Latest / bit of a Rambler / 090 Ramble On

Transcript

090 Ramble On · bit of a Rambler

0:00
Speaker 1: Hello. My name is Kai, and I am a bit
0:03
Speaker 1: of a rambler. I like to travel, learn and tell stories,
0:08
Speaker 1: and we're going to ramble on. So Indonesia very inexpensive overall,
0:13
Speaker 1: and it's very nice that you can have fee free
0:15
Speaker 1: withdrawals from their end, but my dumb American bank makes
0:21
Speaker 1: it charges like ten percent on whatever I'm withdrawing here,
0:25
Speaker 1: and I think I'm finally tired of that. It took
0:27
Speaker 1: me a long time, and it doesn't really matter if
0:29
Speaker 1: I took it out, it would still be worth way,
0:33
Speaker 1: Like the reduction and cost of living by living here
0:35
Speaker 1: completely takes care of it. But at this point there
0:38
Speaker 1: are too many modern alternatives like Revolute and Chime that
0:43
Speaker 1: I don't have to pay withdrawal fees anymore. So I'm
0:45
Speaker 1: going to get probably Revolute, so I don't have to
0:48
Speaker 1: keep paying withdrawal fees for no reason, just because US
0:52
Speaker 1: banks are so far behind the times. Okay, what's interesting
0:57
Speaker 1: is that my credit card work in most stores here
1:03
Speaker 1: in Indonesia, but the people here don't understand, Like, they
1:10
Speaker 1: don't use credit cards here. It's very rare. So I've
1:14
Speaker 1: been the first person to use a credit card in
1:16
Speaker 1: their store in a lot of places in a glasses store,
1:20
Speaker 1: in several supermarkets, in several convenience stores. They're just not
1:24
Speaker 1: really used here, but they have the machine. So I
1:28
Speaker 1: have been to a few places where I can buy
1:31
Speaker 1: nor seaweed snacks and stuff that I like from larger supermarkets,
1:35
Speaker 1: and I've used my card, but I have to tell
1:38
Speaker 1: them it's a debit card because they're like credit, we
1:41
Speaker 1: definitely don't know how to use credit in the machine.
1:45
Speaker 1: And after I heard that like a few times and
1:48
Speaker 1: I was like, wait, they have to be able to
1:50
Speaker 1: use a credit I was just like, well, it's a
1:53
Speaker 1: debit card, and they're like, oh, debit okay, and they
1:56
Speaker 1: put it in and it worked completely normally. So I
1:59
Speaker 1: was thinking, maybe they're just saying that so that they
2:01
Speaker 1: don't have to pay the fee like that the credit
2:04
Speaker 1: card company charges whatever company, But this is a fee
2:09
Speaker 1: free card anyway, So I don't know. I don't know.
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Speaker 1: So I've been using the credit card and just telling
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Speaker 1: people it's a debit card because then they just swipe
2:18
Speaker 1: it or insert it and it works right away. And
2:22
Speaker 1: that's been nice because there are some pretty good supermarkets
2:25
Speaker 1: here and I've been able to get all the stuff
2:29
Speaker 1: I want to get, like a little paper clip box
2:31
Speaker 1: and I put up the paper clips, and then I
2:33
Speaker 1: have a new sewing container, like a sewing compact, and
2:36
Speaker 1: then seaweed snacks and just like snacks and stuff that
2:41
Speaker 1: I don't want to take out money for because I'm
2:44
Speaker 1: paying over eight dollars flat, and I can only take
2:48
Speaker 1: out seventy dollars because the currency is so devalued here,
2:55
Speaker 1: but everyone can afford everything that the with the drawl
3:00
Speaker 1: rate USD equivalent is really low and unnecessary. I don't
3:03
Speaker 1: need too much more than that per month, the seventy
3:06
Speaker 1: five bucks. But with my US bank, no matter how
3:10
Speaker 1: little I take out, they're charging me over eight dollars
3:13
Speaker 1: sometimes more per transaction. And if it was a few dollars,
3:19
Speaker 1: I wouldn't even care. But it's close to ten bucks
3:24
Speaker 1: every transaction, even in countries that do not charge for
3:28
Speaker 1: withdrawal fees, So that can fluff right off. I'm just
3:33
Speaker 1: going to get a different financial service. There's just no
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Speaker 1: reason for me to pay it at this point when
3:39
Speaker 1: the solutions are so readily accessible and apparently work well. Okay,
3:46
Speaker 1: So if you come to Indonesia, which is a nice
3:48
Speaker 1: place to visit if you're not a huge drinker. I'm
3:52
Speaker 1: taking a break right now after Hawaii, so it's good
3:56
Speaker 1: sobering up because the food here is great, the people
4:00
Speaker 1: are really nice, and it's so cheap. It's crazy how
4:06
Speaker 1: inexpensive things are here, like cheaper than India and China.
4:12
Speaker 1: Cheap often, which is cheap. And if you do need
4:18
Speaker 1: to use your credit card, which does work in many
4:20
Speaker 1: larger stores, even regular sized supermarkets and grocery stores and
4:25
Speaker 1: all of the convenience stores, just say debit instead of credit,
4:29
Speaker 1: because everybody knows what a debit card is. But credit
4:31
Speaker 1: they're like, that's a whole set of rules I don't
4:35
Speaker 1: know how to deal with. But if you say it's
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Speaker 1: a debit, it'll just go through normally. And I went
4:41
Speaker 1: to Lotties with the credit card because I wanted to
4:44
Speaker 1: get the beef because they have sliced hot pot beef
4:47
Speaker 1: and I'm trying to make beef jerky out of that.
