Gone Fishin’

Over the Christmas break, we took the kids fishing at Kebun Wisata Pasirmukti.  It is an agrofarm that is located about 1 hour outside of Jakarta.  Fishing is something that we all enjoy doing as a family, and it was something that we had not done since we moved to Jakarta.  I read about the agrofarm in the Family Guide to Jakarta.  It said that you could fish in the stocked ponds.

We took the kids on a Saturday.  The entrance fee was Rp. 15,000 per person.  The fee includes a free complimentary juice from the onsite restaurant.  We made our way to the fishing area.  The fishing fee was another Rp. 15,000 per person.  This fee includes a fishing pole and bait. There are also baskets that you can put the fish in and nets you can use to scoop out the fish.  If you want to take the fish home, you pay for the weight of the fish that you are taking home.  We threw back the ones that were too small to eat and kept the larger ones.

We noticed that some people had the fish cooked at the local restaurant.  We put ours on ice and took them home.  The kids really enjoyed being outdoors.  The girls gave up on fishing after awhile and just enjoyed throwing bait in the pond to feed the fish.  We will definitely be going again.
I forgot to mention that there are people on hand to help you take the fish off the hook if you are squeamish about that. Also, they will clean and scale the fish for you.  I think the cleaning was complimentary after you paid for the fish.  We just tipped the guy that cleaned the fish for us Rp. 20,000.  That is one part of fishing I do not enjoy…cleaning the fish…yuck!


Fishing for Gurame at one of the ponds.  We had no luck so we switched to the second pond.




Colorful baskets that you can use to put your fish in. There is a nail on each of the little fishing huts that you can attach the basket to so that you can keep your fish in the water until you are ready to go.



Fishing!




Lovely bug that we found floating in the pond.  DH scooped him out with the net so we could get a good look at him. Check out those mouth parts!




The final fish count.  We ended up with 7 decent sized Bawal Hitam. Incidentally, they are not supposed to be as good to eat as the Bawal Putih or the Gurame, but we thought they were still good.  They do have a lot of small bones so you do need to exercise some caution when eating this kind of fish. 




Some views of the fishing area.  It was really nice to be outside. The small huts provide shade and a place to sit.




The kids wanted to watch the fish being scaled and cleaned.  I opted not to watch that part.  I am a bit squeamish when it comes to blood and guts.




Price list. We paid Rp. 80,000 for the 7 fish that we caught.  It’s probably not much cheaper than buying the fish at the market, but it certainly was a lot more fun!




Heading back to the car.




We had lunch at the onsite restaurant.  The view was fantastic!  We also got to see a nice rainstorm.




The kids played in the rain a bit after lunch.  We went home with 3 wet but happy kids.



FYI: Kebun Wisata Pasirmukti
Jl. Raya Tajur Pasirmukti Km.4
Citeureup, Bogor 16810
Tel: 021 8794 3864/65
www.pasirmukti.co.id

Quilted Pillow Covers

I bought some quilted pillow covers from a lady named Deliana that I met at a friend’s house. The ones I bought were pre-made.  She will also do custom orders, and she will come to your home.  The covers were well-made, beautiful, and reasonably priced.  I paid Rp. 50,000 for each pillow cover.  I loved the batik themed quilts she had too.  They were so lovely!  A king-sized quilt is Rp. 1.5 million.  I think I may have to get one sometime.  In the meantime, I’m happy with the pillow covers.



I was trying to take a picture to show the zippered backside of the pillows, but my little one jumped in the photo. She loves getting her picture taken…lol.  The white pillows had a zipper across the upper back part.  On the red pillows, the zipper ran across the top.



And here’s our little gray couch spruced up with the quilted batik pillow covers.   I love them!



FYI: Deliana Collection
Tel/Fax: (021) 7313368
HP: 0878 8432 4738 / 0812 1907 6950
Email: delianasukis@yahoo.com

Decision

Well, it didn't take long to decide that I'm going to just let my oldest go to the language school to learn Mandarin Chinese.  It's just too expensive to have all 3 kids go.  I know enough Mandarin that I think I can teach the younger kids at home.  I just need to be more diligent about it.  My parents said that while we are in Taiwan, they will help me pick out some books and cds for teaching the kids Mandarin.  I really would love for my kids to learn to at least speak some Mandarin Chinese so that they are in touch with their Chinese roots.  I wish I knew a good way to teach the kids Taiwanese too, but I think that is a language that is on its way out.  Few people speak the dialect anymore. It makes me sad to think the kids won't speak Taiwanese, but I just don't know an effective way to teach them.

