The Changing Faces of Reality

I just finished my last class before my week in Bali. Yes a short vacation is upon me. It does mean I need to get up at 4 A.M. tomorrow but big deal… I'm going to Bali!

I've been teaching now for 3 weeks and have settled into a regular routine of things, for the most part. My class schedule is pretty set but I have other things that have been taking my time and of course I'm always looking for some leisure time to go to Duta Mall with Puji and just hang out, walk around the Hyper Mart and have strange kids approach me and yell "Hello mister!" I told my students about this, we all laughed. They assured me that it's the only word they probably know. I assumed as such but some how I wonder if I should grow a moustache just to fit in with their perceptions.

It's weird how in many ways I'm getting used to it here. My home has quickly become my refuge to relax in at the end of the day. My bedroom eerily has the exact same layout and dimensions of my childhood bedroom growing up. This last week I noticed that out of some old habit from the recesses of my memories I was reaching for the light switch next to the door but only to realize that in this place it's on the other wall. When I come home I call out "hello" to my roommate… a rat, when I walk in. He still freaks me out when I see him scurry across the kitchen floor but I'm opposed to poison and traps so I just keep it clean, food sealed up and assume he's probably eating scraps from the cantina that is shares a wall of my house. He might disappear when I leave this next week as there won't be even a stray grain of rice that was somehow dropped in the frenzy of measuring and pressing buttons on the rice cooker.

Last week I laid low and didn't have anything eventful to speak of except being invited to breaking the fast with the students one evening. They held the event at the auditorium next to my house, drummed, sang from the Koran and then gave everyone there food. Also I got a chance to visit the hospital. Nida and some other teachers invited me to join them to visit a lecturer's son who was sick. We went to the hospital thinking we'd get a chance to see the child but he was in ICU. He's grade school age and has had a type of immune system attack or allergic reaction. It's apparently unclear why, but one suggestion is that it's a reaction to MSG however I'm told this particular condition happens more commonly in older people here. The women talked with the mother for about 20 minutes, comforting her, quite an emotional event to witness. Laela, one of my co-teachers in the English department talked to the mother the most. Both were crying. Just last week when talking about my grandmother, Laela had told me that about 5 years ago she lost her son to cancer. He was very young too. I asked Laela how she was holding up as we were leaving. I told her that I imagined coming here today must bring back memories. She said yes.

Since I will be underwater for the most part in Bali and living in another world, blogging will probably not be easy over the next week. I'll be taking an advanced open water diver class and joining a dive group as well as reconnecting with some Fellows, getting in some bule face time. But I promise to take a ton of photos at least above water and maybe some from below as well and tell you all about it when I return to Banjarmasin next week.