Singapore-Batam 4 September 2007
Sleeping beauty selama di hostel dan bangun jam 8 pagi masih dengan males2an ikutan sarapan gratis dari hostel. Mulai beres2 dan check out jam 10 menuju ke Harbourfront naik taksi kembali dan fico merasa kehilangan pasport dan ternyata dia letakkan didalam backpacknya dan butuh waktu 10 menit (thx to supir yang ingetin, untung gw da prepare didalam tas kecil!!), bayar S$ 17. Nyampe di Harbourfront check in dulu dan harus bayar pajak S$10 (jauh lebih mahal dari masuk Singapore L). Disini kita bisa nyimpan bagasi dan kalo lebih dari 20 kg harus bayar S$1/kg. Balik naik penguin lagi, tapi dapat kapal yang pake ruang makan gitu, jadi kami pilih tempat duduk yang dekat dengan tempat makan.. hehehe tempat duduknya bisa buat tiduran, lumayan buat tidur satu jam. Suasana kapal adem ayem, kita lupa buat beli bekal.. cuma ngiler liat cowok2 makan McD di belakang..nyam..tapi tenang persediaan pop mie sangat membantu dengan membawa air panas dari Betel Box..hehe... Nyampenya sama aja Batam Centre harus ambil dan bawa sendiri dari kapal, kalo dibawain sama porter harus bayar lagi (??). Akhirnya pertualangan yang lebih menantang tiba ketika berada di negara sendiri.
Batam 4-5 September 2007
Turun dari kapal dengan membawa semua beban yang ada menuju ke agen travel mo cari tiket ferry menuju ke jambi soale semua penerbangan Mandala Airlines ke jambi di batalkan dengan alasan ga jelas :( dan ternyata kalo naik ferry batam-kuala tungkal hanya ada jam 9 pagi katanya dan juga harus naik dari pelabuhan sekapang (dari sini juga bisa kok ke Singapore). Waktu kita nyari pesawat batam-jakarta semua flight penuh dan batam-palembang juga penuh yang ada hanya untuk penerbangan besok...siaaaaaallllll. Mau ga mau harus nginap dan kita menuju Nagoya, nginap di Grand Mutiara Hotel, kelas deluxe 290rb/malam ternyata ga seperti judulnya ga bagus lah pokoknya. Tapi lumayan dekat hotel ada Pizza Hut dan membuat kita rada buas untuk memasukkan semua junk food kedalam perut yang da terlatih dengan makanan ga sehat J. Sempatin pastinya ke Nagoya Hill (salah satu mall di Batam), lumayan besar dan cukup buat cuci mata dan menghilangkan rasa Bt dan penat karena harus delay pulang ke jambi. Kita jauh2 pergi ke Thailand tapi ga menemukan sepatu dengan ukuran kaki kita, eh disini ada, lumayn menghibur de (dasar wanita, selalu menyelesaikan masalah dengan belanja J). Batam lumayan juga, cukup rame dan bahasa yang campur aduk, ada yang bahasa melayu campur english, ada yang pake indonesia asli, ada bahasa cina juga. Tidur dengan pulas dan rasanya ingin melupakan bawaan yang harus dipikul kembali sebelum melihat jambi. What a day!!! Ternyata waktu cepat sekali berlalu dan pagipun tiba dan harus siap2 untuk perjalanan jauh lagi. Tentunya ga melewatkan sarapan gratis dari hotel, menunya Indonesia sekali, nasi goreng, mie goreng, ayam goreng, oseng teri-kacang. Tapi mang Indonesiaku, gw suka banget ini setelah makan nasi kurang dari 5x selama 16 hari buat gw rada tersiksa, maklum bo’!!!!
