In Your SELF Interest: January 2019

After thinking about going to the zoo for a few weeks, we finally made it happen. We set our expectations pretty low after seeing that it only cost $.50 per person to enter and reading reviews online. Just about all of them were negative, saying that the zoo wasn't very nice, that the animals were so spread out, that it was too much walking in the hot hot heat. Basically they all said to skip this one and go to the Taman Safari zoo...which we have also heard is super cool, but it's about 3 hours away and you need a car because you have to drive through parts of it. So yeah, not likely going to happen for us.

Maybe it was because our expectations were so low, but we actually quite liked the zoo. There was a lot of walking in the hot humid heat as many of the exhibits are spread out (definitely could have used a stroller), but overall, it was a really fun day.

Lots of elephants in different areas of the zoo. This one was eating which was so fun to watch. Amazing what they can do with their trunks.

Darin was SUPER excited to see the komodo dragons. While it is cool to say that we've seen them, I really feel like I haven't really SEEN them, as the two that we saw literally looked like long logs. At one point a stray cat (which were all over the zoo) jumped in to the exhibit and excuse me for being a bit morbid, but I really hoped having the cat so close would give us an opportunity to see the komodo dragon in action. Sadly, it did not.

There was a little area with rides that we let the kids each choose one ride to go on. Belen chose the helicopter and Shae and I went on the Dino-coaster.

There was an extra fee to go in to the primate zone, which we gladly paid as it was again, only about $.50. So glad we did as it was a really cool area. There was a long, windy cave exhibit that the kids loved going through and Darin and I enjoyed watching the orangutans.

This little guy was hopping all over the place. So cool to watch him.

So much walking, but at least it 1. Didn't rain on us (it rained every single day last week except for Saturday, we were lucky!) 2. There was an ever so slight breeze in the air. 3.It was so green and beautiful.

Our little navigator, constantly checking the map and all the signs to make sure we were going in the right direction.

While watching the bear, he came right up to the wall separating us and sat down. I asked Belen, is that bear Merida's mom (from Brave--she has really been in to Merida lately). Belen responds incredulously, "No mom, she not have a crown...and, this bear have a penis! It not Merida's mom." She's a smart one.

The kids loved the alligators, although they could have been komodo dragons for all we know, they also just looked like big old logs to me.

Monkey kids hanging on to their monkey daddy.

Before leaving we paid $.30 for the kids to enter and play in the kid zone. There was a playground, a little zip line, and swings! The kids sure do miss swings.

For our "December 1st" party we had really hoped to go to the movies to see the new Grinch movie. However, it was no longer showing (we have since learned that movies only stick around for a few weeks here before they are gone). So, we opted for Ralph Breaks the Internet instead. Very festive :). Movies are so much cheaper here than at home so we're going to take advantage while we can.

We had stake conference in this beautiful building. I was amazed by the choir, they were incredible. In this picture the primary kids were singing. They had the English speaking kids learn "I Am A Child of God" in Indonesian and the Indonesian kids learned it in English to sing that day. Shae had been really excited to sing it, but the day of was a bit nervous and didn't feel like he remembered the words enough, so he just hung out with us. He also didn't know any of the kids very well at this point, so the nerves were definitely warranted.

Drawing while listening to the interpretation. We have quite a few refugees in our ward from Afganistan and Iran. It was so cool to see them listening to the interpretation for English, but then doing their own interpretation into Farsi as well. I couldn't help but think about all the things that were surely being lost in translation from Indonesian to English and then English to Farsi, but really cool to see nonetheless. Especially when the young 12 year old boy stepped up to do the interpretation into Farsi as his English is superior to that of the grown ups.

Sweatin' hard all day erryday.

We can often be found running around this tennis court.

Chores chores chores. I feel like I am constantly cleaning here as we bring in so much dirt and pollution from the city. Thank goodness this apartment has this mini vacuum.

While cleaning up I found this paper. Have I mentioned we've had quite a few days where the peace is just sucked right out of our home? There were a lot of these kinds of days in December. Lots of emotions, from everyone, me included. We started a little reward chart system (if the kids get smileys in all categories for the day they earn doing Pokemon Go with daddy the next day) so that we could all work on some troublesome behaviors. It has been SO helpful (why didn't we try this sooner?) Some attitude changes on the part of the parentals have contributed to the restoration of peace in the home as well. We're all pretty far from perfect. But trying our best (especially with so little separation from each other and very few friend interactions...all we've got is each other right now).

We have made Beef Rendang twice at home now, but I'd really been wanting to try the real deal. This was okay, not great.

Considering we are in a predominately Muslim country, I was pretty surprised to see all the Christmas stuff in the malls. They sure do deck the halls and all that stuff.

Naked Ken, just chillin' in Jakarta.

First braids!

We found this really cool souvenir strip on one of the streets on one of our Saturday outings. We will definitely be vising here again, there was so much great stuff.

These guys were all really good at getting our kids to say, "Please, can we get it!?"

We used our haggling skills (not scary at all) and got these two masks for our first Indonesian souvenirs.

Always some traffic somewhere.

We visited the Grand Indonesia, Jakarta's biggest mall of the 170 some malls that are in this city. These malls are so fancy. And behind every corner there is something like the below that leaves our kids drooling. Seriously, going to malls has become a bit stressful for me because there's stuff calling my kid's names on every single level of the mall.

We usually just stick it to the man and say no, but when you're at the Grand Indonesia (this mall really pulls out all the stops), we decided to have a heart and let them each pick out two activities to try. Of course they chose the bumper cars, of course. Which really meant they were just sitting in cars that they couldn't figure out how to operate for four minutes. Darin tried to warn them.

Belen was very excited to be Pocahontas and chose the canoes for her second activity.

Shae chose the High Sky ride.

While waiting for the kids to finish their rides, we look down and low and behold, Mickey and Donald! Like I said, these malls pull out all the stops.

Tried REAL ramen for the first time. It was SO good.

Belen played "nativity" all month long (and still is, in fact she chose it for our FHE activity this past week--mid January now). In this picture she is showing me the two twin baby Jesus' that she birthed. She is really fun lately.

We waited for about 4 hours in total at this DMV-like place to finally get our Indonesian ID cards.

We've become accustomed to traveling with books and shows anywhere we go. That traffic is legit.

Belen makes friends at the pool pretty easily. She had a blast doing butterfly jumps with the little Chinese boy below.

And playing princesses with these girls.

Lighting always looks cooler with goggles on. A Belen idea at it's finest.

Spaceships in our tiny living room.

The kids sometimes have to plug their noses as we walk around...

Another mall, another insane exhibit. Thankfully this one was free, other than making you feel like you should be buying all the hot wheels cars they had to offer (we had seen the exhibit the previous Saturday and it was insane. I went back with the kids during the week and we brought our own hot wheels). Shae was incredibly excited about this one.

While going up the elevator one day, this sweet lady started talking to us in English. When we got to her floor she encouraged us to get off and go to her home with her so that she could introduce us to her son. She was so so sweet. She filled the kids up with every kind of Indonesian candy and shared a homemade treat with us.

Getting Belen tested for TB (after one of the nursery leaders got it). After her little arm prick circle thing was read negative, we just hung out playing with toys for awhile, because after you pay out of pocket for the treatment (and because we have nothing else going on each and every day) you stay as long as you want to play with the clinic toys. Belen has asked multiple times now, "When we go back to the doctor's to play with them toys?"

Saw the moon one night while trying to get through a short, hot and humid run. The air is so bad here that it's hard to see it. I wasn't the only one stopping to take pictures of it.