Long weekend away to Hong Kong

Kiddo and I just returned yesterday from an EXHAUSTING weekend away to Hong Kong. We're trying to pack as many holidays as we can into the next 6 months as Kiddo starts Grade 1 in August. As it is, her teacher is none too happy with the number of 'ponteng' (truant) days we have taken so far. The comment the other day was, 'Is your husband an athlete?? You've taken days off for his triathlon, diving and now skiing!' Um. Weeellll....

Anyhow, this holiday was planned in about 3 weeks. During the Christmas holidays, my Dad mentioned that he would be in Hong Kong for 5 days at the end of January. At that time, I didn't think much of it, but we later found out that the Man had to be there the same time on business. So, long story short, we cobbled together a trip for the same time. We even stayed in the same hotel in Kowloon although we only met for dinner on Saturday and Sunday, and lunch on Monday. Heh, Dad = food. We flew in Friday night and back to Jakarta Tuesday morning. The flight took about 4 hours and was really good. Set up of the video screen and meals was much better than our usual carriers. We flew Cathay Pacific and it was marvelous. Of course, they gave out little kiddy packs too. That always helps.

It's currently winter in Hong Kong. Meaning that for those of us who have lived in the UK, the weather was a balmy 20C with light breezes. A light cardi was all that was needed for the nights. Saw lots of winter coats and knee high boots around. Overkill, but super fashionable.

Saturday saw us hopping on the MTR (Hong Kong version of the London tube) to Disneyland. Brilliant way to travel. Convenient, fast, and announcements are trilingual. Disneyland was lovely. I have always loved Disneyland. Nice clean, organised streets. Cheerfully lit store fronts... Piped music... I want to LIVE there!! Imagine... Address: # Sleeping beauty Avenue, Disneytown. Or, Snow White Glade, Pocahontas Valley... I digress...

We hit easily 90% of the rides. Kiddo wanted to do EVERYTHING. Which was rather a surprise actually. We expected a fair bit of resistance, but once she tried out the Mad Hatter's tea cups, she was on a roll. We didn't even stop for lunch! Peckish? No problem! Box of yummy caramel popcorn while waiting to enter the stage show. Still hungry? Here, have a bite of a foot long hot dog while waiting to go into the Lion King show... That was the 1st time we've been so lax about food, but we knew dinner was going to be a feast, and since she wasn't complaining, and Daddy was given enough to prevent him from morphing into the monster at the climax of MIB I (the slimy roaring one that ate everything it saw!), I decided to just go with the flow... All the usual rides were there: it's a small world, pooh and the hundred acre wood, buzz lightyear, space mountain (we didn't go on that), princess carousel, flying dumbos, tarzan's treehouse (not sure the point of that actually)... The Lion King show was very, very good. Things have certainly changed since the last time we have been to a Disney park. Admittedly that was 10 years ago in Florida and we were still DINKs.

HK Disneyland opens at 10am. We got there just before 11am and stayed till almost 7pm.Prices were HKD 950 for the 3 of us (about RM450/ USD150). Food within the park is pretty expensive. Captive audience and all that. Not that we ate much. Still, as our little princess' 1st visit to a Disney park, it was a rousing success. If not for having to meet my Dad and his friends for dinner, we would have stayed for the fireworks. No matter. Tokyo Disneyland in 3 weeks!

Sunday, we hit the Science musueum in Tsim Tsa Tsui. The original plan was to do both the Science and history museums then go check into the Hotel we stayed in on HK island. Unfortunately, we ended up spending over 3 hours in the Science museum and ran out of time. Oh well, next time. The science museum was very interesting. They had old rotary phones that were exposed so that you could see how the connection went through. And also all sorts of games that illustrated how things worked... Power stations, electricity, phone operators, mobile phone towers... Fantastic. Sunday night we went to a Teo Chew restaurant on HK island. Can't remember the name but it's 37-39 Queen's road West. Incredibly yummy. Had food like my grandmother used to cook. It also cost HKD23,000 (RM12,000/ USD3,000) for the 18 of us. I only found out the cost the next day when I was chatting to my Dad. My jaw dropped and I'm so glad I only found out the next day. No WAY would I have been able to eat it if I knew the price beforehand...!

