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Farewell, Papua

And just like that, two years are up. It's like they went by in the blink of an eye. A year really isn't as long as it used to be!

I said goodbye to my coworkers at Adventist Aviation a sunny August morning and then headed to airport to make the journey out to Jakarta one more time. The last few days I'd been very conscious that I was experiencing all my "lasts" - last time having Friday night worship with my housemates, last bite of dragonfruit, last walk out on the runway at night. Now it was the last time to sit by the window seat and see Doyo Baru slid
ing past the wing. Well, maybe one day I'll go back to visit. As I told my friends and colleagues during staff worship the day I left, I felt like I was leaving family behind now.

The journey home was a mixture of the familiar and the foreign. Domestic planes were full to the gills while the international planes were half empty. Jakarta's airport restaurants were open so I was able to get a plate of nasi goreng for supper, but the check-in agent for JAL warned me that everything in Narita airport was closed, so to make sure to pack some food. He was right. The place was dead and eerily quiet.

Almost home. Flying the red, white, and blue

A bleary bunch of hours later I was finally on my last flight to Sacramento. Strange feeling it was, realizing I hadn't been

in the U.S. since 2018. But as I stepped off the plane back into California, it was a good feeling. Coming down the escalator I surveyed the familiar baggage hall where so many other journeys had reached their completion. I was back. A few minutes I saw my sister coming through the doors. I was home.

The Way You Expected

2015: I saw myself flying mission planes overseas by 2020

“So, in retrospect, in 2015, not a single person got the answer right to ‘Where do you see yourself five years from now?’” I think we’ve all seen this meme dozens of times by now, but I still chuckle every time I come across it because it’s just so ironically true! And it’s not just the 5-year plan. No one even got their 1-year plan right, because none of us could have seen what we’d be in for in 2020.

One thing I've mused about numerous times over the years is this idea that things often don’t turn out the way you expected them to. I’ve seen this in training pursuits (“I'm going to knock out my training and become a CFI before the summer!”—a year and a half later...), in education ("I'm going to be a doctor when I grow up." "I'm so glad I didn't become a doctor."), the world of romance (“I thought she was the one—and she knew I was not the one"), and in career choices (“They offered me the job! But I didn’t realize there’s nothing out there except cactuses…”).

My one and only year as a Pre-Med student

If I go back through my journals, I know there is no lack of confident prognostications that never came to pass, some of them more amusing and embarrassing than others! It’s just the reality of life that we change, others change, circumstances change. And nowhere are unforeseeable changes more prevalent than in mission field lands.

I tried to keep my expectations as blank as possible when I was getting ready to come to Papua, mainly because it was going to be such a new experience that I really had no idea what to expect anyway. It turned out to be even more unexpected—if I can say this—than I expected!

Didn't think our beautiful campus would end up like this

Who would have ever thought that after nearly a year of waiting for a replacement wing for one of our grounded planes it would arrive damaged? Who would have guessed a flash flood would decimate the campus and set the program back years? Or who in their wildest dreams would have imagined that a family I became friends with here would end up transferring to the country I spent some of my favorite years in as a child, to take the position my dad held when we lived there? (And they’re in the midst of their own huge set of unexpecteds now).

The biggest unexpected for me was that I would end up filling a nonflying role here. My last training flight occurred over a year ago now; it was explained that our one and only operational plane would need to continue servicing the mountain regions and since the second plane was still months away from flying again, there would be no flying opportunities for the time being for a beginner who needed to gain experience in the lowlands. Certainly wasn’t the original plan; but then again, neither were the previously mentioned unexpected events which conspired to complicate the situation.

Final day of training

I could have made the choice to stay in for the long haul—and that’s what was I was originally considering when I first made the decision to come to Papua. After all, this is what I’d been talking about doing for years. But when it came time, a few months after arriving here, to make the decision to sign on for a 5-year term, I was torn. For some reason, it just didn’t feel as if this was the right place for me for long-term, though I couldn’t quite explain why. I had also just gone through a traumatic emotional experience and I wasn’t in the frame of mind to be making that kind of commitment right then. I declined, saying I could only promise 2 years.

I’ll be honest: It’s something I’ve second-guessed multiple times since, sometimes wondering how that played into ending up in a desk job rather than completing my initial training and getting checked out to line. I’ve asked myself what my motives were for coming here—was it just for flying?—and what have my motives been for deciding to return home after my 2 years are finished—is it just because I’m not flying? Hard questions to answer when this occupation is something I spent 10 years training and preparing for.

