The Long Way Home
English teacher Daniel Pope recalls his 1997 nightmare journey by Bintan to Jakarta.
This particular began which has a motorcycle accident. I lost control of my rented bike while negotiating a cliff-top bend as well as landed within the roadside gravel, just short of a steep drop into the sea. in which near miss was merely a portent of coming catastrophes.
The coastal roads of Bintan Island, lesser known neighbour of in which sinful playground for Singaporean weekenders, Batam, were deserted as well as shouldn’t have posed a problem for even the most unskilled of riders. I put my accident down to being unaccustomed to carrying heavy baggage on the back of a bike. I also discovered how nastily gravel can shred a bare knee.
This particular was in which shredded knee in which led me the next day to be hobbling onto a ferry operated by state-owned shipping firm Pelni for the three-day journey back to Jakarta, where I worked as an English Language instructor. My occupation should serve as an indication of why I wasn’t flying. Back within the mid-1990s, within the days before budget airlines flew to additional cities as well as occasionally into the sea or the side of a mountain, ships were the cheapest form of inter-island transportation. as well as teaching didn’t pay much. Especially not to those fresh to the game. This particular also explains why I was travelling economy class.
The prospect of spending three days on a narrow bunk within the innards of a Pelni ferry, crammed together which has a crowd of staring fellow passengers, can be bleak at the best of times. While I was luckier than those spreading out their blankets in cramped corridors or stairways, I was constantly swatting flies away by my festering knee, as well as crushing cockroaches underfoot. My legs were not as sound against the lurching of the deck as I had supposed. I had soon had enough. I abandoned ship at Batam, a mere three hours later, just as the gangplank was being hauled in.
I decided This particular could be more comfortable to return home overland. This particular necessitated getting to Sumatra via a mere nine-hour journey on a modest air-conditioned ferry. As I limped off in which boat, I caught a touch of the sun. Being a newcomer to the tropics, I had never before experienced such scorching sunlight. The complete absence of shaded shelter was unbearable as well as caused me to panic. Being British, I should have waited patiently within the queue, which was more of a shoving mob, to board one of the minibuses in which had arrived to pick us up. To say in which I jumped the queue could be incorrect. In my desperation, I totally obliterated This particular, leaving people to pick up themselves as well as their strewn belongings.
Roads to the city of Pekanbaru, capital of Riau province, were not the best in Indonesia in those days. The bus ride was even choppier than the seagoing vessels I’d been on. As our convoy lurched, swayed as well as bucked onward, I perspired heavily while clinging to the seat in front of me. Then I encountered some Great fortune. I say This particular because This particular was the bus ahead in which tipped over onto its side, not ours. No such luck for the boy standing within the dust next to the wreckage with blood dripping off him, or the bloodied girl clambering by a shattered window, or the injured soldier helping a distraught old woman to her feet. yet we didn’t stop. We extended no assistance. Our bus just lurched on by. This particular appeared in which the fallen on This particular trail were left where they dropped.
A stopover in Pekanbaru seemed sensible as well as The Lonely Planet Indonesia guidebook directed me to a backpacker hotel in which promised comfort, cheer as well as cold beer. To get there, I boarded a public minivan. The vehicle was cramped as well as crowded yet the passengers were enormously helpful, bundling my bags on for me, squeezing themselves further back to give me room, as well as providing conflicting yet altogether useful directions to the hotel. I found This particular heart-warming in which people could be so helpful to a stranger. I thanked them heartily, shaking a clutch of proffered hands as I reached my stop, hopping by the vehicle with my bags. This particular seemed appropriate to wave as the vehicle sped off. Such splendid people. This particular took me a few seconds to discover in which I had been waving goodbye to my wallet.
After spending an hour on a public phone cancelling credit cards, reporting a stolen ID, as well as getting a friend to wire me money (I had some cash stashed separately, yet not enough to get me back), I finally reached the hotel selling the cold beer. Time to relax. Among the assortment of backpackers as well as skinflint holiday-makers, invariably Dutch, I got talking to a German who was riding his motorbike across Sumatra. Just why he was doing This particular, I never did find out, yet he had some fascinating tales, none of which there are room for in This particular tale. During the night, for reasons unknown, he fell through my door as I slept, trod on my scabbing knee, apologised for intruding, as well as staggered out again. I didn’t truly hear his apology. I was distracted by the agony of all in which healing undone by the dirt-encrusted sole of a German motorcycle boot.
My next night’s sleep was aboard a bus heading for Jakarta, a 36-hour journey. Reclining in my seat, with the lights out, I began to drift off to the gentle sound of crunching gear improvements. yet This particular was not a regular bus. This particular was an ‘executive’ one. as well as as such, This particular had certain dues. Unpaid in This particular case. Had I known in which the bus company had not paid the thugs who ruled the territory we were passing through, as well as consequently in which our safe passage could not be guaranteed, I could not have been so relaxed. The abrupt sight of an asteroid shooting just inches past by my left ear was accompanied by the sound of shattering glass as well as screeching brakes as the driver halted the bus, then thought better of This particular as well as proceeded to the next village. There was a hole where the window had been as well as a bloodied empty seat where the unlucky passenger had been sitting. A brick chucked at a speeding bus will do in which. We spent two hours at the village police station.
I reached Jakarta without further incident. Perhaps my sudden return to prayer had helped. I was a week late back to work by my Bintan holiday. I soon had trouble remembering the actual holiday yet not the homeward journey. My injured knee began to heal nicely, though for many weeks I had to contend which has a scab resembling an elephant’s kneecap.
as well as what did I learn by This particular succession of mishaps as well as near misses? Nothing. As far as I’m concerned, I didn’t put a foot wrong. I made This particular through those slings as well as arrows. as well as I’d still recommend travelling around Indonesia on a budget. You just have to learn how to rough This particular as well as be lucky. Seriously.
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The Long Way Home
The Long Way Home