Kami Bisa Berbicara Bahasa Indonesia

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Welcome to the Java blog, Matt style. Meg's been doing a great job keeping you all up to date but I decided I should pitch in and help catch us up (or you guys up actually) before we start making our way home. Don't worry, this won't take long.

After leaving Kota Kinabalu, Borneo we headed for Bandung, Java via the capital of Indonesia, Jakarta. We stayed one night in a hot Mosquito farm owned by an incredibly nice little man in Jakarta for $4 and caught an early train the next morning for Bandung and the sanctuary you find when you stay with a best friend of 13 years. The first class train ride from Jakarta to Bandung was filled with spectacular sites and all the AC and music videos you could get.

Upon arrival at Bandung train station, Isak, the best friend we went to see, was waiting with open arms and whisked us away in a bemo/angkat (the Indo version of close-range inner-city public transport) to his lovely apartment building to make us our first authentic Indo meal of Mee Goreng Sayur- fried noodles and veg. Isak's place came with all the rice you can eat and a laundry service plus a very nice Italian/Indo couple named Simone and Ely who gave us their apartment for the 3 days left in February they paid rent for because they were moving to Bali. Suffice it to say Isak's accommodations were quite nice. We all slept in the same bed the first night (hilarious, but restful because Meg and I had hardly slept the prior two nights) then Meg and I moved to Simone and Ely's place.

Our first night we all went to dinner together (Isak, Meg, Simone, Ely and I) at the best Italian restaurant in Indonesia which poor Simone had only found a few days prior to leaving for Bali. The food was great and the company better.

Isak, after only a few weeks in Bandung, is basically fluent in Bahasa Indonesian and therefore inspired Meg and I to learn some. We got to practice a lot with all his very nice friends and some of the people he works with. Isak is in Bandung doing research for his master's degree. He is doing various different experiments with biogas in some of the local villages. Biogas is, overly simplified, the capture of methane gas release from many different types of animal waste (for Isak's work he uses cow dung) that is "stewed" in mostly underground containers. It may sound kind of nasty but it's not and it really is a very sustainable way to not only use cow/pig/horse/people doodoo, but to also provide people with a very cheap and efficient fuel for cooking and various other things. Furthermore, when you consider that the slurry (cow poo sludge), as Isak and Wawa (Isak's invaluable technical genius of a partner) call it, upon being removed from the holding containers is a rich fertilizer for the myriad crops grown in the hills around Bandung, Biogas systems are great in these types of applications and are as close to a closed production/waste system as you can get. And with the research Isak, and others, are doing Biogas could soon be used in many more applications as well.

Hanging with Isak and his friends, both from local villages and from the city, for nearly a week was a great way to see some real Indonesia, taste some of the best food in Indo (from Wawa's mom who fed us everytime we walked in the house), learn about Sundanese culture, and lay the ground work for learning enough Indonesian to have allowed Meg and I to have some actual simple conversations with people. Plus, it was great to catch up with one of my best friends after almost a year.

Other experiences in Bandung include: some awesome motorbike rides through the mountainous terrain (one carrying chicken wire, metal wiring and various other supplies for the Biogas systems); a beautiful hike up to the village with Rima, passing by a waterfall; a trip to a micro-hydro plant; seeing a baby cow minutes after birth; lots of good food and drink and lots of great people.

So it was after a good bye dinner party hosted by Isak, that Meg made some great lasagna for and for which Meg and I were both too tired to socialize for long, we said good bye to our dearest Isak and Bandung, bound for Bali and some long travel days. Our days of hanging in Isak's adopted village, Cicalong, and being Biogas system assistants were rewarding and educational; thanks to Isak, Wawa and his family (specially his mom), the lady at the local warung who made the great cheap eats and bandrek, Rima, Simone and Ely, and the guy who rang the bell selling fried tofu at 6am every morning making sure we didn't sleep in. And to the others who i'm certain i've failed to mention but probably won't read this anyway.