At least I've found something else to "Excel" at, hehe

And I have to say Yes—and No. Yes, because there are so few people who are in a position to fill the highly specific role of a missionary pilot and even fewer who are actually willing to step forward and take the call, so that’s why I made the decision to come. No, because it’s not about flying a plane, but rather it’s about serving God and helping advance His kingdom.

Then why leave when there’s still so much opportunity for service here? Well, because I am still a pilot and I believe God gave me this skill and passion for a specific purpose. Also, I’ve come to see that for my particular personality, working in this type of setting is actually like trying to put a round peg in a square hole—it can fit, but the peg won’t be very happy, and the hole won’t be completely filled. I’ve realized I need a certain amount of structure in a workplace to be able to give my best contribution and thrive while doing so, and being able to compare my time here with previous work experiences has been really helpful for me to gain that understanding. Though I’ve finally found a niche in the particular work I’ve been helping out with, I know there’s still a uniquely fulfilling calling to be discovered.

So…where to from here? That is a very good question—shall I make a guess?! Haha, perhaps better not, or at least not publicly, since I’m bound to be wrong! Now, more than ever, I am seeing what it means when the Bible says, “Come now, you who say, ‘Today or tomorrow we will go to such and such a city, spend a year there, buy and sell, and make a profit’; whereas you do not know what will happen tomorrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapor that appears for a little time and then vanishes away. Instead you ought to say, ‘If the Lord wills, we shall live and do this or that.’” James 4:13-15 NKJV.

On location with the sis during a trip of a lifetime

But the neat thing is that while many things in life haven’t gone the way I hoped, there are just as many or more special surprises that I could never have dreamed up on my own. Ask me a couple years ago where I would enjoy having a holiday and Thailand would not have been part of my answer—and yet personal reasons brought me there and I had such a lovely time that I brought my family the next year! I would never have imagined my sister would be celebrating a wedding on two different continents and our family could be together for it all. And when I look back at the job I managed to land while I was waiting indefinitely to come to Papua, I continue to be amazed at how I somehow stumbled into what was probably the best instructing job in the country for me.

Burning holes through the blue California sky

But was it really by chance? No—you see there’s a verse that says, “The mind of man plans his way, but the Lord directs his steps.” Proverbs 16:9 NASB. God is very much involved in the details of our lives. It’s often necessary for Him to lead us through difficult places on the journey, but He also takes us through amazing landscapes we could never have discovered by ourselves. This is why the writer of the 23rd Psalm could exclaim, “My cup runs over. Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me all the days of my life”.

Yes, life is filled with uncertainty, there’s no doubt about it. There will be more tough times ahead, and more joys as well. For a guy like me who likes to be able to plan things out and know what to expect so I can be prepared for whatever situation, it can be daunting to face the reality that I just can’t know how everything will go. But now that familiar verse takes on a new meaning: “For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the Lord, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.” Jeremiah 29:11 KJV.

What is that expected end? It’s what the message of the Bible is all about. That after holding onto the Lord’s hand through this journey of life, “I will dwell in the house of the Lord forever.” Psalm 23:6. Sound nice? You have no idea!

“Eye has not seen, nor ear heard,
Nor have entered into the heart of man
The things which God has prepared for those who love Him.”

~ 1 Corinthians 2:9 NKJV

Things often don't turn out the way you
expected. But with God...they turn out better

The Day Before Yesterday

My mouth is watering as I upload this...

I've been delinquent in writing, I know. I got rather busy after the last time I posted and with so many things going on, I did the pilot thing of prioritizing and leaving off tasks I didn't consider essential. But on my Sunday afternoon as I've been sitting in the house and scrolling through my Microsoft To Do app and deciding what I should try to accomplish during the rest of day, I saw something that has been sitting unchecked for...months now. Okay, time to blog again. But boy, where do I start? Perhaps the day before the world changed.

Well, sadly for the folks in China, things had already changed for the worse, but at the beginning of February, COVID-19 wasn't even in our vocabulary yet and life in most other parts of the world was still "normal". My mom and sister and I were weighing whether it was a good idea to go ahead on a vacation we'd planned together to Thailand. After giving it careful thought, it still looked safe enough and so we boarded planes from our respective corners of the globe to travel to the place I had enjoyed visiting so much last year: Chiang Mai!

