Sunday in Bandung ~

This morning at 8 am we checked out of our hotel on the southeast part of town and headed closer to the center of town on Jalan Cihampales to the Fave Hotel.  It is more active around here and we enjoy doing a little wandering around during the day - so it was a good choice!

This guy knocked on our taxi window - completely sprayed in silver!  He was collecting donations for his efforts!
Oh I thought...how bad for his skin - all the paint...completely sprayed in silver paint...!!!!!  Gosh when he first bent down to the window - I said yikes Nick - ! Look at him...then realized we were not in San Francisco but in Bandung waiting for the red light to change! ha!

We dropped off our suitcases first at the Fave Hotel

- they locked them up in the locker room till we were able to check in after 12 noon.  We we were planning to go to church anyway - so that worked out fine!

 Oh it was so good to be in church this morning!  Nick & I meant a whole lot of nice people from many places - and even 3 people there for the first time from - would you believe it....San Jose,  California! We were introduced to Bert who is a Dutchies - and lives in Bandung these past 2 yrs!  He too was born in Indonesia many years ago!  We enjoyed a class afterwards and took a picture with new friends!

We hope to have made some new contacts here in town, and we also hope Lord willing to be back again next week- we shall see how things work out! 

Oh by the way - it was pretty neat - we meant a gal named Diane and she had been there 29 yrs ago and knew the Pastor, Nick had attended church at when he was here in town and she also was in the same church he attended - and most likely even knew the couple with the 2 children who had received "the Letter" and was planning to mail it out on the day Nick attended there!  Amazing!!!!!!  So special these special "appointments" !!!!!

 Well down the street we walked after our special morning and flagged down a mini bus...to take us back to our hotel...fortunately it went straight to our hotel and stopped at the front door...WOW...not switching buses!
                           (oh yes we did get serenaded again!) ...at the signal light that is! ha!

 We checked into our room and it was so cute...and welcoming!
          Yes red tulips for the Dutchies ....of course! Cute huh?

 I just had to take a picture for you all!  Aren't you excited about that??????

 Took a stroll down this street and saw a sign - and of course I recognized my own town of Birth in Holland written the Dutch way....Den Haag   The Hague! It also says klapper taart which is Coconut pound cake!

Well gosh - another picture again of course!!!! Yes we controlled ourselves - no cake - just a picture!

We walked over to the open mall area to go have a cup of coffee - they made us a delicious cup of java coffee...of course...I am in Java!  And while we are sitting there enjoying watching the people - and families enjoying their Sunday afternoon shopping and wandering around - we were visited by some
                       "very tall people"!

 Looking again - I thought...Nick - I gotta go over there and take a picture for Lisa Pinkerton...yes Tom & Marilyn daughter also can walk on stilts!!!!!
So Lisa - this is for YOU from Bandung Java Indonesia to Cupertino, California with love~ 

 The Indonesian's have wooden puppets that tell stories - Wyang puppets (click on this Link)  Wayang Puppet Theatre     and these guys looked like these puppets!

They turned around and gave me a fancy bow....here's a bow....just for you! From one stilt walker to another!  How fun huh?      I can still see you walking down Bond Street on the 4th of July in downtown Bend...looking like our American Uncle Sam (female one!)

 It gets dark here between 5:30 - 6:00 pm and so the lights in the open mall came on and it was a very cozy and a pretty surrounding - hey we are enjoying our new location!  Cute all those palm trees, canopy fern trees -

Because it was weekend there were little tents set up to promote some special items for sale.  There was also a band stand and a group was playing and singing and lots of youth hanging out.

The people love music and have it on really loud and it was loud at this open area too.

Doesn't matter where we live in the world...people love to gather and shop and meet friends and - have a special time on weekends!

Families strolling - kiddies running around - people having a bite to eat.

And we see so many familiar name brands - KFC, Dairy Queen, Pizza Hut, McDonald's, Starbucks, and they are well visited and patronized...oh so much!   

Our Hotel - had this sign out by the elevator!...Greja (church) so the Bethel Church meets here in the conference room upstairs...great to see!

It was a good day - church - a little shopping - this particular area has clothing outlets and one of the Factory Outlets had the Ross brand tags still attached ...how familiar is that?  - bought a pair of casual pants below the knee and a t-shirt and Nick picked out a t-shirt and some nice Polo aftershave!  Good outlet prices!

We decided to eat dinner at the hotel and meant some Dutchies who sat across from us...they have been here 24 days already and heading back to Holland tomorrow.  They had actually tagged along on this trip with their son who is married to a gal from Jakarta.  The family came to visit her relatives both in Jakarta and also Bukittinggi Sumatra - same places we had also visited. Fun to hear the stories and this couple enjoyed visiting here in Indonesia already for the 2nd time!  So many Dutchies come here - but of course there is a 300+ history from the Dutch colonial days!

Yep - time to relax....hugs to all!