Happy New Year!

New Year's greetings from my Korean student, Jin Ju, and me! :)

I'm getting ready to ring in the new year first in the world! :-D

More posts later!

More Christmas randomness...

Here are some more Christmas photos of life for me for the past week,

other than going to Jogja...

Last week, I had some 3rd or 4th graders come singing Christmas carols last week. It was sooo cute!
They'd made cute antlers, so they sang "Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Reindeer" first.

Here, they're singing "Away In A Manger".
Sooooo cute!
They finished with "Feliz Navidad" so they could dance around.

I gave them Christmas cookies. I hope they weren't too wired later on in the day from the sugar...

Last Wednesday, we didn't have classes. Instead, we held a school-wide Christmas celebration in the gym.

We were together, grades preschool-12th grade, for the first 2 hours, which is a huge deal, because it can get pretty boring to keep both spectrums of the age range entertained. It was a lot of fun, though.

The gym was an Indonesian winter wonderland. :)



The Christmas theme was, Where is Jesus?


Some young PYP students did a cute, little dance to "Jingle Bell Rock" in winter clothing and with obnoxiously shiny pom-poms.

(PYP stands for Primary Years Programme = elementary-aged kid)

I didn't take too many photos during our combined session because it was too dark for my camera. The session concluded with a short drama skit by the 6th graders (my future drama students!) and with a short but meaningful sermon by a guest speaker.

After the PYP students went back to their classrooms for their own Christmas parties, we Senior School grades stayed in the gym for our own activities.

The only one that I bothered taking photos for was the 'decorate a student with an explanation' activity. It was pretty interesting, naturally, so enjoy the photos!

Miss Mandy's Homeroom, 7.1 (2009-2010)

Here's my lovely homeroom class!

Most of them didn't want to pose for yet another photo, but I made them do it, anyways.

:-P

Pretty girls in Christmas colors

Some 8th graders, working busily

Some 10th grade girls are busy making Thomas into a snowman.

Catherine, with Ibu Yuda

Catherine's a Christmas tree, obviously.

Isn't he adorable??? ;)

Jeremy's one of my HR students. He's Rudolph, the Red-Nosed Christmas Tree.

This is Andrew, one of my 11th grade English students.

I still don't know what he was supposed to represent...???

The lovely Miss Nindia!

I think she represented the beauty of Christmas, or something...

Haha! Sooo cute!

Kezia, Sonia, Calista, Ghinna, and Andre, the French reindeer (don't ask)

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And now, here are some photos of Santa's favorite, 3-year-old Christmas elf...

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Helping Mandy wrap some presents for Joy

(I taught her to put the tape on her nose until she needs it.)

She took the initiative and began wrapping something all by herself. She did a pretty good job, too!

"Now that I've wrapped it, I wear it on my head!"

Jogja photos, part 1

Once again, I returned to Jogja(karta) this year for a few days for Christmas, but this time, it was to take a language course. (AND, more importantly, I did NOT return to Sentul as sick as a dog!) I'm glad I went back to give the city another chance, because my perception of it was pretty jaded from my sickness.
Jogja is located in the central area of Java, an hour's flight away from Sentul, in the western part of Java. Jogja is much hotter because it's brighter there because there aren't mountains in that part of Java, so the constant heat bearing down on us was exhausting! Elise and I took naps each day because it was necessary. :-P
She and I have wanted to improve our limited Indonesian-speaking abilities, and other expat girls have recommended the language course training in Jogja, so we decided to give it a try.
It was very helpful and well worth our money and time! I did learn a lot, but I forget much of it now because I haven't read my notes for a few days...
In the mornings, Elise and I would go to the center and work with an instructor. Elise and I were taught together instead of having one-on-one instruction, which was beneficial in the long run. We'd take an hour off for lunch, and then we'd come back for 2 more hours.
In the afternoons, we explored the areas and took advantage of some cultural activities, which you'll see photos of here.
(She and I want to go back to Jogja someday for the night trek up Mt. Merapi- the volcano!) :)

***I've also included some web links. This is the first time I've done this in a blog post, so if someone could let me know if they don't work, that'd be great. Thanks!***

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This is Ibu Liana. We stayed at her house after a misunderstanding with our alleged reservations at the center's guesthouse, but it was ok.
(She was sooo cute!)



