Happy Thanksgiving
We had a great time celebrating Thanksgiving this year. It seemed strange to have it so warm and the excitement of the season missing from the air, but we celebrated anyway. We kept the boys home from school and Creed took the day off. We invited another family over to celebrate it with us. We had a couple of exciting things happen the day before that nearly put a kink in our Thanksgiving. First, we almost didn’t have a bird. Apparently, the Butterball I special ordered from the US was stuck in customs. We got a kick out of that, but I feel badly for the store that ordered so many. They’re now stuck with a bunch of turkeys assuming they get out of customs sometime soon. The store called me Wednesday afternoon to tell me what happened and asked if we wanted a Norbest turkey instead. They were quite a bit smaller, but I told them to deliver one to me anyway. It was frozen solid but this tropical climate defrosted it just in time to be cooked. We were able to cook it in our little oven and didn’t have to BBQ it.
The other exciting thing was that we ran out of water. Our maid came in on Wednesday afternoon and said, “Sorry Mrs. No water.” I clarified with her what she meant and learned our water tank was empty. I thought, ‘No big deal. We drink and cook with bottled water anyway. How will this affect me that much?’ Then I realized, no laundry could be done and no dishes could be washed. We couldn’t take showers or flush the toilet. I also realized that our staff, who are all Muslim, couldn’t pray (they pray 5 times a day) without clean water because they have to wash themselves before they pray. They asked us if they could have some pool water.
Our driver was on the phone quite a few times trying to get someone from the water company to come and fix it for us. Thursday morning came and we still had no water. I went to work out at the gym (mostly so I could have a shower in the locker room afterward - he he ha ha) and came back hoping it would be fixed. Finally someone came and told us that a pipe or connection near our house had been broken (and was now fixed), so it had affected several homes in our neighborhood. Our staff filled up our ground tanks (I really don’t understand the whole process and have given up trying to understand it) after scrubbing them clean in an attempt to stop the yellow and brown water we were getting out of the faucets in our house. We were happy to have water again!
I think the best part of this Thanksgiving was the fact that we have house help. In all our baking, cooking and eating we didn’t have to wash one dish or clean up. It was very relaxing and enjoyable. Our staff was in the kitchen most of the day washing and cleaning and helping me cook.
Just for those of you that have had Thanksgiving with us in the past, yes, the pie extravaganza happened. We are still enjoying it!
I was sad to miss out on the annual day after Thanksgiving shopping and looked up the ads on-line just to see what I was missing. Boo Hoo!
Nash’s Lesson
For our Family Home Evening lesson last week, Nash taught us about being thankful. He took us into his 4x10 walk in closet and turned off the lights. Then while it was dark, he talked to us about how most people in Indonesia live like that; in a small hut made out of anything they can find with more than six people and no electricity. He then talked to us about how hard it is for them to survive and what they have to eat. It was a good lesson for all of us. Nash has been studying ‘feeding the thousands’ at school which is a unit on how Indonesia faces the challenges of feeding the millions of people in this country and how many of them are poor and malnourished. It has been on all of our minds because we see it when we are driving around the city – it is difficult to see so many people in such circumstances. It really reminds us of how blessed we are and how it is our responsibility to share what we have with those around us.
The Christmas season has begun
Two weeks ago we purchased an artificial Christmas tree at Ace Hardware (no Christmas tree farms here in Indonesia) and we set it up on Friday night. We also pulled out the two boxes of decorations that we brought. I was sad to see how little we brought with us. I left some of our favorite Christmas decorations in Michigan. Now I’m wishing we brought them, however, Creed reminded me that I said I didn’t want them to get ruined so I left them to be stored in Michigan. Our tree looks rather pathetic and so does the half decorated banister. I’ll have to try to find something to make things look a little better. At least we have a tree, though, and we brought all of our Christmas music.
I went shopping at a huge market last week and was happy to find very reasonable prized 3 ft. fake Christmas trees and little decorations. I bought one for each of the boys’ rooms and surprised them when they came home from school. I was talking to Nash and he got rather sad and said, “It doesn’t seem like Christmas time. There’s no snow, Mom, and not many decorations around.” I said,” Maybe this will help.” And pulled out the trees. They were all so excited and immediately started putting their trees together and decorating them. They have enjoyed going to sleep each night with their trees lit up.
Luke’s Plant
Luke grew some sort of bean plant at school and brought it home last week. He was so proud of it and how big it had grown. He wanted Kandar, our gardener, to plant it outside. He asked Warsi (our maid) how to ask Kandar to plant it (Kandar doesn’t speak English). Warsi told him and Luke marched outside and in Indonesian, asked Kandar to plant it. It was cute to see how excited he was and how easy it was to speak Indonesian. I wish my mind was like that.
Nash’s Mangosteen
Nash has been studying a fruit called the mangosteen for school. He had been reading about it at school and looking up information on-line. We couldn’t find it in any of the stores where we shop but our driver, Cartim, knew a market where he could buy them. On the day Cartim brought them home for us, we all tried some. It is a strange fruit – not the best fruit in the world, but not terrible, either. We all had fun peeling it, examining it and then trying a piece. You can find all sorts of exotic fruits here in Indonesia.
Baseball
We had three baseball games in the rain yesterday. We were all soaking wet, but at least we weren’t sweaty. The boys were all troopers and not any of the children complained. I was impressed by all the teams.
When we came home from the games, our shoes were all muddy. We took them off in the garage. Later, as we were leaving for something else, we noticed our gardener squatting down with the hose and a scrub brush scrubbing all our shoes. They are spotless!!! What lives we lead.
We hope you all had a wonderful Thanksgiving. We think about you all often.
The Millers
