Getting caught in a shower

Out walking after a lazy afternoon, I got caught out by a shower.  Luckily, a friendly security guard was kind enough to off me shelter for the ten minutes it took for the shower to pass.

Hotel security guard who called across the street to offer me shelter

 

Snapshot of the shower - doesn't take long to get soaked!

The new '8'

This is the local replacement for our roaring lion.  Sadly the '8' refers to number of seats rather than the number of cylinders.
It does, however, transport us in relative comfort and has even done 0-60...twice!

Toyota Kijang Innova

Trip to Puncak

A day trip to Puncak, a popular spot renowned for its tea plantations.  The Jakarta traffic situation means we have to leave the house by 06.30 to have half a hope of getting there!

It was worth the effort though:

Overall landscape smothered in Tea

When it rains....it reigns

There can be no uncertainty as to the arrival of a tropical storm 'shower' in Jakarta.
A gentle tapping becomes increasingly rapid and builds in volume to a roar that beggars belief, leaving absolutely no doubt about nature's reign.

This video inevitably fails to capture the true ferocity, but hopefully provides a 'flavour' (it's night so don't expect to see anything, it's the audio that hopefully conveys the scene).

What did we sign?

Last Friday we had our date with immigration.
Under normal circumstances this can be a 2 or 3 day process. Fortunately, the company uses an agent which ultimately means someone grabs a ticket on our behalf (think nrma/vic roads) allowing us to waltz in hours later and be near the top of the queue.

We sit and wait our turn, and regardless of how you tuck away your feet and elbows you're trampled as is local custom.

Eventually we're called into another room and first up I'm directed to 'sign here, here and here'. The forms are in Bahasa Indonesian and our guy doesn't seem too forthcoming with explanations. I sign whilst Shell looks on with that "what are you thinking!" look.

We have a quick whispered conversation about signing unknown agreements, and Shell is adamant that she won't do the same.  She's called over and asked to sign.....which she does......in silence...  yeah, that's telling them! You go girl!

We're then photographed and electronically fingerprinted and sent on our way. The agent advises we'll get our passports back Tuesday or Wednesday of the following week.  This turns out to be correct, except my passport is immediately sent off to the shipping company to organise release of our shipment, so I won't get to see my passport for another 5 to 10 days. What did I sign?

posted from Bloggeroid

This house is such a crack up! #2

The big cracks in the walls that we previously reported were duly repaired on Tuesday 8th.  By the end of the same day it appeared the new and the old paint had started having a disagreement:

By Saturday (fours days after the repair) all peace talks had been abandoned, and war had been declared:

Rock Art

Literally around the corner from our home, is this place.  All of these items are made from petrified wood, and are absolutely gorgeous.

We're particularly enamoured by this table and bench-seat set.  The bench on the left is petrified mahogany, the table base is petrified teak, and the table-top and right hand bench are petrified ebony.  Apparently they're just sanded smooth with fine grade paper and then polished.  All up, there's over 400kg here!  Each bench was around 120kg if I recall correctly.