I then arrived in Abu Dhabi for my 6 hour layover, but found there to be some free wifi, so I figured I would be able to stream the NFL games, but unfortunately the internet was pretty dodgy, so I wasn't able to watch any games, so I just hung out reading and watching tv shows, again, not sleeping. My next flight was at 2:30 am local time, and I was then off to Kuala Lumpur, where I managed to catch maybe another 30 minutes of sleep. By the time I caught my flight to Bali from KL, I had managed maybe 5.5 hours of sleep over a 2 day period so I was pretty tired, and found a fairly empty flight to Bali, so I was able to have a whole row to myself and just pass out there for 2 hours.
Arriving in Bali as a first timer is a very interesting experience, and one should be leery about how many people are trying to scam you. After getting my visa ($28 USD), I emerged to find 3 men around my bag, and they asked if it was mine, and once I said it was, the one guy immediately picked it up, and started carrying it towards the scanning machine. I thought maybe this was an airport service, but then realized he was just some sketchy local dude trying to make some money. He asked for a tip pretty much immediately, and I gave him 20,000 rupiahs, but he was trying to tell me I should give him a red bill (100,000 rupiahs). Now to do a quick conversion, you'll find that 100,000 is about the equivalent for $10 US dollars....and there was no freaking way I was going to give this guy that much money for carrying my bag for 2 minutes....I later spoke to some Swedish guys who said the bag guys got them for 600,000 rupiahs, as they weren't familiar with the conversion yet. Damn Bali! So then I get outside to try and find a taxi, and am swarmed by more bag grabbers, but I fight them off. Then I'm surrounded by a few guys looking to sell accomodations...I had spoken to my friend who was staying at Poppies 1, which is a fairly famous street near Kuta beach and fairly cheap. So I knew I wanted to come this way and find a place, and the guys at the airport were trying to charge about 200,000 to 300,000 for rooms with just a fan, which is again quite a rip off.
So after brushing those guys off, I found a taxi stand that gave a fair rate to Kuta (55,000), and I was on my way. I was dropped off in the absolute mayhem that is Kuta, and wandered around looking for places to stay, seeing so many drunk Australian tourists and people peddling crap everywhere, and even gasoline in Absolut Vodka bottles (I walked past and thought wow that must be moonshine due to the colour, but then realized it was actually stolen petrol in a bottle ha ha). I eventually found a place for 144,000 a night with a fan, so I figured I would stay there and look for something cheaper the next day, as I was exhausted. I basically was back in my room by 8 pm and asleep by 9:30 or so, and slept until 12 pm the next day. I was meant to go and meet up with my friend Bre around 1 pm, so by the time I found a new place that was only 100,000 a night, I was running a bit late and couldn't see her at the designated meeting restaurant, so I just grabbed a seat and waited. Eventually she showed up, as she had just had a tattoo done, and we had lunch and several beers. She was there with her b/f Preston, who ended up being a really cool guy as well. I ended up sitting at the same cafe for dinner, as well, and basically was there from 1 pm until 10 pm when we wandered off to another bar. By this point I was about 7 or 8 beers deep..and starting to feel it a bit. We wandered to a place called Alley Cats, that had 2 for 1 cocktails for a few hours, and was a pretty cool place to hang out according to Preston and Bre.
We arrived there, and found it to be basically like spring break for Australians, as they are currently having "Schoolies" break, which is when Aussies graduate from high school, and take a 2 week trip somewhere to party. So basically you had myself, Bre, Preston who were all in our mid to late 20s and then a bunch of young drunk 18 year olds....needless to say, there wasn't much potential to meet any girls there as they were all much too young. There was also some 50 something year old Aussie dude who was creeping, it was pretty hilarious. Everyone was wearing shorts, singlets, and thongs, with the exception of the old guy, who was wearing jeans! I asked him about it, and he said he was leaving the next morning and was all packed up and had no clean clothing left....it's probably about 25 degrees at night, so definitely not jeans weather! So we eventually sat down at an empty table and were joined by 8 young Aussie girls who showed us some fun drinking games. These games were probably the beginning of the end of me, since I was having to drink double vodka redbulls rather quickly. After hanging at Alley Cats for 2 hours, we then wandered over to some other bar, and then ended up at a place called Skypalace. By this point, I was pretty blind drunk, and recall Preston telling me to go talk to these two girls that were up on the rooftop terrace.
So I wander over to the them, find out that they're Norwegian and start blabbering away...I'm probably swaying and slurring my speech a bit, and then I felt ill...so I used the nearby potted plants to relieve my ill stomach ha ha....this totally creeps the girls out and they immediately leave of course. I do recall several people around me having a good laugh about it all....fun times.....so after that, I feel a lot better and wander back into the dance floor area, and am grabbed almost immediately by some Indonesian woman who starts making out with me....so I'm thinking to myself "geez I guess she didn't just see me spewing over in the corner" ha ha....so after this goes on for a bit, I then come to the realization that as she's taking me towards the dance floor, there is some Indonesian dude encouraging me to go with her, and I thus realize that she's actually a prostitute, since no Indonesian women except for the prostitutes are even in the clubs here ha ha. So I ran off from her, and hung out with some other guys for a bit then realized I was ready to go home.
So I wander outside and start walking, and am soon surrounded by 3 Indonesian guys, so I instantly put my hands in my pockets to protect my stuff, but my wallet was in my lower zip pocket, and one of the guys pickpocketed me and got my wallet...I knew right away and was confrontational with the one guy, but didn't want to strike him since I was outnumbered. I was just pleading to have the wallet back, I didn't care about the money, since there was only $12 US in there...ironically enough, I had about $50 of local currency in my pocket that I was able to get my hands into...so they missed out. Anyways, as I was pleading the guys ran off, but some other guy nearby pointed out that my wallet was on the ground nearby, and they hadn't taken my cards...so that was a relief. At this point, I was pretty pissed off, but things could have been worse. So I start trying to walk my way back, but of course get so extremely lost that I ended up wandering around for over 2 hours when it should have taken me only 10 minutes to get back to where I was staying....I have no clue how I got so lost, and when it was starting to get sunny I just started asking locals who were setting up their shops for directions to get back...so yeah eventually I made it back and was rather excited to be home, but of course I had a crappy and dehydrated sleep.
I managed to wake up around 1:30 pm in a heap of sweat and tried to make it down to say goodbye to Bre and Preston, but I just missed them by 10 minutes, as they were heading back to Canada that day. I ended up just hanging out with one of the local guys at the restaurant where I had been sitting the previous day for awhile, then finding a local cheap restaurant for lunch and a coffee, which only cost $3....pretty cheap country! After lunch, I wandered around a bit more, and did some shopping (I stopped at a guy with a Buddha belly who I told I would buy a fake NBA jersey off him, and to give you an idea of how aggressive the salesmen are, I just stood there, he removed my shirt in the store, put on a jersey and said you'll buy it ha ha). After buying the jersey, I then found an internet cafe for awhile to catch up on a few things. After that, I figured I should start being social and try and meet new people, so I wandered over to another cafe for dinner, and sat in between two tables. I tried to make conversation and join the table with two girls by me, but they said they had others coming, and weren't really talkative or seeming to want to meet new people, so I just chilled out until I started talking to the other table by me. I ended up getting along quite well with that table, and ended up heading out with the Dutch guy for a little party night. We ended up doing a bit of a pub crawl, and he kept buying me numerous shots of vodka....which lead to another night of spewing! I had a little mini one in the bar into my hands, and then after he bought me a few more shots at another bar, I was full on ill, and wandered outside to a large moped parking lot, where I found a nice quiet area to get over my sickness...unfortunately, the spew didn't help at all...and I was still too dizzy and ill to go back and join Dennis, so I just found some guy on a scooter to drive me home. Most of the Indonesians will use their scooters as mini taxis to drive you around, so I ended up paying the guy way too much, but I just wanted to get home to bed.