Never expected to see tulips in Chiang Mai!

It was so good to see my family again and what a lovely time we had together. The thing about my trip last year was that while it was a fun adventure, there was just always this empty feeling each day as I would sit in some little eclectic vegan restaurant enjoying good food all by myself with just my phone and no one that I knew. To me, I think the best part of traveling is getting to share the experience with your favorite people. And that's exactly what I got to do this last February!

We had a blast - from trying every restaurant and favorite dish I had discovered last year, to stumbling across a flower festival in the park, to getting up close and personal with giraffes at the night safari, to negotiating a much-too-narrow mountain road in the rental car. And of course, seeing many, many (did I say many?) temples and pagodas. This year I wanted to make sure we could also see Doi Inthanon National Park, which I hadn't been able to visit last time. Unfortunately, the annual smoke season had already begun, so the spectacular views that the park is famous for were largely hidden, but what we did see was still quite worth it. We made sure to take our fair share of photos in front of the iconic pagodas that star in every advertisement of Chiang Mai.

One of the twin pagodas near the summit

Our favorite part of the adventure? I'm pretty sure we're unanimous on that one: the food! That was the highlight of each day, and with so many options to try, it was always a tossup as to whether to go back and eat something we'd really enjoyed the other day or try something new. But by the end we had begun to figure out some favorites that were worth returning for - the vegan brownie and sandwich wraps at Vegan Heaven, the gluten-free strawberry cake at Pink House, the enormous tasty portions at Goodsouls Kitchen, and of course the unbeatable vegan chocolate croissants at Blue Diamond Breakfast Club.

The ten days went by very quickly and soon we were making a list of the last things we wanted to see and eat before it was time to head on. But the great part about finishing up in Chiang Mai was that our family vacation wasn't over! We had planned a Part 2 in Taipei where my sister lives and so the three of us boarded our Air Asia flight and flew to the island of Taiwan where Rachel took over as tour guide and helped us experience and try all her favorite things.

Feeling out of my league with Airbus and ATR pilots!

While there, I also had the fun opportunity to meet up with people from my previous life as a CFI. I got to catch up with my former boss Ryan and meet his wife and cute little kids. Also, some of my former students managed to get time off out of their busy EVA Air schedules and I got to meet up with them for lunch and hear about what their lives are like as airline pilots. It's so strange to think how just a couple short years ago we were droning around the traffic pattern in little Diamond 40s and now they're flying all over Asia and taking off and landing huge hunks of metal that are many times bigger than anything I've ever flown! It's neat to see what they've accomplished and I'm proud of them and really happy I could play a small part in helping them reach their dream jobs.

Vacations usually are the times of year that go by the quickest and this one was no exception. All too soon it was time to say goodbye and step on another flight that would take me away from my loved ones. We said our farewells in an almost empty airport, and set out on our individual journeys that would take us into a very different world than the one we were used to.

February seems like a lifetime ago now. Looking back, the timing couldn't have been better. Any later and we would have run the risk of getting marooned somewhere or stuck in quarantine, or worse. Yes, perhaps it was more of a risk than we realized at the time. But seeing how it turned out, it was really worth it and I can't help but think that our Heavenly Father was blessing us with a special gift. We had such a marvelous time together and came away with wonderful memories and for that I'm very grateful. I'm really glad we got to go.

Welcome to the new "normal"

Good Fences Makes Good Neighbors

The first time I heard that phrase, I didn’t quite know what to make of it. Isn’t it nicer to have no fence? If the neighbors are good, why have a barrier in between you and them? I just looked up the phrase and found out it was made famous by that well-known poet Robert Frost in his piece “Mending Wall”. He seems to ask similar questions in his poem, but he leaves the reader hanging with the imaginary character simply repeating the statement once more at the ending.

As I’ve gotten older, I’ve started to associate a very practical meaning with the phrase. Whether Robert Frost thought it was actually a valid idea or not, I personally think it encapsulates an important principle: boundaries.

At its most basic, a fence is just a simple structure that make it clear that this is where your space stops and mine starts, and vice versa. And why the importance of a good fence, as opposed to a line on the ground, or a fence that has a few human-size openings in it? Simply because people invariably find reasons to cross lines. There may be no ill intention. But it happens, and it can be habit-forming. Continually doing so can begin to erode an otherwise-good neighborly relationship.