Oops, apparently part of my responsibility for this entry is to relate the travel from Bandung to Kuta, Bali. Here's a short addendum:

We left Bandung for Surybaya on an overnite train (not first class, cattle car style) that departed at 5PM due in at 6 or 7 AM. The train was sticky and hot, but had more beautiful sites during sunlight hours. It was also eye-opening to see the condition of living of those people who lived in various box and lean-to style dwellings inches from the tracks.

Meg slept uncomfortably in the seat and I slept, quite well, on the floor at her feet on newspapers and a blanket with the mice and cockroaches. One little mousey ran across my chest at some point during the night, but once one resigns the mind to such conditions you stop caring about such minor inconveniences. Plus, seeing how the people who lived near the tracks had it I felt fortunate. On a couple of stops during the night little heads and hands would pop in the windows to ask for a bit of change or some food; Meg happily obliged with a few coconut cookies her pockets are stuffed with at all times.

When we arrived in Surybaya we were hungry and ready to be done with that leg of travel, however we had to catch another six hour train for Banyuwangi at 9AM. We attempted to find food and ATM; we found both (many ATM's actually), but the good ol' jackasses at Capital One had performed their quarterly shut-off of our cards because it was, I don't know, March maybe. There is never any rhyme or reason to why the cards are deactivated. We can only imagine the monkeys in the Cap 1 office mashing buttons for fun, like, "hey, Marty, check it out. I turned these cards off for the fourth time. You wanna pull the fire alarms again?"

Anyway, we wanted to save our money for transport because we vowed never to use our Bank of America ATM cards (they charge obscene amounts for international transaction fees) after my mom overnited us the Cap 1 cards in Laos for $200 and a first round draft pick. So, we skipped breakfast and hopped on the train. It was hot again, but with the ubiquitous stunning scenery.
Once in Banyuwangi we jumped in a pedicab to get over to the port for our 30-minute ferry ride to west Bali. It was a lovely ferry ride.

We deboarded the ferry and found a public van headed for Denpasar (near Kuta) for a price that fit with the money we had remaining. Unfortunately, the driver wanted to wait for a full van and walked off to take his 5PM nap. After three hours, and us discovering that the 30 minute ferry ride from Java puts you in a new time zone an hour later, the driver decided he was too sleepy for the drive to Denpasar and wandered off for his 9PM nap. Meg and I resigned ourselves to sleeping at the bus station with the rats, mice and cockroaches but decided we'd go hang out near the area where the cars/busses drive off the ferry in hopes that we'd find a way to Denpasar. Just as I was about to give up, Meg wanted another 15 minutes, a bus came. We boarded with not enough money in our pockets to pay the fare and headed for Denpasar. Luckily everything in Indo is negotiable and having an empty wallet worked in our favor.
We got to Denpasar and got in a cab to Kuta making sure the driver understood he had to find a money changer or an ATM (we'd have to use our B of A cards, sorry mom). Seeing as how it was 1 or 2 AM the money changers were all closed and we settled on the throttling we'd get for using our money in our B of A accounts. All went without issue and we stopped in at an internet place to phone Cap 1 and give another verbal bashing for turning off the cards; they mysteriously worked after the phone call, although the representative swore they weren't de-activated and didn't work in the moments before the call.

After almost 36 hours of travel we made to where we were supposed to be under budget and glad Isak had taught us a bit of Indonesian.

Hmm... I guess being brief isn't that easy. Sorry.

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Photos

More View
Bandung sits in a crater of mountains and volcanoes

Biogas
the long plastic holding container we're standing over is where the cowdung "slurry" gets added everyday. Bacteria then "produce" the methane that is harvested for cooking

Wawa's biogas system
these bags are the storing containers for the harvested biogas. Wawa made this system and uses it to cook everyday. It is super high quality methane that burns very hot and is more efficient than a standard gas stove

Marmots
Wawa raises these little guinea pigs for food. we joked the rest of the time that Wawa's mom was miking us marmot goreng- fried guinea pig

system
Isak showing us Wawa's biogas stove

Isak's experiments
Just like Wawa's actual working system but on a smaller scale to measure production, methane quality, most efficient tank size, etc...

Wawa's house
some of Isak's friends and co-workers

lunch
Wawa's mom in the brown dress allowed us to help one day