4:50
Speaker 1: But you know what, it's been really difficult. I've been
4:54
Speaker 1: doing the same thing I have always done, which is
4:56
Speaker 1: mixing brown sugar with soy sauce until I like the mixture,
5:00
Speaker 1: and then marinating the meat and then drying it, and
5:03
Speaker 1: I have no idea what's different this time. But if
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Speaker 1: the meat is not marinated, if it's just meat, then
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Speaker 1: it's fine. Then it dries very quickly and normally, But
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Speaker 1: after I marinate the meat, even for one hour, it
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Speaker 1: is drying way slower. Like I dried some beef jerkey
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Speaker 1: for three days and it never dried. It turned into
5:25
Speaker 1: like a fruit leather consistency, and I ended up just
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Speaker 1: frying it up and putting it in with some food
5:32
Speaker 1: I made. But yeah, I don't know what it is.
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Speaker 1: I don't know if the red sugar or brown sugar
5:39
Speaker 1: is different here or what. But there's something I kind
5:44
Speaker 1: of want to try, just soy saucenegs to see if
5:46
Speaker 1: it's the brown sugar that's somehow crystallizing and blocking moisture
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Speaker 1: from exiting the meat. So the next phase of the
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Speaker 1: beef jerky saga is I've rinsed off the meat after
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Speaker 1: marinating it so that if there was something on the surface,
6:03
Speaker 1: it'll get out. But I put it out to dry,
6:06
Speaker 1: and it's definitely taking way way longer still to dry
6:11
Speaker 1: than without marinating at all. Like that happens within a day.
6:14
Speaker 1: You can get beef jerky pretty quickly from thin sliced
6:17
Speaker 1: beef after about a day, and these ones it's almost
6:22
Speaker 1: been eighteen hours and they're still they're nowhere near what
6:28
Speaker 1: as far along as the unmarrinated beef was, So it
6:33
Speaker 1: must be either the soy sauce or the brown sugar.
6:36
Speaker 1: And my bed is on the brown sugar. There's just
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Speaker 1: something with this brown sugar that is like gummy or
6:44
Speaker 1: you know, it blocks moisture from leaving the meat. So
6:48
Speaker 1: I'll try soy sauce next, and then I'm also going
6:50
Speaker 1: to go try Lati has a five dollars pack of
6:54
Speaker 1: sliced teriyaki, so it's already marinated in sauce. And I
7:00
Speaker 1: don't like karaiaki beef as much because it's usually a
7:03
Speaker 1: little sweet, but this is actual meat with just a
7:05
Speaker 1: tarioaki flavoring, and I want to try drying that also,
7:09
Speaker 1: because the unmrinated beef I have dries super quick like
7:14
Speaker 1: in a day because it's sliced so thinly. So I'm
7:17
Speaker 1: going to try the tariaki and see how that goes
7:19
Speaker 1: either way. Even the unmrinated beef, I still have beef
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Speaker 1: jerky to chew on, which is great and instead of God,
7:28
Speaker 1: what was it? When I was just in the States,
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Speaker 1: beef jerkey was fifteen dollars for three ounces two point
7:36
Speaker 1: five ounces at worst, up to eight ounces at best,
7:41
Speaker 1: and eight ounces half a pound was for like crapo,
7:46
Speaker 1: you know, Walmart stuff, and that's only so it doesn't
7:50
Speaker 1: taste good. I stopped eating it in the US. There's
7:53
Speaker 1: just no I tried every single version of it, and
7:56
Speaker 1: there was one that was okay, but that was the
7:59
Speaker 1: the fifteen dollars for two point five ounces, which is crazy,
8:05
Speaker 1: and the one I'm making here is as good as that.
8:11
Speaker 1: So two point five ounces for fifteen dollars and what
8:15
Speaker 1: I got is twenty ounces for five dollars. So the
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Speaker 1: one I'm getting is the one I'm making is thirty
8:28
Speaker 1: times cheaper than the best that still wasn't super good
8:32
Speaker 1: of the beef jerky I found in the United States
8:35
Speaker 1: these days, that's and all I have to do is
8:38
Speaker 1: put it on. I'm using the dish drying rack here
8:42
Speaker 1: with a couple of paper clips to hold it to
8:44
Speaker 1: a fan that I have facing up from the ground.
8:47
Speaker 1: That's it, so clip that onto the top of the fan.
8:49
Speaker 1: The fan blows the air through it. Drives. The jerky
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Speaker 1: takes less than twenty four hours to make the jerky
8:56
Speaker 1: the same kind, and it's definitely better than the false
8:59
Speaker 1: whatever the heck Walmart is using as beef jerky these days.
9:03
Speaker 1: And I tried a whole bunch of local brands too,
9:05
Speaker 1: but they're all they all don't taste like meat. They
9:10
Speaker 1: all taste like some they taste like processed meat sort of,
9:13
Speaker 1: and or they're like super wet. There's like a wet jerky,
9:16
Speaker 1: which is just meat. I was confused by that. That's
9:19
Speaker 1: kind of what my fruit leather thing that I made is.
