Banjarmasin - our entry point to Kalimantan

It is 24 km from the airport to the centre of Banjarmasin it is interesting your first impressions on the trip from the airport. There are lots of trucks, on the back of minibuses, the only ads I have seen are for chain saws, at the petrol stations there are huge queues.

As we look for accommodation we hear this constant electronic sound of birds and as we look skyward we see lots of razor wire around the tops of buildings. We find out it is the sound of swallows ( the swallow nests are used for a special chinese delicacy –bird nest soup) so houses for swallows at the tops of buidings are built and their nests are harvested regularly.

Mosques – they are everywhere. There are many things about Islam that is interesting such as Ramadan where people use this month to reflect on and give money to the poor, the trip to Mecca – The Haj where everyone wears the same clothes and walks the same trail rich/poor alike.

But what is it with the singing that is everywhere on loud speakers at many times of the day?

Why are the women so covered up – it is just so hot!!! 

There are just some things that I find difficult to undersand.

The only other whiteys we have seen were a couple in the airport. Most of the hotels we try are full – it is high season so there are many domestic tourists. There must be a spotting fee for tour guides as it doesn’t take long before Tailah finds us– a guide mentioned in the Lonely Planet guide book. We organise a floating market tour, short trip to the Loksodo area for some walking, staying in a long house and a bamboo raft trip. We seem to be spending a lot of money in Kalimantan – plane trips, guides trips etc. because they are comparatively expensive

Transport in Kalimantan in days gone by was predominantly water based – up and down rivers and then to the sea. Mining (coal, diamonds, gold), palm-oil plantations, forestry, transmigration, and in general exploiting the natural environment (as we do in Australia) has resulted in opening up Kalimantan to land based transport.

When going on a trip to the floating markets it is interesting to see all the houses that are built on the river. There is a land frontage and the back section is built on ironwood supports with usually a boat tied up to landing platform. People are washing themselves, their clothes or just getting moving early in the morning. The trip gave me an emotional understanding of how people from Kalimantan’s lives are bound to the rivers.

Even in the smaller rives the water is brown. It has come a long way and there is lots of activity upstream. When we are on the main river that enters to the sea we see large sea-going vessels, coal is floating down the river on huge barges, there are huge stockpiles of wood and timber machine factories on either side of the aprox 200m wide river and in amongst all of this there is a floating fruit and vegetable market.

We buy rambutans and think about breakfast (we got up at 5am) and then a little tea and coffee shop floats by!!!! Sweet tea and cakes selected with a long piece of wood with a nail.

Islam,  floating markets.  river transport,

Four ferries three buses two days one night

Tannah air –Indonesia -the country of land and water

To Indonesians tannah air means Indonesia, there are national songs that are written about it.

We realise we need to get moving if we want to get to Kalimantan – and we do. High season difficult to get a flight we miss one ‘stand by’ by 10 minutes. So…… there is always the bus, ferry, mini-bus, night bus, ferry, bus, ferry, bus and to finish this off sweetly a  taxi air conditioned gentle music that will get us back to Kuta. I may have mentioned the bus was executive class (looked long and hard for the executives – I think they caught the plane). This is the way most people travel. Sleep when you can, wherever, make sure you get down to your bus before it leaves the ferry, hope your bus starts and the drivers are awake for the night trip. We all know Indonesia has many islands but it doesn’t become real until you need to get between them.

In many of the ports there are ferries waiting to be filled just docked and leaving they have phrases such as ‘We Bridge the nation’ ‘ We serve the nation’ painted on the side with the Indonesian flag flying.

On many of the buses they have ‘Pulang di kampung’ which means go home to the village – the bus is full of people who have settled on a different island from their home. It is now holiday home so this group is going home to their village on Java. This gives a human face to Transmigrasi. The government in the past have moved people from areas of dense population to areas that are less populated. There are issues as I am sure you can imagine.

Things that are interesting about the bus/ferry trip

Speaking Indonesian – people in Indonesia seem more friendly than in Australia. It is between all people that they chat ask each other about where they come from and where they are going etc and if you speak a little Indonesian you can be part of this. This is more common on buses and ferries than on planes.

Food in the middle of the night 3.30 – Why!!!

Each island a different language/languages and different cultures. You think you have a handle on a few key local words then it changes even within one island there may be several languages. The architecture is different, the main religion, the food the traditional clothes. There are so many different ethnic groups in one nation.

In Bali we stay in the midst of the ‘land of the young’ – Kuta/Legian.for two nights. There is always a motorbike passing, the circle K convenience stores are open 24 hours and whatever you want you can buy. It is fun to pick the nationality of the tourist by just their appearance.

