learn to be a cheapshit

i had difficulty when i tried to entitle this post. but then i think, the title is not as important as the content.

this story is about my 10 days journey to lombok and bali with my 4 other friends, ippy, indri, and upi.. the story actually begin when ippy suddenly asked me to go to a holiday after i’ve finished my 3 month course in pare. i don’t know why she suddenly asked me, maybe she liked me (peace,love ^^v). I, the one who always (or maybe want to)  identified myself as an adventurous person, am happy with this invitation. I thought that, its the one time before i got into real life, i could go to some last adventurous youthful moment afterwards we planned our vacation to karimun jawa, from the cost, transportation, schedule, etc.  but, seems like the weather was not in the good mood, both of our parents saw  a news on tv reporting the bad weather in karimun jawa, and some people are trapped there for 10 days.. weew, that news ofcourse upset our parents. long story short, we reroute our vacation to lombok and bali, following some couple’s holiday, that is how i met upi and indri.. actually i was feeling a little uneasy when ippy said to me to change our destination, but when i heard about her plan, that we were gonna do it backpacker style for 10 days, it pound my heart as i imagined how it was going to be. then i said to ippy, “bali and lombok it is”

ippy, upi, and indri were going from jakarta, and i were going from kendari, our redezvous point was in ngurah rai airport, bali. then there were we, 4 of us, starting our step by determined motto, “we have low budget!”.

Day 1

BALII! BALII! yep, i text ippy that when i landed on that most renowed island in indonesia. so after meeting with ippy and being introduced to upi and indri, we headed to padang bay harbour, to go to lombok by boat. we rented a taxi for 170 after a very serious bidding. you know, as a backpacker, we got a very small budget, hence bidding is a very necessary skill to have. i never really good on bidding. but i think i learn this skill a little bit as i travel with them.the point is not to be too good-hearted when you face ur opponent. as ippy said, “if he still want to deal, then he still got some profit right?”.. after 2 hours slow driving, we finally arrived in the harbour. we bought the ticket for Rp 36.000 per person. you know, i never really travel using a boat, so i’m a little bit anxious that i take a puke plastic bag from the plane just in case i throw up in the ship but turn out the weather was good so the ship was not so shaky. not to mention we rented an air-conditioned room for 40, consequently, we didn’t really ask the classic “are we there yet?” question.

then we’re in lombok the first impression i got from lombok people in the harbour, they shouting all the time -__- exhibit A, there’s this mini bus offered us a transportation to chakranegara, mataram, the place where we’re gonna stay because  you know, its cheap. when we were bidding, he kept shouting. first he bid us for 20K per person. but we still think its expensive then we just keep going so we can search another mean of transportation. but he kept insisting, he caught up to us outside the harbour and shout, “15K! its so cheap! c’mon!”. but we keep think its expensive and persist on our bidding, 10 k, we kept walking. then he caught up to us again and said, “okay 10 k!”. haha, i adore my friends’ bidding ability

after we’d reached chakra negara, we searched for two hotel that said to be the cheapest hotel there. but we got another info from some shopkeeper there about losmen ayu and some homestay in which i forget the name, and the fact that the hotel that we were heading was a prostitution area.haha  first we got to the X hotel, and they offerred us a room for 75 per night. as usual, we thought it was a little bit expensive, so we went to losmen ayu and their price was 50 per night for 2 people. “losmen ayu it is!”. that is for day 1. we rest our body for tomorrow awesome adventure

Day 2

Day 2 is my favorite actually.. because i can see the most breath-taking beach i’ve ever seen directly, selong belanak as planned, we’re going to travel around lombok and bali using motorbike.. so we rented a motorbike for 50 K per day.. you can get 40 K but only if it is not automatic bike. you can see our rute in here. it is such a long drive. our plan this day is beach-hoping, in which we were going to hop on selong belanak, mawun, kuta, and watching sunset in tanjung-ann. the first 1 hour drive was pretty boring since we were still passing residence area. But we got some eye-opener scenery when we were getting close to the beach. The mountain around us with such a soft moving bush, some cow were eating weed in the side of the road,  and since we were on a mountain road, we can see from above the blue sea ahead of us,  I gotta say, lombok’s awesome. I mean, we were not such a really religios people, but as we seen the scenery along the way, we can’t stop saying, “subhanallah”.. we were really excited back then

And here come the first beach, Selong Belanak.. It was a really quiet beach.. no one was there but us. and the scenery, my God, the scenery! see you it yourself

yeah, lombok’s famous for the natural beatiful scenery it has. and the fact that we feel like it was our private beach makes the sensation being there is inexplicable. I even can’t hold myself to just jump in the water without changing my cloth first.. aaah, heaven..

