Pictures

I'm in Singapore on a magnificent 5 day holiday and don't have enough time to write anything but because upload speeds are phenomenal, here are some pictures of my life. I hope you like them.

Having a chat with some of the Palembang housewives

 

Tanning on the roof of my house and looking out over Palembang.

 The mosque near my house.

 Some of the mooncakes I bought to celebrate Mid-Autumn Festival.

 A pile of dead and live chickens at the traditional market.

 A Chinese man chopping up delicious pork for me to bring home!

 An ad for Romi Herton. He is the vice mayor and his face is EVERYWHERE in Palembang.

 An Indonesian SUV. Family of five on a motorbike. Safe? No. Economical. YES.

 My awesome new box of pencils that I use on my drawings for the MoM.

 What can I buy in Palembang that is made in the USA? Double sided tape.

 The government building for South Sumatra.

 My delicious vegetarian lunch from the Buddhist temple.

 The pool that I swim in at the hotel where I go to the gym.

 Hilariously epic advert for a new ice cream called Magnum Gold!?

MoM-Museum of Megan

Although I have repeatedly assured them, Mom and Dad have requested evidence that I am not living in a bamboo hut in the jungle.  Sometimes it feels like I am, with the amount of mosquitoes and ants that I encounter in my living space.  So far I have lived in two rooms in the house.  My first room, The Cave, was on the first floor, next to the kitchen. Benefits: Good AC, close proximity to the kitchen, and no stairs. Drawbacks: There was a leak in the ceiling, cave ambiance, and a window looking out on a cement wall.

 Closet and window to the cement wall

 Bed, desk, and doorway to the hall

Kitchen and stairs to the second floor

Before my friend Diane left, I called dibs on her room, also known as the Temple of Light, and moved up there the day after she left. IT. IS. AWESOME. It has windows on two sides and one of them looks out onto the second floor balcony. I never knew what all the fuss was about when people would talk about natural light, but it really does make a huge difference in a space. 

The Temple of Light

 

 My desk and window looking out on the balcony

 

Before I start expounding on the amazingness of this room I would like to take note of one major drawback of the whole house. Tile floors. The entire house is tiled from top to bottom and I feel like I'm living in a bathroom. I've never missed carpet so much in my whole life. Just yesterday I was making my morning coffee in the kitchen, when I slipped on the tile, bashing my pinky toe into a cement corner. It's now a vibrant shade of purple. Let's hope it doesn't fall off.

 Anyways, my new room is absolutely fantastic. I wake up naturally at around 7 a.m. when the morning light pours in through my windows.  The room has great energy.  The main wall was frighteningly blank when I moved in, so I have taken up drawing to fill it with pictures of the people, places, and things I love and miss. Unfortunately I can't draw faces on people, so it looks like an exposition of an Amish family. My apologies to those of you who have been showcased.

Welcome to the Museum of Megan

 

 

As my internet connection is terrible, I will be uploading more MoM pictures later.  I love and miss all of you!!!

Palembang Plumbing...or lack thereof

Palembang is polluted. Not in the same way that China was. The air is much better in Palembang than in Shijiazhuang, but nowhere near as good as the crystal clear Adirondack air. No, Palembang is covered in a not-so-fine layer of plastic bags and general garbage. They haven't figured out city-wide plumbing yet, so there are open sewers and gutters everywhere. The smell is indescribable.

 The road near my school. A rather narrow, but still pungent gutter example

Please bear in mind that this city is ancient. Wikipedia tells me that it is one of the oldest cities in Indonesia. It was formed organically over hundreds of years. Many of the roads twist, turn, and end without warning.  It would be a civil engineer's worst nightmare to try and figure out a centralized  system.

Some websites claim Palembang to be "The Venice of the East." If you take this to mean that Palembang is an elegant and tourist filled metropolis then you are incorrect.  This is absolutely true if you know that this is referring to the fact that in Palembang, when it rains, it floods, creating canals out of the usually dry roads. Here are some pictures of the second time when I was stuck in a flood.