You here the term oleh-oleh throughout Indonesia and there are shops devoted to it, stalls near the exit from the town, airport whatever.it means something you bring back from your holiday that you give to those who didn’t come. It is a big thing. Pity those with a big family. Usually they are small things that are special from the place you have been. It is not so unusual really but what we don’t expect is people asking for an oleh-oleh – that’s usual in Indonesia. It is difficult  to know who to give what to, so I sometimes get a bag or box of something and give it to someone to share(a lot of some’s).

Komodo Rinca - The Tour

We came with two Check girls Catherina dan Lucy 19 and 20. From Labuanbajo to Rinca maybe 1and a half hours. At Rinca island there were maybe four or five boats – all tourists doing the same as us. We walked through the mangrove area and mud flats. Many monkeys were sitting there and our guide Bruno said they were often ‘fishing’ putting their tails down the crab holes and then when the crab bites them pulling them out quickly and eating them.

It is more expensive to bring your camera to Rinca and Komodo than enter yourself 50k still camera (video camera even more)and 20k pp to enter the Komodo national park for three days.

Under the guides offices accommodation there were quite a few Komodo dragons – lucky because we didn’t see many on our walk. We saw skulls placed in trees evidence of carnivorous activity by the komodos- monkeys water buffalo and wild pigs. It is interesting the poo of the Komodo is white – even when fresh!!! Great digestion leaving mainly the calcium of the bones.

Water buffalo have been introduced to Rinca so now there only job is to rest eat the grass and be the occasional meal for a dragon.

On the walk we saw Komodo dragon nests they use every year – apparently it is mating season now so they can be aggressive. Usually they have about 15-30 eggs. When the baby komodos hatch they have to be careful often they are eaten by larger komodos.

Later we went snorkelling – beautiful coral and lots of fish all different sizes and colours.

We play a game called Bang bang a Check game all with Spanish outlaw characters and a sheriff. So we shared out Beng-beng bars it was fitting.

Sleeping on the boat in front of the bat island.

Komodo island early the next morning – that was good because it was really hot – at the end of the walk the guide had sweat from his underarms almost to his waist.

Do they train a few Komodos to become semi-tame as the only Komodo we saw was also close to the rangers residence?

Our guide Jhon gave us his speech about Steve Irwin who he met several years ago and said about how he warned him being careful with wild animals.

Then back to the boat - after a big icy cold drink of chocolate milk with sprinkles the search was on for the manta rays. There seems to be a set program you see the same faces on the boats that go to Rinca, snorkel, fruit bat island Komodo, swim with mantas and on to Angel island for snorkelling.

It may be a choreographed thing but I enjoyed it.

Wolowaru Ruteng Labuanbajo

Pak Frans and an ojek driver takes us to Wolowaru Pak Frans takes his son on the bike gently answering the questions he has. It has been an incredible roller coaster of emotions being part of their family and  on leaving I can’t help but cry.

A long trip ahead of us – the thought of being on a bus with five people across with raging music oh no! Steep sides on the roads the roads continually being repaired enlarged or just ‘broken’. Like Cambodia many people ride on top of the bus but not so dusty. How do they do it? - the bus turns this way then the other up down fast slow!

We get on the bus it is express to Ruteng on at 11. First stop 2 minutes down the road for lunch! It was a lunch spot run by nuns. There are a lot of nuns here and many of them were on the move-maybe because of holidays(one nun was returning after 5 years in Kenya - just imagining what the home coming would be like). Several of the young male passengers were in the Seminary returning home as well.

‘Marbuk’ has several meanings – drunk from alcohol, the feeling after chewing betel nut ‘sirih pinang’ and also from being car sick or just plain mini-bus sick. Every half an hour a guy in front of us threw out a ‘tas plastik’ plastic bag he was ‘marbuk sekali’. This happened early on in the trip – the trip to Ruteng his destination was 11 hours!!! Kasihan!!!

‘Inap di Ruteng’ late at night lucky to find a room – up early and on to Labuanbajo.

It is a port town and they are always interesting . Thomas has enjoyed the ‘bencong’ transvestite spotting in the areas close to the ‘kaki-lima’ small stalls with food along the sea front. Every day the ferry from Sumbawa docks and spills out onto the dusty main street. The schedules for the other ferries

require a lot more questioning! We are going to be on that ferry to Sumbawa tomorrow – getting a plane is not that easy as it is high season. We were after a quick get away to Borneo. We will get away on that ferry and the one to Lombok and then Bali but not so quick and sleeping two nights on a bus – executive class no less!!!

Di Kampung dan Maumere

Thanks to Australian/ Indonesian contacts I was able to contact Pak Heri in Australia. He was one of the Flores teachers who stayed with us in 2003. Pak Frans was the other but unfortunately had been unable to contact him.

