Bring Some Souvenirs, Please !!!

Well it’s official: all my travel dates are locked in and my tickets are purchased. I will have a nice trip to back home – Indonesia and some other counties on the way there with my best friend, friend and Ahhaaaaa… Finally I got a news from Alan this morning, login my YM and he waited for me to telling me the good news, that he will join me (us) in Singapore and follow the our itinerary all the way perhaps come to Jakarta as well. Woooohoooooooo… I am so excited. Alan is my old buddy from pretty long time ago, who moved from LA to Philipina a year ago. The last time I met him. When he visited Europe, around 3 years ago. Great.. it would be just great!

Can’t hardly wait for this. I’m definitely looking forward to catching up over many things with family and friends.
In the other side, knowing that I will travel back home, friends and relatives have been asking me what “oleh-oleh” ( little gifts) I should buy/bring back for them from here. It is very common in Indonesia to give bring “oleh oleh ” to relatives, friends, co-workers and whoever knowing you. Oleh-oleh means a little gift. A gift means something that you give to someone on a special occasion (pulang kampung for example or back from your trip) to thank them, to remind them as relatives and friends and show them that you’ve been there. I am not kind of person who like buying some souvenirs for everybody from wherever I go except my parents, my Kakung and my brothers or my close friends and close relatives.

Because sometime, their request what I should bring as oleh-oleh. And they will give me a quite long list, things that I should buy for them as oleh-oleh. Ola la la… I am not a Santaclaus who give away gifts. Sometime they asked for an expensive things that I never thought I would like to buy it for myself for example one of my friend asked me to buy a T-shirt AJAX original for her son as oleh oleh from me. I don’t even ever meet her son. And do you know how much it cost? 25-30 Euro each. It seem only a couple Euro but come on! Don’t you know that 25 euro means I need to work for 2 hours. Yes, understand.. oleh-oleh seems like a culture in Indonesia. I don’t mind at all to bring something sometime I asked what I can buy from here to my relatives and close friends because I would love to do that. Hehehe…. Sounds I am a pretty bad person, indeed.

Yes, I admit that I like to get oleh-oleh also. I remember, one of my friend always gave me Archie Comics everytime he got back from Singapore/Malaysia. A routine oleh-oleh that he always gave me. Hehehe… And yes I missed that now.
This trip…. I will bring some nice stories and also a lot of pictures. What do you think???