mount amazing

we've just come back from a 4 day/3 night trek on mount rinjani. words cannot describe the stunning beauty of this volcano. we set out from sembalun, led by tal, a good friend of mine from the CDC and an expert rinjani guide. we trekked for 8 hours the first day to get to the crater rim where we set up camp 1. tal woke us around 2am for a light breakfast just before beginning the strenuous climb to the summit in time for sunrise. most of the way to the top was a narrow and loose path of gravel, on one side of you the active crater, and on the other a steep fall down to the green valley below. we wrestled with rinjani through the night, searching for something stable to grab hold of to help pull ourselves up to the top of the volcano, but there was no solid ground, and the peak proved ever elusive as each time we thought we had gotten close, turning the corner revealed a new leg of the climb. there were countless moments when i thought, "what am i doing? why did i sign up to put myself through this? this is not fun! this does not feel good!" but if i paused to question myself, turning my back on the mountain, i saw that the sky was an endless black, milky with stars. a cavernous and gaping mouth ready to swallow me whole. it was so dramatic, as if all else but us had ceased to exist. stretching behind and above me was a line of ants, our flashlights bobbing in the dark like lightning bugs, all of us making our pilgrimage to rinjani's summit. sweat and tears our sacrifice, silent awe our prayers at the high altar that was this breathing hole in the earth. and so i, we, continued on. slowly one edge of the sky began to melt from black to blue to purple, until it was on fire with the orange glow of the sun rising up. our sacrifices had been accepted, our prayers heard. the sunset was like none we had ever seen before. a 360 degree view of the horizon as the sun brought color back into the world.

the rest of the day was spent making our way down into the crater to the lake's edge to set up camp 2. we rewarded our weary limbs by soaking them in a natural hot spring near camp. we felt tired, but undeniably alive. we applauded our legs for the hard work they had done, getting us to the summit and back. we ate heartily. and then, we slept.

on the third day we trekked up the other side of the crater and over the rim for a different view of rinjani's majesty, stunning as ever, and then down its jungled exterior to make camp 3, laughing the entire way at our tired clumsiness. we stayed up late with tal and our porters, huddled around the campfire and singing along to all the western songs they had downloaded on their cellphones.

by the fourth and final day we were covered in dirt and our muscles were strained, but we were giddy. we had climbed rinjani and been amazed by its splendor. we capped the trek off with a motorbike ride. set and royal drove us and our packs to lombok's capital, mataram. we shared a late lunch all together and then said our goodbyes. parting was sad, but i was filled up with experience. everything i could have asked for from lombok it had relinquished to me.

island hopping

after diving i met up with my dearest friend, who came direct from china for a couple of weeks so that we could fulfill our life-long dream of traveling together. it was spectacular traveling alone, but it has been soul-quenching to share some of this trip with someone i love and respect so much. we've been island hopping for the past five days.

on the recommendation of some surf junkies i met on the ferry between lombok and bali, we ventured first to nusa lembongan, a small speck between bali and lombok, south of the gilis. the way it was described it sounded like it would be a pristine paradise, as if right out of the movie the beach: an unspoiled place where people of various backgrounds find themselves circled around a bonfire sipping on some brew--blissfully ignorant, sun scorched, sea salted, and free. lembongan was beautiful, but there were no stretching virgin white sands. what we found there instead was an island whose livelihood was seaweed farming. our first night there we walked along the beach watching the seaweed farmers bring back their days harvest. they scattered the tangled green hair of the ocean's floor out to dry, spreading it over blue tarps stretched across the beach from water's edge to their thresholds. farmers' wives waded through the carpets of seaweed laid out in front of their homes with rakes, turning the green knots so that every inch was dried and bleached. this wasn't a beach made for swimming, or even for lounging. alongside the farmers lugging baskets full of fresh seaweed from the gentle and shallow surf, boats were strung to the shore. out beyond them you could see white patches of sand beneath the water, where the sea bottom had been sheared its wool. this was a place of quiet, picturesque industry. we could hardly believe our luck, finding ourselves within a postcard. the sunset was the exclamation point at the end of the poem, punctuated by a beam of blue that stretched from the horizon like an arm pulling the cover of darkness down over the earth.

