One aspect of this trip that really made it an immersion was that we stayed with Indonesian families. After our meeting with the mayor, we went to one of the homes so that we could meet our families. Hillary and I stayed with the family of a retired Brigadier General with the Indonesian national police force who had a huge house in one of the nicest neighborhoods of Bogor. They were certainly rich by Indonesian standards.
One of the interesting things about Indonesia is that regardless of a family's apparent wealth, they still don't have some of the luxuries that regular American families are accustomed to, like showers, sinks, and air conditioning. The other BIG disappointment with the physical conditions of our housing in Bogor was its location. Our room was located 20 feet from a very busy road and because we didn't have air conditioning, we had to sleep with the windows open. Even with the windows open, it's still freaking hot in Indonesia. The road always had traffic, but one of the weird things about it was that every morning at 5 a.m., a steady stream of loud motorcycles would zoom by for at least a half hour. There was also the call to prayer to look forward to at 4:30 every morning. After the first night, we were given a fan, which helped some.
Even though the father of the family we stayed with had been a relatively senior official in the Indonesian government, he didn't really speak English. Even the daughters who were around our age didn't speak any English. There were definitely many times where our vocabulary failed us and we had to move on to another subject, which made for some awkward moments. They were a nice family, so we were pretty lucky.
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