DH and I stayed up last night talking about the best way to have the kids learn Mandarin Chinese.  The consensus is that to have them learn and retain any Mandarin they learn, they need to be immersed in it.  Short of moving to a Mandarin speaking country, the best way to do that is for me to speak Mandarin in the home to them.  It is hard for me to do that since English is my first language, but I am going to make a conscious effort to speak Mandarin to my children.  My youngest gets mad whenever I try to speak to her in Mandarin, but I guess she will just have to get used to it...ha ha.  I am determined that the kids will learn to at least speak Mandarin. Reading and writing would be great too, but I would be happy if they could at least speak conversational Mandarin Chinese.

Mandarin Classes

I've been thinking for awhile now that I would like my kids to learn to speak Mandarin Chinese.  As a kid, I went to Mandarin classes every saturday for around 5 years.  I also took 1 year of Mandarin in college.  My parents did not speak Mandarin at home.  We spoke Taiwanese, which is very different from Mandarin Chinese.  My Mandarin isn't fantastic, but I can speak it well enough. 

DH thought I could teach the kids to speak Mandarin, but I find that to be an almost impossible feat.  I have to really think to make the switch from English to Mandarin whever I find a need to speak Mandarin. It just doesn't come naturally to me.  When my oldest was a baby, I tried to force myself to speak to him only in Mandarin.  That didn't last very long.  The kids do know some songs and some words in Mandarin. They can count to 10.  They know colors and body parts.  They know other random vocabulary words, but they can't converse at all in Mandarin.

I have some friends that are from China and they enrolled their children in Zhong Xin Hua Wen Mandarin Enrichment Center.  The fee is Rp. 3.600.000 for a 3-month term (24 lessons)...lessons are twice a week.  The registration fee per year is Rp. 300.000.  Textbooks used in class are an additional cost.  The maximum class size is 6.

Today I took all 3 of my kids to the center for a class to see how they would like it.  I don't think I can stomach the cost of enrolling all 3 kids.  Still, I wanted to see how the classes were structured and how my kids like the classes.  We are going to try the classes for 1 month and see how the kids like them before we make any final decisions.  We will be spending roughly $400 US dollars for the kids to try Mandarin classes for a month!  The owner said we could pay the fee for 1 child for 3 months but have all 3 kids come for 1 month or 8 sessions.

I already know that I will enroll my oldest.  I just am trying to decide if I want to pay for the younger 2 kids to take classes.  The classes are 1.5 hrs long for each session.  It was a little long for my younger kids.  The younger kids were in a class separate from the older kids.

My oldest liked the class.  The teacher said she was impressed with him.  He has a good memory and he catches on quickly.  My youngest was totally uncooperative and would not repeat any words or listen to the teacher.  She mostly just colored during class today.  My 4-year old was an active participant for about an hour and then her attention span gave up.  She was running around and not paying attention for the last half hour.

I will post again at the end of 8 sessions to give my impression of the school and the classes.  As of right now, I have a good impression of the center. I still will have to give this alot of thought.  I wonder if I can hire a Mandarin tutor for my kids for less than the roughly $400 US dollars I would pay per month if all 3 kids were to attend the center.  I may have to look into that option.



FYI:

Zhong Zin Hua Wen Manadarin Enrichment Center
Head Office: Plaza 1 Pondok Indah
Jl. Metro Duta BL UA/52, Jakarta Selatan 12310
Phone: (021) 7699506/ (021)7699360
Fax: (021)7699505
Email: info@zhongxin.co.id

Branch: Gedung STC Senayan, 5th floor No. 242
Jl. Asia Afrika, Pintu IX
Gelora Senayan, Jakarta Pusat
Phone/Fax: (021)57936272

Branch: Rukp Golden 8 Serpong
Blok G 8B No. 3&5
Gading Serpong Tangerang

Chinese New Year

Today is Chinese New Year's Day!  This year is the year of the dragon!  DH and I stayed up til midnight last night hoping that we might see some fireworks but we were quite disappointed.  We could see a few fireworks off in the distance, but it was nothing like what we saw on New Year's Eve.  A few Chinese families in our complex attempted to shoot off some fireworks around 11:30pm but the festivities were quickly cut short by the apartment security personnel. 

