I've figured it out . . .

I got a free episode of MTV's The Real World.  I was a teenager in the 90's in the US so it was obligatory watching. It was a lousy show then but allowed teens and preteens to peek through the keyhole into what "adulthood" might be. I didn't realize they'd still be producing it when they were on season 83 and the rest of the TV spectrum is composed of about 90% reality TV (statistics based solely on my own impressions).

I had to watch it to see if it was the same trash it was in '95.  It is.  I was fully ready to turn it off almost as soon as I'd turned it on.  It opened with a whiny 19 year old who lives in San Diego (where this particular season was set) and was lamenting leaving her family.  SIGH.  It was your choice, you're driving there (and hence could go visit home, etc. . . I won't start a rant.  After 8 minutes and 12 seconds I had to fight the urge to delete it and trudged on a little further.  I could feel the edges of my brain starting to tingle.  Something was forming. At 12 minutes it happened.  Epiphany.

EF is The Real World. You go to a strange place, you live with other people both men and women who were not your choice. You hope one of them will be hot, hoping they'll all be nice and interesting and funny.  You're stuck together through the BS that they call work, through the inevitable lies, betrayal, heartbreak and homesickness. The imminent housemate fight is always looming. In most an incestuous situation with at least several housemates sleeping/making out with/dating each other springs up.

On the show, the casting directors select people with tempers, people who are emotional basketcases, people who are physically beautiful, and mildly interesting. Most range in age from 19-25. They come from different areas of The States, and can only bring a suitcase or two. They drink, but are less often smokers.  They are put up in a gorgeous mansion where the housemates don't pay rent or utilities or even food and drink from what I can tell. They don't work, they whine about their situation and are totally self absorbed.

At EF the hiring "director" chooses people who they think won't be runners (teachers who leave in the dark or night, or on a weekend without a trace within their first several months).  Most EFs are understaffed enough they aren't very picky and take most comers. They come from the US, Canada, England, Ireland, South Africa, Poland and Wales. They range in age from 19 to 55+.  They are single, or coupled or divorced. They drink enough to make the Real World cast look like light weights. EF provides a house in various states of disrepair which you pay then to rent you, and you pay for everything else. They don't care what you think or how miserable you are so long as you show up for work.

A motley looking crew no doubt.

EF is the REAL version of the Real World.  This is true, in shades, for the greater bule population in Jakarta.  The social circles are small and it's only a matter of time before you are seeing the same people again and again.  It's can be incestuous and there is great competition for potential dating options. The biggest catch is we have to pay our way all the way along.

Power is OUT!

Well it was.  Last Friday we had two power cuts/outages.  Both were during class hours.  One at ten in the morning for about forty five minutes.  The power went back on for about an hour and then back out for another ten or fifteen minutes.  Do you have any idea how difficult it is to keep a handle on a class of forth graders with the power out?  The classes immediately get hot and sticky.  The visibility in my rooms was reduced greatly; the kids had a hard time seeing the chalkboard.  As you might remember from your school days, it seemed like the prefect opportunity to start screaming and trying to run about.

Courtesy of deskofbrian.com

My 4-1 class was twenty five minutes in to a forty minute class when the second power cut hit.  There was about a five second pause when no one moved or said anything.  Then it was like a wave, the shouts of joy came rumbling down the halls and reached us at the end.  These kids erupted too and I gave them a minute to hoot and holler while I laughed.  Windows were opened. Desks moved closer to the board, and we slogged on. 

Courtesy of tulikapublishers.blogspot.com.  I'd love to get a hold of this book to read in class!

We had a loss of power last Wednesday as well, at three o'clock when we are permitted to leave at three thirty.  The rub of it was I'd just spent several hours doing all my paper correcting, things I didn't need the computer for.  I had entered two of the forty five scores I'd marked and the power went out.  We all spent the next thirty long minutes staring at each other and the blank screens.

Courtesy of picturesof.net

When I worked in Pluit, we would go through spells of daily power cuts.  The school turned in to an absolute broiler with most of the classrooms reaching one hundred degrees or more.  The kids sweat, the teachers sweat, it was easily the most miserable I've been over a prolonged period of time. I'll never forget the look on my three year old's faces as they turned in to absolute puddles.  They didn't understand what was happening or why and still trudged along like troopers.  It wasn't until the school finally got into action and got a generator that the power cuts stopped.  Murphy's Law (Sod's if you're from across the pond).  They'd affect school, but since the shared houses were on the same grid, we'd leave work only to sweat it out at home.  Now that I'm in central-south Jakarta I'm rarely affected by power cuts and I don't miss them a bit.

Courtesy of blog.greenearthbamboo.com.  We all ranged somewhere between THIS sweaty. . . .

Courtesy of carrotsncake.com.    And THIS SWEATY!!

Yesterday the school didn't suffer from power cuts, instead the wi-fi was out.  As a result you'll notice there is a lack of blog from both Friday and yesterday.  I do allow myself the weekends off (and this weekend that time was put to fantastic use) but try to journey on during the week, especially as I can normally write from school.  Please forgive the absence.  As a note, I will also be away starting Friday until next Thursday.  I am heading to Singapore for more fun than can be imagined.  I promise to blog all about it after so you might enjoy the ride too.

