To Jogja

More thoughts of Singapore that I forgot to put last time:

There are almost no insects in Singapore. Like, we saw about two flies the whole time, no mozzies, nothing. Some ants if you look for them. Saw a few skinks on buildings at dusk. As a result of the lack of bugs, there are very few birds. Almost none whatsoever in normal streets, though you can see some every now and then in outdoor eating areas and in parks. Still, it was very odd to be in that sort of temperature and not be continually swatting flies and mosquitoes!

Trip to Jogja.


We had really good tickets for the flight from Singapore to Jogja. Last time we came it was split into Singapore – Jakarta then Jakarta – Jogjakarta. This time it was direct, about a two hour flight. The timing was great too, the flight didn’t leave until 11AM, so we had a nice leisurely start to the day and were never rushed. Less taking off and landing meant less sinus headache for me, so that was great. As we got onto the plane, the AC was on, and we’re not sure whether they were spraying something or if it was just the humidity and what-not, but here’s a picture of the Thriller album special effects we got:

With keen eyes you can see the mists coming from the ceiling vents. It was hard to capture with the camera, but was kinda eerie. The flight was as bumpy as last time, well, maybe not quite as bad, but maybe we were just ready for it this time. Quite turbulent in some areas. As we came in towards Jogja and descended I tried to get a few shots of the volcanic cones sticking out above the cloud layer, only a couple of shots came out enough, and even they aren’t great, but here’s one I don’t know the name of:

And I think this one might be Mt. Merapi, there’s smoke coming from the top, but I don’t think you can distinguish it from the clouds in this shot, which was taken as we descended:

On arrival we disembarked to a sunny mid-30s day. Much lower humidity than Singapore, but quite a bit warmer. The wet season is about two weeks overdue at the moment, so it’s very hot, but no afternoon showers. I’m sure it’ll begin during our stay here so that will be kinda cool for the contrast we’ll see.

Now sorry for the block of text...
As you all know, I’m a bit clueless when it comes to travelling (unlike TJ, who knows everything) but apparently there is an entire class that are even worse than me. For example, even *I* knew that you had to buy a visa on entering the country and a preliminary check in any information kit, the internet or asking someone tells you how much. The fastest and easiest way is to just have $25 US dollars on arrival. Tari (being the, um, what’s that nice way of saying it?) as efficient and well prepared as ever got out two lots of $25 US when we left Melbourne airport.

So all we had to do is get off the plane, read the arrow that says immigration/visa and then there were two windows, one close to the plane side of entry, one further away. There was a big sign on the wall that said in several languages:

Step 1: pay at first window for visa (and then listed the prices)

Step 2: hand in immigration card

Step 3: at second window get passport stamped

That was it, there were arrows and a flowchart (yes a three box flowchart). My gut reaction was, wow, what overkill! Then, as we waited, at least three people couldn’t work it out, one guy came up to us and asked, saying “a bit of deficiency in explanation huh” and once we’d told him the two step abridged version (go to that window, pay, then go to that window) he still seemed a little confused.

Once out the security was immense. NOT. You had to declare stuff, which involved just telling someone that you didn’t have anything. Then you handed in a form and were on your way. The routine for people declaring was exactly the same except the form was a little longer.

About thirty seconds after we made it out of the terminal (which makes it sound much larger than it is!) we were met by two young women, Shinta and Wulan. I’m so bad at telling ages, and so many of the women who wear head scarves have such great skin. I thought they were maybe 18-20 and students who had drawn the short straw of having to go pick up foreigners from the airport on a Sunday afternoon. Actually they are doctors who specialise in Molecular Biology. Lovely girls, they have taken great care of us and we had to stress with them that we actually wanted to spend the evenings/afternoons in our room (Tari has work to do) and don’t need them waiting on us all the time!

We often feel embarrassed when we come away from home at how lovely, polite, hospitable and generally wonderful everybody is. On the way back from the airport they took us to lunch, really good fried chicken, rice (of course) and cold sugary tea and juice. The rice is always sticky because you eat with your hands and the chicken was, quite literally, finger licking good. With very little ice breaking we were soon in full conversational swing. Shinta’s brother is studying at Melbourne Uni so that was a good starting point!

She went to visit him a short while ago and actually travelled on Puffing Billy, so she understood where we lived. Tari asked about whether they had more information about what she’d be doing here. That’s right, our accommodation must have finally been sorted, but Tari still didn’t even know what she was going to be doing! Initial information suggested that there was going to be a two day conference/seminar that Tari would be running. The subject matter? Vague enough to not really know! The group? Everybody from younger research students to senior doctors and lecturers. Gulp!

