Sulawesi Trip part 1
Trip Start
Jul 29, 2008
1
5
25
Trip End
Ongoing
Makassar,
Sulawesi,
Indonesia
Monday, September 8, 2008
- Arrive in Makassar via plane. The plane we took was Lion Air. Lion
air is one of the planes mentioned on the state department website as
unsafe to fly. There were two students whose parents refused to have
them on this flight. They took the safer and more expensive option
Guarda. The flight was fine on the way there. The only thing that
alarmed me was instead of safety cards they have prayer cards. You
pray to whatever god that you believe in that they will get the plane
there safely. I hope they still do safety checks on the plane and
don't just put it into God's hands. The only thing scary was the
landing, instead of a nice smooth landing. It just planted itself
down and everyone was clutching the seat hoping the breaks would work
and it would stop. One of my students told me that it was an example
of interia. So, at least I know I have taught them something in
Physics.
Makassar is the southern part of Sulawesi. It is a port town and
looked much different than Surabaya. Makassar was a port town and
just like the port towns in the states and Sicily. In my view, it
looks dirtier than the rest of the area. There were more bars and
just different types of people. I was used to be friendly Indonesians
from Java, who smile and wave all the time. Makassar indonesians are
know for tempers and carrying knives in the old days. It was
interesting, to see another breed of the Indonesian people.
Although, I love the people on Java island the best.
Our first stop is the hotel. The hotel was overlooking the water. I
meant to take a picture of the wonderful view outside my window.
However, I just forgot with all of the craziness from the kids. It
was nice to finally see the ocean. Our next stop was Fort Rotterdam
(historical artifact left over from the invasions of Netherlands and
Japan). It was a nice little fort, this was my first inkling that the
students were going to be a handful. Instead of listening to the
guide, they wander through the museum talking and taking silly
pictures. I gave them my speech, if an adult talks you listen. They
were good for the next 10 minutes and then moved on to hopelessly
wandering and not listening. Next to the fort was the La Galigo
Museum (learning about Sulawesi history through artifacts from Gowa
Kingdom). I wish I had more to report here. But, I spent my time
chasing after students. Next, we went to the harbor. You should
check out some of these boats and see how they are loaded. There were
loads of cement or boxes on one truck and you are paid by how many you
load on to the boat. Some of the boats looked like they were going to
sink. Before dinner, we caught the sunset on the beach. The beach
was just down the road from the pier. The pier water looked heavily
polluted. So, our students did not swim in the water. It was nice to
see the sunset on our little tropical island. We finished night
swimming in the hotel pool.
