Hitched to Sukosari - on the way to Ijen Crater

Our first night after landed at Surabaya was nice, Shanty's long time cyber friend -Jun picked us up at the airport, took us to grab some lips smacking pecel and dropped us at our host's place. We joined Surabaya Couchsurfing gathering that night at a very nice apartment that made Shanty urged to do number two there, she believes that by doing that, she'll have those kind of apartment too one day :D

We left Surabaya the next morning to catch bus to Ijen Crater. We've been told that first we need to take bus to Probolinggo (3 hours from Surabaya), then continue with another bus to Bondowoso (another 3 hours). Since we started at 9AM, apparently that's not early enough to catch minivan/Elf to Sempol (3 hours more before taking 1 hour Ojek/motorcycle taxi to Paltuding/hiking starting point), the last Elf is at 12PM and we arrived at Bondowoso at 3PM. We were in big dilemma, if we stay overnight at Bondowoso, means we're 4 hours more to get to Paltuding and we might be arrived there too late the next day. Early hike is mostly recommended!!

A nice old man gave us ride from Bondowoso bus terminal to a junction named Gardu Atak, we could have just take ojek ride directly to Paltuding at that time, but cos we're too stingy, we tried to hitchhike, and luckily a lady stopped and gave us ride to Sukosari, a village an hour from Bondowoso, we thought well that's not bad, we can try to catch another ride again to get closer to Paltuding, so we hopped on. After some talks, the lady ended up offering us to stay at her place since it's getting dark soon and it's not safe to travel those bumpy road at nighttime. How come you resist nice offering like that, right? It's one of the most touching feeling I ever felt once we arrived at her house. An old lady (the oldest you could ever imagine; humped back with whole gray hair and no teeth) haste toward us, to greet and shook our hands with big grin on her wrinkled face. I suddenly knew how it feels to be a president or celebrity, even they might never get this kind of greeting anyway. The warmest welcome I've ever got in my life :')

She happens to be our host, Bu Supri's maid, she only speaks Maduranese, and has super power, she could do the dishes in total darkness, I was about to help, before realized I could barely see anything, then I gave up :(

Patrick and Bu Supri's granddaughter
Bu Supri seems to be a respectable lady in those village, she has three huge houses next to each other, the first one is used to be her daughter in law's physician clinic (those clinic bed scared Shanty a lil bit and made her wondered how if we wake up the next morning with no kidney, or maybe even already dead mutilated, guess she watched too many thrillers). The rooms are in the first house, but we need to get to the second house for bathroom, and third house for kitchen. With three houses, they don't even have proper dining room, so we ate outside, but that's just even better cos the weather was just so fine, chill but not too cold, just perfect :) I'd always remember the chilli we had those night as one of the best I've ever got, it's literally only chillies grinded with salt. Or is it just because the tasty chicken we had, or...may be the nice windy afternoon, may be those warm hearted humans I'm eating with, may be...

East Java, Here We Come!!

Down from team of 10+ to 2, advance booking of Airasia tickets finally took its toll on us. Booked almost one year earlier, ended up only two people did the trip - me and my partner in crime, Shanty. We've been traveled together as long as I could remember, but it's actually only the second time we did it 'just the two of us' way, the first was our West Sumatra trip, the rest are along with other friends, either her friends, or mine. And this one ain't coming easily, I decided to go two days before departure date, she was on to go the morning of the D-day. It's a full circle, our first trip was right after we both resigned from our job, and this one is right before she leaves Medan to pursue her new career. We never know when will we have the chance to travel together again like this, but we made promise to do it soon, we pin Sulawesi - Toraja as our next year destination. It's not about being skeptical, but promises usually remain promises, most of our trips were ones we never really planned for, but hey ain't life always like that? :)

One thing I discovered from this trip; Well when traveling aboard, no chance people can know that I'm Indonesian by the first guess (there's only one French guy guessed it right so far, he might be a shrink anyway) sometime people were still scratching their heads when I said Indonesia :( In the other hand, when traveling in Indonesia, many times people thought that I'm not Indonesia too, c'mon!! I look like most of any Chinese Indonesians. I used to be confused if people greeted me in English here, but after several talks with people along the way, I'm kinda finally get it. If I wander around at malls or cities, mostly people will know that I'm local, but once in the buses, trains, or stations with my backpack, they are tend to think that I'm foreigner, according to them it's not a common idea for local girls to travel independently (thanks to low budget airlines and internet, bunch of independent female travelers are on their ways), even some locals I've talked to, still frowned when I said "No, I'm not visiting any families here, No I'm not doing any business here, just travel, that's all" And when they asked where will you guys stay tonight? and we answered "Dunno yet" That's when they frowned even deeper.

Literally we don't even need to ask people what bus should we take, which direction should we go, or so on, cos they will ask us first. Sometimes you don't even have to ask for a lift, they will offer free seats at their cars when they see you walking desperately. That's the beauty of traveling in Indonesia. And I can't get enough of it :D

Patrick Star and Friends

Beautiful people Patrick met during his lonely trip.


