Lake Toba

We were given a 4-day weekend for Chinese New Year at BBS. Most of our students are Chinese-Indonesian and celebrate the holiday.

(rockin my Asian pose)

For my 4 days off, I traveled up to Sumatra (the 6^th largest island in the world and the largest island in Indonesia; pictured below) with my good friend Scott. Scott is from Eastern Washington and is a great dude. He was featured in the Taman Mini blog post in 2013.

Sumatra is located on the Ring of Fire and has a lot of volcanic activity (a lot; as you will see later in the blog post). We visited Lake Toba* which is located southwest of Medan. To get to Lake Toba, you fly into Medan (3^rd largest city in Indonesia; largest not on Java Island).

*A little background on Lake Toba: Lake Toba was formed about 77,000 years ago when there was an 8.3 VEI explosion where Lake Toba currently sits (volcanoes are measured from 1-8 on the VEI scale, so...yeah). The explosion caused a climate-changing event where the global temperature dropped 3-5°C and even up to 15°C in higher latitudes. Some experts claim that this explosion wiped out the majority of the world's population. Other experts dispute this claim, but the fact it is even discussed tells you how massive this explosion was. It is estimated to be the largest explosion on Earth in the last 25 million years.

We flew to Medan on Thursday 31 January after school. We arrived in Medan around 10pm. We were both pretty hungry once we landed, so we stopped at a stall in the airport that was serving Indonesian food.

This particular A&W was out of root beer. Read that last sentence again.

A&W. Out of root beer.

Indonesia, mane. That means that I got to settle for orange juice with my burger and curly fries*.

*Scott prefers straight fries to curly fries. I know you are thinking, “Matt, why would you be friends with such a person?” I don’t know. I really don’t.

The Medan airport is brand new and is pretty swanky. The only problem is that it is located an hour east of the city. This means that you get to enjoy an hour cab ride into the city from the airport.

We didn’t get into Medan until right after midnight, which was actually kind of cool because we got to see some fireworks being shot off in the city for the new year at midnight*.

*This is the year of the horse. I am a metal horse having been born in 1990. This means that I am a very sexual being, I love to wander and can’t stay in one place for too long, and I love starting things but hate finishing them. I will let you decide if that is accurate.

We then got to a hotel where we crashed for the night. We had no plans for that night and since we didn’t get to the city until really late, we decided to rest up before the trek to Lake Toba the next day.

****

Scott and I had done our research and knew that we could get to Lake Toba from Medan by public bus for less than 30.000 rupiah. When we checked out from our hotel, the guy said that he could get us in a minivan that went straight to Parapat (where you catch the ferry to Samosir Island) for 100.000. This seemed a lot more convenient than catching different public buses, so we did that. Still having time for breakfast, we went across the street to Tip Top restaurant. In honor of Chinese New Year, I had ordered from the “Chinese” section of the menu for breakfast. The kung pao chicken was yummy.

Our transportation arrived shortly after that. We got in, picked up 3 more people (2 people from Switzerland* and an Indonesian lady) and then ventured down towards Lake Toba. The ride was really long because of the traffic: 6.5 hours.

The road was bumpy. And since it was a two-lane road the whole way, all the drivers were constantly trying to pass each other. It was like we were in a giant race. It was quite entertaining and I never felt not safe.

*This was an interesting group. Scott and I debated the 2 Swiss people. My gut feeling was that they were coworkers or something and had no relation. I pegged the girl at 29 and the guy at 45. I don’t think they were related – father/daughter didn’t seem right. And I don’t think they were “together” – no ring, age difference (not that I care about age difference when it comes to love), and just general vibe. You might be asking yourself, “Why didn’t you just ask them?” Well, we…actually…hmm…yeah, probably should have just asked them. The Indonesian lady was a riot. She was talking in the front seat for probably 80% of the drive. The poor driver just had this glazed look while staring at the road while this chick kept blabbering on. The other 20% of the time she had her headphones in and was singing along with the music**.

**Indonesian radio consists of radio songs that I have heard in America, but they are covers by different pop groups over here. One thing that drives me crazy is listening to the same song over and over again (if you know me, you know that I am not a music person to begin with). Right when I got to Indonesia, there was this one radio song that I swear came on every 5^th selection. It drove me nuts. I couldn’t remember the name of the song until…”Just give me a reason…” the lady in the front started singing it. I hate that song. I hate very few things in life (Mizzou, the smell of tuna in a can, the corner-of-the-endzone fade to anyone not named Randy Moss***) but I hate this song. It made a long ride even longer.

