A Bowl of Stupid

(Transcribed: Sunday, 24 June 2007)

Once again, I’m backdating about my earlier travels. This time, however, I’m doing it because I’ve absolutely NOTHING else to do.

The surf has been dead for the last few days on Sumbabwa (and the rest of Indonesia). I’ve shifted traveling companions (this time, I’m hanging with another Aussie chap and his Turkish pro-windsurfer friend), searching for any reef here on Sumbawa that can hold even the smallest amount of swell. And while we found some at some “semi-secret local breaks, we’ve even extinguished that last bit of surf.

Now it’s completely flat. Everywhere. It’s actually kind of strange for that to happen this far into the season (from what I’m told).

So we’ve been doing anything we can to stay busy – reading books, reading surf guides, learning Indonesian, exploring around on a motor-scooter (the locals ride 3 to a bike, so we thought we could too – not so much; we’re just “slightly” heavier than the locals, and I’ve a nice little “road-rash” on my arm now from when we couldn’t get up enough power to go up a hill), fucking around with the local animals (goats, chickens, oxen, and a horse), and yesterday, fixing up an old boat carved out of a log to go fishing out past the surf break.

It was fun, but just shows what surfers do when there’s no surf.

In my case, however, I going to write about when I first left Bali to head over to the island of Lombok.

Lombok

I took the late “slow ferry” from Bali to Lombok. And although now I know that Lombok is itself a sprawling island in and of itself, at the time, I was under the impression that it was a small undeveloped island out in the middle of nowhere.

Yeah, not so much.

The first problem I had is that I arrived after dark and was left in the “less than comforting” arms of a “travel-agent” I had already paid what I now know was an absolutely exorbitant amount to get me to Banco Banco (somewhere around US$50.00). However, knowing that I needed to get more money, and knowing there really is only one place on the island that has ATM machines (Mataran), they charged me an extra US$10.00 to go to Mataran before taking me to Banco Banco.

So I hop into a van with 3 guys – only one of which speaks even a handfull of English – trusting they would take me to Banco Banco (and somewhere to sleep) without first gutting me and selling my intestines on Indo Ebay.

That trust became more and more harder to maintain as the only English speaking guy left us after about 20 minutes, and one of the other 2 remaining “drivers” left the front seat to sit behind me in the back of the van (easier to slit my throat, I imagined, although it turned out he simply wanted to get some sleep since they were taking turns driving, and he had to drive back while the first guy slept).

Luckily for them, and me I suppose, that they could not understand me when I said to myself, but out loud, “Kish, this has got to be the DUMBEST thing you’ve even done.”

My trust in human nature got further and further stretched as we turned on to ever-smaller roads. From a main road, to a smaller road, to what seemed like alleyways, and finally onto a long stretch of dirt road, heading up and down the Lombok hills.

Just like the Sopranos, I thought. Only these guys may sell my organs for a couple extra Rupies.

In retrospect, I now know those thoughts were entirely unfounded. However, as I mentioned previously, one of my most consistent traveling “tips” is to go somewhere knowing nothing of where to go, stay, or the conditions of both.

In this particular case, that philosophy blew up in my ego, as opposed to my face.

if you ever travel to Indonesia, you will understand in only a matter of seconds why it is known as being the second-most corrupt country in the world.

Everything is negotiable. And by everything, I mean EVERYTHING.

But something else the tourist places don’t mention is that, generally (and by generally, I mean almost everywhere but the Gili Islands), once you have negotiated a deal – no matter how one sided and regardless of how bitter the negotiations – the person with whom you bargained will be like your brother until he or she has rendered the negotiated services.

In that respect, although I now know I paid waaaaaay too much for my initial transport from the Ferry to Banco Banco, the drivers would probably have killed someone that tried to stop them from delivering me there.

So that’s a plus, at least.

Moreover, had I studied up beforehand, I would have known that Banco Banco, where I was going, was out in the middle of nowhere, these guys were doing me a HUGE favor by taking me out there in the middle of the night, and there are only 1-2 places in the area that house tourists – even surfers.

Indeed, Banco Banco (and it’s world renowned surf-break, “Desert Point”) is known as much for its surf as it is for its inaccessibility. Check it out online when you get a chance.

So, after a 3 hour drive over what was probably only 100 kilometers as the crow flies, my drivers brought me to a place with a sign out front made out of an old surfboard – which said “Surimans, Accommodations and Information.”

I had never been so glad to see a fucking surfboard in my life, regardless of the fact that it was hanging like a trophy fish in some guys front yard.

We awakened Suriman – who thankfully speaks very good English – and my drivers left, their duties extinguished.

I cannot say enough about how kind Suriman was, how helpful he was upon my arrival (knowing how green I was), and how accommodating he was – awakening his wife to help him make some coffee and banana pancakes for me before bed.

We sat up for about an hour talking about our respective upbringings, my trip there, the local surf break, and surfing spots in Indonesia in general.

I went to sleep in an outdoor mat, protected from the elements by only a mosquito net and a roof of loosely-stitched palm fronds.

Indeed, had I known what I was to learn a week later – that another surf-tourist has to be emergency evac’d after acquiring neural-encephalitis staying there less than a week prior – I probably still would have thought it was the absolutely perfect ending to that perfectly weird day.

Note: That should not, and frankly cannot, be taken as an indictment against Suriman’s or any other home stays in Lombok or elsewhere in Indo. That shit just happens — you really can’t control it other than by trying to protect yourself through watching your drinking water intake, using bug repellent, mosquito netting, etc. I just thought it was kinda creepy that some guy got so fucked up while staying at the same place I did just days earlier.