Javenese road trip

So Michael came to Indonesia, and we are on the road trip now my kids won't let us take, who knows where we're going or where we'll stay or what we'll eat or if we'll find that thing we really wanted to see. Without planning it, we have found ourselves wading up to our chests in an underground river deep into a mountain, drinking shooters of cobra blood mixed with honey,sipping arak with some street kids in Yogya, making u-turn after u-turn ("that was where you were supposed to turn, dude"). We've zipped around the back roads of Yogyakarta and Central Java. The tour guide at Prambadan, who speaks 6 languages (he launched into French with some stray tourists during our visit) danced his way through the Ramayana story as we stood on a 1000 yr old hindu temple to Brahma. It was a 20 minute narrative, beautiful and funny and graceful. We watched a shadow puppet performance, which Michael thought needed a little more action. We sat in the living room of a puppet maker in rural Yogya while he tried to sell us a complete antique set of wayang kulit puppets and the giant wooden box they go in, and I really really wanted them.

When we first arrived in this country, we couldn't move. We couldn't function, we could barely eat, doing anything took a kind of energy and commitment that was exhausting. So when my parents came, and now Michael, our ability to maneuver around easily and get to places they never would have seen without us has been really fun, and to have people at home who we can share Indonesian memories with when we return will be wonderful too.

I can't think too hard about returning. I get very sad, though I miss so much about Bozeman. I love it here. Yesterday I got an article rejected from a journal in my field, and I felt that gnawing professional anxiety that I haven't felt for a year, and I had to check myself. I hope that some of the things that have lifted from us here, we can keep off our backs when we return. And I hope more than anything that before too long I have a chance to maneuver a car through the cultural wonder that is Indonesian traffic flow. It's almost as fun as climbing the ridge at Bridger.