Couchsurfers to Ampawa Floating Market



Dorm Roomies at Bangkok - Wei Fu and Martha, plus Meena and Adrian




Monik and Steve at Ho Chi Minh City

Cute Kiddos >__<



Sue Choi at Angkor Wat

Gale at cafe near Russian Market, Phnom Penh

Mae, the happy go lucky tuktuk driver


Tole at Popular Guesthouse


Malyn :)

Surviving Poipet

Poipet! Not Polpot :p Tho both sounds notorious, Poipet is the border between Thailand and Cambodia, which infamous for the tourist scams. It's kinda freak me out a lil bit the first time I read scam stories bout those border, since I'm not a world class traveler, yet it was the first time I really travel alone (tho I have my Patrick Star with me), but of course I had to cross it no matter what (read: I'm too poor to fly). I gathered the information from the internet, it's not helping - the more I read, the more freak out I became, how come not if they told you 'You will be cheated one way or another at the border. That's just life in Poipet." or "I met 5 other people who went through exactly the same scam even though they knew it was coming." -___-" Until I said to myself, screw all those wankers, they just want money anyway, let them take it lah if they want, I'll enjoy this trip for sure :p

So it was the day before I departed to Bangkok to stay overnight there for 2 nights before head to Siem reap, a Korean angel - Sue Choi posted on Bangkok Couchsurfing forum looking for companions to travel across Poipet border the same day I've planned to go, with big grin on my face I sent her message that I'm DEFINITELY IN!! Felt such a relief to find out that I'm in a group or 4 now, I'm so ready to fight and win the glory of the...I dunno what I'm talking bout, but heck I'm ready for Cambodia! :)

Tips 1: GO IN A GROUP, it'd be easier to share taxi or van, and the touts are tend to hunt single traveler as their prey. The solidarity is in the air, so just need a lil effort to approach fellow travelers on the train or at the immigration office.

Tips 2: DON'T TAKE THE DIRECT TRAVEL BUS FROM KHAOSAN ROAD. Those believed as scam bus, that moves terribly slow in purpose to reach Siem Reap by midnight, so the passengers have no other choice but to stay at the hotel that cooperate with the bus. There are two other choices to get to Aranyaprathet; by train -twice a day, +/- 50THB, 5 hours from Hualamphong Train station, or by bus -departs every 30mins, 160-200 THB from Morchit Northern Bus station. I took 5 AM train, cos it's most recommended. Upon arrival at Aranyaprathet train station, you'll be approached by lots of tuk2 drivers, take one (50-60 THB) to get to Thai immigration office.

Tips 3: NO E-VISA, it's tricky cos I heard some suggestion to have E-Visa, but heard lots more bout E-Visa scams. We need to pay 10 USD to apply E-Visa by internet, but then still need to pay other 20 USD at the immigration, but E-Visa will save you from Visa touts at the border tho. So after taking tuk2 from train station, they will drop you to travel agents-disguised as Cambodia immigration to make sure you apply Visa thru them. It cost bout 1200 THB (40 USD). I almost fall for this trick, cos their acting was so damn good, they deserve oscar for supporting role anyway, fortunately I remembered that official Visa paid in USD not THB, when I saw two tourists paid them in Bath. I urged the tuk2 driver to drop us at Thai immigration office no matter what. he tried to trick us again by dropping us at a nice building -written Cambodia Consulate, by saying we should get our Visa before get into the border and we can get it for 1000THB here. We wouldn't fall for his trick again this time and refused to get down from his tuk2 before we arrived at Thai immigration. He shook his head desperately and drove us there. Finally we got stamped- You've been officially kicked out from Kingdom of Thailand.

Tips 4: PREPARE YOUR PHOTO. There was quite a queue at Thai immigration and Sue was ahead from the rest of us to get her Cambodia Visa. When we arrived there to meet her, she already paid 20 USD and 100 THB for the Visa, tho it's written obviously that tourist Visa is 20 USD, nonetheless the officers there insisted that we need to pay extra 100 THB for express fee. I didn't see what's that express fee for, since no queue there, only our small group. We insisted not to pay that money by passing only our application form and 20 bucks bill and kept pointing the official 20USD Visa sign, the officer kept pointing a white paper written 20USD+100THB anyway, so it's kinda funny all of us pointing at several directions, he gave up eventually, yay!!! but for some who don't have photo, can't avoid to pay extra for that, the amount is negotiable. Even the government officers tried to rip us off, made me even skeptical bout this country I just stepped foot in.

Tips 5: Run away as fast as you can after get stamped in, kidding! but you can try to not get in the so called free shuttle bus provided by the government in order to help tourists, YEAH RIGHT!!! The bus will take you to a bus terminal in middle of nowhere, where you can take taxi/minivan/bus to Siem Reap, with fixed price controlled by the glorious government. Plus you'll have a guide that will introduce you to Cambodia, including telling bullshit bout how expensive things will be if you pay in dollar, but it'd be half price in Riel (Cambodia currency), or cowshit bout there's no other money changer in town, the one at the bus terminal (with very bad rate) is the last one you can get. YEAH RIGHT!! We finally ended up rent a minivan, cos we got more people in our group, total 7 now. But it's not without long struggling, I let the other did the bargain and stuff, too tired anyway :p see!! that's the most advantage to go in group, you don't have to do everything by yourself :)

Tips 6: DON'T PAY FULL IN ADVANCE. When we finally make agreement for renting taxi or van, they will positively ask you to pay full tariff in advance by saying this and that, whatever they say, just ignore them and close the deal by paying half price. Many cases when people pay full amount, they will drop you in the middle of nowhere, so you need to pay more to get another transportation to your hotel. Make sure they drop you at the right place then pay the rest. If you haven't book any accommodation, you can ask them to drop you around Old Market area where bunch of accommodations are available in walking distance.

Good luck with the border crossing, it's all worth it in the end :)