Social Service Society

From the back of my ojek on the way to work I gape at Kramat Jati Pasar.  It's a traditional market with tables of fresh fish and dead raw chickens lying about. There are shellfish and hunks of red meat, a few veggie vendors and back, away from the road some folks who have permanent shops that sell lots of stuff. By 06:30 they are already closing up, it starts that early to avoid the sun and heat. Every morning I also see the daily (not weekly) trash collection. Most of the trash is organic-corn husks, cucumbers, fish heads, with plastic mixed in. It's not with two guys and a mechanized truck like near my home in the States. This is one or two guys with a wood and metal two-wheeled car, about 3 feet wide by 5 feet long and 3 feet high.  They use two pieces of wood to scoop up the trash which was swept into a pile, and move it to the cart.  The carts are then pushed/pulled to a much bigger truck where the trash is moved again, by hand. Alternately, they can use a round cane basket that is usually carried on the back. Those are also taken to the big truck and emptied. The smell is awful, the work is disgusting and never ending. It's very labor intensive.

Courtesy of www.economypedia.com. This look exactly like many of the men I mentioned.  There are often not the bags you see, just a heap of trash.

I've spent time wondering why they don't mechanize the way we (the US) has, aside from the obvious cost. I've come to realize that it's the same reason as for other professions; for the garbage men, the maids, the doorman, the store attendants, the offices that have secretaries, copiers and janitors all in to service an office of 5. Jakarta has a population roughly estimated between 13 and 21 million. If Jakarta were to employ people in a more efficient way and obtain more machines to help with the work, half the city would be unemployed. It took me months to get used to having a maid at the EF house in Pluit.  Since I was old enough, my parents stressed the need to clean up after myself.  After many years and thousands of repetitions to "put that away" or "take that to the kitchen", it did finally sink in mom.  It made walking away from my two dirty dishes in the sink feel awkward.


I supposed the rationale I tell myself, as others probably do too, is that it provides a better life than they'd have otherwise. Many of the nanny's are young females with probably little or no education or other training. They often live with the family.  The garbage collectors have a consistent job with consistent pay, more than say a fishmonger might be able to boast. The maids are often girls/women from the countryside who send some of the money home to family.  In a societal structure such as Jakarta's, it seems all the 'help' might be in need of some.

MULTI cultural experience

I teach at an international school. I work with Koreans, Indonesians and Ex-pats in a Korean International school in Jakarta. The school staff is divided-the "menial" staff are Indonesian, the "important" staff are Korean. I use these designations for lack of others. The cleaning staff, copy and secretarial staff are all Indonesian.  Some of the more authoritative figures in the head office are Korean, like those dealing with work visas and expenses/funding. The homeroom teachers are all Korean, as are the music, art and physical education teachers.  There are two English departments in the elementary school; 4 Korean women who teach English grammar and 9 native speakers who focus on use and pronunciation.  For those of you not familiar with the TEFL (Teaching English as a Foreign Language) world, natives are not the people native to a country, natives refer to native English speakers. The nine of us are made up of 2 Americans, 1 Canadian, 1 Welsh, 3 Brits and 2 Aussies. I am the only female and the youngest in my department.  We are on the same grounds as the middle and high schools but each school is entirely it's own entity.  There is remarkably little interaction with anyone outside of our department actually.

With a mix of so many nationalities, it's not surprising that there are communication snafus regularly.  The first hurdle is to find a common language.  There are some staff here that speak English and Korean (Han-gul), some speak Indonesian and Korean, some (most of my department) speak English and Indonesian.  There are very few (I can think of maybe 2) that can speak all three languages.  As far as my department goes, I'm the only Spanish speaker and we have one French-speaker.  We do however have two kids that used to live in Guatemala though they're Korean.  The kids in my 4-2 class have decided their favorite word to use randomly in class is "senorita" though I don't know where they learned it or why they like it.

I'm noticing many, many ways that these cultures are different.  Remember that before JIKS, I worked at EF in Pluit where the students were Indonesian or Chinese Indonesian.  Now that I've taught in the US, Spain and here-Koreans and Indonesians- I can more clearly make comparisons. I wish I'd done this while I was teaching in Spain, it would help me crystallize my generalizations now.  Teaching in the States feels like a lifetime ago. Couple that with the fact is was swim lessons or kindergartens, discounting the variety of ages in my after school and summer programs, and I am struggling a little to recall the details for comparison now.

