The last month or so has unfortunately been a bit of a cycle of being sick and catching up on assignments. But there have been some super fun times too. On the 18th-20th November it must have been cultural weekend, as we went to cultural festivals at Universitas Sanata Dharma, UGM and Teal's village.
Our cultural day at UGM was called Gama Fest and somehow I became the person in charge of the Australian contingent. We had planned to make lamingtons, ANZAC biscuits and punch, but found all the ingredients really expensive, so left the lamingtons off the list. I thought it was interesting how ANZAC biscuits were made with ingredients that were cheap and readily available in Australia, but are super hard to find and quite expensive in Indonesia. Most of the things we ended up substituting, and the whole baking process was a big experiment... the best way to cook really! Red, Steph and I were especially proud of our 'golden syrup' success. As golden syrup doesn't seem to exist we mixed honey with several packets of palm sugar and ended up with a super thick, super sweet and super awesome substitute.
It was an awesome team effort to get everything ready. Phil (ACICIS RD) and Yvonne let us use their house, Dimas was a ANZAC biscuit rolling champion, Red, Steph, Joey, Sinta, Hayley, Isabel and Will all played an important role in the kitchen at various stages. Red and Teal were also snaz as Vegemite spreaders :) And then Hayley, Nick, Sinta, Mita and Brett were excellent decorations makers... especially the super snaz flag banner and Vegemite hats made by Mita, Brett and Sinta. Excellent work everyone!
At the actual Gama Fest it poured down rain initially, but inally stopped, allowing the flood in our stall to finally recede and more customers to come. Our ANZACs were a hit, if I do say so myself. But seriously, one lady handed me a Rp.10.000 note and I asked how many she wanted and she simply looked at the note again.... she wanted Rp.10.000 worth of them and we were only selling them for Rp.500 each!
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| Indonesian Golden Syrup... I was thinking of starting a business.... |
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| Our ANZAC production line... Dimas busily rolling biscuits in the background. |
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| Teal (sporting one of the snaz Vegemite hats) and Red (with her Perth shirt) resting after their Vegemite spreading success. |
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| Me, Isabel and Will with our neighbours (ie New Zealanders) at our stall. |
We also did a performance of "I still call Australia home" and the Vegemite ad (with our snaz as Vegemite hats). I felt a bit homesick singing, but it was loads of fun. I really enjoyed having the opportunity to share my culture with not just the Indonesians attending, but all of the other international students as well. Although, admittedly, we did have a bit of trouble identifying exactly what Australian culture is.
On Sunday we went to Teal's village for the cultural day being held at the school she has been helping out at. It was awesome to share a little bit about Australia with the kiddies there, as well as doing a group Macarena/YMCA dance. It was also super snaz to finally see where Teal's village is and where she has been living. It is so lovely up there :) In the afternoon it rained a lot, so riding on the back of the motorbike back to Yogya was freezing! But it was nice to get home "rug up" and have a rest.
That's all for now. Over the next few weeks I will slowly update... it may be all over the place. But I will get there.
Oh! And how could I forget... I'm now officially staying in Yogya until July next year! I'm super duper excited about that. I''ve just been having way too much fun to go home in February... So my course at Monash is deferred, my flights are changed and my place at USD for next semester is sealed. Hooray! :)
I hope you're going super well and that you're healthy.
Sampai jumpa,
Katrina