9:23
Speaker 1: I don't know what's going on with jerky, but in
9:25
Speaker 1: any case, I can make jerky for three cents on
9:28
Speaker 1: the dollar of American jerky, and I know it's coming
9:33
Speaker 1: from fresh meat and whatever spices or marinades I put
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Speaker 1: on top. Was I talking about before I got sidetracked
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Speaker 1: by jerky? Oh the credit card thing? And then in
9:44
Speaker 1: that store. The reason the reason I brought up the
9:47
Speaker 1: jerky isn't just because I love beef jerky, which I
9:50
Speaker 1: do and I'm crazy about beef jerky. When I was
9:53
Speaker 1: in that store, this little kid ran up to me
9:58
Speaker 1: and she was like, Hi, my name is oh what
10:02
Speaker 1: was her name. Let's call her Alita Battle Angel because
10:05
Speaker 1: she was a badass. She was like, hey, my name
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Speaker 1: is Alita, and I was like, oh, hey, nice to
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Speaker 1: meet you. My name's Kai. And her face went slack
10:14
Speaker 1: johed and her eyes went super big, and she ran
10:17
Speaker 1: away back to her brother, who was like there, like
10:19
Speaker 1: twenty feet away, and her brother is a little kid
10:21
Speaker 1: sitting in the shopping cart. And she ran back to
10:23
Speaker 1: her brother and she went, I could speak English. I
10:26
Speaker 1: could speak English. And then she ran back to me
10:28
Speaker 1: and she was like, hi, my name is Alita. And
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Speaker 1: I was like, hey, Alita, I'm Kai, and she ran
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Speaker 1: back again. I came back again, and she was like,
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Speaker 1: what are you. Where are you from. I was like Hawaii. Huh,
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Speaker 1: I'm from Hawaii. What Oh. They're starting the calls to prayer,
10:46
Speaker 1: so if you hear it, that's what that loud chanting
10:50
Speaker 1: is in the background. And she was so excited, and
10:54
Speaker 1: we had like little and her English was really good.
10:56
Speaker 1: Her accent was great, and she she sounded like she
11:00
Speaker 1: in control of the sentences she knew. And she asked
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Speaker 1: me how old I was and how long I was
11:06
Speaker 1: in Indonesia and uh, yeah, just a few things. And
11:11
Speaker 1: she said like America when I said Hawaii, and yeah,
11:17
Speaker 1: she was so happy to talk to me. And I mean,
11:20
Speaker 1: there are no other non locals here. I'm like, I
11:25
Speaker 1: saw two of them get off the plane with me,
11:28
Speaker 1: and they like stood it strict attention when they played
11:31
Speaker 1: the Indonesian song. So I don't know. Those might be
11:33
Speaker 1: like government people, because they they were weird. They they
11:39
Speaker 1: held themselves strangely. They were either cult members or they
11:44
Speaker 1: were like government liaisons of some kind. They had that
11:51
Speaker 1: they had that spine, that street spine look to them.
11:55
Speaker 1: And then there was me strolling off the plane through
11:57
Speaker 1: the immigration with my homemade sandals. That was awesome. The
12:03
Speaker 1: little kid was so excited to talk to me in
12:05
Speaker 1: the grocery store. And I've met a few people now
12:08
Speaker 1: who have been excited to speak English. Like one guy
12:12
Speaker 1: stopped on a motorbike just to talk to me, and
12:15
Speaker 1: his son was on the motorbike with him in front
12:17
Speaker 1: of him, and he was like, talk to this guy
12:19
Speaker 1: in English. But it's clear as dad was good at
12:23
Speaker 1: English and his kid was not great at English because
12:26
Speaker 1: his kid was like two. It's fine, that's not the
12:28
Speaker 1: fault of the kid he's and again they're in a
12:31
Speaker 1: country where nobody there's no like native speakers, but there's
12:35
Speaker 1: a lot of really good non native speakers. Guy stopped
12:39
Speaker 1: me yesterday while I was walking home to talk and
12:41
Speaker 1: he was just sitting in one of those like shaded
12:44
Speaker 1: pagodas they have around just in case it gets too
12:47
Speaker 1: hot or rainy, and we rapped for a bit. We
12:51
Speaker 1: just talked about what was going on, and right before
12:54
Speaker 1: that I bought. I talked to him for like five
12:57
Speaker 1: minutes about just stuff whatever, really chill. He told me.
13:01
Speaker 1: There's a word for chilling and talking sunnay, shunnay or sunnay.
13:07
Speaker 1: I can't. There's so much, so much to learn here,
13:12
Speaker 1: so every day like I'm learning new Indonesian and I'm
13:15
Speaker 1: studying it by myself when I'm not talking to people.
13:18
Speaker 1: But there's also so many non native English speakers here
13:22
Speaker 1: who just remember their English from school. That's something that
13:26
Speaker 1: I think I can attribute to a dry country because
13:29
Speaker 1: there's not a hell lot of alcohol or no one
13:30
Speaker 1: really drinks alcohol, And I cannot imagine that people in
13:37
Speaker 1: that people who regularly drink beer, even recreationally a couple
13:41
Speaker 1: times a week, would remember their language lessons with such clarity,
13:46
Speaker 1: and people here recognize their English lessons with such clarity
13:52
Speaker 1: from when they were six or ten years old or whatever.