Monday Hubs had to go to work. So kiddo and I trekked up to Sham Sui Po on Kowloon island to do some bead shopping. Didn't buy much, but kiddo got a look at 'real' HK street shops. As it's nearing Chinese New Year, all the decorations were out, and there were vendors selling wax ducks etc. Wonderful. Lunch saw us wandering off to Harbour view City on the south west coast of Kowloon. We met my Dad and a couple of his friends there and had more good food. Then we walked around the shopping centre which was obscenely huge. LV is 3 stories high (!!). There's a Manolo Blahnik, Kate Spade and Jimmy Choo (drool)... And also any other branded goods store you can possible name. The entire ground level of the Ocean terminal (one end of this store) is devoted to kids stuff. Dior, Tommy Hilfiger... you name it. Tucked into a little corner next to Toys R us is a little bookstore called Book Buddy. Unassuming and messy from the outside, but if you spend a little time checking out the inside, it's chock full of fantastic finds... Kiddo was in heaven. And of course, since grandpa was there, she literally walked out with the whole store. Trust me, I know. I carried ALL of her finds...

Tuesday saw us returning to Jakarta. The Man moved on the Singapore for more work. HK was nice. Though very, very expensive. A bowl of noodles in a small restaurant can easily set you back USD10. Taxis are exorbitant. The meter starts at HKD18 (USD2.50). The MTR is a fantastic alternative. A HKD 100 trip from Kowloon to HK island cost HKD15.50 for kiddo and I. It truly is a shoppers' paradise. And so alive... I love the neon signs suspended over the streets...

All in all. Great trip. I would have liked to take her to Tai O village, a traditional fishing village built on stilts. But apparently it's better in summer. And being over an hour away, we just didn't have the time. End of the day, the only thing I would have done differently would have been to bring a bottle of face scrub along. Believe it or not, I actually think HK is just as dirty pollution wise as Jakarta (not general cleanliness though. Toilets=sparkling, streets=no trash. HKD1500 for littering). 5 days = 5 spots. Gaaakkk!!

Fun day with the ladies

Yesterday was a morning of indulgence for me. I packed the kid off to school accompanied by the maid and stayed home to await the arrival of my crafty ladies, L and A.

L is a friend from church who makes the loveliest cards. Check out her blog on . Long story short, we both realised that we like crafting and, well, birds of a feather and all that. Ever so often we troop off to each others homes to oo and aa. She has lots of embellishments, I have a lot's books; she's a traditionally creative cardmaker, I'm an experimenter. Lots of dramatic disasters using my way... but it's fun.

So, the morning was spent with the 3 of us gabbing away like magpies. Not to forget L's yummy food. She has an amazing cook, PakM, and we had otak, siu mai and pound cake. Talk about fusion! L is ALWAYS feeding me. It's embarrassing, but I can't resist it. Isn't that worse!?

A, the other lady who came, is a born entrepreneur. She has, I don't know how many different projects ongoing for various yayasans (charitable foundations). She also sells dried mangos. Very yummy. Apparently, according to a friend in the US embassy, agricultural wastage in Indonesia is around 40%. In the US, it's a rounding error. So A's husband has a friend who taught some local farmers to dry their surplus stock. So far it looks like it's working really well...

After a couple of hours of my showing off all the bits and pieces I've acquired over time from Pasar Mayestik (a fantastic fabric, craft, food and pretty much everything market) which is just around the corner, we decided to head over there anyway. Might as well, since L lives pretty far away and goodness knows when she might next get a chance to head this way.

There we were, 11am and browsing through Toko Maju, the best stocked, messiest, dustiest, most incredible craft shop in town. It's been at least a month since I've been back, and they had new things in. Oooo... ribbons, buttons, clips bases... Lets put it this way, I left a little poorer but very satisfied.

L and A eventually left for home at 2pm. I'm going to head back to play with my 'new toys'... Craft time!!

Back to reality

It's been an amazing Christmas holiday for us. But we're finally back to real life here in Jakarta. One could argue, though, that we are definitely not living in 'reality'. After all, how real can it be when I expect to be picked up and dropped off right at my doorstep? Or, I get annoyed that I have to carry the kid's bags to the car myself? Sure, if one were a billionaire it would be second nature, but we're just normal people... Hard to imagine just a few days ago I was loading and unloading shopping trolleys at carrefour all by myself, and driving around KL looking for parking spaces.

