After using coat and shawl for ten days, its time to change the holiday destination into a place with sunshine and beaches. We decided to choose Surfers Paradise which located on Gold Coast, Queensland. It took us 1.5 hours to fly from Sydney and we couldn’t wait to arrive since we keep on imagining the picturesque beach, just like we saw on the websites and postcards. We arrived at Gold Coast’s Airport. The airport is quite small and felt so tropical. As we found wooden furnish, warm sunshine, sea smell, and many tourists using beach floral blouse. Should we say, “Aloha!”? [View Full Entry]

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Traveling to a new place wouldn’t be special without meeting the local animals. Looks like Taronga Zoo was a perfect place to check out native Australian wildlife. Set in a natural foreshore bush land, Taronga which came from Aboriginal word meaning “water view”, operate ever since 1916. We went to the zoo on Saturday, as the weather forecast predicted its going to be a bright sunny day. We started the trip on 9 am. Parked the car near Darling Harbor, we bought daytriper ticket which enables us using bus, train, and ferry around Sydney all day long with only one ticket. [View Full Entry]

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Here we are, arrived in Sydney. As I read from some articles, the most appropriate words to describe Sydney would be cosmopolitan, diverse, energetic, and easygoing. I just can’t wait to prove the opinion! My first impression of the city was unstable weather. We arrived in the middle of rain with cold and windy situation. During our trip in Sydney we stay at our friend Luki’s house, but we weren’t very sure about the location and how to get there especially with our baggage which marked “Heavy” by Virgin Blue airline. Ouch! Luckily, Luki picked us at the airport. It took [View Full Entry]

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As I don’t know much about Melbourne, I trusted the guide (a.k.a our friends) to inform the “must see” places. We arranged the itinerary and prepare ourselves for the trip. On Saturday we decided to see Saint Kilda beach but previously we joined lunch at our friend’s house. Her name is Sherly and she is an Indonesian as well. She served us yummy spicy and hot fried chicken that lighted up our afternoon mood ;)) Yummm... Finished our lunch and chit chat, we continue the trip to St.Kilda beach where we planed to watch sunset. The beach is clean and there [View Full Entry]

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Finally, I am going on a trip which I had planned since 2007. My colleague Angga and I had planned to go traveling together, considering both of us never went to Australia, so why not? We decided April 2008 is the best time for us to go. Successfully got Australian tourist visa, we booked the ticket and start the journey on Thursday night April 17th 2008. We used Garuda Indonesia airlines and it took us 6 hours flight from Bali to Melbourne. We arrived on the next day, 7 am local time. The weather was nice, although I am not used [View Full Entry]

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It's always interesting to find out cultures which I never knew before. Apparently today, chinese community all over the world are celebrating Chinese New Year 2559, welcoming the new Rat year. Most of them said it would be a prosperous year, as Rat is very smart and able to addapt in various environments. At first, I was really interested to see the Barongsai. A dance played by at least 17 people using huge lion suit and also play traditional instruments such as Gong and Cymbal. The dance is very unique as the dancers form themselves as if they were one huge [View Full Entry]

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There’s not so much to say about the last two days. The weekend when I was plan to travel to many places. To join a test and visit my hometown Surabaya, to meet my colleagues in Jakarta, and to spend holiday in Bandung which I never visited before. Everything was well planed and booked, until the heavy rain and flood come. Heavy rain which happened since Thursday, Jan 31st 2008 at Jakarta caused flood in some places including the main road to Jakarta’s Airport. On Friday afternoon, the Jakarta’s airport was closed to all flight due to heavy rain and flood [View Full Entry]

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January 23, 2008 is a special day for Hindu Balinese community, as they celebrate Galungan Day. The Hindu celebrates Galungan day every six months. Galungan Day held on Wednesday and will be followed by Kuningan Day on the Saturday. This 11-day holy period is based on ancient harvest festival. Barong dance held house to house on Galungan Day. I’m very interested to know what the Hindu do on Galungan day. And I was looking for information, which Pura (Hindu’s place for praying) allows tourist visits. I heard about a big Pura which allows tourist visits called Pura Jagatnatha in Denpasar, but [View Full Entry]

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Although I have joined Safari Tour when I was a kid at West Java, I found out that I would never felt bored on this kind of trip. This Saturday, I went to Taman Safari Gianyar (Gianyar's Safari Park). This park just launched early on January 2008. I went there with my friends which made this trip even more exciting. It took us 30 minutes drive from Denpasar and 9 am was the perfect time to start. We bought the ticket for Rp 75,000/person. We heard the news that after the park completely finish its construction process on March 2008, the [View Full Entry]

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Sometimes, beautiful moments may come unexpected. This Friday, I was on an office trip to Sidemen Village at Karangasem Bali. It is quite a remote area which takes 1 hour drive from Denpasar. At first, I didn’t have any thoughts in my mind. Just prepare myself in a very long journey to a remote area which took 2, 5 hours drive, as said by my Balinese colleagues (which in fact never went to Sidemen anyway). Then miracles happen. First, I just realized that the new driver is formerly worked in a travel agent. He used to bring tourist from every part [View Full Entry]

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