Easter
We had a quiet Easter. We had district conference so we didn’t have anything special at church regarding Easter. I did find a ham for a small fortune and made potatoes, rolls and pies. We had the Willis family over to join us after church. We certainly had a feast. Those kinds of meals are really appreciated by all around here. The pleasure we get out of simple things.
Some friends of ours who have recently been to the states brought us some Easter candy, including Reese’s Peanut Butter Eggs! I am hoarding the other package of 6 we didn’t eat on Easter.
I forgot to buy Mallory an Easter dress, (what’s wrong with me?) and Saturday afternoon I remembered so Luke and I stopped off at my favorite store (for Mallory) after a movie and Luke picked out a cute little pink stripped dress for her. She looked adorable and of course she loved it. When I brought it home she put it up to herself and walked all over the house like that.
I tried to find the boys new ties for Easter, but no luck. Maybe I’ll pick some up in the states this summer and save them for next year.
Mallory and Shoes
Mallory needed some new sandals. Because I had no idea what size she wore, I decided to take her with me to the store. That was a joke. This is a girl who rarely goes out because everyone mauls her. She doesn’t like to sit in her stroller at all and normally, I would just put her in there and walk around with a screaming child…thinking, she’ll get over it. Not here. No one ever lets their child cry. If the child lets out the tiniest squeak, the child is given anything he wants. So, walking around a mall with Mallory screaming and struggling to get out of her stroller brought several harsh stares from people. The only way I got her to stop was to finally get to the shoe store and put some shoes on her. She was all smiles then and wouldn’t let me take the shoes off. I finally found some that fit her and she loved them. She then saw some flip flops. She grabbed them and I put them on her. She thought she was so cool. I asked for her size and when I got them, I put them on her feet and she continued to parade around the store like she owned the place. Glancing down at her feet and admiring herself and then making sure everyone around were watching her. She was hilarious. She still loves them and had to show all of our staff as soon as we got home.
Another great thing about this place
I discovered something fantastic here. Going to the spa is wonderful and cheap!! I have had several pedicures (have it done the same time I’m getting my hair colored...it’s great) but I’ve never had a facial or anything. I went with a friend today and had my eyebrows waxed, a pedicure and a 2 hour facial all for the wonderful price of $25! I believe I’ll be doing that more often. Anyone that comes to visit…that’s the first stop.
Bikes
We have a dirt bike path just a block or so from our house. I think Creed wrote about it previously. Nash often goes there with his friends. Normally, our driver or guard go with him but a couple of weeks ago Nash was with 3 other friends and they all went without an adult. They came back all muddy and very upset. Apparently, a group of Indonesian boys were there and started bullying Nash and his friends. Rocks were thrown, words were yelled, the Indonesian boys were knocking them off their bikes. It was quite dramatic. Luckily, our driver and guard went out into the street as the boys were chasing Nash and his friends. Nash learned not to go without an adult. Funny thing was that all the bikes were muddy and so were all their shoes. Not too long after they came home and our gardener was scrubbing every ounce of dirt off the bikes and shoes! I don’t think our bikes have ever been so clean!
Family Fun Fair
The school sponsored a Family Fun Fair a couple of weeks ago. It was a great activity. The boys had so much fun with all the carnival games and treats. Everything was about .50. The school owns several of those huge blow up slides and climbing walls and things so they were all set up and were being run by the high school kids. The boys loved spending the day there and seeing all their friends. I enjoyed the real snow cones and decided my little hand crank snow cone machine just doesn’t do the job here. I need a real industrial one!! We would be the most popular family in the neighborhood.
Makassar
This is Creed. I just thought I’d put in a word or two about my trip to visit our dealer in Makassar last week (one of two dealers I have been assigned to work with on their customer satisfaction scores). Makassar is a city of about 1.5 to 2 million people on the southern end of the island of Sulawesi. I was amazed at how modern it made Jakarta look. Despite how big the city is, I really felt like I had taken a step back in time – infrastructure, buildings and the city in general were all really run down and old. Makassar has a long history as a large shipping & trading center for the region. At one point in the last 50 years it was an international port, but apparently the customs officials demanded excessive bribes, which made it much less economical for shipping companies so a lot of the shipping shifted to other ports, which put a lot of customs officials in Makassar out of work. (This is an example of typical, short-sighted, self-interested behavior that ends up hurting the people in the long run – seems to happen a lot here). The dealer there is good, though, so we had productive meetings. In between meetings the dealer took me to places to eat that are pretty famous in Makassar – a seafood restaurant for lunch (and using the word restaurant is very generous – it was more like a diner), a Chinese restaurant for dinner, then a small shop to get some noodles with a certain kind of pork for breakfast. The seafood was pretty good. We picked out the fish (on ice in coolers at the front of the store), though I didn’t really recognize what kind of fish they were, then they cooked them up for us. At the Chinese restaurant we had some strange looking fish sausage shaped into the form of a baby chick, then boiled in broth. And when they served the noodles for breakfast, the dealer made sure to tell the waiter to serve mine without the complimentary piece of intestines. Let’s just say I am glad that I didn’t get sick from the food I ate on that trip. It was interesting to see a different area of Indonesia and to see how things differ from Jakarta. I’ll probably go back there 2 or 3 more times this year to work with them on their plans to improve customer satisfaction.