***

We got on the 4:30pm ferry to Samosir Island from Parapat. This is the ferry that takes you from the edge of the lake to the island in the middle of the lake.

We got to the island and found where we were gonna crash the first night thanks to 6 other white Americans we ran into. They are all English teachers in Sumatra on vacation and we crashed in the other two beds in the 8-bed dorm room they were in. We didn’t spend too much time with any of them, but they were good people. One of them randomly knew my buddy Christian, who teaches at the KJ campus in Jakarta.

Scott and I then set out to enjoy some beer and some food. Scott is a great dude to talk with: sports, women, life, you name it.

(Batak houses; Lake Toba; Samosir Island)

(this place only had Anker beer - the only reason to ever drink Anker beer)

Over dinner we got on the topic of what we want in a future mate. The usual answers came up and then we talked about things we find attractive/things we don’t find attractive that most do (for me, heels; they look so uncomfortable - why would you do that to yourself?). I told him how I just seem to have no luck when it comes to the ladies. The ones I’m interested in don’t work out and the ones that are interested in me turn out to be either way too interested and I back off or they are crazy. This led to girls in college saying I have commitment issues. I don’t think that’s true, but who knows. I just need one, though. Still holding out hope, prepared for the worst but still prayin for the best.

We headed back to Bagus Bay (where we were staying) and chilled on the pier for a while. I brought up the idea that we (my generation) are living in the perfect time slot. The Earth is slowly decaying, but it will never be our problem because we will die before it becomes a huge issue. But we are very fortunate because we have all this technology and it is super easy to do anything. Add on to that the fact that we are white* and everything is gravy. We had some good conversation on this vacation.

*White privilege is real. I didn’t know that until living abroad. It is very real. Totally unfair, but it is there.

****

The next morning we went to Liberta to check in to a room that the two of us could share. We had breakfast there. I got the chocolate and banana pancake. I had this the following two mornings as well. The best banana pancake I’ve ever had.

Scott and I rented a motorbike for the day to go explore the island. This was a huge mental barrier for me to overcome. I’ve never been able to ride anything with 2 wheels. I’ve never ridden a bicycle and I am extremely self-conscious about it. Scott used to ride dirt bikes and I figured that he would be the best option for my first time.

It was surprisingly easy. Scott is such a beast on that thing that I just had to sit there. We got going pretty fast at times (95 kmph) but I wasn’t too scared. It was actually a lot of fun. The only hiccup we had was when we went over a pothole too fast (the roads on the island were pretty bad) and that popped our back tire. We had to walk it back about 10 minutes to the nearest mini-town to get it patched. The only place in the town that would do it was a little hut with 3 kids none of which were over 12. They knew what they were doing, though. They took the tire off, dunked it to find the leak, and then patched it up.

Exploring the island was fun. There isn’t a ton to actually see on the island itself, but it was fun to just see the whole place.

There is a massive waterfall that would be dope, but since it is dry season there it was not flowing. We went to a “beach” but there really wasn’t anything because it is a lake.

Most of the places we go on vacation are used to seeing white people and we are left alone. Not on Samosir Island. We were the subjects of many stares and “hey mister!!”s. It felt like we never left Jakarta (other than the green, being able to breathe the air, etc.)

(#longlifeeducation)

(you already kno the team)

The two main things that we thought were pretty cool on our jaunt was an old church (there were a ton of Catholic churches – most of them looked abandoned) with a dope view.

(church)

(view as you leave church)

The other was the Batak museum where you got to go inside several different Batak houses. They look really cool from the outside.

(paparazzi, mane)

Once we got back to our accommodation, we did our first swim in Lake Toba. It was very refreshing and wasn’t as cold as I thought it would be. We sporadically jumped in the lake whenever we had a few down minutes throughout the rest of the trip.

Once done there, we headed back to Bagus Bay to kick it on their pier and then hang for a while. As we were walking back from the pier, we stumbled upon…

A putt-putt course!!...made of concrete!! The course was maddening. The greens were rolled for s***. It was like putting on glass (Johnny Drama voice). I always say the true measure of a good putt-putt player is how they do the first time they see the course. I had the following putt to beat Scott in our first round.