Batam-Kuala Tungkal-Jambi 5 September 2007
Kita berangkat dari sekitar jam 7.30 karena beritanya ferry berangkat 1x yaitu jam 9 pagi sedang kita belum punya tiket. Naik taksi dari hotel ke pelabuhan sekapang bayar Rp 60000 dan ada berita lain yang buat ga enak untuk memulai hari ’jaket ijo andalan gw ilang...huuuaaaahhhhh’. Seingat gw sewaktu turun dari taksi masih nyantel ditas dan waktu packing lagi sebelum keluar hotel da ga ada, waktu lapor ma front office mereka bilang ga ada dan minta nomer hp gw, katanya ntar kalo ada dihubungi tapi mpe sekarang NIHIL. Eniwei, tiba di sekapang baru sadar sudah ada dinegara sendiri. Banyak sekali calo2 dan orang2 dari pihak ferry yang narik2 tas biar ikut tas mereka. Kita rada bingung karena sepertinya ada sekitar 4-5 ferry yang berangkat, ada yang jam 9 dan jam 11 menuju Kuala Tungkal. Ternyata kita dapat berita yang salah, kalo ada yang jam 11, kita ga perlu nginap kale. Kita ikut ferry ’marina’ bayar Rp 230000 tapi rasanya BT dan was2 karena diisi dengan banyak orang bahkan pake bangku tempel segala dengan banyak barang2 muatan lain, Puji Syukur aja de ga tenggelam walo mesinnya sempat mati sesaat makanya kita telat 2 jam tiba di Kuala Tungkal so bagi sodara2 kalo ga kepaksa jangan naik ferry de kalo mo menuju Kuala Tungkal or Jambi. Tiba di Kuala Tungkal sekitar jam 5 sore dan lebih parah lagi para supir angkot malah berani megang supaya ikut mobil mereka, dan ga ngerti kita bilang ’Ga!!!’. Mereka gak percaya bawaan kita beratnya sampe 40-an kilo total, jadi main tarik aja, tapi waktu disuruh angkat beneran baru tau ! dan si abang2 salut ama kita yang bisa ngangkat beban seberat itu dengan gaya cuek (padahal hikksss !!). Mang Indonesia luar biasa, butuh perjuangan dan keberanian yang ekstra kalo mo jalan2 keliling Indonesia J. Akhirnya menemukan satu mobil buat mengantar kita menuju rumah fico, sekitar jam 9 malam tiba dengan selamat dengan disambut ma mama fico didepan pintu pagar dan terima kasih Tuhan da tiba dengan selamat dan semua beban bawaan bisa di simpan dengan selamat.
The best thing about going from Harbour front ? they checked your luggage in.
I don't have to carry my 23kg's back pack while i try to wake up from the flu medication. Hehehehe...
But the sun is still shining, i feel happy because finally the trip is almost over..
During the ferry trip i were just sleep, while Maria awake and listen to her MP3. I just feel exhausted, and maybe because the weather at singapore that made me feel tired all sudden (raining all day).
We got a different Penguin boat, its much better than the one that we got when we left Batam to Singapore. At least this one had a dining room, where we sit. Its a good chioce because in here we could sleep because the seat is bigger, and had a table between the seat.
The weather little bit cloudy but the wave is not so big. We made pop mie for each of us. We forgot to buy something in Harbour Front. Beside that actually before leaving we feel little bit full after the break fast.
We finally arrive in Batam, but alas !! all the flight are full, even to Palembang !!!! so were staying for a night in Batam (new adventure).
Were staying in Nagoya, the hotel name is Grand Mutiara. Taxi driver that drive us suggest to stay at Nagoya because it's in between Batam Centre and Sekupang pier where we should take boat to Kuala Tungkal. First we want to seek hotel near Sekupang, but he said there were less choice there, so we said, Nagoya is all right. It's not a vancy hotel. But its better than hostel tho.
I am not feeling so well, i had flu, i got headache and fever. But i will survive until back home (i had to!!).
I already call my mom so she dont need to worry.