Millers in Shanghai
Thursday, April 20, 2006
Photos: 19 April 2006 #2
Luke came downstairs on Sunday morning, proud as can be at how he had gotten himself ready for church. I had to take a photo of him, because it cracked me up -- hair slicked around (he loves getting his hair wet, but then he combs it in no particular direction), collar folded in, one side unbuttoned, and a tie with a big spot of toothpaste on it. He gets high marks for effort - we're still working with him on his form, though. 
Mallory fell in love with her new Easter dress instantly. She always holds her new clothes up to her like this, then parades around the house to show everyone.
Happy as can be in her new Easter dress.
Mallory surrounded by her fans, chocolate in hand, reading a book she received from the Easter Bunny.
Luke came home from school one day saying he really liked the star fruit, second only to rambutan (I think they had tried it in class that day). We bought one and cut it up last night. Luke was all too willing to pose for this photo, of course.
Wednesday, April 19, 2006
Photos: 19 April 2006 #1
This is a common sight in our house - if anyone is sitting at the computer, Mallory will come up to you and ask to sit on your lap. She especially likes looking at photos and listening to music on the computer.
This is Nash with his friends Rish, Guido, and Doo Yun at our house after returning from a skirmish with some Indonesian kids at the bike track. Some of the boys are more dramatic than others.
This is Grant, Luke, and their friend Spencer at the Family Fun Fair, waiting to get drenched.
Grant at the top of the climbing tower. Nice photography, though, isn't it? It appears as if the climbing tower is as tall as the two apartment buildings in the background.
Grant and his friend, Spencer, during (above) and after (below) their duel on the pole. I think they both fell off the pole.
Nash has been participating in a singing group at school called the PIE Pipers (PIE = Pondok Indah Elementary, the name of their school). They performed a couple of songs in the auditorium on the morning of the Family Fun Fair.
Wednesday, April 5, 2006
Photos: March 2006 Perth # 9
Killing time, waiting with the kids while Heidi was at the temple.
Mallory was fascinated by all the kangaroos she saw all over Pinaroo Memorial. 
We saw so many dead, burned out trees in and around Perth.
Inside the Perth Mint (above) near a gold mining site replica, and outside the Perth Mint (below). That gold bar Luke is holding is chocolate.
Photos: March 2006 Perth # 8
Mallory's trying to talk to this kangaroo.
The flying foxes in this cage climbed down and hung on the fence right next to us -- sticking their tounges out at us. 
The goats attacked us all, including Mallory. They tried to eat her stroller and her shirt. She loved it, though, and kept telling all of the goats "Hi." 
Here's Grant holding a wombat.
This Tasmanian devil kept running laps around his pen. 
There's a koala or two hiding in the eucalyptus behind us.
Photos: March 2006 Perth # 7
The DNA tower in King's Park.
The mini Tree-Top Walk in King's Park.
A few more photos from King's Park.
Letter: 3 April 2006 - Perth Trip
Our trip to Perth was great. The weather was perfect, the sky was blue, it was clean, not too crowded, and the food was good. We all enjoyed the trip a lot and decided that we could easily live in Perth. Heidi had two options for me: I should either find a job in Perth or we should move her and the kids to Perth, and I would commute to Jakarta during the work week.
Thanks to Kaye & Lonnie and my parents for being our tour guides. Even though you weren’t able to be there with us, we referred to your email often during the course of our trip.
We left for the airport late Thursday night (March 23rd), because our flight left just after midnight Friday morning. We opted for the Qantas flight, because it was the only direct flight between Jakarta and Perth, but we had to fly in the middle of the night. We arrived at about 5:00 am Friday morning, rented a car, and went straight to a hotel in downtown Perth so that everyone could sleep. It was strange to be driving again, and even stranger to drive on the left side of the road. Even though they drive on the same side of the road in Indonesia, it is a lot different when you are the one in the driver’s seat -- I almost crashed a couple of times on the way from the airport to the hotel, and I couldn’t seem to keep the vehicle in my lane (the white lane lines don’t mean anything in Jakarta).
