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| Goodbye Dunkin' Donuts. Thanks to your strong coffee, my bro and I were able to get to a strong start to our mornings. |
One More for the Road:
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| Breakfast special. 12,000 rupiah |
Last night my brother gave me the option of where I wanted to surf. He said that Daz was down for a paddle out as well. The options were either Nusa Dua or Uluwatu again. It was kind of a big decision. Should I score a crowded, world class wave on my last day, or should I go somewhere that I can have all to myself? The swell was predicted to drop again, so it’s not like the surf would be epic anywhere. But I’ve learned since being here that no matter how flat the prediction, there are places that will at least be a solid Bali three feet no matter what. We decide on meeting at Dunkin’ Donuts at 0630.
I went to sleep at about 0100 last night. I wake up, look at my watch, and it’s 0527. Fuck, I could just get up now, but I’m so tired. I close my eyes, open them again, and it’s 0540. I consider it a blessing that my body’s woken itself up this early; this is the earliest since I’ve been at the Ayu Beach Inn. I take my time, get my gear ready, and head out in the morning darkness. It’s the last morning, surf session, ride that I’ll be doing in a while. I try to absorb the moment. There are only a few taxis and mopeds on the road, a few street lamps and neon lights illuminate the street, shadows grow darker away from the road, the cool air hits my face, and the hum of the motor is all I can hear. I fill up the tank and head to Dunkin’. Randy’s not there. Today is a holiday, or the “Indonesian Christmas.” The workers are wearing celebratory clothing, and they’re still opening the store.
I grab my coffee, skip the donut again, and start to eat my breakfast sandwich. The TV is off, which sucks. Television in other countries intrigues me, and who can’t resist Indonesian Scooby Doo? Just as I dust off my sandwich, I see Randy pull up. He says that Daz is running late, but that we’ll check out Nusas without him.
We start off the morning with another episode of “What Would Randy Do?” Traveling to Bali has really opened my eyes and made me curious about other possible surf adventures. I ask him, “If you had an opportunity to travel somewhere and sit on a spot for about a month, where would it be?”
Without hesitation, he says, “Sumbawa . . . Sumbawa, Lakey Peak.”
I wonder if he’s understood my question because I intended to find out where he’d go other than Bali or Indo. He then explains to me about why Indo is so good.
He says, “I know that you’re thinking Thailand, Matt, but Thailand is seasonal.” He sits up in his chair, looks at the table, and mimics the motion of his hand chopping something. “You can surf there, but there’s only surf in the wet season.”
“What about PI?”
“PI, too. There’s waves, but it’s not year round. The thing about Bali is that we get swell during the wet season, and we get swells during the dry season from Australia in the summer. The other places don‘t do that.”
His insight on the matter kind of kills my drifter fantasy. I really wanted to see those countries and knock out surf at the same time, and despite the seasonal issue, these other places don’t really compare when it comes to surf. So is it be better to travel and sightsee while surfing waves that won’t put you to the test, or is it better to make surfing the priority and go where the waves are heavy?
Randy goes on about Sumbawa. He says, “The wave is like this.” He pulls up his hand and shapes a “C” with it. “But that’s strictly a surf spot. Once you land, the surf is right there. You don’t have to go anywhere.”
We switch the subject and talk about my trip since I’ve been here. I ask him, “Have I seen six feet in Bali . . . at all!?”
Randy looks down, shakes his head, and says, “Nah . . . maybe . . . five feet at the most.”
I’m not surprised. He feels like getting another coffee. I tell him I’ll get one with him, but we look at the clock and decide to start the morning. I go to release the morning mud before we leave. The toilet has one of those faucet things with the water spout that shoots up into your bunghole. I’m already sold on rinsing my anus off with the sprayer thing, so I give this contraption a try. I turn the knob for pressure, but I open it too much. The water pressure misses my asshole, hit’s the inside rim of the toilet bowl, and water ricochets all over my face and lips. I shut the water off and this time open the valve slowly, but it’s no use, the sights are off. I’m not sure if any shit germs are now on my face, but I wipe myself off and check the toilet paper; there are no brown marks.
