Mansur arrives at our hotel promptly at 6:30 A.M. and Cita our driver comes at 7:00 A.M. It is the start of a long day on narrow jungle roads. Cita drives on the left side of the road, although most of the time the road is just wide enough for one car. He honks his horn around every corner and motorcycles whiz past, veering to avoid collision. Children step back, eyes wide with curiosity and wave as we pass; livestock scatters and miraculously we avoid any accidents. Except for a few buses there are few other cars on the road. These small, colorful busses are piled high with young men sitting on-top of the roof and hanging to the back and sides of the vehicle. As we round corners, I can take pictures of them and the men smile and wave, seemingly to enjoy the attention and the game. John and I are fascinated just looking out of the window. Rice paddies fill every valley and terrace the hillsides. The landscape is lush with coconut and Banana trees . We drive past dense jungle with clusters of houses interspersed. Women and children sit in the doorways of simple wood framed homes on low stilts, dirt swept clean in their front yards. They wave and smile as we pass. Clusters of children are everywhere, and when we stop for a photo, they materialize from seemingly nowhere to see who we are and what we are doing. At first I am shy to take their photos, afraid that I will offend them, but when Art reminds me that I can show them their picture in the back view screen of my camera, it becomes a game where I can give back to them. I kneel and they gather around me, pushing and laughing with delight when they see themselves captured inside the camera. Women and children sit on covered wooden platforms along side the road selling fruits, vegetables, drinks and gasoline. I am in wonder at the liter water bottles full of gasoline until in one town, I witness a line of cars and trucks hours long, waiting to refuel at a petrol station. The small road side stands selling the liter bottles of gasoline are for the convenience of the thousands of motor-scooters that frequent the roads.
Just before lunch we stop in Cancar, hike up a steep hillside and through a family compound to see a spider web rice field. The sun is directly above and although I can admire the geometric beauty of the rice field, the direct light is not good for photographs. I wish we were here in the early morning when low, slanted light would give contrast and drama to this amazing patchwork of rice paddies. We stop at Ruteng for lunch, a hot, dirty and dusty town bustling with humanity. The restaurant serves Chinese food and we order ginger beef and stir fry noodles with chicken and walk outside while we wait for our food to be prepared. John, running to catch up with us, stubs his small toe on the uneven sidewalk and we butt heads when I insist that he wash and bandage the bloody toe. The toe incident shadows the next two hours until John finally concedes to my wishes. With medicated and bandaged toe, or drive continues peacefully. We stop to view Ranaica Volcano from afar and to peer in
It is dark when we arrive in Bajawa and the first hotel is full. We are confused and annoyed, since we assume reservations to be part of our package, but Mansur finds room in a near-by hotel. Although there is room in this inn, candles flicker in the lobby and I soon surmise that the hotel is without electricity. We have been driving all day and are tired, our physical batteries low, as well as the batteries within our camera and computer. Art vents his dissatisfaction to our guide Mansur, telling him that he hates being stuck in a car all day and that there has been some motor “under his butt” since we started this tour. He explains that the cost of our tour is excessive to the quality of accommodations and food. I suffer Manur’s discomfort, but understand Art’s point of view. Our room is shabby and although I am getting used to the bathrooms in
To our delight he electricity at our hotel goes on minutes after we return from dinner. We prepare for bed, each of us brushing our teeth and then using the toilet. John is the last to use the toilet which has a valve to control the flow of water into the tank. John might prefer that I omit that he now has diarrhea, thus his need to make sure that the toilet flushes properly. He uses the shower wand to expedite the flushing and the valve breaks within the wand and he is unable to turn off the flow of water. He cleverly resorts to tying the hose in a knot to stop the endless flow. We need not have worried because minutes later the water is turned off permanently for the night. Art, already in bed, calmly asks me if I notice anything about the lights? I retort that I do not and he points to the glass transit pane above our room door. Now that the electricity is on a bare light shines directly into Art’s eyes so I climb up on a chair and do my best to use John’s sweat shirt to block the light coming through the transit. (When I remove the sweatshirt in the morning, it is covered with dead bugs and spider webs.)