Bali or Bust!

When last we left off on our Indonesian adventure, we were leaving the Togian Islands. Since no one has been able to find them on any map when we texted them our location, we decided to make this interactive blog entry. Each hyperlink brings you to a google map of the corresponding location. Basically this is what happened and below you will find the record of our most epic journey from Northern Sulawesi to Bali. If someone is able to calculate the distance traveled, we would be happy to post it. It was a lot. 5 days of NON stop travel. Well worth it in the end, as Mary Ann Maggiore, mother of Maximilian was the light at the end of the tunnel. And, "hell journey" as we have come to call it (Sulawesi-Bali) was still half the cost of flying in the end (accomodation and food included.)
Here we go....

We were in The Togian Islands for 2 weeks, and it was beautiful and amazing etc etc. But we had to meet up with Max's mother in Bali on the 14th. We had 2 options: take a boat to a bus to an airplane-which would be expensive and would take 1-2 days (maybe,) or we could have an adventure and only travel by the very cheapest means possible which would take 5-7 days. Needless to say we chose the later and this is how the journey went:
DAY 1: 5 hour boat ride from Wakai, Togian Islands to Ampana. 5 hour bus ride to Poso, (spent the night there.)
DAY 2: a 26-hour bus ride in the dirtiest, most cramped bus we have ever taken with horrible music blasting full volume ALL NIGHT LONG where sleeping was absolutely impossible to Makassar, (spent the night there.) Also, Kara fell into an open sewer here after exiting hell bus and was emersed up to her neck in what she calls,"oh god." It is a testament to Max's love that he did not make fun of her for a full 36 hours.
DAY 3: 26-hour boat ride to Surabaya, where we chose to sleep on the deck because it was cleaner than the economy class bunk, located in the deepest bowels of the ship. It rained the whole time we were on the deck, which was still considerably better to the cockroach infested, smoke-filled, a/c and windowless economy area. We slept on the boat and were woken up at 3:50 am by the morning call to prayer.
Day 4: 8 more hours on the boat. Finally arrived in Surabaya, Java. Took 1-hour bus from the harbor to the long distance bus terminal (no taxi for this crew), 13.5 hour bus ride to Denpasar, (spent night on bus).
Day 5: Arrive at 4:45 am to Denpasar, Bali. Waited for 2.5 hours for the public van to fill up with enough people to take the 1-hour van ride to Ubud with one change of vehicle in between.

A small photo essay on the journey. Kara wishes she had taken more pictures, but really folks, it was hell journey.

Hell bus. The longest we ever stopped on our 26 hour bus journey was for about a half an hour.

Reflection of Rita, 6 months pregnant wife of asshole driver #1. She explained to me over the course of our journey that she was accompanying her husband on the journey to Makassar, and would be returning with him the next morning. This was literally the worst bus ride Kara or Max has ever taken, and the thought of doing it again, while pregnant, was harrowing. We can not understand why this woman would put herself through this, and can only assume that her husband insisted on her company. This made us hate the driver even more. There were 2 drivers who alternated driving over the course of the trip. Asshole driver #2 was a much worse driver and insisted on blasting loud techno as well as indigenous music throughout the night. We were sitting directly behind him and repeatedly yelled at him to turn down the music. Sometimes he did for 10 minutes at a time.

There's really so much more we could say about hell bus. But we should leave some good stories for when we come home. Eventually we made it to Makassar, the southern end of Sulawesi where we caught the Pelni (government) boat to Java. Here is Max sitting with stuff on the deck of the boat after we had made the decision that "downgrading" from economy class to the deck was actually "upgrading." This is our first location where we tried to sleep, but the rains were so intense that a group of construction workers who were also sleeping on the deck, bekoned us over to their better covered area. We also noticed that many people were congregating throughout the night in this area. After all, it was a "muster station" (see photo above.)

Oh yeah, sidenote. There's also very few women on this boat. If they were around, then they were hiding. This earned the ship our nickname, "man boat." Can you spot the woman in this picture? Neither can we. This is the area where Max is sitting in the photo above, the muster station. You will notice that the deck is impeccably clean, and we were happy for this. However, the trash bins are literally emptied into the sea throughout the whole journey. This is horrible and the Indonesian government sanctions this. They sanction this on a national scale as well, for so far, as we have seen, the entire country has no waste disposal system. Citizens are expected to take care of their own trash, and this means burning or throwing it into the river/ocean as they have no other alternative.