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| Happy birthday Reilly, from Dennis...ugghh |
I eventually made it back, and had another crappy sleep, waking up looking like a zombie with glazed eyes. I desperately needed water, so I went to a market, grabbed some fluids, then tried to find Dennis, as I wasn't too sure if he was going to leave that day or not, but I managed to track him down and just chill out at a swimming pool at a nearby hotel for a good portion of the day. After that we just wandered down to the same cafe where we met the previous day and just chilled out there, enjoying the free wifi. After hanging out there for several hours, we agreed to meet back up and head out that night for another birthday celebration. I tried to have a little nap in my hot and sweaty room, but was unable to. I eventually just wandered around the area to try and find a cheap massage place (without happy ending) and was able to find a place for $6 for one hour massage...win! After the massage, I went and met back up with Dennis, but he informed me that he was leaving very early the next morning and wouldn't be able to head out and celebrate my birthday that night, so we just chilled out over a late dinner and some beers then he was off to sleep. I was contemplating doing the same, but as I started walking home I figured ah hell I'm awake now and it would be a bit silly to just go home to bed early on my birthday.
I wandered down to Alley Cats to see if I could meet any people there, as it's a bit easier of a place to meet some people, and within the first 5 minutes of wandering around with a beer and my Dutch football jersey, a table started speaking to me in a foreign language, which I didn't understand. Of course, it ended up being Dutch and they were commenting on the jersey. So I joined their group and went out to some nightclub for a little while but they were all living in a town about 25 minutes away, so they all bailed a bit early and I was back to being solo. By this point it was already 2 am, and I just decided to wander back home and crash for the evening.
Being without air conditioning does have its definite drawbacks, so it was another poor night's sleep. But some sleep nevertheless. The next day I just wandered around doing some shopping for a beach towel, and wandered to the mall. It was surprisingly expensive to try and find a towel, as the cheapest price I could find was $9....so I wandered outside and stopped by a little market shack, and asked the guy there how much for a towel, and he wanted $35! I started laughing and walked away, but then he started bargaining with me, and I was able to get him down to $6.50 so not so bad. So after that it was off to the Kuta beach finally....after being in Kuta for 4 days, I had yet to see the beach which was all of a 3 minute walk from my hotel ha ha ha! So I wandered down there, and started chatting with one of the dudes who rented out surf boards...I wasn't keen on surfing, but figured I would chat with him for awhile since he was a cool dude...so we're going on chatting and all of a sudden he turns his head and sees this Indonesian guy with a backpack near some white guys, and he was putting some shoes in the bag....so this guy I'm chatting with just runs over to this guy, kicks him in the ribs and drops the guy...oh and while he was running over to the guy he was yelling out in Balinese and all of a sudden there's about 20 other Indonesian guys running towards this guy who was just kicked, and about 6 or 7 of the people start beating the shit out of this guy...they're kicking, punching, screaming....and us tourists around this are just looking at each other asking "what the f**k is going on!!!" so after watching this beat down for about 5 minutes, eventually a police officer comes down and a few guys carry this guy off with the police officer.
So after witnessing this, the surf shop guy returns to me and continues conversation with a simple "sorry about that" and just gets back to a normal conversation. So of course I ask him what happened, and apparently it was some thief who had been stealing a few days earlier from tourists. Apparently, this is the way of dealing with thiefs, Balinese style! It was wild. I actually tried filming it, but realized that my memory card was left in my computer so I was only able to get a very short video of the event boo. So after that I just wandered down and met some quiet Finnish dude for awhile, then ran into the Swedish lads from the previous day. After hanging out with them for a little bit, I just wandered back to my room, and decided to head out for dinner. I had to be up the next morning at 6:15 am to head off to Gili Trawangan so I wasn't planning on having much of a big night out. I stopped by Skygarden, and had a super amazing mozzarella/bacon/mushroom burger...damn it was so good. I ended up meeting a bunch of "Toolies" who are Aussies who go to Schoolies parties a year or two after they graduated, to party with the youngins. They were alright guys, but started to get pretty drunk and were throwing peanuts and spilling their drinks everywhere and on each other, so I decided it was time to peace out.
I just wandered back to the hotel, and tried to get a good night's sleep, but of course I was used to staying up super late every night, and only ended up getting about 1 hour of sleep yuck. The mosquitoes were also really bad in the room that particular night, so that didn't help much either. So after my crappy sleep, I wandered over to Kedin's to catch my morning taxi and ended up chatting with two English lads named Matt and Dave. They were both from Portsmouth, but sounded completely different from each other. Dave has such a difficult accent and talks with his mouth closed, so I actually thought he was a Kiwi when I first started chatting to him. They were two pretty cool guys, and we chatted most of the taxi ride over to the ferry port. They had actually been working on farms in Australia for awhile, and then quit and lived as beach bums for several weeks along the East Coast of Australia. They were actually sleeping in tents, and had a spear gun and would go out snorkeling and spear fish, and that was how they ate each day ha ha. The taxi was so small for the 6 of us people with all of our big bags, and I was completely amazed that the guy could actually fit all of our stuff in, and it was particularly funny when he was putting Matt's spear gun in and slid it right next to a Chilean girl's head....the look on her face was priceless.
So we take the taxi ride and end up at the pier a bit early, and have some breakfast and then lounge around outside, trying to avoid the people that are peddling useless things as per usual. They are pretty pushy salesmen and women, and don't really take a hint too often, but I still try to be nice to them, although they can be quite bothersome. I later chatted with a lady who had been in Bali 30 years ago, and said there were no salesmen or anything back then, it was when the Javanese people started moving over to the Island that lots of salesmen showed up and crime began. Too bad, but that's how it goes. I also met two Canadian guys, one of whom had this amazing Movember stache still going strong. I guess those two lads took the opposite approach as myself, and ended up going out partying all night and only getting 1 hour of sleep. I ran into them several times over the next few days, and they actually thought they might have had things put into their drinks in Kuta or something, as they had some pretty nasty headaches and weird side effects over the next few days. The one guy even ended up getting some sort of bacterial infection in his stomach as well, so they were having a pretty rough go at things.
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| Waiting for the fast ferry to Gili |
So the options to get to Gili from Kuta are either by slow boat (takes about 11 hours) or by fast boat (takes 2 hours or so). Since I have some limited time I took the fast boat and that turned out to be quite the adventure. We arrived to find that there were about 10 or 15 wheelchair bound French people on the same boat, and it took the Indonesians forever to get these people all sorted and with their chairs and what not, they pretty much took up all the space in the actual enclosed part of the boat, so the majority of us able bodied people had to sit up top. This didn't seem so bad, since I needed to get some sun, so we got up there. All was well for the first hour or so, until we started getting into some rough sea. At this point, the boat was getting a bit of liftoff and splashing down causing huge amounts of water to come up and over the top of the boat, absolutely soaking everyone. None of us really thought it would be wet up there, so pretty much everyone had their electronics and day bags up top, which was bad news. Several people had cameras, phones ruined, my passport got absolutely soaked (and I'm not too sure if it's going to cause any grief at customs over the next few months since it looks a bit flaky now), so it was quite the event. Some people actually made the desperate move to try and get down to the bottom of the boat and sit on the little floor space available to save themselves.....other than my things getting wet, I was having a helluva good time, although I did get a bit of a sunburn but still it was good fun watching everyone's reaction as the next big swell came over the top!
