Some piccies

Not sure if this works, but hopefully this will post some piccies. One is of some of the staff,one is the pool and one is my new apartment. The latter, you'll be shocked to hear, isn't quite finished yet.

Back again

Well, the sun is back out, and yet again, it is before ten am and it is 30 degrees. Not too sure about my early morning swim though, as the wate seems freezing. Haven't swum for a couple of day though, so I oughta. Last night was a fucking disaster, after trawling a couple of malls to find some bargains, Harry had to go and drop off some medicine to one of his wife's friends. Now they live in the middle of nowhere. It was about ten minutes down a dirt track til we found the place. When we got there, harry has jumped out and got the driver to turn it round. Unfortunately, as we are in the middle of nowhere, and there are no street lights, he reverses into a ditch, made nicely half full of water due to the rain of the last two days. Also, sadly, this huge 4x4 that we had been driving around in urns out not to be so much a 4x4, and more of a rear wheel drive. Even with Harry and my weight on the back wheels, all we did was spin. So we hop out to have a look at what we can do, and I am immediately warned about snakes andreminded hat only four minutes earlier Harry had been telling me that last time he was down here, he saw a cobra fighting with a dog. One by one ltarted materialising out of the darkness, like skinny brown wraiths, but bless them, they were all there to help. Even so, I couldn't help thinking that we were miles from anywhere in a place where the police would never come to, so felt a little twinge of concern. Harry kept asking me to scour the wasteland for bits of rock and timber, and I carefully filed this request in the same mental drawer as 'for gods sake look out for cobras', and told him to fuck off. Luckily the kids wer all more tha happyto risk rummaging around in the gloom, waiting for a hiss and needle-prick that would end up leaving their arms looking like a basketball sized blood blister. After an hour of repeatedly jacking up the car and forcing stuff under the chassis, we were ready for another crack at it. Joining in at the rear, we rocked the thing back and forth until the damned thing got some grip. In the process, however, the wheels spinning in a foot of mud, water, and urine from the little boy who peed in it while e were there, sprayed up covering everyone, especially me, in a kind of loam pate.
After this fairly death defying experience, I got back to the club determined to have a beer, to find that all the staff had been sent home early. So I raided my fridge and drank the bintang in there while nattering on MSN.
Have just had my morning swim, and the combination of heavy rainfall, coupled with two days of no sun meant that the pool was a little on the chiily side. There were Inuit hunting seal near the deep end. Didn't stop me from doing an entire length before my limbs went numb.

J

Not too dangerous

Went to the bank this morning, and happened to pick our timing to coincide with the ATM run. Not exactly Securicor, although, you'd be a little nuts to attempt robbing them. The transport itself wasn't exactly armour plated. In fact it was a bog standard SUV. The protection, however, was supplied by two not too bright blokes with what looked like homemade automatic rifles. One went off ith the cash in the SUV, while the other remained at the bank, basically just waving his gun around, mainly pointing it at our windscreen, with his finger on the damned trigger. Couldn't help thinking it would be an undeserving way to die, at the hands of a moron with a rifle.

J

Turnup for the plus-fours

Considering I am out here in the middle of the monsoon season, I guess I was just lucky in having to wait all this time before it utterly pissed it down like this. The swimming pools have overflowed, and the hill just behind my room looks like it's eroding at a fair old lick. Today I also found out that there was a cobra that used to live in the drain behind my room. Cool as fuck! At one of the apartments they are constructing they found the skin of a python in the roof space about a metre and a half long. But luckily no spiders of any import. Saw the cutest ginger kitty yesterday, although it was probably rabid. The rain is actually easing off a wee bit now. The Indonesians have this weird thing about getting their head's wet. You see them wandering around with boxes on their heads, or carrier bags. If they're on a moped, it is not unusual for them to be under an umbrella at the same time.
Bless the security guy though. When I leave the apartments, he offers to escort me under a brolly across to the bar. They don't seem to understand that, as a lifelong UK resident, rain doesn't bother me too much.

Hoorah, the rain has finally stopped. I wasn't looking forward to getting the boat to Singapore in a storm. Hopefully it won't be back for Saturday, cos I don't fancy that much. The boat out here was bouncy enough, and it was sunny as hell then. In a lightening storm doesn't sound nearly as pleasant. And now I think about it, taking off from Sillypore in a thunderstorm doesn't exactly sound enticing either. At least if I die in a plane crash I can take comfort in the fact.....nope, I got nothing. Think I will skip on the whole dying in a plane thing, thank you so very much. I'll jump straight to the happily ever after.

J

It's about time

Well, considering I'm on the equator in the middle of the monsoon season, this morning was the first time that it has actually rained. And fuck me, it is making up for it now. With my back door open it is deafening! Might not bother with my morning swim. I could manage it by steppin off my patio..

Sunday morning

It was about nine o'clock this morning that I left the guys and went fo a post-brekkie swim. It was the hottest it has been so far. Must have hit 25 degrees at least by 9 am. Unfortunately at half nine, all the local kids take over the pool, so I escaped to the bar overlooking to stop myself from burning to death and to fire off some emails in relative comfort. Spent yesterday trawling around bars and 'fishbowls'. Fishbowls were a fucking odd experience, and it was difficult to whom it refers, the customers or the girls. You got into a room, and on the other side of the glass was, basically, the meat. It was just a load of girls all sat around looking pretty much uninterested in the whole process, except for the opportunity to stare at a collection of bules looking with horror at what was obviously not the establishment's A-squad. It felt more like we were the ones in the fishbowl, staring into a collection of wide, incredulous eyes, being scrutinised in case we did something fascinating. Admittedly, Tony did fart, but at least no bubbles came out of his arse. The bars were actually pretty mundane, just like the UK in many respects, except you see more asian customers in the UK. Football on the large telly, drunk white men leching over the bar staff, and overpriced beer. Just like home.
Just realised the major downside of the pool here. There is no sun, apart from on the pool itself. Don't know if you can tell from the photo, but all the seating is shaded, even the jacuzzi. Although I think that I would fry in this sun. We're only 1 degree north of the equator here, so it can be pretty warm. I dread to think what it is like in te direct sunlight, and it isn't even 11am yet.
Last night the guys went to a place I think iscalled Malam, but has been nicknamed 'the rehab centre'. Batam police clean up the hooker districts every so often, and arrest all the working girls, sentencing them with 3-6 months at a rehabilitation complex. The upshot of this is that there is a police-run encampment, a working village of bars and hookers. From the sound of it, I'm glad I skipped it, but I bet it was an experience. The guys got back around 2am, and when they went to the ferry this morning, they had lost one of their number. When they called him at his hotel, fifteen minutes before his 9am ferry, apparently he sounded pissed out of his head, so he might not be going home today.
This place gets more surreal every hour, turns out one of the guys who trailed down to the rehab last night is a famous aussie comedian, a sort of oz roy chubby brown. Pass me the tablets!

Peace out