day 261 – today was my last day in australia. i packed and checked out of my room. i had a coffee in town and met kennis for lunch. she’d just returned from a kakadu trek, which she said was fantastic. we had chinese for lunch and spent the afternoon together. we chatted until my airport bus arrived, i said goodbye and went to the airport.
i want to tell a strange story. during my stay in the yha (youth hostel australia) there was another guy in my dorm room. our room had 8 beds and this one guy was in the bunk opposite mine.
i’d been there one night when i was awoken in the early hours of the morning. the guy in the opposite bed was yelling in his sleep. he was yelling “help! help me!”. then he’d kick the wall or shout. this went on for about 30 minutes or so. then he finally quietened down. i ignored it, as one of those strange things, and forgot about it.
the next night he did it again. this time much worse. he was shouting and yelling in his sleep. he said quite a few things, including “help! help me!” again. he hit the wall next to him and a few times he kicked the bunk bed above him (which had someone sleeping in it). then the guy got out of bed and started walking around the room, talking and shouting … and he was still asleep!!
honestly, i was actually a little scared. i didn’t know what the hell was going on. eventually (maybe 30-40 minutes later) he went back to bed and quietened down. i got back to sleep.
in the morning the other guys in the dorm room started talking about the guy. i was having a laugh about it, but another roomie was angry. a third roomie immediately moved out and requested another dorm room. the guy who had the yelling nightmares woke up and i told him about what he’d been doing. he said ‘sorry’ and actually knew that he had this problem. i felt sorry for him … having this problem and not being able to control it … and, especially, not knowing whether you’d slept quietly or had been noisy.
i told him it was cool … even though i knew the other guys in the room were unhappy about it. i was leaving anyway, so i didn’t care. poor bastard. that’d be a really shitty problem to carry with you … especially traveling and sleeping in dorms.
when i went to check in, jetstar were indignant that i needed an outbound flight. they refused to check me in. although i was angry, they were reasonably helpful and let me use their internet to try and get an outbound ferry or flight. i couldn’t book anything online so i had to buy a $75 flight to singapore. i was pissed off at having to spend the money, but had no other choice. i went through immigration and customs and waited for the flight.
the flight was delayed three times (mechanical failure and then time to shift luggage to a new plane). the other passengers were getting angry at the delays and spent the extra time drinking. as a result, many passengers had drunk a fair bit of beer by the time the plane finally got in the air. i was stuck sitting next to two drunk young guys who yelled and shouted to people all over the plane. the flight was horrible, the food had to be paid for, the guys next to me were stupid and drunk, and i was still angry at the money i’d paid for the second flight.
when i arrived in bali, immigration never asked me about the outbound flight. they didn’t care. i even asked the immigration officer and he said they never ask. god fucking damn it!!! i made the decision never to fly jetstar ever again. hear that jetstar? fuck you! you can stick your shitty budget airline up your arse.
*i discovered too late that i could have got a cheaper flight (air north) to east timor. i’d really wanted to go to dili instead of bali, and that pissed me off too.
i shared a taxi into town with a canadian couple. it was nearly midnight by the time we arrived in kuta (thanks to jetstar’s constant flight delays) and i stayed in a hotel i had found in lonely planet. it was late, i was angry and tired, and i wanted to sleep.
day 262 – my first day abroad again – i got up and went to find the beach. i was not in a beach front hotel (there are none near where i was) and i walked through the narrow roads to the beach. i went for a long walk along the beach and watched the surfers. the cafe next to my hotel had wifi, so when i returned from my walk i had some lunch and checked email. i had an afternoon sleep, followed by dinner and a swim in the hotel pool. i read my book and then went to sleep.
day 263 – i went for another long walk along the beach. this time i took my camera and photographed some of the surfing. i got a shoestring south-east asia lonely planet. it was stinking hot, so i went for a swim in the pool, relaxed at the hotel and decided to spend the afternoon catching up on chess games.
day 264 – i spent the morning hunting around for information about how to get to medewi. the tourist offices were quoting ridiculously high prices. i put my pants and didgeridoo bag in for alterations, went for a swim, read my book, checked email and got a fairly early night.
day 265 – i picked up my pants and bag, packed and checked out.
i figured the cheapest way to get to medewi was by bemo (local minibuses which act as public transport). i got a bemo from kuta to denpasar. once there, i had to get a different bemo which took me all the way to medewi. the whole trip cost me about $7. the reason i’d decided to go there was that i heard it was a small, surf town which was largely off the tourist radar. i was completely caught off guard by how small medewi was. there was one decent hostel, two small ‘homestay’ style places and an expensive hotel on the beach. there was also a small restaurant and some ultra-cheap rooms around the corner on the beach. medewi was one street, mostly vacant land. i hadn’t brought enough money and there were no facilities in the single street town. so, i checked into the hotel and jumped on another bemo to the nearest town, negara, which was 20kms away. it cost me about 50 cents each way. i got off the bemo in negara, took money out at the nearest atm, bought a coke, and walked a few blocks to the bemo stop going back towards medewi.
when i returned, i went for a walk along the beach. then i returned to my hotel, had a nice chicken satay and rice for dinner, with beer, and read my book by candlelight (since the entire street had lost power since the early evening). i got talking to a south african guy, who was there to surf, and then i went to bed.