People sleeping outside of the ship's mosque.

We were on the other side of these bars, just opposite to the Women's washing area of the mosque. We were convieniently located right next to the bathroom and below the karaoke station of the boat. Here is the group of construction workers that befriended us for our journey. The man in the light pink vest, second from the right was the group's ambassador. If anyone had a question, it was coming through him. He was the one who invited Kara over when it started raining really hard. They slept on pieces of wax paper and cardboard, which got very wet throughout the journey. There was a communal water sweep up which we participated in when the deck got particularly soggy.

There are no pictures from the last leg of our journey. Sorry. It was a bus. Then it was a bus on a ferry. Then it was a bus to a bus station, and then a very dirty van to Ubud, Bali.

Moment of silence for hell journey.....





We went from sleeping on the deck to sleeping in the most beautiful room we have been in since we left America. In fact, this is way better than our old apartment. We arrived the morning before Max's mother and the rush of seratonin we recieved upon entering this room can not be pictured.

Or...maybe it can! Thank you, Mary Ann!!!

View from the road of the rice paddies that surround Ubud, central Bali. This was our view from the hotel, which is atypical of many Ubud hotels. Ubud is a fairly congested tourist area, and we were glad to be on the outskirts of town.

Mary Ann arrives! After flying through Korea and spending a day in Seoul, she was ready to hit the ground running. If she had jet lag, it was imperceptible. Amazing. This was a really delicious restaurant, Lamak in Ubud.

Our shortcut to the town brought us through this bucolic Balinese garden hotel. A plaque proclaims that the king stayed here once. It was a pleasure to walk through it every day.

Here is a weird little frog we saw on a walk home one night. There will be a separate blog posting on all of the extremely bizarre flora and fauna in Bali later.

Religious procession. Preparing for the blessing of the cars.

Art opening, Kuta. Mary Ann, on arrival, mentioned she had a party to go to. We were very impressed with her international party connections. Her yoga teacher's friend is a famous Dutch artist living in Bali, Carola Vooges. It was fun to see this part of the Bali art scene and intriguing to see traditional Balinese sculpture techniques used to create abstract sculpture.

Mary Ann meets Carola.

Max looks at the art.

Max drinks; Mary Ann is cute.

The blessing of the cars. There are religious ceremonies for most things, in Bali. Cars and metal are not excluded. This festival, dedicated to all things metal, happens 2x a year. Throughout the day, we saw cars and motorbikes adorned with sarongs and offerings.

The next day we all decided to go to the beach. We went to Lovina, which is in the north part of Bali, and is known for its black, volcanic sand.

Mary Ann hangs out on the porch of our bungalow after breakfast.

The bungalows that we were staying in had these ridiculous looking birds, typical of Bali in that they were so bizarre. They made clucking sounds that were half way between the sound of a gecko and a chicken.

Enter weird insect bite. Two days before this photo was taken, Kara had noticed a tiny pimple like wound on her upper thigh. On the car ride from Ubud to Lovina, she felt it growing, getting harder, and becoming very hot. It was painful and mysterious. We advised bedrest and liquid...more on this to come.

Sadly, Lovina beach was not the paradise our guide book had made it out to be. There was no mention of the abundant trash strewn along the whole length of the beach. Everything from cargo pants to florescent light bulbs was represented here. The sewer is also the landfill, which flows into this water. You can find trash in every body in water, however big or small, in Bali. Though it is a gorgeous island, it unfortunately has little to no waste management system. This is not uncommon for Indonesia, or most developing nations. It is, however, dismaying that the guide books do not find this worthy of note, and that this growing problem is largely ignored by locals as well as tourists. Unfortunately tropical paradise is more often than not covered in garbage. The notion of the "eco-conscious" indigenous population safeguarding its birthright natural habitat from outsiders is a fallacy.

On a lighter note, here is Mary Ann helping to push their chartered snorkeling boat into the water for a morning of underwater sightseeing.

Mary Ann, action shot.

Butterfly fish seen on Max and Mary Ann's underwater adventure!