We head out to Nusa Dua. In the villages, all the locals are dressed up and heading somewhere. There’s a holiday feel in the air, but not one based on consumerism. The last couple days, there was no traffic from people rushing to get last minute gifts. They are mostly carrying food, and it seems that their presence alone is enough. It reminds me of going to little Filipino parties, growing up on Maui, but this is a much larger scale.
We can’t park at our usual lookout point because there’s a party at the temple. A Balinese woman calls for her dog that prances in front of Randy and I. It jumps over the small wall onto the next lot, but it’s about a seven foot drop down. The woman gasps, but then we see the dog prancing around again in the distance. She’s relieved. It was a weird sight to see it just jump over the wall like that, almost suicide-like.
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| Low Tide |
We can see waves breaking, there’s definitely surf there, but the reef is completely drained. It looks like a long walk out to the line up.
“I’ve never seen it this low,” says Randy.
He dismounts to take a piss behind a wall. We watch two surfers to see if they catch anything. They don’t.
“Okay,” says Randy. “Here’s the deal. We can either go to Uluwatu and surf cleaner, crowded, waves . . . or we can surf this.”
“I’m just worried about the tide, if it’s breaking too close or not.” It’s a moment of indecisiveness. Uluwatu is so tempting. It’s such a beautiful place, I’ve only surfed it once, I know for sure that there are good waves there, but again, I don’t want to have to deal with crowds on my last day. “Let’s just surf here.”
Randy gets on his phone and sends a last line of communication to let Daz know what we’re doing. “Daz will probably be turned off by this,” he says.
I contemplate for another moment. “Okay, we can surf Ulus I say.”
“What, you sure?”
I’m reluctant, a couple seconds pass. I look back out. “I know you don’t want to surf here.”
“Bro, it’s up to you. It’s your last day. I can do either. We can surf here if you want.”
“Okay, let’s do it.”
Interesting Characters:
We park down by the one empty warung. I’ve never seen the place packed, but they’ll watch your stuff for you if you got valuables. Half way through preparation, a guy pulls up on a moped. He says hi to us, and we start talking about the surf. His name is Carlos, and (interesting enough) he’s a surf traveler from the Dominican Republic of all places. All the dialogue is just small talk, but his insights on certain things resonate with me. He has bandages all over his ankles.
Randy asks, “Ohhh! What happened?!”
“Ahhh. I try to wear reef booties to protect the reef. But instead, the reef kicked my ass.” He looks down at the gauze around both ankles. There is so much that he looks like a muay Thai fighter.
We start talking about the surf today and how the tide is low. Carlos says that he’ll probably never surf Bali on a low tide again. He has a trip planned for the Mentawais, but he says that he’s “over it,” and that he’d just rather stay in Bali. Randy asks why, and Carlos says that you’ll definitely score, but that after you’re done surfing, there’s nothing to do.
Carlos says, “After the surf, you just sit on the boat, and then what? There’s no restaurant, no womenz! Just eat oatmeal everyday.”
I think to myself . . . Mentawais sounds awesome, but I’m sure he’s right. That would be a trip just for surf, strictly for surf. And with all the good food in town, it would be hard to be limited oatmeal for a week.
Carlos also fills us in on the crowds, that nowadays there are more surf boat trips, and that when they see your boat, other boats just dock next to it. “At least fourteen people in the water when you pull up,” he says.
Randy was adamant that I keep the details out of their next conversation. They talked about the “secret spots” that they both know. It turns out that Carlos is waiting for Daz, and he’s part of Randy’s surf circle, so they share the info. It sounds intense. “It’s round,” says Carlos. He makes a “C” shape with his hand. I guess everyone does out here. “Even two feet, the wave is round. It stands up so much. You not getting barreled, but it feel like you getting barreled.”
