Moment 6
It was June 1990 and I was in Parapat, Sumatra, Indonesia. It was time to move on to the next city. My traveling companion was going back the way we had come, but I was venturing onward. The next city on the trip was Bukittinggi. The trip would be a long one, about five hundred kilometers, winding through the mountain range along the west coast of the island. I booked a ticket for the regular bus. I decided that I did not want to spend the extra money on the tourist bus. The bus would leave the next morning. Not a problem, as I was not in a hurry. The next morning I checked out of my hotel and made my way to the bus station. After waiting a while I asked when the bus would show up. They told me that it broke down on the way to the station from another town. There was only one bus a day, so I decided to not risk it not showing up again and booked myself on the tourist bus. I was not in a hurry, but I was anxious to go on to the next city. The next morning the tourist bus did not show up, but they got two Mitsubishi mini-vans as a replacement. It was a tight fit, but we all got in. I sat in the middle of the first bench row, right behind and in between the front seats. I had a clear view out the front window of the van. Everyone on this adventure was a tourist. The road we traveled was narrow, and it wound through the mountain range. The driver would honk his horn when he came to a blind curve as he was driving in the middle of the road and I presume any oncoming car would be too. It seemed that he was honking the horn more than he wasn't honking it. This was all too simple, though. To make it more difficult the people living along the road would place mats on the edge of the road for drying their cloves. That would take away a third of the already narrow road. We were fortunate not to collide with anything, but the driver did lock up the brakes twice while avoiding obstacles. We got one flat tire, which we stopped and had repaired. We were quite a spectacle for the locals it seemed, as a crowd of kids gathered to stare at us while we were standing around waiting. We stopped at the little monument marking the equator. The trip took fourteen exhausting hours. Our reward for surviving it was our destination, the beautiful town of Bukittinggi. It is located in the mountains, at over three thousand feet, so it was cool for being located just south of the equator. It was quite pleasant, I did lots of relaxing, reading and sight seeing. After spending a bit of time there, I woke up one morning and decided it was time to leave. So, I packed up and went to the bus station. I got on a bus to Padang right away. This ride was much shorter and was on a well traveled road. As we headed out of town I saw a crumpled pile of metal along the side of the road. It was a vehicle that had been hit by something much bigger and was thoroughly demolished. As we passed by I saw that it was the remains of a Mitsubishi mini-van, just like the one I took on that long ride.
Indonesian Long House
Map of trip route