Granted, this is a Western interpretation of a principle, but I guess I still function mostly as a Westerner. And the reason I’m writing this has nothing to do with my friends next door (they’re awesome!), but just to share some musings I’ve had on how this phrase applies to more subtle areas of life that aren’t defined by physical stones or wooden fenceposts. Specifically the area of personal boundaries, as it relates to the expectations that others (and perhaps even you) have of you.

Let's look at the work environment. I think most of us would agree that good fences make good employees. A company that is always expecting its workers to be available even while on holiday or at home, regularly put in overtime, and give 110% of their energies to achieve its corporate goals would be seen as a toxic work environment. In the employer-employee relationship, work hours and responsibilities that are clearly defined in a job description or contract form a boundary between what your company is entitled to receive from you and what it isn’t. Having such fences in those areas, amongst others, does a lot to keep the relationship healthy.

For people in missionary-type or ministry-related fields, however, knowing how to draw the line and build a wall between the responsibilities of your calling and the real needs of yourself and your family is a very real challenge. Could it be going too far to also say that good fences make…good missionaries? After all, you are in your position not to serve yourself, but serve others, right? So how far do you go in sacrificing yourself or your family to meet the urgencies that will never cease to demand more and more of your time?

It’s a tough question and it’s going to depend on the individual, his or her relationships, and the situation. But it is my belief that good fences there must be in certain areas, otherwise expectations and obligations will invariably encroach into space that belongs to you, perhaps eventually crowding you out. That’s another name for burnout.

When it comes to trying to find the balance between ministry-related work and personal life, I would argue that long-term sustainability should be the goal, of course with a healthy dose of prayer to know how to be adaptable for special situations. What is going to keep you from taking care of your health, spending enough quality time with God and your family, being able to recharge personally? Build a fence and keep it out. In some areas, put up a big huge wall that everyone can see and no one can penetrate.

Selfish? Nah. It’ll just mean your fences and walls will help you stay in the neighborhood longer so you can make a long-term impact.

I want to be careful in what I communicate, because I don’t want to encourage a stinginess while dealing in the currency of helpfulness. I know I have a natural tendency to pendulum-swing too far in that direction after going through a bout of overextending myself. I’m still trying to find that perfect balance and how to be flexible while still retaining the ownership of the boundaries. Some jobs require more of that flexibility than others. Some people have a higher capacity for flexibility than others.

I suppose that’s why a good understanding of your personality and individual makeup are essential. Acquiring that understanding doesn’t come overnight, and will probably come as a result of a great deal of trial and error. But at some point, you start to figure out what your personal needs are and what allows you as an individual to be the best long-term blessing you can be. Then you begin to understand the places where it’s okay to have a gate that’s sometimes left open, and the areas that must have a strong fence or solid wall.

Just as a practical tool, it may be helpful to see tasks and responsibilities that are thrown at you through the lens of the Eisenhower matrix, which has been used in Stephen Covey’s Seven Habits of Highly Effective People (confession: I haven’t read the book yet, sorry…). It’s a really simple graph that makes it instantly clear that tasks can be categorized into just 4 simple groups—urgent and important, non-urgent and important, urgent and non-important, and finally non-urgent and non-important. The first two should take priority, the last one is the obvious time-waster, but the third is the tricky one because urgency imparts a false sense of importance. And this is where we can end up spending most of our time, putting out proverbial fires but not getting ahead in projects that require long-term attention, or keeping up with maintenance that is important but seemingly non-urgent.

https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:MerrillCoveyMatrix.png

Again, it’s important to always ask God for help so you have the right goals and priorities and also the inside scoop about something that might not immediately appear important. Some things He may indeed want you to do, while other things that you feel you really should do He might not actually be asking you to get involved with.

I wanted to write this post to share what I feel may be helpful for others, especially people who work in or are preparing to enter service-related fields. Again, it’s pretty general and I'm not addressing specific situations, but I’m sure someone will be able resonate with what I’m trying to convey. Just remember that there will always be more expected of you than you can give. Also that God supplies what we don’t have. And that there’s a balance between those two principles.

And while you’re thinking about those ideas, here’s one more thought to add. God really does care about the personal welfare of those who serve Him.

“The Lord be exalted, who delights in the well-being of His servant.” 

Psalm 35:27 NIV (emphasis added).

