Monday, January 18, 2010

A little place called the U.S of A...

America has always been one of the few countries that I NEVER thought I would EVER live in. Why? It just never appealed to me...but i guess God had really different plans for my family and I and so here we are. Mainly we left Jakarta so Armid could pursue his Masters in Public Health at Johns Hopkins University, here in Balitmore. It's a ten month full-time intensive course and so far he's thoroughly enjoying it. He's meeting so many people from all walks of life and i think its rather a refreshing change for him from the 8 to 5 job he had with International SOS. So he's only got 1.5 months to go and before you know it, we'll have to make decisions on where to go next depending on job offers.

So for the last 9 months Baltimore has been our home. We arrived in the summer time which was a good idea on our part because if we had arrived in winter, we'd have been absolutely miserable. We live in an apartment block really close to the Inner Harbor which is so beautiful in the summer time. Unfortunately our view has been of the Mercy Hospital construction but the windows are super sounds proof that we hardly hear anything :)

view from our eighth floor apartment ;)


downtown Baltimore, a great walk in summer


Keon and cousin Zhian running through the water fountain at the Harbor

One of the many amazing ships around the harbor

The Beautiful Baltimore Inner Harbor





Tuesday, January 12, 2010

Catching up....

A little over six months ago, my family and I left Jakarta, Indonesia to begin a new adventure in Baltimore, U.S of A! It was sad to leave a city that we had called home for two years. We had a fabulous group of friends, Keon had a wonderful bunch of mates, we had a beautiful home, great places to go on holiday and truly an experience of a lifetime. But all good things must come to an end and so we packed up our house, said our good-byes and shipped all our belongings to Baltimore.
Below are a few pictures of our time in Indonesia....

Keon and Armid chilling poolside in Bali
sunset in Uluwatu, Bali
I loved Indonesia...love Love LOVED the country, its people and some of the food (i was never as adventurous as Armid in that department). We lived in an overcrowded, polluted city known as Jakarta which had so much to offer in terms of entertainment, shopping, restaurants, salons and spa's, playgrounds for the kids. One thing that was definitely missing though was open green space, like a park. Jakarta had none of that kind of thing and so we either had to travel out of town to get a taste of nature again or go back home and soak it all in. The official language is Bahasa Indonesia and what I loved about it is that, among others, it has dutch influence. In South Africa, one of the 11 official languages is Afrikaans which also has dutch influence and so we were able to understand a couple of words or phrases because they are so similar. Some examples include pisang (banana), gordyn (curtain), handuk (towel), kamar (room) and tas (bag).

There is so much to be said about Indonesia, its rich history and its people and I'll probably bring somethings up in future blogs! I do however, miss my friends in Jakarta SO MUCH! I think of them often, especially as we've all either got kids the same age, were pregnant at the same time or just had such a damn good time with them every time we hung out! I hope we can all get together soon and have a mini reunion :)


Some of our closest friends. Top are Adele and Emily. Below are Marc, Sean, Joe and Willem
A few of our wonderful Indonesian
friends!


Till the next time...

The beginning...

I've finally decided to start a blog for a couple of reasons. Firstly I want to be able to look back at this in a couple of years and remember things my family and I have done and experienced :) Secondly, to keep family and friends up to date with what we're up to. With two kids and a household to run, it often takes me weeks to reply to emails..but this way, if you're really interested in what we're up to, you can check the site out! Thirdly, its an outlet for me to express myself..we all need something or somewhere to express one's ideas, feelings or just to have a rant... this will probably be one of many outlets for me;)

Now the hard part starts... where do i begin. As a young girl, for one of my birthdays,my older sister bought me a diary and I used to write in it almost everyday. I have found that i express myself much better through written word than actually expressing myself verbally (something my husband works really hard on changing..lol).I guess this is another reason why having a blog will be great fun for me.

I am a wife, mom and friend.I have two beautiful boys, Keon Orion, born 4th October 2006 and Shayan Milan born 28 October 2009. I’ve been a stay at home mom for 3yrs now and although it’s challenging at times, I try to treasure as many moments possible because I know I won’t get these years back ever! Before I know it, I’ll have two grown boys living their own lives!!! So what will this blog be about.. well nothing in particular, just a mixture of great adventures,trials and tribulations, and beautiful moments I never want to forget.


Now that I have that little intro out the way, let me welcome you to my blog and hope you enjoy reading it!!

Till the next time...