traveling

The ferry is in sight of the port on Bali, but like the trip over, we were too early, so we came to a complete stop. The captain came on and said something in indonesian. I happened to be talking with Dyce at the time and since he spoke a little Indo, i asked him what the story was. He said he didnt follow all of it, but something to the effect that we were early and it wouldn't be long. now we had waited almost an hour and a half at the Lombok side, so my faith was a little shaken. Plus the Danes had said that they waited almost 3 1/2 hours at the port on the Lombok sid, so I was a little concerned about my flight, although the agents who had arranged this trip said that I had plenty of time to get to my 9 PM flight, (which is what I told them even though the flight actually left at 10PM). Anyway, about 1/2 hour later we came into the port on Bali and off we went. Now when one of these ferries arrives at a port, the porters and musicians and vendors start immediately boarding the ferry like pirates boarding a captive ship. It was the same here, but Ange and i fended off the porters with the simple but firm command of "no" and "no rupiah."

The other westerners that were on the travel/tour were assembled at the port and we were grouped by company. Then our company guys says, "ok, go that way" and he takes off on a scooter. We all follow on foot and before too long its obvious that every one is following me, although I lost site of where our "guide" had gone and was just walking in the general direction of where we had been dropped off from the Taxi from ubud on the way over. We all did make it to the right place, and those of us who were heading to Denpassar and Kuta, and me (the only airport goer) was loaded onto one mini-bus, albeit a larger one. So here we are about seventeen people with too many bags, surf boards and the like loaded into a mini bus that had normal seating for 13. Angie had to sit cross legged on her bag, and one of my bags had to rest on my lap. Now it is hot, mind you, and there are grumbles as one might expect from westerners promised one thing and dealing with another.

Thankfully tho, our driver was a maniac out of hell, so we went fast and we passed many many other vehicles (including the mini-bus that had Dyce on it -- they seemed to be going slow, since his tour left well before ours) as we crossed Bali towards Denpassar/Kuta. When we got to Denpassar we took the most interesting circuitous route easily doubling back on the direction that we had come from (the sun doesnt lie about direction), altho i am sure that this was the most direct way to where the two local women who were on the bus wanted to go. They were dropped off at the door of their destination, so imagine my surprise when we finally get to the airport, Angie and I are dropped off at the entrance to the airport, not inside the airport mind you, not at the departure drop off area at the terminal, but at the end of the road that leads to the airport. The driver motioned that the airport was "thata way" and off he sped to Kuta.

So Angie and i with all our bags walk the kilometer or so to the actual denpassar international departure terminal, and I have to go thru the first of the three security checkpoints before i can even check in, and with my airport departure tax in hand, i left Angie, thankful that indeed I had made it in plenty of time to get on my airplane.

So, another side note to travelers to Indonesia. Dont trust someone who is someone else's "friend" as the "friendly" travel agent charged me a very large amount for the flight from Bali to Aukland, probably almost double what Lynn (my CB travel agent) would have charged me. She explained that it was on Qantas a premium airline and therefore more expensive. However, at the airport it was soon obvious that this was not "Qantas" but a discount airline called "Jet Star". So how was my very expensive flight on Qantas actually a discount airline ticket? And why did I pay so much ... ah yes the travel agent was that guy's "friend."

Anyway, I board the airplane with every Australian with a new born, and my overnight flight to Sydney began. Needless to say, a flight that starts at 10:30PM and arrives at 6Am albeit three time zones later is gonna have some cranky babies on it. Thankfully there were only about 2 dozen crying babies within about 3 rows of me on the 767, and i managed perhaps two hours of sleep. The good thing about being ripped off on the fare was that at least it had included all the extrasa that the discount airline normally charges for -- i got a blanket and they fed me breakfast.

There I am in Sydney and I have now officially left the global east and I am in the global west. Now in the east, things are crowded and crazy and unexpected, but airline travel is remarkably smooth and easy. In the west tho, it is uptight, rule bound, difficult, and fraught with delays. I find out in Sydney as I was bumped from my original flight, and re-booked on an actual Qantas airline flight, that before I can enter NZ, i must have a ticket out of the country, or immmigration simply wont let me in. Thankfully, i had my ticket to Tonga the next day, so a one night stay was OK with NZ officials. however, what I didnt understand until the next morning was that Air New Zealand will not check me in to their flight to Tonga without a printed copy of my eticket returning from Tonga to NZ. Apparently Tonga has the same rule as NZ about people coming in without travel plans that include leaving their country -- a type of immigration control, no doubt. Now I have not heard of this in the west, and even tho I had the code, my eticket number, etc. Air NewZealand needed the computer printed version of the same thing. My return from Tonga is from a different airline than Air New Zealand so they said "go down there and maybe they will print you out a copy" Good thing that i arrived 2+hours early for my flight!!