Level 3

I've taken many steps on this runway by now

They say culture shock has 4 stages. First is the honeymoon phase, where everything is new and exciting and anything that is different from what you’re used to is considered novel. Stage two is where you find yourself getting frustrated with those differences, and realizing that you really do miss home and familiar things. If you stick it out long enough, you’ll work through the third stage of learning how to adapt and function and understand your host environment. Your network of community begins to grow and you begin to develop your everyday life routines. Finally one day you will find yourself realizing that you’ve crossed the long bridge from “I want to go home!” to “Hey, this is normal life.” They say this fourth and final "acceptance" stage doesn’t mean you’re an expert on your host culture, but you’re at the point where you are starting to become bicultural and are able to really start participating fully in your host culture. Life has taken on a normalcy and you feel a sense of belonging.

The Parts Room is much less lonely these days

That’s my spin on the four stages (and you can do a web search to read more descriptions of them). Lately I’ve been thinking about my own journey through these stages and it’s interesting to see how far I’ve come since landing in Papua a year and a quarter ago. I haven’t quite made it to the last stage in the progression, but I’m happy to have made it to where I’m at, as I continue to slowly learn the language and strengthen friendships. It hasn’t been easy getting this far, for sure. Just read my blog entry from a year ago, where I briefly showed a glimpse of what I was experiencing while in the midst of the second stage, which ironically had very little to do with culture. It’s been a one-of-a-kind learning curve.

But back to culture. Each month I jot down ideas that pop into my mind about what I could write about for this blog and this time I’ve just been remembering some of the amusing language and culture lessons I’ve learned over the past year. So let me share a few that come to mind.

First off is a Bahasa word that gave me a good deal of perplexity early on. It seemed that everyone liked to use the word “already” for everything. I would get on the back of a friend’s motorbike, and he would ask “Sudah? (Already?)”. I would finish eating and someone would ask, “Sudah?”. The person who borrowed a campus vehicle would announce in the WhatsApp group that the pickup had “already” returned. To my English-speaking mind, the word seemed to imply impatience or prematureness.

I finally made the connection that since this language doesn’t have tenses like English, the word "sudah" gives the sense of something having been accomplished rather than still being in the works. This little insight into the way of speaking has been helpful for me when it comes to understanding what my friends and colleagues say when we talk in English, as they tend to carry that mode of expression over from Bahasa. So when an office worker asks me “Did you already send me the document?” and it was only requested just a short while ago, they’re not trying to rush me. And likewise when someone says that they “already came back from town”, they’re not trying to say they came back early. They simply came back.

Another somewhat unique expression to me is the announcement that someone is going to “go first”. My housemate would tell me “I will go first,” when he was getting ready to head out the door to work. Again, to my English-speaker’s mind, associating the word “first” with “Me”, “Myself’, or “I” instantly sets off warning bells in my mind about lessons learned in childhood—it’s better to let others go first. But it has nothing to do with pushing to the front of the line or competing to see who will be first. The expression is simply the polite equivalent of the English way of saying, “I’m going ahead.” It’s just a way to let the other person know you’re heading out, and "dulu"—first—is really just a filler that reiterates the obvious, that you’re going ahead of them.

There are many such examples of how direct translation doesn’t always work out. Just as my Indonesian friends will use English words to say Bahasa phrases, I try to use Bahasa words to communicate English phrases and sometimes people just stare at me, trying to figure out what this bule is trying to say. Like when I learned the word for “when” and would try to use it try to talk about stuff that happened in the past. That usually injected confusion, and I eventually discovered it seems to be more a word to be used for asking about something that hasn’t happened yet and there was another word I needed to use. But, hey, it’s just all part of what makes learning a language intriguing and fun! And of course there are those hilarious language faux pas moments that everyone has. I haven’t had too many—yet. But at least one possible accident comes to mind, as I think I told a villager that I don’t drink cow’s milk but rather donkey milk. The word for soybean—kedelai—and donkey—keledai—are too awfully similar.

Getting ready to go on Staff Picnic in style!

So far, I’ve been finding the Indonesian culture to be welcoming and easy to adapt to. Some things I find amusing. Like how it’s considered essential to have a banner for any and every event that your organization or church is putting on—and if you put English words on it, the better. Or how an introduction of a new individual in staff morning worship is always followed up with a question as to the person’s status—are they single? Or some specifically Adventist ways of doing things that have developed in this local setting, like the MC picking a group of people on the spot to do the musical selection in church. “Today the song of praise will be given by…(picks something randomly out of his/her head)—all the men!” (or all the women, or all the singles, or all the fathers/mothers/young people, etc.).