The US has become very hands off in regards to children.  We've become so paranoid that everyone wants to take advantage of the children that now teachers are not even to touch them unless absolutely necessary. The Korean kids are happy to come wrap their arms around your waist while you try to maintain (or regain) order.  This happens with all the teachers and it causes no problems.  There is a move that's quite popular in Korea and with Koreans called a Don Ho or Don Chin.  The 'aggressor" puts their hand together as though in prayer.  They then proceed to ram their hands between the butt cheeks of some poor and usually unsuspecting victim.  Hilarity and laughter ensue.  I find it all mildly disturbing but I'm starting to understand why they see it so differently.  The Korean kids are very very physical with each other, in both positive and negative ways.  I was taken aback the first two or three weeks to see kids really thumping and smacking each other.  Boys hit girls, girls hit boys and boys hit boys. They'll smash another student into a wall, sit on them, run across the class just to thump them twice and run back.  It all seemed so violent but they ALL do it and no one really minds.  It's the accepted norm. They are also very physically affectionate, girls and boys will lay in each others laps, hang in hugs and embrace each other.  They does tend to be a divide here, girls with girls and boys with boys.  My kids are 4th grade so this is well before dating etc.  They still "ewww!" if two cartoon characters in a movie kiss.

My Korean students are by far the most talkative I've taught.  The talking, yelling and worst of all high pitched screaming is incessant. The Spanish and American students were quite similar from what I remember, talkative but shush-able. I often struggle with the overall volume of the class. I chalk a bit of it up to the fact that, while most of the Korean teachers don't use corporal punishment, they are happy to threaten it and then parents are known to smack the kids around if they under perform.  I won't do that and they know that.  We made class contracts in all of my classes.  The students make 5 rules for themselves and 5 rules for the teacher (me).  bar none, each group made a "the teacher won't hit the students" rule.  I have a two-pronged technique at this point: stickers and the rare candy for students who listen, follow directions and complete their tasks coupled with the punishment of writing lines for those who don't participate, shut up or stay in their seats.  It's working a bit better as I refine it but I'm still nearly lost my voice this week, again.

The catalyst

I realized I had to start writing when I ended up in Singapore on a Korean tour bus to get a work visa for Indonesia.
No one seems to understand why it's required that we go OUT of Indonesia to process a work visa for work IN Indonesia. Since I've just changed jobs, I had to head out to Singapore again.  I'm not complaining. Singapore is clean and organized. It has great Indian food and cheap shopping.  Last time I went (February) to process my visa for EF, I was on my own.  EF gave me a half a page of vague instructions; the most unsettling of which was "go find the man sitting under the umbrella in front of McDonald's.  give him your passport, your visa paper work provided by EF, and X,000 Rupiah".  I  have not met a single other person who completed this process for EF without a flash of doubt about doing this.  Who in their right mind just hands over money and their passport to a guy in front of McDonald's?  Well, we all do.  And for the most part we get the passports back.  I got lost in the mall on the way back to meet him.  To get to the street from the MRT (mass rapid transit-think subway) to the correct corner of the street takes some doing.  The malls connect underground and you must pass from one to the other underground because you are prohibited from crossing the streets above.  Singapore does love its rules.  I kept getting turned around in the 2 floors and 6 turns, 4 escalators and 200 meters to walk that it took to get out (funny enough I only went out that way once this trip and did it without a problem).  Because of this inane system I showed up at 4:10 instead of 4pm to meet him.  He wasn't there.  He refused to leave my passport with a girl I'd met earlier that day from another EF; good to know there were some safety precautions. The next ten minutes were filled with me panicking.  I couldn't find him, couldn't reach him or the EF office on my cell or a payphone and the realization that not only did I not get the visa (kitas) I wouldn't even be able to leave Singapore without my passport.   This mystery man, who had shown himself at the drop off to be less than friendly, turned up and proceeded to lecture me about not being late before summarily dumping my passport in my hands and swiftly walking away.
This time around was so completely different that I couldn't complain.
 I  was met at the airport by a Korean woman.  After 8 of us had gathered there we went out and got in a small mini bus.  It was quite nice inside.  I was the only "foreigner".  None of us were from Singapore, but they were all Korean. We trolled around the airport, waiting in the bus while the overly busy woman jumped in and out, for almost an hour.  We then proceeded into town.  I had to get new photos take because the ones given to me by the school were the wrong size. This was the point where, luckily, the woman pulled to the side.  she confirmed that I had been to Singapore before and asked if there was a part of the city I'd like to go to.  I said Little Indian. She promised they'd drop me there.  In the mean time, the tour started.  I was reading Paulo Coelho in English while the woman gave a narrative in Korean that sounded to me like "blah blah blah Chinatown blah blah blah Singapore".  I was grateful to get out and be on my own in Little India.  4 hours of shopping, roti prata, more shopping and walking later, I met the group at a hotel to head back to the airport.  She seemed genuinely surprised that I had a good day.  I had a good shop in the airport, especially the pharmacy, and managed to buy two bottle of alcohol to bring (sneak) home. Then headed to Jakarta.
I was relieved to see my ojek driver at the airport waiting.  That morning he'd been 20 minutes late to pick me up, we hit construction on the way and he had to stop for gas (though I'd asked him the previous day to make sure he was ready to go to the airport) and I ended up with a 500M sprint to and through the airport to the ticketing booth where the agent chided me as cutting the time close. More about the ojek issues to follow.