To Arkansas and back (part II).

Tuesday:
Second day was actually the busiest and most tiresome of the workshop, but seriously, there isn't much to talk about it. Nor anything interesting happened at that day. What happened was first the chief of the workshop selected four Aceh communities that needed rebuilding based on the essays submitted by students. Before we got here, each of us was asked to write a short essay describing our community back home, what's the condition of the populace, the infrastructure, etc. So the chief selected four students and asked them to give a brief presentation about their communities. After that, we were assigned into groups based on our disciplines and discuss how we can contribute to the rebuilding process. After more and more discussions, then we picked a representative from our group to give a presentation of what we've come up with so far. Then the chief gave some suggestions, and we had more discussions, and then we had dinner, and then we took photos, and there was dancing and singing, and there was another meeting again, and then we went to sleep (all these happened between 8.00 AM - 8.30 PM).

Whew, glad I've written that down.

Oh btw, I watched Contact on TV and went to sleep at 1.30 and woke up the next morning sleepy. Again.

Wednesday:
The next morning we wrapped up our presentations after breakfast, and then about 11.00 AM we went back to our rooms to pack our bags and checked out. We went to Little Rock (which I was told to be Arkansas' capital), had a chicken steak and fried rice lunch at a place called "Lily's Dim Sum and Then Some" (gotta love American puns). We all went to William J. Clinton's Presidential Library (yes, that Bill Clinton) to take a short tour. Well, the place was called "library" but it really is some sort of gallery and/or exhibit center filled with memorabilia and historical stuffs from America's preceding president. It kind of fascinates me how Americans erected this place in honor of their president. I wonder how long till we get to see something like this in Indonesia. There was a duplicate of the Oval Room, a meeting room where the president and his aides had a, well, a meeting! There were also shelves stuffed with real government records, a black armored presidential limousine ("Ever since JFK's murder we never used convertibles anymore," the tour guide explained), rows and rows of exhibits like saxophones Clinton used to play, and gifts and souvenirs from other countries. We also had a short screening of Clinton's life from his birth to his becoming a president. Oh, one other thing I forgot to mention was that the building was built based on "Green Design". What it means is that basically the building was built using recycled materials (some of the floors was made using rubber from used tires) so it's more "economically friendly", so to speak. My sister-in-law can probably explain this better than I do, lol.

After that we had another short tour to a Heifer building nearby, a center of a project dedicated to "getting rid of world's hunger". Wow. The tour guides explained that the project had also contributed some to the rebuilding of Aceh and Nias. We walked around the building for a short time before we (finally!) went shopping for souvenirs in a gift store not so far away. Most of the gifts there had Clinton on it (well, duh. The place was called "Clinton Museum Store"), but much to my chagrin, the stuffs there was pretty expensive. So I just bought two Arkansas fridge magnets for souvenirs. and then went to the hotel where we're staying for the night. The hotel was nice, but the food's mediocre, so I don't remember the name of the hotel (ungrateful bastard). Shortly after, we got on the bus again for a dinner invitation at the house of one Dr. Alan Suggs, the President of the University of Arkansas. His house itself isn't very big, but it lies in the middle of a huge piece of land in the city. He and his wife were perfectly nice and sweer. We ate there, did a few presentations like singing and dancing (Aceh traditional songs and Saman dance). Then finally (whew!) retired to the hotel to rest for our return trip the next day.

To Arkansas and back (part 1).

Like some of you have probably known, the Tsunami Relief Program was intended for students from a certain region of those countries that got hit by the Big T. So, it is only natural that most (if not all) of the Indonesian students that got this scholarship program was from Aceh. It's been nearly a week (doggone it, a week? How fast time travels never cease to amaze me) since I went to Arkansas for the Fulbright Tsunami Relief Retreat/Workshop. Since I have nothing better to talk about (unless you want to hear my whining, which I doubt), I'm going to write down the whole experience here.

Monday:
I woke up at 5.30 AM, grab my stuffs and went to a friend's house nearby who would take us to the meeting point with the staffs from Texas A&M Univ. Why so early, you say? Well, I was asked to show up at my friend's house before 6.10 AM, that's why. It was not surprising though, that I was the first one to show up. None were there yet, including the guy who asked me to come before 6.10 AM (he showed up half and hour later). So we got to the meeting point at 7 AM. There were eight of us Fulbrighters plus four staffs. We divided up into two vans and departed shortly after. The journey was smooth and uneventful, but the companionship was pleasant. The two TAMU staffs in our van was very friendly and we chatted alot. It was a good opportunity to practice my speaking. We had a stop over a few times, and stopped by a Mexican restaurant called 'Two Senoritas' some time at 2 PM. I didn't enjoy Mexican foods too much, having tried nearly every single menus on Taco Bell and finding none to my liking, so I got a good old-fashioned American chicken steak instead. We continued on our journey and got to the location of the retreat around 6 PM: the Winthrop Rockefeller Center. The place was pretty much in a middle of nowhere not-so-high up in a mountain. Some of the participants were already there and I got to meet some. Not surprisingly, most of them spoke to each other in Aceh language (which I don't understand), so it took me a bit getting used to. To my delight, each of us was assigned our own room, and I got the first room on the list.

Ahh, the room. I suppose I could expect nothing less from one of the richest family in America (FYI, Winthrop Rockefeller was Governor of Arkansas once). Well, it's true we're not talking about "OHMYGODTHISROOM WAS TEH LUXURIOUS@#$T", but I love my room. It's more of a "This is really comfy. I got everything I want here." Satellite TV, big bathroom, and fluffy, fluffy bed and pillows (these are of the utmost importance!!).

Anyway, I washed up and met everyone for dinner. The food was fine, but the real show for me was the chocolate cake (I just love talking about foods don't I). When one of the waitresses came by to pick up my plate, I told her that since the cake was so good I'm gonna grab a few slice to my room to eat tonight. She laughed and asked if I would want a box for that. What an angel.

After dinner we gathered in the meeting hall. There were around 35 of us participants, and the chief of the workshop asked us to introduce ourselves before he talked about it. To my surprise, all of the participants was from Aceh. I thought there should be some from outside of the region. And so it turned out that I was the only non-Aceh and non-Acehnese participant in the retreat. However, I was relieved that the atmosphere of the workshop was not stiff (as in 'too formal' stiff). It was pretty casual. Everyone was very friendly and prone to laughter, we had a good time on our first night. And that's a very important thing. A good beginning does good to your spirit when you're doing something.

We retired to our rooms some time after 10 PM. I turned on the TV, grabbed my cake, and watched a crappy show about that whore Paris Hilton; Sex and the City; South Park; X-Files; and Law and Order. By the time I realized, it was 1 AM already. "Shit," I grumbled to myself, "I'd probably got sleepy tomorrow." And it turned out I was right.