I’m still learning the normal things to do in various social situations, like how you really can’t give too many handshakes. I’m accustomed to slipping into church unobtrusively, but I’m learning that it's not quite the way to arrive here. It’s important to greet those around you with a handshake and “Selamat Sabat” as you’re making your way to your seat, sometimes even if the Bible study discussion has already started. And then after church is finished, it’s pretty much a given that everyone will shake everyone else’s hands—even if you they already shook each other’s hand when they arrived.

Going from just faces to friends.

These are just a few snatches from what I’ve been learning. It’s hard to capture everything in one blog post, and I also have no idea how much more I have to learn during the rest of my journey here. But as I mentioned earlier, it’s good to be where I’m at and slowly, but steadily moving forward. Though a lot of the conversations still go over my head, I feel comfortable in a group of people talking Bahasa. It’s familiar now. I know how to get around and buy the various things I need and interact with some of the people I might encounter in the process. That’s familiar now. There are great people to work and worship with. They’re familiar now.

Christmastime in a place that never gets cold is familiar now too. As we wrap up the year in our respective corners of this tremendously diverse world, may our thoughts return to the One who took the greatest cultural leap when He was born that first Christmas day. I wish you all a truly Merry Christmas.

Man's Favorite Sport (not)

Sentani Hypermarket: Your satisfaction is our pride...

Last entry was about food. In this one I’ll share a bit about what it’s like to go grocery shopping. Here in Papua you have two main sources where you can buy your food: a store, or the market. The market is going to be the best place to find fresh produce, of which there is an abundance. The bigger food stores will also have some kinds of fruits and vegetables, but those items usually look like they’ve gone there to die. Local markets are really easy to get to, though, and there’s even one about 5 minutes’ walk away from my house.

The biggest market is in the heart of Sentani. Referred to as Pasar Baru, this place is teeming with activity and is chock-full of all sorts of things from buah merah (a red something-rather that I haven’t sampled yet), to blocks of sago, to stuff I don’t even recognize yet. Of course you can get the well-known items like tomatoes, cucumbers, eggplant, etc. No lettuce in these parts of Papua, though, so you can make do with Chinese cabbage. But if you need to replenish your stock of pinang, there’s certainly plenty of that all around. Just kidding, I don’t think you don’t want betel nut.

Yeah, I used this picture last year, but forgot to take more

Pasar Baru looks fairly navigable from the front, but once you start to poke around further inside it starts to feel like you’re in a labyrinth, and since I haven’t gone through there that many times yet, it’s still easy to get lost among the many back passageways. There are some familiar landmarks I’ve started to recognize, like the meat section, with the vendors waving duster-like swatters over the dead carcasses to keep the swarms of flies from settling. When I see—or rather smell—it, I know I’m on the right track to arriving at one of the better spots to buy things like potatoes and onions and other vegetables. After that I hazard a few turns, perhaps spotting the place where guys are processing coconuts, and usually manage to find my way to the fruit section before finishing the rounds and popping out along side of the market grounds.

It’s certainly a very different experience shopping in such a place compared to Winco or Safeway. No price tags on anything—you just have to ask how much the item you want costs and practice hearing your Indonesian numbers. If you are stocking up and need to haul a bunch of groceries, there aren’t shopping carts. But you can hire a wheelbarrow driver who will accompany you around the market and make sure to keep your stuff safe. He can probably tell you where to find something you’re looking for too.

Now if you want to buy food items that don’t come under the category of fresh produce, then it’s time to go to a store. There are plenty of little shops all along the roadside, but if you’re looking for more than just instant noodles or Pocari Sweat, then you’ll want to check out the two main supermarkets in town, Hypermarket and Saga. If you can’t find what you’re looking for in one, maybe the other one has it. Or maybe what you saw last week on the shelf will take 3 months to appear again, like it did for the kind of soy milk that I like to buy.

There are always plenty of cool designs to choose for your ride.

It’s about a 15-minute drive to the “mall” in Sentani where Hypermarket is. After arriving in Papua, I was initially dependent on catching rides with other folks going that way if I wanted to do some shopping for dry-goods staples like quick oats or whole grain rice. But after a couple months here I started learning how to use the taxi system. At first I was rather intimidated about the whole idea of trying to figure out public transportation with my very limited Bahasa comprehension. But after figuring out how simple it is, I wish I would have started using it sooner!

