Literally. And not just here! I was away from home for over half of April. Fortunately my family was able to join me for a significant portion of that! In fact, I flew from Hanoi directly to Okinawa, there to meet my family arriving the following day. I had a trip planned to Okinawa and… Continue reading Long Time Gone…
Category: Writing
Seka
I arrive in the capital city of Sri Lanka, Colombo. I don’t speak either of the two major languages here though there’s a fair amount of refined as well as rudimentary English here. As I do in Indonesia and everywhere else I travel to on this side of the world I rely on ride-hailing services… Continue reading Seka
Edi Long Hair
The pier we emerge onto at Lake Toba is a small, unassuming stone affair. Large, volcanic stone mortared together, layer upon layer out of the calm surrounding water and leading to land. Two young men sit hoping for customers for their water-craft tourist experiences. I pause to talk with them. With only a month of… Continue reading Edi Long Hair
Rick
I imagined from the US that Southeast Asia would be sprinkled with people from other parts of the world who opted to transplant themselves both short term and long term. And I imagined these people would have fascinating backstories that likely would take years to write down or tell. I met one this weekend. His… Continue reading Rick
Lenten Beauty
It may at first seem counterintuitive, that in the midst of Lent we could find and enjoy beauty. But contrition and repentance are not the same thing at all as boringness or repetition or monotony or ugliness. If anything, our Lenten contemplations should drive us in part by comparison – the aching awareness of our… Continue reading Lenten Beauty
Scenes in Medan I
The area of Medan we know best after three weeks is the small street our hotel/apartment is on – Jalan Listrik. It’s an elbow of a street jutting out to the east and north from a major thoroughfare. This is looking out are window, facing southeast. There are two large complexes directly next to us… Continue reading Scenes in Medan I
Just the Facts
I’m too young to have seen many of the original Dragnet episodes. It was not nearly as favored in syndication where and when I was growing up. But the famous line of Just the facts, ma’am (even if erroneously attributed or cited) has become cultural parlance of a sort (or at least it was the… Continue reading Just the Facts
Beginnings
It’s early morning here on the West Coast. The rest of my family is still sleeping soundly when my alarm goes off at 5:30am. I stumble about, getting dressed, making a cup of hot tea, fiddling with the settings on my phone and WhatsApp – the application I’ll be using shortly to do something I’ve… Continue reading Beginnings
What We’re Reading
Part of trying to prepare ourselves for life overseas means doing research, learning history and other things that could help us make better sense of where we’re going. I don’t know about y’all, but Southeast Asian history was touched rather lightly (ie not at all!) in my education. Even my undergraduate studies in history never… Continue reading What We’re Reading
A Bit About Chronology Here
Just as a heads up, I try to keep this blog more or less chronological. But being human, I’m also prone to lapses of memory. Add to that juggling technology in terms of whether the photos for the day are on my wife’s phone or mine, and sometimes things get lost in the shuffle, at… Continue reading A Bit About Chronology Here
The Nelson Family Indonesia 