The Perfect Day

Gde and Geger being silly with chopsticks

Just like some days are “wrong side of the bed” days, some are destined to go down in the books under “absolutely wonderful things could not have been better” days.

Just to preface this account, I’d like to say that this was my first whole day back in Jogjakarta after almost six weeks of being gone. Six weeks! Yes, taking a cold bucket shower after all those hot showers was difficult. Yes, my room was full of mold (all my fabrics are at the cleaner). Yes, my bike did not want to start. Yes the gas is out in the boarding house kitchen and no one is taking the responsibility to get a new tank (I did it last time, just for the record). And yes, my house is suffering from a massive plumbing mutiny because someone decided that their women’s-time-of-the-month items needed to be flushed down the toilet. Come on, people, even I know better (so yes all three bathrooms downstairs are full of shit, like, literally).

Friend Dia's soon-to-be-dorm-style-hostel house!

So maybe it was springing off of yesterday’s mild disappointments that made today so wonderful. But I have a feeling that it was written in the sunshine. Today IT DID NOT RAIN. So wonderful was the not-rain that after a delicious breakfast out on the town (see above note about no gas) with my dear friend Gde, I returned to the house and decided to get out the ol’Honda.

Now Honda Supra Astreas, though marvelous specimens on the road, do not take kindly to six-week abandonments, and Betty (yes, named after January Jones) is especially sassy towards me when I return from abroad. You think you can just leave me in the garage, covered in dust for weeks and I’m just gonna START UP right away? Nuh-uh. So after a few failed kickstarts, my sensitive side told me that maybe Betty just needed a little love. Luckily, there is a lovely patch of pseudo grass and a water spicket just next to the house, and a cleverly stashed away sponge in my possession.

I must have looked like the equivalent of a cheerleader bikini car wash, since I decided that shorts and a tank top were appropriate for my front lawn. But actually my outfit was less strange than just the fact that I was washing my own bike. Queenie (my Taiwanese next-door neighbor who studied at Oklahoma University, married a Jogjanese man), after squealing and doing the regular, “How was your break?!?!” stuff, asked, “Why are you washing your bike? You can do it around the corner for 2000!” This is the equivalent of 22 cents USD. I had a good laugh at myself and a good defense: “It’s a time-honored American tradition to wash the car!”

And wouldn’t you know, a little love worked… Betty is back.

And this was only the beginning of my glorious, wonderful, very perfect day. I’ll compress it into a list:

The master chef and host, Astrid

1. PERFECT weather. I know I should pretend to not gloat about 83, dry, breezy and sunny with cotton-puff clouds to those of you buried under snow in the NE US, but it would ring false. So this is me gloating.
2. Chinese New Year! Or as they call it in Jogja: Imlek. Gong xi fa choi!! Gde, Geger and I went to our friend Astrid’s house and helped her (marginally) cook an amazing Chinese meal and then shared it with friends down the road.
3. What could be more beautiful than the late afternoon sky reflected in young rice paddies?
4. Visit to Geger’s “countryside” house and meeting his parents (obviously this means drinking tea and eating MORE).
5. Return to JAMU! the bitter herbal medicinal drink known to cure everything from hangovers to heartache and high cholesterol to boot. Keep posted for an in-depth blog coming up about my new favorite jamu joint.
6. No work tomorrow. ‘Nuff said.

Welcome back.