ACICIS Christmas Party

The ACICIS Christmas party was tonight at the Yogya Village Inn. There was plenty of food, secret Santa, and an awards ceremony.

For his secret Santa gift Tom received a Rubik's cube and a fancy holder to go with it. I received chocolate and James a cigarette/ cell phone holder, but Adam's was the best of all. He received a motorized go fish game! We played several rounds and I won all but 2, and on of those was a draw. This game is fantastic and provides endless hours of entertainment for all. Who would have guessed!?

One of he funniest parts of the evening was the awards. I will list them here:

KATE - The Lola Award for taking a bit lama with some of her loading. Kate thought that both Padang and Bali were part of Java and also thought that loading lama meant actually loading stuff onto the back of a llama.

TOM - The Pecinta Alam Award for liking a bit of alam. Tom has watched birds, been chased by ducks, savoured the fresh air and adopted and cared for wayward geckos. He is also rumoured to have drunkenly staged a real-life cicak versus buaya fight using a buaya he bought on the black market. Entry was 500k Rp and the cicak fought nobly but ultimately lost.

CHRIS - The Marriage Material Award. Chris always knows exactly how many days are left until his pacar gets here and has (as far as we know) remained setia despite the legions of Indonesian girls drooling over him and trying to get his HP number.

LISA - The Yes Man Award. Lisa is gung ho, always up for stuff and has never turned down an invitation to something (again as far as we know).

DIMI (JAMES yes) - The MacGyver Award. Dimi is able to fix anything ever and also saved the lives of a family whose car had stalled on train tracks in front of an oncoming train. Seriously.

LAUREN - The Onward Christian Soldier Award. Lauren receives this award for bringing Jesus to the people of Indonesia through karate, which we would like to ask her to demonstrate now if she wouldn't mind.

SIMON - The Some Like It Blonde Award. Simon receives this award for managing to find a Swedish girlfriend in an island full of black-haired women.

PAUL - The Why Do We Even Bother Award. Paul receives this award for repeatedly turning down invitations to stuff, especially stuff he has asked to be invited to.

ADAM - The Fashionable Gentleman Award. Adam receives this award for having by far the most impressive collection of both Batik and Hawaiian shirts.

SAMIRA - The Javanese Princess Award. Samira is Javanese and has gone to enormous lengths to avoid squat toilets. She also lives in a hotel.

BRI - The Valium Award. During her time in Indonesia, Bri unwittingly consumed Valium to the point of dependency. She has also displayed an ability to stay positive through difficult times that makes it seem like she is perpetually on Valium.

JEMMA - The When In Rome, Do As The Indonesians Do Award. Jemma has gone native with extreme dedication and has improved her Indonesian language greatly as a result, though she will deny this fervently.

NYSSA - The Cute Kid Award. Nyssa has a very cute kid who is universally adored and extremely photographed.

MADDIE - The I Own The Moon Award. Maddie officially owns the moon, as America got there first and she is an American. While there are technically other Americans in the ACICIS program, Maddie owns the moon and I think we all can agree it is in good hands.

PETER - The If You Go On Safari You Will Probably See The Rare Javanese Rhinoceros More Than You See Peter Award. Peter has a rich full life in Jogja, a lovely local girlfriend and many girls with secret crushes on him, but he is like some rare jungle bird that you try to see in the jungle but you can't see it because it is elusive.

The Staff

ELE - The Naughty Nurse Award. Ele receives this award for freely dispensing and consuming the forbidden drug codeine and for sticking it to the condescending and patriarchal Indonesian medical system.

PHIL - The God Award. Phil receives this award for being an invisible but omnipotent and ominous force in the ACICIS universe.

SINTA - The Where The Bloody Hell Are You Award. Sinta answered the call of our great nation's intimidating tourism advertisements and deserted us for several weeks to eat steak in pubs, pet kangaroos in wildlife parks and learn some Aussie slang.

FICKRY - The Simple Social Butterfly Award. Fickry has delicately flitted around campus this semester in his new role as ACICIS assistant, people person and chief dosen headcracker. Those of you who have been bonceng'd by him before will understand that 'delicately flitting' in a Fickry context means careening around on a motorbike at terrifying speeds.

It was a really fun evening and I am happy to see my ownership of the moon finally being recognized. :-)