Wuthering Heights - what a drama!
Sengiggi,
Indonesia
Friday, August 8, 2008
Day 154 - Arrived at the airport at 5am and with over 3 hours to kill, I found a quiet bench, put my thick socks on and spread out for a snooze. I probably would have been able to sleep until check in, if I hadn't have woken feeling people looking at me! There was noone around when I settled down initially, but I woke to a small audience!
The flight took under and hour to Mataram in Lombok and as the sky was clear and I had a window seat I could see the sea below and the Gili Islands as we approached Lombok. However I noticed we passed the runway and circled, and so assumed the runway must be busy. However, when we reached the start point again the pilot came on the loud speaker to admit they had had problems trying to land, which is now fixed and "the aircraft is NOW UNDER CONTROL"! And, err... when was it NOT under control?!
Anyway, we made it ok and once at the airport I got a taxi straight to Sengiggi, just further north along the coast from Mataram. I got the pleasure of two taxi drivers, as the one was in training, and had my first taste of meeting men from Lombok - that is to say, they are obsessed with cockney! Being extremely tired, I failed him trying to come up with any slang for him to broaden his vocabulary with, and I could see the disappointment on his face. Nonetheless, he persisted in displaying what he knew to me, with the likes of "tip top" and "hang on", and the Lombok favourite (which you get absolutely everywhere once you tell someone you are English) - "war - urgh" (water).
Sonya Guesthouse is a cute little homestay and is everything I want for 60,000IDR - basically a bed, shower and peace and quiet. I went for a walk into town and with the hopes of finding Lombok a place to relax after the constant hassles of Java, I was quite disappointed to find a tonne of touts following me along the street, which was particularly augmented as there are fewer tourists walking about and so the hassling is more concentrated! They even came up with their hands full of necklaces when I was sat in a cafe, until they noticed I was not in a tolerant mood and hastily back tracked! Indonesia is interesting, rich in culture and unbeatably beautiful, but today, everytime I had someone burp, fart, spit, barge, smoke, hassle, being letchy or trying to rip me off (which happens more than you think) the more I wanted out of this place!
Thankfully, the sweet old lady owner at the guesthouse is very sweet and is a good cook too. So I escaped to my veranda and had some home cooking, feeling very fortunate in my choice of accommodation (which I later had reason to regret). The next few days will be mostly aimed at reading, eating fruit and avoiding hassling people as much as possible!
Day 155 - After waking up slow and eating a banana pancake (with Jack Johnson in my head), I went to the bookshop to exchange my book, with the idea of taking my new one to the beach for the day. The day's design went slightly array, however, as I had a major disagreement with the bookshop owner, which ended with me swearing at him and him calling me a "bad tourist"! It was basically due to him trying to charge me three times what my neighbour had just paid for a book exchange, when my book was in perfect condition, as opposed to hers which had pages falling out (and was incidentally the one I wanted to exchange for). His justification for doing this was comparing the prices printed on the back cover - of course my copy of Wuthering Heights being about 50 years old was only worth 2 pounds fifty when it was published, and the newer book was more expensive as it was printed last year! Deciding not to go into the concept of inflation with him, I rejected that plea and endured his second strategy... being that he liked the new book more than mine! Since his english was limited, I am quite sure he knew nothing of english literature and so told him he was talking nonsense, and so the episode ended with me leaving, still holding onto my Wuthering Heights!
Absolutely seething, I walked into town in search of another bookshop - the boss had the cheek to direct me, knowing full well there were no others! I was drawn into a tourist information office for help and ended up sitting down and chatting to the three guys inside, about the homosexual serial killer that had been caught in Java and other subjects such as gender equality in Indonesia. After a while, one of them named Wawan (pronounced Wow...an), took me on his motorbike to a lovely little homestay where I might be able to exchange my book. The choice was limited but I was able to find a temporary fix and spent a few more hours drinking coffee and chatting with Wawan and his friends at the guesthouse.
Mid afternoon I was returned to my guesthouse and rushed to Yessy cafe at the end of the road for some late lunch. The waiters were very friendly and had some more english phrases to entertain me with. I had to apologise to one of the waiters whom I ignored yesterday on the street when in my intolerant mood on my way into town but everything was "sweet as a nut" by the time I left!
Wawan picked me up at 5pm and took me a few kilometres north of town to a restaurant called Coco Beach, (which is by the beach and surrounded by coconut trees) to watch the sunset over Mt Agung in Bali, but it was too cloudy to see well and instead we sat and drank Bintang. We then swapped vehicles, from bike to car, and drove into Mataram to see the city at night, stopping halfway at a furniture store for me to use the toilet! Back in Sengiggi, we had dinner at a flash resort on the beach - literally a tbale on the beach with a lampost - which was very good seafood (Wawan ate with his hands, thus being the Sasak way). Afterwards we went to Happy Bar, which had a band playing the likes of Sting and the obligatory Hotel California... the singer was incredible. The place was packed with tourists (God knows where they've been hiding) and I was particularly taken with a creepy, older gentleman, with snake hips and his shirt unbuttoned to the bottom of his breastplate, revealing a medallion laid upon his bare chest! Wawan and I shared a jug of jungle juice, which is a fruity cocktail containing the indigenous rice wine, arak.
Day 156 - After breakfast, Wawan picked me up in his car and set off for Kuta, Lombok, which is about 1.5 hours away from Sengiggi. On the way we stopped at Mataram to buy some music and some oranges and had a lovely drive to the South Coast and back: with my choice of Jimi Hendrix on the way there and Wawan's preference for the return; Sting.
