Christmas in February

  Yogyakarta, Indonesia
Monday, February 18, 2008

The Indonesian postal service is nothing if erratic, with letters and parcels posted in the UK taking anything from 8 days to 4 months to get here.

Having been on the

Christmas post!

island of Flores on 25 December, and with Christmas post continuing to arrive throughout January, I somehow found the will-power to save cards and parcels until it seemed that the majority had arrived.

On the 4th day of February, a Monday, I took the day off (kind of) and started it with a lie-in, followed by a fried egg on toast and some sauté potatoes - my idea of a nice breakfast here - which I ate in my front room. Then I slowly opened cards,

Delicious! A taste of England...

savouring various notes and letters that people had kindly included, which took the best part of an hour and a half.

I had just finished opening the presents, which to my happiness included lots of books and some DVDs, when the postman turned up with three more parcels! What good timing!

Thirty minutes later, I noticed a lady and a very young boy standing outside the door. Visitors? I wasn't sure, so I went out and said hello.

Sparkling mince pie

I hadn't seen them in the neighbourhood before, and I had no idea who they were, or what they wanted  ... perhaps they were visiting friends in the area and had come to have a look at me - Berbah's very own visitors' attraction. We'll never know, for after a few minutes of light conversation they had to be off, and I came inside to make some lunch.

Lunch was followed by a Waitrose mince pie (complete with a rich mincemeat filing containing cranberries, glacé cherries, nuts and brandy - luxury!) from a box that I had received from a friend a few days beforehand.

To finish the afternoon off I went for a little walk around the village, and bought a couple of lightbulbs. Unfortunately there were a couple of work-related emails I needed to send, so I didn't escape work entirely, but they only took a couple of hours, and I had a nice evening with a cup of coffee and a chocolate bar, watching one of the new DVDs!

Happy Christmas!