So we arrived in Gili and the few people who were able to snag seats in the bottom part got off the boat and were in shock about how wet all of us people up top were ha ha. So we get all unloaded, and have a bit of a chuckle watching these Indonesians try and figure out how to get these poor French people onto the shore without getting them wet. Good for a laugh anyways. So we then went on a mission to try and find a place to stay by talking to several of the awaiting accommodation people. I had met an English fellow on the boat who was by himself, and I asked if he wanted to try and find a place and split a room to cut down on costs, so he said sure. We looked around for quite sometime for a place with air con that was decently priced, but the best price we could find was 200,000 Rupiahs a night at some cottages. It was an alright place, with a pool and free wifi, so we negotiated that price, but unfortunately they only had places with 1 bed in each, so we got our own bungalows...good for privacy I guess but a bit pricy for me but oh well. So we settled in there, and went for a bit of a wander around to check out some other places and see if we could find something cheaper for the next few days. We ended up finding Matt and Dave and they had found a place for 120,000 a night with two beds, so that seemed pretty good. Hamish, the other English dude then just randomly decided he was actually going to leave the place we just checked into, since it was a bit far away from the action, and he had enjoyed a place he had stayed at a few years earlier ha ha.
I decided to stay at the place I was at though, and then fatigue kicked in pretty bad, so I decided to go wander back for a little nap, but agreed to meet up with the boys for dinner. So when I wandered around with Hamish I wasn't really tracking my direction so well, and when I tried to find my bungalow, I got so lost for over an hour and a bit. To make things worse, I actually couldn't even remember the name of the place and had left the key at the front desk, so I was pretty lost and tired ha ha. I did eventually get back and tried to wake up after a little 15 minute nap, but that backfired a bit, as I just ended up sleeping until nearly 10 pm. I eventually tracked Matt and Dave down, as well as two French girls we had met on the boat, since the island is actually quite small. They were just coming down from a mushroom high (there are mushroom shakes everywhere on the island, and drugs for sale everywhere too since there's apparently no police on the island, so it's somewhat lawless). I guess they had a pretty fun experience, and we ended up hanging out at a place called Rudy's for a few drinks, then wandering over to the Irish bar, which is the happening place every night of the week it seems. Although, being a Muslim island, they also try and discourage places being loud all over the island, so there's actually only one designated "nightclub" per night that can play loud music until late. We ended up hanging there for the rest of the night, although the boys were pretty tired from also not sleeping the previous night, so they left fairly early. I just hung around meeting a few other people including some Canadian girls, and ended up staying pretty late, but was unable to find any company for that beautiful bungalow of mine, oh well! So I was back and just about to fall asleep at 4 am, when I heard this awfully loud Muslim call to prayer! In Istanbul I think it was more like 5 or 6 am that they would play it, but apparently here in Gili, it's at 4 am....it was so loud and I'm surprised that people can actually sleep through it.
So I got up the next day, and wandered down for a bite to eat, and then rented some snorkel gear. The place I rented it from told me I could just go out behind their shop and snorkel, but it ended up being super crappy coral, and not much fish, so I made my way up the East coast of the island. I emerged at one point because the area was pretty bad, and as luck would have it, I came up on the beach right in front of where Matt and Dave happened to be sitting in a cafe, so I caught up with them, and agreed to meet up later in the day for dinner. I continued to snorkle around a bit more and found more decent coral further up the island. Of course, at this point, my "waterproof" camera stopped working and would only make a beeping noise, which was really too bad since I was looking forward to a few days of underwater photography arghh.....so to recap, the Shockproof/Waterproof Olympus Stylus Tough, was neither shockproof (as I broke the screen while laying on it on a ferry in Finland earlier in the year), and then after several underwater photos, it then stopped working, thus not being waterproof either...arghh damn you Olympus!
So after finishing up the snorkel, I wandered back to the villa to clean up a bit, and found that the shower was super shitty and had no pressure. It was at least warm, but I couldn't even have a proper shower. I met up with the boys for dinner and a few drinks, and we just continued on into late in the evening. They cut out a bit early again, and left me alone once again in Irish Bar, but I managed to meet a pretty cute Polish girl there, using my sneaky good Polish pickup lines. We had a great chat, and she was a super nice girl, so I figured I would try and plant a kiss on her, but she shunned me and told me she wasn't that easy...ha ha shut down. So I walked her home, but asked if she wanted to see me again the next day, which she did, so we agreed to meet up at 3 pm the next day. I wandered back to my place, and attempted to watch some NFL, but the WiFi turned out to be super crappy and slow....strike 2 against the place I was staying at. So I just crashed for the night.
I woke up the next day, and decided to head out for another snorkel around the island before meeting the Polish girl. I didn't get too far before finding Matt and Dave again who were with a dude they had been working on a farm in Australia with, and then finding some cool lounge area on the beach that had free WiFi. The place was called Egoiste, and from that point forward, we ended up there every single day of the week, sometimes twice a day for the happy hour and the good breakfast. I snorkeled for a bit more, had some decent coffee, and then Dave, Kevin (the guy they worked on the farm with), and I decided to go for a little workout on the beach. I've been so lazy and haven't done anything physical in months, so I figured I would tag along and do some pushups, pullups, etc. I noticed a girl looking over in our direction a few times while we were busy doing our workout, but didn't go talk to her. After the workout I ran back to my cottage to clean up before meeting the lady friend. Well when I had left earlier in the day, I had troubles locking the door, as the door was warped and the lock wouldn't engage properly without a lot of effort. I returned to find that I now couldn't open the lock, and was bending the key....strike 3 stupid Lumbeng Cottages! So here I am, meant to be meeting this girl in 20 minutes, locked out of my own place and not smelling very nice at all blah. So I called over the staff, and they tried my key unsuccessfully, and then gave me another key. After fighting with that, and trying to push and pull the doors to a point where I could get the lock to open, I finally managed to get inside, but by this point I was fed up with the place. I cleaned up, and ran out to meet Bogumila (apparently means Nice in Polish).
I arrived just on time and didn't find her anywhere...I waited for about 10 minutes and figured I was snubbed, so grabbed a beer, but then she finally showed up and we had an amazing 2.5 hour chat and flirt session. Eventually Matt and Dave also showed up and sat besides us at the bar, but it didn't really change the mood. The girl was actually leaving the next morning, so I figured this day or night was my only chance with her. She had dinner plans with the other 5 students she had traveled to Gili with, but said we could meet up later in the evening. I had wanted to take her to the Sunset bar, but then the torrential rain showed up and ruined any chances of making a move to another location.
