One Year Away

Penny

Indonesia is an interesting place. We arrived in Jakarta planning to spend two days in the city to organize our Indonesian itinerary and book our flights to New Zealand. After being in Jakarta for a few hours, we changed our plans and made sure to leave the city the following morning. What we saw of the city is unimpressive and somewhat depressing. There seems to be a lack of a true city center, it is not pedestrian friendly, but is polluted, congested and dirty. In the small residential alleys of the city, chickens and ducks live side-by-side with humans. That is particularly concerning after having heard all of the news reports about the avian flu cases in Jakarta in the last few weeks.

We often find refuge from unpleasant cities and towns in our guesthouse or hotel. Not this time! After looking at a few different places, we settled for the best of the worst. The only solace was the fact that it only cost about $5. As we checked in, we asked what room we should use. The owner waved us upstairs and said, “Any one, just don’t take mine!"

Trying to avoid spending any of our waking hours at the guesthouse, we roamed around the city going to Internet places and travel agents. Eating was another challenge. Most of the restaurants around our guesthouse were uninspiring. In places like this, homesickness hits fast and hard! So, for dinner we wanted something familiar. McDonald’s was out of the question having gone there to use the bathroom earlier in the day and having seen 3 cockroaches. For dinner we went to Chilli’s for burgers, nachos and free soda refills!

The following morning we returned to the airport for our flight to Kalimantan (the Indonesian side of  Borneo). We landed in the town of Palangka Raya and quickly tried to get organized and get to the town of Pangkalan Bun where we planned to stay. The people in Kalimantan are extremely friendly and helpful. We went to a local hotel and got information concerning bus schedules. We were not guests of the hotel but they gave us all the information we needed and allowed us to leave our big packs with them as we rushed to the bus station to buy the last two tickets on the Air-con night bus; the seats farthest in the back directly on top of the engine.

The 14 hour ride was an adventure. Being at the back of the bus, we were bouncing all over the place as the bus driver tried to navigate around all the potholes and other vehicles on the road. Only about half way into the trip, the bus broke down. At first we were hopeful that we would be able to get back on the road within a few minutes. Unfortunately, it was only after 3 hours and a lot of tinkering and the replacement of a few parts of the engine that we were able to continue the trip. The wait was long and we were exhausted but as we waited for the bus driver/mechanic to fix the bus, we had the chance to also make friends. The people in Kalimantan are out-going and readily approach Orang Asings (i.e. Foreigners). Thanks to Jimmy and the rest of our newfound Indonesian friends, the 3 hour wait was filled with laughs and learning the language, Bahasa Indonesia.

We are looking forward to seeing some of the Borneo wildlife in the next few days. We have already planned a three day trip where we are going to visit an Orang Utang rehabilitation center. We will let you know how it goes!