Trips!!

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Whilst I came to Indonesia to teach English, my other motivation is to travel. (travelblog... duh!) I have spent the first few months of my time here ensuring that I pass my probation period (3 months) but I've still managed to get a few trips in.

A few of these trips are to Surabaya, a large city further up the coast. Surabaya has plenty of shopping choice, big malls, and an international hotel with sunbeds and a swimming pool. During these trips to Surabaya, I'll generally be in the malls buying batik (a type of clothing pattern here, much like the different tartans of Scotland) or visiting Dunkin' Donuts.

Another trip I went on was to Malang (30,000rp, or £1.50 on the train from Sidoarjo, return ticket!), a picturesque town about 80km from Sidoarjo. I stayed in a backpackers hostel there (The Helios Hotel) which was extremely cheap (50,000rp per night, which is £2.50) and fairly comfortable. The hostel also organizes tours of the surrounding area, including excursions to Mt Bromo, and numerous beaches around the city. After exploring Malang, which has a beautiful Chinese temple, traditional market, and the Hotel Tuggu, I went to bed in the hostel feeling satisfied with my first day. The Chinese temple is near the hostel, and featured beautiful architecture, smells of incense, and a very serene atmosphere, and is free to look around. The traditional market is crazy, big, and lots of fun to practice bartering in Bahasa Indonesia (Indonesian language, translated literally) with cries of "mahal" (expensive) and lots of lively sales people selling cheap wares, clothes, and food. The hotel Tuggu is a stunning hotel in the city center, which doubles as a museum. The owner of the hotel chain has a numerous collection of artifacts dating back from the early years of civilization, and he's collected a number of them in the hotel. It's free to go and look, though the staff are so courteous I bought a drink at the bar by way of thanks. The next day, I went to Belekambang beach (it's easy to say, and hard to spell, like a lot of Indonesian!) with a Dutch man, Marcus, whom I met at the hostel the night before, and who had a free day in his schedule of backpacking across Indonesia after quitting his job in Holland. It was about 700,000rp (£35) for the full day, which included a driver, guide, and rental car to drive the 2 hours or so to the beach.There's a Hindu temple near the beach, over a rope bridge onto a small island near the shore, which is interesting to look at, and we learnt a few facts about it from our lovely guide. The beach itself is nothing amazing, though after 2 months without seeing a beach, I was happy enough! The people we met there are what made the trip special. We met a group of Balinese traditional dancers who'd come to this beach on holiday. After watching them dance in front of their rented truck (stacked with speakers, and amplifiers, and who knows what else!) for a few minutes, Marcus and I joined in, and danced away with them for hours, swimming in the sea, and attempting to speak Indonesian with them, as they had no English. They loved watching me dance, and tried to copy quite a lot of what I was doing, with varied success! The enjoyment was mutual, and by the end of the day, I had a few traditional Balinese dance moves to add to my repertoire! Upon finding out that I was an English teacher, the oldest of them said "thank you" very sincerely, and was extremely familiar with me thereafter. They gave us a Balinese head wrap (kind of like a bandanna) each, that marked us as being members of the group, and we knew that they'd be going soon. We carried on dancing for a little while, and then an arm wrestling competition broke out (which they won!) between us and many of the group who wanted to test their strength against a boulé. We bade them farewell, and asked our guide (a beautiful Indonesian woman, whose name escapes me, if we might depart back to the hostel, as we were tired after 4 hours of dancing, swimming, and acting silly on the beach.

One of the main trips for anyone to make in this part of the world is Singapore. I'm lucky enough to have been twice now, and it is somewhere I want to visit again very soon. During my first stop, I visited the Chinese and Japanese park, which is literally split in two to accommodate sculptures, trees, and plant life from both cultures, including a garden of bonsai trees! The garden itself is stunning, and contains enough to entertain you for at least a few hours. What made the visit more interesting for me was that there's a tortoise and turtle museum located in the grounds, and it's only $5 to visit. Lots of interesting creatures await, and it's not simply a zoo, because all the animals on show are taken from homes that could no longer care for them, or from abusive situations which have no place being described here. Also in Singapore are numerous museums, places to eat, shops, malls, and possibly the best subway network I've experienced anywhere in the world. One such museum is the Asian culture/civilizations museum, which is well worth a visit; it's 3 floors of artifacts from all over Asia, and is fascinating viewing. I visited a Chinese temple in Singapore too, which (like the one in Malang) made me feel so serene and peaceful. I'm not remotely religious, but if I was, I'd go for that one because it spiritually recharged me despite being in the middle of a crazy, bustling city. Singaporeans are interesting people from all cultures, and nationalities, and the English there is very good. It's a place I'd recommend to anyone who wants to travel in Asia, though it's also quite expensive, unless you do it with hostels and budget eateries, which is certainly doable (I did it!).

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