On Friday after everyone got some rest, we walked around downtown Perth for a while (our hotel was on Murray street, right near the Hay street mall area), then we walked to the Perth Mint. They had a great tour, including a live demonstration of pouring a gold brick. We stopped at Miss Maud’s for dinner on the way back to the hotel, and that night Heidi stayed home to get everyone to bed early while I went to the temple. All three of our boys asked us if we were sure it was safe to drink the water from the tap in Perth. Grant made me try it first, though, to prove that it was safe.
Saturday morning we dropped Heidi off at the temple, then I took the kids to Pinaroo Memorial Cemetery to see if we could spot some kangaroos. We picked Heidi up later that morning, then drove 15 or minutes or so to the Caversham Wilderness park. It was a great zoo – we saw wombats, kangaroos, koalas, a Tasmanian devil, flying foxes, turtles, lizards, etc. Nash, Grant, Luke, and I went on a camel ride, too. On the way out we stopped at the snack shop and got some ice cream, where we tried our first peppermint Magnum – a flavor they don’t have in Indonesia. We went to King’s Park that afternoon, too, and enjoyed walking around, including the mini-tree top walk and the DNA tower (Mallory is fascinated by stairs, and even climbed to the top of the tower, with me holding onto one of her hands) . I cannot tell you what we would give for a park like that in Jakarta. The boys and Mallory loved the opportunity to walk around freely, to play at the playground, and to just see the green open space. It seemed that half of Perth was at the park – playing cricket, football, having a BBQ, or just taking a walk.
Sunday morning we went to church at the Dianella ward right near the temple and met several people who know the Nally’s. We picked up some food for lunch and drove to King’s Park again and spent the afternoon outside.
On Monday morning we drove to Fremantle to the boat dock and took a 45 minute ferry ride to Rottnest Island. We had reservations for 2 nights at the Rottnest Lodge in a section called the Quod, a building that is a former aboriginal prison. We took a train ride up to the top of one of the hills on the island for a tour of the Oliver Hill Gun – a WWII era gun positioned on the island to protect Perth and the Western Australian coast. On the train ride back the driver let each of the boys take a turn in the driver’s seat, which was a thrill for them. After lunch we walked 10 or 15 minutes to the Basin, a beach in a small cove with white sand and clear water. It was great to be able to walk right out into the water and to see all sorts of fish. Rottnest Island has a bunch of quokkas on it, and Mallory especially loved spotting them (quokkas are small marsupials about the size of a large cat and are only found on Rottnest and in one or two other areas of Western Australia. They walk around on their hind legs, mostly, but will sometimes hop on their back two feet like little kangaroos if they want to move quickly, but they mostly just hung out on the grass, eating and staring back at the people who were staring at them). Mallory would always walk up to them and tell them “Hi.” I don’t think any quokkas ever answered her back, though.
The next day we rented bikes and rode around a bit, then went on a boat tour in a semi-submersible boat to see the reefs and 2 shipwrecks close to the island. In addition to seeing all sorts of fish, we also saw a sting ray and a jelly fish. We rode our bikes out to a different beach in the afternoon – Little Parakeet Point, I believe -- for some more playing in the sand, swimming, and snorkeling. That night we went to see the movie “Nanny McPhee” at the small movie theatre on the island – basically an old dance hall with a bunch of canvas chairs / benches (the whole time we were on Rottnest it reminded us of summer camp). We walked back to the lodge that night in the dark and enjoyed looking at the stars & constellations – many more stars than we have seen in a long time.
Wednesday morning we took the boat back in to Fremantle, then drove down the coast a bit, stopped for lunch of fish & chips at Cicerello’s in Mandurrah, picked up some apples from the road-side stands near Donnybrook, then drove in to Pemberton to a place called Pump Hill Farm Cottages (a place highly recommended to us by a couple of people here in Jakarta). Our cottage was great – it had two bedrooms and a small kitchen & family room – with a great view overlooking a valley with fields & cow pastures. We got some food from the grocery store and made tacos for dinner, then we lit a fire in the fireplace, popped some popcorn, and watched a movie on the DVD player.
