Gili Air, Lombok, Indonesia (continued)

A motley crew of characters evolved into a circle of friends for the weeks spent on the languid Gili Air -- everyone dove with the same dive shop so we hung out the majority of days together.  They included: a South African woman, an English couple, a German, and an Australian family with a 19-year old son (Rhys).  Ken, feeling old while trying to relive his younger days, proceeded to ignore the age gap between the young Aussie and himself.  As the new “bro-mance” blossomed, others brought it to Ken’s attention that Rhys was young enough to be his son!  Ken took on the nickname “young dad” and Rhys’ real dad became “old dad.”  

  

Selected lessons from a faraway island:

1. At a lunchtime temperature of 105 degrees Fahrenheit, it is not recommended to “man up” by eating the local curry.  You will transform instantly into a puddle of pure sweat.
2. Do not enter an eating contest with a 19-year old from Perth.  You cannot win.  Instead, learn and routinely use the phrase, “that is f#$&ing bloody awesome mate.”
3. The one fancy restaurant is the only place on the island with real ice cream.  Do not act appalled at the $1.50/scoop price, as they have a priceless monopoly.  While other places claim to have ice cream, it is actually ice shavings mixed with sweetened condensed milk.  
4. The minimart on the island that boasts chocolate sells out instantly... if you happen to be there on delivery day, purchase the entire box... and then eat it longingly in front of your friends.
5. Do not be surprised if a gecko poops or pees on you.  It is common etiquette not to then wipe it on your neighbor’s shoulder... not to mention any names... Carryn.
6. Do not attempt to download your emails unless you possess infinite patience.  You can, however, steal the internet from the before mentioned fancy hotel as you are eating ice cream, refer to #3.
7. Renounce your desire for cleanliness: soap does not lather up in a salt-water shower.  Everyone else has the same issue though, so it does not matter.  Yum, salty.
8. When leaping off a dive boat, do not ask “Are those bubbles in the water coming from turtles?” ...especially after divers have just descended into the water below you. 
9. On an island when giving directions, it is either five minutes to the right or 55 minutes to the left.  Who needs GPS?
10. Start using the metric system as every person in the world gives you a blank stare if you quote the distance in miles.  The same can be said for measuring in pounds.  In fact, if you use Fahrenheit they will simply laugh at you like you are an idiot. 

Hill Heading out for her Daily Yoga

Ken Heading out on his Daily Dive

Gili Air, Lombok, Indonesia

Apologies for not posting lately, we had little to no Internet connectivity for the last few weeks... but we just found the only internet cafe on the island... so here it goes.

After pickup truck, ferry, minibus, and taxi rides we made it back to urban Bangkok - a brief interlude before we set out for the island nation of Indonesia.  The only eventful happening at the Hilton (goodbye to the last of my coveted frequent flier points) was fortunate access to the 31st floor Executive Lounge - not exactly backpacker country.  Pulling out the finest clothes from our rumpled stuff sacks, we rode the elevator to the roof, marveling at the Bangkok skyline as we sipped wine and ate hors d’oeuvres with the Asian business elite and well-to-do.

We hopped a flight to Bali (Indonesia) with a layover in Singapore.  The modern airport had high end shopping, TV lounges, electronics charging stations, and free WIFI... the Singapore amenities were so enticing Ken actually wished our layover was longer!  Arriving into Bali on a tropical rainy night, we mentally set our expectations for rain.  Winding through narrow streets along the Legian beachfront, we reached a small courtyard guesthouse expecting to stay one night (we heard the southern beach was too crowded to enjoy)... we ended up staying three nights and soaking up intense heat by the pool, cheap massages, and $4 dinners.  One hundred degree blistering afternoon sun squashed our fears of wet weather.  Heat wave!!

Being the lonesome wanderers that we’d become, we yearned for a secluded location (ok, I wanted seclusion, Ken wanted scuba diving) so we compromised catching a minibus and speed boat to the nearby island of Gili Air, a series of three tiny islands off the larger Lombok island - about two hours from Bali. 

We couldn’t believe the enchanting island location.  Why was everyone crowding onto Bali with this treasure in its backyard?

There were no paved roads, only a dirt path around the outer edge.  About ten horse drawn carts were for hire for heavy luggage; the horses sported jingle bells around their necks, announcing their presence.  It took about 60 minutes to walk the 3-mile perimeter of the island.

