I stumbled upon priceless rubbishes!

Months after coming back from Indonesia, I finally cleared these papers off my bag to give way for the incoming papers from my incoming trip! I took a picture, placed them into a big envelope and put them in my memento box. I got a box full of stuffs – all collected from places I’ve been to

Ah, I couldn’t be more excited on my coming trip. 4 weeks to go! Can’t wait! <3

To read about the Indonesia trip, please click the links below.

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While going in and out of the room to the toilet, I bumped into an Indonesian guy who stayed in the room opposite ours. From exchanging smiles to small talk, all I know about this guy is he’s from another part of Indonesia (can’t remember where now – I think it’s Medan) and he’s in Jakarta for work. He then asked where am I coming from. When I told him that I’m from Malaysia, he revealed that he used to work in Malaysia in the city of Kuala Lumpur long, long time ago. After that I went back to my room and he went to the toilet.

Had Yakult as breakfast! Hoho!

Then it was time to go. I took my backpacks and went down with the rest. We waited for our pre-booked Alphard Taxi at the verandah. After getting call from the company saying that the taxi is somewhere near the area, we walked out to the main road, Jl. Jaksa since the company claimed that the taxi is too big for the small lane.

Again, I bumped into the same Indonesian guy and he bid goodbye to me. I said goodbye to him back. Sat was puzzled on why a stranger saying bye to me and I responded. Haha! I then explained to him the whole thing and he finally understood.

Spotted an Astro mini satellite while walking out. Hoho! The peach colour building behind is La Margot Hotel.

Sat pre-booked two taxis but only one came. The other one claimed that he got caught in the jam. So we sent one taxi off first – the one carrying Aaron, Elise, Lasker, Daniel and David. The rest of us waited at the junction anxiously for our cab as we need to check in by 10.  After all, we were told that the morning traffic in Jakarta is always heavy, so we’re hoping not to be caught in one.

An interesting looking tourist information corner with a helmet as representative. Haha.

About half an hour later, our taxi came. He apologized for his lateness and then we boarded the taxi. I was a little bit disappointed as I was hoping for outgoing, outspoken driver like Dade (the driver we got the night before).

In the entire journey, he just kept quiet and listened to local news and prayers on the radio, while the rest of us looked out to faces of Jakarta in the day.

And I concluded that Jakarta looks better at night. Lol! In the day, it looks like Beijing. @_@ Don’t ask me why.

We reached the Soekarno-Hatta Airport Terminal 2 for domestic flight to Denpasar at about 9 something. The journey is shorter I guess, as I paid only 34.000 Rupiah (RM12.60) for the taxi ride including toll I think. Forget to jot down if that’s the taxi payment alone or with the toll. Paid the driver, took picture with the car and then went in the airport for check-in.

The security was quite tight there. The lady security officer would only allow people in the hall if we showed her the boarding pass. But how can we get a boarding pass when we bought the ticket online? Luckily, Sat printed out the flight itineraries (as he said he foresees this would happen) and we went in smoothly.

Like usual, we turkeyfied our check-in backpacks for 30.000 Rupiah (RM11), followed by checking-in our turkeys, getting our boarding passes and paying the departure tax of 40.000 Rupiah (RM15) which is not included in when purchasing our flight ticket.

My turkey weighted 10kg upon checking-in. I don’t understand why there’s 900 gram difference as I didn’t add anything in. In fact I threw 2 things out – my out-of-shape-blue-top and a pair of long-pants-with-holes. Was it because of the air that got trapped in the backpack? Or the way I squeezed my stuffs into the backpack.

Feeling hungry, we went food-hunting to fill our stomachs. Spotted NZN outlet at the airport, so I pulled Sat over to have a look at the ice-cream choices – to see they’re selling the same favours or they have those we couldn’t find back home. Upon scanning, I found out we never had ‘Spotty Dogs’ flavour before, or maybe I didn’t remember seeing it previously. Then Sat bought 2 scoops, one scoop of Spotty Dogs and another scoop of his favourite flavour for me to try. Slurps. Can’t recall how much it costs, but I think it’s almost the amount we used to pay in Malaysia after conversion.

Yup, all the way in Jakarta to have New Zealand Natural ice cream. True, loyal fans right? They should award us by giving us free ice-cream for loyalty. Lol!

While Sat and me hovered over the NZN counter, the rest went and bought gigantic curry puffs at the other side of the booths. After seeing them munching the curry puffs (where they purposely showed me the filling of eggs, and chicken chunks), I asked Sat to get one to try.

