Diary of a mosquito bitten, dirty clothed, gin rummy winning wanita (girl)

I know I haven't written in a while--since Ubud in Bali actually--so this next entry is going to be more like a short diary of the past week or so.

After Ubud, Derek, Eric, Ross and I took an illegitimate 'van' cab over to Sanur, which is a port for ferries to take to some of the islands off Bali. We had planned to go to Nasu Lembongan (Lembongan Island), so we set sail after a horrible night's sleep at a guesthouse in Sanur. The old lady (probably 100+ years old) who ran the place sounded like Yoda mixed with Shmeagel from Lord of the Rings--pretty frightening. Getting onto the boat was like nothing I'd ever experienced..knee deep in ocean water, trying to hop onto the small wooden plank before the next wave rolled in. (Imagine playing jump rope and having to time your jump just right as not to hit the rope..)

After a two hour ferry ride, we had made it. I'll skip the boring parts and just skip to when Eric and Derek found our bungalow for the next two days. Wayhu was awesome...close to the beach, had a sparkling swimming pool, and even a cheap cafe on the premises. Still no hot water or AC, but at this point in our journey, we pretty much expect only cold water showers and a fan to keep us cool. We spent the next two days lounging, riding motorbikes around the island and seeing some of the most turquoise waters I've ever seen...Very jungle-esque, and probably what a lot of people imagine "the real Bali" to be like. Only downside of the island was it's..an island...not much to do. So we spent our nights having early dinners and playing cards until we got tired.

The island was officially Derek and Eric's last real trip around Bali before having to jet off to their respective destinations (the Phillipines and Vietnam), so we headed back to Kuta beach, where Ross and I spent the first few nights of our trip, and just relaxed for the night. The next day, we hopped on a flight to Jakarta, Indo's capital. Prior to going to Jakarta, I had heard a lot of negative reviews...Dangerous, concrete jungle, etc...so I wasn't too stoked to be going but we both figured it was a good hub to stay for a day or two before trekking out to Sumatra or somewhere else on the island of Java. We stayed in Jakarta for 2 nights and made a couple great people. Being in Jakarta was difficult for a couple reasons: 1. It is currently Ramadan, and Jakarta (most of Java for that matter) is a predominately Muslim country. That means most of the restaurants, shops, etc are all closed...2. It was pouring rain the first night we got there. We were lucky enough to meet Ben, a traveler from the Bay Area, who's our age. We hung out with him the next day and meandered the winding, trashy streets of Jakarta. We made our way to a section of town called Kota, which the book describes as a charming historic district. If by "historic" they mean literally abandoned and crumbling with street urchins and animals living under tin roofs than yeah, it's historic. All in all, the day was alright--good conversation with a new friend is always a nice pick me up from the dirty monotony that is this city.

We decided to head to a small beach town about 3 hours away from Jakarta...Carita.

Disclaimer: The following is crazy and should never have to happen to anyone. It really does seem like a dream even as I type this...Mom, don't worry...The universe is watching out for us for sure, I know this now because of the following story:

We took the bus to Merak, a main bus hub in south Java. From there, we were supposed to take a taxi to Carita (only 5000 rp (about 5 bucks). No taxis were in sight, and there were motorcycle taxis just waiting for some passengers. So, in the spirit of adventure we climbed on our respective motos. (Keep in mind, this is supposed to be a short ride--only 15 mins max). We got on, with our helmets on and packs strapped to our backs and started to backtrack the way we had come in. That should have been my first clue something was amiss. Then, we went to fill up our tanks. Second clue. Third and final clue something was not quite right, these gentlemen only wanted 1000 rp (Less than a buck! Our lucky day!). But we figured what the heck, and drove off into the midday sun. And drove. And drove. FOR AN HOUR. We didn't stop driving until we were so far out of the way I thought for sure they had misunderstood where we were headed. They said, "This is Carita! 100,000.00 rp please!" Obviously there was a misunderstanding because they had said 1000 each, and now they were saying 100,000 each. Of course these men spoke no English whatsoever. So we gave them 50,000 each after a huge fuss. Feeling broke and just so disappointed we started walking. Mind you, as we are driving into Carita, and passing about 8 towns in between, we see a few guesthouses. Not many though...So, as we start walking back the other direction we feel certain we have to find something...We had basically wasted a day, and 2 days worth of our budget to get there, when all we wanted now was to get the hell out of there. We both uttered more than a couple expletives into the sky, and cursed ourselves for coming to Carita.

We walked for 2.5 hours, in our sandals, shorts, and sweaty t-shirts. The sun had gone down at this point, and we literally had no idea what to do. We only found 2 guesthouses in that span of time, all which were WAY too expensive. My legs had about 10 mosquito bites between them and we even saw a snake skin on the side of road. This situation was not ok.

We were running out of time and options and felt so lost. I don't know if either one of us has ever felt so vulnerable to nature and what lied ahead...Anyway, we were damn thirsty at this point and hadn't eaten anything except crackers since 9am that morning (it was now 7pm). We went across the street to a vendor selling water and snacks. No one was around, so we took the biggest water she had and started opening it, as we ducked around trying to find someone that worked there rather than dart off with the water. A nice lady, probably 30 years old, shows up and we pay her. She can tell we are obviously in a bind so she has us sit and collect ourselves for a minute. In broken English, she explains she has a friend she would like to call for us who speaks English. So Ross gets on the phone with "Nessa", who says she just so happens to rent out a room in her house. On one hand, we are thinking "Sweet!" and on the other hand we were thinking the only "houses" we'd seen so far were shacks in the wilderness. 

We were definitely skeptical...The nice lady who sold us the water took us to Nessa's house. It was a two story mansion for Indo standards, in a gated community, where we finally layed our heads that night. After a 30 minute interview, she agreed to let us sleep there. We payed her way too much, but we didn't care at that point. Nessa is Indonesian and doesn't speak that great of English but she definitely gets by..She has a 2 year old daughter and her husband is a seaman (hehe) who was born in Croatia..Neither one speaks the others' language so they speak in English together and somehow get by. He doesn't return to Indo until next week. Obviously, she had to trust us as much as we had to trust her. We honestly felt like Hansel and Gretel, or Goldilocks for that matter. In the morning, she gave us tea and helped us find a cab back to Merak. Bless this woman's heart...Without us buying a bottle of water from her friend (one of literally 50 street vendors we had seen), we would have been sleeping on the beach.

Now, as I type, we are safe and sound in Bogor, an interesting, safe and green city in the heart of Java. It's pretty rainy right now, and the rivers through the city are feasting on the water. All we did today was relax, watch a movie, and play gin rummy. And that was fine with us. We just want to be somewhere for a week, with no busses, trains, moto taxis, vans with no doors, etc. and hang out for a bit.

Tomorrow's task: doing laundry for the first time! (Can you believe we are sitting in our own filth after 2 weeks?! Ewwww...)