Meanwhile, back at the ranch, Kara's insect bite grows to unreasonable proportions.

Medical attention is deemed necessary after realizing that she can't walk and that the whole top of her thigh is a hard, red unidentifyable thing.

The next day, we all took a trip to visit the surrounding areas of Lovina, including the Buddhist Temple just 10 Km away. It was gorgeous and grounding. Here sits Mary Ann and Max.

Seussian flower (as in the good Dr.)

Kara and Max, flower children.

Later at the Holy Hot Springs.

A good mix of tourists and locals were here. Max was sad that the hot springs were really just warm springs. But the sulphur smell attested to the authenticity of their origins.

Two heads in the water.

This guy stood under this for the entire hour we were there.

After puss letting of Krakatoan proportions, mystery bite improves remarkably. However, it is still with us, and may tour the rest of Indonesia with us, depending on how long we stay. Don't worry Mom, I took antibiotics, Kara says.

After a few days, we decided to leave Lovina and head back to Ubud. If it ain't broke, don't fix it.

Another view from our hotel room. Mary Ann watercolor painted these fields most mornings and it was fun to see her interpretations of the land around us.

Life is good.

Indonesia LOVES Obama. Loves, with a capital L, much more than their own politicians it seems. Ubud, being the mecca for American ex-pats was an easy place to catch a live viewing of another historic American event from abroad. Here is the advertising for the inauguration party at Labong, a local reggae bar.



We told you, Indonesians REALLY love Obama. These head bands were donned by the staff at the bar, and were being given out to all who were interested.

Americans abroad watch history being made. CNN claims it was the most watched television event in history. We don't know. Was it?

If you know Max, is a caption really necessary for this one. We were all particularly disturbed by the invocation. For some reason, the table of French people in front of us thought it was inappropriate when we started booing. Whatever Frenchies, it was our night. Sarkozy is your president, not Obama. Chill out.

Mary Ann's visit was brief but memorable. Thank you for coming to Indonesia and for restoring our English vocabulary to its pre-trip operating standards. It was really fun hanging out with you and we miss you already!

To arrange your own appearance on the blog follow these instructions:
a) email Kara and Max
b) pick a country, any country
c) buy plane ticket
d) prepare to be photographed

Hope to see you all soon.

Love
Kara and Maximilian

Underwater Adventure Part One: INDONESIA!

"Visit In-donesia!" That's the slogan for the Indonesian Tourism Association's latest television advertising campaign. And so, we did. We left Cambodia, excited to embark on our diving adventure, a part of the trip we had looked forward to since first planning it a year and a half ago. We flew from Phenom Penh to Manado by way of Kuala Lumpur. We spent the night sleeping on our thermarests in the airport. On the plane we met an American, and that was exciting for once. We started talking to him because Max asked him for the front page of his newspaper showing Bush being "shoe-d" by an Iraqi journalist. It made the moment all the sweeter to share it with an fellow countryman. Later, some thousands of kilometers away, we met this American on a remote island. More about that later.

Manado: Manado is an old Dutch port town on the northeastern tip of Sulawesi, Indonesia's K shaped island. Some people say it looks like an S. Manado is one of the few places in Indonesia where the majority of the population is not Muslim; they are mostly Christian. We did not know this going into Manado, and were surprised by the Christmas music and fireworks leading up to Jesus' birthday. From the airport, we were whisked away in a van to a small boat that would ferry us to our final destination, the Bunaken Marine Reserve. Bunaken Reserve is a small group of islands and their surrounding waters a few miles away from Manado. It was here that we had planned to learn how to dive after contacting literally every dive center on the island of Sulawesi months before. We had been told by many people before we left that this place is one of the best dive sites in the world. They were right.

The "harbor" at Manado, where we met the boat.

Our ride.

Our ride to Bunaken. It was very wet, but we welcomed it. Getting wet, after all, was the chief reason for coming to Bunaken.