Can’t remember how much the curry puff is priced at because I forgot to jot them down. But I think it’s about 5.000 Rupiah (Rm1.85) per piece? Or maybe 10.000 Rupiah (RM3.70) one as the size is big.

We sat at the tables belongs to the curry puff’s outlet before going into the Departure Hall. Quickly finished our food and then calculated last night’s dinner. Though we kept the receipt but it was rather complicated to calculate as it didn’t tally in the first place! Somehow we managed to settle it after few rounds of calculation and David was again loaded with Rupiahs! Haha!

Feeling like going to the loo, I asked Sat to accompany me to the loo, but he didn’t follow – which I didn’t know why. Probably because he saw me walked behind Ailing and Emily, thinking that they went too. I don’t remember if they went too, but I REMEMBER as I was in the toilet’s cubicle weewee-ing, I heard a guy whistling in the LADIES TOILET, and then a loud bang on my cubicle’s door!

I was super duper kan cheong (panicked) at that time as I was weewee-ing halfway through only when the thing happened. Still, I prepared myself to launch an attack should the guy try to break open my door or do some silly stuff.

Luckily, nothing happened after that. I quickly flushed, opened the toilet door, scanned left and right, quickly washed my hands and ran out of the toilet to where the rest were.

And obviously I complained to Sat for not accompanying me. HMPH!

Then it was time to board the plane. Woohoo! Finally the hard-core backpacking days were over and hello to the tour-style! Haha!

Our flight took off slightly later at around 11 am. The whole journey took 1 hours and 45 minutes. Initially Sat and I thought that it would take us 2 hours and 45 minutes to reach Bali but we were wrong as we forgot to minus an hour off to the calculation as Bali is one hour ahead of Jakarta and Yogyakarta.

We napped not long after flying. But soon, I got hungry and woke Sat up. Haha. Damn evil la me. Then I ordered Air Asia’s nasi kuning for him, nasi goring sate ayam for me and a bottle of water. Damn potong stim upon seeing the size of the bottle. Moreover, I need to drink lots water especially flying on plane and the bottle definitely wouldn’t be enough for both of us.

Still, we can’t afford to order another bottle as we were running out of Rupiahs! Thus, both of us tried drinking as little as possible to last us the entire flight. But eventually, my throat was so dry that I had to finish up the bottle and asked the stewardess for another bottle of water.

She came to me and told me that they have already closed the counter and gave me a cup of warm water instead! Without charging me anything!

Ahhh! I felt so thankful for what she did. She saved me from possible sore throat (which I didn’t want to have during travelling) and the fact that the water was warm is even better! My throat felt better instantly and I gave half to Sat to quench his throat. He was also surprised to see the lady passing me the water without charging me.

Probably they didn’t know how to charge me gua. Moreover it’s just water, not some fruit juice or wine or beer.

**If you are offered wine by the air stewardess, please opt for fruit juice or water, because wine and beer will make your throat feel even worst after that. Believe me, as I tried that before. Out of glamour (because first time being offered as usually the First Class and Business Class only got it), I took a glass of wine from her hand, slowly drank it and found myself requesting for 2-3 cups of water an hour later. LOL**

Soon, I could see land and sea from the plane window. I assumed that land is Surabaya as we’ve flown more than an hour. Lovely view, took few shots and continued whispering and giggling with Sat.

Then announcement of landing was made, where we were asked to fasten the seat belt, push up our seats, etc etc. I looked out of the window, and I saw this beautiful bay, lovely moon crested sand island just few metres away from the shore (which looked like highway built on top of the sand island. Haha!) and boats going in and out from the bay. I asked Sat to have a look at the place, and he asked me back, “where is that place? Kuta?”

I have no idea on where is that place. So I told him, “ya gua.” Haha.

Our plane began descending lower and lower and lower till the sea felt near. Okay, this plane is not a water plane (it’s not Maldives anyway), so it wouldn’t land on the sea. But because part of the runway is surrounded by the sea, that’s why the sea looked and felt near to me.

Didn’t know why those senget/blunder photos look nicer than the straight ones? Hmm.

I never been to Hawaii, but the moment I stepped onto the land of Bali, I felt like I was in HAWAII! Haha. My mind must have been jumbled up, or maybe I yearn for Hawaii too much that I see Bali as Hawaii – as they say Bali is the Hawaii of the East.

