The Prayer of the Expat Wife*

Heavenly Father,

Look down on us, your humble obedient expat wives, 

who are doomed to travel this earth, following our loved ones

through their working lives to lands unknown.

We beseech you, oh Lord,

to see that our plane is not hijacked,  that it won't crash,

that our luggage is not lost or pillaged and our overweight baggage goes unnoticed.

Give us this day divine guidance in our selection of houses, maids, and drivers.

We pray that the telephone works, the roof does not leak,

the power cuts are few, and the rats and cockroaches even fewer.

Lord, please lead us to good, inexpensive restaurants where wine is included

in the meal and the food does not cause dysentery.

Have mercy on us, Lord, if it be the latter, and make us fleet of foot to make it to the loo in time,

and strong of knee in case we have to squat.

Also, give us the wisdom to tip correctly in currencies we do not understand.

Make the natives love us, Lord, for who we are and not what we can contribute to their worldly goods.

Grant us the strength to smile at our maids,

even though our most treasured dress resembles a rag,

or when they take bleach to clean our well admired silk rug.

Give us divine patience when we explain for the hundredth time

the way we want things done, and, Lord, if we ever lose patience

and thump them, have mercy on us for our flesh is weak.

Dear God, protect us from so-called 'bargains' we don't need and can't afford.

Lead us not into temptation for we know not what we do.

Almighty Father, keep our husbands from looking at foreign women and 

comparing them to us, and save them from making fools of themselves in nightclubs.

Above all, please do NOT forgive their trespasses for they know exactly what they do.

And when our expat years are over, Lord,

grant us the favor of finding someone who will look at our photographs and listen to our stories, so our expat lives will not have been in vain.

Amen.

*author unknown.  Given to me by my friend, Jenni, whose expat life is over.  May she rest in peace and shop at Target.  Lucky Girl!

Island

We live on an island on the other side of the world from our home.  Never has this been more apparent recently than at the grocery.  

Today I went because we were completely out of toilet paper.  Can't wait a day on that!  I did manage to find plenty of toilet paper but can't find several things: popcorn, paper towels, macaroni and cheese to name a few.

Every once and a while you find that suddenly your item is no longer there.  A week goes by..... no item.  Another week,  no item.  The entire island runs out of things.  

The island is out of popping kernels (we can get microwave, but not the kernels for homemade), grape jelly, Kraft macaroni and cheese, and the only decent paper towel in existence in Singapore.  I'm reduced to using the horrible Scott paper towel which disintegrates when it touches anything wet.  How does that work?!

Good times.

Paper Chain

Yesterday we made the World's Longest Paper Chain to count the days until we go back to the states.  Technically, I suppose, it is only the longest paper chain in our world, but it is John's world that counts!  I'll get a photo up soon. 

This serves two excellent purposes.  One: I don't have to answer or hear the question, "how many days until...." any longer, and Two: it makes a really nice way to wake the child up in the morning.  He loves to break off a chain every day and practically bounces out of bed to do it.  

We decided yesterday as we officially booked our tickets (with seat assignments).   The long flight is going to suck.  No way around it, and I am still bitter.....but "at least we have a job", right?   I can tell you that if we encounter many more cuts, that's one flight we'll take home and one less back! 

Off to Spinning!  

Bali Bike Tour

We were picked up early and driven out toward the town of Ubud for our bike tour.  The first stop was a restaurant for a breakfast buffet, consisting of cold toast, cold fried eggs, warm banana pancakes and fruit.  The view was spectacular, overlooking a valley of rice fields:

After fueling up, we drove about 10 minutes onto a back road.  Very rustic and rugged.  We stopped in the middle of the road where a van was located that was surrounded by bikes.  We picked out a bike for each of us.

And off we went!  The tour stayed on the back roads and was downhill the majority of the way.  It was not necessary to pedal for the first half of the tour at all.  Here we are starting out.  The buildings on the right in the photo are Balinese Homes:

Along the way, we pulled into one of the Balinese homes where we learned a bit about home life.  Each "home" consists of about 4 separate structures: the kitchen, a main bedroom, a secondary bedroom, and a temple.  Each home has their own temple.  There is usually a smaller structure used to hold rice as well.  

We learned that the Balinese live in a larger family group.  The highest ranking couple of the group gets the "nice" bedroom, one that has 2 walls.  The rest are together in the secondary sleeping building.  Each morning, the women make the daily meal.  They cook one thing in the morning, and that is the food for the entire day.  There is no dining room or dining area.  Sitting down together for meals is not ever done (and seems different to them)  Instead, they pick up their food when they are hungry and take it anywhere to eat.

In the back of the compound, the family has a garden.  This was the most interesting thing!  This family grew peppers, lemongrass, ginger, coffee, cocoa, coconuts, vanilla.....and more I can't recall.  They also have a still where the family makes alcohol from Palm Oil.  We tried some of the sweet palm oil drink, followed by the distilled palm oil liquor.   Wicked stuff!  

Some members of the family were there and I couldn't help but notice the small kids with no shoes, dogs running around (it is customary for families to have 2 dogs).  Our family's dogs just had puppies and the boys enjoyed watching the puppies.