Throughout the day there are always tons of little white mini vans driving back and forth on the main road in front of the campus. These are the taxis—angkot in other parts of Indonesia. Getting one is as easy as standing by the side of the road and putting out your hand as one approaches. As far as getting to where you want to go, that’s pretty easy since there’s only 1 main road going to Sentani and the main stores are right along it. The taxi runs more like a small bus, and so you don’t even have to tell the driver where you want to go; you simply indicate when you want to get off, and he’ll pull over right there. The price? 5,000 rupiah, or about $0.35. One of these days I need to try out going a bit further afield using the taxis, as I’ve only been as far as Sentani. You can go all the way to Jayapura if you want, but that does mean changing taxis a few times.

Dec 1 I'll be setting up the tree the Boyds left for me

Last Sunday I introduced my housemate Timothy to the bigger versions of the supermarkets in Abepura, about an hour’s drive away. Luckily for us, the campus pickup was available, so he was able to drive us there for our shopping spree. I manage to make it out to Abepura every few months or so and it’s a good opportunity to stock up on things that don’t show up in the stores here in Sentani.

Ah, yes, the fruit jam shelf on the right. A bit more variety here.

We stepped into the first supermarket and were greeted by a rocking-out version of Joy to the World playing over the speakers and a large stock of little plastic Christmas trees. Oh, that's right - Christmas is (sort of) around the corner! Tim and I combed our way through the store searching for the various things we needed. He was particularly happy with the stock at Saga, even finding some vegetarian seasoning that his family uses back home. I found some snacks that weren't loaded with MSG and also managed to get several kinds of preservative-free fruit jam. No V-Soy drink at the first store, though, and the second supermarket had the price so high I lost my appetite for it. I'll survive by making my own coconut milk with carton coconut cream and water for the meantime. It actually works pretty well, don't worry.

Overall it was about a four-hour excursion and we managed to come back with some nice treats. And having gotten the first dose of Christmas music, I was reminded that there will be plenty—plenty—more of that to come! But in the meantime, I’ve got a jar of sun-dried tomatoes from California to enjoy.

There's no lack of variety in shirt designs here

Expat Eats

Tropical colors never fail to make the picture pop

Alright, this one’s on everyone’s favorite topic: food! One of the first questions I had when I started to pack for Papua was what would I be able to find to eat once I got here. With the help of folks with present and past experience living in Doyo Baru, I was able to form a bit of the picture in advance of what was available - lots of tofu and tempeh and soy milk, staples like oats and flour, and even the canned Chai Pow Yu gluten that I love. And of course plenty of fruits and vegetables. Rice was a given. Special things, however, I would have to bring in my suitcase, like nutritional yeast or special seasonings.

After arriving, I got a good orientation of what was currently available, as I followed Wendy Roberts around the Sentani pasar and tagged along with Ruth Boyd to the supermarkets in Abepura. It was nice to see there were indeed quite a few ingredients to work with and I wouldn’t have to subsist on just rice and beans. (Good thing too, because the beans here don’t seem to ever get soft, however long I cook them).

Some items were missing, however. The only available bread was white bread with milk in it; I eat wholewheat bread and I’m a vegan. Apart from sesame, any other kind of seeds—pumpkin, sunflower, chia, flax—had to be special-ordered from Jakarta. There were no sugar-free fruit spreads, just very sweet pineapple and strawberry jam. And of course any kind of vegan substitute bread spread like margarine or mayo was nowhere on this side of Indonesia.

Bread is important to me, so I got to work on that early on. I immediately ran into a problem, however, as I couldn’t seem to find bread pans anywhere. That was one thing I hadn’t thought of bringing in my three (yes three) suitcases, and now I was discovering that most things related to baking simply weren’t sold around here. I managed to find a couple sets of measuring cups, but no cookie sheets or measuring spoons. Wendy bailed me out by giving me a couple bead pans she wasn’t using anymore. I breathed a sigh of relief when I was able to start turning out loaves (some more successful than others) of bread. Eating rice three times a day is stretching it a bit for me, but when I saw I was able to make bread, I decided I was going to be able to survive! Since then, Barokah Bakery has opened up and I can buy wheat bread from them, making it a lot more convenient.

I would say that the supermarket experience here is a mix of being able to find the everyday fare you would expect in a Safeway or Grocery Outlet—pasta, canned vegetables, flour, sugar, corn flakes—and wistfully wishing there were specialty items items like tahini, sunflower butter, crackers without milk in them, tortilla chips without milk or MSG in them, or even simple things like apple juice without added sugar. The couple times I’ve traveled out of Indonesia this last year, I’ve eagerly devoured all the things I can’t get here, and even brought back a suitcase-full of food from Lebanon!