The white sand beaches reached out to crystal turquoise waters with prime snorkeling five meters off shore.  The only place in the world we had seen clearer water was on the Australian Whitsunday Islands, but given its jellyfish infestation, we decided Gili trumped Australia.  We’ve also gushed about our love for Thailand, which while gorgeous, was more about the Thai hospitality and friendly customer service than the unspoiled nature of its beaches.

Gili Air, by contrast, had simple breathtaking beaches which are destined for an onslaught of tourism.  We couldn’t decide if it was off-season or if the island hadn’t been discovered, but the beaches were essentially empty... at most a few hundred people which was negligible -- we had the entire western beach completely to ourselves for sunsets.

Our accommodation was one part tree house, one part outdoor house... on the ground floor was an open-air living room.  Behind the living room a door shielded an outdoor shower and toilet (hidden behind a half-fence, netting, and trees).  Climbing up the latter to the second floor (like you’d climb into an attic), you reached a balcony overlooking the tree tops to the ocean.  The bedroom had a vaulted ceiling.  An oddity though, was that the island didn’t have fresh water, so only salt water flowed from the shower and faucets - hmm... we couldn’t decide if the shower actually cleaned us, but it was so deathly hot that we didn’t really care.

Our typical days went something like this:

Breakfast: eat at our guesthouse restaurant on the beach (scrambled eggs, fruit, and coffee) 

Morning: rotation of scuba diving (Ken), yoga (Hillary) or laying on the beach

Lunch: walk five minutes into the interior of the island to a local food stall (full plate of chicken, squid, vegetables, tempe, and rice for the bargain price of $1/person)

Afternoon: snorkel, read a book, take a nap and/or jog around the island

Dinner: eat at the Zipp Bar next door (grilled tuna kabobs with salad, vegetables and a cocktail or fruit shake = $4/person)

Evening: watch a movie on the iPad and fall asleep to the waves (and crowing roosters and moo’ing cows)

    

Koh Chang, Thailand

After reaching the Thai border by taxi, we passed on foot and Ken displayed his best travel intuition skills as a local attempted to scam us out of $40.  Luckily Ken found us a minibus to the city of Trat instead of an overpriced ride with a tour company.  We arrived at the seaside town as the rain started to fall.  Jumping into the back of a pickup truck, the driver raced down the broken highway to the boat landing.  We had zero minutes to spare as we nearly missed the last ferry to the island of Koh Chang - on the eastern Gulf side.  The boat was filled with screaming boy scouts hitting each other with empty water bottles - seriously, twelve year old boys are another species (and yet the same everywhere in the world).  Arriving in the dark, we hopped another taxi and found our way through the rolling hills to the Paradise Palms Guesthouse on the western shore.  (The taxi was over capacity, so Ken stood hanging out the back on the tailgate).  The bungalows were quite nice, although, gasp! no Internet.  

We spent the next few days exploring the island by scooter - including a broken kickstand spring incident.  As a short term remedy, we used our camera string to hold up the kickstand so it wouldn’t shoot sparks as it drug on the blacktop.  To save a little money, on the latter days we only rented one scooter so we shared the ride (think Dumb and Dumber style).  Then we got a flat tire, but luckily we were only 200 meters from town (walking in the 100 degree heat) where a repair shop sold us a new tire for $3.

The island was one of our favorites as it had plenty of restaurants/stores/amenities but wasn’t overly crowded with partying kids.  For Super Bowl Sunday... err, Super Bowl Monday due to the time difference... we woke up at 6:30am and watched the game live at an Irish bar while eating eggs and bacon and hanging with the other Americans on the island.  We didn’t see any of the TV ads though, as the broadcast was commercial free, except for a few ads for Malaysian football.  

We love this place.  Somehow this country just sucks us in like quick sand... it’s impossible to leave!

Phnom Penh and Sihanoukville, Cambodia

Oh Cambodia, it’s difficult to stay optimistic as a tourist in a country ravaged by corruption, inefficiencies, and severe income disparities.  While the country is relatively peaceful compared to its traumatic history of genocide, civil war and famine, we couldn’t help but compare it to its more successful neighbor (Thailand).  