Kuta is absolutely stunning - one of the most beautiful and quiet beaches I have ever seen. The town is very small and basically consists of sparsely situated local shacks and restaurants, and is therefore quite delightful and unspoilt. The surrounding area is extremely dry and cannot sustain rice, creating a barren drought-filled landscape of goats and dust. When we arrived we drove to a restaurant on the top of the hill, which has a fantastic view of the bay and palms below. After lunch we drove to the furthest bay and sat in the shade and enjoyed the quiet. There were a few locals trying to sell things on the beach, but having a local with me, there was no hard sell and they were actually quite nice. Wawam bought a pineapple off a sweet old man whose only knowledge of english was "coconut" and "pineapple", which we shared as he explained to me how a tourist died last year in my room at Sonya's due to an excessive combination of alcohol and paracetemol! Ewww!
There are more local people enjoying the beach than tourists and after a swim in the sea I was coaxed into a photo with a group of teenage boys. I am really pleased I decided to go to Kuta as it is really beautiful and so untouched. Although Lombok is small, it has so much to offer and I prefer it to Bali already. We left at around 5pm and drove to Mataram, myself watching the pickups and trucks crammed with people. I decided to stay in Mataram that night as I had no inclination to go back to Sonya's, and instead stayed in a very quiet little homestay with a very sweet lady owner and two gorgeous dogs. Despite being the capital of Lombok, Mataram is one of the places least used to tourists, and the amount of excitment I stirred up when i went to buy some water was quite phenomenal!
Wawan came back from Sengiggi later in the evening and we went to a Chinese restaurant called '99' where we enjoyed delicious seafood and bought some pearls simultaneously. Throughout the entire meal, Wawan was busy doing business - bargaining over sms! Has to be the most inefficient means of agreeing a price to rent his motorbike! We went back to my hotel veranda and had some drinks. Being the only guests there, the owners brought us some bugis (gooey rice and coconut milk with brown sugar wrapped in a banana leaf). Once the gin was finished and my eyes were drooping I went to bed and poor Wawan drove all the way back home to Sengiggi.
Day 157 - Wawan collected me at 7:30 in the morning and we took the most scenic route to the Gili Islands jetty at Bangsal over the hills in the middle of the island, on a road known as monkey forest, which is lined with monkeys!
Bangsal is pretty horrible - full of touts and horse karts, but being with Wawan meant I avoided most of the hassling and once the boat ticket to Gili Air had been bought, we sat down for a Lombok coffee and local breakfast of rice, veg and chilli which was bloody spicy! As we were chatting, Wawan mentioned how they call the Gilis 'Gili ATM' (Air, Trawangan and Meno)... and then it dawned on me - S**T! I forgot to get money out of the ATM and there's no banks on the Gili Islands! Despite Wawans proposals to lend me some money, I wasn't comfortable with the idea and decided I'd have to go back to Sengiggi and try again tomorrow! As I believe most things turn out for the best, it turned out to be a great day as we took another route to Sengiggi along the coast, which is breathtakingly stunning the entire way - the scenery in Lombok is far more beautiful than I had imagined.
Wawan left me at a really nice hotel called Pondok Damai a few kilometres north of Sengiggi on the beach, which was a splurge for a night, but worth it. The bungalow was gorgeous, as was the beach to which the hotel looks out onto - better than anything in the town itself. I went to the beach to watch the surfers and wasn't alone for long as the street (or in this case beach) sellers and surfers were soon surrounding me. I kept in mind Wawan's warnings of male gigolos that seduce girls on beaches, but since I had a day to kill, quite enjoyed the company.
I ate lunch at the hotel, while talking to the young bartender called Hassan. I was in the mood for talking to strangers today! Afterwards I needed to go into town for the ATM and to book the bus to Gilis tommorrow and one of the sellers, Mel, took me on his motorbike. As I walked to the front to meet him, Hassan put his arm around me and then tried to kiss me, which shocked me beyond belief and resulted in a rather aggressive shove from my side and an exclamation of "what the hell?"!
I am wary of people offering to help me in Indonesia, as a great deal of the touts are pushy, dishonest and greedy, which kind of ruins it for the nice ones who are generally generous and good natured. I spent the afternoon by the beach with Mel and since I was bored and although he did not say it, times are clearly hard and he needs the money, I asked him to give me a henna tattoo. At one point I was sat on the sun lounger, having henna applied to my finger nails (which I consequently regretted when he told me it lasts months!), flicking through DVDs and trying on sunglasses!
Aside from the selling, the touts also proved a nuisance when it started to get dark and each one seemed to want to take me to Sengiggi. I declined every offer and was almost kissed against my will again, before they finally took no for an answer.
So, having finally shaken them all off, I went to the hotel restaurant for a hot ginger and some peace and was immediately approached by another henna artist called Leo who kept trying to join me and by the end I was quite frank in saying "no, I don't want you to sit down" and it took him 15 minutes to finally disappear. Mind you, seconds later a very funny Aussie called Nathan, skipped the asking and just plonked his Bintang in front of the chair opposite me and as he sat down, told me not to worry, he wasn't going to hit on me as he is here with his girlfriend! The next few hours he proceeded to tell me of his unfortunate childhood and how women love him! It was a mixture of entertainment and inappropriate disclosure of information to someone you've just met. After a while Wawan turned up and the three of us went to dinner at Coco Beach. We were the only ones there, sat on cushions on the floor drinking Bintang and watching the stars.