We continued the bike trek on the back roads of Bali, enjoying the scenery of rice paddies.  Eventually we made another stop near a rice field.  Here our guide, Bagi, taught us a bit about rice farming and pulled off a few grains to show us how it grows

Here is John riding by a field:

Here we are along the back roads:

Joe riding by more rice fields.  The fields were in various stages of harvest.  Some ready to plant, some just growing, and some ripe for harvesting.  The climate is much like Singapore.  It never changes.  That is why the rice is always growing!

We made one other stop where we trekked down a large hill, through jungle, to a pretty waterfall and river.  After this,  John joined the crew in the chase vans.  The trip from there became more busy with traffic and had a few hills. 

At the end of the tour, we stopped at Bagi's house where his very pregnant wife served us a traditional Balinese lunch in their home.  Here is their atypical "dining room"  (one wall)  where we ate satay, rice, noodles, fried soy beans.  It was delicious.

Koi Boy

Remember these beautiful grounds and lovely Koi ponds?

We really enjoyed our afternoon drinks and appetizers in the Club lounge every day.  The staff was extremely friendly and helpful and really seemed to enjoy kids.  They would bring an entire bowl of bread out to the kids so they could entertain themselves by feeding the Koi.

One afternoon after a full day out and about, we made our way to the lounge as usual.  Across the ponds, three men play the Indonesian instrument called the gamelon.  The music is always harmonious and you immediately relax, sipping your red wine and feeling the gentle breeze in the air.

Suddenly, the air is cut by a loud splash and giggling, followed by yelling, "He pushed me!"

As far as we can tell, no push happened.  A simple case of lost footing.

No fish were harmed, just an ego.  ;)

Bali Adventure 1: White Water Rafting

We began our White Water Adventure by descending over 300 steps to the Agung river below.  The climb down was long and without hand rails to assist you.  At times it was a little un-nerving, but we all made it and, thank God, the steps weren't slippery.  Here we are at the starting point:

I had been assured several times by Jim that this trip is a Class II rapids and nothing to worry about with a six year old.  The tour technically was for ages 7 and up.  

Let's just say I wouldn't repeat this adventure again unless it were on slower moving current.

The first 3 drops were downright scary.  There were no rope handles or anything to hold onto.  We were told to duck down when the guide, who spoke about four words of English, yelled "boom-boom"!  Jim and I were seated in front, John and Joe in the middle, and James in the back with the guide.  No one was able to hold onto John.  I about had a fit after the first rapids.  John was literally shaking so hard from fear as well.  It was NOT a pleasant first 45 minutes.  Keep in mind that the guide's four English words were "forward", "back",  "stop", and "boom".  We couldn't exactly ask him what was coming. 

Luckily, each drop got progressively tamer.

After 45 minutes, I began to relax.

After that it got much better.

Here we are at the point that I was ready to quit.  The boys weren't happy here:

Everyone was happy by the end.  We didn't lose anyone overboard, although we did see an Asian lady get dumped.  The scenery was downright beautiful:

When we were finished, we were given a lunch and trekked back up the mountain to our car service back to the resort.  Later that night,  John thanked us for taking him on the rafting trip and said he had the "best time".   The older two loved it as well and said they would do it again. I have to agree that it was a highlight of our trip.    I would do it again in the U.S. but I'm generally not a fan of risking our lives in foreign countries!

Bali

Happy New Year- 2009! 

We recently returned from our Holiday trip to Bali, Indonesia.  We left the Saturday after Christmas and arrived in Bali around 1:00.  The Grand Hyatt-Nusa Dua is a beautiful resort and didn't disappoint us at all.  If you had blind-folded me and dropped me at our resort in Bali, I would have thought I were in Cancun, Mexico except for the building architecture.  

The resort sits right on the Indian ocean.  Here are a few photos of the resort:

                                       Koi ponds.  Remember this for later.

This was taken at the Club lounge.  When we booked Bali, Jim booked a package that included breakfast every day.  Little did he realize that he had actually booked us in Club level.  It was perfect for us, though.  We had breakfast every morning and appetizers and drinks every afternoon.  The staff helped us book our excursions as well.  It made the trip so much easier and relaxing! 

                                            Pool area, beach and ocean.

The resort was very large and spread out.  It didn't fill up until New Year's when we noticed the beach chairs almost all taken that day.  The vast majority of guests this week were Russian!  Our boys got a first hand experience of Eastern European beach practices, including "banana hammocks" and a few topless bathers.  Interesting when you have a pre-teen boy!  We also noticed a few Japanese guests,  one German family, and one other American family (who happen to be our friends!)

                                                The grounds near our rooms.

 Our rooms were on the second floor to the left here.  We were required to book 2 rooms now that we are a traveling family of five.  The extra space was great as the rooms were a bit small and the boys are a bit big!

                                             The pool in the morning.

The pool complex was fun.  It had two slides for the kids and a pool bar to grab quick drinks and lunches.  It did fill up by the end of our week, but we were always able to find chairs.

                                      Our view from the beach the first day out.

Up Next:  We did two excursions this week: a bike tour and a white water rafting trip.