Follow up to the Indonesian accident

Hi guys, I thought I'd do a short piece as a follow up to my vlog piece about my accident in Java. This was actually part of my original vlog but it hit the cutting room floor as the piece became far too long and I had to leave it out originally, but I felt that this could be better expressed in this form anyway as a blog piece rather than on video. So for those of you who have yet to see the original vlog piece, here it is:

I would like to show you a picture here, this is of three books I have found in my parents' house in Ang Mo Kio, these were birthday gifts I received as a child (there were plenty more such books - I just chose to photograph these three). Now despite the fact that I didn't get to travel that much as a child, I was fascinated with the world out there, the world beyond Singapore. I remember how I would read these encyclopedias and atlases cover to cover, learning about different countries around the world and that curiousity of the world began a life-long love affair with geography and languages. Oh those were the days before wikipedia - we read books! As a child, I long to visit these countries all over the world and at latest count, after this long trip, I have traveled to 424 cities in 43 countries.

I read these cover to cover by the age of 10. Call me a geek if you must.

I have always had wonderful experiences when traveling and even when I did encounter difficult situations or problems, I have always been able to rely on my language skills or knowledge to find a solution. I have so many funny stories to tell about when I have gotten hopelessly lost abroad when traveling and how I have managed to get myself out of these situations. It has always been interesting meeting people and making friends when I am traveling, even if they knew nothing about the country where I am from and it has always been interesting telling them about Singapore. Take Croatia for example, sure I met some people there who knew nothing about Singapore but at least I was starting on a clean state with them, telling them about a country they have never ever heard of - that was a good place to start.

This was why I was very disappointed with my experience in Indonesia - now Indonesia is one of Singapore's two neighbours along with Malaysia. Most Indonesians know a lot about Singapore and certainly the ones I encountered did. I am able to speak Malay, which is mutually intelligible with Indonesian and have made the effort to do my research before going to Indonesia to make sure I knew which words to substitute in Indonesian: such as using 'bisa' instead of 'boleh', 'berbicara' instead of 'bercakap', 'dana' instead of 'duit', 'mobil' instead of 'kereta' etc. My regular readers will know what a total linguistic geek I am and I actually took great pleasure in learning Indonesian prior to my trip.

'Wortel' in Indonesia, 'Lobak Merah' in Malaysia/Singapore

Hence when I found myself in difficult situations, I thought I could rely on my language skills to negotiate my way out of any difficult situation. Admittedly, my language skills did prove to be really useful in Indonesia, even in a place like Bali where the locals didn't speak much English and it was extremely useful to be able to communicate in Bahasa Indonesia. Nonetheless, given my accent, most locals would ask me, "Awak dari mana? Malaysia? Singapura?" (Where are you from? Malaysia? Singapore?) It was clear I wasn't a local given my accent despite the fact that I was making a valiant effort with the language (and actually speaking it with confidence).

Let me give you an example - whilst driving in Bali late one night, I nearly ran out of fuel and needed to ask some locals where I could get some petrol for my car. The people I approached spoke virtually no English and the conversation took place almost entirely in Indonesian. They explained to me that we were very far from the nearest petrol station but I could buy petrol from the local warung (shop) in a nearby kampong and they gave me directions to it. When I got to the warung, it was closed but a little old lady (who spoke no English) popped her head out and asked me what I needed and she sold me two litres of petrol for 14,000 Rupiahs which enabled me to get to my destination that night. All this was done without a word of English - so yes, it was certainly very useful to be able to speak the local language for I wasn't sure I could have resolved that problem if I didn't speak the local language.

Limpeh in Prambanan, Java

Nonetheless, there is obviously a lot of animosity between Indonesia and her neighbours Singapore and Malaysia and my accent didn't earn me any friends; and telling them that I was from Singapore didn't exactly score me any brownie points either. And yeah, I know that Indonesians don't like Singaporeans - but I naively thought that I could prove to them that I was a sincere visitor who was not like all those other Singaporeans who don't speak a word of their language (and that by that token, they would like me). Maybe it was extremely naive of me to expect them to like me or reward me for having made a huge effort with their language - but that was always what I had experienced traveling elsewhere in the world. Heck, when I was in Oman, my Arabic was a lot more limited than my Bahasa Indonesia - yet the locals reacted with such warmth and hospitality when I made valiant efforts to speak Arabic with the locals.

I do accept part of blame of course, I could have done a lot more research on Indonesia before going. I have so many friends in Singapore who have traveled to Indonesia a lot more than me and I could have spoken to them a lot more before going to Indonesia. Yet there was a part of me that thought, I am a seasoned traveler, I can speak some Bahasa Indonesia and I can handle this - so I suppose part of the disappointment lies with myself in having bitten off way more than I could chew in trying to 'go local' in Indonesia by traveling around independently rather than staying in a 5 star resort on Kuta beach like most other western tourists.

Limpeh in Tampak Siring, Bali

Will I go to Indonesia again? No, I probably wouldn't. There are other countries in Asia that I would love to visit - Cambodia, Laos, Nepal, Myanmar, Pakistan, Mongolia, South Korea, North Korea etc. I would prefer to go to explore those countries rather than return to Indonesia. There are plenty of countries where I have enjoyed and would love to explore further - the countries where I have had my best experiences have been covered in my tourist season series last year. I didn't get that much joy with the locals in Indonesia despite being able to speak the language and the locals came across as quite predatory - like they were trying to get money out of me since they assumed that I was some kind of rich foreigner and me being in their country somehow gave them the right to extract as much money from me as possible. I didn't trust the local police. The most friendly people I actually met in Indonesia were other foreigners who were either traveling or running guest houses there, but I suppose it was a lot easier for me to sit down and have a long conversation with a Dutch or Australian person than with an Indonesian person given the huge cultural differences.

In terms of the friendliest people I have encountered whilst traveling, it is hard choice - but I think France and Spain and very high on that list (but do bear in mind that I am fluent in both French and Spanish, which makes it easy for me to make friends). Turkey, Sweden, Finland, the Netherlands, Belgium, Croatia, Czech Republic, America, Portugal, Switzerland have all been awesome in terms of being able to make friends with locals. In Asia, the two friendliest places I have experienced are the UAE (Dubai) and Malaysia - Malaysia is amazing, I really like Malaysia and I did enjoy my time there despite not getting to meet my friend Alvin there.

Limpeh in Ubud, Bali

So there you go - that's why I felt sorely disappointed with my experience in Indonesia. Have you traveled in Indonesia before and what were your experiences? Have I been naive in my expectations? Do you have friends who are Indonesian? Is it easy to make friends as a traveler in Indonesia? Or have I simply been unlucky whilst other have had fabulous experiences in Indonesia? Do you enjoy visiting Indonesia? Do leave a comment below and let me know what you think, share your experiences. Thanks everyone, terima kasih.