Jakarta (this is a Javaminilogue from Alissa)

Today is the day before the big holiday for the Haj.  As I drive to work, we pass
many farm animals.  At a traffic light, large white cows stare at the car window,
slowly chewing grass, oblivious to the fact that tomorrow they will be slaughtered
and butchered in sacrifice.  The meat will be distributed to the poor.  There are also
goats.  A cow will cost 7 million rp.  A goat only 300 thousand.  (~US$700 and
US$30, respectively)  Most of the cows are thin and bony, but the goats seem to
have healthier coats and more meat on them.

This evening, the road is lined with red PDI flags -- PDI is a political party.  I don't
know why.

We have turned off the main road (Mampang Prapatan) and have come to a
standstill.  This too I don't know why.  It's better to not worry about it as there is
nothing to do about it.  The cars and buses and motorcycles and bajai will move and
stop and start and creep along at their own pace and rhythm.  

Pink cars are popular here.  I just passed two of them.  One was a silvery dusky pink
and the other fuchsia.

We have turned onto Kemang Timur and are zipping down the road.  The stores
seem to have all closed early, for the holiday, I'm sure.  Kemang Timur is one of the
streets with many furniture stores/workshops.
Unrelated to Text
This, and most of the others below, was snapped when
Annaliese, Christopher, Arianna and a friend of hers
went up in the mountains about an hour south of Jakarta.

School Outing
These folks accompanied all the little boys dressed in green who are playing in
the small waterfall in the pictures above. The women were all so colorfully
dressed and were carrying all sorts of bags -- they put me in mind of Gypsies,
uh, the Roma people.
Christmas Eve
We were invited to the home of
one of Arianna's friends for
Christmas Eve.  One feature of
the evening involved igniting all
sorts of flammable materials.  
Perhaps you can make out
Arianna doing exactly that.
Interestingly, this was all done
in a relatively small backyard in
the middle of a neighborhood.  
Not just sparklers, but Roman
candles and skyrockets, too.
Hooter Vendor
Many of the ever-present
pushcarts in Jakarta were
converted for party-hooter
sales in the weeks before
Christmas and New Years.
Javalogue 17: 10 January 2006
the Javalogue
Tea Plantation -- About halfway up the mountain one finds fields of this sort stretching out on both sides of the road.