Hoping for beach time, we traveled south towards the Gulf of Thailand, only to discover an undeveloped destination.  Our first bus broke down, delaying us over four hours - we wrote it off as a fluke.  After spending one night in Phnom Penh (sadly, a sleazy aura of prostitution and disabled beggars) we journeyed on a second bus to the coast.  Open minded, we took the ride in stride as it too was delayed and then broke down.  The scenery over two days included never-ending barren rice paddies, deteriorating shacks built on stilts, spewed garbage, bicyclists overloaded with goods, and wandering cattle on the road.  Arriving to a scruffy and hedonistic beach (with signs clearly not adhered to: Prostitution Prohibited) and an abundance of child beggars, we decided the destination wasn’t our style.

We bought bus tickets to Thailand, only to find out the next morning the bus was actually sold out for several days.  Feeling traveller’s fatigue of broken buses and promises, Ken hired a private taxi to transport us to the Thai border.  The ride was surprisingly pleasant through the rolling jungles of the Cardamom mountains.  On the upshot, we can only hope the combination of tourist dollars and foreign investment will help pull Cambodia from poverty and corruption to one of prosperity and stability.

If you’re looking for an easy read to learn about Cambodia’s tragic history under the Khmer Rouge, try “First They Killed My Father” by Loung Ung -- a true account of a child’s terror written by a female refugee.

Siem Reap, Cambodia

We flew from Vientiane to Siem Reap (with a random layover in southern Laos that the government-run carrier failed to tell us when we purchased the tickets), where twelve uniformed Cambodians in a semi-circle greeted us, who then manually passed our passports along the human chain as each inspected our pages.  

Arriving into Siem Reap town, we discovered the ATMs only distributed U.S. dollars... only to find out later that stores gave us change in Cambodian riel but they did not want to accept it as payment (they wanted dollars).  Siem Reap town was definitely a tourist bubble, our first sign of the traveller’s ghetto was the Swenson’s ice cream store in the air conditioned mall three blocks from our guesthouse. Was this really Cambodia?   

Our first night we had too much self indulgence - a bar served our favorite drink (Moscow Mule, shout out to the Smutny’s) in bucket form (equivalent to four servings in a plastic bucket with 6+ straws)... lethal.  We later learned that locals buy similar plastic buckets for children’s toilets and thus think the tourists are totally crazy drinking from them.  Upon further review, we completely agreed with them.  After the cool Laos mountains we started experiencing Cambodian heatstroke, so Shelley found us a pool / fitness center for the bargain price of $5 per day... score!... a much needed escape from the searing heat.

The national treasure in western Cambodia is Angkor Wat - the largest religious structure in the world.  The fortified complex is actually a series of temples and royal residencies built between 900-1200.  Constructed of sandstone, the stone carvings decorating the walls depicted various historical battles and religious tales.

We hired a guide for two days of touring, a definite advantage for both historical context and ease of travel.  We laughed at every bathroom break - our guide joked of the “toilet temple, most visited temple in Angkor Wat”.  On our drive we pulled over to learn how local people produce palm sugar... yum!  The liquid dripped from the trees, followed by boiling and then stirring until the mixture hardened and was served in hockey-puck sized servings.  Talk about sugar overload.

Thousands of tourists packed the temples, each vying for the perfect photo opportunity -  we had a bout of tour bus overload.  The Chinese and Korean groups were a riot though, with their matching lanyards, yellow baseball caps and determination to “visit every temple on their itinerary” regardless of the grueling heat or exhausting stair-master climbing days.

After about ten temples, they started to look the same and feel a bit repetitive.  But the one thing that is always gratifying is visiting local children, so we arranged to tour a “floating village” - an impoverished rural community about a one hour drive from Siem Reap.  Fishermen built the village houses on stilts in the middle of Tonle Sap, the largest freshwater lake in Southeast Asia.  During dry season the lake recedes (and actually flows backwards into the Mekong River) and in wet season the village homes can only be accessed by boat (as the snow from the Himalayas floods the area).  Our boat driver, aged 15 (who looked about ten) cheerfully struggled with the boat and then played a grueling game of bumper boats (sans bumpers) along the canal leading to the lake.  We sat silently, wide-eyed, fearing the tiny boat was certain to sink.  

Before we reached the village, we purchased 40 pairs of children’s flip flops (a request a teacher had made previously that the kids desperately needed).  The students were thrilled and started screaming when they saw the footwear we brought them.  The reward was seeing each strut home with a smile from ear to ear after school in their new Superman or Hello Kitty flip flops.  Such a positive experience - another trip highlight!