At that moment, I wished I bought the oversize lady straw hat in Prambanan for 20.000 Rupiah to cover my head and face. I didn’t take that as the lady refused to go a little bit lower at 15.000 Rupiah, and my mind forgot to convert the 20.000 Rupiah into RM7.50 at that moment. So yup, I should have close the deal!

As we were walking, the breeze coming from the sea felt like tho welcoming us to the land of Bali. Despite the sun shining directly on our skin, I didn’t feel any pain or hotness. Probably the wind made the rays gentler.

We walked into the Arriving Hall of Ngurah Rai International Airport, took our backpacks and then spotted our fellow friends, Jess, Steven and KeatMeng standing with the locals. Jess was holding signboards bearing “Adokys Travel – Mr. Satkuru”

Together with them were our guide, Mr. Yoga and a personnel from the agency – which I can’t remember his name. Ops. The travel personnel  introduced our guide to the rest of us and then accompanied us to our vehicle.

I was super excited upon seeing all five of them as it further confirmed that the Bali trip would be well-taken care of by the agency Sat engaged with. Finally we can totally relax and enjoy the whole trip. Before that we felt like we were living on a ticking bomb. T_T

When our van came (a-13-seats-van), we quickly loaded our backpacks and sat in the van. Then the travel agent bid us goodbye and our van left the airport with high spirits.

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Though it was RM2 more than the wrapping service I did in LCCT, they sealed my backpack very tightly that I don’t think people would want to waste time opening up my backpack after looking at it. Lol.

We then checked in and paid our departure tax of 25.000 Rupiah (RM9.30) at one of the tax counter, before entering the Departure Hall. My turkey before leaving Yogyakarta weighted 9.1kg.

We sat at the Departure Hall, Facebooking, tweeting, napping, talking, phototaking until we were bored. Our flight supposedly at 4.30 got delayed more than half an hour without any announcement. Luckily the Departure Hall is small, therefore easy to keep an eye on the boarding.

We made our way to the door once we saw 2 Air Asia’s stewardess opened the door and started accepting flight tickets.

We took AirAsia flight from Yogyakarta to Jakarta and the journey took about 1 hour. The flight was rather shaky as we had to go through the clouds. I’ve faced worst air turbulence before, so that shakiness was considered okay though some passengers on board were quite terrified. Lol.

We touched down the Soekarno-Hatta Airport at around 7 something Jakarta time. Jakarta’s time is same as ours, so we readjusted our wristwatch to an hour later.

It was raining quite heavily when we reached. I dreaded thinking about walking on the ground holding the red umbrella! Thankfully, there were red buses, ferrying us from the airplane to the airport. *Phew!

The airport is big, and modern. The amounts of luggage conveyer belts are plenty, and there weren’t any sign showed to which belts our backpacks will come out. Fortunately, our plane was the only one there in the airport; and it didn’t take long till then one of the conveyer belts started moving.

Quickly, we took out our backpacks and thankfully we wrapped them as the bags were wet when we got them.

A bit further up, we came to an almost round desk with 2 polite speaking Indonesian behind. They called us, asking if we need transportation to anywhere.

So we went to them, asking on the price, the transportation to Jl. Jaksa. They were trying to sell us their package, I can’t remember what package; but we ended up agreeing on taking 2 Toyota Alphards running on meter.

Okay, to be frank, I didn’t remember how Alphard looks at the moment we agreed on taking that though I keep seeing them on roads back in Penang. I weren’t as excited as the rest until I saw the vehicle and sat inside it.

It was quite dark and I didn’t have much time to retake the car since we were in a hurry so let it be blur! Muahaha!

And OMG! It’s seriously one LUXURY CAR! Who on earth goes vacationing and takes Alphard as taxi to a shabby place in Jl. Jaksa? And our driver is one heck of a cool guy too! He’s very friendly, he spoke to us about the city, the culture, the malls, BAK PAO, and many more.

This pic also blurry but I don’t care! Muahaha!

We were required to pay for the toll on the expressway we took. 10.000 Rupiah (RM3.70). The other car panicked, and called us on the payment. Sat told them that we have to pay for that as said over the desk.

After that, we continued talking. He explained on the black market taxis, and how it’s better to get reliable ones like the Blue Bird Taxi. I can’t remember the whole conversation, but something about not being conned by the illegal ones. The funny thing about the bak pao conversation was he suddenly said those words loudly when we asked him what the guy is selling at the middle of the highway. We were shocked upon hearing that because back in Malaysia, bak is considered non-halal; to the point that they want to rename the famous bak kut teh dish to chi kut teh. –“ He said the bak pao isn’t only made of pork meat, but of chicken meat, kaya, vegetable, beef too – just that they are all called bak pao in general. Afterall, it’s just a word. Imagine selling bak pao to our brothers and sisters in Malaysia, they would have freaked out upon hearing those words though the filling is chicken or vege or kaya or beef.