So she had to head back, and I borrowed Matt's umbrella and walked her back with the umbrella to help keep her dry since I'm a gentleman and all...at one point, the streets were so muddy and slippery that I almost completely bailed in front of a few locals who had a great laugh. I got her back to her place, and figured I was good to try for a kiss again, and she shunned me again! Ha ha damn difficult woman...so she told me she would just meet me later at the Irish bar, so I went back and met Dave and Matt for a beer, and then wandered off for dinner to a place called Rudy's where we often ended up every night for cheap cocktails. I checked out my camera that I had left in their attendance, and found the goofballs had been playing around a bit...
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| Hey Matt! |
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| Matt and Dave, two jokers! |
When we arrived, we found a spaced out Canadian girl sitting by herself, who came over and started chatting with us. Turns out she was the girl who was watching us on the beach earlier in the day and had 2 other friends who were meeting her there (Sam from England and Maria from Sweden). They had been having mushroom shakes all day, and were all pretty spaced out but having fun at least. We ended up chatting for quite a bit and having a pretty good time. We exchanged some details with them, and agreed to meet up over the next few days, as we all got along quite well. We eventually ended up back again at the Irish Bar, and when I was going to grab a drink from the bar since the guy serving our little table area was pretty slow. As I was walking back, some guy sitting with a few great looking girls motioned me over and started chatting to me like he knew me...well apparently I had met him and his mate in Kuta a few nights earlier and they were calling me Diego Maradona because of my moustache and long hair in Kuta ha ha... I had really no recollection of hanging out with them in Kuta, but apparently we all had a good laugh at the one pub, so they were sharing some stories from the night and rekindling my memory from that crazy night.
So I had a seat with them and ended up meeting a few of the English girls they were hanging out with. Eventually both Dave and Matt ended up feeling the effects of their shakes, and left to bed, so I was just with the English lads and their ladies that they were all shacked up with, but still had a pretty good time. Unfortunately the Polish girl from earlier in the day never showed up, so I was a bit bummed, but still had an alright time partying with lots of new people, so it was all good. Eventually it was time to wander back to my new place for one last night. I didn't sleep much again, and woke up in so much pain. I couldn't at first figure out why I was so damn sore, but then I realized that several months of no exercise and then pushing myself a bit, lead to some very very sore arms and chest... After getting a hold of Dave, I went out for a little breakfast down to Egoiste and just hung out there for awhile. Eventually we moved closer to the beach and met a super amazing Polish girl (who I later found out models all over the world) and an older Dutch/Indonesian lady who was absolutely hilarious. We were chatting with them for awhile, and agreed to meet up later in the evening. I decided to book a snorkeling tour the next day to tour the 3 Gili Islands, since there isn't really much else to do in Gili, other than sit on the beach all day and party during the evenings. I also hauled my bags over to Matt and Dave's place since I was going to be replacing Matt as Dave's roommate, since Matt was checking into a different hotel for a scuba diving course. After getitng all sorted, it was time for another wild evening.
We met up with Ashley, the Canadian girl from the previous night, and the two other girls and hung out with them for quite awhile, having some drinks and chilling out. Then things got a bit strange, as the girls were really dehydrated, and Maria the Swedish girl ended up just completely collapsing at one point, so I had to prop her up in a chair and start feeding her water and trying to cool her down. It was a bit scary, but I think she was really just dehydrated. Eventually she was alright, but I didn't want to hang out too much longer with the group, as they were all pretty messed up, but the Polish gal and Indonesian girl wanted to go out and find the designated "nightclub" for the night, so we wandered down to a place called Blue Marlin. It wasn't really much of a club, as it was just an upstairs bar and had a DJ who was seriously like 70 years old and wearing a shirt that said DJs.com. I think the place actually went on the website and found out he was on the island and had him come deejay for the night. As soon as they saw the Polish girl, they instantly wanted her to get up on their stage and dance because the girl seriously turned everyone's heads. Fortunately, since I had been chatting her up earlier in the night a fair bit, I was able to actually grind it out and have some dirty dancing with this girl, which was pretty sweet considering you could see every single person in that place just sitting and gawking at her...damn she was hot. Eventually it got to be late and she wasn't really into the place, as she prefers huge clubs like the places in Kuta, and her Dutch friend was super drunk, so I walked them home, but she gave me her number to give her a call if I was back in Kuta, for some party nights.
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| Lovely Polish woman wow |
After walking them home, I decided to try and find the others, and see if they were still hanging out at Rudy's but they were all gone, so I just wandered back for the night. I took the last of my things to the new place, and wandered off to my snorkeling tour. I was hoping there would be some young people to meet on the tour, but unfortunately it was all families and couples, but I still had some good chats with an older Aussie widow. Taking my camera and my phone on the snorkeling boat was a pretty bad idea, as the waves and the dodgy boat were pretty wild at times, splashing everyone and almost capsizing a few times during the really rough sea ha ha. We had an alright snorkel tour, as there's some really good reef off the other Gili islands, and some amazing fish. We were also fortunate to spot several turtles during the tour, so that was good fun. I quite wish that my waterproof camera was working, but such is life.
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| On the dodgy glass bottom snorkel boat |
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| Gili Air |
After returning to Gili, I tracked down the guys for dinner and another party night. Basically that's all there is to Gili life....snorkel or sit on the beach, and then party at night...simple life, but good fun. This was one of my nights where Dennis and I just wandered out and ripped it up and had a good time, meeting some pretty cool people, but also getting a bit out of control as per usual. It might have been one of the earlier nights, as I was back by about 2 am that night, as opposed to the usual 3 or 4 am nights. The next day was another chill out on the beach day and get some sun, plus organize some shenanigans for the night, since it was meant to be my last night in town, as I booked a Komodo Island tour the next day and had to be at the piers for 8 am for that. We had several drinks down at the beach, meeting some cool Dutch girls, then experienced a nice sunset on the beach even though I had meant to wander down to the Sunset Bar at the South end of the Island, but the scenery was very nice on the East side of the Island too. After that Matt, Dave and I met Dennis for some German Sausages at a restaurant along the beach, which was damn tasty, and something different from the usual Indonesian food we had been eating. After eating a good feast it was down to our other favourite place, Rudy's for some cheap vodka red bulls and eventually vodka-joss shots. If you haven't heard of Joss, it's basically this powder they give you with vodka shots, that has like 5 times the amount of energy additives that a can of Red Bull has. It gets you pretty amped up, which is necessary when you're only sleeping 6 hours a night at most. So after doing some Mailman shots, we wandered over to the Irish Bar, where the party was really going off that night.
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| Showing the boys the Mailman....Dennis absolutely loves it! |
There was over 100 people spilled out into the streets, dancing and drinking and having a pretty good time. There was even some crazy break dance battles going on in the street, as a fair bit of the Indonesian locals are into it, and of course there's always an occasional drunk white guy who tries to get in and participate, much to the laughter of everyone present, and this was no different of a case with an Australian dude. So after partying all night nearly, and wandering home at 4:30 am, I had about 3 hours of sleep to catch before packing up and heading down to catch my boat to the Komodo Islands. I managed to get up and get down to the pier, feeling like absolute death, and running into a Dutch girl I had been talking to until late the previous night, who also looked like death. So I get down there, and the tour staff inform me that the tour is now cancelled...damnit! So they handed me back my money I paid, and I was back to the hotel to wake up Dave and check back in ha ha.....I guess it wasn't so bad to be stuck on Gili for another few days, as the place really sucks you in.