13:55
Speaker 1: So before this guy resting in the little Shaq who
14:01
Speaker 1: taught me the word chenane or whatever it was to
14:03
Speaker 1: mean talk story down in like further down the road
14:09
Speaker 1: half a kilometer, there was this little restaurant I got
14:11
Speaker 1: some food at and it was like a house, but
14:13
Speaker 1: they had a like the kitchen was in the front,
14:17
Speaker 1: so it was like half house half restaurant. And one
14:20
Speaker 1: of the ladies in there started talking to me and
14:23
Speaker 1: I was like, oh, she's speaking English. And she spoke
14:26
Speaker 1: a lot of English and was really interested in talking
14:30
Speaker 1: to me and just asking questions about traveling. And she
14:33
Speaker 1: said she liked to travel, but her husband didn't, so
14:35
Speaker 1: they never went traveling. And when I told her I
14:38
Speaker 1: was thinking going to Mongolia, she was like, oh, Mongolia
14:41
Speaker 1: are the prettiest girls in Asia. And she said like
14:45
Speaker 1: she she went there before, and she was just amazed
14:47
Speaker 1: at how pretty everyone was in Mongolia. And I was like,
14:51
Speaker 1: that's great news for me, thank you, and yeah, and
14:54
Speaker 1: she was very nice and we talked for a long
14:56
Speaker 1: time because they I asked them to for like one
15:00
Speaker 1: dish and one drink, and then it started pouring pouring,
15:02
Speaker 1: so I stayed in extra few minutes until the rain
15:05
Speaker 1: wasn't going insane before taking my bundle of tasty food
15:11
Speaker 1: home and munching down. But after we talked for ten minutes,
15:15
Speaker 1: I was just like, how, how was your English so
15:18
Speaker 1: good here? There's nobody else here, and she was like, yeah,
15:21
Speaker 1: there's no foreigners or boules here at all. I just
15:26
Speaker 1: remember it from school. And I was like, that is
15:29
Speaker 1: wild because she means like ten years old school, thirty
15:33
Speaker 1: years ago, No, thirty eight years ago. She told me
15:37
Speaker 1: she was forty eight. Like that's incredibly impressive. So that
15:41
Speaker 1: was cool. I like talking to people. I'm talking to
15:43
Speaker 1: someone new every day. Everyone has some level of English,
15:47
Speaker 1: and they also speak Indonesian, and many of them speak
15:50
Speaker 1: Javanese because Java is the like islands language before Indonesian,
15:56
Speaker 1: but then they learn English in school. So there's a
15:59
Speaker 1: lot of high intelligent, multi lingual teetotalers here. And everyone's
16:07
Speaker 1: really chill too and like optimistic because they're not brought
16:12
Speaker 1: down by barbiturates. I'm guessing it has some part to
16:14
Speaker 1: play in that because everyone here is really happy and
16:17
Speaker 1: cool all the time and very nice. I got a
16:21
Speaker 1: hamburger and beef crunch rap recently. When I went to
16:24
Speaker 1: get my new glasses, I had to walk somewhere after
16:27
Speaker 1: I got them. I don't even know whatever, but on
16:28
Speaker 1: the way back I saw like a local hamburger stall.
16:32
Speaker 1: And I don't like hamburgers in the US. I don't
16:35
Speaker 1: really like hamburgers that much, except for that one in Portugal.
16:38
Speaker 1: That guy was great, But like local in terms of
16:44
Speaker 1: like the wealth of a country, basically poorer countries. They
16:47
Speaker 1: don't use like things of beef. They don't use pure
16:52
Speaker 1: ground meat to make their hamburgers. They mix it with
16:56
Speaker 1: like spices and maybe noodles or vegetables and egg, and
17:01
Speaker 1: then they have like this paste of vegetables and noodles
17:07
Speaker 1: and beef. It's not a lot. It's still mostly beef,
17:11
Speaker 1: but instead of like just beef, they also mix in
17:15
Speaker 1: vegetables and egg andst so you get this. The patty
17:18
Speaker 1: is much crisper and generally thinner, and I think much
17:23
Speaker 1: tastier than a conventional just ground beef patty, which is
17:29
Speaker 1: boring and kind of chewy and not my thing, especially
17:33
Speaker 1: compared to these local ground beef mixtures that they use.
17:39
Speaker 1: And I didn't know if they made that here in Indonesia,
17:42
Speaker 1: and it turns out they do. So I got a
17:44
Speaker 1: good hamburger that was fun for sixty cents, Yeah, sixty cents.
17:51
Speaker 1: And then oh, a crunchy beef or a beef crunch wrap.
17:56
Speaker 1: It's just a tortilla with really good beef inside. And
18:00
Speaker 1: this was just a strip of like marinated fried beef
18:04
Speaker 1: and some vegetables and too much sauce. So I won't
18:07
Speaker 1: get sauce if I go back there again. But those
18:10
Speaker 1: were both fun to get because I haven't had like
18:12
Speaker 1: one of the local beef mixture hamburgers in a long time,
18:16
Speaker 1: and it was very tasty. So I mentioned I got
18:19
Speaker 1: new glasses. That was on the day I got my
18:21
Speaker 1: new glasses, and so my new glasses. I've got two
18:25
Speaker 1: new glasses now right. I got the one with the
18:27
Speaker 1: metal frame that were the first replacement in over ten
18:30
Speaker 1: years since my Cambodia glasses. That are great, but I've
18:33
Speaker 1: had them for ten years. They have scratches on the lenses.
18:35
Speaker 1: It's time to move on. I have to accept that,
18:38
Speaker 1: and I have. So I bought lenses, and I went
18:41
Speaker 1: to this place that made me nice new glasses looking,
18:46
Speaker 1: but they screwed up the curvature of the lens, so
18:48
Speaker 1: the top half of the lens was clear and the
18:50
Speaker 1: bottom half was very blurry and it caused a lot
18:53
Speaker 1: of eye strain. And they were rated five out of
18:57
Speaker 1: five stars, five point zero out of five stars this place.
19:00
Speaker 1: So I was kind of bummed out that they screwed
19:02
Speaker 1: that up. But it turns out they also I do
19:06
Speaker 1: have a stigmatism, and I didn't know because I brought
19:09
Speaker 1: in my old glasses the second time, because these new
19:13
Speaker 1: glasses after ten years were covered under warranty, so if
19:16
Speaker 1: they were uncomfortable, they would replace it with a new pair.
19:20
Speaker 1: So I brought in these new glasses and my Cambodia
19:23
Speaker 1: glasses I'll call the first new pair of the metal glasses.
