Wednesday 14 January 2015

Yet another of 'those days'!

Indonesia is an archipelago consisting of approx 17,000 islands - at the last count! But don't worry, we are only visiting two of them - Java and Bali - as sadly the tour we are booked onto does not include the island of Sumatra; where the Orangutang is found and that was originally my main reason for wanting to come down to this part of the world. But, the travel agent we booked through, was not as proficient at her job as we expected, for many reasons and suffice it to say we will NOT be using 'Round the World travel agents' EVER again or recommending them to anyone - reader please take note!

But I am not going to spend the whole of this blog ranting and raging over the fact that we are about to spend two weeks travelling on a tour with only two other people (plus the tour guide) instead of the usual twelve, through parts of an amazing country in the Southern Hemisphere, in the height of it's rainy season, whilst schlepping a back pack full of summery clothes, most of which I have just found out I cannot wear due to the fact that shoulders and knees have to be completely covered over here! So that rules out my sundresses and all of my sleeveless tops rammed neatly into my back pack, leaving me with the use of three t shirts and two pairs of calf length trousers for two weeks!

There are over 700 languages spoken over here - that's languages NOT dialects! And sadly my skills at learning anything other than English, has always been extremely limited. However, I have managed to learn two words in Indonesian (the second language spoken in this country, after the individuals local one). "Thank you" is "Terima kasih" and the only reason I can remember that is because it sounds like "tear in my car seat"!?!

Our first stop is the island of Java the most populated island in Indonesia. And our first day was to be spent in Jakarta - the capital of Indonesia - before meeting up with our tour group at six o'clock in the evening.

Jakarta is one of the most populated cities in the world. Formerly called Batavia by the Dutch when they colonised it, then in 1945 renamed Jakarta by the Japanese when they briefly took over, before 'leaving' (mainly via harakiri) within a few weeks after the bomb dropped on Hiroshima.

As I mentioned yesterday, having not slept through most of the night, we had finally been woken up by the cleaner knocking at our door, only to realise it was ten in the morning and TC panicking that we had missed breakfast! 

Thankfully it was unexpectedly sunny outside and so once we had managed to get dressed, followed by a little trouble over TC trying to stuff her huge money belt into her newly aquired tiny shoulder bag because she refused to put her Indonesian money into the zip pocket of aforementioned belt as she didn't know where the money had been and her bag was clean and new and therefore she didn't want to spead germs?! (But she is trying to keep control of her OCD remember!?!) We finally dragged ourselves out of the hotel room, with half of the day already gone and headed off for some food.

Feeling completely out of it and not in the mood for a breakfast of noodles and soup, we ended up in .... Starbucks! Well it was the easiest thing to do when half awake and in need of an English breakfast tea and croissant (very Indonesian?!).

After a short discussion on how unimpressed we were with Jakarta and it's busy, grid locked and smelly streets we agreed the best thing to do was to visit the huge and highly recommended National Museum, look around it for a couple of hours then walk back to our hotel and relax before meeting the others. The museum was only a ten minute walk around the corner, so if we timed it right we would be able to squeeze in a massage too!

Famous last words! 

You see, without realising it, we had exited Starbucks out of a different door than the one we had entered through, then turned right and headed off up the street.

Thirty minutes later not only did we realise we were lost, but my feet had started to swell from the humidity and I had weeping blisters from my flip flops!

I sat down at a cafe and TC hurried off to find a pharmacy to buy some plasters for me! Half an hour later she was back - my saviour - I smothered my feet in the plasters, squeezed them back into my flip flops, which were now too small for my swollen feet and we headed off in the right direction.

Or had we?

After another twenty minutes, we passed 'the famous statue' that TC had read about but couldn't remember the name of, but was 'definitely close to the museum' and after another ten minutes, having still not found the bloody museum we headed into a posh hotel to ask for directions where we found out that not only had we continued going the wrong way, but we still had at least another twenty minutes to walk!

And so it was agreed that the best bet was to grab a cab.

The taxi took us all the way back past where we had walked; past 'the famous statue' that TC had read about but 'couldn't remember the name of' but was apparently close to the museum! Then all the way back past bloody Starbucks where we had had breakfast and finally pulling up just past the 'Oops, yes that's the famous statue I have read about but can't remember the name of'! 



We climbed out of the cab, paid the kind driver and headed into the museum only to find that we had about an hour left before it closed!

There were seven floors and we managed three of them before turfing out time, but to be honest that was enough; my feet were killing me and we were starving and half asleep and so we hailed another cab, stopped off at another hotel close to ours to quickly grab some food then made it back just in the nick of time to meet our tour leader and group at six, only to find out the meeting had been moved to six thirty!!

At six thirty we met our tour leader Sally, who lives in Indonesia but originates from Sidney Australia and the two other girls travelling with us. Two friends from the south of England (more South than us!!) who are both work in the catering business and are both called Jo! (That's lucky because as well as being crap at remembering directions, I'm also crap at remembering names and who they belong to!)

