We have
already finished three weeks of the new term. I just can't
believe how fast things are going. Sam is going to be 10 in
another four days; we'll have his birthday a few days late
so that I can be there since I have a three-day weekend coming
up.
No new scans
right now, but here is the link to the first four.
I'm including
some new photos and perhaps a flash movie since I'm working
on Flash now with my students. Blogging will be coming up in
the next few weeks.The flash movie is on the sumbawa.org site.
I'm not sure how it will work as it is a large file, but it's
not a bad first attempt at working with flash, video, and music.
We're (or
perhaps just I am - Su seems quite in agreement with the idea
of Mercedes leaving home to go to high school on another island)
getting to the stage of figuring out where Mercedes will go
to high school. Right now we don't have one here - the closest
is a 45 minute drive away along fairly rough roads. The government
is building one about 100 meters down the road from us, but
Mercedes does not (definitely does not) want to go there. She
wants to get into a more high-powered school in Denpasar (Bali)
so that she can enroll in a good university somewhere in Indonesia.
Right now she is alternating between wanting to be a doctor
or a teacher. Fortunately, we have enough saved up for her
to do four years - after that she'll be on her own, pretty
much like Aaron was when he went to law school.
The Plan
(as it stands now) is for me to look for two more contracts
here and retire at 60. That will put us on a fairly restricted
budget (still quite plush by local standards, but certainly
nothing extravagent), but if we can refrain from building new
houses, or buying more property (we just bought more land here
in Sumbawa last week - Su insists that we will make a good
profit off of it in a few years), we should be ok (if none
of us becomes seriously ill). I really want to continue on
with writing about Indonesia and Asia. I've just been offered
some money for a magazine article on me (yes, someone is interested
in my experiences over in Asia). But, right after the editor
asked for the article, he disappeared from the email radar.
We'll see how that goes, but anyway, the idea of hanging around
writing all day sounds like such enjoyment and luxury that
I enter a blissful state just thinking about it.
I'm not sure what Su will do. She brings up this business
and that, but a lot of what she's going to do will depend on
where we end up living. On the one hand, I'd like to stay here
in Sumbawa: the house is large with a huge backyard, and a
bunch of animals to tend to; there is very little traffic;
no pollution; very few tourists. The downsides are: the kids
will be going away to high school in Bali, and I'd like to
keep an eye on them; there is no real health care here which
will probably become an issue as Su and I age; we still have
no phones in Sekongkang which means no internet access and
thus no way to keep in touch with folks and try to flog my
writing off on some kindhearted editor.
I could live
in the Townhouse (the name for the Rambutan house in Bali),
but that leaves open the question of what to do with our house
here. The market for a large house is fairly restricted - who
can, or would want to, pay $50,000 for a house here? Hopefully
we will have three more years to figure all of these things
out
I put a little guest book here so you can leave a message here
for us if you are having trouble reaching us by email. Thanks
for the messages in the guest book. I like hearing from you all.