Back to life, back to reality

So, we are back. Friday and Saturday were horrible days, made more horrible by the seven hours we gained travelling through the time zones. Gulf Air, who had served us so well on the outward journey, let us down big time on the return. First they cancelled our flight, meaning we had to fly with Etihad (who were actually far better) and fly via Abu Dhabi and Bahrain instead of via Muscat. In Abu Dhabi we boarded a Gulf Air plane heading to Bahrain. We sat on the plane, surrounded by coughing and spluttering people, feeling the air filling with bugs and infections, we were sat on the plane in the airport for so long that we got a full meal. After an hour the passengers travelling to Frankfurt, London and Paris were told to get off the plane. In a very last minute kind of way, we were given new tickets for a British Airways flight to London and ushered onto the very comfortable BA plane. On arrival in Heathrow we were subjected to ridiculously over the top security procedures - over the top for normal security procedures but for passengers getting onto connecting flights who have already been through security at the first airport it was just plain unnecessary. When we finally arrived in Frankfurt, 26 hours after we had left Jakarta airport, we discovered that our luggage had not made the journey with us. God knows where our stuff is. Looking on the bright side, it meant we didn't have to carry the 60 kilo on the two trains back to Fulda. But actually, it just means we don't have our clothes, our phone chargers, our toiletries, our shoes, or any of the presents that we bought. As the airport staff in Abu Dhabi appeared to not have a clue what they were doing, I would not be surprised if our bags are still tagged with the original tags sending them to Bahrain and Frankfurt, I would not be surprised if our luggage is taking the route we would have taken had we stayed on the broken plane to Bahrain. Hopefully when they arrive at Frankfurt someone will put two and two together and match the luggage with our missing baggage file from British Airways. Hopefully they will arrive in Frankfurt. We shall see.

Anyway, aside from the return journey, the trip was amazing. I wrote about Jakarta, about Yogya and about Bromo. After visiting those places we spent almost two weeks in Bali and it was the best part of the trip by far. The atmosphere was completely relaxed and totally comfortable. No stares from the locals for being the only white person within miles. No hassle from people trying to sell their goods to the gullible tourists. The reason for this is probably the sheer number of non-locals in Bali. Tourism has suffered a lot due to the 2002 bombings, meaning there is less traffic and less people around. The non-locals in Bali are mostly people who have moved to the island, a move I can fully understand. The Indonesian heat is compensated for by the sea breeze, the scenery is extremely diverse and from the beaches, to the rice fields, to the mountains, completely breath-taking. There are temples galore, monkey forests, fantastic restaurants, and so many things to buy at really cheap prices. During our stay in Bali we took a minibreak to Ubud - the cultural capital of the island complete with monkey forest, artists, silver, handicrafts, the spell-binding kacak dance and one very cool jazz cafe. The Kecak dance was completely amazing and an experience that I will never forget. From Ubud we travelled to see a temple balanced on the edge of a mountain, and not so cleverly chose to visit it on the day the remains of the Australian hurricane were passing through. Another unforgetable experience, but for quite different reasons! The temple is on a volcanic mountain that overlooks Lake Batur, again, super picturesque.

I was really sad to leave Bali and have vowed to go back soon. It is one very cool place.