Posted by Bik on Wednesday, 28. October 1998 at 23:00 Bali Time:
Dear all,
As I used the forum intensively before leaving, I wanted to let you know how I experienced Indonesia.
I spend a bit less than 3 weeks on Java and then 8 days on Bali.
Java was great, I first spent 4 days in Cianjur where I was "teaching" English to students of a language school, I stayed with the family of their teacher and they made me feel really at home. Then I left for Pangandaran, stayed at Delta Gecko which is one of the best places where I stayed. Christina (the owner) has some little bamboo houses (without electricity) with a mandi outside under a little roof, a nice terrace around the bungalow and she really makes you feel at home immediately. The same night she organized a fishbbq for her guests, afterwards some Javanese shows and then there was a campfire on the beach and we were all sitting there, singing and the locals were playing guitar, anyway, a great evening. The next day I took a trip to an Island, which is normally illegal, but as money makes the world go round, we managed to visit it anyway. There is a big prison in the middle of the Island, surrounded by jungle, and we were taken there in a boat, first we had to "swim" through a little village to get to the harbor, as it had been raining a lot the days before, so the whole village was under water thus the bus could not bring us to the harbor. Anyway, then we were in the boat for a couple of hours, had to go through the jungle to get at the beach, the guides made a bbq for us on the beach and in the mean time we could do a climbing to a hidden waterfall, first crossing some riff sand and then climbing over rocks in the water to the waterfall, only four of the 12 that started the climbing actually made it to the waterfall. But the view was great, so I'm glad I actually didn't give up and climbed up the whole way. Then we went swimming and enjoyed the sun and the beach, had our bbq and ofcourse, and had to cross the village which was still underwater to get back to Delta Gecko.
I then left for Cilacap, a nice boat trip of about 4 hours and then headed for Yogyakarta. I chose the Rose Hotel which has a big swimming pool, chartered a taxi together with some other European travelers I met on the way and we visited Borobudur and Prambanan. Went to the Via Via traveler's café (it's Belgian run and it's excellent), and they organize cooking courses, bicycle trips etc. The next days I visited the Kraton and the Waterpalace, did a day trip to Kaliurang, went to Kota Gede to buy some silver, and did ofcourse lots of shopping. After Yogya, I took the transport to Bromo, did not take the organized package, so I stayed in a hotel (The Lave View Hostel) which is right at the edge of the sand sea and which has a great view on Bromo. The next morning I took the jeep trekking to the best viewpoint, and then went back down and climbed Bromo itself. Beautiful. Instead of leaving immediately, I stayed another day, and as there was almost nobody who does that, you really have the whole place for yourself. Spend the day sightseeing, it was really great. The next day I left for Bali, because of problems with the chartered bus, I was dumped in Probolinggo and had to search for transport myself to get to Lovina. Eventually I arrived there late at night, I stayed at Taman Lilly which is a super clean hotel, managed by a nice Dutch guy and his Indonesian wife. In the early hours, I took the boat to see the dolphins, but I was very unlucky, we searched for 3 hours and only saw 3 dolphins. Because everybody told me this was very exceptional I decided to stay a day longer and take the trip again the next day. So, in the afternoon I went to Mas Lovina together with a Dutch girl I met , Mas Lovina is a 75 Us $ hotel and you can spend the day at their swimming pool for a small amount of Rp. Nobody else was there, so we had the swimming pool for ourselves. At night, I had a great dinner, and the next morning I actually saw lots and lots of dolphins. The same day I left for Ubud, stayed one night in a noisy losmen in the center (Ning's House) and the next morning I searched for a quiet place to stay and ended up in the rice fields, homestay Taman Indah, which was a great place. I spend some days there, walking around, rented a pushbike and went bicycling in the ricefields, met nice Balinese people and at night I always enjoyed dinner at one of the recommended places from the Forum. Lotus Resto was terrible (expensive and no lotus flowers …and the food was not good at all), Casa Luna was rather disappointing, but all the other were just terrific.
Anyway, I then went to Kuta, did not like the place at all, but I could rest on the beach and that's all I wanted anyway.
So, if I now look back to the trip, I can say that I loved Java, loved the views and loved the people. They were just great, always friendly and always ready to help. I had the impression that they were very honest and very interested in the people they meet. Had great conversations there with the locals and I'm certainly returning there.
Bali on the other hand was different and honestly, it did not really impress me. The Balinese people are friendly, but different than the ones at Java, and also, I liked the nature in Java much more. What I found a real pity was that Bali has adapted itself to the tourists, where as Java doesn't seem to have changed in function of tourism. That was my first big shock. The second and even bigger shock was the behavior of some tourists…. Walking around on the market of Ubud, dressed only in a tiny bikini top and a tiny short, well it's in my eyes not showing a lot of respect towards the people there. I almost went up to those girls to ask if they could show me the shortest way to the beach. Anyway, everybody behaves how they want ofcourse, but I think that lots of Balinese people must think that Westerns are strange, because I saw many many girls dressed in a way which is ok when you're on / around the beach, but which is not really the correct way of dressing when you visit more distant places.
But Ubud was a good preparation for what I was going to see in Kuta. I'm not giving any comments on Kuta or on the way the Aussies and Japanese youth spend their holidays there, I learned that for them it's the nearest place where there is sun, beaches and good surfing, so it's clear that they come there for other reasons than I, as we have similar places in Europe where we go if we want to go for relaxing and fun only.
One last thing : this summer the Rp fell as low as 17.000 against the Us $ and in Bali the restaurants and shops have put their prices higher because of the weak Rp (on Java they did not really do it). When I arrived in Indonesia the Rp was at 11.000 against the $, but towards the end of my holidays (and that's when I arrived in Bali) it was 6.500 against the $. Nevertheless, everybody kept the prices from this summer, so I spoke with some Balinese people that were complaining that tourists did not spend that much money anymore etc, especially in restaurants they felt it strong. I tried to explain that if you had to pay 5000 Rp before the crisis for a certain dish, that logically now that same dish should cost around 12.000 Rp. But they have put the price at 30.000 Rp in summer for that dish, and they keep that price now, so in fact, in October you were paying more for everything than before the crisis (in Ubud anyway), which is ofcourse why people actually started counting a bit. I KNOW it's still cheap, but when you change $ and you get only half of what you got the first days, then you start counting a bit in order to avoid having to change another 100 $ the last day of your holidays.
Also, for us the ticket to get in Indonesia is rather expensive, so because life in Indonesia is cheap we can afford it.
About spending money : I bought everything I wanted and I did give people in restaurants a tip after my meal. They need it and they are underpaid.As for bargaining : I bargained to the bottom but then paid them a bit more anyway. Some thought I was crazy, but I just wanted to make clear that it's not because I'm white that they can ask whatever they want (they sometimes started at a price of 200.000 Rp for something I paid 30.000 Rp for a day before, if you then follow the rule of "start at 50 % and settle on 60 to 70 %" the item becomes relatively overpaid…) I'm very fond of pisang goreng, and normally you get 4 pieces for 1000 Rp. All over Java I paid this same price, in Bali suddenly I was charged 5000 Rp for only 1piece. Well, that's an attitude that I hate, the price in Java was okay for me, it's more than Javanese people pay, but that's normal, they use the rule ‘you have more, so you pay more'. But there are limits…
Anyway, I had a great holiday and my comments on Bali are not meant negative at all, it's just my impression.
Bik