Anyway, after lunch they wanted to look after us some more, but we convinced them to just take us to where we were staying and point us in the direction of a supermarket. We’re in a quite large room, but there is a lot of renovation going on, so we’re just not 100% sure how new/old it is. We think that they may have set it up partially for us (subtle things like the TV remote says on the back it’s from a different room!) It’s very simple in terms of amenities, but the most important, air-con, seems to work. It struggles to keep the temperature below 30, but that’s still a vast improvement on outside!

The door lock is one of the old chain ones, you know, you stretch it out, put the big end in, then slide it along. Great, except this one is installed backwards, so it makes a rattling noise as the door opens, but then pops out because the big opening is at the wrong end. Also, you know in most hotels nowadays instead of keys you have those cards where you swipe the card to open the door then put the card in a slot next to the door to turn on your power. Well, this room has a normal key, but also a keycard. There’s a slot to put the keycard next to the door. I had my suspicions about the mechanism being there without being on the door. I tested it by putting my Safeway Everyday Rewards card into the slot to turn on the power. It works fine. This means we can leave the aircon on if we’re gone for a couple hours (it has a timer on it) instead of coming back to a sauna. Most rewards I’ll probably ever get from that card!

Tari’s been provided with a USB modem so she can do things like check her email. Speed is variable and slow, but fine for that sort of thing. I’m typing this up on my laptop in advance to copy/paste at some later date.

The main advantage of the modem was that Tari finally had access to email and FINALLY had details about her job. Well, that’s an exaggeration, she had the program for the first two day seminar thingy. It’s a start anyway! Fortunately she’s not running the whole time, but is running one session. Unfortunately it appears to be a bit of a talk fest and she’s really here to help them get hands on. Still, we were to meet with some of the uni folk the next day and they were much more helpful in giving her an idea of what they’d need.

There are only two power points in the whole place, so you have to choose wisely when to use each one. I’ll probably venture out to get an extension cord at some stage, but I’m a bit wary of using a quad board or double adapter because I’m not sure what the power ratings are like and don’t want to blow a fuse and lose air-con power!

I’ll take some exterior/interior pics at some stage!

After dumping our stuff and turning on the AC, we headed out at maybe 4ish to the local supermarket. We’re actually staying on the university campus grounds, so everything is geared towards students. Lots of food stalls in the designated areas, lots of green space that fill up when the sun goes down with sporting/talking/etc. The little supermarket was not a lot bigger than Goodfellows (or whatever it’s called now) but cram packed with tiny aisles. Tari and I did our impersonations of jolly white giants. You can tell the marketing is aimed at uni students because of the produce for sale. I’ve never seen so many varieties of instant noodle. I mean LOTS of instant noodle!

We didn’t get much because we don’t have a fridge, also, carrying bottled water is a heavy job and best done in an accumulatory fashion, a few bottles at a time. Just for fun to break the watery monotony I got some blueberry fanta as well. It’s kinda like sugary lemonade that smells like lolly snakes.

After we got back (only a 10min walk each way, but took about an hour because of the narrow aisle negotiation) it was time for dinner. We just went down to the little restaurant/cafe downstairs. It was air conditioned! Our room is tolerable, but this was really really nicely cooled! I may be spending a lot of time there. To make it doubly good they have the discovery channel (or maybe it was nat-geo) on, which we don’t have in our room.

Food here is ludicrously cheap. We both had a full dinner with yummy fruit drinks for less than $4. Again, Tari especially was feeling the guilts when people come to live/visit in Australia and food costs relatively so much. It’s really odd to pay less for things here that have come from Australia too! Cadbury (specially imported) is cheaper. Strawberries (product of Australia) are cheaper too!

Anyhow, the service was traditionally Jogjakartan slow but polite, a survival tactic in the long heat! After dinner it was back to the room, we’d left the air-con on so it was probably only 27-28 degrees I think. Hard to judge accurately, but I was shirtless and in shorts and still hot, so it may have been a little warmer than that even.

It’s quite dry, totally different from last time when we were in December, well and truly after the start of the wet season and nearing the end of it. Lots of brown, brown grass and public places being watered.

With the clock going back another hour, although it was early, it was bedtime for us both! The time thing is weird if you look on the map to see where we are in relation to Singapore. We’re closer to Australia, but use a further away time zone, it’s what you get when you’re in an elongated east-west country I guess. I think we’re now four hours behind home now. Fortunately after a week in Singapore the time difference isn’t too dramatic. We still often feel tired early and wake before dawn. For example, at the moment it is 4pm and for you guys it is 8pm. Hence I feel hungry! Tari would suggest that time zones have nothing to do with when I feel hungry!

Well that was it for the travel day. Next time I'm online I'll put up pics of today (Monday).

Thanks again for the e-mails, a special thanks to Dave (Tari's still addicted to Scribblenauts), the younguns and their excellent blog comment mooing ability, and to Juni for keeping us informed about the dogs and for talking to Nev for us! Love you!

Mum and Dad, hope your trip is progressing well too!

Love to all the rest of you too!
Sim.