wishes

sorry i’ve been terrible about keeping in touch! Though i am not sorry i have spent so very little of the last month and a half staring at glowing pixels. In last-minute (and you know how literally i mean that) panic - inspired by a desire to be able to independently carry my bags over great distances if need be - i unpacked over 30 lbs of stuff. When it came down to the tent vs laptop showdown, my tiny temple of a tent triumphed. As it turns out i have never had to carry my bags more than 10 ft but this was certainly not the case one hot day languishing beneath bloated bulging bags over neverending cobblestone streets in spain. Anyways, my excuse for my failure to keep you all in the know is my relative lack of internet access but i do get a chance between and after teaching classes sometimes to use one of the computers at my school so do not let me get away with it any longer.

First a wish list:
Just in case some of you stop reading shortly but love me enough to send me a gift across the ocean, i would love to receive books and music. My ipod broke right before i came here so my music collection has been reduced to the random CD’s i was able to burn from fellow ETAs during orientation which are the following:

joanna newsom, old crow medicine show, johnny cash, MIA, sufjan stevens, andrew bird, juno soundtrack, fleet foxes, decemberists, beirut, weakerthans, some death cab for cutie, mt goats, bossa nova, bob marley, neco, broken social scene, nick drake, bjork, thom yorke, lcd soundsystem, and some varied hip-hop.

i am going to be here another 9 months so would love some more variety, you know what strikes my fancy. If you’re unsure, look at my facebook list but i am also down to hear newness.

Books i have: winter’s tale- helprin, the wind-up bird chronicle- murakami, still life w woodpecker- robbins, 100 selected poems – cummings, unbearable lightness of being- kundera, mysterious flame of queen loana- eco, timequake/god bless you mr. rosewater/breakfast of champions- vonnegut, a people’s history of united states- zinn, disgrace- coetzee, mountains beyond mountains- kidder, a portrait of the artist as a young man- joyce, botany of desire- pollan, the snow leopard- matthiessen, the yiddish policemen’s union- chabon, the prophet- gibran.

I finally have the free time to read ravenously so again, see facebook list to see what i’ve already read and what i like or just send me some works you loved. Also am craving some non-fiction, esp. about healthcare, women’s health, alternative medicine and healing, environmentalism, meditation, yoga for beginners, origami and the such.

Thanks! Here is the address:

SMA NU 1 Gresik
Jl. Raden Santri V No. 22
Gresik 61114, Jawa Timur, INDONESIA

and if you have skype or a phone card, i would love to hear your voice

+62.8122.037.2587

Also, come here! Islands of so much incredible lushness, wildness, fiery volcanoes, black white and everything in between beaches, jungles and rice fields, hot sun and giant rain, delicious and dirt-cheap eats, friendly faces, and so on... mmm surrounded by the ocean! So really you should just gulp, buy the plane ticket, and come over here already!

Note: also please forgive the many misspellings and complete lack of a grasp of grammar and some Lonely Planetified sections.