That's bahasa Indonesia for "I am not yet fluent" ... nevertheless, my Indonesian proficiency improves daily ... and now I even know some words that Thasya doesn't know .... such as "fasih".  Of course, it did shock her last night when I said "Thasya, dangan lupa belajar malam ini" ..... which means "Thasya, don't forget to study tonight".  She replied in English "already" ... and I replied in Bahasa "hebat" ... meaning "great !!!".  Decy broke out laughing.

Finances moving forward at a crawl ... hope to put 1/3 down payment on 2 cars today.  Then need to move the remaining 2/3rds in country late this week or early next week ... so we can pay the remaining balance next Friday.  All going well, the CrV will be available on the 15th or 18th ... so we only have a 1 week gap to work through (11th to 18th) where we are potentially down to 1 car (which is unworkable here in Indonesia). [ we are already renting one car & driver from our own pocket ]

What frustrates me the most about the cars is that the company will provide only one rental and only until 11-Sep; after that it is up to me.  And, they are supposed to subsidize the car purchase by $10k (b/coz of the high auto cost here) ... in mid-Aug they had promised to send me the money by 6-Sep ... now they tell me it will be 30-Sep ... but ... I still have to have the car by 11-Sep .. that's not right in my mind.

As for the house ... well, let's just say we are waiting to see what happens. Sure hope the owner signs the lease next week after my company says "we're ready" ... if he doesn't that means we have just wasted an entire month ... and have to start the process all over again ... pray for a good resolution.

What frustrates me the most about the house is that our allowance is for "furnished housing".  However, the houses have "no furniture" ... so we have to buy our own.  But, even so, we are supposed to attach to the lease the furniture list ... when the list is short or non-existant ... everybody keeps asking "where's there furniture?" And I have to answer "there isn't any" ... not sure how the company thought this was supposed to work .... you can't force a homeowner to put furniture in a house ... and even if you can negotiate it... you can't do it before a lease is signed .... he's not going to buy furniture on speculation.  [ for the avoidance of doubt, this "furnished housing" concept is part of a new policy that just went into effect hasn't been fully tested/vetted ... I think one other employee is going thru this and is only one week ahead of me in the process].

Gotta run ... time for work.

ciao ciao