Sport on TV

25 - 26 July 2009

Both John and I have had many obstacles put in our path in our quest to watch sport on TV. The 7 or 8 hour time difference between the UK and Central Indonesia time gives John particular problems watching football with evening kick offs. There is a limited number of fixtures shown on cable TV and nowhere in Kupang that would stay open late enough for him to watch a satellite broadcast. My interest is F1 grand prix. This is broadcast on cable TV which I can receive. The pre and post race discussions are in Bahasa Indonesian and revolve around competitions to promote the programmes sponsor Kapal Api and coffee. As well as taking up a large proportion of the adverts they also feature on a screen behind the presenters. The race commentary is the BBC feed so is good quality. The big problem is the adverts; which appear every 10 minutes irrespective of what is happening in qualifying or in the race. This week there was an advert break just towards the end of second qualifying as Massa crashed. This was a particularly long break so I totally missed the results of this session. At least when ITV had the rights there was some flexibility with advert breaks and the commentators filled you in with what had happened and there were replays if something special had happened – here I am left guessing. At least this weekend I did get to see all the broadcast. Some weeks I have been watching only to have the power fail – not normally a problem with day to day activities at night as the hospital generator is swiftly switched on and power restored. The problem is it does not power the cable companies equipment so although my TV is working quickly ther is no broadcast to watch. The cable company provides 10 channels but these are not always the same 10 channels and I missed the British GP because they had switched channels to a children’s network for the weekend. Whilst in Bali I went to a Sports Bar to watch the race and the one week had to contend with a table of drunken English football fans who wanted the main screen to be switched from F1 to football and who eventually won as the local F1 enthusiasts walked out in disgust. My father is now kindly recording the BBC coverage and I get a batch when ever anyone comes to visit so I can belatedly catch up with what is actually happening in the sport.

NB My motorbike a Honda GL 125 finally arrived on Rote on 26 July. My thanks to Ega an ojek driver in Kupang who collected it from the post office, took it to a benkel to get it working correctly and then put it on the ferry for me; keeping me fully informed at every stage of the journey.

Tangga Tiga Ratus

20 July 2009

Well today was another public holiday – I have lost count of how many there have been since my arrival in Indonesia. In preparation for today’s trip I had again borrowed John’s bike – mine has still not arrived, over a month from Bali so far! I had managed to get a puncture on the relatively good local road going to the market and had to take the bike to a benkel (local motorbike maintenance shop) where it took 6 men over an hour to mend the puncture, everyone seemed to have a specific part to play in the process. Today Yarni – a friend from church – who works for World Vision and two of her colleagues went with me to Tangga Tiga Ratus (300 steps); as you may gather this is a high vantage point. It is towards the south of the island and is reached over some very challenging unmade roads. Then the climb up 350 steps of very variable height and depth. We were fortunate that it was a cloudy day so the climb was not dreadfully hot but arduous enough all the same. The views certainly made the climb worthwhile but I am not sure how long it will take for my body to recover from being shaken over all the bumps. We had a picnic of rice, fish and pizza before heading back home.

Work

14 July 2009

It has occurred to me that even though work is the reason for me being in Indonesia it has actually hardly figured in my blog. This is partly because there are so many interesting things going on each week and partly because with my time off sick I have actually only been at the hospital for 4 months. For long term volunteers the first six months is about adaptation and learning about the culture of our partner organisation and assessing what we have to offer; then there is a review meeting with the partner that VSO facilitates to agree the objectives for the next 18 months and a work plan to achieve these. Today was my review meeting. My colleagues were very complimentary about how well I had adapted to life on Rote and fitted into the community and integrated well at work, they also were more complimentary about my Bahasa Indonesian that I was. There was a view – that I share that there is still a lot I need to learn about the organisation and that I need to continue to gather information to be able to be fully effective in my role. I now have four slightly more specific objectives to work on:-

1. To assist the hospital in participatory development of Standard Operating Procedures (SOPs) in nursing – I want to highlight the need for improved infection control and privacy and dignity in all these
2. To improve nursing skills through formal and on the job trainings and implementation of SOPs
3. To improve the nutrition of patients diet
4. To assist in making health promotion a part of patients routine intervention

The hospital already had a few SOPs which I had been updating whilst in Bali – this is a very arduous task as I have to translate them into English – work out what is missing, outdated practice etc, think about what can be done to improve practice; within the limitations of the available resources and then translate this into Bahasa Indonesian. I have been very grateful for the help I have had from my colleagues at Worcestershire Royal Hospitals NHS Trust for all the information they have sent me in response to specific questions I have had.

Motorbikes

12 July 2009

John and I have arranged to borrow motorbikes from VSO until they are needed elsewhere – for volunteers who need transport to do their jobs. John’s motorbike arrived a couple of weeks ago. Mine was expected to be in Kupang for me to have brought back with me at the end of my holiday but had not arrived. This weekend as John was not feeling up to going far I borrowed the bike. It is a Honda Magapro 1600 and has manual gears and a petrol tank that you can use your knees to steer against – ie a real bike. On Saturday I used it to go to the market getting up at 05:30 – even though I had not left a wedding party until midnight the night before. On Sunday I set off to explore heading south along the road that leads past the airport – I had never been further along the road than that. The further away from Baa the worse the road became with many sections showing no signs of ever being surfaced. I was very pleased with how I was doing when I got to a bridge which was also unsurfaced, did not have all the planks present and no continuous side rail. I decided discretion was the better part of valour and dismounted and tried to walk across as I could not even bring myself to do this without the bike and would have needed to cross the bridge a second time to go home I decided to turn round and go back home.