But, despite the reality that this island doesn't have many of the things I'd taken for granted back home, I must say I certainly haven’t landed in a desert. There's a good deal available, and I'm told that a lot more products have been showing up on the shelves lately, compared to just a few years ago. So it's quite doable to make a good variety of tasty dishes.

No berries for sale around here - so what is it?

As an American with European influence (or the other way round), I tend to like to eat traditional Western-type breakfasts, hot food for lunch, and bread for supper. So for morning menu items, I’ve enjoyed tropical smoothies with homemade granola or corn flakes, potatoes and tofu, pancakes, muesli, and of course the reliable standby of oatmeal. I even occasionally make grits with the corn meal that Barokah Bakery grinds.

Vegan spreads are hard to come by, but with some creativity I’ve been able to make some homemade spreads that do the trick. I was very happy to learn of one store that usually stocks garbanzo beans, so I pick up a couple cans every now and then and make hummus, sometimes using toasted sesame seeds if I’ve run out of tahini that I’ve packed in. Eggplant is super cheap here, and as I write I can smell the aroma of roasting eggplant as I get ready to make some baba ganoush.

Lately I’ve also been experimenting with aquafaba (a fancy name for the water from the chickpea can) and I was amazed the first time I tried to make a vegan mayo spread with this magical ingredient. I’ve tried blending oil slowly into lemon juice and vinegar and water before, but of course it always just turns into salad dressing. But this time when I drizzled the vegetable oil into the chickpea water that was swirling in the blender, something remarkable happened and the whole lot just stiffened up like cream! Refrigeration made it even firmer and I was delighted to discover I could make something that was something similar to my sorely missed Vegenaise from the U.S.!

There's a good reason why I eat rice for lunch everyday!

Now I have to say, my mealtimes don’t consist completely of just Western food. Actually I eat Indonesian food for lunch everyday! Since I thought I’d be pretty busy with flying, I started paying Ida, the wife of one of our maintenance staff, to cook lunch for me. The result is that I get the best of both worlds, and I’ve been enjoying many delicious vegetarian Indonesian-style dishes, from stir fries, to pumpkin sauce, to sweet potato greens in coconut milk, and of course always some kind of tofu or tempeh. The only downside is that I haven’t really learned how to make Indonesian food myself yet! I’ll have to take some lessons from Ida at some point before I leave.

Actually, it’s funny because not having to cook means that I can do it as a pastime now. Often I’ll try experimenting on the weekends during my time off. My housemates are always happy to try whatever comes out of the oven or off the stove - banana muffins, dragonfruit crisp, biryani, spring rolls, or one of Choqky’s favorites: oatmeal raisin cookies. Are you getting hungry yet? I’m afraid I am, and I’ve already had supper!

Meet my Mauritian roots

Ok, so the goal of this blog post wasn’t to show off or send you wandering to the fridge, but to simply let you in on what this expat’s everyday eating experience is like. And also show how it’s possible to be vegan and still enjoy good food.

Of course, some of you might be wondering, why am I vegan in the first place? And why continue to bother when it would be easier to just contextualize and eat what most everyone else in my host culture consumes? The answer to the first question is that’s how I was raised. So, true, my eating habits were largely the product of my upbringing. But the reason I’ve continued to stick with it into adulthood is because of a book I read a couple years ago called The China Study. Although I’d heard it cited many times, I never actually knew what was in it, so one day I picked the book up out of curiosity and decided to read it through myself. That did the trick of cementing in my mind why I want to continue to be plant-based. The science was very striking, and ongoing research—like the Adventist Health Study on America’s longest-living people group—continues to support Dr. Campbell’s findings that plants have protective properties, while foods, and in particular proteins, from animal sources have a cancer/diabetes/heart-disease promoting effect.

Apart from the physical benefits of being plant-based, there’s also reason to believe there are mental performance benefits too, as my classmate explains in this article. The modern research is certainly backing up what is likely the oldest clinical trial on record.

Alright, this wasn’t meant to turn into a research paper either. But despite the fact I can’t send you any real samples to try, I hope you’ve enjoyed this gastronomical read. And at the least, perhaps I’ve been able to provide some food for thought.