Anyway... We're back to our usual routine, and I shall remind myself that it's totally normal if clothes don't reappear in the closet the day after I chuck them in the wash basket.

Yesterday was kiddo's first day of school. Why a Wednesday? No idea. Except it gave me an extra day in KL, which is always welcome. Waking up was a real chore. Bleary eyes, incoherent speech, uncoordinated limbs... That was me, by the way. The kiddo was so excited with her new alarm clock that she practically leaped out of bed when it rang. Oh, to be young again and actually look forward to alarm clocks!

She also signed up for extra swim classes at the apartment we live in. 'But it's soooo much fun mom!' and also piano classes. 'I looovvveeee the piano!' Yes, we seem to have entered the age of exclamations...

I've come back to my crafty little haven. 3 weeks with no supplies and I was definitely suffering withdrawal symptoms. Eventually made a paper mache bowl just for something to do. Pathetic. At least now I'm back to having a whole bunch of new things to fiddle with. Thanks to finding supplies in the most unexpected places. Craft-haven on the 1Utama 2nd floor promenade would count as a big find this trip home. Together with the online store scrap-n-crop... Who says if you can't do, teach? If you can't do, SHOP! Hee.

Things I need to get on with now... Blog about Werner, restauranteur extraordinaire; finish my crochet projects before the japan trip; photograph my crafty things BEFORE giving them away, penguins...

Back in my kampung for Christmas

Another year done, another Christmas looming. Back home in lovely KL again. No matter there being no snow or festive street lights, Christmas has always been one of my favourite times of year. When I worked in the UK, I used to always have the misfortune to be on-call Christmas and New Year. The lovely snow and Oxford Street lights made up for some of it. I choose to ignore the wet and gale force winds and tube strikes... Now, I spend my Christmases in hot, sometimes wet, KL.

There were moments in the plane this time when my life flashed before my eyes. First was when we (seemingly to me) dropped about 200ft out of the blue (am sure in retrospect it was probably more like 10ft). Kiddo was having lunch at that time and her food went flying up out of the box. If I were super mom, no doubt I would have caught the lot with some fancy wielding of the box and fork, but being me, I just shoveled the pile back into the box and asked her if she wanted more. I think the pale face and gritted teeth gave me away (am not a great flyer at best of times). Kiddo took one look at me and started whimpering... Then said, 'I don't think I'm hungry anymore mummy...' Maybe the sweeping up of dropped bits put her off. Don't blame her. The second time was when our delightful air stewardess blithely carried on offering piping hot food and drink to everyone. My seat belt was on so tight I swear I couldn't feel my toes. So, no, nothing in front of me please. I don't fancy a hot coffee shake the next time we hit a bump.

There's just something about flying that makes me totally nervous. Absolutely no control. Inside some huge metal canister that logic tells me shouldn't be able to get off the ground let alone fly... Yes, yes... I know I'm a bit of a control freak.

In any case, we landed safely, albeit with me a little green. The rest of the flight was actually quite smooth, but anticipating the next plummet kept me on tenterhooks and my stomach in knots. Happily kiddo fell asleep. Mind you, the flight only takes 2 hours, and after 'the incident', we only had about an hour to go. I have to say that I was tempted to ask for some wine ('Thanks, just leave the bottle!'), but opted not to since, a)showing my kid that consuming alcohol as a way of dealing with stress is SERIOUSLY bad parenting, and, b)I really didn't want my Dad to pick us up with me looking like a total lush. Dads still need SOME illusions about their daughters even when said daughters are ___ (insert your age here).

We've now been back a day and already hit the Dentist (my old pal J who's an absolutely AMAZING kiddy dentist), Czip Lee (fab stationers), Borders, Art Friend, Think Toys (the old ELC) and Yuzu (yummy Japanese restaurant in the Gardens shopping centre). I also planted a row of loofah all along one wall and hung lights on our Christmas tree and in the front window. Kiddo went garland crazy and did the stair rails. What a day...!

Tomorrow we're off to Book Xcess (unmissable book store in Amcorp mall that does cheap books) and my little niece's birthday in the afternoon. It's wonderful being home...

Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year one and all!!

The hidden gem of Cibubur

Blogspot has just gone funny and I can't move my photos, so here it is: top is kiddo in her outfit, bottom is our haul for USD75...

