Day Tripper

On a recent school holiday, several teachers took me on a day-trip into the mountains east of Amurang. They told me excitedly that they were taking me to a coffee plantation, which I'd been begging to see, but having been in Indonesia for six months, I was skeptical. Both the frustration and the fun of this country tend to come from its unpredictability. You're told you're going to a birthday party, and instead you end up singing worship songs and praying for an hour with a bunch of 60-year olds. You're told you'll be giving a 3-minute speech to the school's faculty about the Fulbright program, and instead you end up quietly playing Truth or Dare for hours in the back of the room while the principal drones on.

On this particular day we visited a cemetery, a sister-in-law's house, a playground, a lake, a mall and a roadside pineapple stand, but no coffee plantation. To be fair: the teachers did pull the car over at one point and say, "Look, Polly, coffee trees!" It was a lovely day, and if nothing was what I expected, so much the better.

Entering the agricultural valley of Modoinding, or "The Promised Land," as this billboard boasts.

Mountains surrounding Modoinding.

One of my co-teachers' husband's grave, which we visited.

The road to the cemetery. It was lined with small palm branches in honor of a 16-year old girl whose funeral had been a few days before.

Flowers by the side of the road.

Everyone, even my 50+ year old co-teacher, enjoyed the playground equipment.

My co-teacher's sister-in-law gave us souvenirs: cabbages and cucumbers grown in her fields.

A lake outside Modoinding.

Ester and me.

The elusive coffee trees.