I continued to win the second round as well. I dominated the first 2 rounds (4-hole course) by 17 strokes. I think we can all agree that I was the better player. Did Scott win the 3^rd round? Yes. Did he win the 4^th round? Yes. Did he win rounds 5-8? Eh, who cares. All that matters is I flexed my muscle to start the festivities.

Dinner that night was fish and chips. It was a fried fish. It was good, just not very filling.

Our entertainment that night was local Batak music and dancing at Bagus Bay. The band was hilarious. The music was solid, but the real entertainment was how drunk these homies were.

“Horas Samosir!!” One guy yelled this 4 times in a row to a standing ovation each time. It was a hoot. “Horas” is their local greeting.

****

Woke up on the 2^nd, and immediately went with Scott to go stare at the lake for about 10 minutes. We both noticed that the sky was a bit cloudy. The previous days the sky had been crystal clear, but on this day it was really cloudy. Hmm.

After breakfast, we walked to the biggest town on the island, Tomok. It was a little over 4km away from Tuk Tuk (where all the guesthouses are located) so it was a decent little hike.

(we have no idea what this statue is)

There were a lot of places to buy trinkets and other items. Scott and I both got Lake Toba sweatshirts (pictured below) that feel super comfortable. I won’t be able to wear it until I live somewhere that experiences a winter, but it was well worth the $6.

In Tomok is the King’s Tomb. I’m not sure who the king was or if there was more than one of them, but we went to his/their tomb.

Scott and I then headed back to our room to dive into the lake and chill out.

(#atthecribonchillz)

Lake Toba was a great place to kick back and relax. There wasn’t a ton of stuff to do on the island, but it was beautiful and was a great relaxing long weekend. We get so many vacations that it sounds silly saying I needed a vacation, but the Aussie trip really wasn’t relaxing at all and it was nice to decompress with a great friend for an extended period of time. A couple random pics from my time on Samosir Island:

(one of our admin at school always calls me, "mas bro," meaning "dude;" I thought the hat was funny)

As we were buying some water, a guy from Australia saw me in my KU shirt and yelled, “KU!!” Turns out he studied in Hutch for a semester. Jayhawk Nation. We everywhere #itsjustdifferent

Dinner that night was at our guesthouse. We started with a pizza. It was, quite possibly, the worst pizza in the world. Just so, so bad. It had carrots and some other veggies that just don’t belong on a pie.

****

Waking up to go back home is never fun. We got on the 8am ferry leaving Tuk Tuk.

After the 40 minute ferry, we were scheduled to get on the 9am transport to head to the airport. We thought we would play it safe because we had no idea how long it would take to get to the airport, especially after our excruciating trip down. This trip was much shorter, it only took us a little over 4.5 hours to get to the airport.

We took the same roads for the most part, all two-lane roads*.

*I’ve never understood that. I would call it a one-lane road because there is only one lane going each direction. I would call a four-lane road a two-lane road. It doesn’t make sense to me. Larry David could find a joke somewhere in there…

We did get pulled over at a checkpoint by the po-po. We were told to say that we were traveling as a group together if we got questioned. It never came to that, thankfully. I have not had any run-ins with the police, yet. I am thankful for that.

While waiting for our flight, Scott and I talked about the Super Bowl which happened that morning*.

*We were in Indonesia the whole time, so our phones worked. That meant that I was updating twitter every 2 minutes during the game. I don’t know why, though.

S: “It’s pretty cool that the Northwest got 2 teams in the Super Bowl this year.”

(pause for me to try to comprehend what he just said)

M: “Uh…what?”

S: “Seattle and Denver.”

M: “Uh…what? How the hell is Denver ‘Northwest’?”

S: “Well, ok…it’s borderline.”

M: “No. No, it’s not.”

We had a safe flight back to Jakarta. The hardest part about getting home is getting a good taxi when you land at the airport.

Scott got one right away, but it only took me about 10 minutes to get into an Express.

Got home in a decent amount of time. Later that night, Scott wrote on my facebook about the explosion at Mt. Sinabung. I had no idea what this was. Apparently the "haze" we saw on Samosir was from a volcano that erupted 48km away. It killed 16 people. We had no idea.

http://www.cbc.ca/news/world/mount-sinabung-volcano-eruption-kills-16-in-indonesia-1.2520311