Hello again,
We have made some progress this last week in getting our house feeling like we are a little more settled in, but it will probably take a good 6 weeks. Our air shipment arrived last Thursday (quicker than we expected), and it had quite a few toys for the boys, a lot of our kitchen dishes, pots, and pans, and Mallory’s crib and dresser. Our sea shipment will not arrive for another month, though.
This week Heidi went to an interior decorating place and ordered some family room furniture (sofas and chairs) as well as a couple of chairs for our bedroom. Later that day, the same decorator came to our home to measure our windows for window coverings. The sofas will be finished in about 5 weeks and the window blinds will probably take 2 weeks. Having furniture custom made in Jakarta is very reasonable compared to the US (probably half the price in the US). It will be nice to get some furniture in our house that looks the way we’d like it to look and to replace the rented sofas in our family room.
Here’s something for the embarrassing file. We found out that we’ve been saying our housekeepers name incorrectly. We’ve been calling her Wasiah, when her name is really Warsi. We feel badly that she hasn’t told us we’ve been saying it incorrectly. She always just smiled and answered when called. It is probably like calling Nash “Nick” or something.
On Saturday (yesterday) we went to a place about 40 minutes south of Jakarta called Sentul – a city / housing development in the hills on the way to the mountains closest to Jakarta. For work we had arranged an event for the employees to test drive the new Ford Focus being launched here in a couple of months, as well as compare it to the prior version of the product and to competition. It was great to get out of the city and to see Indonesia outside of Jakarta. It is really beautiful here. The whole family went to the test drive event, then afterward we took the boys to an equestrian center and had them go on a pony ride (see Grant’s description in his note, as well as a picture or two).
Yesterday afternoon Heidi and I went to the mall so that we could do a little bit of shopping and so that I could get a haircut (long over due). My barber in Canton took about 15 minutes – including washing my hair at the beginning. At the place I got my hair cut yesterday it took over 45 minutes. 3 different people worked on my hair – one to wash it at the beginning (that took at least 15 minutes), then a different guy cut my hair – 1 millimeter at a time, and 1 hair at a time. After he cut my hair, another person rinsed my hair off. I hope all haircut places in Jakarta aren’t like that one – it took way too long.
It has rained several times this week (though the rainy season doesn’t start until November, we hear). Traffic here is bad enough, but when it rains, traffic is even worse. After shopping at the mall and the eternal haircut, we called our driver, Cartem (pronounced char-team), to pick us up at the entrance. It took him more than 30 minutes to get from the mall parking lot to the place to pick us up. It was raining so hard that the traffic was backed up to get into and out of the mall, and things were moving slowly. It was quite frustrating.
Here’s another observation – we see all sorts of American restaurants here: Outback Steakhouse, Wendy’s, Pizza Hut, McDonald’s, even Sizzler. But the American restaurants we see the most are A&W and Kentucky Fried Chicken. I am sure there are more of those two restaurants per capita in Jakarta than in Detroit. It is so funny to go into those places. For the most part the menu is the same (but they add rice as a side order alternative to French fries, as well as a few other Asian menu items), and if you eat in the restaurant they serve it on stoneware plates. It is fast food, like the US, but they put your food on a very heavy plate.
Well, that’s about it for now.
Adios,
Creed & Heidi
