Hurry up and wait

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My project is progressing rather slowly… There are, of course, many hurdles to jump through. This is expected, and I am certainly not concerned yet. I have an office in the anatomy department of the veterinary school here. The anatomy department has a huge collection of animal skeletons and bones. It’s really cool! There are several articulated (assembled) cows; in my office are two complete monkey skeletons and a civet. The monkeys (maybe macaques) are very creepy, miniature humans with tails. I hid them in the corner. It’s fun being in the office there, everyone I’m working with is incredibly helpful and friendly!

I’m really coming to love Jogja! I really love where I’m living, especially now that I’ve replaced the bedspread and my room is slightly less overwhelmingly blue! I really wasn’t expecting to have such a nice place, and hot water! Of course everyone working at this house know me (there is round the clock security, a couple housekeeper, and a young boy who looks 12 to me but is probably 18, and who walked in on me with I was on the toilet!). They try to talk to me, but generally don’t get very far. I’ve learned enough bahasa Indonesia to get by. Meaning I can greet people, I know the numbers, and I have tell a taxi driver to turn or continue or stop! But certainly not enough to satisfy the curiosity of the people in my house!

While my project is going ahead slowly, I am definitely embracing getting to know the city! I think everyone in this city has a motorbike! It is the way to get around here, though I gather that’s the same throughout southeast Asia. Cars have a hard time on the roads because they are completely swarmed by bikes. And I now have a friend with a bike, and so I am getting to see Jogja in true Jogja style!

Unfortunately my trip to Kalimantan has been cancelled; since I was going as part of a research project I needed proper permission from the government which I was not granted. Even more unfortunately, I had already bought the plane ticket and couldn't refund it. I lost $100, which goes an awfully long way here. I'm also missing out on Borneo, though I will certainly benefit from the extra time in Jogja to get my work done. On a good night, I'm getting plans together with my friend Jenn (http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Jenni/)! We'll be going to Bali and Lombok together to go diving!

I didn’t work on Friday since my project is on hold temporarily, and instead I got a ride up to Kaliurang, the mountain resort town of Jogja area. It is at 900m, and is remarkably cooler than down here in the city. The drive up was fantastic - this was my first time out of a city in Indonesia, and it was excellent to see green! This are is still habitated, so green as in banana plantations, not quite forest. The town has incredible views of Mount Merapi, the active volcano just north of Jogja. We could see the volcano during the drive, but by the time we arrived it had hidden again behind cloud.

Kaliurang was really beautiful; I was really happy to be immersed in green again. We visited a park that was an excellent viewing area - now the skies we clear again and we had an amazing view of the volcano (the most active one in all of Java!) with smoke rising out of the crater. The garden was full of trumpet flower trees - nothing says Indonesia like a flower made for a hummingbird with a several inch long bill. It really was spectacularly beautiful here, and I was pretty disappointed to return back to the city.

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