From the title, you would assume that I'm referring to some fantastic natural wonder or ancient monolith. I'm sorry to disappoint, but although I'm fairly certain that there are nice landmarks around there, what I went for was winter apparel shopping for our ski trip to Niseko (Japan) next February. Yup, that's right, you didn't mishear at all. Winter apparel shopping. I know, I know, winter is not the first thing that crosses your mind when you think of Jakarta, but seeing as a lot of western clothing brands have their factories in this part of the world, would you be surprised that there are lots of outlet stores too?

The store in Cibubur is called Upscale and is located in Cibubur Times Square (CTS for this post). Opens at 10am. Before you think of spending some time wandering around CTS, let me warn you that CTS is a far cry (more like a whimper) from NY Times Square. Apart from a pretty large ACE hardware, it's practically deserted. So don't bother thinking you could kill some time in the local Starbucks while you wait for it to open. There's a McD's off the toll road and a petrol station KFC nearer CTS. More than that, you would have to go explore...

Walking into the store, you are immediately confronted by lots of lightweight clothes, and only a couple of racks of winter stuff. Thump goes the sound of your heart hitting the floor as you think of all the unnecessary calories in the KFC meal just consumed and the amount of money just spent in impulse buys from the ACE hardware that opens at 9am (Yes, yes, guilty...)! Well, not to worry, head upstairs and be amazed! Racks upon racks of ski jackets, heavy duty winter stuff, sweaters, ski ensembles... Even the cutest little onesies for the little ones. I went totally crazy. My friend KP and I must have tried on at least a dozen items each. Downside was the 'what you see is what you get' policy. If it doesn't fit, move on. Don't bother asking for sizes. Usually it's just the one available. The other thing of note is that sizes don't always correspond with what is printed. So try everything. There's a reason some items are factory rejects...

Well, after an hour of rummaging, I walked away with a jacket, ski pants and a body warmer for kiddo, and a jacket and body warmer for myself. I wasn't really supposed to be shopping for me, but couldn't resist the prices. The whole haul cost me about USD75. Considering my ski jacket and pants bought in London during the sales cost GBP129, it was a definite bargain.

I raved about it to my Dad today, and he's just given me a shopping list for himself! He's also headed to Japan next February, except it's a little earlier and he's doing a eating tour of Hokkaido rather than a ski trip. In any case, I shall take it upon myself to deck him out in unmissable in the dark ski jackets!!! Just kidding... Yes Dad, I heard you, only darks...

Bazaar No.1 done

Bugs in blogspot, can't organise the pics. Sorry. Top: Me behind my stall. Couldn't stand up straight, so figured peering from around the rack looked better than hunched over the table. All other photos: pics of my haul. Excepting the bear. The bear is kiddo's. She just felt it looked better with he new tutu on...

Today was the first bazaar of the Christmas season for me. Organised by the BWA (British Womens' association). It was held in the Grand Kemang Hotel. Lest anyone think I'm an insatiable bazaar hopper, I actually go to flog stuff for charity. This time it's the Panti Asuhan Pondok Taruna orphanage. With the thought of them needing 70kg of rice a day (costs about Rp500,000/ USD50 per day), I went there totally prepared to be the barracuda salesperson of the year. No taking 'no' for an answer! Everyone who pauses has to buy! Buy! Buy! I say!! Well, within an hour of arriving at the venue (6am for set up!! Ugh!), this barracuda became a minnow... I stupidly bent over to pick up a box forgetting that it was heavy and that I generally have a dinky back. No prizes for guessing what happened next... My back locked up big time, and I was left squirming around trying to pretend that I was looking for something inside the box when in actual fact I could neither fully straighten nor fully bend! I eventually plonked myself onto the sample bean bag I was selling since it allowed me to wriggle into a non excruciating position in order to unpack the offending box. No surprises that everything ended up on the edge of the table. It was as far as I could reach. An emergency call to my co-vendor, who luckily, was only due in later netted me a couple of lifesaving panadols. She was very apologetic about not having anything stronger, but at that point, I would've gratefully settled for anything, even a hammer to my toe as distraction from my back.