Selong Belanak

we actually hadn’t been satisfied on playing there, but since we were supposed to catch up the schedule, we headed to the second destination, mawun beach. The Itenerary said that Mawun beach is more beatiful, but I think Selong Belanak is still the rockin’ one.. well, ofcourse it’s beautiful too. but I was probably still under the spell of Selong Belanak’s Charm :p. we were not playing in there, just enjoying the view from some small wooden shelter. here’s the view of not as awesome as the previous one mawun beach:

Mawun beach

it was almost 3PM when we decided to go to the next destination, kuta beach. I don’t know why this beach is named the same as the famous surfing beach in bali. but little bird says that this place is just like bali’s kuta 100 years ago. since it still has the beautiful natural scenery that bali’s kuta no longer has. the reality? well, ehh..I mean, it was my least favorite beach of the day.. but still, it’s actually beautiful. it’s perfect for swimming since you could barely feel the wave, just like in swimming pool. and it’s not deep at all even if you’re already far from the shore.

kuta lombok

all in all, the rank of the beach supposed to be, kuta, mawun, then selong belanak. but turnout in reality, it’s in reverse order.

the last destination this day is watching sunset in tanjung ann. the beach there was surprisingly nice. the sand was soooo white and soft as baby’s powder. but we didn’t have the chance to play there since we were heading to the hill near that beach… the view from there was spectacular, the wide blue sea, the tanjung ann beach view from above, let alone the scenery of the sunset made our eyes kept opened wide back then. here’s some photos of it:

the scenery from the tanjung ann hill

behind us is the scenery of tanjung ann beach

the sunset from tanjung ann hill

after seeing the last moment of the day, we headed back to our hotel in darkness of the night. funny story here, the gasoline indicator in the bike that upi and indri rode was broken, so they didn’t know exactly how much gas left in their bike. this lead to the emptiness in their gasoline tank, which force me to pull them with my bike to the nearest gas seller. after dealing with such sudden problem, we headed to taste the lombok’s original food, bulayak satay.. you can find it in foodcourt near airport in mataram. it priced 7000. the taste is good and unique.. worth to try

okay then, i think it’s enough for describing the legendary day 2. for the rest day, i’ll write it in another time okay, just wait for it thx for reading all.. ciao..

p.s. you can see more photos in here and here

some photos is credited to upi

sempu island (part 3)

wew, its been a  long run. okay, this is the final part of sempu journal. enjoy!

they all got up in their tent, with unbearable sickness all over their body. but when they remembered, that day should be the day when everything was payed off, made them woke up with full energy.

this is the view that made them come to this island

After they’ve all woken up, it was time to make breakfast. what is that? you ask me about their morning routine? like what? taking out some yellow stuff? dude, thats disgusting! but thats true, some of them can’t hold their desire to perform their morning squat routine. you really want to hear this story? if you’re not sure, i discretely sugest you to skip to the next paragraph. i’m not sure about the exact detail since i wasn’t there. i heard this from one of the members, lets call him/her CHIA (stands for Can’t Hold shIt Anymore ). so the story start when CHIA hesitately asked ATH (stands for Able To Hold), “hei dude, don’t you feel like taking a dump?”. “nah, i’m good”. that short answer left CHIA no other option. he/she had to go to the jungle all by himself/herself. cold sweating, he/she had to climb the slipery cliff first in order to conceal himself/herself while he got “down” to business. after found an isolated area and dig some, you know, temporary holes, he/she finally did what he/she had to do. but wait, he/she forgot to bring a tissue or something. luckly, earlier that week he/she heard some survival tips on how to pick an unpoisonous leaf, that is to stick the surface of the leaf to the back of your ear, if the back of your ear feels itchy, then the leaf is poisonous (and seems like the tips didn’t really work since afterwards that day, his/her “you know what” got hurt). after tormenting the leaf, he/she got back to his/her friend without anyone notice that he/she has just performed some ‘serious’ stuffs.okay, thats all for the secret story of  CHIA.

