Wednesday, March 9, 2016

5:40 a.m. Room 7 on the second floor of the Tamariah Losmen, Siantar, Sumatra

Getting out of Perdagangan took longer than I expected, and I wasn’t on the road until after 10 o’clock. That really wasn’t the best idea, and I realized that very quickly as I started to ride. The sun was high in the sky, and I would be dealing with that hot sun the entire time. Still, I only had 40 kilometers to cover, and I was hopeful that it wouldn’t be that difficult.

On my way out of Perdagangan, I came across another hotel. I wasn’t aware that this town had more than one. This one was modern and new, and the cheapest room there was 98,000 rupiah. It might have been better to stay there, but I was pretty happy with the Idola. It had character. This other hotel, though 35,000 rupiah cheaper for its cheapest room, was pretty bland. A man there struck up a conversation. He thought I worked for Unilever. Apparently, they have a very large plant nearby. It supplies much of the local employment and they probably have foreigners working there as well. I was surprised to learn that this man was 78 years old. He looked much younger than that and appeared to be quite healthy. He said he had been retired for 20 years and had a pension. I never did find out what his job had been.

The cycling to Siantar was much like the cycling I had done to get to Perdagangan. The road was a simple tarmac affair. If pressed, you could perhaps put a line down the middle and create two narrow lanes with no shoulders. But it was unmarked, and traffic tended to treat it as a single lane. They simply kept as far as they could to their side and then they’d hug the side even tighter when they faced oncoming traffic. A special characteristic of the traffic in these countries is that there is a variety of vehicles on the road and they all tend to drive at different speeds. You’ve got everything from bicycles going very slowly to motorcycles racing at top speed. In between, you’ve got cars, buses, and trucks. And even the trucks travel at different speeds. Some are high-powered beasts and if they are empty, move very fast. Others are dinosaurs carrying heavy loads, and they creep along. The result is a sometimes insane game of leap frog with all these vehicles passing each other and trying not to have accidents. I did not see any accidents, but the potential for them was everywhere. The most dangerous situations came about when traffic built up behind large slow-moving trucks. The blocked drivers would understandably get a bit impatient as they waited for their chance to pass, and then they would swing out and go for it. It was routine for people to try to pass even though they could see that they didn’t have enough room. It was clear that they would end up hitting oncoming traffic, but they would go anyway and just count on the oncoming traffic seeing them and slowing down accordingly. This was an agreed-upon situation, and no one got upset about it. In Canada, I think people would get very angry if someone tried to pass and ended up nearly crashing into oncoming traffic. Here, it is unavoidable, and people take it in their stride and slow down to allow someone to pass and move back over.

My experience on my bicycle wasn’t that bad, but there were challenges. There were lots of potholes and uneven stretches of pavement, and I had to keep my eyes open for those. People tended to honk their horns to give warning when they passed me, and I had to fight down my visceral Canadian reaction. In Canada, a horn honk is a big deal. It’s either a warning about danger or a signal of anger. But here, horn honking is very common, and it doesn’t mean anything. It’s like having your lights on. It’s just a way to signal your presence. When I was out on the long stretch between towns, it didn’t bother me that much. It was only later in the day when I got to Siantar itself that the horn honking started to get on my nerves. Traffic was much more intense, and people were blasting their horns when it was clear that it would do nothing. Blowing your horn while stuck in a large traffic jam is not going to help the situation one iota. So it’s not logical, and the constant horn blasts started to shred my nerves.

Most people were friendly and called out greetings. I got quite a few thumbs-up gestures. I think people admire what they see as the physical accomplishment of riding a bike. Personally, that is the last thing on my mind. I’m aware that it takes a physical effort to ride the bike, but I don’t see any great value in that. It’s not like I’m trying to prove anything. I just dislike buses intensely, and I like the freedom that riding a bicycle gives. If I could find a bicycle with a strong electric motor and just scoot along with battery power, I’d be more than happy to make the switch. Still, riding the bicycle does have value in that it gives you a bridge to connect with people. People are more interested in talking with you when they see you on a bicycle, I think. And it forces you to be out in the world having experiences—whether positive or negative. The best thing about a bike, however, is the freedom that it gives you once you arrive at your destination. As such, I can see it being very enjoyable to travel with a folding bicycle and treat it as luggage. The idea would then be to always stay in hotels, so you don’t need camping gear. That would reduce your load considerably. Then you’d simply take a bus or local transport from one town to the next with your folding bike and trailer up on the roof. Then when you arrive at the town, you get on your bike and head off in search of a hotel. You could still ride from town to town if you wanted to, but the idea would be to just use the bike inside towns and in the surrounding area. That might even work out much better in terms of an overall travel experience. For example, I’m glad to be out on the road, but truth be told, I was having a better time just staying in Tanjungbalai. While there, my entire day was open to the experience of being in Indonesia. A day of cycling is a day of cycling. You are out in Indonesia, but the physical effort required is so extreme that you don’t have energy for doing anything else.