Thursday morning we went around with the farmer to feed the donkeys, cows, goats, sheep, ducks, and then after feeding the chickens, the boys got fresh eggs from the hen house and we took them back to our cottage and cooked them for breakfast. That day we drove down near Walpole to go on the Tree Top Walk in the Valley of the Giants, then we came back to Pemberton to climb the Gloucester Tree – a 60+ meter tree with two-foot spikes pounded into the side of it like ladder rungs. I wasn’t sure which of the boys I should let try climbing it, because it didn’t look exactly safe, but Luke started up the tree and Grant and Nash quickly followed, so I took off after them and by the time we realized it, we were more than half-way up the tree.
On Friday after going around to feed the animals with the farmer, we checked out of the cottage and drove back in to Perth. We stayed near downtown again, and Friday afternoon we went to a nearby shopping mall for dinner (we tried the doner kebabs), and to do some shopping for things we aren’t able to get in Jakarta. On Saturday we went to Fremantle for some more shopping (Target, Fremantle markets, E-Shed markets), lunch, and to see a few things – the Roundhouse (an old prison) and the Shipwreck Museum, with a recovered portion of the ship Batavia, which sank off the coast of Australia on its way from Europe to Jakarta (the story sounded interesting, so we bought a book about it, and Nash has read nearly half of it already).
Sunday we went to church again in Dianella, then in the afternoon we went to King’s Park (did I mention that we like that park?) and met the family of a missionary who was serving in our branch in Jakarta, but who was released last week. We had lunch, talked a while in the park, then we went to the airport. You know those flights where someone’s child cries and screams the whole time? Well, we were the family with the screaming baby last night. We think Mallory is getting a new tooth or two because she cried in pain and was inconsolable for much of the flight. I’m sure people thought we were torturing our child. Our flight landed at midnight in Jakarta, so we didn’t get everyone home and in bed until 2:00 am. Hopefully a few of these pictures fill in the rest of the story of our trip.
Thanks to Kaye & Lonnie and my parents for being our tour guides. Even though you weren’t able to be there with us, we referred to your email often during the course of our trip.
We left for the airport late Thursday night (March 23rd), because our flight left just after midnight Friday morning. We opted for the Qantas flight, because it was the only direct flight between Jakarta and Perth, but we had to fly in the middle of the night. We arrived at about 5:00 am Friday morning, rented a car, and went straight to a hotel in downtown Perth so that everyone could sleep. It was strange to be driving again, and even stranger to drive on the left side of the road. Even though they drive on the same side of the road in Indonesia, it is a lot different when you are the one in the driver’s seat -- I almost crashed a couple of times on the way from the airport to the hotel, and I couldn’t seem to keep the vehicle in my lane (the white lane lines don’t mean anything in Jakarta).
On Friday after everyone got some rest, we walked around downtown Perth for a while (our hotel was on Murray street, right near the Hay street mall area), then we walked to the Perth Mint. They had a great tour, including a live demonstration of pouring a gold brick. We stopped at Miss Maud’s for dinner on the way back to the hotel, and that night Heidi stayed home to get everyone to bed early while I went to the temple. All three of our boys asked us if we were sure it was safe to drink the water from the tap in Perth. Grant made me try it first, though, to prove that it was safe.
Saturday morning we dropped Heidi off at the temple, then I took the kids to Pinaroo Memorial Cemetery to see if we could spot some kangaroos. We picked Heidi up later that morning, then drove 15 or minutes or so to the Caversham Wilderness park. It was a great zoo – we saw wombats, kangaroos, koalas, a Tasmanian devil, flying foxes, turtles, lizards, etc. Nash, Grant, Luke, and I went on a camel ride, too. On the way out we stopped at the snack shop and got some ice cream, where we tried our first peppermint Magnum – a flavor they don’t have in Indonesia. We went to King’s Park that afternoon, too, and enjoyed walking around, including the mini-tree top walk and the DNA tower (Mallory is fascinated by stairs, and even climbed to the top of the tower, with me holding onto one of her hands) . I cannot tell you what we would give for a park like that in Jakarta. The boys and Mallory loved the opportunity to walk around freely, to play at the playground, and to just see the green open space. It seemed that half of Perth was at the park – playing cricket, football, having a BBQ, or just taking a walk.
Sunday morning we went to church at the Dianella ward right near the temple and met several people who know the Nally’s. We picked up some food for lunch and drove to King’s Park again and spent the afternoon outside.