In any case, there was selling to be done and people to meet. I love doing the bazaars. Every time I do, I meet someone new, or an old customer. And you never know when you're going to meet a great friend. Like my co-vendor today, V. I met her at the last bazaar a few months back and we got to talking. Now she's a fab friend that I cannot imagine I've only known for a really short time. Even funnier, our girls both have the same name! And we both love crafting... Not to mention we're going on holiday together in 2 weeks and moving into the same apartment complex in 3 weeks. Before you suggest it, no, I'm NOT stalking her...

Well, if there's shopping to be had, I'm the one to call. I can ALWAYS find something to buy. Picked up some lovely little batik covered boxes for gifts, as well as some cutesy little things for the kid. Turns out it's lovely having a co-vendor because we can take turns shopping while the other person mans the stall. And V is as great a shopper as me, which is saying a lot...

All in all, it was go, go, go from the moment the doors opened. I've never been in a bazaar that has been this busy. Barely had time to shop for myself!! *wink* For the first time, I also won a raffle prize! I only know it's to some restaurant. The main thought flowing through my head when going up to get the prize was, 'Suck it in!! Walk upright! OWN the pain! Don't limp!'. Hilarious that as we were walking around the hall, V kept trying to carry my bag. Geesh...!

Back pain or no back pain. A preliminary accounting shows that the orphanage will get Rp1,750,000 (about USD175) from today. That's about 3 days worth of rice or 60 chickens. Rather pleased with that I have to say. Hopefully it's a sign of things to come for the next few events.

PS will post some photos when my back unlocks enough for me to focus my camera higher than my knees...

Kebayoran Market

Following on from our recipe book acquisitions at the Indo Book Fair, my maid declared that the only place she could get certain ingredients (namely a duck for Bebek Bengil) was at a market. The largest one near us being the Kebayoran market. Neither one of us had been there before, and it fell to Mr.D, to take us to the market. Who needs the Jakarta Shopping Guide when I have a walking, talking version!

1st stop, ducks. There were big ducks, little ducks, super fat ducks (called 'entok'. Don't ask me what it means. Apparently it tastes the same, just fatter). All looked the same to me. My maid IbuI, seemed to do this weird squeezy, pokey thing and would reject some with a scoff and accept others for further consideration. These were live, flapping ducks, mind. They would then be presented to the totally useless money banks (that would be me) for perusal. The vendor would gleefully ask me to personally 'feel' the duck to see how fantastic the meat was. Uh. No. I could see them wallowing in their own poop. No feely for this missy... In any case, 2 ducks set me back Rp80k (about USD8 / RM25). I also bought 3 kampung chickens (free range chickens) for Rp135k. Cue the whole, 'Pegang aje Ibu. Bagus s'kali!!' (Hold it madam. Very good!) again. As I said just 2 minutes ago, NO HOLDING!! Or touching, or pulling of feathers. I ran off when I saw the guy whip out a machete the length of a saber to do the nasty. I insisted on taking home meat instead of a live animal lest my little sunshine decides to adopt dinner. Left D and I supervising the sectioning. My only request... Keep the duck livers. I want to make pate.
Ibu I doing whatever it is she does to get a good duck...

The fowl (foul too!) defeatherer. Birds are dipped in boiling water and tossed in this device. The little rubbery protrusions spin around and smash all the feathers off. Perhaps also adding a tenderizing effect? Out of the holes ooze icky blood and pulverized feather. Note to the curious, don't stand within 5ft of the thing, you'll get covered in the stuff.

After that it was spices, fish (1/3 the price of Hero!!) a wok (yeah, mine's not the right size apparently), some weird looking round, green eggplants for sambal, some tempe, and we were done. Tried to get a photo of the ginormous rat that was slinking around the fish seller, but it ran up a pipe before I could whip out my camera. I would say it was the same size as the rat that came by our place for a visit last week except it's fur was more, well, ratty. Perhaps the food it steals in the market is not quite as good as what is finds in the compound...The fish alley. Thank God for Crocs and a recent dry spell. Merely somewhat 'pongy'... But the ground was still a little fish gutty... No nice shoes here.

We walked past people selling hamsters, guinea pigs, rabbits, birds, eels... The was a man challenging people to beat him at chess in 3 moves. He had the king and a castle, the opponents virtually the whole board. It was something along the lines of if you won, he paid you 10k, if you lost, you'd pay him 10k. I wasn't going to pay someone to humiliate me, so onwards we went.
The chess player waiting for his marks...

