August 17th is Indonesia's Independence Day. At exactly 10:00am on August 17, 1945 Indonesia proclaimed their independence, but did not legally become indepedent from the Netherlands until December 27, 1949.
Over the past couple weeks the streets of our neighborhood have been decorated with flags of various colors including red and white in celebration of Independence Day. The Kampung's (neighborhoods where the nationals live) do a bunch of activities including climbing up a greased bamboo pole to get presents:) Today, Charity and I went to Starbucks to talk teacher stuff and on our way to getting an Angkot to take home the road that is usually bustling with traffic and people was nearly empty and there were no cars. Except near the mosque, there were a bunch of people sitting and standing listening to what sounded like a sermon. It was really interesting. Later, Jennie, Lindsey and I went to visit our Jaga, Pak Ade and his family. In their Kampung, all the children dressed up in various costumes. His daughter, Pani, got to wear a very fancy gold outfit and rode her elaborately decorated bicycle. It was so cool to get to see where he lives and interact with all the kids. We took a lot of pictures and they really enjoyed that. We didn't get to see a whole lot of the activities, but the national staff from BAIS is having a carnival at the school tomorrow, there I will get to experience all the games and stuff they do. Very exciting!
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