Randy’s already frothing at this point, and they agree to hit up the spots together in the future.
One Last Reef Dance?:
The tide is so low that you can only walk to the line up, just short of where the waves are breaking. If you haven’t been able to tell from the Nusa Dua pics, it’s pretty far. Randy says that that’s why it’s barely packed there. No one wants to make that long ass paddle when the tide is up. And of course, reef dancing has its challenges.
Our walk has different depths. One moment we’re waist deep and the next we are fully exposed. Randy’s especially careful after his vana incident, but he’s still three or four car lengths ahead of me. Randy spots things on the way there. “Baby lobster!” he shouts back at me. A couple paces later he says, “Sea snake!” I thought I was the explorer, I’m thinkin’. I’m so worried to step on something. The last thing I want is to have to title my next blog “Nusa Dua’s Revenge,” so I completely miss everything my brother finds.
Randy says the one word that slows me down even more, “Vana!” I look down a couple paces later, and they’re everywhere. Every little dark patch that looks like a shadow is a sea urchin. We’re nearing the white wash, the water’s moving around, I lose visibility, so I can only pray that my feet will do the rest.
Classic Brotherly Moments:
My grandpa had a pasture in the West Maui mountains. It was pretty high up there past the pineapple fields. It was the biggest and most beautiful out of all the ones that we maintained. He worked for Maui Land & Pineapple Co., so he had access to all the gates.
It’s not uncommon for people to “grow” in Maui. My brother was still in high school, and I was probably in sixth grade on some school break vacation visiting from L.A. My brother and I hopped over the barbed wire fence which bordered the pasture. We walked into some dense vegetation, dark, canopied by the forest. I forgot what happened with the plants, if we saw them, planted them, checked on them, or left with them. What I do remember was hearing a wild boar snorting around in the bushes around us.
We both froze in panic. Randy was in front of me. He put his arm out to stop me at the shoulder and said, “Wait!”
Being a young pussy and scared shitless, I held my breath as Randy approached the bush with only a metal ditch digging pipe to defend himself. As he neared the bush, the whole fucking thing started shaking. He took a step back and held the pipe, but the boar wasn’t coming out. Randy turned to me and said to run on his signal.
I was thinking the worst, running full speed, chubby and dumb, heading back to the safety of the barbed wire. We MacGuyver-hopped that fence. I don’t think he ever told my grandpa what happened.
On this very morning, decades later, we stand in ankle deep water on pokey reef staring at some big sets breaking right in front of the shelf. The white wash comes in, raises the sea level, and we’re knocked backwards, awkwardly struggling to maintain footing.
“Woooooooh!” Randy shouts. He’s smiling and being pushed back with me. It’s out of character. Usually he’s stone cold, sober as a judge, and cool as a cucumber when we’re in the water. Whenever he’s calm, I feel calm. This doesn’t mean he’s scared, but I barely see this from him, so I’m expecting that this situation may be somewhat heavy.
“Okay,” he says. “We’re going to have to time this!” Another set crashes, white wash explodes, we’re in knee deep water from the rush, then it goes ankle deep again. “We can paddle out here!”
I look down and see hard reef, brown plants growing on it, a couple purple things, and some green slimy stuff. Right here.
“We just gotta get past that shelf,” he says. “So . . . just paddle your ass off.” We brace the next set. “Are you ready!?” he asks.
Do I really have a choice? Of course not. What a question filled with contradiction. They should replace “are you ready” with “we’re going.”
The white wash crashes, it lifts us. “GO!” he says.
I’m paddling, the shelf is right below us, and it’s so shallow. We’re paddling through foam, and all I can do is look in the distance, waiting for that bump that’ll make my back look like grated cheddar. The water’s getting deeper, the wave in front of us is small, and by the time we have to duckdive we’re in deep water.
When we reach the outside, Randy lets out another “Wooooooh!” He’s smiling again as he looks behind us at the crashing set. “We made it!”
