Around The World w/Scott 2011: These are the Days of My Life...Bali Indonesia, Arrival Tales

I'm borrowing from that old Soap Opera from back in the college days. I decided that after 2 months + on the road that my blog needed to have some cohesiveness. I decided after a week staying with my friend Ben in Singapore that I was so tired (my feet hurt) from exploring that I needed some relaxation/beach time. Let me tell you that what I have found is paradise lost, paradise in transition, paradise untouched, paradise transformed and a beautiful people to top it off.

Fabulous Bali, Indonesia accomodation

Bali, Indonesia agrees with me!

The tiny Island of Bali where I flew in to Ngu Rai where the airport is located and was met by the driver of my chosen hotel van. I finally thought I would impress my co travelers with seeing my name on one of those placards that distinguished drivers in caps hold up for those all important travelers. Yeah right....As I swept thru customs....WAIT JUST A DARN MINUTE.....why is it that once you are on the KLM (Dutch sounds like German, because the flight crew addresses you in Dutch/German prior to English, first for everything) flight that there is a brief and disturbing announcement over the speaker comment that you are responsible for a On Arrival Visa that is not part of your ticket purchase. What the hell am I supposed to do about that once I have my ass planted in one of your none tooo comfortable coach class seats? Well let me tell you the fun of arrival. You and all well 300 other people are now queued in 4 none to straight lines of differing inclusions of the mass of people lurching toward the 4 tellers behind lass enclosed booths. There are no instructions provided for the kaos that follows. First entry is US$25. I have not seen an American bill/coin in just shy of 60 days. Next i panic to think if I even have any Singaporean currency as i know that Singaporean dollars and Bali, Indonesian Rupiah are totally different and I almost emptied my pockets before leaving Singapore. Lucky me once again, with conversion I barely scrape by with the pocket money that I have. And here we go again to the Welcome to Bali...customs line.

Another bit of disorganization. Queueing is obviously not an art form in every country. Singapore the folks are so polite and do NOT push shove or cut in queue. Well, foreign tourists (Germans) are full on body block, tackle, and push/shove and roll you over with their luggage cart types. That and their language is just as ugly. All the while jostling for position they tend to scream all at the same time at the top of their lungs some ugly sounding phrases that based on volume truly does not get them anywhere any faster than the other 300 people wishing they would be nice and quiet down. They chose not to and of course made the military Polisia have to step in to do crowd control. After training the foreign tourists on queueing and going to the proper customs window rather than anyone they felt like going to, the ease of entering Indonesia was eased significantly. Welcome to Bali.

Fortunately i had decided to travel light...really, really light....like a small backpack light for my visit to Bali, Indonesia. If I could get away with this for the rest of my trip, I am sold on the concept. Excess is so overrated. I took a pair of jeans, shorts, 2 t-shirts, tennies, slippers (Bali for flip flops), the good ole laptop, the piece of shit Apple I-phone (love the camera, the rest is useless) will discuss the application jailbreak that I plan on performing once I'm in Thailand, and 2 swim trunks. Oh and a book to read on the beach. So once thru customs which I somehow misplaced my Indonesian custom claims card. Thought that was going to send me home, but as I was traveling light the agentnet just said to fill one out next time. How Nice!

Everyone in Bali has a driver...there were at least 50 signs w/names for pick up

Well a few further steps and you are not only outside the airport terminal but you are thrust a bit like a movie star out into the glare of poperatsi....or more clearly the overwhelming siht of about 300 drivers all with handmade signs with last names; of course i took the picture. It was so overwhelming to think that in this little island nation that every sinle person on the flight must be being picked up at the airport by a driver. So much for feeling special...It is now just about survival because if you think the foreighn tourist se isn't keen on queueing for officials think of how they acted trampling one another to find their name/driver. PANDEMONEUM!!!! Fortunately my driver stood back and held the sign high so that while everyone else was in a mosh pit of crazy, I easily spotted my driver and signaled that I had not additional luggage which i think surprised him but he just smiled and said follow me. Lucky for me my driver must have been a linebacker in school because he made a bee line outa there and no one came close to taking me down on our way to the car park.

I was politely greeted as Mr. Scott and advised that my hotel was a short 40 minute drive (harrowing experience at sundown in a new country of thousands of motor scooters, just as many taxis, and the rest are bicycles and pedestrians) along unpaved roads, some with very deep, like loose your under carriage of the car deep or send the unsuspecting moped driver into orbit. All of this takes place on unlit streets and an undisclosed speed limit with horns blaring. It is like a synchronized dance that no one practiced for but everyone survives.