Final Thoughts:
My time in Indonesia was fantastic and it now goes down as one of my favourite countries that I've visited. The people were some of the friendliest I've ever come across, and Rene and I received generosity beyond expectation - the guy we hitchhiked with who bought us lunch, the various people who rescued us from being lost and drove us to where we were heading, Ubay and friends who showed us around Balikpapan and paid for everything, Gustin who spent five days showing us around her local area. Everywhere we went on Borneo and Sulawesi island we were met with the sound of 'hello mister' accompanied by a warm smile; for some of them a rare or first sight of a 'white person'.
We went to tropical islands, on a river trip to the centre of Borneo, and to a crocodile farm. We danced at a funeral, saw a buffalo sacrifice, went to a one-in-five year tribal festival, visited some cities, and hiked up three active volcanoes through the night amongst so many other things. The country was surprisingly westernised and a lot more modern and developed than I expected even if it has a long way to go in places, and whilst being wild enough at times to be interesting, pleasingly lacked the chaos I encountered throughout India. The roads were sometimes pretty crap though, the transport hit and miss, and almost everything left late but we got there in the end.
We spent most of the two months off the tourist trail, coming across only the occasional other foreign traveller and as anti-social as it sounds, that really made the trip feel special since we got to see the real country, people unaffected by tourism, and many sights that other travellers don't.
With so many islands to visit though we only saw a small chunk of this vast country, no doubt I'll return one day in the far future to explore further.
Indo Insights:
A few little quirky things stuck out in my mind that seemed to be common throughout the country and gave it character:
£4.50 - bed in a twin room (£9 total) inc simple breakfast
And to finish, here's the final set of photos from Java, Indonesia - here
My time in Indonesia was fantastic and it now goes down as one of my favourite countries that I've visited. The people were some of the friendliest I've ever come across, and Rene and I received generosity beyond expectation - the guy we hitchhiked with who bought us lunch, the various people who rescued us from being lost and drove us to where we were heading, Ubay and friends who showed us around Balikpapan and paid for everything, Gustin who spent five days showing us around her local area. Everywhere we went on Borneo and Sulawesi island we were met with the sound of 'hello mister' accompanied by a warm smile; for some of them a rare or first sight of a 'white person'.
We went to tropical islands, on a river trip to the centre of Borneo, and to a crocodile farm. We danced at a funeral, saw a buffalo sacrifice, went to a one-in-five year tribal festival, visited some cities, and hiked up three active volcanoes through the night amongst so many other things. The country was surprisingly westernised and a lot more modern and developed than I expected even if it has a long way to go in places, and whilst being wild enough at times to be interesting, pleasingly lacked the chaos I encountered throughout India. The roads were sometimes pretty crap though, the transport hit and miss, and almost everything left late but we got there in the end.
We spent most of the two months off the tourist trail, coming across only the occasional other foreign traveller and as anti-social as it sounds, that really made the trip feel special since we got to see the real country, people unaffected by tourism, and many sights that other travellers don't.
With so many islands to visit though we only saw a small chunk of this vast country, no doubt I'll return one day in the far future to explore further.
Indo Insights:
A few little quirky things stuck out in my mind that seemed to be common throughout the country and gave it character:
- Street food - so common throughout the country, sold either from pushkarts moved into place every evening, from the back of specially adapted motorbikes, or from over the shoulder kitchens whereby a long pole holds a small cabinet on each end full of cooking gear.
- Clocks - often wrong - no wonder nothing is on time!
- Population - Indonesia is the world's fourth most populated country with 240 million people, but unlike India which always felt busy, with the exception of Java you couldn't generally tell
- Pedal fairgrounds - you sometimes see these clever bits of kit ridden to location in more rural areas, then with a pull of lever the bike pedals power a little fairground ride complete with music, which young kids seemed to absolutely love. Enviro-friendly fun.
- Freelance traffic policeman - I was staggered when I first saw this - enterprising locals will stand at busy road junctions with an illuminated baton held out and help direct traffic. In return, the drivers they help will stick their arm out the window and hand them some small change for their efforts. Clever and sometimes essential.
- Islam - Indonesia is a majority Muslim country, which is very obvious from the head scarves women wear and the call to prayer blared out over speakers from mosques each day, but it doesn't seem to dominate life as much as in the middle-east. You see prayer rooms everywhere, including every petrol station which was a first for me.
- Selling stuff in traffic - I've seen this before, but in Indonesia it's very prevalent - newspapers, flowers, and even buskers
- Men's nails - it's quite common for men to leave their thumbnails long whilst having their other short. I still can't work out why though!
- Bathrooms - I've mentioned this previously, but bathrooms in Indonesia are so different to elsewhere; generally clean, with huge trough-fulls of water often used for washing with a small bucket rather than a shower, toilets often of the squat variety, and sinks commonly absent. Soap and a towel are almost never seen.
Typical expenses per day:
£4.50 - bed in a twin room (£9 total) inc simple breakfast
£0.50 - surfboard hire
£0.70 - egg fried rice meal for lunch
£2.50 - two hour bus ride
£1.80 - eight hour overnight economy train ride
£0.75 - nasi pecel street food meal
£12.40 TOTAL
Photos
And to finish, here's the final set of photos from Java, Indonesia - here
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