Merry Christmas from Indonesia

It is Christmas Eve in Indonesia, and I am sitting in my room listening to Christmas music thinking about this holiday.  From my calculations, this will be my fifth Christmas spent aboard; I have spent Christmas in Taiwan, Paraguay, Panama-Costa Rica, and now Indonesia.  I am always intrigued how different cultures celebrate or don't celebrate this holiday.  In the small village of Paraguay that I lived in for two years, Christmas was about spending time with family.  We would get together and eat and drink and be merry.  In the village there were no Christmas trees, no presents, just family and food... oh and fireworks.  Santa did not exist; however, on the day of the Three Kings (aka my birthday) the children received small presents.  I thought it was strange when I went into the capital city that Coca Cola had a huge Santa Sleigh that drove around the city even though most Paraguayans didn't really 'do' the whole Santa thing.  As I was listening to my tape of Christmas music on my Walkman (yah you can do the math and laugh, I was using a Walkman in 2003) washing my clothes by hand in the hot Paraguay sun, I laughed as I listened to White Christmas.  Paraguay celebrates Christmas in the middle of summer, it was 110 degrees Fahrenheit.  Who decided that the birth of Christ should be symbolized by snowflakes and evergreen trees (as my minister friend pointed out, Jesus was born in the Middle East... also not a cold place)?
This year, I wasn't expecting much from Christmas.  I knew I would be spending it in a country that is predominantly Muslim.  However, as I walked around town, I was surprised by how many Christmas Trees, signs wishing people a "Salamat Natal dan Tahun Baru" (Merry Christmas and Happy New Year), and store workers wearing Santa hats.  I even saw fake snowflakes (which always weirds me out since most people here have never even experienced snow in their lives).    In a country that is 88% Muslim and 8% Christian/ Catholic why was there such a 'Christmas' presence?  Although the commercial cultural might accept Christmas, the religious meaning of this holiday was not as universally accepted.   Churches were searched for bombs and police stood watch as Christians tried to celebrate an important day in their religion.  This was definitely a side of Christmas that I had never seen before.  I decided for my protection, that going to church would not be part of my Christmas Celebration this year.  Instead, I would watch Christmas movies and spend Christmas electronically with my family (video conferencing is a great thing).
No matter where you are in the world, or how you choice to celebrate it, I wish everyone a very happy and safe holiday season.  

The PhD Candidate Goes to Kindergarten

When I have been staring at my glowing rectangle (aka computer) writing grants, my mind often drifts to days gone by when school seemed so much easier.  I remember fondly the days when school consisted of coloring, reading picture books, and playing.  The past two weeks of language school has allowed me to go back to those care free days of education when one's hardest task was learning colors, numbers, and how to make simple comparisons of which lady is fatter and which tree is taller. It seems like it should be one of the easiest times in the journey to obtain my PhD.  I should have mastered such things as telling time and reading numbers years ago, therefore I just need to learn the words in a new language. Well, the truth of the matter is that I have forgotten that I was not a good student till about the 5th grade, I really struggled with grades 1-4... and all those things I struggled with are coming back to haunt me.

Spelling, I can't spell in my own language that I have been speaking 'fluently' for 29ish years... how am I supposed to spell in a language that I have been learning for two weeks.  I get really excited when I am one or two letters off (that means spell checker will know what I am talking about) but the language teachers do not see that as acceptable.

Telling time, I have decided long ago that a digital watch is the best method for telling time.  It is quick, it is exact, and it has Indiglo.  However, my language teachers insist that I practice my telling time words on a real clock.  "Wait a second, which one is the hour hand and which one is the minute hand... and each number is worth how many minutes."  To add insult to injury, they tell time here by saying 27 minutes till whatever o'clock, so I had to remember my simple subtraction skills also.

Left and right, I never learned my left from my right.  I blame it on having pneumonia for a few weeks during kindergarten. We had multiple lessons where I had to use this skill...which person is standing to the right of Dewi, do you turn left or right if you want to go to the post office, and is the bank located to the left of the police station.  I really struggled with those days.  It was a constant, left,  I mean right, I mean hmm, can I just say North?  

I tried to explain to the teachers that it is not the language that is hard for me, it is the basic life skills that I some how missed mastering when I was younger.  They don't get it and assign me piles of worksheets to do for homework, which I need to write neatly (another skill I did not master).  It is a strange predicament indeed to go from planning research that has never been done before to having to answer, "The color of my shirt is blue." "Your pencil is not red."  Given the choice, I think I would prefer to go back to reading journal articles and writing grants.