We got back home to Jakarta last Thursday afternoon after travelling through 13 time zones and 3 long haul flights over 3 days. By the time we arrived at Soekarno-Hatta we both felt absolutely wretched, and Pedro even more so as he had to endure all the travelling with a roaring temperature, shivers and flu. How I got him back in one piece and alive I don’t know, but it was touch and go that’s for sure. Farjar met us with a beaming smile at the airport and it felt so good to have a friendly face there to greet us, especially when he said ‘Welcome back home Pak Pete and Ibu Lottie’ and I knew that he meant it.

It’s Sunday now and we both still feel like zombies and neither of us are yet sleeping properly. We tend to crash out at the most inconvenient times, then wake up thinking it’s the morning when in fact it’s only 6pm. I’ve been up all through the night ever since we landed and when I do sleep, I have the most weird dreams.

Last night I dreamt about Prince Harry. Now before I get started on this, I need to tell you something. I am not, I repeat not, a Royalist. I don’t dislike them; it’s just that I have little interest in the Royal family in general. I thank my lucky stars that I was never born with an ounce of blue blood in me, and I harbour no secret fantasies of Harry or any other prince come to think of it so where this Harry dream came from, I haven’t a clue. Anyway, despite the fact that I once fancied myself having a career in Psychotherapy, and was devastated to be then rejected for the MA degree course in London (something I have now got over thanks to loads of therapy) I cannot make head nor tail of this dream so if anyone has any ideas, please let me know.

Ok, this is the scenario: Pedro and I have come off a plane and are somewhere like Africa or South America. We arrive at a centre where there are lots of young students, back packers etc. It’s obviously an establishment of some sort and I think the students are all going to be doing something physical like climb a mountain or go on a long hike. Pedro disappears at this point of the dream and I am left in a corridor where people are waiting around with their bags. As I walk through the corridor Prince Harry is there in a queue with some other students. He smiles at me and says ‘Hello Lottie, how are you’ (God knows how, but Harry and I have already met as he’s very friendly and seems to know me from somewhere) he then goes to shake my hand but then realising it’s a bit formal, puts his arms around me gives me a hug and then kisses me 3 times, once on each cheek then another for luck I presume. He then whispers in my ear, ‘Please help me, I’ve got to fill in this form and hand it back to the desk, but I don’t know my postcode (zip code) for Buckingham palace.

‘I know it’s really stupid, but I’ve never had to fill in a form before and they don’t know who I am so I’m a bit embarrassed’.

I tell Harry not to worry and that I will go and explain to someone and sort it out for him.

I leave the corridor and go into the office where there are a number of women sat behind a long desk doing all the paperwork and there are students lining up with their forms.

I go up to one of the women and ask if I can have a private word with her. I tell her that it’s very confidential. She comes over to my side of the desk and we walk to the other side of the room where no one can overhear the conversation. I start trying to tell her about Prince Harry not knowing his postcode but then I start to stutter uncontrollably. I can’t actually get the words out. End of dream.

There have been several other really odd ones but that is the weirdest.

Jakarta is looking very green so it must have been doing some raining whilst we’ve been away the past month. Friday was very hot and unusually there were clear blue skies, something that you don’t see much of here despite the heat because of the umbrella of pollution that hangs over the city much of the time.

It’s good to be back but it is a bit of a culture shock after 4 weeks of being fully westernised again.

The good new is that the cockroaches seemed to have vanished but the washing machines up to it’s old tricks again flooding, and spewing water everywhere so guess it’s back to buy yet another hose attachment. Everything else is looking good.

Tomorrow is Chinese New Year so it’s a holiday here. If the Irishman is up to it, I’m going to drag him up to Chinatown and get a piece of the action.

HAPPY NEW YEAR EVERYONE!