from lembongan we moved on to gili meno. on the day of departure we enjoyed our breakfast a little too much and missed our boat. the family who sold us the tickets were stupefied that we had f*cked it up, but quickly arranged an alternate route. a kind neighbor took us in his small farming skiff from nusa lembongan to bali. we ended up beating the boat we had missed and fancying the bumpy ride to the point of debilitating laughter.

gili meno was a honeymoon escape for us. we splurged on a beautiful one room beach hut with an outdoor bathroom and spent our time exploring the small island. the entire thing could be circled in less than 90 minutes by foot, the only alternative to that being a donkey cart. we felt a slight air of mystery about the island upon making our first exploration of it, as on the western side we found several seemingly abandoned resorts, with cabins overgrown and collapsing, the swimming pools festering under the hot sun and becoming swampy. not storm damaged but left to rot, like the end of civilization on the twilight zone. there was an inland salt lake, which gave the misleading impression that the island was big enough to get lost on. while this was not true, it was true that at night we walked the paths of the island's interior with flashlights and sticks extended in front of us to fend against creepy crawlies. best of all the memories born on meno, however, was of last night. there was a concert of local music in the village school yard at the heart of the island. we wandered there after dinner, finding a crowd of bored-looking tourists and docile tunes. we opted to check our email instead of partaking, but as we surfed the net the sounds on the street outside grew louder and more boisterous. two hours later the tourists had all returned home and tributaries of locals were flowing into the yard to dance and sing along with the band. we watched in awe from the outskirts until invited to join, and then we gave ourselves up to the throbbing crowd with sweet abandon.

diving gili T

Coming here from Sembalun, I've been in a haze of culture shock the past 4 days. Sembalun was mountainous, cool, and extremely Indonesian - void of tourists, the only non-Indonesians being us few volunteers. Gili T is beachy, hot, and built for bule ("boo-lay" means foreigners in Bahasa Indonesia). Fortunately, I didn't come for the company of a crowd I haven't yet had a chance to miss, I came for the diving, and my, has that been worth it! My first order of business upon arrival was to sign up for my advanced diver course. I decided I may as well get the next level of PADI certification while I'm here, so I signed up with Blue Marlin, a semi-famous dive shop, the one considered to have started it all on the island. The dive family there made me feel right at home, which is only natural. I can't exactly explain why there's such comradery amongst divers, though I could muse that it's because we all feel we are in on this big secret together, all of us part of a story that "you just had to be there" for. Those who blow bubbles together also eat together, drink together, laugh together... So, for several splendid days of underwater adventure I was a member of the Blue Marlin family. Mad fun was had both below and above the water. Highlights?

• Diving again, it's been too long. I remember again why I love it so much, and how addictive it can be.
• A cuddlefish, up close and personal.
• The biorock reef, healthy and growing. I want to see some biorock in the Caribbean. Everyone who dives the Gilis pays a tax which goes towards the biorock and keeping the ecosystem here clean and alive. It's such a small price to pay to see soooo many fish!
• Breathing nitrox. It lived up to the hype, I might be hooked.
• The full moon party, on the beach, around a bonfire... which had nothing on Koh Pahngan, to be true, but was great fun nonetheless.
• Seeing the Blue Marlin family in togas (or as close as you can get to togas on a small island in Indonesia)

earthly magic

i have just come from the sembalun valley on lombok, where i spent my first 9 days. i am finding it hard to find the words to do it justice... it was so incredibly beautiful there, on every level, i just don't know where to begin. perhaps, i shall begin at the beginning...

before i left i had emailed several organizations i found online about possibly volunteering with them. all but one got back to me, and only one seemed even remotely reasonable as far as cost, charging what seemed just enough to cover the expense of my room and board and transportation. (why on earth some organizations think it appropriate to charge thousands for you to give one week of your time for free to work with them is beyond me!) the organization is 4th world love, and they work with the community development center (CDC) in sembalun lawang. doing what exactly was not made clear in the information they sent me, but that they would arrange for a homestay and allow me to volunteer with them for a week for so small a price sounded perfect enough to me. on my way to the airport in LA i finally got email confirmation from them that they could have me for my first week. still with no idea what i'd be lending my time and expertise to while there, i at least had some idea of where i'd be going when i arrived.

