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Published: January 1st 2008
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We arrived in West Sumatra late at night on December 4. A larger airport at Padang than expected but bit of a melee from the start and very hot and humid. The two men at Immigation took an inordinate amount of time reviewing passports and then stamped forms with vigour. After an hour we were waived through to collect our bags which I managed after only a short sharp tussle with shark-like wannabe baggage handlers. Customs officers smiling, but far too interested in the 4 arriving foreigners i(ncluding your fearless friends). Chatted with a friendly officer from Bukittinngi who expressed genuine pleasure that we were going hiking in the highlands the following week. For some reason I became separated from the missus and the Customs officer I was dealing with asked to go through the heavy shoulder bag I was carrying for Helen (She was across hall dealing with another officer and her main duffle bag). My guy zipped open H's shoulder bag and began holding up items asking "What this?" Reply, "Ummm, hair stuff?", and "What this", Reply, "face cream stuff?...". They clearly preferred rooting through our bags than those of Indonesians who shared our flight.
The driver organized
by the beach inn on Cubadak Island awaited us in the arrivals hall. Coincidentally, the other two foreigners from our plane, John and Laura from Oregon, were also bound for Cubadak and would share our ride. Our driver scurried to the vehicle dragging Helen's bags and hotly pursued by an aggressive baggage handler carrying John and Laura's bags. We brought the rest of our bags and loaded them into the back of the small SUV whereupon the baggage handler turned to me with outthrust palm demanding "money, money, Singapore dollars OK!". Somewhat bemused by his aggression I offered him 20 cents Singapore (subsequently learned John paid him $10) which he brusquely shrugged off, so I shook his hand and waved cheerio.
We hopped into the vehicle for the 2 hour drive to the boat for Cubadak and I managed to get front passenger seat. What ensued was a hairy late night thrill ride. It was an excessively humid overcast night with occasional rumblings of thunder, but neither the moon nor stars were visible. Our driver started our journey by shifting the SUV into first gear, firmly placing his hand on the horn and flooring it. We raced down the
Cubadak Island
Sumatra Island across the water. hills and through the city of Padang blasting past overloaded scooters, wobbling bicyclists with no lights, shadowy pedestrians and lumbering old trucks which took up 3/4's of what may only generously be described as the "2-lane road". Heavy on-coming traffic led to Sumatran Chicken as our driver popped out into the breaks in on-coming lights to overtake heavily laden trucks with his horn blaring, and lights flickering wildly. At the same time he had the Sumatran Top 40 caterwauling from the speakers which he sang along with whenever he was not yelling into his cell phone or text messaging with one hand. Internally I contrasted this pitch-dark drive careening up and down the coastal moutains on heavily pot holed twisty road with antiseptic, high tec safe and orderly Singapore from which we departed a few short hours earlier.
I had a great viewpoint from the front seat. Busy coastal traffic with sudden appearance of small kampong villages straddling the road. Our rapidly moving headlights briefly illuminated people and scabrous dogs shambling across the road blithely avoiding our bumper by inches. Periodically, we lit up groups of men seated on the side of the narrow road animatedly discussing world events
as we blasted past. Once out of the kampongs we would accelerate up or down hill until held up by trucks whereupon our driver would flit out into oncoming traffice with horn blasting and lights flickering at the rapidly approaching vehicles. A few times we were forced to hastily blip left in between two vehicles and an on coming truck would rumble by with horn wailing off into the distance. As we juked in or out, our driver occasionally passed off edge of the raised road kicking up a large amount of gravel and dirt . I won't say that my life flashed before my eyes during this drive however I think I may have gotten up to the highlights of my 3rd or 4th year on at least two occasions. The truth is that our driver knew what he was doing so I refrained from yelling at him or distracting him in any way.
After two hours
we turned off the main road and sped a final 10 kilometers to a small harbour. A complete absence of light in the kampongs we passed through informed us that the power was off in this area of the coast. It resulted in a rather eerie scene as fires were burning in upright oil barrels by the side of the road and shadowy figures were grouped around them. The road ended abruptly and our vehicle lit up a concrete pier looming 1 meter above the road surface. At this pont it was after midnight and pitch black save for our headlights and occasional flashes of dry lightning over the ocean. We stepped out of the vehicle and a group of men opened the rear hatch and pulled out our luggage without a word to any of us. I shook hands with our driver. Before he backed up and turned away his headlights allowed us to climb up onto the long pier and follow the 7 men, some of whom carried our luggage and one with a flashlight. Ou driver reversed and drove off leaving al of us with only the light of the one wavering flashlight to guide us along
Fisherman
They arrived in mornings with fresh catch for our dinners. the long pier. Periodic flashes of lightning would freeze-frame us on the pier and with its disappearance we were immediately plunged into almost complete darkness made all the worse by the memory of the lightning in our retinas.
The helmsman and his flashlight wielding assistant then climbed two meters down from the pier into a heavy wooden boat and began to load the luggage. A bit of an ugly scene developed as the 5 remaining men circled about us and held palms out "money, money" with one laughing harshly. The confrontation took place in absolute darkness as the helmsmen and assistant kept their heads down and kept the light in the boat. John began handing out some bills and I grabbed several 1,000 rupiah notes (10 cents each) from my wallet and gave them to the leader. Taking Helen's hand firmly I climbed down and handed her into the boat where Laura joined her. I handed up a couple more 1,000 notes and said "John lets go", whereupon we both climbed into the boat. An argument broke out between the helmsman and the "money " guys before the latter finally untied the boat. Pulling away from the pier lightning
Our Beach Home
Gorgeous loft beach house. lit up the 5 "robbing hoods" gathered together on their knees trying to divide up the money in the absence of any light - wish I could have taken a picture!
The heavy wooden boat made its way out into the dark sea under the thrust of two powerful outboard engines. The assistant stood on the prow and only occasionally turned on the flashlight. Dry lightning continued to flash providing glimpses of dark waves, far flung fishing boats and the wide smile on Helen's face.
I loved the journey from the airport to the island.
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Deborah McIntosh
non-member comment
What a great tale!
Hi you two - I'm not sure if you're getting these comments, as they don't seem to show up on your blog site, but I'll hope for the best. Your blog entries are magnificent - what a great thing to find waiting for me when I boot up my computer on an otherwise dreary Vancouver morning! Happy New Year to you both, and looking forward to the next installment ... Lots of love, Deborah