19:27
Speaker 1: So I brought in my old pair of the Cambodi
19:29
Speaker 1: glasses and my new pair of the metal glasses because
19:31
Speaker 1: they had a metal frame. And when the person looked
19:34
Speaker 1: at my old glasses under the microscope, it turns out
19:37
Speaker 1: I did have cylinders in the left eye, which means
19:40
Speaker 1: that I do have an astigmatism. And the metal glasses
19:45
Speaker 1: were just magnification. They didn't have cylinders or anywhere near
19:50
Speaker 1: the other prescription, to be perfectly honest. But I don't
19:53
Speaker 1: want a strong prescription anyway, because I'm afraid that if
19:57
Speaker 1: my prescription is too strong, it'll make my eyes adjust
20:02
Speaker 1: to that strong magnification, and then when I don't use
20:05
Speaker 1: the glasses, my eyes will be very confused. So but
20:10
Speaker 1: the main problem with these new glasses was that it
20:12
Speaker 1: was blurry. There was no the curvature was incorrect. I
20:16
Speaker 1: could see it myself when I tilted my head up.
20:19
Speaker 1: Things were much less clear, and that was due to
20:23
Speaker 1: the lens themselves, not not just my eyes. So I
20:29
Speaker 1: went back in and I explained it, and they took
20:32
Speaker 1: a new test and they couldn't cover my astigmatism. I'd
20:36
Speaker 1: have to order a new thing. It would take a week,
20:38
Speaker 1: and I was worried that I didn't have a guarantee
20:41
Speaker 1: that these lenses would be made correctly. It's very cheap.
20:44
Speaker 1: It would still be less than twenty dollars or maybe
20:46
Speaker 1: twenty dollars to get new nice glasses. And I'm here
20:51
Speaker 1: for another two weeks, so I do have enough time
20:54
Speaker 1: to get the glasses. But because they screwed up the
21:00
Speaker 1: the actual production of the lenses the first time. I
21:03
Speaker 1: don't want to risk it and look forward to these
21:07
Speaker 1: new glasses then have them. There's another place I didn't realize.
21:11
Speaker 1: So this place is five point zero out of five
21:14
Speaker 1: and it has sixty reviews, which is pretty good. This
21:16
Speaker 1: other place is five point zero out of five and
21:18
Speaker 1: they have over five hundred reviews. So I'm thinking of
21:22
Speaker 1: going there and seeing what they say about my eyes.
21:26
Speaker 1: And while I have loved my Cambodia glasses, they are
21:28
Speaker 1: a much stronger prescription than after the metal glasses. I
21:33
Speaker 1: got plastic glasses. I got another frame and I asked
21:37
Speaker 1: them to just give me a magnification of plus point
21:39
Speaker 1: seventy five in each eye for that original store. So
21:44
Speaker 1: my old Cambodia glasses, I'm not going to use those anymore.
21:47
Speaker 1: My new metal glasses, I'm not going to use those anymore.
21:49
Speaker 1: But they're covered under warranty. So I got these new
21:52
Speaker 1: plastic glasses and I got to choose the frames, bring
21:55
Speaker 1: them in and for free. They made two new lenses
21:58
Speaker 1: that were produced correctly, and I can see through them
22:01
Speaker 1: at all angles or around the edges. Also, there's no
22:05
Speaker 1: blurriness the closer you get to the edges, which is
22:07
Speaker 1: a sign of poor lens manufacturing, which is what happened
22:10
Speaker 1: with the metal glasses. So I have these third pair,
22:14
Speaker 1: and they're not strong, but they magnify a little bit,
22:18
Speaker 1: and like glass, stops a lot of radiation also, So
22:23
Speaker 1: I'm just going to use them with electronics so that
22:26
Speaker 1: radiation isn't pouring into my eyes, like the blue wavelengths
22:29
Speaker 1: and whatever. Because that was a big part of why
22:32
Speaker 1: I liked the Cambodia glasses. I would just put them on.
22:36
Speaker 1: There'd be like this little layer of protection against staring
22:40
Speaker 1: into electronic devices all day, which I do because I'm
22:45
Speaker 1: recording a podcast or doing something digital. Yesterday I was
22:48
Speaker 1: editing a whole bunch of stuff on the computer for
22:51
Speaker 1: a long time. So it's nice to have this small
22:54
Speaker 1: wall of glass between my delicate, delicate pupils and eyes
22:58
Speaker 1: and the radiation. Okay, so I'm happy with these new ones.
23:04
Speaker 1: I might try to get a new pair of glasses.
23:08
Speaker 1: I still have enough time to go to that new
23:11
Speaker 1: place with six hundred reviews that say your eyes are great.
23:14
Speaker 1: I might just go ask them and see what they think.
23:17
Speaker 1: Just go get a test today. Well, yeah, maybe I'll
23:20
Speaker 1: do that. Just go get a test and see what
23:22
Speaker 1: they say. Because if they do the lenses in house
23:26
Speaker 1: and I can get them in a few days, I
23:27
Speaker 1: would do that. I don't know if I want to
23:29
Speaker 1: wait ten days and bank that their production will be great.
23:33
Speaker 1: Although five stars and six hundred reviews that's pretty good,
23:37
Speaker 1: but most people are getting magnification lenses. They're not doing
23:41
Speaker 1: a stigmatism. Is still six hundred reviews. I don't know.
23:43
Speaker 1: I'll think about it whatever. So I do have new glasses.
23:49
Speaker 1: I do like these ones now. They're super lightweight. They're lightweight,
23:53
Speaker 1: they're very comfortable to wear, and if I take them off,
23:59
Speaker 1: my eyes don't go crazy like oh my gosh, the
24:02
Speaker 1: magnification's gone, because it's it's not too much of a magnification.