On Monday morning we drove to Fremantle to the boat dock and took a 45 minute ferry ride to Rottnest Island. We had reservations for 2 nights at the Rottnest Lodge in a section called the Quod, a building that is a former aboriginal prison. We took a train ride up to the top of one of the hills on the island for a tour of the Oliver Hill Gun – a WWII era gun positioned on the island to protect Perth and the Western Australian coast. On the train ride back the driver let each of the boys take a turn in the driver’s seat, which was a thrill for them. After lunch we walked 10 or 15 minutes to the Basin, a beach in a small cove with white sand and clear water. It was great to be able to walk right out into the water and to see all sorts of fish. Rottnest Island has a bunch of quokkas on it, and Mallory especially loved spotting them (quokkas are small marsupials about the size of a large cat and are only found on Rottnest and in one or two other areas of Western Australia. They walk around on their hind legs, mostly, but will sometimes hop on their back two feet like little kangaroos if they want to move quickly, but they mostly just hung out on the grass, eating and staring back at the people who were staring at them). Mallory would always walk up to them and tell them “Hi.” I don’t think any quokkas ever answered her back, though.
The next day we rented bikes and rode around a bit, then went on a boat tour in a semi-submersible boat to see the reefs and 2 shipwrecks close to the island. In addition to seeing all sorts of fish, we also saw a sting ray and a jelly fish. We rode our bikes out to a different beach in the afternoon – Little Parakeet Point, I believe -- for some more playing in the sand, swimming, and snorkeling. That night we went to see the movie “Nanny McPhee” at the small movie theatre on the island – basically an old dance hall with a bunch of canvas chairs / benches (the whole time we were on Rottnest it reminded us of summer camp). We walked back to the lodge that night in the dark and enjoyed looking at the stars & constellations – many more stars than we have seen in a long time.
Wednesday morning we took the boat back in to Fremantle, then drove down the coast a bit, stopped for lunch of fish & chips at Cicerello’s in Mandurrah, picked up some apples from the road-side stands near Donnybrook, then drove in to Pemberton to a place called Pump Hill Farm Cottages (a place highly recommended to us by a couple of people here in Jakarta). Our cottage was great – it had two bedrooms and a small kitchen & family room – with a great view overlooking a valley with fields & cow pastures. We got some food from the grocery store and made tacos for dinner, then we lit a fire in the fireplace, popped some popcorn, and watched a movie on the DVD player.
Thursday morning we went around with the farmer to feed the donkeys, cows, goats, sheep, ducks, and then after feeding the chickens, the boys got fresh eggs from the hen house and we took them back to our cottage and cooked them for breakfast. That day we drove down near Walpole to go on the Tree Top Walk in the Valley of the Giants, then we came back to Pemberton to climb the Gloucester Tree – a 60+ meter tree with two-foot spikes pounded into the side of it like ladder rungs. I wasn’t sure which of the boys I should let try climbing it, because it didn’t look exactly safe, but Luke started up the tree and Grant and Nash quickly followed, so I took off after them and by the time we realized it, we were more than half-way up the tree.
On Friday after going around to feed the animals with the farmer, we checked out of the cottage and drove back in to Perth. We stayed near downtown again, and Friday afternoon we went to a nearby shopping mall for dinner (we tried the doner kebabs), and to do some shopping for things we aren’t able to get in Jakarta. On Saturday we went to Fremantle for some more shopping (Target, Fremantle markets, E-Shed markets), lunch, and to see a few things – the Roundhouse (an old prison) and the Shipwreck Museum, with a recovered portion of the ship Batavia, which sank off the coast of Australia on its way from Europe to Jakarta (the story sounded interesting, so we bought a book about it, and Nash has read nearly half of it already).
Sunday we went to church again in Dianella, then in the afternoon we went to King’s Park (did I mention that we like that park?) and met the family of a missionary who was serving in our branch in Jakarta, but who was released last week. We had lunch, talked a while in the park, then we went to the airport. You know those flights where someone’s child cries and screams the whole time? Well, we were the family with the screaming baby last night. We think Mallory is getting a new tooth or two because she cried in pain and was inconsolable for much of the flight. I’m sure people thought we were torturing our child. Our flight landed at midnight in Jakarta, so we didn’t get everyone home and in bed until 2:00 am. Hopefully a few of these pictures fill in the rest of the story of our trip.
Photos: March 2006 Perth # 6
Not exactly sure what this shack was doing in the middle of King's Park, but the boys loved posing by it.
Nash knocking on the Nally's old office door.
Photos: March 2006 Perth # 5
The view from the top of Oliver Hill.
One of two of the Oliver Hill guns on Rottnest.
Each of the boys had a turn "driving" the train.
The family on the Underwater Explorer reef & shipwreck cruise.
These photos are on the beach at Little Parakeet Point - Rottnest Island.
Photos: March 2006 Perth # 4
The Basin - Rottnest Island.
One of many hundreds of quokkas on Rottnest Island.
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