1 May 2007 – Tuesday
A long but delightful day. Up at the regular time and after getting ready for the day we started packing for our trip to Malang and the Couple’s Conference. We decided to check one piece of luggage so we took one of our large suitcases. This allowed us to pack lots of clothes and other things and keep our carry-on light. When we were finished with that we read from the Kitab Mormon until 9 and the morning passed quickly – at least until then. The hour from 9 to 10 went on forever. We had everything packed up, cleaned up, etc. so there was nothing really to do but wait.
The trip to the airport was perfect – the possible mess from some demonstrations that were supposed to take place did not materialize – and so we were there over 2 hours before our flight was due to leave. Luckily for us the Kanes also had no trouble coming in and so they arrived just about 10 minutes after we did. We were able to check in together, good to a bookstore together, and then sit and just talk for the rest of the time. I do not know what Mary and Sister Kane talked about, but Elder Kane and I spent most of the time talking about the Cosmology of the Universe. No light chit-chat for us.
The flight left 30 minutes late but other than that went well. I sat next to a nice Muslim woman who turned out to be the headmistress of a school near where we live. We exchanged cards and hopefully we can visit her at some time. I wrote some in my paper journal and did a little studying of the language.
The Malang airport is tiny – it is actually part of a large military base – and the luggage pick-up area is about the size of our living room. I forgot to mention that the airplane we were on – 73-200 was configured so that there was no room in the over-heads for normal carry-on luggage. So we had to check both pieces – and so did just about everyone else. This means that everyone of the plane is gathered in this small area waiting for their bags to come off a conveyor belt that must have been about 10 feet long. The smallest pieces come off first so of course the Kanes and our bags were among the last off. But that was OK because it cleared out many of the other passengers and it was easy to get our bags and pull them out.
The Hash’s – they are the couple in Malang – picked us up at the airport and took us to the hotel. It is a lovely place and everyone was expecting us. They knew our names and when we got to our room there was a flower arrangement with a printed card that had our name on it welcoming us to the hotel. At first we thought that it was a very expensive place – we thought the price they were quoting was per person and not per room – but it turned out to be only moderate.
We unpacked and then went with the Kanes to have ‘high tea’ but with cold water instead of hot tea. It was interesting to try all the different sweets – none of them except the chocolate cake were very sweets – but they did not have little cucumber sandwiches so we were disappointed.
Ari – the Hash’s driver – drove us to their house. It is not in the greatest area – Elder Hash said that they had to put the barbed wire around the fence because it was considered a high crime area – but the house is wonderful. There is a huge, high ceiling living room – dining room. Two large bedrooms and a nice sized kitchen. But the best part of the place were the three small but lovely gardens – one with a fish pond and orchids. How great it would be to be able to sit out there and just listen to the splashing of the water. That would be possible in Malang because it is about 1700 feet above sea-level and so it is 10 -15 degrees cooler than Jakarta. It is also much cleaner and the sky is clear and blue. I was very jealous but know that this was where the Hash’s needed to be. They could not have afforded Jakarta.
They then took us on a quick tour of a couple of sights of the city. An old 14th century Buddist temple – we could not get in but we were able to take some pictures and a modern Chinese temple. The Chinese temple was beautiful and we started to take pictures and tour it. However as I started to go in, I realized that it was truly a place where the Chinese people came to pray and remember their ancestors. It did not feel right to be a tourist here. I could feel the faith of the people who were worshiping and so I decided to step back outside. I would not want tourists going through the Provo Temple while it was in use. Mary and sister Kane assured me that someone inside indicated that it was OK but it still did not feel right to me.
The Hash’s then drove us to our hotel and dropped us off. They will be staying here tomorrow night as part of the conference. We started to go in but decided instead to go for a walk to see if we could find a restaurant – we felt that the hotel would be too expensive. The area around the hotel is above average for Jakarta and so the walking was nice and the temperature was just warm. At times we were the hit of the night – people like to talk to white folks and so many said hello. We were just about to give up on finding a restaurant when we came across a nice open Chinese place. It was clean and well lighted so we decided to eat there.
We found the menu was extensive and some of it was even in English. The prices were very cheap – as we have found whenever we went to local restaurants. When the orders came we found the portions were quite small but beautifully presented. This was fine with me because I did not want to eat a heavy meal but the rest bought a ‘mixed salad’ for dessert. They expected a mixed green salad but what they got was a mixed fruit salad on a couple of lettuce leaves. It turned out to be very tasty so they were pleased. When the check came the four us had eaten for a total of under $8. We may go back on Thursday night to try some more things.
We then had a nice walk back to the hotel where we sat down and started to play a dice game that the Kanes have learned to enjoy. It is much different from anything we have seen before and it is going to take some time to learn the rules. But it is fun and there is some skill involved. As we were playing up walk the Barnards and Roberts from Solo. They had taken a travel – basically a van – up to Malang. It was a 6 ½ hour trip and they decided that they really did not want to leave at 3 a.m. tomorrow to get here in time for our opening meeting.
Elder Roberts told us that they tried to call me but I had accidently left my phone in the room so of course they could not reach me. The rest of the evening was spent talking. At first I spent some time talking to Sister Roberts while the rest of the men gathered in one area and the women in another. Sister Roberts told me all about their experiences of the last month and how things were going. They have a house and hopefully will soon have a car. However she is having some kind of problem with either the food or water or both and has been sick a number of times. When we first met them when they arrived in Jakarta, she was worried about this. She seems to have a sensitive stomach and anything new bothers her. She is such a cheerful person it is rather sad to hear that she is having these problems. Hopefully she will adjust because they are going to do a great job in Solo.
At about 9:30 everyone agreed that it was getting late and so we broke up until tomorrow. Some of them are going to go walking in the morning but I did not bring anything that might be counted as walking clothes. I will need to go down to a clothing store we saw last night and get at least one casual shirt so I will not feel completely strange out walking with them. I only brought white shirts and other missionary attire because I thought we should always look like missionaries and did not think of going out for a walk in the morning.
Like many of the hotels in Indonesia, the electricity only comes on when you insert your room key into a special slot. Of course this means the air-conditioning does not work while you are out of the room and so the room was a little warm when we got here. But it quickly cooled off so we were comfortable.
I tried to read some from the Kitab Mormon and then from one of the novels we bought at the airport – the airport is the best place in the city to buy English novels. None of them are current best sellers but there is a good selection and they are about ½ the price as they are in the SoGo mall store.