It was at the meeting that Sally informed us about the dress code in Indonesia - not to show shoulders, knees or cleavage! NEVER use your left hand to wave at anyone, or shake their hand with, or put food in your mouth with, for it is the left hand that's used to 'wipe oneself after going to the loo' and therefore considered unclean!

TC and I paled when we realised we had been giving the thumbs up sign with our left hands to various passers by shouting out and waving hello at us - oops!

After a 'group' dinner at a stunning art deco restaurant, we all headed for our beds in the hope that we would get the better of our jet lags and have a good nights sleep. Yeah right!?



The following morning we were up at 6:30, after managing only three hours of sleep! But we had a train to catch to Bandung.

Breakfast at the hotel consisted of a tasteless porridge made from rice, which had even less taste when I added sugar to it - go figure? A cup of black tea and a weird piece of fruit called 'Snake skin fruit' which believe me tasted and smelt worse!

Within the hour we were on the train (executive class, which meant we had a pillow) and on our four hour journey through the pelting rain.

TC and I settled into the first two episode of The Killing (American version) as this was our programme of choice for this holiday. (You may remember our obsession with Broadchurch last year?). After which I was in need of the toilet (all that raining outside).

As expected, it was a squat style structure! Not my favourite, least wise because all my weeks before the trip of going to Zumba had not been enough to strengthen my weak thigh muscles as intended for this particular occurrence! The only saving grace was that my need was at the earlier end of the train journey, which meant the toilet was reasonably clean and therefore less slippery! However,  the main problem was that there was no latch on the door! I immediately broke out in a sweat as the scenario brought back 'unfortunate' memories of a similar situation when travelling on a train in India three years ago. And so yet again I found myself trying to balance over a squat toilet, whilst holding my trousers out of the line of fire with one hand, whilst holding the door closed with the other, whilst trying not to fall over (or in) as the train rocked from side to side as it sped along the track!

Finally, having achieved my mission, I returned to my seat, exhilarated, releaved, dry and with quivering over exerted thigh muscles! After telling TC about my little adventure, she refused to go to the toilet for the rest of the trip and suggested I wash my hands again before helping myself to some of her crisps.

Finally we reached Bandung - the capital of the western Java province and we arrived at The Zodiac hotel.

After dropping off our bags and pulling out our rain macs we headed out for the day.

Luckily the rain eventually subsided and we managed to get to see The Gedung State - where the central government controls all of West Java. We passed by the oldest coffee factory in Indonesia, it's  still in use, we took a gander at the stunning presidential palace and the oldest theatre in Asia. 

Then sadly TC had to return to the hotel as she was feeling ill from lack of sleep and I continued with the others to go and watch the Udjo Angklung puppet, dance and music show!

Angklung is a traditional Indonesian percussion instrument made completely from five pieces of bamboo hung loosely in a small frame. There are 8 sizes and when each one one is shaken it plays a note. 'Doh, re, me, far, so, la, ti, doh'!

The founder of The Udjo group had developed a new technique to hold a collection of the different sized instruments together in a larger frame so that they could be all be played as one instrument with a range of octaves.

The first part of the show was a puppet performance, giving us an example of a typical Sundanese, (the ethnicity in Bandung), story. The puppets are made from balsa wood, all operated by one man, who can work two at a time with each hand and uses his foot to make sound effects. In every performance a moral message is given to the audience with each puppet representing part of human's character trait, such as anger, greed, benevolence etc ...

After the puppet show a group of about twenty children ranging from about 3 to 16 years of age, all dressed in traditional costumes performed a ceremonial dance for us. It turned out that this was the 'heleran' often played after a circumsicion or during the harvest season - I kind of see the connection there?!

The last part of the show was a lesson in how to use the Angklung, followed by the audience using our newly aquired musical skills to join in with Udjo band in various songs such as the French national anthem and Queen's 'We are the champions'!

To be honest it was an amazing show which culminated in the professional young Angklung players performing Tchiakovsky's 1812 overture! Truly amazing.



On the way back to the hotel, we stopped off for some beers at a 'dodgy' off license (the new mayor has banned alcohol being sold within specific parameters of the city, in a bid to crackdown on gang crimes), as we followed our tour guide into the shop, she immediately turned round and ushered us out. It seems they were being raided by the police!

So we casually strolled back to our waiting mini van and drove off, whilst the police loaded their own cars up with the crates of beer!

Back at the hotel, I checked in on TC, who was resting but feeling slightly better and hungry! (Usually a good sign for her). And so we stayed in, ordered room service and watched another episode of 'The Killing' before attempting another night of jet lagged sleep.

As I drifted off I felt quite relieved that I was lying in the slightly hard bed of my hotel room rather than the floor of an Indonesian prison with my new travel buddies!

And so until my next post I say "Tear in my car seat" and "selamat malam (goodnight)"
















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