24:06
Speaker 1: And that leads into the newest thing about IE exercises. Actually,
24:13
Speaker 1: i'll just talk about that first. I have started doing
24:15
Speaker 1: IE exercises once a day, only a few days now.
24:19
Speaker 1: But I don't know if this is placebo. I don't
24:22
Speaker 1: think it is. It really seems to have made a difference.
24:26
Speaker 1: And this is like eight minutes a day. I just
24:28
Speaker 1: do one session per day, and it's things like closing
24:31
Speaker 1: your eyes tight for five seconds and then opening them
24:34
Speaker 1: back up rapidly, blinking for a minute, moving your eyes
24:39
Speaker 1: diagonally and rotating them around. And then an interesting one
24:43
Speaker 1: is trying to see an auto stereogram, so you unFocus
24:47
Speaker 1: your eyes so that there's a three D image in
24:51
Speaker 1: the you know, in the picture that pops out at you.
24:56
Speaker 1: And I can't do that right now, and it seems
24:59
Speaker 1: very difficult for me to do on my on my phone.
25:05
Speaker 1: I don't know if that's it or if my left
25:07
Speaker 1: eye has just gotten so crappy that I can't do it. It
25:11
Speaker 1: says if your eyes are really bad, you can't. But
25:12
Speaker 1: I know I used to be able to do them,
25:14
Speaker 1: and every now and then I would see one in
25:16
Speaker 1: life and just I can do that. So I might
25:20
Speaker 1: try it on my computer and see if I can
25:21
Speaker 1: do a stereogram, because I can very easily unFocus my
25:25
Speaker 1: eyes and you know, put your fingers in front of
25:28
Speaker 1: your face so that there's a third finger in between
25:31
Speaker 1: your two fingers. Like that's basically an out of stereogram.
25:35
Speaker 1: So I like the exercise though they're very simple, but
25:39
Speaker 1: they do seem like they're actually exercising my eyes without
25:43
Speaker 1: any strain, and I personally just have found it easier
25:48
Speaker 1: to look at things and focus on them in the
25:51
Speaker 1: past few days. Like the first day I wasn't sure,
25:56
Speaker 1: but the next day when I woke up, my eyes
25:59
Speaker 1: were focusing batter or on smaller text, like because two
26:02
Speaker 1: days before that I went to Lotti Grocier, the supermarket,
26:06
Speaker 1: and I was like, like and blinking owlishly at tiny
26:12
Speaker 1: text on the drink cartons to try and check how
26:14
Speaker 1: much sugar there was, Like my eyes were not working.
26:18
Speaker 1: And then with these eye exercises, like I said, eight
26:22
Speaker 1: minutes a day, six minutes a day, very little, I
26:25
Speaker 1: my eyes are focusing better. It's really interesting how much
26:30
Speaker 1: improvement I am perceiving. So I kind of want to
26:33
Speaker 1: do it. And then oh, that's what I was. That
26:35
Speaker 1: was my plan. I was going to do it for
26:36
Speaker 1: like a week or something and then take an eye
26:39
Speaker 1: test and see if I got different results than the
26:42
Speaker 1: eye test I just took. I think I'm going to
26:46
Speaker 1: do that just as I go along take because all
26:49
Speaker 1: the eye tests are free in like every country except
26:52
Speaker 1: the US, So I think I will do an eye
26:55
Speaker 1: test every couple of weeks and just keep doing this
27:00
Speaker 1: I exercise regimen because because so far it seems to
27:03
Speaker 1: be making a difference, and it would be great if
27:06
Speaker 1: I had healthy eyes. I just figured, well, there's probably
27:10
Speaker 1: some app now, and there are. There's a whole bunch
27:12
Speaker 1: of eye exercise apps, and one of them I didn't like,
27:15
Speaker 1: and the second one I liked a lot because it
27:17
Speaker 1: was so simple and straightforward. And I like it more
27:21
Speaker 1: now because it seems to actually work, which is yeah,
27:24
Speaker 1: very cool. So I'm doing eye exercises now and they
27:28
Speaker 1: seem to be helping, all right. I had a junk
27:31
Speaker 1: food day because I went again to Lotti Grocier and
27:34
Speaker 1: when I was walking around in there, I walked through
27:37
Speaker 1: one aisle and it was the instant noodle aisle and
27:40
Speaker 1: I was like what because it was ooh, who knows,
27:45
Speaker 1: one hundred feet and four shelves, like four layers of
27:51
Speaker 1: different brands and flavors of instant noodles. It was so
27:57
Speaker 1: much it's crazy. And I think I mentioned this here.
28:02
Speaker 1: When they make instant noodles, you boil it for two
28:05
Speaker 1: and a half three minutes and then you drain the
28:07
Speaker 1: water out after and then add in the spices, and
28:09
Speaker 1: oil and mix that up, which I think tastes way better,
28:12
Speaker 1: and you don't have soggy noodles after another minute, like
28:16
Speaker 1: one extra minute. So it's a great technique, and I'm
28:19
Speaker 1: enjoying the instant noodles a lot more so because I
28:22
Speaker 1: liked trying that. I was like, oh, what a good technique.
28:25
Speaker 1: I was like, I guess I'll try a few of
28:26
Speaker 1: these flavors and companies, and I got a bunch, and
28:30
Speaker 1: now I've been eating instant noodles every day, which I
28:32
Speaker 1: haven't done in thirty twenty years, a long time. But
28:37
Speaker 1: they taste so much better if they're not soggy. And
28:40
Speaker 1: there's definitely different types of noodles. So I know a
28:44
Speaker 1: couple of the brands and flavors that have the better noodles.
