Indonesia

Day One: Survived a flight and Amy touched an arm
Summary: Amy and I got a room at Rita's House with a nice little set up, cold water, and an alright location to some restaurants and shops. That night after some Mexican in our bellies we fell asleep. First our beds were apart until in the middle of the night Amy woke up hysterically screaming that she touched someones arm. She jumped on top of me in the pitch black. And we all know that I am scared of the dark and wasn't going to allllllll the way to the door to turn it on. Come to find out, her arm was asleep and she touched it. She moved the beds and this is how it ended up. The rest of the trip we slept either in the same bed or pushed them together.

Day 2: A tourist ripped of on a ferry ride and supported a poor boys education with $3.
Summary: Got up early and went to Pandangbai to catch a ferry to the island next to Bali called Lombok. The driver took us straight to the "ticket office". We paid 200,000 for a ticket and a ride to our first city (equivalent to $20). The ticket is 27,000 ($2.70). Our first mistake. I read in the book something close to that price, but was off a zero. A big zero. Whoops. The ferry was packed full of trucks, motorbikes, and only one safety boat for all of the passengers. I blew up my inflatable pillow just in case because we all know if they didn't have boats, they weren't going to have life jackets for all of us. We did get to the city of Sengigi and bought an overpriced boat from a boy off the street. All of that money was put to good use I hope. This was used for his schooling he told me in perfect English from a 10 year old, poor Indonesian. Unlike my Japanese students who have the education and can't answer, how are you.... The boy asked where I was from, I said the United States. So I asked him where he was from..... He said his mother.

The overloaded trucks packing into our old ferry.

Another ferry waiting to dock.

The view from the ferry of Lombok

Day 3: First River Crossing and witnessed extreme fishing
Summary: We woke up to see a temple. We walked along the beach and climbed over some rocks and decided to keep walking until we found this temple that actually couldn't be reached by the beach. It was soo close only a dirty river. We were assisted by some of the workers who tromped right through the river over to grab our hands and lead us back. Once inside the temple we witnessed some extreme fishing. Then we passed out at Cafe Alberto's in the sun. Ended up walking through town and watched the sun set while trying not to buy anything from the beach hagglers. That night we played dominos with boys who sold us the boat. We shared Oreos and stories of the politics of Indonesia.

The beach stalls full of food and souvenirs.


Our domino playing boys

Day 4: Markets, mountains, monkeys, and Amy uses a bucket to pee.
Summary: We started the day early with our driver named Dingdong. I loved it but then I couldn't call Amy a ding dong. We climbed a mountain for a temple and got a lovely view. Checked out some markets that sell everything. It was definitely a locals market because the rip off name brands weren't there. They were sure persistent on me buying meat from them. Let me whip out my portable grill and cook some up for all of you. Dingdong took us to some pottery place that i wanted to go to. Yes I bought some heavy stuff and had to lug it around the rest of the trip. They used egg shells to decorate it. Then off to a weaving community. Some of the things they were weaving took a month to make working full-time-job-hours. I bought it for about $35 dollars. We found our way to the south and walked along the beach and witnessed some extreme fishing. (Don't worry mom he wore a helmet just in case he slipped.) We trekked back up to the mountains to a town called Tetebatu. We got a nice little bungalow and slept in the top of it. The bungalow made of thatch had holes in it for the thatch to breath. Amy covered them up so bugs wouldn't eat her. But she was terrified that the toilet was soo far away that she brought a bucket up next to her side of the bed for the midnight run.

The temple view. On the hike up, we encountered monkeys in every direction.

The markets of everything

Extreme fishing

I got attacked by the boys and Amy got attacked by the girls.

A cute little lady from the weaving village. She told us we were beautiful.

That's what you get for tonight because it took me too long and i am out of creative juices.