To celebrate Chinese New Year today, I made lots of dumplings or "jiao zi."  As a kid I would stuff myself silly on dumplings.  My parents would put dimes inside the dumplings and the kid with the most dimes was the luckiest person.  I also made some noodles and spring rolls.  I thought about frying some fish and making some steamed buns too, but  I thought that might be too much food. 

DH and the kids are enjoying their time off from work and school today.  Chinese New Year has been designated a national holiday in Indonesia since 2002.  It's been a nice day to just eat some good food and spend time with family. 

Happy Chinese New Year! 
Gong xi fa cai!

Taiwan

We bought tickets last night for my parents to go to Taiwan in March.  We will meet up with them for a couple of weeks in March.  I am so excited to go back to Taiwan.  My parents, my brother, and our family of 5 went to Taiwan 2 years ago.  It was a whirlwind trip to see family that my parents had not seen in some 30+ years but we all had a fantastic time.  We are so looking forward to going again.  Taiwan is also known as Formosa which means beautiful island in Dutch.  It is just a fantastic place to visit. 
The thing we are most looking forward to besides seeing family again is the food.  I can’t even describe how delicious the food is.  I am not kidding when I say I gained at least 10 pounds in the 2 weeks we were there.  The food in the restaurants was excellent, but you could buy  delicious “small eats” off the streets pretty much anytime.  They were readily available, cheap, and just amazingly yummy!  I’ve been desperately trying to lose a few pounds in anticipation of the sin of gluttony that will surely overcome me once I get back to Taiwan…lol. 

Sunset

I don’t love living in an apartment.  However, one of the positives of living in an apartment is the view from our balcony.  Tonight’s sunset was beautiful!


Panoramic view overlooking the Bung Karno Stadium


Probably the only positive aspect of air pollution…fantastic sunsets…lol.

Mexican Food

Being from Texas, DH and I miss having good Mexican food.    DH tried out a place called Hacienda and really enjoyed the fajitas there.  He said they tasted as good as the fajitas at one of our favorite Tex-Mex restaurants back in Houston.

Today my little daughter and I joined DH for lunch at Hacienda.  I ordered the chicken quesadillas and DH ordered beef enchiladas. The food was good, but nothing to rave about.  DH said the fajitas were definitely a lot  better than what we ordered today.  I’ll definitely have to try the fajitas next time.

I would go back to Hacienda.  Overall, the food was pretty good.  We ordered and received our food in 10-15 minutes.  Of course we went at 11:30am before the lunch time rush so that may have made all the difference. 

Hacienda is located inside Plaza Arcadia.  There are numerous restaurants inside Plaza Arcadia which is located behind Plaza Senayan. Anyone know of any fantastic Mexican restaurants in Jakarta?  We heard there are some Mexican Restaurants in Kemang, but we have yet to try out any of the restaurants in that part of town.



The eating area is surrounded by windows and very bright! The bar area is just inside the door and is very dark!

Entryway separating the restaurant from the bar


The food…


Guess someone is still hungry…lol.

Happy New Year Jakarta!

Today is the first day of 2012!  Last night we went to a New Year’s Eve party.  We arrived home about a half hour before midnight.  We could see and hear fireworks going on all around us.  DH and I stepped out onto the balcony of our apartment to see the fireworks.  It didn’t matter which direction we looked, there were fireworks everywhere.  At about a quarter to midnight, the intensity of the fireworks increased dramatically.  I’m not sure I’ve ever seen so many fireworks going off at one time. 
We’ve lived in Jakarta for 10 months now.  Time certainly flies.  We have seen and done a lot of things in the short time that we have lived here.  We are looking forward to having more adventures in 2012! Happy New Year everyone!