Island work

Monday, March 11, 2024

By 10:00 we're in the Jakarta airport. (Yes, we left home early.) Our rest stop along the way includes breakfast - a bento box of salt and rice.

Don offers his "Top Three" takeaways from the week in the car, before we hang out in the airport lounge. It's a short and empty flight to Belitung.

W's arranged a van for about 20 passengers since many took the same Jakarta-Belitung flight. The driver casually checks his playlist while negotiating the curves and hills to the Sheraton in the northwest corner of the island. 

The hotel lobby is impressive. Conference venues look like tourist flyers. That's one privilege of living in the tropics. Someone mentions the chirping of a lizard in their hotel room. It's novel and weird to them because they live in a Jakarta apartment, high above the ground. The chirping is familiar to us - those cicaks run through our rooms day and night in Bandung.

The view to the sea makes us hopeful about the setting for this week of conversations and connections.

When we walk to the onsite restaurant, we look back over the lagoons toward the rooms.

The clay-lined lagoons are sterile: they're not fish-friendly, we're told. 

It's a "sustainable" resort and lodging is expensive for this part of the world, though about the same as a lower-range hotel room in the States. Of course, W has gotten a reduced room rate through his travel apps and signing up for their member bonuses.

The lobby attendants let us know we've arrived in the worst season of weather: westerly monsoons mean rain at some time every day. We settle into clean calm room. Our view is a tree beside the balcony that provides privacy (yay!) We overlook a grassy courtyard toward similar longhouse-style lodging. I break off the branch scraping the roof and pluck a seed head from the tree.

God's handiwork is intricate. I watch the seed-head unfold in the next few days.

Tuesday

We wake to the patter of rain on leaves. W reads on the porch for an hour and heads for an early breakfast while I enjoy a bath on the balcony. The stone tub keeps the water hot. Two stand-up wicker screens shade me from view.

Privacy screens are available in the exterior halls. Near the service elevators on our floor, a cart has been sitting full of rainwater and unwashed dishes since Monday (remnants from room service?)

I finish listening to the book club's next book: "Lady Tan's Circle of Women" by Lisa See. What a marvelous story of the terrible circumstances in the Ming dynasty: oh, the competition and malice, striving for status, household rivalries, political alliances to protect self against others, wealth vs. abject poverty, and more. I wouldn't have enjoyed reading the detailed descriptions of the beauty of clothing, faces, and gardens half as much as I learn by listening to it. The tale makes me grateful to be a follower of Jesus - in this era.

Just before 10:00, I head for breakfast and connection. The furnishings in the restaurant are simple and elegant.

Someone has carefully considered the decor. We're told 80% of building materials are from the island. I like the little rock/water/sapling centerpieces that dot the dining tables.

W and I walk the length of the beach in one direction about noon. Natural beauty is everywhere.

The tide has come in so there's a narrow strip of beautiful white sand to walk under an overcast sky.

The restless sea hisses relentlessly against the beach. It's a soothing sound.

Seaweed and tree trunks have been swept onto land.

So has plastic and human discards.

The boat wrecks are full of plastic bottles and refuse.

This close to the hotel, I'm surprised they haven't been picked up and recycled.

You'd expect a sustainable endeavor to have connections with a recycling plant (or build a small one of their own?) At the least, why not hire someone to pick up the bottles - glass and plastic? 

That would provide local wages and a more pleasant shoreline.

The water is tinted brown from iron in the rocks. Further out, the beautiful blue sea awaits. The chug-chug of diesel tour boats drifts across the surface of the ocean.

W requests room service at the front desk because our wet towels are still in the room at 4:30 when we head to supper. At the tables, the company is good. The food is ... indifferent, if not unappetizing.

We come back to a clean room with a small piece of cake and an unopened box of tissues on the end table. Hmmm.

My PJs have been taken from under the pillow and set on the bench at the foot of the bed.

Wednesday

We sleep well. After breakfast and conversations, we head for the beach again, turning left instead of right.

Similarly to our walk the other way yesterday, the brown (iron-infused) creeks run into the sea. We step through the flow to continue our stroll.

A fisherman has lost his net and float. It tangles around driftwood and we carefully step around it.

A few boats are parked on the shore, pulled up beyond the reach of the tides.

A little motorboat bobs in the waves.

Someone has built a cement and stone barrier around the roots of this coastal tree. Trees are considered homes to spirits in local traditions.

A cuttlebone sits between recyclables: I have one of these in each of our bird cages. Fun to see them on the beach.

Some children splash in the pools, watched by their parents.

There are few other guests here during the week, which must be very hard on the hotel. It's restful and quiet for the conference attendees.

Read more:

*Who can say, “I have made my heart clean; I am pure from my sin?” Proverbs 20:9

*Your love, Lord, reaches to the heavens, your faithfulness to the skies. Your righteousness is like the highest mountains, your justice like the great deep. You, Lord, preserve both people and animals.

How priceless is your unfailing love, O God! People take refuge in the shadow of your wings. They feast on the abundance of your house; you give them drink from your river of delights. For with you is the fountain of life; in your light we see light. Continue your love to those who know you, your righteousness to the upright in heart. Psalm 36:5-10

*When Jesus perceived their questionings, he answered them, “Why do you raise such questions in your hearts?” Luke 5:22

Moravian Prayer: Lord, examine our hearts and see our faults. We have erred and strayed, but you, O Lord, are our shepherd. Guide us into the paths of righteousness. Forgive us when we have made excuses or questioned you. With pure hearts, help us to pursue your ways and do your will. Amen.