Two for One

So, I’m skipping a full Monday and Tuesday blog entry, because really, who wants to hear my ranting about being on the beach near the Equator with tradewinds cooling us down, spa treatments, swimming, drinking pina coladas….in the midst of winter back home? So, as we prepare to leave the beachside hotel today and head to the rainforests in Ubud, I’ll just highlight some things that interested me about the last three days here.

The last two nights we’ve had some great dinners with the family. Monday night we met Don and Molly for a family dinner at the Un’s Restaurant—an open air restaurant run by a Swiss couple. It’s clean and one of Molly’s favorite restaurants here. Everyone who works there knows them, cause every time they come to Kuta they eat there at least one. It’s considered “pricey” by Indo standards, but at $3 to $6 bucks for a gourmet filling meal, it’s a steal for us. And since the dollar has been strong throughout our trip, the exchange rate offers a considerable discount for us. Un’s is known for their unbelievably good mango and coconut ice creams—really delicious—served in a frozen halved coconut shell.



And last night we went to Scott and Jenni’s apartment atop the girl’s home (they have a boy’s and a girl’s home next to one another) for some fresh made tuna tartare ala Scott. It was really good. We ate Indo style—with our hands. And we had some Butterfish sushi. Butterfish is probably the best fish I’ve ever eaten. It’s a local seasonal specialty, and locally they call it the Devil Fish because it’s totally black on the outside and really pure white on the inside. But we thought that if it’s called the Devil fish it should be pure white on the outside and pure black in the inside. We ate outside on their little balcony, drinking Bintangs (local beer) with our friend Jason, who had just returned from vacation Australia. He is on staff at the kid’s home, and about to become the sole “guardian” of a little 1 year old named Christian brought to the home on Monday by he and his 3 year old brother’s (Yaya) mother. She had returned to Timor for her mother’s death and funeral and when she returned to Bali her husband was shacking up with another woman he had gotten pregnant. So the mom was left to provide for her two young boys by herself since she has no family here, but she couldn’t work and take care of them, so a pastor told her about the kid’s home and she brought them here. Totally heartbreaking. I can’t imagine being in her position. The boys have been crying and having fits and asking for their mama. So Scott asked Jason to take the youngest boy under his wing and be his care taker full time. A big responsibility for a guy who’s never had kids! But the littlest one needs consistency in his care, especially since he’s not potty trained. So that’s two more boys this week, and I think another newborn is supposed to show up this week.

Scott and Jenni came for breakfast with us every morning, so it was a great time to hang out and catch up. It’s been funny because every morning they opt for the very American style breakfast options at the buffet—the pancakes, danishes, sausage, bacon, egg omelets, and waffles—rather than the Indonesian options. As they said, “We never get to eat American food here, and we eat Indo food all the time.” They really stuffed themselves everyday. It really was funny. Meanwhile Dave’s chowing on the Indo breakfasts because they are so different and really tasty. In fact, yesterday morning they brought three of the boys from the kid’s home to breakfast with them before they needed to head off to school—Krishna, Hendri, and Andre. Hendri loaded up on sausage. Because he normally eats fish and rice for breakfast. The other boys followed suit. I’ve never seen a little boy like Andre fit so many bites of waffle with berry syrup in his mouth at one time!

Hendri’s story is really special to David. His full name is Hendri David M... (I'm not using our last name per David's request). He came to the home when he was about 5, after his mother tried to hang him. He had escaped from he noose and run next door to a neighbor lady’s home who had been nice to him. He hid under her house. She was a friend of Tina, the lady who started the street kids’ home, and told the boy he could go to a good home with other boys and girls and find love there, and since his mother had tried to kill him and his father had already abandoned him, he decided to go. He and Scott really bonded and one day while on the beach he told Scott that since Scott was more of a father to him than his own father had been, he thought he should take Scott’s last name. And he also thought he needed a new name. And he wanted one with a strong Biblical meaning, so since David was a great man of faith in the Bible, and also the name of Scott’s older brother, he told Scott he wanted the name Hendri David M...(again, not using the last name per Dave's request). When we first met Hendri but didn’t know it was him, we asked what his name was and when he told David “My name is Hendri David M...”, David said, “My name is David M..., too”. To which Hendri opened his mouth wide and smiled. It was a sweet moment. Well, he’s a lot bigger (I think he’s 11 now) on this trip and a really sweet boy. When we went to the kid’s home yesterday Hendri was put in charge of watching Declan and he did a great job of it. He was very protective of him. It was really precious.


So today David really wanted to take Declan for a ride on the motorcylce through Kuta, so they spent about an hour driving around—just the “boys”. While they were gone Dash and I played, and he crawled for the first time! And David had taken the video camera! He dropped Declan off at the home and then came back to get me, which was a bit of a surprise because I was expecting Scott to pick us all up in the truck and take us back to his house. So David shows up and says to jump on the motorcycle—me and the baby in the Baby Bjorn. So, praying as he’s driving, and “feel” our way back to the kid’s home (the streets are really screwy around here). It was Dashel’s first ride on a motorcycle and he smiled the whole way there.

This has definitely been a faith-building trip for me!