28:49
Speaker 1: It's the same brand but for some reason with different flavor,
28:51
Speaker 1: Like the Kimchif flavor has really crappy noodles, like really
28:55
Speaker 1: gross noodles, but the spicy chicken, the torri kata like
28:59
Speaker 1: specific has really good noodles. So that's been nice. But
29:03
Speaker 1: because I was like, well, let's buy a few different
29:06
Speaker 1: instant noodles and try this out, I was like, Okay, well,
29:09
Speaker 1: that's terrible for you, so you might as well buy
29:11
Speaker 1: other crappy food. And I got like every candy bar
29:14
Speaker 1: that I hadn't tried yet in this country. Oh there's
29:17
Speaker 1: Silver Queen, which is this really good chocolate here, And
29:21
Speaker 1: I was like, this is so good. I bet it's
29:23
Speaker 1: from Indonesia, and it is. It's an Indonesian chocolate and
29:27
Speaker 1: it's much better than all the other chocolates they sell here.
29:30
Speaker 1: But it's very common like it's as commonly sold as
29:33
Speaker 1: a Hershey's bar in the US or something, but much
29:37
Speaker 1: better quality. So I really like Silver Queen candy. But
29:40
Speaker 1: I bought all of the different variations, fruit and berry, yogurt,
29:44
Speaker 1: and milk chocolate with cashews, milk chocolate with almond, just everything.
29:50
Speaker 1: And since I got that, I also got like cookies.
29:53
Speaker 1: I got a bunch of nori seaweed. I got a
29:59
Speaker 1: whole bunch of crap. That's it. It's got like a
30:01
Speaker 1: whole bunch of crap. And I had to pack everything
30:05
Speaker 1: and I only had my little day bag that wasn't
30:07
Speaker 1: quite big enough, so I had to use my hat
30:10
Speaker 1: upside down holding the chin strap as a basket handle,
30:15
Speaker 1: and I was able to fit a couple more pop
30:19
Speaker 1: me instant noodles into that, and I shoved my pockets
30:23
Speaker 1: full and then I was able to carry everything home.
30:25
Speaker 1: It was really funny. I was full up, and it
30:29
Speaker 1: was fun I had just had a junk food day
30:31
Speaker 1: and I ate a whole bunch of crap. But I'm
30:33
Speaker 1: not drinking any alcohol while I'm in Indonesia. I had
30:37
Speaker 1: one day that I drank some alcohol and I was like, yep,
30:39
Speaker 1: tastes like beer or whatever. So I don't feel any
30:42
Speaker 1: compulsion to drink more. So I'm just drinking like super good,
30:45
Speaker 1: no sugar added, like fruit juices, and I can eat
30:50
Speaker 1: a bunch of stuff because I ain't drinking the alcohol.
30:54
Speaker 1: Feel unhealthier every day, which is nice too. A lot
30:57
Speaker 1: of the quick food, though, is fried, which I usually
30:59
Speaker 1: don't like. I don't know if I'm just getting used
31:02
Speaker 1: to fried food more. I don't think that's it because
31:04
Speaker 1: I was just in the US and they still when
31:07
Speaker 1: they fry things it's soggy with oil, like the oil
31:12
Speaker 1: is sticking to whatever you eat and soaking the bottom
31:16
Speaker 1: of the plate. I do not like that, never have.
31:21
Speaker 1: I don't know why it's different here, but and in
31:24
Speaker 1: many in Cousco. It's the same in pretty like so
31:28
Speaker 1: many places I go the street foods. Even if they
31:30
Speaker 1: fry foods, there's just not a lot of oil left
31:33
Speaker 1: over after they take the thing out of the oil.
31:36
Speaker 1: I don't know why American fried foods have so much
31:40
Speaker 1: like soggy to the point they make the skin of
31:43
Speaker 1: chicken or onion rings or whatever you're cooking soggy again
31:46
Speaker 1: after they take it out. I'm pretty confused as to why,
31:49
Speaker 1: because that's the only country I noticed that in. If
31:53
Speaker 1: that happens in another country, it's certainly the exception. And
31:57
Speaker 1: if that happens in the US, it's the norm for
31:59
Speaker 1: me when I order fried food. But maybe it's because
32:01
Speaker 1: I don't order a lot of fried food in the
32:03
Speaker 1: States anymore. Anyway, The point here is that the fried
32:06
Speaker 1: chicken here arorel good, and it's not breaded deep fried chicken.
32:10
Speaker 1: It's like a stick, you know, like a drumstick, fried
32:17
Speaker 1: in a walk so in a shallow layer, and they
32:20
Speaker 1: turn it over so that it's equally fried on all sides.
32:23
Speaker 1: And that's really good. So I got chewed chicken. I
32:26
Speaker 1: am gaprek that I've been trying to get for a while,
32:29
Speaker 1: but I was at like two different places that offered
32:32
Speaker 1: I Am Gaprek, and then they didn't have I Am Gaprek,
32:35
Speaker 1: even though it was in big bold letters on their store.
32:37
Speaker 1: So it's like, oh, maybe it's difficult to make or
32:41
Speaker 1: chicken's expensive, but it's not as I know now, So
32:44
Speaker 1: I didn't know why none of the restaurant's advertising had it.
