"If you reject the food, ignore the customs,
fear the religion and avoid the people,
you might better stay at home."

Thursday, September 16, 2010

Language Lessons

Bahasa Indonesian.....oh how I thought it would be so easy.  First off, learning a new language has sparked the little ounce of Spanish still left in my brain from my six years of language in high school and college.  All of a sudden I can speak fluent Spanish (never could before) and I stink at learning and pronouncing the new vocabulary.

The nice thing is that Brian's company pays for our language lessons so we have a private tutor who comes to our apartment two times per week, 90 minutes per session.  It's nice getting the one-on-one time with the tutor.  That is when the tutor doesn't come on a Monday when the Redskins are playing Cowboys and I could be watching the game live.

So far so good though.  We are learning words to use when riding in a taxi....pagi (morning), berhenti (stop), Pak (mister), and Makasi (Thanks)....four words I use about 10 times per day.  Next lesson I need to learn words/phrases for shopping...how much?, do you have this in black?, and charge it. 

This morning Brian gave our pembantu (housekeeper) a high lima (high five) which she thought was really funny.  I'm sure there is an actual word in Bahasa Indonesia for high-five...but it seemed to work ok.