I said that my time on the road was largely positive, but there were a few negative moments. Some vehicles cut way too close at a very high speed and it scared the life out of me. It would only take one such driver to cut it too close to basically end my journey and probably my life. A couple of young boys and men would come up beside me or ahead of me on their motorcycles and start demanding money. Their demands for money would eventually turn to loud jeers and laughter and they’d race away. I lost control during one such encounter with some particularly obnoxious teenage boys, and I casually gave them the finger as they drove away. They annoyed me to that extent. And one time, someone threw a lit cigarette out of a window at me. The cigarette didn’t hit me or burn me, luckily. However, later that day when I stopped for lunch in a shady spot, I saw the cigarette lying on top of my trailer. It had gotten caught in the fabric there and burned and melted a series of spots. It didn’t go all the way through, but it was a near thing. Even so, I’ll probably have to reinforce the burnt areas where the cigarette landed. Even in friendly Indonesia, a cyclist can be a target for other people.

The 40-kilometer ride was much more difficult physically and mentally than I expected. On the positive side, the terrain was largely flat. Only at the very end when arriving in Siantar did I face any kind of climbing. But even with the easy cycling over flat ground, I found myself struggling. I stopped often for mini-rests and had to promise myself a rest after X number of kilometers in order to keep myself motivated to keep pedaling. I think the problem centered largely on the pain in my butt. My legs were fine, and I had no trouble turning the pedals. My arms and elbows and hands were a bit sore, but it was nothing much. The real pain was in my butt. This has been a common experience for me, and I often think that if I could just solve that one problem, cycling would be a breeze. My butt hurt so much that I had to shift position all the time, and I had to constantly fight the urge to stop and get off the bike. It feels like if I could just get rid of that pain – and it’s a strong one – I could cycle forever without a problem. I’ve tried a variety of saddles in my life, and I’ve had the same experience with each one. They all hurt like crazy. One time I had a saddle that was somewhat comfortable. Unfortunately, someone stole that saddle from my bike, and I’ve never been able to replace it with one as comfortable.

The scenery was not spectacular. I kept thinking that the scenery in the Philippines was much more attractive than what I’ve seen here in Indonesia. But it was very green and lush. The sides of the road were largely taken up with plantations – rubber trees, palm oil, and durian. That caused a certain monotony in the ride. The Philippines didn’t have areas like that. I did have a few interesting encounters. I stopped for a rest one time and met an older man that was selling herbal medicine from his motorcycle. He spoke no English, but we tried to communicate as best we could, and we took pictures together. He wanted me to buy one of his drinks, but I said no. I had one such drink back in Tanjungbalai, and it was horribly bitter. I couldn’t even finish it. Another time, I stopped to chat with two men selling catfish and eels in plastic bags at the side of the road. We didn’t chat much, to be honest. I just looked at the fish and took some pictures and then moved on.

The only real excitement occurred when I arrived in Siantar. The traffic built up as I approached the city – the second largest in this province of Sumatra – and it quickly become almost nightmarish. I arrived in the town proper exactly when the schools let out. This causes a traffic jam in every city in Indonesia as dozens of becak and city vans (buses) cluster around the school’s exits to pick up the students and take them home. And they do this with no regard for their effect on traffic flow. They double, triple, and quadruple park and no amount of honking will get them to move. Gridlock ensues, and a dumb Canadian on a bicycle finds himself with little space to ride. It was pretty brutal.

I still had vague thoughts of going to the immigration office before they closed at 4 o’clock. I had just enough time to get there. Unfortunately, their office is located about 9 kilometers outside of town, and that would mean an additional 18 kilometers of riding. And I was a wreck. I still would have done it, but the route I chose to head toward immigration brought me to a very long and very steep hill. It was a major struggle to get to the top, and I was trembling from head to toe when I got there. I started to think that it was not a good idea to go to immigration. I could feel the stress and irritability growing inside me.

I decided to compromise. I would ride toward immigration, but I would try to find a hotel for the night along the way. I used my smartphone and called up Google Maps and did a search for losmen. A whole bunch of them popped up, and there were two of them on the road toward immigration. I did this search while parked at a very busy corner. My road with the major hill met the road heading back out of town and toward immigration. It was here that I would have to turn right, and Google Maps indicated that there were two losmen on that road just a short distance ahead – maybe two kilometers at most. If things worked out well, I could still even find a place to stay for the night, dump my gear, take a quick shower, and then ride the rest of the way to immigration. That was the plan.