We were picked up by Pak Heri and had lunch and dinner with him through his contacts he contacted Pak Frans to meet us in Wolawaru about 20K from Kelimutu.

We saw Pak Frans face it was the same gentle kind strong face I remembered. We were picked up by motorbike from Wolowaru and driven along the small and often ‘jelek road to kampung Wolotoi  Jopu. The views are spectacular huge stands of bamboo, bananas, jungle style trees, cacao and kemiri. Most of the roads have steep sides no guard rails etc etc the occasional red and white Roudup sign is stapled to a tree (Monsanto is infiltrating a predominantly chemical free mountain area).

When we arrived there was a fresh burial near Pak Fran’s house. Only two days before his 14 year old niece had died. So in the middle of their sadness – two bules (whities)arrived!!!! There was an orange tarp put up with about twenty plastic chairs around where their niece had been buried. Wax from candles was in piles over her burial site from where they had been praying the night before.

We arrived and had lunch together – Prior to lunch I was offered a sarong to wear obviously a lot more fitting than the clothes I was wearing for a woman of my age!

Chairs were brought into the traditional house beams with split bamboo laid over them for the floor. It was suggested to bring the chairs and a table inside so that we felt comfortable. That was the last time that happened it didn’t feel right.

The first night the rosary was held all the family involved even those that hadn’t started school. The young ones  played with the candles making sure they stayed alight and joined in with the prayers many people just huddled around the burial site.  Flores is a predominantly Catholic island.

It was cooler at night – people wearing their sarongs in many different ways over their heads, over one shoulder, just huddling up under it. Inside Fran’s house it was warmer with the family. Above the cooking fires it is smoke stained the cooking is done inside – there were spaces for two cooking fires on either side of the living area maybe when a lot of food needs to be cooked.

Washing for the village- there is a small road that goes through the village every day a small mini bus goes through and motorbikes going to market or wherever. It is on the side of this small road where the main washing of clothes and people happen. In the afternoon when there are a lot of people its boys/men on one side and girls and women on the other. It is all done very privately wearing your sarong. All the water is carried to the houses everyday from the main water source.

It is a traditional weaving village it is one of the main sources of income for the villagers. They also form an important part of rituals eg when someone dies uncooked rice and a sarong is taken to the house of the family with a death.

Pinang Betel nut custom; it is traditional for women to offer pinang to other women when they arrive. Always the basket comes out with the  green fruit of a tree with a long fruit and lime. In the house the bamboo had some convenient spots for spitting through the floor. Mostly it is outside but it does get cold.

Men seem to offer cigarettes when friends/visitors arrive.

We experienced many things but what struck me most was that all  Pak Fran’s family opened their hearts to us in a time of great sadness.

Boat trip from Kupang to Larantuka

This is the overnight ferry that runs twice a week between the two islands. It was seething humanity just buying the tickets. School holidays so everyone was going home as well as livestock, trucks, cars etc. when we arrived into our economy section- there was just no space. Most people anticipating the full ship were there early hired their mat or brought their own- it is a way of marking your territory on the bunk arrangements for sleeping. I was standing with our gear by a stairwell and Thomas had a wooden seat. This was going to be a very long night.

Being the only Bules on board as there was nowhere for me to sit when checking the tickets they asked us if we wanted to come up the top –open air and room to lie down. How lucky can you be!!!

They even gave us some cushioned mats-gratis!

We were able to see the preparations for meals for over 400- is there something religious in that or did I get the numbers wrong!!!

As the night wore on I went down to the toilet it was located below in the area of ‘seething humanity’, people were chatting, sleeping coiled around luggage, sleeping with arms thrown back on their mats, smoking, sleeping sitting up, not much air, warm/hot and this is 12.00midnight –seven hours to go. I go up to the cool deck with the fresh air and wonder about the analogy of this the privileged few the most who do it exceedingly hard and why one is one and not the other? and why is it like that?

On arrival at Larantuka the bemo hustlers were out in force to get a full bemo/minibus and make the trip to Maumere profitable. In the back of the minibus they expect five people to sit across one row of seats. Thomas’s shoulders take up at least the width of one and a half - pity for all of us in his row.  It was steamy hot until the bemo started moving and then we were plied with ‘duff-duff’, Indonesian love songs, bad western boy band music and Celine Dion at full blast. The roads were windy and there were road works but they didn’t drive fast!! Albeit conditions were squashed our nerves were jangled with the loud music we arrived safely.