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| Ashley, Dave, and I |
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| Street party! |
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| Ashley, me, and some randoms |
I ended up sleeping until like 2:30 pm somehow, trying to battle off the hangover in the sweltering heat, while crushing water non stop. Eventually I hauled my ass out of bed, and wandered around for some breakfast, and then another snorkel session with Dave. It was the best snorkel session by far, as we spotted a massive turtle, a crazy sea snake, jellyfish, and some massive fish. The sea snake was hilarious, as Dave spotted it and grabbed my attention towards it, but then the current started pushing him towards it, and it looked damn poisonous! So he started flailing about and it looked hilarious. Fortunately the snake just burrowed down into the sand, so no snakebites for Dave. I really wish that damn Olympus waterproof camera hadn't broken, as there was some opportunities for some great pics! After the snorkel session I just wandered down for a sunset and blogging session at Egoiste. Here's what I get to enjoy while blogging :)
So after catching up on a few things, it was back to my place to clean up a bit, and go meet up with guys and girls (Ashley, Sam, and Maria) for a few drinks and some dinner. We ended up grabbing one more gal at the Irish Bar who was by herself, and had a nice dinner, as the skewers at the Irish Bar are amazing. If you're ever in Gili, highly recommend you grab them for at least one meal. After dinner, Dave was pretty keen on heading out to the Full Moon party that was going on that night, and even though I was exhausted, I agreed to head out with him, and we eventually convinced all the girls to tag along. Poor Sam had not only Bronchitis but also Gastroitis or something along those lines, and had actually had an injection and a bunch of antibiotics given to her that morning. Apparently this healed her up real well, as she was able to come out and stay until around 2 am and even have a few beers...crazy English women!
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| With Maria, Ash, and Sam at the Irish Bar |
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| Making a Dutch girl have a laugh |
The Full Moon party wasn't all that great, especially when they made a bold statement like this....
For those of you who have been to the original Full Moon party in Koh Phangen, Thailand, you know that it is the best party in the world, but I guess these guys thought they would try and talk up their party, but nowhere close to being the best. But we did have a pretty good time, just dancing and watching people crazy on mushrooms dancing. Most of us we all pretty worn down though, so we left the party at 2 am or so, and walked the girls home. Sam and Dave kind of had a little thing going on, so I left him with the key, and walked back with all them, and then disappeared figuring he could have the room to himself if he wanted to, but then he kind of missed the opportunity and came wandering by where I was hanging out shortly after, so I gave him a hard time over that, and we were back to the place for the night.
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| Maria, me, Dave, and a dude who worked at our hotel |
The next day we decided to rent some bikes and drive around the island, since I had been wanting to do that for several days. So we grabbed some bikes, and negotiated a price which we thought was fair (50,000 rupiahs for 2 bikes for the day), which the little slimy buggers later told us was wrong and charged us 50,000 each...damn Indonesians are always trying to rip white people off...it's kind of a bummer, makes you dislike the place a bit more but oh well. So we tried to find the girl's place to see if they wanted to come with us, but they were more keen on going to the beach and snorkeling. So we decided to go down to the beach for awhile with them. While meeting up with them, I ended up meeting 4 other girls that were staying at the same place, including two nice English girls named Pippa and Kate. We all wandered down to the beach and went for some snorkeling, where we found a turtle, and we were able to get some great photos of it. Pippa had an underwater camera, but her snorkel was leaking, so I took her camera to grab some pics, while Ashley used her underwater camera to snap this amazing pic.
So after snorkeling for awhile, we wandered down for a bite to eat at Egoiste, where we parked our bikes and I tried to keep an eye on them. Well of course, after about an hour of casually seeing them, all of a sudden they were gone ha ha ha...I went running downstairs to see if I could see anyone riding them, but no luck. But then I was able to see that the staff had simply moved them, so all good. So after our little feast, Dave and I went for our bike ride around the island which took way less time than we figured it would. The island is actually only about 7 km or so in circumference, so it went by pretty quick, but it was good to do a full tour and see all of the island. Eventually we made it back to our starting point, and decided to head down to the Sunset bar at the South end of the island, since I had yet to catch one sunset over there. We arrived down there, had our little bromance and cocktail ha ha, and enjoyed this lovely view.
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| Gili Sunset :) |
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| Enjoying an Arak and Fanta |
So after the sunset, we wandered back into the town, cleaned up and went to meet the girls and Matt for dinner at the Irish Bar, with the obligatory first stop at Rudy's for cocktails. After another delicious meal, we wandered back to Rudy's where the party was happening that night. At one point, we realized that Matt had lost his iPhone, possibly over at the Irish Bar, but of course it was gone. We had a local guy from our hotel hanging out with us, and asked him to ask around and see if he could track it down, but of course no one would fess up to finding it. So we basically just all hung out, enjoying our last night together, as Ashley and myself were off to Ubud the next day. At one point I was wandering out towards the dance floor to check things out, and then stopped at the bar for a beer. I ordered one beer, but the server thought I said 5, and I told him only 1. Then there was a guy to my left who was standing there, and said "no, get him 5 beers!" so the server came back with 5. I kept arguing that I only wanted 1 beer, while this guy next to me kept saying I should get 5 ha ha....so we started chatting after I finally settled on 1 beer, and found out that he was from Canada, had family from Yorkton (near Melville, Saskatchewan where I grew up), and that he had been living in Bali the last 4 years in Ubud. We ended up chatting a fair bit and then meeting some other Canadian girls who were visiting him.
After dancing with them for a bit, I happened to come across Pippa from the same hotel as Ashley. We ended up chatting a bit and kind of hit it off, and next thing I know, we're making out. So we danced and made out for awhile, but I couldn't quite figure out why she was kind of leery about kissing with her mouth open, and I would later find out that she's extremely allergic to nuts, so if I had any nuts that night, it could give her a bad allergic reaction, crazy! So after dancing for awhile, we wandered back over to the rest of the group and were hanging out there, where things were all great and well, until we were all summoned over to find the Norwegian girl who was also staying at the same place as the other girls to be passed out and in a few Indonesian dudes' hands....it looked really bad, so suddenly we're all over there carrying her, not knowing what was going on, and putting her on a horse drawn carriage, which I thought was heading to the hospital possibly. It was a very scary situation, but I guess she had just drank way too much arak and had passed out, and wasn't in as bad of shape as we thought. It was pretty tough to get her on the one carriage, as the horse got spooked and ran away as we were trying to put her on it, and almost causing us to drop her. Eventually we got her on another cart, but that was an evening killer, so we all went our separate ways to bed.
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| Getting the locals to do the Mailman |
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| Pippa and I :) |
The next day I got up, battled off the hangover, and said my goodbyes to Dave again, and was off to meet the girls and take the fast boat to Ubud. It turned out that Pippa, Kate, the Norwegian girl, and a Mexican girl they were traveling with were all on my boat, and Ashley was taking an earlier boat to Ubud, but we set up a designated meeting spot. I said my goodbyes to Maria and Sam, who were heading off to Kuta, and then found some breakfast and chatted with the other girls. The poor Norwegian girl had spent the night sleeping outside on the ground, but was actually doing fairly well considering the state she was in the previous evening. She had bought some local weird looking fruits, and held out a piece of one to me, so I took it and ate it, then she told me she was just holding it out to show me a worm on it, that I apparently ate ha ha...everyone had a good laugh over this, and I was ribbing her pretty good about that gesture. Eventually the boat arrived, and we were all boarded, and I made sure to get a seat on the bottom part, to avoid getting soaked like last time. It was a super rough ride, and I was hoping to catch some sleep, but it was way too bumpy, and there was some good g forces at the front of the boat. Kate and I ended up having a good chat, and the time went by pretty quick.