Batam is not really "safe" for girls, that's my experience when i work at woman advocacy, to prefent trafficking. Most of womans in Indonesia are "sell" in here. Bad..bad place.
But i've seen worse so we will be okay. I never been here so it's quite experience too tho.
We had our lunch at Pizza Hut, i ate alot. At least our hotel is close to PH. (Another junk food).
We went to Nagoya Hill just to look around something. (Hehehe.. girls..). Its short of a shopping centre. Huge enough to explore all day after our journey from Singapore. We just want to make sure that we didn't missed anything !
Maria got a new cutie shoes with heels, cute. I bought my self a sexy shoes and a boot !! and its all Edward Forrer (sorry about the blurry pic, its from my cellphone). I'll use the boot sometimes to work, and i am so excited to think about that. And about the sexy heels ? i will use it for special occasion.
I got upset thinking that .. Bangkok doesn't have my shoe size, its so unfair !! my size is 41.. and their biggest shoe size is 40... same like most Indonesia shoe shop.
We're girls.. we're dying for shoes !!
We went back to hotel at 5.30 afternoon. We went to buy crispy banana fries near our hostel for Rp 10.000,- (i never eat fried banana this expensive before!!).
We take rest, Maria sleep fast, i still watch tv until 9. I think its because flu i can't really sleep.
We woke up at 5, and take breakfast at 6.30 with friend rice and fried noodles and eggs with orange juice (hehehhe).
We check out at 7.30 and then went to Sekupang. From our hotel the taxi flat rate is Rp 60.000 to Sekupang.
Sekupang ?? bad, dirty, full of "calo" that offer you ticket and pulling your 23kgs backpack.
We got "Sabang Marindo" ferry ticket and it cost us just the same price with the airplane ticket Rp 235.000,- . The ferry will depart at 9 am.
Back to civilization again ??
I don't know if shopping centers counts as civilization (for girls yeahhh, hehehe).
This morning i wake up too early. There's few girls just got back from party, and they were so late, and NOISY to the hostel.
So we decide to just take a bath and get out from the hostel at 6.15 am. We left some of our biscuits there, too much to carry.
Theres a tuk2 outside the hostel. But he want to ask us for 80 baht to the hostel, for both of us.
Oh, God, we cried, not again !!
We said 50 for both, and he just don't want. Sorry.. but we're too tired with all of this tuk2 ISSUE, maybe its REALLY a tradition in here if you were talking about tuk2 that's mean headache.
We decide to walk a bit and there's a songthew passing thru. He stop, Maria don't want to do anything about the songthew because of yesterday incident. But i told the driver how much to the airport, he said 60 baht (wew ! lower than tuk2??) and finally he agree with 50 baht for both (could be cheaper because its not really that far).
Anyway, we just jump in to the songthew and then there's two other girls join us to the airport. They were planning to go to Koh Pang Nga. We already been there, sunshine and beach.. good luck girls !
The songthew stop us at local departure, wrong terminal.
But its not that far to go to the international departure. So we walk with the help of trolley (yess they had that !! so happy to see specially when you carry so much luggage!)
Okay, this is it... could we get thru without paying for extra weight with our big luggages ?
I did pay for extra luggage so we both could bring at least 20 kgs each. So total is 40 Kgs.
And you know how much our total luggage after we measure it at checkin counter ????
39,3 kgs !!!!!!!
Hahahahahhhhaaaa!!!
I think that was a good news, and need to be celebrate with being happy for the rest of our flight.
But..psssttt.. little black secret here..you know.. the total weight of our luggage is actually 43 kgs more. I just do some old trick to the backpack. If you were worried about your luggage over weight, when they put that on scale, don't lay them all. Put it straight up where there's less space/pressure to the scale, the weight getting lighter, its physics law. It works for me all the time on budget airlines !
We had our breakfast at the coffee shop at the 1st floor near the Tiger Airways ticketing. I had a cup of tea and a croissant for breakfast. Trust me.. its NOT enough for my Indonesian tummy. So i get few bites on chocolate that i brought also.
