Cari Kos

So much has happened since Tuesday. We've had a full-on few days with orientation, but it has been good. Before I go any further, here are some photos from our flights. I know they're pretty much just out of the plane photos, but hey I was maybe just super excited!

The view from our plane of Lake Eyre (I think).

Last view of Bali, witha beautiful sunrise in the background.

My first view of Java... I was pretty darn excited. (Another thing I was excited about was the literal sausage roll we had for breakfast on the plane)

The mountain on the left is actually a volcano called Mt. Merapi, which exploded last year, so I figure I'll be ok this year.

So probably one of the most important things that happened on Tuesday was that we found out we won't be starting uni until 12th September. By the time I have my first class it will have been 3 1/2 months since my last one! This break is just as long as the summer holidays! So now we have all this free time and not sure what to do. Some people are planning trips to different islands, but I think a few of us might catch a train to a few places in Java like Solo and Bandung. We'll see though...


Also on Tuesday we got to know each other. I have trouble remembering names at the best of times, so because there are 47 of us anak ACICIS it has been a tad hard, but I think I've been doing an ok job. Aside from the other anak ACICIS, we met our pendampings (aka "dumplings"). A pendamping is kind of like a student-helper-guide-person (that is the best way I can describe it). My pendamping's name is Shelly, and she is so lovely. She has worked so hard to help me find somewhere to live (but more on that later).


Yesterday we had massive form filling for several hours. But it is nothing compared to what we would have to do if we were studying as independent students. ACICIS has been amazing in sorting everything out for us. The only problem was, that all of my forms had a mistake on them... mostly just that Shepparton (my place of birth) was spelt with only one "p". But that's ok. It's only something little... it just meant that I was a bit of a white-out hog. As well as the form filling the police came along to finger/hand print us (standard procedure for going to study anywhere, even primary school I think), leaving us all with lovely black hands.


In the afternoon, we all went off with our pendampings to search for a kos (see my first post for what a kos is). Shelly and I first went to get a new Indonesian sim, so I will get around to messaging people with my new number soon... but not now, as I think it is nearly 1am in Melbourne. After a lot of kerfuffle, we then went in search of a kos. Man! It was hard! Before yesterday I had never heard the word penuh, but now I think I will never forget it. Penuh means full. Pretty much all I heard was penuh, penuh, penuh! I did find a couple of places, some of which were over Rp. 1 million (which I could afford, but people keep to themselves in those places), there was a place with western toilets but no toilet seats (I'm still bemused as to how that works, but oh well) and then there was a lovely place, with rooms a tad small, but which was all full only a couple of hours later!


So this afternoon, my dumpling and I set out again to find somewhere. The owner of the perfect kos also managed another one and we tried there. After waiting quite a while, one of the girls showed me her room and while it wasn't luxury, it wasn't too bad either. The rooms were reasonable size, all the anak kos get along (I think), it does have a squat loo and no internet, but it is reasonably close to uni. I kept it as a possibility, but still wanted to keep searching. We came across a super yellow building which was really nice and modern-ish. After looking at it I wanted to live there, however three other ACICIS kids will be there too (including Nick).


Some mild panicking by me, some "santai saja" and sound reasoning by my pendamping, and phone calls later and the long and the short of it is: I will be living in the suggested kos from September (as the spare rooms are being painted/cleaned, which is good for me) and staying in the super yellow kos for one month. The one thing about the yellow one is that upstairs is a kos putra (boy kos) and downstairs the family live, with one spare room as homestay for a girl... aka me. So it will be a very interesting experience indeed. I just hope that I don't get too accustomed to the nice place and not want to move into the other one (for which I am paying a deposit for tomorrow).

Among this massive account of me trying to find somewhere to live, I have toured the campus (which is massive as, even more so than this post), gone to Matahari (an Indo equivalent of Myer), had tea at the ACICIS house with all the other ACICIS kids and, of course, been woken every morning at 4.30 to the call to prayer (I think earplugs are going on my shopping list).

I was going to say I hope I'm not boring you, but if that was the case I'm sure you would have stopped reading by now. So I will leave you with some photos and update you again soon.

In the middle is a banner welcoming us all to Yogyakarta! How sweet :)

Outside view of the University Club Hotel, where I have been staying since Tuesday and checking out of tomorrow (Friday).

View from the Boulevard of the famous UGM building (the name escapes me atm). It mimicks Mt. Merapi (as pictured from my plane earlier) which, on a good day, can be seen in the background.

Hope you are going well.

Sampai Jumpa,

Katrina