in order to cook the breakfast. they have to gather the wood to make a camp fire. And there they were, searching in the slippery jungle for some dry wood. but the result was not so satisfying. they searched for another place, but the monkey got in their way. so they searched for another area and found this fairly cuttable tree. brain heroicly suggest to cut down the tree. and, after so many slash from mr al and alfred(yeah, the heroic person sugesting it barely help the process ), they cut down that tree.

after all the hard work, we finally cut down some tree. funny story, that big heavy wood never been used

after enough(well, actually too many) woods were finally gathered. now it was time to cook. but turn out it was not a duck soup to light the camp fire. even after using almost all of our kerosine, the camp fire still failed to be made. they tried everything, one use the cartoon paper from the mineral water box, one put some dried leaves, another even put some wet leaves on it -__-” . thankfully,some kind-hearted camp neighbour gave them spiritus and it finally enabled them to cook their breakfast. wheww, even though the fish were extremely salty and and the sausages were sandy(as any other food they ate there), it was magically delicious. they even can still remember how it tasted. well, apparently, everything going on there were unforgettable.

i cried my eyes out that time(because of the smoke though )

haha, this picture is self-explanatory

now, the main act. playing in the water. you can’t imagine how happy they feel. some explicitly said, “oh my Good, i’m so happy right now”. haha, probably after all of their miseriessssss, some little fun in the salty sea water gave them maximum happiness. it was fun. need thousand words to explain it. since one picture equal thousands of words, i’ll just give you their happy picture back then

you got to admit, the scenery was so beautiful back then

play! play! play!

^^/

two thumbs up!and it's no small talk dude!

and you could find other photos in here

yeah, their misery finally got payed off. and they didn’t regret (right?) even a bit for going there. after a short fun time playing in the lagoona, since most of other campers in there had already gone, they decided to pack their camping stuff and be ready to go back. well, for them, it was such a short time since they didn’t really play much. its like they really want to add one more day for being there, if only their food and water stock were enough. after hastily prepared their stuff, they said goodbye to that lagoona that had moved their tent, and take the last picture together T_T

the complete 9 members of sempu journey

Ah, it was difficult to leave that white sand, but apparently they back on the slippery and muddy track again. the road turned out to be less pain taking because it was drier than before. since they already knew what they are getting into plus their stuff had been reduced, the atmosphere on the way back was more cheerful. some can still throw a joke, laugh, acting like spider man, or even sing kuch-kuch hotahai song while swing using the brach or small three. but seemed like the sandy food had finally taking its role, while on their way back, some of our cruiser had to do what our CHIA did, perform a long silent squat in the jungle. luckily, unlike CHIA, they brought tissue with them. so they didn’t have to perform some crazy uneffective way to determine whether the leaf poisonous or not, like CHIA did. unluckily, one of them earlier had heard that in the forest, there were wild boar. so one of them just squat there, feel anxious , and dread to think that wild animals would just suddenly appear. Only 4 hours of piece of cake walk, they got back again on the seashore. taking the boat to the sendang biru, they literally said goodbye to the “beloved” sempu island.

see? they looked like they enjoy the trip. and their outfit didn't seems too dirty like before

why she held tissue? ^^v

finally relieved knowing they didn't have to walk anymore

the way back home actually not really tormenting as when they go to sempu. but they unfortunately had bad luck, probably because they kept swearing on their first walk in sempu . first, the car taking them to malang raised his fare by 50%. Second, they had to change car in the middle of the way from sendang biru to sempu. why? because the driver was an ass. third, they had to pay fine of 50 K for the camping stuffs they rent, and for illogical reason like for washing the safety vest. and finally, just like the world want to complete their journey experience, the bus taking them to pare dropped their heavily exhausted bodies, 3 kilos from their house at 11.30 pm. seriously, THIS TRIP ROCKSS!!

fyuhh..that’s all the story that i can tell you about our trip to sempu island. i dedicated these post to my friend whom i travel with, so that it can be some kind of remembrall for us later in the future, when we got old, and suddenly said, “you know when i was younger, i ever walked 5 hours in the jungle, with sweat and mud got mixed and covering all my body, but i totally was able to make it even if i carried almost 15 kilos of camping stuffs on my back. such a fun and adventourous time ” .. okay, thx for reading,, Ciao