A post on fitness

This post is dedicated to fitness and goes over some of my fitness endeavors here in Palembang.

Novotel    So I meant to write this post weeks ago, but was re-inspired today by a trip to Novotel, the nicest hotel in Palembang. I had been wanting to check it out for awhile because it looks very impressive from the outside, and the pictures I'd seen from the inside were equally beautiful. So today I decided to treat myself to a day at the pool and nice gym. And it's very nice, but it cost like it too. It was ~$15 for day use (which included gym, steam room, sauna, and pool. plus a burger/noodle/rice dish). For reference, the gym I go to now costs ~$10, a month! I was glad I had set aside a whole day here, and have given myself lots of time by the pool reading, and it was great to see an elliptical for the first time in 3 months. I laughed at myself in the sauna and steam room, leaving the hot sun outside to sit in an even hotter more humid room inside. How silly.
    It really is a mini-vacation here- everybody speaks english and wants to assist you with anything you want to do. It's nice to have a little get away. I was considering a membership here for the remainder of my time here, but it would be about ~$85/month, and it would drastically cut the number of interactions I had with people in the community. My gym isn't anything fancy, but it has it's charms.

Basketball at school
    A few weeks ago my school repainted it's basketball court, and the coach invited me to their practice the following Sunday. I warned him that although I like basketball, I'm better at watching than I am playing. When I first showed up I was shooting around with some of the students, and happened to make all of my first few shots. It was completely misleading. Later when we were doing drills and I wasn't making any shots, the coach announced that if I made a basket everyone would have to do push ups. Lucky for everyone, I still couldn't make a shot.
    Regardless of my poor performance, the coach put me on the scrimmage game with all the best players. Although I still couldn't make any shots, I was decent at marking and was good at switching back and forth between offense and defense and the first one up or down the court, so I think I earned my place on the team. Then we did an all girls scrimmage. That was fun because I was taller than all the other girls, and could run faster and throw the ball farther. I felt a little guilty about all of this, but overall fun was had by all.

Sunday morning "jogging"
    There is a park in the middle of the city called "kambang iwok" with a pond, and it takes up about half a city block. On Sunday mornings, the community all gets up early for a little exercise. They city closes off the surrounding streets so that people can run/walk/bike around the loop. I have only been once, but I am supposed to go again tomorrow. It isn't exactly exercise, because whenever the teachers from my school want to go for a "jog", it ends up being a very short very slow walk. But some people do exercise there! They have the largest congregation of Zumba enthusiasts that I have ever seen. There are hundreds of people dancing along with a number of instructors, and they take up an entire corner of the track. It's impressive.
    There is also a neat little bike community there. It's the only time it's really safe to ride your bike in Palembang, so people bring out all kinds of bikes. The kids are there to actually ride there bikes, but then there are lots of really cool people who just stand next to there bikes. There are different cliques too. Old school bikes, fixed gear bikes, nice road bikes, each group has there designated hang out spot along the track. I don't know if they groups have any beef with each other, but all the guys look pretty tough so I'd imagine so.

Mercy Fitness & Salon
    Now I'll talk about my gym. Maybe sometime I'll profile all of the different characters I've met, but for now I'll just give an overview. The first two floors of the building are filled with chairs and beds for all sorts of salon/spa treatments, and then the gym is on the third floor of this lovely old un-airconditioned building. If I were to compare it to another gym, I'd say it's like average joe's gym from the movie Dodgeball, but it's an all women's gym. Which is really fun. These women come in all dressed in long pants/shirts, with head scarves, then dress down to shorts and a tank top and they are ready to go. They are still entertained by their bule member and I often get interrupted several times throughout my workout for photos. So there are hundreds of photos of me, gross and sweaty, somewhere out there in Indonesia. Also, whenever I show up I can hear both my name and the word bule and my name being shouted from the entrance up to the third floor where the gym is, so there is a nice welcoming crowd ready to greet me by the time I get up there, along with techno remixes to 80's hits.
    The ladies in the gym are excited to talk to me and work out with me and all have really fun goofy personalities. Perfect for working out with. There are lots of weights/machines, a few cardio machines, some spinning bikes, and a TV. There is always some sort of Zumba-esque video playing, with different people joining in or dropping out as they like. Everyone is very welcoming and thoughtful, and they always want to give me a ride to or from the gym. There have even been a few minor arguments about who gets to take me. It's funny being such a novelty sometimes.
    The instructor there is really excited to have me there, has shown me how to use everything in there, and makes my arms want to fall off. My first day there she gave me a ride home, after a detour to her own house where I took lots of pictures with her and her children (post-workout, so very sweaty). She has also asked me about becoming a fitness instructor. I briefly considered it, but didn't seem like a good idea for a multitude of reasons, most importantly I'm not allowed to do any outside work from Fulbright.