Jakarta

We left our hotel at 5am Singapore time (thanks to jetlag, it was no problem waking up though) and ran into a small problem - one of the 13 suitcases we had stored at the hotel was actually not ours!  Apparently we weren't the only family flying from Houston to Singapore who decided to tie green ribbons on all of our black Samsonite suitcases.  This ribbon was a slightly different color and happened to catch my attention two days too late.  Thankfully, we were able to return it at the airport and locate our bag, which was still there.  Whew!  Wouldn't be a memorable trip without at least a few moments of panic.

So, once we were checked in with all of OUR suitcases, we had breakfast in the lounge.  Check out the glass Alex chose for his apple juice.

 

 Ben and I celebrated with our orange juice on the last flight to our new home.  Cheers to Jakarta!

We arrived, met our new driver, and got settled into our temporary accommodations at the Kristal hotel. We have a cozy 3-bedroom apartment to get us through until we can move into a house.  We've really enjoyed the restaurant here and ate our first dinner outside by the pool.

Ben's first Indonesian breakfast was a success because he found out that Indonesian bacon is good enough.  Not great, but good enough.  He had better like it because it's about $1 per strip!  Some groceries are worth the price.

The pool here is great as well and we've spent many hours relaxing and playing out here.

Thanks to a little lingering jetlag, we saw several 5:45am sunrises.  The air quality is obviously not the best here but the haze comes and goes.

The kids and I walked a few minutes down the street to see how far their new school would be and found many interesting sights in 10 minutes time.  Tucked in between buildings, there are cows.  I'm not sure why because I can't read the signs!

Beautiful flower stands.  I can't wait to get my vases here and enjoy some fresh color.

A typical view of the road - busy and crowded with cars and motorbikes.  It's always noisy but it's pretty fascinating to watch how everyone weaves around and gets through.

The front of the kids' school with some pretty major security.  They get embassy-level security here because it was originally built for all the embassy kids.  Thankfully, parents get real IDs made so we can come and go freely.

A few things that have caught my attention this week...
This is an interesting ad in the elevator!

I bought a pancake mix and had to spend some time figuring out exactly how to make them.  I did learn that air = water.  Who knew?

 I loved this - a store had an open stamp pad and obviously a little gecko wandered through it one night!

Happy Independence Day, Indonesia!   We enjoyed seeing the mall all decorated before the holiday.