Literally seconds after we stepped off the boat and into the dive center, we were told to eat our lunch and then meet our fellow classmates for our first diving lesson. We hadn't slept, eaten properly, or showered for at least 2 days. After learning diving theory for 4 hours, we showered and changed our clothes. We had been invited by Terry, our dive instructor and co-owner of the dive resort to a "Christmas Party." We thought we would make a quick appearance and go to bed. Christmas Party in America: booze, inappropriate office or family behavior, music, and a tree. Christmas Party in Indonesia: two hour religious service with praying, preaching, and psalm singing. We both fell asleep several times during the sermon, which was a full hour and it was only in Bahasa Indonesian. We stood when it was evident that we were supposed to stand, and sat when everyone else did. It was even more awkward because we were given front row seats. The whole entire Christian population of the island was present. It was the event of the year, and we were sweaty, tired (non-religious) Jews. At one point, the pastor said that although we might not understand each other's languages, we were united by a common love of Jesus. Max says, "Whatever." Kara doesn't want to offend anyone, so she says, "It was interesting."

Terry, our dive master, explains something to us before we embark on our first dive. In our class were two awesome Indonesian guys from Java, Leo and Eddie. We really enjoyed being in class with them because they were our first Indonesian friends and were fun. Leo is currently living in Germany, and although he denies it, he has a German accent when he speaks English, which was really fun.

Kara checks her low pressure inflater before going under. She should probably be looking at the inflater and not at the camera.

And we're in!

Scorpion fish inside a sponge. DIVING IS REALLY AWESOME. These sponges are one of Max's favorite part of the reef, because they often contain little scenes like this. DIVING IS REALLY REALLY AWESOME. Special shout out to Katy Jarz and family for donating the underwater camera to our cause!

Bat fish. Not as scary as their above water "counterparts." They are so plentiful in this part of the world.

Kara is becoming one with the ocean. Max noticed her dancing underwater a lot and mimicking fish actions during the dives.

Some kind of silvery fish.

On the boat between dives. This is Ferry, our tiny but fearless captain. He is a chain smoker and usually is seen in his underwear and a t shirt on the boat. He is great.

Majestic sea turtle. Kara is obsessed with them. They are her favorite underwater creature. A note about sea turtles, DONT RIDE THEM! They have very slow heart beats and the exertion of dragging and/or the sudden scare of a human being grabbing onto them can kill them. Seriously.

Don't do it!

More sea sponges.

These yellow things that look like organs are actually an animal that eats plankton through one orafice and expells waste through the other. An incredible simple animal.

American Gothic, underwater remix.

Max studies the fish book after a dive. The meals at this place were amazing. Though it was by far the most expensive accommodation on our trip (16 Euros/per person/day), 3 meals were included with our lodging and they were exceptional and veggie friendly. Did you know that tempeh comes from Indonesia?

Bunaken is beautiful, rain or shine. In this case, rain.
After 10 days and a night dive, it was time to move on. Months before we left, Kara's friend, Kelly sent her a photo from the Togian Islands, Sulawesi, with a subject line that read something like, "GO HERE." We looked at this photo every day on our desktop as motivation to keep saving for our trip. We decided we needed to see this paradise for ourselves, so we began the journey. An eight hour shared taxi from Manado brought us to this port in Garontalo.

As you might notice, the harbor wasn't exactly set up for tourism. This shot was taken feet away from where we boarded our boat.

The boat for the Togians only leaves 2x/week. Once a week, it is a large, clean, government run ship. We unfortuantely, had bad timing, and were cramped into the ship on the left, a wooden boat named the Puspita, fit for transporting livestock. Which it did. After our long drive from Manado where two of our fellow passengers vomited out the window on account of the windy roads and horrible driver, we had to wait in this harbor for over 5 hours. That's Sulawesi.

The boat ride from Garontalo to Wakai (the main city in Togian Islands) was 15 hours. The boat only got more crowded and dirty as the ride went on, for we stopped at many ports along the way. Not pictured is us sleeping on a slab where people lie next to one another in narrow rows.

Still on the boat. The Togians are mostly Muslim, like the rest of Indonesia.

Pulling into a small port in the Togian Islands. That water about 30 feet deep and you can see all the way down.

Some friends we made on the boat. We tried to teach them about not throwing their trash into the ocean. Throwing all waste into the ocean, especially non-biodegradable items such as plastics, is common place in Indonesia. It was particularly disturbing to see this happening in the most beautiful water that we have ever seen in our entire lives. If people keep doing this, we won't be able to see 30 feet to the bottom. It is surprising how quickly this can happen. We saw this quick deterioration of the ocean in Halong Bay, Vietnam. Although its only been an active tourist site for the past 10 years, it was impossible to swim more than 5 feet without running into some piece of trash.

