Most Indonesians around here do not understand us.
They will get on their motorbike to go buy Chicken Sate from the stall one hundred metres down the lane but we walk most places within a kilometre or two of home and on a regular basis.
Walking for exercise is permitted early in the morning before the sun has risen and while the day is (relatively) cool but after that if you can avoid it you do. Currently, of course, we have neither car nor motorbike so there is a large degree of necessity.

However today we walked about eight kilometres from home to and around the Kauman area of Yogyakarta, stopping off on route for second breakfast.

Once into the tourist area a regular stream of becak (think bicycle transport for two powered by the legs of a third) owners asking where they could take us and accepting our "tidak, jalan-jalan" (non literal translation: "no thanks, we are out for a walk") with a smile.

When the time came to find a taxi home I answered one "where do you want to go" with our address. Rather than just decline to pedal us the many kilometres home he suggested taking us to the bird market which was a much more manageable two hundred metres round the corner. I declined.


Home again and there was some laundry to collect.
I wander up the village back-lanes good-afternooning the locals when one of a group of three women sitting on a porch asked "Mau ke mana?" ("Where are you going")
"Ke laundry" ("To the laundry") I replied and carried on.

Ten minutes later and I return where there are now four women on the porch, the newcomer asks "Mau ke mana?".
"Dari laundry" ("From the laundry") I said with a broad smile to laughter from the three original women and a baffled look from the fourth.
She then asked what I had in the bag, I forget the exact Indonesian used.
"Laundry" I replied with further laughter all round.