We arrived and I was somewhat disappointed to see that no one that was sitting up top got really soaked, compared to my ride over to Gili, must have just had bad luck I guess! So after arriving, we fought off the usual peddlers and made our way to Ubud, found the designated cafe and Ashley. We waited around for the Mexican girl who was on a later boat, and then went on a wander to find a place. Some of the girls wanted a place with a pool, but the prices were a bit high, even though it's low season. We eventually found a decent place for 100,000 rupiah per night for a double bed and breakfast, so that works out to about 5.70 CAD a night for accommodation and breakfast. I ended up picking the one room with a double bed, and was pleasantly surprised to find that Pippa was coaxed into joining me in there ha ha. So after we got all settled in, we went out for dinner and a few drinks, but I was absolutely exhausted, as were the rest of the group, so we wandered back to the hotel for the night and had a relatively early night. I was also pleasantly surprised to see that Pippa was up for a bit more than just sleeping ha ha, good fun. And thus began a little 3 day travel romance, which was nice.
The sleep wasn't the greatest, as the place we're staying at his all these roosters in the yard, who are unbelievably loud, communicating with other roosters all over the city. It usually kicks off around 3 or 4 am, and I'm about ready to go outside and start strangling the damn birds, as they are so loud, so early. I didn't get a whole lot of sleep, and was up fairly early for our breakfast. The pancakes they served were amazing, but they came with coconut, which is a big no no for poor Pippa. So after having the staff prepare a new one with no coconut, we went for a wander down to the monkey temple. It was a pretty awesome experience, as there's heaps of crazy monkeys all over. I've had a few friends head there before, and they warned me not to buy bananas for the monkeys, as they will go absolutely ape shit and attack you for them, and I witnessed several tourists experiencing that...great fun. I managed to grab quite a few great pics from the temple that day.
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| World Aids Day promotion...why promote condoms when you can promote candy bars and mints? ha ha ha |
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| Monkey see, Monkey do |
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| This guy wanted to use Lamarisa's camera |
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| Owlin' |
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| He's pleasuring himself he he |
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| A stone carving contest |
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| Rice paddy |
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| neat lizard |
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| this monkey kept trying to play with him |
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| planking by the monkey with big bals |
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| family get together |
After wandering around for a few hours, I was completely exhausted again, and just wanted to head back and sleep, but we stopped for a cheap lunch and beer first. After that, most of the girls wanted to go shopping, but I was in the mood for a massage, and Pippa decided to come with, as well. It was her first massage ever, so I even paid for it, since I like to make that a tradition for people, as long as the massages are cheap. Fortunately, it wasn't a massage like earlier in the year in Nepal, where there ended up being a surprise happy ending ha ha.....so after the massage we met back up with the others, and got cleaned up then headed out. We had a tasty dinner and a few drinks at a place called Bamboo, and listened to some live music. I was again so exhausted though, that I wasn't really being much fun. The girls all wanted to go out clubbing afterwards, and dragged me along, so I gave them 20 minutes of my time, even though I just wanted to sleep. We ended up being pretty much the only people in the club, and were dancing like a bunch of idiots, but I was just too tired, so I wandered back to the room and just crashed hard. Pippa joined me about an hour later, but I was too tired and sleepy for anything else, so we just slept.
The next day we were going to try and get on an organized tour that started around 9 am, but were too late waking up. By the time we finally got all organized and ready to go, we found a guy to drive us around to several temples, a rice paddy, and to a place for a nice sunset. We stopped at the Mengwi (Royal Family) temple, which was fairly nice on the outside, but they wanted 3000 rupiahs to get in...I'm pretty much always against paying to enter religious places, as I think they should be donation only. It was also interesting to note that women weren't allowed to enter the temple if they were on their period! I guess Hindus consider it to be very unholy to enter during this time, so I was giving all the girls a hard time and asking if there was any reason we couldn't enter...of course, it's not like the security guards would actually check or anything. But yeah we actually didn't really want to go in the temple anyways, although Ashley wanted to, but not the rest of us.
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| not too sure how they actually enforce this rule |
The next stop was the Jati Luwih rice field for lunch, and it provided an amazing view during our lunch. The lunch itself was actually a fairly tasty buffet lunch, although the girls later complained they got sick from it, but I was fine. It's been a bit more of a challenge trying to eat the right things with Pippa around, as I don't want to make her sick if I kiss her and have eaten some peanuts or something, so it's a bit interesting but oh well.
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| hi Pippa :) |
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| chilling at lunch |
After that it was off to the Bedugal Ulun Danu Temple, which was located at Lake Beratan. We ended up paying the 10,000 rupiahs to get into this temple, and the views of the lake and temple were actually worth it. It was very lovely and scenic.
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| hiding in the flowers |
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| 2 of these 3 are bear naked |
After hanging out there for awhile we were off to Taneh Lot Temple, where we were meant to catch the sunset, but unfortunately we started way too late in the day and arrived much too late to catch the sunset, or see the temple. Of course this disappointed the girls, and I knew they would all be complaining some more, so I had to get myself a beer for a ride home to deal with the wingeing (Australian term for whining) ha ha. Fortunately, everyone was quite tired, so after a bit of wingeing, they all fell asleep. We got back to Ubud fairly late, and I managed to get a hold of Denton, the guy I had met in Gili a few days earlier. He said we were welcome to come crash at his place if we needed to in the next few days, and we agreed to meet up the next day. After we got back, I just wandered down to a live music bar called the Laughing Buddha, which had really great internet and decent drink specials. It sort of became my internet home over the next few days, as I liked the vibe of the place so much. After being there for quite awhile, and meeting a French and Dutch girl, who invited me to go out and party, which I declined, as I had company back home, I just retired back to the hotel for the night.
The next day we had booked into a much earlier tour, so we were up fairly early. The girl from Mexico was leaving that day, so after a few goodbyes, myself and the 3 remaining girls were on our way on our tour. We had a pretty full day planned, with our first stop being the Elephant Cave Temple. Initially I thought there may have been some elephants in the cave, but then you realize that there's not any elephants in Indonesia. The reason it's called the Elephant Cave is because it was a holy cave that had a large carving of Ganesh, the God of Luck in Hindu, out front and inside the cave. Ganesh, is an elephant character, and you can see a fair bit of statues of the God around Bali. After wandering around there for quite awhile, seeing some small temples, being harassed by Indonesian salespeople, finding some crazy ants destroying other ants, and various other cool creatures, we were on our way to the next temple.
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| Elephant cave |
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| spider |
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| crazy evil ants tearing another ant apart |
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| spying on men bathing in the river |
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| my lovely pink sarong I had to wear |
We arrived at the Mountain Temple, which was built somewhere in the 1050-60 AD period, is quite amazing. Of course, upon arrival we were harassed by the local salespeople, trying to sell us sarongs and such, telling us that we needed to wear them to enter the temple (which was true, but the temple gives you a free one upon entry), we walked down the long steps towards the temple. It provided some amazing views of nature, and was really quite impressive. There was even a little cave house that kind of resembled Fred Flintstone's house. We wandered around there for another 45 minutes or so, and then I decided to try and run all the way up the stairs. Well I got about half way up, before my legs got pretty heavy, so I know I'm really in bad shape. I walked the rest of the way, sweating profusely, and was attacked again by the salespeople at the top, but ignored them. I figured if I put in my iPod headphones and sunglasses, they would maybe stop harassing me, but no, that was definitely not the case. The just get even more aggressive and start shoving things in your face. I think if they weren't so aggressive here, I might be inclined to buy things more often, but they are just too pushy. It was interesting to see a bus full of Indonesians pull up to enter the temple, and watch the salespeople completely ignore them, and not even bother trying to make sales. Apparently white skin equals sales only. Ah well.