Off I go to Pacific Blue, wait in line, and ask for a copy of my itenerary so that I can check in the Air New Zealand flight. "We cant give you that. " Why not? "We dont have tickets we have etickets, you have to get it printed out off your email." (The airport has internet access, but not access attached to a printer.) I ask if they have a computer that i can access my email and print the eticket. they said "sure, follow me." So back i go into their offices. "What is your email account?" It is daveincb@yahoo... "Oh, we cant access Yahoo, sorry tough luck." Huh? what do you mean? Yahoo is blocked on their office computers for the reason you can guess, everyone would futz around on the internet instead of working while at work.

So, back I go to Air New Zealand, and butt right to the front of the line and say to the lady who was helping me, "they wont print one out," I report. "Try our guest services desk they may help you." So off i go to Air NZ's guest services desk, and low and behold the answer they give -- no yahoo is blocked on our computers too. "But you have a ticket, I see it here in the system, go down there and demand that you get a copy of it, it is simply ridiculous that they wont give you a ticket from their own airline."

So back to Pacific Blue who is like, "no, you are screwed sorry." May I speak to your supervisor. The supervisor gets the story and says that they can print out the same info that I had on a hand written piece of paper, the eticket number, the booking code, the times and dates of the flights. Give me your passport and I will be right back. now i have just come from the east where giving your passport to ANYONE is THE cardinal sin of all sins, so i ask if i can go with her She protests at first but then relents. We go and she prints it out, but it is a little to faint on the dot matrix printer to read. Not to worry she will go next door and get a better print out. Off she goes with my passport in hand. At this point with about 20 minutes left until my flight is scheduled to depart i just have to laugh until i cry that "I am going to miss Genevieve in Tonga because they are out of ink in their printer!"

Minutes later she reurns with a print out that does not look official or off the internet or nothing, with all the same info that I had and already provided to Air NZ that they could already see in their system. Anyway, to Air NZ i go, and again straight to the front to the same girl who looks dubiously at my printout but relents to my pleadings and checks me in. Rushing thru security, and imigration, i arrive at my gate right as boarding is supposed to start, only ... no airplane! (Passengers but no airplane). The aircraft is late and has a mechanical problem. Oh great my connection in Tonga is a scant 1 hr 30 min, and we are late! But not to worry the Air NZ people had told me the night before (when i confirmed my flight from the hotel which had a printer attached to its yahoo friendly computer -- if only i had known!) that I only needed 45 minutes in Tonga.

Amongst the travelers were many who were experieinced Tonga travelers... oh immigration in Tonga is easy, the island hoppers are always late, it wont matter it'll all be cool. OK. then the horror stories, "but I have arrived at the island hopper with a paid ticket in my hand an hour early only to have been told that i am bumped from the airplane"... yikes!

Long story shorter, Tonga is as easy (and very similar to) any number of Carribean airports, immigration was about 3 minutes long (vs th 1 hr and 1/2 for Bali) and zipping over to the domestic terminal took all told about 10- 15 minutes from the time Air NZ landed, so on the plane to Ha'apai I am!

So i had not heard from genevieve about my arrival time email. I thought it was 3 PM but it turned out to actually be 12;30 PM. So i wasnt too surprised when there was no Viever at the airport to greet me... Oh well, I took a taxi "into town" and I will simply look until I find her. How big can this island be anyway? So I start asking folks, "do you know an american girl named "genevieve"? Which might seem silly except that EVERYBODY on this island that i met once remebered my name thereafter, and everytime i saw them anywhere they were like, "hi david how are you today?" -- the tongan people are super friendly and Ha'apai with 4,000 residents felt very much like an island version of Crested Butte.

Back to the search. Since she hadnt heard about "genevieve" i figure, next check my email since that is the way i am communicating with everyone these days. So I ask Anna-tia the onwer of the shop that the taxi let me off at, where is the internet cafe? She points down the street and off I go. Now it is the hotest part of the day and it is sunny, BUT tonga is just within the tropical zone and I was amazed when the pilot of the airplane said it was a warm 28 degrees C. Wow, how cool it is here! I was used to the low in Indo being about 31 degrees C, so it did indeed feel cool in the blazing mid day sun. I am walking down the street and I see a westerner turn the next corner wearing a big straw hat. She walks towards me and her body language changes -- does she recognize me? Is that Geneveieve? Then I hear that distinctive laugh, and shout, "was it that easy?" to her and she says, "yep. It was that easy."

until next time, newo-out