Chelsea

Chelsea has recovered well from her stint with Dengue fever. Here she is at an exhibit on diseases in the Singapore Science Centre.
Chelsea is now on first name basis with all the nurses at SOS clinic!
The night before we left for Singapore, she slipped and fell on the wet floor tiles in the garage and I was almost certain she had broken her arm...again.

Luckily I was wrong, it was just a bad sprain.

GJ was stuck in horrific traffic after an afternoon of torrential rain and accompanying floods, so we were car-less. My wonderful neighbour came to the rescue and took us to the emergency room where we got these 'cool' x-rays of Chelsea's arm.


This is when you realise one of the realities of expat life, in emergencies you get yourself to help.
No ambulance, no blood bank etc; these are the things you take for granted in Australia, yet for millions of people in the world they are services that are not available.

Week 11 of the first trimester.

I have just passed the fifth week of an unidentified tropical bug that mimics the 24/7 morning sickness and exhaustion symptoms of early pregnancy. So by using this reckoning, I am up to week 11 of a phantom pregnancy and within a week I should leave the sickness behind and enter the lovely stage…..or I could start to waddle like a duck and have weird food cravings.

I would like to reiterate the words mimic, phantom, unidentified, there is no fourth child on the way lol.

Repeat, there is no need for congratulations!

Hopefully blogging will recommence soon, this site is feeling neglected!
I have been keeping up with Facebook though, I get it now. I never understood its appeal until recently.

Janny got lost....

I had a huge stress attack last week when TanTan (sister) rang and emailed me to let me know that Janny (my mum with Alzheimer) was missing.

It is all ok...but we both had an hour or two of sheer panic.

Janny left a message at Tan's office that she had had her handbag stolen........We did not know where she was, if she had money, a phone, or ?????????.
We figured out that she had got somewhere safe as she had found Tans work phone number (she can not remember phone numbers).

Janny moved into the retirement village last weekend, and the phone has still not been connected.

It turned out that she had dropped in at the her old home and left her handbag on the lounge and then just left......so she had her keys and went home to the village and asked them to call Tan.

We had the village staff looking for her, Tan in a mad panic to get home from the city and me.....sitting in Jakarta unable to do anything.

Tan found the handbag and has returned it. We have also taken some of the credit cards out of her purse...we are uncovering huge amounts of credit card debt.........Nothing we can't handle, but just another sign that the Alzheimer is getting progressively worse.

Since this happened, a few other mini crisis's have occurred.

I am so thankful for communication technology....
Tan and I can use our mobile phones to talk (landlines don't seem to work at my house.....)
I can also emphasize with Tan for hours on Skype FOR FREE!!!

Time stopped.....

Ben had a little accident last night which took at least 15 years off my life.
He was monkeying around (as 4.5 yr old boys do ALL THE TIME) and pulled this sideboard table over on top of him self.

I watched the table top land on his neck...just like a guillotine...life stopped for moments.

The edge bounced of his chin and ended on his chest and the draw came out in advance and knocked him. He slammed the back of his head on the tiled floor. He was writhing in pain and was breathless, the screaming took about 45 seconds to start, little bits of blood followed.

All is ok now but I was so traumatized, he was too and so upset so I put him in my bed. I wanted to be able to check on him during the night and hold him close.

This is where the difference between dads and moms comes in......

Mums comfort, check for injuries and fix all with masses of kisses. Afterwards they realise the enormity of what could of happened.

Dads tell them that it's nothing, bruises aren't there and that it is not really blood...then they (the male parent) have a very loud attention seeking tantrum when they don't want to share a super-king sized bed with a quietly sobbing, possibly concussed little boy.

Isn't it lucky we have a guest room for cranky old men.

Still in Sydney

Poor Ben is missing Jakarta!

All he wants to do is go home.

All the kids are being good whilst dragged from one retirement village to another.
They have also discovered the complete DVD set of "Gilligan's Island", they are rapt in the show.

We are having a hugely stressful time dealing with Alzheimers, but are at last moving forward.

Sickness in Jakarta

Just to break up the monotony of our fun adventures in Indonesia...

I have more sickness to report.

Both the girls came down with Cytomegalovirus last week.
This week Ben has Glandular fever
Quite a few kids are off school at the moment with one or the other.....We are at week 7.5 of a 10 week school term...School holidays are needed!

I think GJ has both!

I had both in my early twenties so should be fine. The girls are back at school and are on the mend. Georgia needed antibiotics for a very infected throat, but Chelsea has not needed any.

