A Wedding and a Funeral

Unfortunately no pictures to share today. We have wanted to share more things lately but it seems the pace of things is picking up here! We have three and a half weeks left here. We have ten page papers due as a final language project, and Heather's mom Ellen, stepdad Dave, and sister Holly coming to visit in three days. We are really excited they are coming, and we know these last three weeks here are going to be a wild ride! At the end of it all we will be getting on an airplane to move to Papua, to begin serving with MAF. Exciting, nervewracking, new, yes all emotions bound into one. We especially covet and appreciate your prayers over these next few months.

So a wedding and a funeral? Yes these last two weekends took un-expected twists. Two weekends ago we were graciously invited to another wedding here in our neighborhood. How fun it is to see this neat cultural tradition. The first time we did that we had only been here a couple months. We actually had a lesson in our language school a while back on the meaning of the traditions (which are much different from in America), so it was neat to watch! Hopefully when I get some time to do pics I can put some up here. It was a pretty neat sight. One funny thing about weddings in Indonesia, is that they typically don't send out the invitations very far in advance. People generally don't plan to do much on their weekends here. We have some funny ongoing conversations with some of our friends here almost weekly that go something like this "Have a nice weekend"...or "Selemat berakhir pekan." Then "Do you have plans for the weekend?" Or "Ada rencana untuk ahikr pekanya?" And that question is usually followed by a laugh or giggle and "tidak ada, di rumah saja" which means, "No I'll just be at home." So our wedding invitation for the wedding two weekends ago came two days before the wedding. A pleaseant surprise! No biggie because we didnt have any plans either. We enjoyed the wedding this time. And this time we were savvy to the fact that they tell you to show up at a time that is way earlier than you need to. Last time, we were among the first to arrive at the wedding. Then, they seated us up near the very front (which was embarrassing because we didn't even know the bride or groom!) and they also seated us close to the MC's, and from what we could tell we were a good source of comic relief for the DJ's, a punch line in many jokes!

So this time we showed up at a more normal time. Thankfully we were seated among the general guests. And our kids (generally) were good throughout. Elise even made a little friend during the wedding.

The funeral? Funerals are also very different here in Indonesia. The same as weddings, funerals are a neighborhood affair. Last night the mother of a neighborhood friend of ours passed away. In Indonesia due to both religious and practical reasons, people are (almost always) buried within 24 hours of their death. So the announcement went out from the mosques in the neighborhood early this morning to the community. (Sorry, we didn't get that memmo. Still not good enough to understand what's coming out of those loud speakers) Fortunately our friend Teresa told us about it. So we went to the funeral that started at 10:30 AM. Almost the ENTIRE neighborhood was there. I confirmed this when, part way through the service Elise had to go to the bathroom. That meant I had to walk her home! As we walked through the neighboorhood (the long way around the block so we didnt have to walk in front of all the people in the street) It seemed like you could hear a pin drop. As I walked down the street that the mourning family lived on, I did not see a single person. They were all at the funeral. Normally that street is alive with all sorts of people. At the funeral there were some that prayed over the loudspeakers, there were special ceremonies, and it was followed by the pall-bearers taking the deceased to the local cemetery (less than a kilometer away). I followed to see what came next. The casket was only for transportation, there is a special cloth that is used here instead (I think it's called Kain Kafan)(I did not get there in time for the transfer, which I dont regret). Again there were prayers lead by a spiritual leader, mourners gathered around, religious chants, and finally the family members taking turns to help fill in the grave. She was laid to rest within about 12 hours of passing away. Ironically the only other funeral we've been to here was her husband (our friends father)who passed away about four months ago. Suerly it's a hard year for this particular family and I am sure they would appreciate your prayers.

Today was the first time our son Ian "hit his stride" with the whole walking thing.  Pun intended.  He has taken a couple little steps here and there before, but today at lunch was the first time he did it over and over, and had a blast with it.  For sure a Father's day I will never forget.  Go Ian!!

Make sure to push play on the slideshow above to watch Ian go for it!


Link to album (ipad users)

Venus Transit

Venus what?  Did you know the planet Venus just passed infront of the Sun?  If you were in America, it started in the afternoon/evening on Tuesday, and the sun set during the event.  Here in Indonesia, it started on Wednesday just before Sunrise.  As I tried to tell people what was happening here, I was greeted by mostly long, quizzical faces!  Especially when I tried to describe it to Indonesians.

When I heard this was going to hapen two months ago from a friend of ours, I put it on the calendar and have been getting excited.  It's not going to happen again for another 105 years.  I also knew that it would be visible at sunrise, and sunrise is almost always clear and sunny here in central Java, Indonesia.

So I have been scheming to find a place where I can go to have a sweeping view of the sunrise for this.  I decided to go explore the other side of a nearby marsh/lake called Rawa Penning.  I figured from there, I would have a pretty good view of the sunrise.  So I left before dawn on my Suzuki scooter to go find a spot.  I found a great spot on a little dock on Rawa Penning.  As it became light, this was the scene I was greeted with.....

Don't get me wrong, it was peaceful and beautiful, but cloudy.  Bummer!!  It's hardly ever cloudy here in the morning.  So no awesome sunrise view of the Venus transition.  Here were some other sights I took in though....

And as it became lighter......

As I sat, I pulled out my phone and enjoyed reading some of Psalm 119.  I love that passage.

But no sun!  :- (  So after waiting a while, and talking with a local boat owner/operator (who offered to take me fishing for ten bucks...bummer I had to get back to go to language school!)  I got up to head back.  I went a little further down the road that I came in on to explore.  I saw some beautiful sweeping scenery, rice field workers working in a beautiful rice field.  I had to pull over to take some pictures.

As they say, pictures don't do this stuff justice.

And here's a close up of the Padi (stalks of rice) in the Sawah (rice field).  There's a fun song we learned about that in language school.

Anyhow, as I was taking these pics, I noticed all of a sudden, the sun starting to break through.  I trained my camera on the sun to take some shots.  I thought the pictures would never show Venus making its way across the sun since my welding glass I planned to use to lower the intensity of the sun was back in the scooter.  The cloud cover, however, made it perfect!  It turned out these first shots I took by the rice field were the only ones that really turned out to show Venus transitioning the sun.

For some artistic variety....

After I drove home and went to school, the sun would poke out from behind the overcast off and on.  But the welding glass would not dim it enough to take any more good pictures.  Here's the only welding glass pic that worked semi-OK...because I put the lense of my sunglasses infront of it too...

So you can barely see a smudge of Venus on the left.

I brought my camera/welding glass to school for others to see.  With the welding glass alone, the spot made by Venus was really small and hard to see.  It was easily visible through the viewfinder of the camera though (of course with the welding glass over the lens so we didnt fry anybody's eyes!).

Some happy kids, new outfits from Granny Robin, and some good picture weather (cloudy) were all motivation for us to take the kids out in the yard for a photo shoot yesterday!

Heather and I took some pictures of both kids, all in the front yard.  Heather wanted to capture the many cute little faces Ian makes that remind us of his personality.  So Here's the album if you want to see!