Part #7 - Sacrifices, Seedy messages, and Bali.... oh and some Work!

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I arrived after an awfully dodgy flight into Makassar (aka Ujung Pandang.... quite confusing), and headed straight into town and to a hostel. Next morning i rocked up to work, excited and pumped to get started. However upon arrival i was told they weren't expecting me for another month (despite my numerous emails and correspondence discussing my arrival with them), and so they said to give them a week and they'll find something for me. GREAT! So after working out some slightly more permanent accommodation (ugh, we'll get to THAT later), it was time to explore! First thing on the list, what Sulawesi is famous for: Tana Toraja.
I set off to spend the "long weekend" up in Tana Toraja, Sulawesi's cultural hub. I took an 8 hour bus which of course turned out to be a 13 hour bus, and made some friends who very kindly offered to let me stay, but i had already booked a hostel. So they helped me find my way to it, and then i checked in and got ready for the big day coming. However somewhere along the line i had seriously misled one of my new friends, and at 2am received a message from him that was exactly as follows: "hi, can i sleppy in your bed you this night? You Sexy."..... Well at least it was a compliment....
After a night of numerous missed calls (which turned into an entire weekend of them), i finally slept. The next morning i met a guy called Emmanuel who offered to take me to all the fun things Tana Toraja had to offer. Defo, was my response. So i jumped on the back of his motorbike and off we went to all the various wonders of TT. Now for those who have either never been or not heard of it, Toraja is a place that has combined its oldest traditions with a skewed adaptation of Christianity. The result being a cool mountainous land, with lots of friendly fun people, who live in boat shaped houses, slaughter buffalos and boars when someone dies, then bury that person in a cliff wall and hang a wooden doll made in their image outside of the burial place.... i know, why didn't we think of that!?
So E-Dog and I (Emmanuel is less fun to type), trundled around the beautiful countryside for hours and hours on the back of his motorbike, stopping in various villages to see boat houses, cliff graves, dolls, doll makers, and around lunch we hit up a funeral ceremony! We arrived with gifts of tea cigarettes and sugar, and watched as buffalos and wild pigs were killed, skinned, and gutted in front of us... Afterwards we were treated to very kind hospitality, and we drank coffee and ate buffalo. Afterwards there was more rice paddies, grave sites, houses and bumpy roads, and of course lots of laughs.
<Side note: according to E-dog's infinite(ly limited) wisdom, the reason for the boat houses was the belief that their ancestors came from china on boats of similar shape. However in a big storm they were separated from their convoy, and agreed that in order to find eachother again they would build their houses in the shapes of their boats.>
The next day was more of the same, though that doesn't nearly do it justice as the scenery alone was unbelievably beautiful and entertaining. After a few hours the rain came down and E-dog became a little stressed about driving without a rain coat. I finally put my raincoat to some use, and offered to drive...Great fun. And then it was back to Rantepao (main city) to bus home to Makassar... The 8 hour bus turned out to be even longer than previously, as some kid thought it would be a great idea to throw a rock through the window of our bus.

Work:
So i came back and got into things at Bakti, an organisation that essentially creates a forum for local development projects and organisations to coordinate with eachother as well as with donours. I was asssigned to work with cool guy called Desta, and he outlined the next gthree months for me. My job was to write 3 articles for their monthly newletter/magazine about local development projects or "smart practices", and to encourage others to follow in their example. As this isn't terribly interesting for everyone I ended up writing about a locally run water company in Lombok, a women's safehouse in north sulawesi and a malaria clinic in north maluku. Best parts about Bakti: the kind people, the weekly badminton death matches, the amazing morning coffees and delicious lunch.
The work was really interesting, however it gave me a lot of free time. So! More exploring! I needed a motorbike, and got one. First trip to Bantimurung waterfall just outside makassar with its caves, butterfly park, and thousand children asking to take photos of me the sweaty foreigner (bule in indonesian), something that i had to get used to very quickly.... I'm scared to know how many photos of me have found their way to the internet.

It wasn't long however until i was summoned by my lovely sister on a Bali adventure. So off i went. I arrived in the morning and headed off to see Jess and her entourage of 4 (including the wonderful Katie Althans who despite her regular visits to chez Mackenzie i had not seen in years) relaxing over brunch by the beach looking fancy.. My filthy shirt, too big jeans, and worn thongs made me stick out just a touch. But we settled into a gorgeous villa just outside the city, and Jess and i were quick to rent motos, and explore. I enjoyed the opportunity to shop for clothes that might actually fit me (everything in sulawesi only come in "Indonesian size") and to spoil myself people watching, as wide-eyed at the sight of tourists as the Makassarese seemed at my presence. There was much fun to be had, including cheap lunches in Seminyak, Sorong shopping, sunset drinks on cliffs, pizzas, LOTS of planning for upcoming little sister's birthday, matching colourful sunnies, a lot of embarrassing villa dancing, and a little dancing in town. All in all a wonderful weekend, and then it was back off to Makassar.
<Notable highlight #1: Katie wore her sunnies out for a dance in town, and didn't realise until the next morning that one of the lenses had been missing the entire time, she just thought it was lighting tricks. #2: Skyping Freddie for her birthday party, wishing her well and doing a synchronised drink with her and her mates.>

I returned to my little Kos (apartment) which was a far cry from the luxury of our bali villa. The Kos i have lived in for the last 2.5 months now consists of a squat toilet, shower head, a nice bed, windows that won't quite close (and as such....) a temperamental air conditioner, and 3 million mosquitos. The place is run by a strange duo: a bratty kid called melki who daily asks me for cigarettes or extra cash, and his brother who is at most 19, and is similarly helpful... But it's home.. for now. However, this was no time to be down! Thanks to the one month tourist visas enforced by Indonesia, i was up for an international journey! With Singapore done, i decided to hit new territory.... Malaysia!

Till next time!

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