Selamat malam!
Life here has been going so much better, it's hard to believe. Although, I may have just had a good week so I forget how tough it can be here sometimes. But still - a whole week that is good! That is amazing! Thank you Lord! I think I am beginning to adjust to the way of life here. Even (most of) the yelling and pointing and laughing at me on the streets didn't seem to bug me that much this week. Sometimes I even say Hi back or answer one of the questions or smile at people. It's been nice. Church this Sunday and the young ppl's get together on Sunday night was really good; I am starting to feel more like I am part of the church there. It's been really hard (for me & them) to get over how different I am and try to act normal. There's still a huge division, but now it seems to be more of a lighthearted joke than a huge obstacle.
Tonight (Monday night) was the worship/Bible study I go to, but today was Becca's birthday, so we all celebrated. The Indonesian girls threw water on her, then buckets of flour and blue powder and then confetti. They wanted to throw eggs too (which is customary), but we said that would probably not be the best idea since Becca is from the US and that would most likely be considered mean. I have to say, she was an extremely good sport about their whole "surprise" (I had nothing to do with it), I don't think I would have handled that quite as well! We also had a cake for her, Batik clothes (the traditional clothing here.. Tika and I went to the mall/market and got them on Saturday), and a volcano formed out of rice. Then we sang worship songs for the rest of the night. It was super fun. There were a few friends that joined since it was a Birthday party too, so I think there were 2 or 3 Muslim girls there that stayed for worship which was cool.
Volcanoes
I'm sure many of you have been hearing about Indonesia in the news due to the huge earthquake that caused the tsunami that practially wiped out the islands to the west of here as well as Gunung (Mt.) Merapi errupting in central Java near Yogyakarta. I wanted to go do relief work at the islands after the tsunami hit b/c the country is now severely short on relief workers and supplies, but my program wouldn't let me. I may go anyways sometime later, as I'm sure relief help will still be needed. The volcano that is the closest to me is Gunung Krakatau (or Anak Krakatau - they are the same volcano, don't let the news confuse you), which started errupting about a week ago. So far it has just been very small amounts of ash/gas/or lava that it has released. Nothing major. No one has moved out of the villages yet. If you are unfamiliar with the geography, Krakatau is basically a volcano in the middle of the ocean (an island, i guess). Is is almost exactly between Sumatra and Java, but a little closer to Sumatra, so it is considered part of the Lampung region (where I am). The villages closest to it are on the southernmost shores of Sumatra - so near Canti, where I went in the hot springs and wrote about. So no one is leaving from there yet, but you can see it errupting from the coast (the Polish couple went down there 2 days ago and brought back photos). Where I am is about 2 hours north of Canti, so pretty far away from Krakatau. Everyone is thinking it will errupt soon. Hopefully if it does, it won't reach here, or it will be gradual enough that everyone will have time to evacuate. It's just crazy how this is all happening right now. Scientists are saying the plates moving that caused the earthquake, are causing volcanic activity... apparently numerous volcanoes all around Indonesia are now reporting "increased activity" since the earthquake ~2 weeks ago.
ok, Selamat tidur (Happy sleep)!
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