The plan quickly fell apart when no matter what I did, I could not find these losmen. It was maddening in the extreme. Google Maps showed them right here or right there. Yet, when I got to that point – as indicated by satellite-driven GPS – there would be nothing there. I asked local people over and over and over about these losmen, but, as usual, they knew nothing about them. I drove up and down and up and down and up and down this crazy busy road trying to find these losmen, and just couldn’t track them down. I went into all kinds of businesses to speak to the owners about these losmen, but got no useful information. I did see a somewhat upscale hotel called the Anda. It was sitting just a short distance away from where Google Maps said the Tamariah Losmen was located. I thought perhaps the Anda Hotel was actually the Tamariah Losmen and they’d changed their name. I went into the hotel to ask them and to see what they charged for their rooms. It was a nice place, but their rooms were in the 350,000 rupiah range. My budget is sub 100,000.

I spoke to a manager at the Anda Hotel. She understood that I was on a budget, and she appeared to be willing to negotiate a better price. However, she was thinking in terms of knocking ten or twenty percent off. When she learned that I usually stayed in places for 60,000 rupiah a night, she knew there was nothing she could do for me. I had asked the other staff at the hotel about the Tamariah Hostel, but they all insisted there was no such place. But, to my delight, the manager knew where it was. She even dispatched one of her desk clerks to go with me and show me where it was. We went out of the Anda Hotel and started making our way up the road – the same road that I’d been cycling along for what felt like days. And guess where the Tamariah Hostel was located? Of course, it was sitting right on the corner of the intersection where I’d started this whole mess. It was right there. When I stopped my bike to check Google Maps and I entered “losmen” into the search feature, I was sitting directly beside the losmen. I couldn’t believe it.

The problem was that Google Maps wasn’t accurate. This has caused me big problems twice now. When I rode to Kisaran, Google Maps had Al’s bird shop misplaced by three or four kilometers. And now Google Maps had the Tamariah Losmen misplaced by a kilometer. I guess I’m learning a lesson. You can’t count on Google Maps 100%. It’s an amazing tool, but it’s only as good as the information that gets fed into it. I have no idea how the Tamariah Losmen’s location information got entered into Google Maps, but it isn’t correct. I just checked again, and today it shows this losmen about 220 meters away from its actual position. That doesn’t sound like much, but in this chaotic city that is a real problem. A visitor like me would go to the spot indicated on Google Maps and then be totally lost. My assumption has been that even if Google Maps isn’t 100% accurate, the business indicated would be somewhere around the spot shown. So I look around and ride a hundred meters that way and a hundred meters the other way and I ask people. But it didn’t help at all. In the case of Al’s bird shop, the position was off by kilometers. The Tamariah Losmen’s position was off by only 220 meters, but that might as well be kilometers. It’s not like you’ll be able to just look around and find it.

In any event, I really shouldn’t complain. The mere existence of Google Maps and my smartphone is a miracle. It night not show me the accurate location of everything in the country. But it always shows me exactly where I am located. And that makes all the difference in the world. I can just cycle out into the countryside or into a city and I have perfect confidence that I can find my way back. I always know exactly where I am, and I have a fantastic map to guide me. Compared to what it was like finding my way with paper maps in Ethiopia and in Guinea, it is astonishing.

I was so happy when I finally found the Tamariah Losmen. There was no chance of now making it to immigration, but I had my home for the night. And it seemed like the perfect sort of place for me. There was a big lobby. It was big enough for scooters and motorcycles to park there, and I was encouraged to bring my bike right inside and lock it up. Room prices ranged from 60,000 rupiah up to perhaps 200,000 rupiah. There was a bit of confusion when I was looking at the rooms, and I ended up with a room for 80,000 rupiah instead of the cheapest room at 60,000. But that’s okay. I’m not sure what the difference would be between those. Perhaps the 60,000 is a single and the 80,000 is a double.

I did ask at the beginning if they had a room on the main floor. That makes it easier for me to wheel my trailer into the room and carry my other luggage. They did have one, and it was a nice room, but it cost 135,000 rupiah. The room I ended up with is on the second floor, but it wasn’t difficult to get my trailer up here. The stairway was relatively wide, and I just picked up the trailer and carried it up. The second floor is very interesting with a wide open floor plan and lots of wood. There is a big outdoor area outside my room with tables and chairs and plants. It’s an older place, and it shows in the worn-out and dirty fixtures and walls and doors, but it is right up my alley. There is no bathroom in my room. I have to use the shared bathroom. It is a typical sort of bathroom for Indonesia with a big tub of water and a scoop. It has a western style toilet, but it is smashed to bits. And it is quite dirty. But that is all par for the course.