Kadidiri! Our final destination in the Togians. After arriving in Wakai, we were hustled onto the Black Marlin shuttle boat. Black Marlin is one of the three places to stay on Kadidiri, a 3 km long island. It took us about an hour to get from Wakai to Kadidiri. Once there, we immediately went for the cheapest option, which was a small home stay called Pondok Lestari Kadidiri. Which means "beautiful small place." The other locations, Black Marlin and Paradise are more geared towards diving holidays or the more upscale traveler, or the backpacker who is willing to pay $15/day/pp. Pondok Lestari is a family run joint with 3 bungalows, an outhouse, and free snorkeling trips with the family when they go to fish in the mornings. It cost 75,000 Rupiah (approximately $7USD) per person/day for accommodation and three meals a day. The family used to own the island but sold off chunks of it to Black Marlin and Paradise Resorts. Black Marlin has since overstepped their boundaries and built a restaurant and dive center on Lestari's land. Calls for justice were silenced with bribes of the local authorities, and the family has been left with a small corner of the beach. They do however still own a large part of the interior, and the children took us through their coconut plantation to another beach that is also theirs. We really loved staying with them and felt like we were a part of the family for the two weeks we were there.

The first three nights we arranged to sleep on the floor of the grandmothers room (not pictured) and sans grandmother because the regular bungalows were filled. After that, we moved into the bungalow on the left. You can see the outhouse behind it. To the far left is the beginning of two new bungalows. They used to have ten, but after a long slump in tourism, one shortsighted brother decided to tear down all but 3. This year, business is booming. We were happy to see that.

One of the chairs on our porch. Max really loves them. You can't make this up.
Ana, the youngest child in the family sits on the fishing net cum hammock.

We arrived on Christmas Day to have a feast of jack fruit curry and eggs. (It was delicious however we did not know then that we would be eating eggs, 3 times a day, every day, for the next two weeks...hello cholesterol.) Pictured here is part of the "original Kadidiri crew." Clockwise from Left: Scott (England), Robert (the American from the Kuala Lumpur airport), Maximilian, and Damien (from Ireland but had a small identity crisis re: his current British citizenship.) Just kidding Damien. Not pictured is Paul (England), Scott's friend, and Sophie (wife of Robert, British.)

They were awesome and we got along so well. We really had a great time. We didn't do much of anything for that first week other than sit around, learn the benefits of drinking about 10 cups of tea a day, and look at the beautiful water in front of us. This was the first time in a while that we were surrounded by native English speakers.

Here Max continues his depressing book about the North Vietnamese Army while surrounded by tropical scenery. Behind him is Sophie, getting water for the toilet. We "flushed" the squat toiled with ocean water, but washed with well water.

Activities on Kadidiri:

Playing with circle rules ball. Anna kicks, Max wields giant bamboo stick.

Using the fancy Black Marlin dock to teach yoga class. Yoga class not pictured, however it was the most international class Kara has ever taught. Two Italians, a Frenchwoman, an Aussie, and a Max.

The goodbye party for the English lads. We were sad to see them go. Hope to catch you all around somewhere!

Paradise Dock. Paradise as in the name of the other dive resort. We watched almost every sunset from this dock in the two weeks we stayed on this island. We also practiced yoga here daily.

View from yoga dock.

Coconut crab. The name says it all: It eats coconuts and lives in the forest. Max went out with Aka, the patriarch one evening to catch this crab. They only come out at night.

Here is Aka. He is amazing. A true Renissance man, he is fashioning necklaces for us made out of the shells he finds on his daily fishing trip. He fishes every single day with a homemade harpoon gun and hand carved goggles.

Another day in paradise.

Eventually we did have to leave after three prior attempts to depart. Here is Max, Aka, and the eldest son, Pudin. Pudin and Max had formed quite a bond in those weeks.

Us and the fam. We miss it there. From left: Pudin, Aka, Max, Tetang, Kara and Mom. We never learned her name. It's ok, she's a mom, and wonderful. Not pictured are Ana and Amal, who were sent to school on another island just days before we left.

Goodbye Togians. We will be back.