A Bowl of Stupid

On yesterday’s less than encouraging last thought, I’m outta’ here, kids — I’m heading back down to Indonesia for another month (but I’ve got a couple “time released” entries ready to go, and I’ll also try to post stuff from the road just to let people know I’m alive — hopefully — and to provide some more travel information about the area).

Frankly, until I actually saw a calendar over the weekend, I thought I was leaving yesterday. Errr … yah, not so much. I actually leave on Thursday, 2 August, returning to Singapore on 1 September. Oops.

This time, I’m heading back down in the general south-eastern area of the Indonesian archipelago, but more easterly and more southerly — to the Nusa Tenggara Province, which includes West Timur and the Islands of Rote and Sumba. I’ll be flying from Singapore through Jakarta to Kupang, and then a 5 hour ferry to Rote. And unlike my last trip, I don’t plan on wasting as much time and money “island hopping” this time — instead I plan on spending much of the month on the fairly uncrowded Island of Rote (or Roti), working on my surfing and napping skills.

(Nusa Tenggara Province (containing Timur and Rote), Indonesia)

For reference, Rote Island is the furthest southern point of Indonesia, with beautiful unspoiled beaches combining amazing surfbreaks (onshore and offshore), pockets of lush tropical rainforests, savannas and rolling hills ending in sheer cliffs. Nembrala Beach on Rote is where I’ll be making my base, as Nembrala has the surfbreak called “T-Land” — which many claim has one of the best right-hand waves in Indonesia — located directly out front. There are also 10 more surf breaks in the general area ranging from peaky rights to barreling lefts (there’s also supposed to be some really good fishing and snorkeling too).

Indian ocean ground swells provide the juice to light up Rote’s southwest facing shores. Combined with dominant E-SE trades winds which blow offshore from April to October, this is a recipe for perfection similar to the Uluwatu-Impossibles-Padang Padang setup on the Bukit peninsula of Bali, minus the crowds. “T-land” breaks with great shape at any size of swell and on all tides, with rides up to 200+ meters. And best of all, although the break has been surfed since 1979, it remains uncrowded.

Due to its location and its immediate proximity to the troubled country of East Timur, Rote is a tropical paradise that has remained relatively untouched and unspoiled from tourism — one of the last places one can truly still experience the real “Indo-dream.”

Anyway, before I go, I wanted to get a few things out of the way here — both in terms of maintaining my “online presence” as well as giving some info as to my proximate whereabouts to friends, family, and well wishers (as well as those of my friends whom have recently stabbed me in my proverbial “online back” — “You broke my heart, TK! You broke my heart!!”):

Seriously though — first off, as per Manny’s great suggestion, you’ll notice that I’ve put up on the top title-bar, next to my “MySpace Page” link, another link to my new Flickr page — where you can see many, if not all of the photos I’ve taken from my trips so far. I’m still uploading them, but I’ll be updating the lions’ share before I leave, so check back in the next few days.

Second, as noted above, I hope to be checking my email, messages, comments, etc., on this and my other online sites (MySpace, Flickr, LinkedIn, etc.) whenever I get the chance, and any comments and/or well wishes are greatly appreciated (although I may come off as a bit of a selfish, uncompromising asshole hell bent on doing everything my way regardless of whether or not I ever see my friends, family or hometowns again, I really do miss all those folks and places greatly and love hearing from them any chance I get).

Thirdly, when I return from Indo, I am planning on another extended “outing” somewhere. Right now, it’s a toss-up between: (1) staying in Southeast Asia and backpacking for several months through Thailand, Myanmar (Burma), Vietnam, Laos, and Cambodia; (2) chasing the surf when the season starts in Sri Lanka in late-September and October; (3) heading to Johannesburg (and Cape Town), South Africa, where one of my best friends will be working for the month, to do some shark-cage diving and other stupid shit; (4) heading to China to tour there for a couple months; and (5) whatever anyone else may suggest (INSERT SUGGESTIONS HERE).

In other words, if anyone has any ideas as to my next trip when I get back from Indo in September, I’m open to suggestions.

And on that note, I’m outta’ here guys. I hope everyone has a great remainder of their summer (winter for you Aussie guys -and you thought I forgot about you, huh?), and I hope everyone stays safe and happy. Peace, out.

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