30 hours and 10,358 Miles To Go (Give or Take)
Last summer, I remember reading and loving Jen and Maddy’s blog about their experiences with the CPGC’s Indonesia Research Program. Here I am almost a year later, about to embark on my own journey to Indonesia with Alia Luz, Amanda Beardall, Elizabeth Reilly, Alex Jacobs, and Colin Lubelczyk.
Our flight leaves from JFK in about 5 hours. Right now, I am both excited and nervous. There are so many new experiences and challenges awaiting us: a new language and history to learn, a new culture to embrace, a new city to explore, and according to Maddy, lots of new juices to be tried.
Things I can’t wait to write about include:
- Indonesian history and politics
- Bahasa, the main language of Indonesia
- New foods
- New juices (are there any Maddy didn’t try last summer?!?!)
- New friends?!!?!?!?!
- Yogyakarta, the city where we will be staying for the next 10 weeks
- Experiencing Ramadan in a Muslim Nation
- Living in a country with a strong Muslim identity
- And so much more!
I promise to write a more detailed post soon about what our program is about and what we will actually be doing while in Yogyakarta. There is so much to talk about, but right now I have to get ready for our flight. 16 hours from JFK to Hong Kong, 4 hours from Hong Kong to Jakarta, and another hour from Jakarta to Yogyakarta. Add in layover time and that all comes out to about 30 hours of travel… Let’s do this.