At the beginning of my Christmas-New Years week off, I took a car trip with friends to the east end of the nearby island Madura. We visited a couple of beaches and also visited a historic mosque and kraton (palace) in the town of Sumenep. I especially enjoyed the delicately needled "shrimp tamarack" trees by the coast which are unique to that area and to Japan. You can see more photos from this trip at this link on Facebook (even if you don't have a Facebook id).
New Years in Bandung
At the end of that week I travelled by bus to Bandung, a city in West Java. I left my town, Sidoarjo, on Thursday morning and arrived in Bandung on Friday morning, and returned on Sunday evening/Monday morning. I travelled with my friend Nisa and her friend Zhara. Once we got to Bandung, Zhara's 2 cousins took charge of us and were excellent hosts. They took us around to tourist spots, bought our meals, and waited patiently for us. They even enlisted a friend so there were enough motorscooters for all 3 of us. The trip included a volcano with 12 active craters, a hot springs, a wander through a tea plantation, and my first taste of delicious rabbit sate (sate kelinci). Again, you can see more photos from this trip on Facebook at this link.
February on Flores
For the first week of February 2011, I visited the island of Flores with my friend and co-worker John. We were based in the small port town of Labuan Bajo but hired a boat for 3 days and 2 nights of snorkeling and other adventures including visiting the islands of Komodo and Rinca where the Komodo Dragons live, and swimming alongside manta rays in an area where they come to feed. Unfortunately, I don't have an underwater camera so I have no photos to share of my favorite parts of the trip: the incredibly beautiful coral reefs and the immense and graceful mantas. I also took an inland journey with a car and driver to the town of Medun. I packed a lot into the 2-day land trip including the site where the Flores Hobbit was found, some traditional spiderweb ricefields, a cave with interesting stalactites and stalagmites and cave insects, traditional houses, a mountain jungle hike to a waterfall, and some shopping in a traditional market. On the way home, we had an enjoyable half-day layover in Bali. I also managed to lose both my cell phone and my glasses on this trip - I hope that there are some monkeys and dolphins enjoying their new toys!Click here for the rest of my photos from that trip.
Dance Party!
In mid-February, I organized an EF "Life Club" event - an extra-curricular, just-for-fun chance for the students to practice English outside a traditional classroom setting. We held a Saturday afternoon Dance Party with lots of traditional American line and party dances including the Macarena, the Limbo, the Chicken Dance, Cotton-Eyed Joe, the Hokey Pokey, and the Bunny Hop. It had a bigger enrollment than I'd expected and everyone seemed to have fun. I had a blast!
After this
My Sidoarjo contract ended in late February and I decided to sign up for another year in the same school. My next blog entry, in a week or two, will share some photos from my "contract break" trip back to America, and from the wedding I attended just before leaving.
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