Amy's Birthday and Karawang Countryside

I recently went to Karawang to surprise Amy for her birthday. On Friday Caca and her friend drove me to Bekasi which is another city maybe 30 minutes outside of Jakarta. From there I met up with Nathan and we went to Karawang which is maybe another hour away. We went to Andrew's house first to prepare for the surprise. We made a sign - out of batik letters. As presents we had ourselves (because it was a surprise) and red peppers and cupcakes and a cake as well.

    After we were readily prepared we took becak to a karoke place. Karoke is really popular in Indonesia - think of it as their national hobby. Becak is a bicycle with a seat area in the front for passengers. This was my first time riding one. In Jakarta I could not imagine them being very pleasant to ride in with all the traffic and heat and smog. In Karawang it works because there's less traffic. There's lots of rice fields (sawah) and little market/stores but not much else. One classmate said when she goes to Karawang she likes to play in the sawah and 'get back to nature'. I like that. I laughed so much. Apparently it's almost like a beach because in the water there's eels and crabs. I have to go back so I can really get back to nature and play in the rice fields.
    Nathan and I waited a bit as Andrew went to get Amy. Then we did the surprise bit of the surprise birthday party. Always a good part. But we weren't done after being escorted to our karaoke room Nathan brought out his computer so Amy could skype her family back home. We presented the vegetables, cupcakes, and then got to singing. We mixed it up - Indonesian and English songs.

The infamous Alamat Palsu song

After this we did a little host family visiting. I'd never been to Karawang so this was my first time seeing their houses. At home we ate the cake and watched a movie.

You might ask why it says Ankhet on there too. Well ... that is a long story

I plan on going back to Karawang so you can actually see pictures of how different the countryside is from Jakarta. It would've been a totally different year if I was being hosted there.