it took me 24 hours all told, from LA to Bali. when i landed and got through customs i went straight to padangbai, a port town, to spend the night before catching a ferry to lombok, where a mr. setiyadi from the CDC would be picking me up by motorbike. padangbai seemed nice enough, and for about $5 i got a mattress and mosquito net on the floor of an open-air but covered balcony overlooking the far end of the beach, above a quiet but popular restaurant. i was too jet lagged to check out the town and passed out at 8pm, with people still eating dinner around me on the balcony, and slept for 12 hours. air travel being the time warp that it is, i really needed the rest. (on a side note: where does all that time go when you're in the air? it feels like mere hours, but when you arrive you're either in the future or the past by a significant and mysterious margin, depending on where you were headed and from whence you came, but the time in between is just gone. gone! even on a 15 hour flight, you may find yourself 24 hours ahead, those other 9 hours absolutely unaccounted for. talk about a mindf*ck.)

the ferry the next morning from bali to lombok took roughly 5 hours. i was apprehensive about being able to locate the stranger coming to pick me up from the ferry, but sure enough, when i walked off the pier there was a happy face there holding a sign with my name on it, the wonderful mr. setiyadi, who would be my dearest friend for the coming days. we shook hands and then, knowing there was at least a 3 hour drive ahead of us, we quickly got on our way. we arranged ourselves precariously on his motorbike--two small people, total strangers, balanced between two backpacks.

the 3 hour drive from the ferry in lembar to the sembalun valley was breathtaking. green and lush, glittering rice paddies stretching away from the road on either side like ribs from a spine, hills rising up in the distance, growing ever larger as we drove further inland. as we climbed upward from the level of the sea i could feel the air grow cooler, see the trees grow thicker, sense the eyes of monkeys grilling me as we drove past. "who is this intruder, this strange creature in our territory? with white skin and yellow hair and a giant red thing protruding from her back?" they must have been thinking as i and my red backpack flew by, balanced on the back of set's motorbike.

 {my first view of sembalun}

we arrived at the crest of the hill protecting the sembalun valley from all the rest of lombok just as the sun was setting, so i got a glimpse from up above of this secret shangri-la, a patchwork quilt of fields stitching the valley together from hill to hill. i was elated, my whole being full of anticipation. whatever was in store for me, whatever job, whatever kind of homestay...i was ready, hungry even, to be filled up by an experience bigger than myself.

it was dark when we pulled up to the home of my host family, but they had been expecting us and as soon as we walked in they served us a great big home-cooked meal. this first meal, like every meal i took in sembalun, was superbly delicious: white rice, fried egg, a green bean/bean sprout/peanut/chili pepper concoction, tempe, vegetable stew, and local loose leaf tea. i slept like a baby that night, in a room all my own, and when i awoke there was another delicious meal awaiting me. no sooner had i finished it than a young indonesian man arrived to whisk me away on his motorbike to the CDC. it was then that i learned i'd be teaching english!

i taught a class in the morning at one of the local schools to little ones, a class in the afternoon at the CDC to teenagers, and in the evening to a group of male farmers, who couldn't learn until after nightfall as they spent their days in the sawa (field). i simply cannot say enough about how magnificent this experience was. being thrown into it so abruptly that first day was like being thrown overboard with no floaty, but to my rescue in a sturdy life boat came two young Aussies who have made Sembalun their second home. these lovely girls have grown roots in the magical Sembalun Valley, and were able to show me the ropes with not just teaching but also the local people, the crew at the CDC, the village gossip, where to get the best pisang goreng (fried banana!)... my time surely would not have been as great without them. on my first day they took me along with them to salong hill, one of the many emerald giants framing sembalun, to watch the sunset. a short little hike up to a stunning view over the fields, the sun's rays pullled away from the valley like the tentacles of an octopus retracting into hiding. i sat there amongst new friends, breathing the last warmth of the sun into my lungs and watching darkness gradually mute the many shades of green in the valley below, and i felt at home.

