Where am I?

Alright, here I am again. (and, incidentally, here you must be as well if you’re reading this). Do you actually know where Indonesia is? (please say yes) What about the island of Sumatra? So, here’s my challenge: where, in relation to Medan, is Meulaboh? So, mark, get set, go! Find those maps (or better yet, google-earth it!) Write me with the correct answers, and you’ll win a prize (to be disclosed, um, well, when you win it).

After flying around the world, I have really reached, well, a whole different world. Which seems cliché, but it really is different here from the U.S, Hungary or Japan. There are still a lot of similarities: people are just people no matter where you go, with hopes and dreams, loves and hates, as well as the necessity of doing the dishes. But a person who lives in Meulaboh (myself included) leads a vastly different life than one who lives in Budapest, or Seattle (both wonderful places, I may add). Naturally, I can only give you life in Meulaboh through my bule “boolay” (Indonesian for “gringo” or foreigner) eyes, but I’ll do the best I can. Later on, when I know people better, I’ll try to tell you some of their stories and thoughts as well.

Meulaboh does have a road to it from Medan, but it’s long, windy, and bumpy. It has to go over some decent-sized mountains, and I understand it takes a long time to drive it (if you want the exact time: a)you’re anal, b) ask me later). There is a small airport, with a paved landing strip, where several UN, Red Cross, MAF or Samaritan’s Purse aircraft come in daily, but no commercial flights. It took about an hour on a twin engine prop airplane (sorry, Kossuth students, I don’t know the exact name of the plane) to get here from Medan. The town has a couple “main” roads and lots of tiny roads that wander amongst the little water canals and ditches. Perhaps 50,000 people live here, but the actual area is quite small with a dense population. People build their houses out of brick and cement, and some of them (the ones not destroyed) are quite beautiful with intricately decorated gables and lots of bright flowers out front. There are a few cafes around, and many shops have opened in the past year; in one you can find all sorts of great chocolate and bath products, probably catering to all the foreign workers in the area. Most people travel by motorcycle, and they put as many people as can fit on the bike, including babies and women sitting sideways. The roads are absolutely filled with traffic, and chaotic; I swear I saw a 10 year old driving a motorbike the wrong way up the street the other day.

While I can see the mountains in the distance, the coastal area here is quite flat, and that’s why the tsunami wave devastated it so horribly. The people say that the wave was 3 palm trees high, and everyone here lost family members, friends, and neighbors, as well as their homes, schools and businesses. Parts of the town have been rebuilt, and some areas are in the process of rebuilding, but the peninsula part of town is like a desolate field of rubble still. Nothing was left standing over there (it was about 1/3 of the town). Everywhere you go, there are still signs of the tsunami, from wrecked buildings, to piles of ruined cars, to topless palm trees.

The organization that I’m with (Food for the Hungry International- FHI) is one of many NGO’s (non-governmental organizations) here in Meulaboh. Essentially every relief NGO you can think of is represented here, and it’s shown in a confusing soup of acronyms pasted on the side of the trucks tooling about town. While F.H.I. began doing purely relief work here, they have shifted focus to meet the current development needs of the local people, and that’s why I’m here! They’ve started an educational program that includes English language education. So, I am employed to teach the non-bilingual Indonesian staff (about 10 people) English, and to develop curriculum and teach a children’s monthly English Camp, as well as teach a few other community English classes. So far, I’ve only taught the staff, and we’ve had a blast. They’re eager to learn and a lot of fun.

I live in the women’s staff house with 6 other women (Indonesian and American), they’re all great people, who do a lot of laughing. Next door is the men’s staff house. We eat all our meals together (prepared by the housekeeper-awesome, hey?!) and since there’s not much to do in Meulaboh, we all hang out together too, as well as with the other NGO people. Our house has no flushing toilets, or bathroom sinks or showers-just buckets to dump over yourself! And it has resident geckos (lizards) in every room. In my room the geckos’ names are Melchizedek and Simone. In the evenings and weekends we can go to the beach, eat at a cafe, or go to each others homes. That’s about it! Needless to say, we do a lot of reading, watching DVDs and chatting in our free time. The beach is absolutely gorgeous, with great sand and a splattering of palm trees. Sometimes there are kids there who are nice, and want to play Frisbee with us. The only drawback is as a woman I can’t expose my leg more than mid-calf and I can’t wear sleeveless shirts, which makes the beach a pretty warm endeavor.

Well… the evening call to prayer is wafting out in the night air, which means that it’s time for me to think about going to bed. I’ll tell you more about Islam in this area later, I need to learn a bit more…..

So, go look at a map, figure out where exactly I am…. And write me an email!