On my way home!

About to board I Taiwan and want to share some final photos of the house!

We painted a mural with the family and other workers. This was our main team working on the house.

Here's the Americans of the team. 

These are the three families whose homes we worked on. We had a little celebration on our last day.

Tuesday & Wednesday

Yesterday we started the morning by visiting a local school for the Gobleg Village where we're building. The kids were excited to have us, we played a few games and saw the small and modest but nice classrooms.

At the site we spent the rest of the morning hauling bricks in the the hot sun. In the afternoon I sat on a high beam and finished row 10-11 of one room. The walls are pretty tall now!

For lunch the partner families helped prepare a meal we shared. The whole pig was pretty much eaten.

In the evening I got to do some shopping and then we had BBQ buffet at the hotel. Here's my favorite dessert from a chocolate museum and cafe we went to. I bought some cocoa powder.

Today the ladies were harvesting some flowers.

Sunday & Monday

Sunday we had 2 choices for activities: snorkeling or market, Buddhist temple and hot springs. I chose to do the day of snorkeling. One of my favorite couples from Chicago who are on my house team and in my van have an under water camera so hopefully I'll get pictures later. We saw a squid, dragon fish and lots of pretty coral. Even though the island we. Later to is a national park, it sadly had a ton of washed up garbage and some in the coral reef area. Snorkeling was overall great. We drove by a market on the way and in many ways markets are usually similar I noticed as I travel. 

For dinner we had Indonesian food at a place that also had a traditional dance performance. They are very expressive with their eyes, it's quite impressive.

Today (Monday) we did a lot of hauling bricks. The local women are very impressive and can carry 3 bricks to my 1, and they carry them on their head.

August 17 is Indonesian Independence Day so driving around we always see groups of children or men training to march on that day. The men groups will march 45 kilometers from 7pm to 7 am I the day (independence was in 1945), the kids do less. The practice in the street which is crazy if you saw how he people drive sure.

More building and weekend activities

Friday was my favorite day at the build site so far. I finally got to do more than tie wires or bend rebar. I painted the septic tank with cement, dug and hauled dirt to fill the foundation an we started to build walls with brick and mortar. Here's everyone at the end of the day. Our house is ahead of the other two. You can't see as many in the pictures but we work along side the family, neighbors and the staff from Indonesia's habitat site. We're learning a little Bali and Indonesian and are making small connections with the people. I really like the work team I'm on.

Today we got up early for dolphin watching, did a cooking class for lunch and canoed around a small mountain lake near the village we are working in.

There were a few over sides with meat that I'm missing in the picture. There's lots of seafood in Bali and the food has been pretty good, so far my stomach is doing well and there's enough variety to not get bored. Here's my favorite veggie lunch that was delivered to our work site wrapped in banana leaf.

I also tried some local fruit that was tasty- mangosteen and snake skin fruit.

The canoe was a dug out canoe from a whole tree and the two are attached. 

The building begins!

Yesterday we arrived in Lovina. Along the way we stopped at another Hindu temple on a lake. My hair was doing its own thing.

Then we visited the build site which is actually an hour up a hellish windy mountain road for our hotel. It's a small village , most of the people work on farms of hydrangea and oranges that they sell at market. Blue hydrangea are bought by Hindus who use them in their offerings/prayer. There's another team from Canada working on 3 houses and we have 3 of our own. They are at varying stages, mostly all just still building the foundation and digging holes for septic tank and well. 

Today I mostly twisted wires and shaped wire to build these long posts that will guide the mortar and cement bricks that will be placed next. Pretty easy stuff and not as tasking as those who were guiding the well. 

Our house has 5 puppies, chickens, kittens, and 2 cows. The husband and wife work along side everyone, including some over villagers who recieved a habitat home and are then required to help others build in their village. 

Later we return to our hotel for a quick swim in the pool (our driver told us the beach has poisonous fish) and dinner .

Be careful of the monkey!

Today I went on a tour with a few Of the folks from our build team. At the first Hindu temple monkeys ran about, one stole the sunglasses off the hat of a woman in our group! Luckily some kid ran after him with a stick and somehow for it back. 

A view of the temple. Our guide shared some interesting information about Hinduism, we weren't allowed to enter the worship area but the view was great.

For lunch we visited another beach where we picked out our meal from these bins of fresh seafood. I shared a red snapper with Susan, a fellow social worker from Maine. She's a hoot, reminds me of grandma.

Another guy from our team who came along was a world religion major with a focus on SE Asia, he said this was Rama and his side kick from the Ramayana.

Tonight we met the whole team, there are 25 of us. It's an interesting group with people from all over the US, all ages and personalities, should make for an interesting time. We leave for Lovina tomorrow, and will visit the 3 houses were working on.

I like the hotel I'm staying at but I'm right next to a busy intersection and they seem to avoid street signals and instead everyone honks. Problem is you can't destinguish if they're honking bruise they want to give you a lift or to warn you they're about to hit you. Scooters, taxis and your buses dominate crowded chaotic streets. It takes me an average of 5 minutes to plan and execute crossing the street. Lots of foreigners rent scooters and join the crazy show, not me.

My new favorite drink... Ice cold watermelon juice! Just about 25,000R

A memorial close to my hotel where the 2002 terrorist bombings of 2 popular night clubs and the US embassy killed over 200 people, mostly Australian tourists. Later they reported a message from Osama Bin Laden claiming the stacks were retaliation against the Australians for aiding the US fight on terror. The memorial site is called ground zero.

Welcome to Bali!

After almost 24 hours of travel time and skipping a day on the calendar, I arrived in Legian area of Kuta Bali. Today was pretty low key, went to the beach in the morning-- this is a very touristy surfer town and most everyone in the water was on a surf board. Too bad I've developed an unfounded fear of surfing. Lots of Australian, European, and Chinese tourists. There's a Swiss restaurant down the road but it didn't seem too popular. The Indonesians selling in their shops have an awkward Australian English accent and call you darling in their calls to get you to buy something. Large wooden penis bottle openers are a popular selling item that I first thought was those things you put in your shoe to keep it shaped. Today I met with one of our trip leaders for lunch. She's from Olympia and is a student at Evergreen. In one of the pics below you can see these little offering plates that line the streets and beach along with insense.