John and I have arranged to borrow motorbikes from VSO until they are needed elsewhere – for volunteers who need transport to do their jobs. John’s motorbike arrived a couple of weeks ago. Mine was expected to be in Kupang for me to have brought back with me at the end of my holiday but had not arrived. This weekend as John was not feeling up to going far I borrowed the bike. It is a Honda Magapro 1600 and has manual gears and a petrol tank that you can use your knees to steer against – ie a real bike. On Saturday I used it to go to the market getting up at 05:30 – even though I had not left a wedding party until midnight the night before. On Sunday I set off to explore heading south along the road that leads past the airport – I had never been further along the road than that. The further away from Baa the worse the road became with many sections showing no signs of ever being surfaced. I was very pleased with how I was doing when I got to a bridge which was also unsurfaced, did not have all the planks present and no continuous side rail. I decided discretion was the better part of valour and dismounted and tried to walk across as I could not even bring myself to do this without the bike and would have needed to cross the bridge a second time to go home I decided to turn round and go back home.

Elections

8 July 2009

Today is the presidential elections – it is the third election that has been held since my arrival in Indonesia and each is accompanied by an extra days leave. The need for leave is because of the time involved in getting from place of residence to the village where you are registered to vote. I struggle to believe that amongst all the photographs I have taken in Indonesia I failed to take any of the campaign posters and flags which have been adorning the roadside every few meters but I seem to have skilfully taken views missing these advertisements for the various parties – there was nothing discrete about the size which makes it all the more remarkable that I did not get a photograph. I have just been going through the photographs my fatehr took and found one of posters for a candidate in the presidential elections. The other thing on a large scale was a ballot papers for the parliamentary elections these were A2 with photographs of the candidates. Each candidate had a number and this was displayed on all their promotional material along with photographs to ensure everyone would be able to cast their vote for the candidate of their choice.

Jogja and Solo

28 June – 4 July 2009

My father has come out to Indonesia to visit me and we met up in Jogjakarta for a weeks holiday. We had a remarkably comprehensive schedule but with time for daddy to have a rest at some time most days. There are two big temples near Jogja – Borobudur a Buddist temple with a lot of steps we had visited in the afternoon when it was a little cooler and with a very considerate guide who took his time Daddy made it all the way up much to his surprise. The other is Prambanan a Hindu temple. Both of these have been extensively renovated but work is still continuing to find the stones to restore more sections.

We also had a 24 hour trip to Solo by train where we visited another two temples much smaller but set in the mountains with a spectacular drive to reach them. The most striking of these was Candi Cedu a Hindu temple on the lines of those in Bali. It had a lot of steps but even to get as far as these there was a steep climb up a slope. Thankfully due to the altitude it was a little cooler there and there was a haze so by taking it gently Daddy made it to the top. There were two rates for all the temples one for locals and a considerably higher rate for tourists – up to 10 times the price! Because I have a KITAS visa – see previous entry about visas – I got in for the local rate.

As well as temples we visited the Sultan’s palace, a disused underground mosque, the local market and a good range of eating places and the Ramayana Ballet performed outside. It was also an opportunity for me to meet up with friends. We spent the day in Solo with Dan a volunteer from Canada and met up with Dr Meli (who used to work on Rote) and her family. On our last day we met up with Nick for lunch – he had been one of the first volunteers I met on arrival in Indonesia.

Celebration with staff from Ruang Anak-Anak

14 June 2009

The staff of the children’s ward had invited me to a party to celebrate the confirmation of one of the staff’s younger sisters. Ibu Dewi the ward manager collected me on her moped at 14:00 and we headed into town. The confirmation candidate and her parents were sat in front of many rows of chairs and we went and greeted them and then sat down – after a while we were invited to go and eat. Soon four other members of the children’s ward came to join us. After most people had eaten the dancing started and I was encouraged to join in. Dancing is on the line dancing principle of everyone doing the same thing, sometimes in lines but also in circles. Once I had started to dance I hardly had a chance to rest as the dancers wanted me to try all the difference dances. They did extra repetitions to make sure I had grasped the principles of each one.

After a couple of hours Ibu Dewi suggested we sent to the beach so all six of us set off on three bikes. The first beach we got to was deemed too hot so we moved on to another surrounded by high rocks and climbed on of these to over look the bay. I was really pleased with the level of involvement I managed to have in the general conversation both at the party and on the top of the rock. On the way home we called into the house of Ibu Dewi’s husband’s family to see his grand-mother who has dementia and is almost bed ridden and doubly incontinent, with pressure sore. The daughters have to help to care for her we talked through a few strategies for caring for her including how to transfer her to a chair.