and goats. Lots of goats. The three bule were accosted immediately, and there was a lot of confusion involving Maduranese men shouting to each other and making sure we were taken care of. Having chartered a bemo, we were off to Sambilangan, a tiny town home to an old Dutch lighthouse and the only place we could reasonably reach and return from before nightfall at 5 PM.

The Madura countryside is gorgeous - lush, green, and glistening with the watery faces of rice paddies. It was the idyllic jungle paradise I had always dreamt of. On the way, we listened to the driver and two young women fondly bickering, intermittently answering their timid questions about us and America. 

Sambilangan was indeed tiny - a couple warung, and what would turn out to be a handful of farming families living nearby. The lighthouse was gorgeously jutting out of the landscape, unmistakably Dutch in all its white and metal glory. It was around 100 years old, with all the original metalwork and signs still in relatively good condition. We paid to enter and rushed inside, to be greeted by a dingy interior, and a stomach-clenching empty elevator shaft shooting up from the ground to the top, 200 feet above. 

The climb was long - 200 feet worth of staircases and stopping at every opportunity to look out the windows at the scenery, and the cows below. Graffiti was everywhere, mostly fairly recent scribbles, declarations of love and names paired up with hearts. The only other people there were a quiet Indonesian family on their way down. They offered us tired smiles as we continued up, probably glad they didn't have to make that trip again.

"Look! It's suckling!!" - David

The man, the myth, the legend

The climb, of course, was so worth it. We poked around the lantern room for a while, finding out that the lighthouse was decommissioned and the light would never guide men home again, before the fumes of motor oil drove us out to fresh air. Even out on the deck, everything was cramped and precariously close to the only thing protecting us from falling to the ground below - a little cast-iron fence.

We ended up happening across some friends who had much less than that keeping them from disaster. A few guys, probably about our age, were hooked up to harnesses on the top of the lighthouse, messing around with metal and doing repairs on the roof. We could hear banging and drilling the entire time we were up there. I shouted up to them: 

"Mas! Takut ga?" ("Bro! Aren't you scared?")

"Tidak! Ada tali." ("Nope. We have ropes.")

The worker looked a little shocked that someone was talking to him, and in turn I was shocked that most of the structure keeping them aloft was made of bamboo. Their faith in it was incredible as they must have been at least 230 feet above the ground.

We turned to see that another young guy had either climbed down or was helping the others from the same place where we were standing. Though he was very shy and hesitant to talk to us, we coerced him into getting a picture with us.

The singular thought I had while wandering another direction on the deck and staring out at the landscape was this is it. This is the rainforest. I'm here. It was so shocking that something which was so foreign and unimaginable when I had only lived in a scrub desert my whole life, was spread out before me. The rainforest. I was an exchange student, living in the freakin' rainforest. I had dreamed of the moment when I could see it in real life ever since I learned of the rainforests' existence, and its plight, and had done multiple school projects on the subject.

Despite everything that was weighing me down then, I felt free, and so proud of myself to have gotten so far. I was seeing the world, in a way I couldn't have even dreamt of when I was younger.

But sadly, a fact stands out that kind of diminishes the inspirational power of that story: I don't think that Madura even has any real rainforest. I'm told it was temperate or something like that. Doesn't make it any less pretty though. 

Before it was time to board our bemo and get back to Surabaya, we decided to explore the haphazard veins of the rice paddies/mangrove forest. It turned out to be just as fascinating as our trip up the lighthouse. It was untouched, wholly original, and enough for an entire day's worth of slow strolling. Shacks were set up here and there, as were little fish traps on the muddy shores. Snails crawled in the muck; we tripped over home-made wooden bridges fit snugly from one edge of the earth to another. 

My camera was dying at that point though, so I got just a few pictures, but as it began to sprinkle and I covered my head with the sarong I had hastily packed that morning, the feeling of 'oh my God this is happening' came back. I was squishing through a mangrove forest with three of my best friends, doing 'what backpackers do', as David had put it. Not even the irritated driver or my hurting wallet could diminish the high that suddenly overtook my previously sullen mood. 

We got back to Kamal in one piece, paid an exorbitant $15 to the driver, and rode our ferry back to Surabaya shores. Heading to my host family's house, we boarded an extremely crowded bemo, where I was forced to spend a good ten minutes sitting on Avery's lap just so we could all squeeze in. It was the last chance we had to take public transport before everything shut down, and we weren't about to give up on it just because 25 people were shoved in a vehicle that logically should have barely fit 12.

Ty-pi-cal is all I have to say about that, and this picture, and everything else about that day.

*Madura is an island and madu is honey

Also, as for the title of this post, I still don't know. You tell me!

The Two-Bedroom Suite

Right now I'm sitting at a hotel near the Albuquerque airport, waiting to wake up at 4 AM to catch my flight back to Boise. It's been three sun-burnt days in New Mexico with my mom and grandma, spent riding in the affectionately named "kidnapper van", volunteering at a BBQ cookoff and wandering around the stucco streets of Santa Fe. I'll fill you guys in on everything later.

The crowning moment of this mini-vacation has been, by far, this hotel room. It's the biggest I've ever stayed in. Not surprising, considering most all the hotel rooms I've ever stayed in have been mostly State Department sponsored and I'm sure that in DC they're not too keen on putting up their teenagers in the most luxurious suites.

Anyway. Let me take you on the grand tour. No, there isn't much point to this blog post other than me geeking out about how EXCITED I am about this room.

The view from the door

The kitchenette...

With our own dishware and everything!

A toaster, too. But no bread or bagels or anything delicious to toast.

A very homey bathroom...

And two - count em! - bedrooms 

View from one of the bedroom doors. There's a pullout couch and TV and everything. I feel right at home.