sapijantan: Building a New Home

Jet-setting between Indonesia and Vietnam – spending a fortune of air tickets to stay connected …

…at that time for the family only the best, and we booked SIA straight away

getting familiar with my new home … I found Sanur horribly boring in the beginning, possibly I was also lonely, nowadays I find it quite relaxed and laid-back

I kept myself sane with surfing…

… and now also standup-paddling

…

and I spent much time just resting at my apartment staring at the nice coconut-wood ceiling

I arrived on the 1^st of January 2013, and it took more than 2 hours from the airport to the small home-stay room in Sanur, into which all my bags hardly fitted. On the next morning I reached the office and was exhausted. My job was to organize an already existing department that was suffering from massive staff turnover, quality issues and “cultural” problems as well. The next few weeks and months would mean becoming more than before workaholic, to establish structures and procedures, play the psychologist, encourage and motivate people, get rid of those that have already lost their values and trust and that were poisoning the atmosphere, learn all aspects of a new destination, train the team, and manage my department into the right direction while at the same time still taking care for many aspects of the daily business that the existing team could not yet handle or we simply had no staff for. Bali meant for about 9 month only office to me. I was working to late at night. I was missing Vietnam, the city life. I was annoyed by the village of Sanur where you could not let a fart without people noticing. The town and the whole island appeared very provincial to me. But I had known before that the job, the place and the move would pose different challenges from what I had experienced before, and I came to accept them. After three months I was almost giving up, but I was strongly encouraged by our CEO, and after that, slowly, we moved into the right directions. It took a year to be stable. Two to be good. And now we are really running for excellence.

During a short stint to Saigon in January 2013, one of the last evenings that we should spend together before living temporarily in two countries; at the Snap Café in Thao Dien

The corner Le Loi / Nguyen Hue observed from the Highlands Café on top of the Tax Center, seeing Saigon’s streets made me sad, and I knew, me, the “bụi đời” would be missing them much

there we were sitting, at a place that was so often a venue for meetings with friends, one of the Highlands cafes

And we were walking through the streets, having sold the motorbike already, and not comfortable on my wife’s, as if it was for me to soak-in the atmosphere on my last days in the country…

…and it was just right at this spot of Le Loi Street that I looked at Hang and was pretty sure she is pregnant

Chris’ wedding in the Saigon Zoo

Privately, the challenge for the first year was to build a new home. I was looking for a house, and on weekends went around Sanur and Denpasar to look for a suitable and well-priced place to stay once my family would move. In terms of family and relationship it was all not too clear when I had left Saigon, and the plan was actually to visit each other and see what to do. We were thinking of getting married, not because we believe marriage is an institution both of us would fit with, but simply because we love each other and that is the way we can live our live together without restrictions. I had earlier discussed the matter with Chris at the sushi bar in Saigon, where we had sometimes met for dinners, drinks and good talks. He was at that time making the same move and I was afraid of such commitment. He told me a proverb, I do not exactly remember it, but it said as much as that the “butthole surfer” does only regret what he hasn’t tried and not what he has, or something like that. He said that if this is important to one, one sometimes just has to give it a try, and after all it is nothing that cannot be undone. And it was this Chris who had his wedding with his wife Ann only 10 days after I had moved to Bali. So I flew back for a long weekend, to attend what for me and my wife was a dream wedding we should never have, and which took place at the zoo and a bar in the highest tower of the city. While we haven’t been much in touch back in Bonn at university where we studied together, Chris has become a close friend in Saigon. I realized how nice he is, what a great attitude and open mind he has, and he is really one of the few people one could rely on. I think around that time, probably a bit earlier before I had left, we had a last coffee session in the park of the Reunification Palace. It was a "historic meeting", as I commented. Chris said that as long as one does not leave Asia, one is not out of the world. We haven’t met since, but are still in touch, and I know, should we meet, it will be as if we have never separated, and there will be the same great sense of humor.

