Welcome (back) to Bandung!

a little mold and ant mix on dishes

Beautiful birdsong, the sounds of construction below us, motor scooters gunning it to make it up the steep hill beneath our bedroom window, morning prayers, cicaks running the walls and leaving their little "gifts" behind, moldy clothing and having to remember how to deal with the water – such is life here in Indonesia. It just goes to show how fast a person can put bad stuff out of their mind and go back to “normal living” like we did during our stay at home. Our time in the States stretched out longer than originally planned because of Ronnie’s moms death and the nice long break and time with family and friends was exactly what we needed to make it till mid-June!

molded closet contents

fuzzy mold growing on walls and cabinets

whatizit? crawled up from shower drain

So now we know. You can’t go off for weeks during rainy season in Indonesia with everything locked up, no air flow and the drapes closed. Talk about the perfect environment for mold to grow! And grow it did. UGH! We’ve been dealing with mold covering just about every surface in our apartment. All of our clothes hanging in our closets, shoes, personal belongings, food in the cabinets, even walls and cabinets – everything covered with mold, mold, mold!

green stuff coming from faucets

Our water (nasty anyway) began to have clumps of green, fabric like material in it. Yuk. Every shower, faucet and toilet was loaded with the stuff, and good luck getting it off if it dries on a surface (commode bowl, shower wall, sink). And the critters?  We love the pretty birds songs, but not the cicaks (lizards), ants or the slimy black slug (?) that crawled up out of the shower drain! The rats are gnawing loudly in the attic. We’ve had the landlord remove the traps because the bait they use smells worse than a dead rat – we finally figured out what that awful odor was - Friendster salty fish head bait. Make a note and DON’T buy it!! We’ll bait the traps again soon with something more benign.

In spite of the “welcome back” we received, the people here seemed genuinely glad to see us. Partly because they wouldn’t have jobs if it weren’t for us, and partly because they are just nice and friendly people. Dadang, our driver, presents us with a new problem almost daily. It usually relates to the fact that he needs money. It’s hard to know how/how much to help. There’s a line between being compassionate and being taken advantage of, and we’re still trying to figure out where that is. When Ronnie told our landlady about the mold problem, she told us to go buy some dehumidifiers at the grocery store – these are plastic tubs filled with tiny white balls that absorb moisture from the air. We were thrilled to learn about these and are using them now, but how nice it would have been had we known before we left!

In addition to the mold and critter issues, we’re finding some type of “mystery spit up” on the front porch each morning. Speculations (opinions from those around the apartment as to what could be leaving this little surprise at our door) include monkey, bird and dog. I’m not sure what the heck it is, but it’s unpleasant to wake up to. I’ll post a photo in case any of you want to take a stab at it. Warning: it’s not for the faint hearted.

your guess is as good as ours - eeeuuwww!!

I apologize if this post is somewhat of a downer. I guess I just needed to get it out of my system. Hopefully the rest of them will be more upbeat and on a more pleasant topic. 

PS Today our driver Dadang speculated that the "mystery spit up" is being left by an evil devil (Indonesians are very superstitious). Ronnie questioned him and after much discussion determined that he thinks it is an animal (an animal devil?)