The driver made me feel more multicultural in Jakarta, than in Malaysia. How sad. As we were moving towards the city, more and more malls are seen. I kept going ahhhh and wow at the malls as they are all big and beautifully decorated! Then our driver told us that in Jakarta itself, there are like more than hundreds mall and soon are still building. Really jaw-dropped after hearing that. We then passed by a big roundabout. It looked so beautiful at night and I wished that we could stop for a while that time. But knowing that the meter was moving, it’s better to reach our destination as soon as possible.

Soon, our taxi went into a lane, with a signboard bearing Jl. Jaksa at the entrance. As our taxi driver didn’t know where the Hotel Le Margot is (as he normally drives to the bigger and well-known hotels), he asked for our help in looking for the place. The hotel is situated in the middle of the street. As we didn’t make any reservation beforehand, Sat went down to check on the room availability. Before that, he requested for the driver to stop the meter. The rest of us stayed in the car, talking.

I remembered making a joke on asking Ailing to go for this massage that can make people taller that I saw in Yogyakarta the day before. Our driver overheard that and he interrupted us by telling that massage really exists and it works; making all of us turned to him and listened attentively. But he told us that those who want to do that needs to being massaged for 4-5 times only it works. On the amount of increment of height, he said about 13 cm. 13 cm!!! That’s like a lot! I too got interested in that and threw even more questions to him, where we ended up laughing even harder.

He’s one very good driver, and his name is Dade/Dedi – can’t remember the exact spelling but it’s pronounced as ‘daddy’. Lol.

Then Sat came back. He told us the Hotel Le Margot was full house that night but he managed to get us rooms at Bloem Steen Hostel. I read about the place before, though the place is not as well as Hotel Le Margot, the cheaper price compensating it all.

The meter showed 197.000+++ Rupiah. He rounded it up and asked for 200.000 Rupiah (RM75) when we asked for payment. We gladly gave him as his service was excellent and joyful! That’s 40.000 Rupiah (RM15) per person.

We said goodbye to our nice ‘Dade’, and walked along the dark alley towards Bloem Steen Hostel. There was a guy sitting at the wooden chair in front of the door, welcoming us by saying, “Welcome to my world.” As Sat already checked-in our names, we got the keys to our rooms, threw bags into our rooms, refreshed and sorted out the payments for the hotel rooms, the taxi and the toll. The triple room I stayed with Ailing and Emily costs 85.000 Rupiah (RM31).

Then all of us went out to hunt for food along Jl. Jaksa.

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I’ve been Indonificated in just 6 days!

Since I’m still feeling Indonised, I shall quickly summarize the whole trip before I went into details. Ah~ I can still ‘hear’ the Javanese music playing in my head.

In just 6 days, I’ve…

1. took 6 flights. Fly cheap and further with AirAsia!

2. been to 3 cities. Yogyakarta, Jakarta and Bali! ♥

3. spent 5 nights at 5 different places

4. attained ‘Nirvana’ at Borobudur temple

5. paid 17.5% of service charge for food!

6. conquered Mount Batur

7. drank the most expensive coke 1.5km above sea

8. bathed black, salty water

9. had Alphard as taxi!

10. got denied access to 2 holy temples because of menstrual.

11. addicted to teh botol

12. spoke and bargained in Bahasa Indon

13. fascinated by chickens! They look so prosperous!

14. ate the overrated babi guling

15. awed at the great statue of Wisnu!!!

16. sipped one of the most expensive coffee in the world – coffee luwak

17. turned backpack bag into turkey

18. went gaga over ronde

19. sarong-ed ourselves before entering temple

20. fall in love with the blue sea, again

21. Bought camera battery for IDR275.000 because forgotten to bring. Dang!

22.  Left my mark at Kuta beach

23. …and used more than 1.5 million rupiah! And yet I didn’t buy enough souvenirs!!!!

And thank god I decided to go broke and get the wide angle lens. I brought my kit lens there and I didn’t use it at all! All pictures in Indon were taken with wide angle! Damn umph!!!

Now, I’ve to go back to mundane life and slowly get rid of the post-vacation-syndrome.

♥ Can’t wait for July!!! ♥