Our new home...

Hello everyone...

Well Jeff and I arrived in Balikpapan on Thursday morning at about 10 am. We both had a bit of culture shock but 2 days later we are doing a bit better....it is not a resort city by any means and poverty is everywhere, welcome to a third world country I guess.

The people are nice, smiling everywhere we go. No one speaks english, not even Bertha, the cook/housekeeper so we are trying to rapidly learn some Bahasa Indonesia to communicate a bit better and show some respect as well. Today, Saturday, was Jeffs first full day off and we didn't do much. Pram, the driver, took us to Matahari, one of the malls, so we could go shopping. Everything is very inexpensive...the rupiah value is approx. $1 Can to 9,500 rupiahs.

To give you a better idea as to what things cost....

12,990 rup - 4 Cans of Coke
2,970,000 - cell phone
120,000 - Cheerios

Things such as stationary supplies are very expensive with a package of loose leaf for $4. Cheerios and other cereal is also very expensive but otherwise food is very reasonable...Vegetables and fruit are very cheap and are everywhere...in fact we are woken up each morning by people who ride bikes down the street ringing bells selling fruit, soup, fish you name it they sell it. We are eating very well...Bertha is an amazing cook with our favorite dish as Spaghetti, so far anyway.

We will update you more as we experience more but right now we are being very low key....tomorrow we are going to look at houses so hopefully we will find something we like.

Keep in touch

Jeff and Lori