Once settled in, I was faced with the task of getting water. That’s another aspect to this type of travel. One turns into a rather primitive sort of human – a hunter-gatherer more than anything else. I had expended nearly every ounce of energy I had just getting to Siantar. But once I’d arrived, my work had really just begun. I now had to find shelter, water, and food – usually in that order. It took me a long time to find my shelter for the night. This is a basic sort of hotel, so they don’t provide water dispensers. You can buy water in bottles in the lobby, but a cyclist needs so much water that it’s insane to buy water like that. I’d have to buy a dozen bottles at an insanely inflated price. The better option these days is to go to the water purification businesses and just fill up with all the water you need. In the old days, these places didn’t exist, and getting water was more complicated. You’d have to use local water and filter it and purify it with chemicals. Now these small businesses are everywhere.

However, as often happens, now that I needed a water purification business, I couldn’t find one. I knew better than to ask the staff at the hotel. They would have no idea. All I could do was get on my bike and ride around until I spotted one. This is normally the type of business I would look for as I cycled into a city. I’d make a mental note of their location so I could return there later when I needed water. But this time, things got crazy and with all my wandering around trying to find a losmen, I never did see a water place. I knew they were out there in their dozens. I just had to find one.

I turned left outside my losmen and then rode along. I expected to see a water place very quickly, but I rode and rode and rode and I never saw one. I soon found myself in downtown Siantar. There are two large thoroughfares running parallel that kind of make up the downtown core. They are one-way streets, and I rode all the way down one and all the way back along the other, but I still didn’t see a water place. The traffic was nearly unbearable. Public transportation is based on large vans. They’re kind of like the jeepneys in the Philippines. And they seem to be out of control. Each one is a private business, and they are all competing to get passengers. With no control and no schedule and no stops of any kind, they just take over the streets and clog them up and pull over whenever and wherever they feel like it. They stop two or three deep at the side of the road and block all traffic flow. Horns start to honk, but they don’t care. It’s their livelihood, and they need to make money. It’s a bad situation for a cyclist because these vans just pull over all the time and cut you off.

I rode slowly, scanning both sides of the road and the lanes and alleys, hoping to spot a water place. Unfortunately, I never saw a single one and that long and desperate ride through downtown was a complete waste of time. I soon found myself back on the main road that took me all the way back to the Tamariah Losmen – right back to where I’d started and still without water. I contemplated asking the losmen staff, but I knew they would be no help. I simply chose another direction on another road and started cycling. This time, I got lucky. After about a kilometer and a half, I spotted the telltale big blue water bottle that indicated a water purification business. I was a bit worried that they would refuse to fill my Dromedary water bag. They generally just fill up the ten-gallon bottles and deliver those to businesses and homes. They have no system whereby they can measure the water flow and figure out how to charge for smaller amounts. But the people were friendly and gave me no trouble at all. The man took my Dromedary bag and placed it under the water nozzle and pressed the button to start the water flow. He struggled a little bit as he tried to handle this unfamiliar container, but it all worked out and they charged me 1,000 rupiah. That made sense since a full bottle went for around 3,000. I happily rode back to the losmen with my eight liters of water. The bag is supposed to hold ten liters, but I’ve learned it generally holds less than that – about eight.

Once back in my room, I stripped off my sweat-drenched clothes and rinsed them out in the shared bathroom. I also dumped tons of cold water over my tired and hot body. It was deliciously refreshing. Next came food, and I was content with the remaining four or five pieces of fried snacks that I was given in Lima Puluh. That bag of leftovers had ended up being lunch, dinner, breakfast, lunch, and now dinner again. It was all I’d eaten in two days. I probably should have gone out to get a real meal, but I was too tired and stressed out to face it. I had the fried snacks and then topped it off with a serving of oatmeal and liters more of water. It’s astonishing how much you drink when you are cycling. I had polished off countless liters of water, and not once during the long day had I felt even the slightest urge to pee. The water just went into my body and then straight out the sweat glands.
I went to bed early, hoping to get a really good night’s sleep. Unfortunately, my mind was racing, and I had trouble sleeping. There was also a fair amount of traffic noise. The door to my room faces the outdoor area near the busy road below. It isn’t nearly as loud as my room in Tanjungbalai, but horns and revving engines did wake me up from time to time. At least I don’t have the super loud call to prayer from the local mosque that dominated my life five times a day in Tanjungbalai.

Today is an important day. Once I have some more oatmeal for breakfast and shower, I’ll be heading to immigration to apply for another extension to my visa. I really hope I don’t have any trouble.

 

Tags: Sumatra Part 01