32:47
Speaker 1: But I was walking by a place and I just
32:50
Speaker 1: saw it and I was like, you know what, I
32:51
Speaker 1: bet they do have it. It just looked clean, put
32:54
Speaker 1: together and like they only had five menu items, like
33:00
Speaker 1: they're probably gonna have their five menu items if they
33:03
Speaker 1: only have five menu items. So I sort of lingered
33:07
Speaker 1: outside the window waiting for someone to show up because
33:10
Speaker 1: the kitchen was empty, but it looked active like lights
33:13
Speaker 1: were on, and I knew there were people inside, so
33:17
Speaker 1: I just waited around and a lady eventually entered, and
33:20
Speaker 1: I was just using the time while I was waiting
33:23
Speaker 1: to learn what phrases I would have to say, like
33:26
Speaker 1: brapa harga, how much is this? And this? Because there
33:29
Speaker 1: was no prices, and do you have iamgaprec kumapunya, I
33:35
Speaker 1: am Goaprek, And she did have Iam Gaprek the chewed chicken,
33:40
Speaker 1: which I'm interested in because what a weird name for
33:42
Speaker 1: a dish, chewed chicken. And when I looked at the dish,
33:46
Speaker 1: like a lot of these menus and signs had pictures
33:50
Speaker 1: of Iam Gaprek, I was like, that just looks like,
33:52
Speaker 1: I don't know, like deep fried chicken fingers. So I
33:55
Speaker 1: didn't know what to expect, but I ordered it and
33:58
Speaker 1: she asked like something in Indonesia I didn't understand, and
34:02
Speaker 1: I was like, I'm sorry, like I don't understand it all.
34:07
Speaker 1: And I gave her my and she looked embarrassed to
34:10
Speaker 1: be explaining it, and I was like, I really don't
34:13
Speaker 1: get it, so can you type it? Because I didn't
34:15
Speaker 1: know why. She was like distressed by not being able
34:19
Speaker 1: to ask this question to me. And I was like,
34:21
Speaker 1: it's not important, just make whatever it is, and she
34:22
Speaker 1: was like no, and she typed in my Indonesian English
34:28
Speaker 1: translator something and it means chest, and I realized then
34:32
Speaker 1: her vague She was vaguely gesturing toward her chest and
34:36
Speaker 1: then pointing to her thigh. So I was supposed to
34:39
Speaker 1: choose the chicken geprec Did I want chicken breast or
34:43
Speaker 1: chicken thigh, and then I was like, oh, that's why
34:46
Speaker 1: she's embarrassed. I get it. Sorry, And this is a
34:48
Speaker 1: super conservative country too, so she wasn't even She was
34:51
Speaker 1: just like vaguely motioning toward the top of her body
34:54
Speaker 1: and then slapping her thigh and she did that three
34:57
Speaker 1: times that I was like, you have to type something.
34:59
Speaker 1: I have no idea what's happening. So she died chest
35:02
Speaker 1: in Indonesia and I was like, oh, thigh, definitely thigh.
35:06
Speaker 1: So I got Iamcaprek and they they fry the chicken.
35:11
Speaker 1: She fried it perfectly. It was delicious, no extra oil
35:14
Speaker 1: when she brought it out. And then they use the
35:16
Speaker 1: sambal plow, which is like the pestle in a mortar
35:20
Speaker 1: and pestle or the mortar whatever. The smashy part is
35:24
Speaker 1: mortar and pesel. Yeah, I think the mortar is the
35:27
Speaker 1: smashy part. It's called a sambal plow or a plow also,
35:31
Speaker 1: and she used the plow to smash the chicken ahead
35:34
Speaker 1: of time. So after it's fried and like cooked and
35:37
Speaker 1: ready to go, she smashes it in and then she's
35:40
Speaker 1: made sambal belong like the local hot sauce and that
35:44
Speaker 1: gets mixed into the smashed chicken, so it's mixed in, like, yeah,
35:50
Speaker 1: it's really mixed into the chicken. This sambal, they made
35:53
Speaker 1: the spicy fresh chili sauce and it was really good,
35:58
Speaker 1: and yeah, she she gave it to me and there
36:01
Speaker 1: was fresh rice and a little salad with it, and
36:04
Speaker 1: it was absolutely delicious. Cus like I don't know, seventy
36:09
Speaker 1: cents something like that, but it was great. I'm going
36:11
Speaker 1: to go back to her just because her cooking technique
36:14
Speaker 1: was so good and her rice was really good, which
36:16
Speaker 1: is important, and I got a little salad, but she
36:20
Speaker 1: just fried it so good. I'm actually going to try
36:23
Speaker 1: the breast next time, because I don't like chicken breast.
36:30
Speaker 1: I think it's dry and boring and always overcooked. But
36:33
Speaker 1: the chickens here clearly don't have any hormones or anything.
36:37
Speaker 1: They're like skinny little things, and real chicken can taste
36:42
Speaker 1: good if someone makes real chicken well, and I think
36:50
Speaker 1: she makes chicken well, and these are all real chickens.
36:52
Speaker 1: So I'm going to give chicken breast to try and
36:54
Speaker 1: see how it is. Indonesian chicken breast. Okay, Well, there's
37:00
Speaker 1: a bunch more to talk about because I went to
37:01
Speaker 1: the zoo recently, but that's like a long I expect
37:06
Speaker 1: there's going to be a lot to talk about because
37:08
Speaker 1: I have so many memories of that rolling around in
37:10
Speaker 1: my mind. So I'll probably leave that for the next episode.
37:13
Speaker 1: Next ramble on, I hope you have a great rest
37:17
Speaker 1: of your day. Talk to me a bit of a
37:18
Speaker 1: Rambler at gmail dot com or bit of a Rambler
37:21
Speaker 1: on Blue Sky on Lemmy, I'll talk back. Have a
37:25
Speaker 1: great rest of your day. Thanks for listening.