Finally Arrived!

Hello all!

I am reporting live to you all from my hotel room in Bandung, West Java, my temporary home for the next three weeks. The journey was very, very long. To be honest, this is because all Fulbrighters are required to travel only on US airlines. And since no American airline flies straight from the US to Indonesia, it takes a little bit longer to get here. Therefore, for any other normal person who wanted to travel here, they could probably take a direct flight from LA or even Chicago to Jakarta, much more desirable then the Pittsburgh --> Chicago --> HongKong --> Singapore --> Jakarta route.

So a piece of my luggage was missing (how it became missing is another story in itself). There are about 5 of us that all have this same problem (some people are missing both pieces though). FYI, to get into the lost and found area of Singapore Airport once you have left the airport requires you to go to the Singapore Airport Police Station, lol.

Once we arrived in Jakarta, the AMINEF people met us as soon as we deboarded the plane and they pretty much walked us through every step of the operation. It was definitely nice not to have to wait in any lines for immigration and customs -- the AMINEF people just gave all of our stuff to the airport security people while we waited for luggage (Note: it can be very scary when people just take your passport and claim they'll take care of the paperwork for you....many of us were like "um, you think we'll get those back right?").

So the lost and found people in jakarta's airport were much more helpful than those in singapore's. Granted, this is probably because they had all of the AMINEF people demanding that they find everything fast, but they were still really nice. I think I had my first exciting moment in Indonesia with good old Deca from Lost and Found. While making copies of my baggage tags he was asking what we were all doing in Indonesia and where we'd be (I mean, we're a group of 30 Americans in there twentysomethings just being rushed through immigration and customs, I'd ask too). When I told him the name of the city I would be living in, I finally found the response of recognition and familiarity I had been looking for! Most people, even those that have been to Indonesia before, have no idea where my town is; it was nice to finally talk to people who had heard of it! According to Deca, its a great place, lol!

So after we left the Airport, we got on a bus that took us from Jakarta to Bandung. Most of us passed out for the majority of this trip, but it was about 5-6 hours long, making my entire trip close to 50 hours long. I will admit, it wasn't as bad as I though it would be. But it was kind of strange to arrive in our hotel yesterday and think, "oh my god, I don't have to leave this place tmr to travel somewhere else."

The good people at AMINEF gave us the rest of today off so we can just kind of take it easy before we get thrown into everything tmr. They also gave us our orientation schedules. Most of our days start with breakfast at around 6am (ouch) but they usually end pretty early and we have the nights to ourselves.

Now I am off to get some breakfast. Hope everyone back home is doing well!