Ben is still contagious so is at home being my little shadow........
I think that this is what explains the temper tantrums from a few days ago!


I think that this photo is so precious, It was late at night and we were still at the clinic and the local dr wanted a second opinion with the Expat dr, so Georgia was taken back to the ER to lie down and wait. She is such a little princess like me..........so dramatic but soo cute. My sister saw this photo and wanted to jump on the first plane to comfort her.....
This is the exact opposite from Chelsea LOL, If she needs a blood test she just sticks out her arm and watches......Ben falls half way between the two extremes. This time his vein collapsed so he needed two goes and was quite ok with it all.

It is not until you move to a third world country that you realise how much you take for granted at home.
Australia's drinkable tap water, clean air, sanitary conditions, non polluted environment and access to safe foods makes it very easy to stay healthy.
Here it is a whole new ball game.


I have worked out how to take photos with my hand phone AND to download them......It makes it easy to take discrete photos.....

I am trying to sneak one this week to show the raw chicken handling procedures at the local expat supermarket....oh my you will be shocked!

Lack of posting

My sister and I have had a change in status...we have stopped being the children and have become the parent.

We are dealing with Alzheimer's, and unfortunately we are dealing with Alzheimer's in the denial stage. We have the support of a variety of health professionals.

Two of my mothers friends are also in denial which is making our role reversal a little more difficult.

I rang my moms best friend who I grew up with and made her cry.
This wonderful lady, who I still have to stop my self from calling "Aunty" S, is a housebound paraplegic.
As my mothers illness progresses it will mean the end of contact with her very best friend.

This is where being a expat is tough.

Since the tough years (#25), my family has shrunk to three...Mom, Tan and my self.
My sister is in Australia shouldering most of the responsibility of care.

I will be back in Australia soon and hope fully can sort out some arrangements to make it easier for all of us.

It makes it hard to enjoy and write all about the wonderful things in our daily life when I have all this in the background.

Cough and start of term one at school.

I have just finished my second week back at school, it feels like we did NOT have a 6 week holiday at all LOL.

During the first week back, two kids came in with a cough…well it has spread like wildfire through teachers and kids……and guess what….of course I got it.

Ms K, one of the other friendly teachers who has also come down with the cough/flu and I are going off to find a detox centre, we have seen 2 in Kemang. Since the typhoid (K was one of the 1st ones to get it at school) time we have both caught every thing that has gone around. If any one even talks about a sickness we both seem to get it!

We think our immune systems are compromised and are going to fix them.

K has heard of an American plan that lasts for 10 days and apparently has excellent results. It will be 10 days of herbs, limited (imported) fruit and vegetables, brown rice and water and not a skerack of any thing else. There would also be massages and something I have no wish to even think of let alone contemplate.

They could be a variety of outcomes:-

• I keel over and die from all the toxins leaving my body

• I make it to day 2.5 and break the fast with a glass of wine and some strong pain killers

• GJ and the kids have me committed for being a raging lunatic while suffering the release of all toxins

• I survive 10 days on the plan and emerge glowing with health and vitality and in a dramatically slimmer body……

I think I have listed the options in the right order.

Blogging will resume today

I have been told by numerous sources that blogging HAS to recommence ASAP!

Today I will.

Do not expect greatness as the dreaded Typhoid has returned.
Silver lining......I have now lost 7kg (15.4 lb). Hope it stays lost.

I also need quiet a few hours to sort through the nearly 2000 photos I took in December!
Expect photos...many, MANY photos

Family sun protection policy

We have a strict family policy on sun exposure......it is basically

no unprotected skin in the sun EVER

We all wear hats (I am very disappointed that my kids and about 2 others are the only kids that wear hats at school play times) and we all apply sunscreen every day after cleaning teeth. The kids even know to apply sunscreen on their ears and necks.
We also live in the tropics, the sun is strong 365 days a year. There is so much light around us we don't have to worry about lack of vitamin D either.
We have all fair skin....Chelsea and GJ are the fairest. Chelsea is an almost blueish white. We don't tan, we just go lobster red then peel. GJ and I have already started the "cut out the skin cancers from your youth" routine......I don't want the kids to have to go through this.
So this makes me so mad......
Georgia went on an end of year school excursion to a water park. With sunscreen on and in her bag.........but no reminders to reapply+ she "forgot".....Her face is red raw, she is in pain and will probably blister and peel.
I hope she learns why we are so insistent on sunblock and that this never happens again.


more health updates........

