In Kuala Lumpur after a relaxing couple days in Lake Toba

I had a lovely time in Lake Toba in northern Sumatra. It got as cool as the 60's at night and was a great break after the jungle trekking--which was fun but a little tiring!

Now I am getting ready to board my connecting flight in Kuala Lumpur, a fantastic airport. They have a jungle walk that is open air inside of the international terminal, with trees labelled and explained. There are even birds and butterflies flying around in the little rainforest. And, like Changi airport in Singapore, plenty of duty free shopping: be it alcohol or perfume or Versace. It's such an interesting contrast to see women walking around in burkas past Starbucks and duty free alcohol retailers. Truly a diverse airport if I've ever seen one.

Should be in Bali in about six hours, where I will go to the reportedly serene and beautiful town of Ubud for a couple days before heading to the Gili islands for some beach bumming and diving. Then, if I feel up to it, I'll head down to Ulu Watu, the Bali everyone wants to experience but can't find in the cities closest to the airport. I'll post more soon!

A little about Sumatra

I've been in Indonesia long enough to get a decent impression of the culture, and so far I really love it and find it more tourist friendly than anywhere I've traveled so far. And, as opposed to the other places that have plenty of tourist traffic in down season, this is high season and one would expect a lot of people to be competing for tourist dollars. For example, when I got out of the airport I didn't get hassled at all by drivers asking to take me somewhere. I was politely approached by only one person, ad got a good price for a ride to my hostel without trying to convince me to go anywhere else. He was very talkative and pleasant and seemed genuinely interested in learning about my travels and America. The one thing an American will hear absolutely everywhere in Indonesia the second they tell someone where they are from is "Barack Obama", because he went to primary school here for a few years and his sister from his stepfather is from here. Therefore, Indonesia basically claims him as their own and is very, very proud of their ties to the president of such a prestigious nation.

The guides at Bukit Lawang were very nice as well, buying big amounts of food and giving some of it to us and helping us out in ways you wouldn't expect as part of just a "trek". One of the guides even brought me to his friend's wedding, which was very fun. He said that there is no real "normal" age for marriage in Indonesia, as some girls get married at 15 because of unexpected pregnancies and others wait until their twenties (the latter was the group our wedding belonged to, thank goodness). About half the women were in head scarves and half weren't--so far it seems like religions, though pervasive here, don't really come into much heated conflict. One of my guides was Protestant (they only have Protestant/Catholic, not further denominations) and said he feels safe and welcome in the community and never has had problems. Good to hear.

 

 The language also hasn't been as much of a problem here, as the phonemes and cadence of Bahasa Indonesia are a lot closer to English than other languages in Asia. The guides could all speak a decent amount of multiple languages, like French, Dutch, Danish, etc. And even though Sumatra is primarily Muslim, I fell like there is less of a culture shock here than in the rest of Asia. Maybe it's because the guides I work with  are always in contact with westerners, or maybe the cities in Sumatra are just more relaxed. Maybe it's because they all listen to American music (most of Asia listens to some, but mostly they listen to music from their own country). Either way, I don't feel like as much of a foreigner here, even with the light skin.

The saddest thing I've encountered in Indonesia is the strong memory of the tsunami of 2004. Everyone was affected by it in many ways, and there hasn't been one person I've talked to who didn't know someone who died during it. The most poignant story was a guide's friend whose child was 3 at the time. The eucalyptus trees grow here very infrequently, but they float really well. One happened to get uprooted during the tsunami and his child, who was about to drown, clung onto it and they didn't find her until the next day, 20 kilometers downstream of her house. She doesn't remember the event anymore, but her parents make her retell the story every few months to she will always know why she is alive now.

Bukit Lawang Bliss

I had an incredible time in Bukit Lawang trekking in Gunung Leuser National Park. I got into my hostel later because of a delayed flight, but luckily was able to book a trek right at the hostel. We left the morning of the 5th for Bukit Lawang, a city right on the border of the park that is about 3 hours away from Medan. They drive on the left side of the road, just like Thailand and Singapore, but significantly more crazy. Even our driver seemed surprised by some of the maneuvers people in other "lanes" tried to pull. Luckily, he was safe and defensive and I felt as safe as I could on those roads.

We got into Bukit Lawang at about 1 pm and met all of the guides that work through our company along with a few from other companies. The guest house we stayed at has a bar that he locals love to come to. Their favorite thing to do (and something I've noticed all around Indonesia, including on TV) is sing. An ideal night is to have a few beers, break out the guitar an bongo drums, and belt out the favorite times everybody knows until late into the night. They love American songs, including John Denver, and old songs that they gave their own lyrics to (instead of Jingle Bells they sing about Bukit Lawang). The rest of the afternoon it rained (their "dry season" is relative) so we played cards with the guides. The other girls in my group were from Holland and Denmark. Apparently a lot of Danish and Ditch come there, because the guides spoke their respective languages very well and even knew a few songs in each language. And, of course, they also spoke excellent English. I also met an American man traveling around for a few months who had befriended one of the guides and had been in Bukit Lawan for a week already. He showed me some great videos of the jungle critters and through him I got to know the guides better.

The next morning we woke up bright and early to start our trek. We got to the National Park by passing some rubber plantations and palm oil plantations. Few people were out that day because it was market day for the town, so we had the plantations to ourselves.

After entering the park, we almost immediately got our first glimpse of orangutan: a semi wild female and her little one. The baby was about a year old and was having a good time swinging on its own a few trees away from mom. The orangutans in the park are separated into two groups: the wild and the semi wild. In the 1970's, some orangutans were kept away from the wild and were raised around people. The government outlawed the practice, but since some orangutans had never grown up wild they couldn't be counted on to find all their own food. To help, a feeding center was established as a sort of orangutan safety net to aid their transition into the wild. These are the semi wild, and since these distant relatives of ours live to be about 50 years old in the wild they still comprise a significant portion of the population in the park. The wild orangutan, on the other hand, were never in contact with humans and don't know or care about the feeding center because they can get their own food and don't trust people. When you go into the park, your likelihood of meeting a semi wild orangutan (like our first two) is highest, followed by the offspring of a semi wild (though thy never come as close), with the fully wild being the least common to see.

Along with the mom and baby orangutan, we also got to see some Thomas's leaf monkeys, which are beautiful monkeys that have a striped grey, black, and white patterns on their face and aren't found in many other places in the world.

Our campsite was beautiful and felt totally isolated--I felt like Tarzan in the wild, amidst giant trees with massive vines and hearing the loudest bugs of my life.  The morning after our trek we were even greeted by some monkey friends that like to visit to try to get some of the food scraps left at the camp site.

Safe and Sound in Sumatra!

Got into Sumatra tonight after a short flight. The people here are very nice and luckily it's relatively cool for SE Asia. Tomorrow I leave for a three day guided trek in Bukit Lawang to see orangutans, as Sumatra and Borneo are the only two places that still have wild orangutans. Can't wait!