And when i take my wallet out, oh no... there it is.. my pink swiss army knife. AAAAAAAARRGGHHH !!!
Once again, i forgot to put it on my luggage.
Maria and i got sudden panic (especially me). But then we try to hide it on my wallet where theres so many magnetics cards (ATM, credit cards, etc) and it is attached to my keys as a key chain, but still it's a knife.
We went to the second floor of the airport. First we cant really decide what to do because we still have like 1 hour time to spent here. There's only coffee shop out side the waiting room. We try to peek in ..well yeah.. there's more shops there but not as much as in Singapore.
First i think it was amazing that a small city like Chiang mai have international airport, but then Maria reminds me that there's been Olympic games held here, so yes, its good. Small but comfy.
So we went to the immigration line to get to the waiting room. And (gasp !) they were taking pictures of me !! (arrrghh!) if i know they will take the picture i would made my self not looks like some one that "had" to be awake at 5 am ! (read:messy and dull).
We do body scan, and then they x-ray our things, my heart beating fast because i don't want them to take the swiss army knife !! and they re-scan my things AGAIN ! i think my face become more pale than it used... but then they said okay... then all sudden i could breathe as normal (i'm such a criminal...don't ever try this people !!)
We took few pictures there. The toilet is clean and international standard (toilet tissue, clean, smells good and no squad potty or leaking waters).
The flight is all right, and amazingly boring. I'm wondering what would it be on the plane for 18 hours or more?? I try to sleep, i feel tired but just can't. Read mags.. oooohh the mags too good to be read, that you know sometimes that you want to keep some of your reading because you afraid that you don't have anything to read.. that "syndrome" happened there, that time, so i quit reading the mags. I just try to write few things on my temporary journal.
Anyway theres a guy that ask for our blog address cause he see us taking pictures and i explain that for our blogs. He is a nice guy, always smile ( you need that when ever you were in a place that you never been, and you don't know anyone !).
So here we are in singapore and its raining quite hard. We're planning to go to Orchad road as soon as we book our bed at Betel Box. When we finally had our bed we feel so tired that we sleep until 5 afternoon.
The raining is not as hard as before, but its cold and cloudy. I guess moonson not only hit Thailand. We went down stair with umbrella. Hungry !
We rush to find Ayam Penyet Ria, just few blocks from Betel Box, all we need to do is just walk along the road, in rain !
My feet all cold, but thinking about the Chilli that i will eat, uuuhhmm.. Yums !!! we're Indonesian we can't live without those hot chilli and extra hot spices.
We almost can't find rice in Thailand, so when we did find rice.. awww and tempe !! feels we just at home (even the tempe sliced so thin !!). We full after eat a portion for eac of us. Maria have a hot Milo and i had my hot orange juice. I have fever !
After eat and lick our finger tips (yummss), we went back to hostel and wash our face and get ready for Orchad Road.
We took MRT and went to Orchad road. We're lost as usual on our very first day on every town.
Singapore, especially in geylang areas is look different than before we went here. There's a lot of pretty light and some people were busy building tent along the road. They were preparing food stand for the holly month Ramadhan.
Its good to see how this country could celebrate all of their religion beliefs. It's quite different than in Indonesia. I said so because even we had so many cultures and 6 religion and beliefs, you could only see the Moslem celebration.
As a moslem, it's good, but as a nation, where is other culture that we should show to others ?? so much to think about.... i rarely see chinese celebration held in Jambi.. where theres so many chinese. Or where its chrismast.. i could only see they put lights and christmast tree only in shopping centre. In Singapore, its every where !
But then we find the place that we want to go.
We have Burger King as dinner at Orchad, and watch Barongsai dance(lion dance) competition until 9.30 pm. The competition is an international competition. We could see the participant mostly is from Chinese or Hongkong. They were great , and people seemed like it.