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| duck duck duck...goose? |
So after lingering and waiting for the girls, and watching one of the kids from the bus get sick and spew up some crazy pink vomit, we were ready to head on to the next place. We arrived at the Spring Bath temple, and found many people in the spring bath, dunking their heads and praying underneath around 2 dozen different sprouts. Apparently each sprout symbolizes a different part of the mind or body, and you're supposed to pray for each. Interesting culture. After watching people there, we wandered over and caught a mass prayer session, where Pippa and Ashley were even invited to come be blessed by the prayer leader. Before the big prayer session began, I was wandering around a bit, when I came across a super amazing and bad ass spider....check it out!
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| prayer time |
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| each spout is associated with a different part of the body |
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| a Sasky sarong! |
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| Ganesh, Hindu god of good luck |
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| Arachnophobic? |
I tried to get several people to go look at it, but most people seem to be afraid of spiders. Judging by the bright colours, there's a good chance it was poisonous, but I got pretty close for some good photos. After that, we wandered around for a bit more, and went to exit the temple area, which just lead us past numerous shopkeepers who were trying to sell useless things as per usual. Once we finally escaped that mayhem back to the parking lot, some banana lady forced bananas upon me, and made me take one free one....I tried to refuse but she wouldn't let me, so I just ate it but made sure to run away before she tried to make me actually buy any. We waited around for Ashley and Pippa who were a bit lost, and finally were on our way.
Our next stop was a coffee plantation, where they offered us several cups of local coffee, but what I was really there for, was for some Kopi Luwak! It was 100,000 a cup (11.39 CAD), which was well worth it considering you would normally pay about $60 to $70 a cup back in Canada, so I bought two! For those of you who are wondering what Kopi Luwak is, here's a link to what it's all about. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kopi_luwak So basically, to sum it up, the coffee was "the cat's ass"! It was absolutely incredible, and so tasty. You have to get over the thoughts that it was shit out by an animal, but the taste is so amazing. Another thing checked off my list of things to do in life :)
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| Entering the lush jungle |
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| Kopi Luwak times 2! |
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| Embracing the aroma (it doesn't smell like shit I promise) he he |
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| Unfortunately this plantation has the Luwak in captivity..felt bad for it after seeing it like this |
So after there, we were off to Mt. Katur, for lunch and a view of the amazing volcano. It was a great sight, and of course upon arrival we were harassed by more salespeople. I've gotten to the point where I don't want to buy anything because of their aggressive nature. It's hard to always be seeing no, but I'm still being polite at least. We ate at a restaurant by the volcano, but the food was actually quite terrible. Too bad really, considering the view. After that, the girls were thinking we were going to see a sunset on this tour, but I was pretty sure that wasn't included in the itinerary, so we asked the driver if it was, and of course it wasn't. This just made the girls upset, and more complaining insued....I don't deal well with complainers, but I just keep my mouth shut and try to ignore it all. So our final stop was a nice rice paddy, but there was no sunset for anyone to enjoy, but oh well, I've seen my fair share of nice ones on this trip, so I'm just happy to be here!
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| Mt. Katur |
So after hanging around the rice paddy for a bit, we were back in Ubud, where I got a hold of Denton, and went to meet up for a few drinks and dinner with him and a buddy of his named Forbes. We met at a cool restaurant called Mingle, and had some tasty cocktails and food. Denton ended up being a pretty cool guy who was in the finance industry in Calgary for several years doing stock trading, and made some decent money, and left for Bali. He's been living here for a few years now, and just does day trading to make money from day to day, so we had some cool things in common to talk about. We all hung out there for quite awhile, and then it was closing down, so we all went back to Denton's place for an after party. He has a pretty amazing pad here in Ubud, and even rented the house next door so that he could have parties. We ended up hanging out there for a few hours, meeting his g/f who is a yoga instructor from California, and a few of her friends who were here for the yoga retreat. After having a pool party, and having a pretty good time, it was already 3 am, and there were no taxis running, so we just crashed at his house. Of course this lead to more complaining from two of the girls, as they wanted to get back to the hotel, but this wasn't possible...ahhhh women and their complaining.....so after a short night's rest, we were back to the hotel in the morning, thanks to Denton driving us, and booked one more night, since Ubud is so nice and chill. I ended up just sorting out the Laughing Buddha place for some lunch and some blogging, and chilled out there for several hours, catching up on a few things. Eventually I did a wander all over the city to try and find some latex free condoms, since Pippa was allergic to Latex and we used up her supply, so I felt like I should replace them, but it's surprisingly very very difficult to find any latex free ones in Indonesia ha ha...so after wandering around through many shops with no luck, it was just back to the hotel.
It ended up raining quite heavily for most of the day, so we didn't really get up to a whole lot. Pippa had mentioned that she would be interested in checking out Forbes's studio that day, as he had a large workshop where he was making high end bags for super yachts. Kate, Pippa, and I sorted out a taxi driver to take us out to his place, said our goodbyes to Ashley who was off that evening to Australia. We took our drive and ended up hanging out at Forbes's place for a few hours. He had a pretty cool setup, as he had a huge metal shop, and then a cabin like thing for living quarters and a workshop on top of it. He had a friend from back home living there and helping out as well. The guy was quite the character, as he's been in school for several different trades, including circus training. So we had a little juggling teaching session in the shop. Eventually it was getting to be a bit later in the evening, and Forbes was tired from being out late the night before, so he said he was going to go to bed, so we just got our taxi guy to come pick us up and back to Ubud. Pippa wasn't feeling so well, and went back to bed early, while Kate and I just grabbed a late dinner, and then we too became quite tired, so it was back to the hotel for an early night.
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| juggling lessons in Forbes's studio |
The next day I was up for breakfast, and tried to sort out how I was going to get to Semanyak. Initially, I thought the girls were going to tag along with me, but then they changed their minds when they found out their Swiss friend was in Ubud, so I was going to be heading off solo. I happened to notice the day before that Dave had mentioned that him and Matt were back in Kuta, so before I sorted out transportation to Semanyak, I gave them a buzz and found out that Kuta was actually decent again, now that all the schoolies had left. They said they had found a decent hotel with a pool and air con for 150,000 rupiah a night, so I figured ah what the hell, I may as well just head back to Kuta for the next few days, since I knew the area well enough. I found some cheap shuttle bus to take me back in the afternoon, and just hung out with Pippa a bit before saying my goodbyes.
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| cool statue in Ubud |
Then it was off to Kuta, where I was dropped off in a part of town I didn't really know. I'm a bit stubborn, so I figured I would just walk and try and sort out where I was, and fortunately I was eventually able to make my way towards a familiar area, find the hotel where the lads were staying, and check in. We then met up and wandered out to find some dinner at Bubba Gump Shrimp factory, as Matt has been to a few of them around the world and likes them, but we found that the prices were way too much, so we just wandered back towards Legian Street, which is where all the big clubs and parties are, and stopped at the Irish Bar to grab one of the tasty burgers I had eaten before I left Kuta the previous time.
