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Published: July 25th 2006
Think it's a Sunday, but it's hard to tell, days just haven't meant anything to me for so many months.
After my travels in Ubud and Kintamani I got the bus and ferry over to Gilli Trawangan (165,000 3hours). It was a long and hasslefull travel where the standard tourists tricks were played on us laden-down and exhausted travellers: busses would stop for no apparent reason at ports and terminals where you'd be shepparded into restaurants and cafes, given menus and expected to eat, eat, eat while tens of street vendors attempted to emotionally blackmail you to buy, buy, buy their tat, tat, tat or they'd drop you somewhere you thought was your final destination - the place you'd paid all inclusive to get to, then expect you to pay their mates to take you 400yards in a horse drawn cart to the real place ... except for the obvious extra charges.
It's hard not to feel as though 'they', (a seemingly innocent reference that we've picked up for the Indos that's turned derogatory and impossible not to use), are always trying to screw you. Sad because it really tarnishes your opinion and experience. Having said that, if you're
lucky you can have some relief-inducing and enjoyable chats with others, most of whom are simply happy to enquire about your travels and practise their English. Refreshing to say the least.
Gilli trawangan is a beautiful island, don't get me wrong, it's no paradise but I'd managed to get talking to some guys on the little boat over here from Lombok's Pemenancy port who seemed fun and I'd tagged along in the hope of it developing further.
Mike and Nick were two second year students from Exeter Uni. Mike, a fun and kind of hyperactive English student and Nick a wake-boarding champion reading Biology from Hong Kong; both sound as a pound. Then there was Jack, or Giacomo, an Italian paediatrician, 36, with dreads, who I'd first spotted looking like a typical 'The Beach'-seeking traveller in flowing orange trousers at the port, good looking but hard to place in one of my boxes of sterotypes.
For the next 6 days we hung around together, falling welcomingly into Trawangan's reputation as party island, drinking endless bottles of Arak, (a local whisky-type liquor), full-moon raving on the beach with psilocybe mushroom shakes and meeting some lovely people.
Plans
slowly formed to visit Flores in search of the legendary Komodo Dragon, (we'd heard it was not possible to see them on Komodo), driven by Mike's life-time dreams to see the 3-4m monsters and bring back a photo to put in Freddy's (his lizard), tank as aspiration.
A choppy and bone-drenching boat ride back to Lombok started our dred-inducing, painfully slow 30 hour island-hop.
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