Georgia went back to school on Monday. She has been complaining of intermittent pains on her RHS as well as depositing her dinner over GJ and I and the floors and walls the other night........so back to the doctors.
We decided to go back to the tried and tested SOS clinic instead of the new convenient Global doctors clinic. At least this time the nurse was able to get the blood sample from Georgia with out incident. The last attempt needed two stabs and the nurse sucking the blood out by pulling on the syringe over about 18 minutes.
We are both on the mend, Georgia has no active Typhiod left and is fine. I'm improving except I now have a kidney and toe infection as well......
The upside, I have lost 4kgs (8.8lb)!
So we are both improving well.

Funny bit
Georgia has grown up with a camera in her face, she smiles and poses like a professional. Yet this morning when I was trying to get a shot of her face it took 16 shots to get one with her eyes open! We were all laughing so hard!

This Cinderella didn't make it to the Scottish ball

I had the dress, I had a ticket, I really wanted to go BUT I did not have the stamina to go to the Scottish ball. This was to be my first ever ball I could walk into (My first ever ball I went in a wheel chair).


This is GJ and his blind date........an empty ball gown LOLI spent the afternoon ringing around trying to find GJ a date (it seemed a shame to waste my ticket). How strange does that sound, a wife trying to find her husband a nice date! As it is the end of year, festive season most people had prior arrangements. My friends husband was stuck in transit somewhere in Asia so GJ was able to escort T. T's husband and GJ's "date" arrived at dessert in time to catch all the fun.

I would love to see all the photos GJ took, but he left the camera in J's handbag!

Apparently all had a great time, GJ made it home before daylight...just! They skipped the breakfast part of the ball, yes the Scottish know how to do a ball......Dinner, midnight supper, early morning snack and then breakfast!

But the highlight for me was that GJ won a raffle prize
2 business class tickets to Bali and 3 nights accommodation in a villa!
We won't have to be the only Australians in Jakarta that have NEVER, EVER been to Bali!

When I get the camera back I will share some more Ball photos.

More Typhoid Fever.....

I haven't been feeling that good the last few days, actually I have been going downhill since last weeks diagnoses.
Fortunately Georgia is doing great and should be fine for school next week.
We went back to the Doctors today and I had another blood test, my typhoid levels have actually risen. I have a resistant strain of typhoid and now need to begin a new course of stronger antibiotics. My liver something or other is too high as well which is adding to the pain and misery.

Typhoid Fever

Yes...Georgia and I have managed to pick up Typhoid Fever, even though we were immunised against it before leaving Australia.

Read all about it here on Wikipedia

But don't be too alarmed, we have caught it early and are on a course of strong medicine and should be fine in a week to ten days.


Our main symptom are tiredness, disgusting diarrhoea, fever and aches. Just like a really bad tummy bug...... We have so many pills and potions to take I have had to draw up a schedule.

2007...A broken ankle and now this.

Georgia is most unamused. Worst was that it is confirmed by a blood test! Georgia's blood does not flow easily...took two attempts and even then the nurse had to pull on the syringe for about 8 minutes to get 1 vial of blood. Poor thing was distraught.
Now the problem for her is the disgusting antibiotic she has to take....pink chalk filth she calls it.
Georgia has a countdown marked on the white board for every dose until gone, 4 down 26 to go!


We have probably caught this disease from eating food that some one with typhoid has touched....it is spread through poor sanitation and fecal matter.

Oh my goodness...it doesn't even bear thinking about does it.

It doesn't matter how much we wash our hands in antibacterial soap and use disinfected wipes, we can catch if off food handled by people that don't wash their hands. The food can be infected before I get it and prepare it.

One thing I have noticed is that there is mostly no toilet paper or soap in Indonesian restrooms........

I have spent the morning again at Global Doctors with Sarinah (our housekeeper) having her checked out. Sarinah has been feeling off colour for a week now, as are her daughters and granddaughters.....
I think this is going to be an expensive month.....Sarinah's visit, pathology and meds are 2.3millionRP of unclaimable expenses. The positive is that I know she will get well and have proper medication; at a local clinic I couldn't know for sure that she would receive proper medicine. Fake medicine is a huge problem here.

Dr has told Georgia and I to stay away from school for a week and to not handle food. We also need to use separate bathrooms and utensils from the rest of the family

So.....back to bed, hand washing and lots of disinfecting to keep GJ, Chels and Benny safe.

Hopefully we will start to feel better REAL soon, as this is very yucky!