We had a nice feast and several beers there, and then wandered upstairs to the VIP area, where they give free drinks to foreigners for one hour...win! Unfortunately, we had a table and kept stacking it with drinks, which lead to us being a bit too drunk and all having to leave a fair bit early to head back to the hotel. We had made plans to head out to the waterpark the next day at 9 am or so, so to be out late all night wouldn't have been the best idea anyways. So it was back to the room for a quick sleep, and up early the next day. Matt, Dave and I ended up going to the waterpark with 2 English girls and 1 American girl who all lived on Gili Trawangan, and had a super fun day. We had first gone for breakfast, and I assumed we would be going back to the hotel first, but then they surprised me and grabbed a cab straight there, so I wasn't exactly wearing the best swimwear for the day, as I had my hiking shorts and a belt and nothing else. I ended up making do with it, but for one of the slides I had to take off my belt, and the shorts are really loose, so my ass was basically hanging out the whole time I was waiting for the ride. The rest of the waterslides there were a ton of fun, and they had a great pool bar that had way overpriced Bintangs (47000 R), but a cool place to sit. We ended up hanging out at the park for most of the day, but after all those beers and sun, were all pretty tired out. The best slide there was one where they would actually put you in this capsule thing, and then the bottom would just drop out and you would have a free fall slide and then up a big ramp thing. The ride only lasted about 10 seconds and was called Climax. Of course, being the joker that I am, I would yell out "I'm about to come!" every time the capsule was about to drop me. So after the waterpark, we wandered over to the nearby mall, where they had A&W, but I couldn't find that damn restaurant, after having talked it up to the guys, telling them that they had amazing burgers. We ended up settling for some American restaurant on the boardwalk, which provided some very nice views of the ocean.
After dinner we just wandered back to the hotel, and I crashed pretty hard for a power nap, then found the lads and wandered out for some "Tucker" as Dave calls it. I've picked up a few of their funny English sayings while hanging out with them, and Tucker happens to be one of them. After grabbing some feed, we just went back to the hotel and played a 3 way poker session. We were all pretty tired, so it was a pretty early night, although I made the mistake of buying some Pocari Sweat and convincing Matt to buy some as well.....well I drink the stuff all the time, but drinking it before bed is not such a good idea, as neither of us could fall asleep properly until really really late. I think I had maybe 5 hours of dodgy sleep on the stuff...damn. It was funny to note that as we were walking back to the hotel with our 2 L bottles of the stuff, some locals guys were saying "Ohhh you guys so crazy" and pointing to the bottles ha ha.
So after the dodgy sleep, and listening to the torrential downpour that arrived, I woke up and wandered down for breakfast with Matt and Dave, but found that we were a bit too late for the breakfast menu, so I just settled for some super tasty chicken satay. Since it was a pretty rainy day, and there wasn't any chance for surfing like we had initially planned, I decided to go sort out getting my first tattoo. I've been thinking about something for a few years now, and finally decided to take the plunge, so I found one of the local guys I had made friends with, who had a cousin with a tattoo shop, and got everything all sorted. He happened to have a Japanese girlfriend, who came with me to the shop to help me get it all sorted out, since I wanted it in Kanji characters. I had wanted to get something along the lines of "free spirit" and had google translated it out, and had a rough idea of what I wanted. The girl was kind enough to tell me that there wasn't really a meaning in Japanese for free spirit, but there was an expression that says "free man" which was the meaning I was looking for. So she got the proper characters for the tattooist, and helped make sure that his sketch had the proper spacing for the letters and everything. It ended up not hurting that much really, and looks pretty cool I think.
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| Free Spirit |
After the tattoo was finished, I wandered back to the hotel and found Matt chilling with the American girl from the day before. I ended up joining them, and starting on the Bintang parade. The price at the hotel for them is actually a pretty good deal, so we ended up having several beers there, and then had Burger King deliver us dinner. Yeah, in Bali, all the fast food restaurants deliver, so you can be pretty lazy and lay in bed and get your food if needed. It was a bit of a battle to get it ordered, as they didn't understand us mostly, and then we tried to get the staff at the front desk to order, but they didn't have the number, so finally I got it all sorted out and we had our feast. The other two English girls joined us and we just sat around shooting the shit, until it was nearly 10 pm, and a few of us were up for heading to Skygarden for the free drinks from 10 until 11. Every night they put on a promotion for foreigners where you can have unlimited cocktails for 1 hour...it's a pretty sweet deal.
So after several drinks and meeting some people, I randomly ran into Pippa there. Apparently they decided to come back to Kuta after all, so it was nice to see her, although she was super drunk and Kate was kind of making her avoid me for some reason. So I just wandered around the club trying to talk to other girls and not really having much success. By this point Dave and Matt had both disappeared, so I decided to just wander back to the hotel to catch up with them, but as I was almost home I saw some woman arguing with her friend, so I stopped to chat with her and ended up finding out she was from Java. We ended up just sitting and chatting for quite awhile, and flirting a bit, and I didn't really think too much of it, until she said she was going home and wanted me to come with her. I've been pretty leery about Indonesian women here, as they are typically prostitutes if they're out clubbing, but apparently this one wasn't one, as she even jokingly offered to pay me for my services ha ha....so I ended up back at her small room, and had a pretty good time, and didn't get to sleep until 4 am or so. When we arrived in the taxi, her one neighbour was just getting home, and she didn't want to be seen with a white guy so we had to hang out in the taxi for awhile, then when we finally made our way to her place, he was sitting out on the porch anyways. So after getting into her room, she could hear them talking about us, so she went out there and started yelling at them, it was hilarious.
This woman was a morning person, and was up after 2 hours of sleep and getting ready for Yoga, and she was a pretty hilarious woman. I had a lot of laughs over how direct she talked about sex and various other funny topics. So we shared a taxi back towards Kuta, and dropped her off at Yoga, and I just continued back to my hotel for a bit, then off for some breakfast.
After grabbing some breakfast and sitting at an internet cafe, I wandered back to the hotel, and found the lads sitting around the pool having some beers. We ended up doing that for a few hours, then everyone went off for massages except Dave and I, so we just hung out playing cards for a few hours and having a few more beers. Eventually the lack of sleep from the previous night started to get to me, and since I had an early morning the next day to head to the airport, I ended up just heading back to the room around 8:30 pm, after joining the group for one last beer in the British girls' room. I said my goodbyes to all, except for Dave who I was joining for breakfast the next morning before leaving. I didn't have the greatest sleep, but it was certainly better than the previous nights ;)
I was up early the next day to find it still raining cats and dogs...I hadn't realized it, but there was a tropical storm in SE Asia at the moment, and Indonesia was seeing some of the effects from it. Fortunately, it wasn't as bad as the Philippines. Thoughts and prayers go out too all affected by the storm over there. So after a breakfast with Dave, I was off in the taxi and to the airport, where I lingered around for awhile, paid my depature tax fee of 150,000 rupiah, and was on my way to lovely Thailand. Overall Indonesia was an incredible experience, as I met so many awesome people there, and had so much fun, I hope to return again and see more of this amazing country, as there's much more than just Bali to see :)
I'm now in Phuket Thailand, and will be continuing my story from there.
Ciao,
Rye
