Indonesian manners, etc

So a lot has happened since the last time I wrote, but I'll try to make this a bit more than just a laundry list. First I got a moped (95% of the vehicles on the road are mopeds or motorcycles); it's $27/week to rent (which is a good deal even for here). I got such a good deal by renting from Andy's friend's father. To do any sort of business here (and especially to get a good deal), one has to pay in time instead of money. So, we went to this guy's house, spent about 3 minutes working out the details of the transaction, and then had coffee, cigarettes, more coffee and cigarettes and chatted for about 2.5 hours. The guy is interesting; he taught himself 5 languages having never graduated high school (though not English) and gets up every morning at 5am to do Tai Chi. He looks remarkably good for a 70-year-old. But, particularly as the conersation was in Indonesian, it did get old after awhile. But yes, time well spent (and Andy had already talked to them earlier about it so the groundwork was laid...it would have been longer otherwise). This brings up a kind of general point about here and just about everywhere tropical---you can't expect privacy or time alone. I guess because you pretty much need community to survive, everyone fosters relationships with very long and frequent contact. Another example: after agreeing on a couple guys to come help me get dog samples at the house of the head vet in this area, I had gone and done some more errands. I got home tired and ready to lay down and read. All the sudden, there's a knocking. The guys had come over just to chat. Of course they didn't speak English and I hardly speak any Indonesian so it was mostly pleasantries and was over relatively quickly, but yeah...never get comfortable! It's nice in some ways to have such community, but it is a double-edged sword.

My first trip from Ketapang was to Sukadana, about 100km north along the main road, a couple days ago. Andy and I went to visit his friends Kinari and Cam. We had a good time; it rained very hard (and some lightning) while we were swimming in the ocean which actually was really, really nice. They also had a wide selection of imported booze, of which I could only have a little as I was driving home. I got to try rainforest honey too, which was good. Kinari is a doctor who works in the area; she gave me helpful sampling pointers and told me all the places just lousy with malaria. So now I get to go on a tour of the malarious tropics. Not much malaria (or mosquitoes) here in Ketapang, but now I know where to find it. One island I will be going to apparently gets everyone sick. Yay. At least I have a good antimalrial. The things we do for science. On the way there, btw, I got hit by a truck...only my mirror was hit though, so no real harm. A $1.60 repair and the bike's as good as new.

I injured myself at futsal on Friday, bending my knee a little the wrong way. Hurt horribly at first but now it is almost all better. Just in time for me to catch a little bug. Nothing too bad though.

On Thursday I'll be heading out to the real field for 3 days to do some sampling. No contact then and primitive conditions---staying with the local head man, sleeping on a straw mat on the floor, etc. Should be fun to really get out there. I'm also looking forward to really getting started with some research. Got to get my things in order for that and also trying to sample some dogs this afternoon and tomorrow morning. Whee.

PS - Submitted a paper to American Naturalist last week and have a news article on Cori and I's honeymoon in Science this week. W00t.