{the sunset from salong hill}

over 9 days there i fell in love with 30 little children, ate myself silly on so many phenomenal local dishes whose names or full list of ingredients are unbeknownst to me, accepted more gestures of hospitality than i could begin to count from not just total strangers- but from people who spoke not a word of my language, nor i any of theirs. each day i got on the back of some other Indonesian's motorbike to be swept off to whatever local cultural event someone thought I should see- whether to meet someone's extended family, hear traditional gamelan music, watch a wedding party march through the village, feast at a circumcision party, grill fish on a black sand beach, wade in a waterfall, walk a motorbike that's out of petrol home by only the light of the moon and stars, or laugh until i cry because the whole CDC crew dances to cheesy western music by the light of their cell phones when the power would go out, which it did nearly every single night. i felt so welcomed into their hearts and homes in Sembalun, though i truly could not be any more of a stranger- from the opposite side of the globe, from opposite circumstances.

{peeling garlic}

{gamelan}

{wedding march}

{circumcision party}

{my youngest students}

{the village soccer field}

{the CDC crew at the black sand beach}

{grilling fish at the beach}

{fresh chili sauce for our grilled fish}

{the waterfall}

{my home}

 {the view from my porch}

{my beautiful host mom}

 {me and my host sisters playing on the porch} 

{where all the magic happens...the kitchen}

 {a home cooked meal}

 

{the living room}                                    {my bedroom}

>>__________________________________<<

this morning when i left to make my way to Gili Trawangan to do some diving, my host mom and i balled like little babies. we had not had one verbal conversation, though i suppose we'd had many other kinds. i had been thinking for a few days, as i realized i would inevitably be leaving and moving on and that Sembalun would not be all of Indonesia for me, that to me, this experience, the warmth of the local Sasak people, was everything- beautiful, moving, enlightening, the overwhelmingly perfect beginning to 6 weeks in a foreign country- while i was nothing to them, just another foreigner sweeping through for a week to give a little bit of time to a community that was most certainly grateful, but ultimately didn't need me as i needed them to change my world. but when set came to pick me up and i hugged my host mom goodbye and she began to cry, i did question for a second if i was right in my thinking. why else would she be crying? in the end, i know she and her family didn't need anything from me, but perhaps she recognized how badly i had needed them, how much they had given me, and how wonderfully glad they had made me- letting me peel the garlic from their farm with them in the kitchen in the mornings, my little host sisters- Hulut and Bilal- indulging my camera by playing and posing for me in the afternoon sun on the front porch, nursing me with hot tea when my cold had undeniably overtaken me- and perhaps that realization had drawn out her motherly instinct, and she was sad to see me go because she knew as well as i did that every experience in Indonesia following my time in Sembalun would likely pale in comparison.

so grateful for the earthly magic of Sembalun and its people. i'll report back from Gili T.

till then!

OH! and PS - everyone wish my mama a happy, happy birthday!!!! today is her day!

countdown

30 hours to go until take off! people keep responding to my summer plans with, "wow, really?" i'm not sure what exactly is so curious about my trip... that it's so far away? that i'm going alone? that i have zero plans so far? to me, taking this trip seemed the only thing i could possibly choose to do with my summer, the only thing i know how to do, the only one that feels right and natural. so in 30 hours i'll be passing through security at LAX, about to board my first flight. what will i do when i finally land in indonesia? TBD. i know i want to get my hands dirty with some volunteer work, i know i want to do some diving, i know i want to befriend some locals, i know i want to find a deserted beach somewhere and feel alone with the life forces of water and sun, i know i want to do some trekking, and i know i want to get lost enough to find my way.

this all hardly feels real still, as i've already been away from home for three weeks but am still in the land of stars and stripes takin' it easy. missing loved ones already, though i barely feel i've gone anywhere. really looking forward to getting off the grid--not being accessible by phone and email 24/7... i will absolutely relish in the disconnectedness.

!!!!! me stoked.

in the meantime, happy 4th, america! bottoms up to rich displays of fireworks, BBQs, pool parties, and most of all to the healthy dissent that defines us--may it grow louder and continue on...