Over Tet I was visited by the "clan" and we explored Denpasar and the South together; with durians …

… and coconut, the way it had to be for a Khmer-Vietnamese needing to feed two bellies at the same time

we went to see the Kecak Dance at Uluwatu temple

which was impressive in the first row

…especially for Boi

… but also for Hang and Be …

We went to the beach …

… in Kuta …

… and played in the water

Sunset and high tide

We went to a day out with Jeff and Shurhat which ended with a seafood BBQ in Jimbaran

We went for a skate event in Renon (of which we did not yet know at theat time it would become our home later; I was always attracted by the park)

We went to a motorbike festival in Sanur …

… or just for fisnh and chips or a coffee on the beach

farewell at the Sri Chinmoy Peace Airport shrine at Ngurah Rai Intl Terminal

On Chris wedding I realized that Hang was a bit puffy and didn’t fit well into the pink áo dài she had borrowed for the occasion. I was wondering whether she was pregnant, and she replied that she was wondering the same and would check. This turned out to be the case. And so the case was also clear for us. We started to prepare and collect all paperwork that would be required for us to be united and for her and the kids to move to Indonesia once the baby was born. We were missing each other every day, and until then we would visit each other. Hang and the kids came over during the Tet holiday February/March, and I showed the boys Bali for the first time. Of course they were impressed, and could imagine to move.

while my family was back in Vietnam I continued to prepare living the dream together

Enjoyed the surf spots in Bali – here Batu Bolong

Afternoon dreams at Batu Bolong surfbreak

Canggu sunsets

Bali Sundays SUP on the reef at Pantai Sindhu

Beach dog at Sanur

Ubud Bridge

Banjar Ubud Kelod in evening light

Hang's 30th birthday at Massimo Sanur

my favorite luxury town house in Sanur

Ubud soccer square

At Ubud Palace: please don’t walk on the grade … I’m sure nobody will do it

Grilled corn for Mahina at Sindhu Beach

hosts and guests on a lazy afternoon at Sindhu Beach

When they left and we took a last Tet holiday photo at a small shrine at Ngurah Rai airport, Hang and I were already making new plans to meet again in April. We weren’t even sad to say good bye to each other, because this time we saw that everything is taking shape. The belly was growing. We were advancing with the abundant paperwork for the marriage. I continued to live and build the dream that I ever had, and that was becoming true for me after many years of an exciting but not yet satisfactory life. I was still often not believing it, and scared that all may be fragile, but I was working hard to make it come true: have a family, be with the one I always wanted to be, stay on an island I always wanted to live at, have a good job, go surfing on the weekends. When Hang arrived later in April, her belly was already quite big. She spent the days in Sanur while I went to the office which was near the small apartment I had rented back then. Because she woke up earlier than me now, she got fried bananas for me on the morning market, that the priest nearby would laugh at when I carried them to office as my breakfast. We spent the weekends under the shade on the beach. Our next meeting would be in Vietnam. A short sting for our company anniversary, and then later the 21^st September was predicted for the birth of our daughter, and I had my tickets booked for around that time. I would be working again, and waiting. I had bought a standup-paddle-board and this should become my new hobby for the next years when surf wasn’t good or I didn’t feel like surfing.

Going for champagne

The Ice, Bangkok

GM Training 2013

Evening-sun effects at Danang airport departing from the party of the year

At Saigon Sushi Bar with the boys

downtown Saigon atmosphere – a picture reflecting the fast change

the boys at the Kid’z City

…and as always lots of eating for our “Bà bầu”…

…until there was the broken egg, fortunately I got it and not someone else; it caused the worst food poisoning I ever had

There was also a bit of travelling for me. In May I went to Bangkok for management training. In June I went to Hoi An for the anniversary that should become best party in years. On the way back I stopped to meet family and friends in Saigon, and needed to delay my departure due to a bad food poisoning form a raw egg in a Pho that I had in Phu My Hung. In September I did a short inspection trip to Central Java, from Semarang via the Dieng Plateau and Magelang to Jogjakarta. And shortly after that should come the phone call from Vietnam.