Arrived at Ankermi – a small diving accommodation close to Maumere run by a Swiss lady Claudia and her Javanese husband Kermi – it’s the classic simple bungalow accommodation simple open bathroom mezzanine with mattress and double bed with mosquito net on the ground. Clean, subtle, great food, the gentle lapping of water 15m in front of your room AND ‘duff-duff’ free!!!

Woken by roosters but that was good, Snorkelling was nice big soft corals and sponges and a turtle but spoke too soon we exchanged the ‘duff-duff ‘music for ‘duff-duff’ motor noise-aduh.

Still this was an island of non-culture, a mini-western break in the sea of this Indonesian holiday/journey.

The Hell Journey and a little Kupang

Dili to Kupang takes about 12 hours you receive a complimentary snack box before you leave. Maybe sleeping tablets would be better. I was sitting in the front so I could take photos with the window wound down. Little did I realise that I would be seeing everything up close the pot holes, the splits in the road, the very skinny road, the sea down on the side(no guard rails), the trucks, the road works and the schedule the driver needs to keep to reguardless of the previously mentioned road works. I felt like I was in Nepal between Katmandu and Pokara the wide rivers with gravel and fine dust the roads.
The bad decision was sitting in the front – we stopped for an accident moved seating position -what I didn’t know was easier on my nerves.

It was great seeing the countryside from the road rather than a plane but there will be no rush to repeat it.

Now in Kupang the port for many places Bligh found it years ago.

Great seafood at the night market and music at the Lavalon bar with the sound of waves quietly splashing on the shore.

Delayed photos

Dili East Timor

Get off the plane, taxi ride to the city with a lady who works in Malyana.

They have a container terminal smack bang in the middle of the city right in the middle of the road along the beach not far from the many countries that have consular buildings. China has a new, flash and very secure one. China is paying for many of public buildings for the government. They bring in all the materials and labour. (There is a lot of unemployment here!!!!). What does China want? Australia already has provided aid to East Timor and negotiated a oil contract with East Timor which many say is less than generous!! Australia’s consul building is on a busy road far from prestigious.

Many UN, NGO’s vehicles buildings and people.

Pantai kelapa food is barbequed at the beach – chicken drumstick on a stick, fish, sausage, squid everything on a stick!!  The red meat is really well cooked or more so like leather. A meal for 2 – 2 pieces of chicken, 4 satays, 2 small squid and 4 ketupat (solid cooked rice) $7US

Apparently it goes until 3 in the morning might be tricky finding a taxi home at that time.

You can never have enough small money $1 $5 US notes are essential because it is not always easy to get change. Even the ATM’s give out $100US broken up into 4-20’s and 4-5’s. It is more expensive than Indonesia. Taxis are an easy way to get around

Indonesian is still spoken and can be a great communication aid if English Portuguese or Tennen is not part of the equation. Not cool for some though.

Obrigato, Nada  Thank you, You’re welcome in Tennen

Great to hang out on the sea front especially as the sun sets.

Goodbye Darwin

Delayed by plane BUT free accommodation meal allowance. Not quite East Timor but do they have a wavepool? do they have Austar in the room? hot water and air-conditioning and a minibar? is there a $70 meal allowance for 2 people? I don’t think we will be experiencing those things there!

We think it is goodbye Darwin tomorrow.

Into the great unknown………..

capital of top end

Stayed with the McCarthys in Darwin family and friendship connections we felt we were at home. The jetstar flight usually arrives at 1.55am or 2.30 on the 16^th June!!! Now I know why it is the cheapest air ticket to Darwin

Did lots of tourist things – Crocosaurus, fishing charter, tour of the wharf and coast, saw the sunset in Fannie Bay at the sailing club, feeding fish, art gallery and museum, concert, bus trip home alcohol fuelled and entertaining and our last meal was a NT special crocodile and barramundi.

People of the long grass

Pubs are busy early there is no such time as beer o’clock because it is all the time

Buses are cheap and free if you are a student pensioner or pre school

V8 supercar weekend at Hidden Valley Raceway– watched the concert ‘Bliss and Eso’ I didn’t realise that Chris Liley of Angry Boys had done such a good job of taking off rapping and hip hop artists. I thought he was a little extreme in the take off- not so.

At the art gallery the best or year 12 art is put on display called ‘exit art’

Watched a movie (a bit cheesey) ‘big mike’ that said to me amazing things can happen if you open up your life to include others. I am not sure if amazing things will happen to  Jane Michael Will Jessica and Millie but they definitely opened up their family to us-thank you all

first step of the journey

here we are sitting in adelaide airport
our immunisations have cost more than our airline tickets
and I don't believe in flu injections!!!
Thomas felt like an injection test dummy

the chilean volcanic ash has yet to stop our journey out of this cold place