To the dentist

After not visiting a dentist for 8 years, I decided to make an appointment in Melaka. The medical standard is the same as in Europe, but the prices are much lower. Besides, I have plenty of time to go. The only possible problem might be that I do not wake up early enough for the appointment. As I do not have any machine that tells me the time anymore, both my camera and telephone have died, I might get up to late. When I wake up on Saturday I go into the street to ask someone the time, it only is 8 o'clock so I can go back to bed for an hour. At 9:30 sharp I arrive at the dentist to find out my appointment is only one hour later. After losing an hour I return. The dentist is a beautiful woman, who speaks impaccable English. She is assisted by a another beautiful woman. May be I should have gone more often to the dentist. The damage in my mouth turns out to be not to bad. One new cavity and some work on an old filling, with some general cleaning at the end. The work takes about 3 quarters of an hour and I am only charged 25 euro's. Next year I will try to come back here.

Afterwards I go to my regular morning coffeeshop, where I bump into Marko who already is enjoying his third coffee. Without having to order, I am served my coffee, by the woman who never smiles. Today is a good day again, like all the days. I do not mind staying here another 2 weeks.

Sama sama

After staying an extra day in Duri I cycle to Dumai, the last destination in Indonesia. I buy a ticket to Melaka, Malaysia for the ferry for the next day. When I am in an internet cafe, a girl invites me to come with her to the school where see follows an English course. After chatting with some teenagers I am put for a class of 14 year olds to entertain them for one and half hours. Afterwards the teacher and older students present, convince me to return the next day and delay my ferry crossing to Malaysia with one day. At night I watch a concert of a band from Medan in the street of my hotel. When watching I meet a brother of the girls I stayed with in Duri, it is a small world. Before I go to sleep I recheck my Indonesian visa to be sure I do not overstay, with staying an extra night. To my surprise I find out I have to leave the next day, so I will not return to school the next day.

The boatride to Melaka is fast and as the rooms are usually airconned to refrigorator temperatures, it is now quite bearable. In the port I wait till everybody has disembarked before I go ashore. I feel a bit embarrased when the officials direct me to the front of the queue straight through border control. From there I cycle to the Sama sama guesthouse which was recommended by Marko, who I met in Maninjau. The guesthouse is full, but because Marko already is there and has forewarned my arrival I am allowed to stay and sleep in the communal room.

The guesthouse is tiny, it only has 7 rooms, but it contains interesting and nice people and is in the middle of the old town. I won't mind staying here for a while. Soon the biggest decisions in the day, become when and where to eat. There is a lot of variety in restaurants. I can choose between Indian, Chinese, Indonesian and Malay food. I am fortunate that I have very inefficient digestion so every day I can eat at all the cuisines, without growing a big belly, although I would not mind getting on a bit more weight.

The day that I will return to the Europe is set now, as I buy a plane ticket to Frankfurt for the 8th of April. I have not decided what I will do until then. Most likely I will spend most of my time eating.

Earthquake

On the 5th I reluctantly leave Bukit Tinggi. My visa runs out on the 10th and it at least is 400 km to Dumai from where I wish to take a ferry to Malacca. As this ferry leaves at 8:00AM I have to be there the nineth and to not feel rushed I have to leave. First the road predominatly goes down and I can race with the minibusses, but not far after Payakumbu the road goes up. After a delicious descent, racing a black Honda car all the way down, it becomes tough. The hills are very short and steep, 200 m steep down and right after up. This drains my power especially with the sun blistering the road. When I am at a restaurant to drink some tea to rest I am invited to put my bike on a truck and go with them for the next 40 km. I am very happy with the invitation and hunp on. The big cement truck is probably slower than my bike, but I at least do not have to cycle. After an hour we are surprised by a big bang only to discover that one of the tyres is blown. The delay is an hour, but I am not in a hurry, so who cares? I spend the night in Bankinang, from where I leave early the next morning. Around noon I take a rest in a palmoil plantation, when the earth starts shaking. I check if I am not under a coconut tree and wait till the earth settles down again.
I have been told that the next town with a hotel is Duri. This is still a considerable amount of km away so I do not hang around to long. Against usual practise I continue cycling when the night falls, because I expect Duri to come in sight any moment. The last km are hard, because I no longer can see the potholes, but without many problems I manage to reach Duri. When I walk through the streets to search for fruit and dinner, I am invited by a girl to visit her house and some of her friends. Having nothing better to do I join her. It is not after 5 minutes she tells me I smell bad. She of course is right, but I am surprised she tells me. I tell her I just had a shower, but the combination of heat and dirty clothes do not improve my body odour. I am still welcome to her friends houses, but they keep their distance, which does not stop them to have me invited to marry some girls. After travelling a while I am now pretty much accustomed to these questions and I can politely decline.

Cita cita

After more than a month at Lili's homestay I finally take the incredible steep road to Bukit Tinggi. To my surprise I am able to digest the 44 hairpins quite easily. I just take the outside of the corner which saves me 10% of incline. Only corner 25 and 30 are a bit hard. My new bike's lightest gear is much lighter than the old one, which also helps. When climbing out the canyon near Bukit Tinggi Herman, Lili's owner overtakes me and invites me to put my stuff in the van and join him to Orie, the bass-player in the Cita cita band. I already met a few of the band members and at Orie's place I see Teddy the singer and Mande, guitarist and singer again. Also Marko, the German I spent most of my days hanging out with in Bayur. In the evening the band was to play at an art gallery, but in the end they play in a cafe. Afterwards most of us go to Orie's place, his parents have a huge house. The next day we tour around the countryside in Orie's van. It is very nice to hangout with the band members and I hope I will see them again in a not so distant future.