With Ibu Ninsigh, in front of our training center

On Friday night, Elise and I went with some random Australians, who were also taking the language courses, to see wayang kulit, or a shadow puppet performance.

(pronounced "why-YANN koo-LEET")

All shadow puppet performances are about the epic of The Ramayana, which is a Hindi story about...I'm not really sure, other than murder, violence, and marital devotion. Yeah, that's pretty much it.

If you have a burning desire to read a brief summary, you can click on this link to read it. (I found this on the Internet, and its Google disclaimer said it can be easily read to children. I don't think so!)

This is what the audience saw at the puppet show. It was soooo cool, in a creepy way! It was the one thing in Indonesia that I've ALWAYS wanted to do, and I was in bliss watching it.

However, Elise and I left after an hour because she was getting a headache from the gamelan music. (More information about that down below.)

(I don't know what this thing was, but it might have been to divide the scene performances, because I saw it used once in awhile. It's pretty, though.)

A fiery monster shadow puppet!

There were dozens of shadow puppets lined up behind the screen, from smallest to largest, with the largest ones on the outside.

The puppets stood in a log until the puppeteer needed them.

Here's a good-looking guy!

I think he was a giant or something in the story.

These men are playing the gamelan ("GAH-may-lahn"), which is an orchestra of ancient Javanese instruments, like gongs, drums, and xylophones.

Oops...his eyes are closed!

A mother and 2 future gamelan players :)

Shadow puppetry is a dying art in Indonesia, which is too bad, because it's so fascinating, and it's an art that represents this country. Judging from what others here have told me, the only place on Java to watch a shadow puppet performance is in Jogja. Lucky me!

If you want to see a 1-minute-long shadow puppet presentation, you can click here to see one from YouTube. In the video, you can see the violence we saw and hear what the gamelan and other instruments sound like. (Imagine listening to this for hours!)

During our morning course sessions, Elise and I learned several phrases and grammatically correct rules for ordering and buying food. Most of the content we learned could be applied immediately to activities in our surroundings.

One morning, Elise and I walked around the block to find food she could eat- she's a glucose-intolerant vegetarian- and so I could take more photos. We found this happy little man running a fruit market with beautiful, fresh fruit.

We went to a market to buy some fruits for Elise's parents, who would be coming to Indo in a few days.

Grapes and oranges in various sizes

Rambutans ("RAHM-boo-tahns")

You peel these open with your fingernails, and they taste like giant grapes with giant seeds that you spit out.

Jackfruit

(I've not yet tasted it, so I can't give you my professional opinion about it.) :-P

Jogja photos, part 2

This is a fruit called a salak.
On one end of them, there is a flower, and the number of petals on the flower indicates how many pieces of fruit are inside. So cool!



To open one, you put your thumbs at the stem and press down; it'll open naturally and neatly.

It's a very colorful fruit- brown on the outside with a pinky-red inside peel, covering the white pieces. To me, they tasted like firm, sweet, peeled grapes. Yum!

Elise is an artsy person, so we took a free tour of a silversmith to see how silver jewelry, knick knacks, etc. are made.

The silversmith we went to was much smaller than I'd expected it to be; it was just a long room with these workers in it.

The tour only last about 7ish minutes. Our lovely tour guide was quick to usher us into the gift store so we could buy some silver.

We didn't.

We went back to our homestay and took naps instead.

Some mini silver furniture

Making some silver elephants

Here's a gorgeous, silver vase with a rose in the gift shop. I don't know what the silver giraffes have to do with it, though...

A close-up of the pretty vase. (I'm sure the price wasn't as pretty, though.)

Elise and me with one of our instructors, Ibu Ninsigh

(rhymes with "Lindsay") :-P

Elise and I met up with Fera on Sunday night for dinner. (Fera and several other teachers at SPH live in Jogja.)

Even the gamelan and other traditional instruments at the restaurant were decorated for the holidays.

Merry Christmas! :)