sumatra

this is sumatra calling.
it had been a long time since i had been in such an exciting place. the roads are bad, there aren't many foreigners at all, the food is great, the volcanoes are gorgeous, there is music everywhere, the sound that calls for prayers happens like a clock, the people are super friendly and the kids want to play and laugh all the time :) and on top of all that, the desserts are amazing! and they have pancakes and GREAT COFFEE! so basically... this is the place to be!

the boat from georgetown was a crazy experience! i met piotr, a cool 22 year old polish guy with a serious hangover ;) we were the two solo travelers on the boat so we sat together. the 6hours across the straight of melaka were passed chatting and making travel plans and feeling dizzy, sometimes very dizzy and piotr ended up vomiting all that he had inside of him! haha, we can laugh about it now!

i thought i'd go up to banda ached straight after the boat but the thought of taking a night bus for 15hours right after the super fast and rough boat trip... i decided to go to berastagi. so me and piotr became travel mates - and we make a great team!!

that same day we found a super cheap guesthouse in berastagi and wondered off after dinner looking for something... it was just not the time to go sleep yet... we heard some music and got closer and we met the youth of berastagi gathering in front of the church with a guitar and 2 great singers :) they played traditional karo music which makes me think of pete doherty :) with a tropical tone ;) very cool tunes! piotr is recording the sounds of the island so one day i'll have the cd! we soon got back to the guesthouse to study some indonesian but ended up listening to polish music - great stuff!

the next day we got up early and after breakfast and a huge glass of strong coffee we went up gurund sibayak, a really cool volcano. amaziiiiiiiing trek! lots of little fumarolas (geysers?) and a crater that was surprisingly filled with messages and names that people wrote with stones :D gorgeous views! then on the way down we went to the hot springs and we soaked for some good 3 hours to make the muscles tender again :) it was great!! then we still had to head back to town and we thought we'd walk until we got caught in the rain and so we sat for a long time talking about deep stuff (sometimes!) and watching life unfold. soon we realized the rain would not stop so we hitched and ended up getting a bus at some intersection and eventually made it back to berastagi. it got quite cold and we were annoyed with the weather, especially the dampness - it felt like london!! so we went for an excellent dinner to feel happier. and so we did :) had great desserts too and then studied this pretty language! we seem to keep on forgetting how to say thank you though...!

oh, and last night i went to the ATM and got a million and 200 thousand rupiahs :D i am therefore a millionaire!! even if that only means i'm in possession of 88 euros :) hehe

today we didn't want to respect the alarm clock at 7.30am..... but we had because the trip ahead of us was long! so amazing noodles for breakfast and we hit the road. buses are fun here but we wanted to hitch hike...... so we got on a truck. and then another one. and another one. and yet one more. and we got here to the town with internet (finally, as other places didn't have it or had power cuts) where i'm now writing from with a cool teenager staring at the screen from behind my shoulder :)

so we need to get one more car to take us to ketambe to see the orangutans :D:D:D:D:D

sorry if it takes a while until the next update, this is not a good place for internet! it's great for many other things though :)