The coconut grating machine. Watching them do it, I would suggest anyone who wants to eat grated coconut from the market makes sure that it's cooked very, very thoroughly. Goodness knows if the machine is EVER washed...

On the way home, IbuI and I were animatedly discussing the market when we realized that Mr.D was rather conspicuously quiet. Turns out he was amused at us raving about the market because he had only taken us to the periphery of the market as he felt the main bit was too hot and too crowded! What a man!! Sounds like something MY man would've done. Well, IbuI and I were not stinting on the abuse we heaped upon his head! So much more stuff to buy! We probably missed it all! Next time, we're leaving him with the car!! His point was that everything inside can be found outside. Why go in? But, but... What if there IS something different?? 'Nggak lah, Madam. Semuanya same aje...' (Nah Madam. It's all the same) Grrr... Even sounds like something 'Mister' would say.

All in all, I'm hot, sticky and tired. The distances weren't far, but dodging hand-drawn carts can be a rather athletic experience. By the time you hear, 'Permisi!!' (Excuse me), the cart can be practically on top of you. Couple of times, torn between the options of getting run over or cozying up to a bucket of slithery, slimy eels, I opted instead to stand with one foot parallel to the path (so the cart didn't lop off my toes!) and the other suspended over the bucket of eels. Lots of strange looks, but they saw my camera, so most just ignored me.

All in all, a rather interesting experience. Next time though, I will stand 10ft away from IbuI and pretend not to know her. I'm sure (and she agrees) that despite the prices being rather low, they were still artificially inflated when the sellers realized I was the person actually paying. Somehow, they can always spot an expat at 10 paces.

Indo book fair 2009

Book fair=No money... I should just leave it at that.

The 29th Indonesian Book Fair started yesterday the 4th and will run through to the 8th. I went with rather low expectations of everything being in Bahasa and me not finding anything to buy, but since the entry fee was only Rp5,000 (USD0.5), I figured that even if I only found 1 book, it would still be a bargain... Yeah, right, like I've ever left a bookstore without buying more than 1 book.

In any case, I was there bright and early at 945am waiting for the 10am opening. Walking in I thought, 'Wow, I didn't know there were so many book sellers in Indonesia.' The English books were mostly outside in the foyer. Well represented by some standard shops, Periplus, Aksara, Times. However, compared to some of the others, their selection was pitiful. It was like they had brought out all the trashed up, totally not in demand titles. Periplus was better than the other 2, at least I managed to pick up some craft books. The Times stall was truly dismal, I had vouchers to spend and after going through everything twice eventually walked off with 'The enormous crocodile' by Roald Dahl for kiddo.

The inner hall was filled with offerings from local publishing houses. Never heard of 99% of them. But I DID find the Femina magazine stall that was selling their recipe books cheap. Yay!! I bought books on Manado, East Jawa, and Minang cooking, Street food, banana and corn recipes. Matter of interest, I found a recipe for Bebek Bengil!!! Had a whole discussion with the maid on where to get the ingredients. She reckons we have to buy the whole duck from the market. I'm totally ok with that as long as she doesn't come home with one still quacking. No doubt kiddo will adopt it, and there goes my Bebek Bengil.

I also figured that since I was there, I would look out for some Bahasa books for the staffs' children. From speaking to them, it doesn't sound like they can afford leisure books. Wandering around, everything was 'cinta' this and 'cinta' (love) that. Ugh. I ended up at the Islamic book store being served by a goateed little guy who was amazingly helpful. He picked a few books and gave me a synopsis of them. Apparently, the titles often have nothing to do with the content, they use words like 'cinta' only to catch the attention of teens. He also suggested 2 books on avoiding celebrity chasing and girls not looking for early marriages. That gives you an idea of the issues affecting local teenagers...

All in all, it was a morning well spent. Very, very satisfied with my haul, though in retrospect I should have grabbed the other 2 art books I was looking at. Sigh. The only downside was that the Comtec fair was bigger and noisier and right next door. So traffic was pretty bad. Although nothing like for the bazaars. Conclusion being books and tech stuff are less popular than fashion, home dec and kid stuff?

Anyway, I'm off to try my hand at some of the crafts featured in the books I bought. Tin foil here I come!!!