Simuelue

Simeulue

Friday we toke of to Simuelue. We had our private airplane, it was great! A really small plane and I was basically sitting on the pilots’ lab, so I could see everything very well and clear. We flu over the sea, the mountains and the jungle, because it wasn’t flying so high you could see everything very well. I thought a little plane would shake more but that was alright and it was an other cool experience.
When we arrived in Simuelue there was only one place to land and the airport was only wooden huts were we got some tea and coffee (nothing we are use to). Two cars came to pick us up, because of the amount of baggage we toke with us (not me, my parents ). The road was really bad and when they showed us the town, there are only a few streets with some shops (but even more than I expected though!). We went to my father’s office and met is colleges and after we went to the HOUSE.

A beautiful wooden house made from bamboo leafs and wood, it’s standing on steals and it’s designed from the old houses in Aceh. There are two rooms, one for my parents and one for me (how fairly divided, lucky me) The house has two levels; the balcony and the bedrooms are on the same level and than there is a lower part when you enter the house (you first come up with wooden stairs). Before the people had a little hall in between the rooms where they cooked, but because that’s really dangerous they made a lower level behind where which they made a wall in between where they cook. The man/visitors and woman live in different rooms and are separated (because of there religion; the Islam).
The balcony we have is just hugs and really nice. Wait till you see the view……..!!!!!!
It is beautiful!!! I don’t know what else to say, it’s just amazing! We look over the sea and have a jungle next to our house, there is nothing in front of our house so we have an open view.
They have built some houses op the hill next to us and down the hill they have there Mandi (bathing) place. So in the beginning they all started up and looked what we were doing there. We could look strait down and see how they are taking a shower or how they wash there clothes or how they go to the toilet. Not the shower, washing machine nor the toilet we are use to, no they wash themselves by throwing (dirty) water over their heads and in the same water they take their bath they wash their cloths. And the toilet well that’s just the nature; put your pants down and just sit down and do whatever you have to… (luckily it doesn’t smell here). But you can imagine how poor they are here (you feel really lucky for everything you have).
Our bathroom and kitchen are in different buildings outside, so if you have to go to the toilet you have to go outside first. Both really big, but not so practical decorated.
So we had to find some stuff to buy to decorate the house and reorganized everything. Because it’s an island you can’t buy everything, if you want to buy something special (or things they can’t make/have here) you have to get it or let it come over from Medan.
A lot of things were already broken or damaged, although the house is not even a year old! (those people here don’t seem to know how to take care of or use there stuff) So we had to repair and buy some new things.

We have our own guard here, Latif, a nice guy, but what I said before; different norms and values here. He just comes here and sits down, as if he owns the place, and it’s hard to tell him that it’s our house and that we would like to have some privacy sometimes. One evening we came home and the light on the balcony was on and we heard loud music, guess what?! Latif was just sitting on our balcony with our stereo installation listening to our music. And even when we came home he didn’t move and just sat there! Unbelievable.
I think he also just uses our kitchen and bathroom. Ones he left the gas on, which is really dangerous because of explosion danger (and fires when there is an earthquake) , because he wanted to lighten his cigarette (they don’t really know much about safety here, or better said they don’t know much here).
He wants to learn English so every time he comes over he asks how you call things, so now we started to write it down for him and he has to learn a few day’s everyday (yes, we are strict teachers)

We also have some animals here, like karbouws in our garden, haha, that are big cows, they look a bit like buffalo’s (so you feel really as if you are in a national park somewhere in Africa). I am glad they are not dangerous or wild; they say you can even ride on them (so maybe I can give that a try one day )
There are many animals here like chickens, dogs, cats, goose, birds, tjictjac, lizards, a lot of flies (bleh), all different birds and we even got monkeys (sometimes they come on our balcony they say, we saw a large group of monkey’s running down the beach; because of the building here they don’t come so close anymore, they moved into the forest).
The animals don’t look as nice as in Malaysia and most of them are also wild (but that’s understandable if you see how the conditions are here). We have a cat coming when we eat and just sits and miauws all the time, he must be really hungry, so he gets our leftovers. But although the cats and dogs are really afraid of people the chicken and goose just come in your house (so sometimes we have to chase them out of our sleeping room).

In the beginning I really had to get use to the climate here, everything just gets sticky and smelled bad. So we first had to clean everything and hang it outside. Also your skin and hair changes and gets really sticky and greasy. In the big city’s there are lots of pollution and humanity so that’s also not so good for your skin.
I also really had to get use to the people, how they all stare at you and want to talk to you. All the people say or yell: “ Hallo mister!” when you pass them (they haven’t learned that your not a mister but a miss, but well we’ll just have to take it). In the beginning also people just come to your place because they want to see you and talk to you (but I think we made them clear now that we don’t want them to just come up and stay at our house). They love to come and sit with you and have a talk and they all want to practice their English.

The first week in Medan and Simuelue I was ill, and especially with this hot weather it’s not so nice to feel sick. It started with a bit of a flew and my throat was sore, than at night suddenly I felt really sick; I couldn’t walk nor move otherwise I had to throw up. I felt really weak and had high fever. Than in Simuelue I saw that my tonsils were full of white spots, later also my teeth got infected and there were also white spots on it.
My back was hurting and sore, it felt red and bleu. Later also my toe started to hurt and my joints felt painful. The blue spots I had two years before (when I had that erythema nodosum) started to appear again.
I had to go to the hospital, but it was a free long weekend and there were no doctors on the island. Luckily my fathers college was a nurse and she gave me antibiotics. So for ten day’s I had to go on antibiotics, after a few day’s I got a bit better; the white spots disappeared and all those other infections also went away, but still I felt a bit weak and tired.


You can still see the damages from the tsunami and the earthquake; a lot of houses broke down. There are still white tents standing here, now they look a bit dusty and old, just like on television (that’s weird to see it in reality). My mother said that in Bandeh Atjeh the boot was still in the house, just like on the news back than.
Although there are a lot of new houses and schools build, in some tents they still teach. It’s hard to believe that they actually lived in those tents and slept on the floor all together,(but than they also live in huts now where they also all sleep on the floor, it’s funny because they live so primitive here and than most do have got a television).
I already saw a lot of schools my father has build and they look really nice; the people here also find them really nice, so now they don’t want other schools anymore (good for my father, but not for the other organizations/companies here)