My heartbeat starts to settle. We made it. I’m glad we did.
Surf Closure:
It’s not the wave buffet that it was two days ago. The swell has dropped so much, but there are still some sets to start the sesh. Not all the waves have shape.
“If you go right, watch out for the shelf,” says Randy.
Out of naïve inexperience, I paddle for a right that has a shoulder. It’s a big tilting wave, but by the time I finish dropping in and try to set up my bottom turn, the section’s about to curl over me. I thought it had a shoulder. I look down and see the brown plant life. I’m thinking about the reef. Oh God, here it comes. I try to ass plant at the base as it closes out, doing everything to stay behind the wave and not in front. It crashes, I’m swirling, but it’s controlled. I don’t know how, but I never feel the bottom. I paddle back out to Randy.
“You went for the right,” he says.
“Yeah . . . I can’t believe I didn’t hit the shelf.”
I can’t bullshit myself. I’m freaked out. I think I’m lucky. The wave closed out right over the shelf. It was a set wave; I should’ve been torn to shreds. I’m humbled and cautious. A perfect A-frame appears out of no where, but we’re both out of position.
“Awwwww! That’s the one I’ve been waiting for!” says Randy.
We adjust and sit in that spot. Another one comes, I’m in perfect position right in the middle of the peak.
“Go!” Randy yells.
I’m one stroke away, see the section building, but I pull out. Randy catches the next left while I bob on the outside.
He comes back and says, “Don’t be afraid to go for the bombs.”
I sit and think. I’m already frustrated at myself, but the reef just has me freaked out. It’s still shallow. “I’m not afraid.” I say.
“You passed up a good one.”
I know I did, it‘s a backhanded comment that I don‘t really need. I smile defensively, pause, and say, “I know I missed it. It‘s obvious. I’m just a little worried about the reef.”
“You’re thinking too much.”
I’m going for the next one, I’m thinking. I catch a left, but the waves are a little fast for me this morning. I can only angle as I’m dropping, and then I have to safely fall as the wave closes. I catch a small handful, but I don’t get any turns. Randy’s good, he rides them much longer, and kicks out over the shoulder, unscathed, on the inside.
One more bomb comes in, but we’re both out of position again. Two boats come to drop off some surfers, but they’re going to another spot. From there, the surf goes dead. It may be the rising tide, but Nusa Dua may as well be a tiny day at Porto. We can see the other peaks working, but they are really far away.
It’s my last surf session of the trip. It’s not an epic one, but it’s quiet, no ones around, it’s peaceful, it’s not gnarly, and I’m spending it with my one and only blood brother. I was always concerned about getting seriously injured by the surf out here, and this session was more like a sense of closure. I’ve had my fun, faced ball shrinking conditions, obliterated the zones of my comfort level, and here I am now, perfectly fine.
I tell Randy that I’m good. I need to check out of the hotel anyway. I catch my last Nusa Dua wave. It’s shapeless, but I use it to straighten out and take me in. I’m a little sad. Not for the lack of surf but that all these surf adventures have officially come to an end.
Time To Go:
Instead of a long walk back, it’s now a long paddle back. I paddle in way ahead of Randy; I don’t see him anywhere. And yet, as soon as I touch the sand, the fuckin’ guy is right behind me. Damn him and his bionic paddle!
Daz waits for us near the stairs as we walk in.
Daz says, “Boys, we seen you out there. We’ve been watching, but the other guys went to go grab something to eat.” He’s wearing a faded pink shirt and an old baseball cap. He’ll never be confused for a fashion model; he’s all surf addict.
He asks how it was, but I figure if he was watching that he probably saw me eating shit. Daz says he’s not gonna do it; it’s not his style. I say my farewells to him, say it’s been a pleasure, and that next time I’ll be better prepared to charge with him.
“Yeah,” Daz says. “I tried to invite you guys to Sumbawa.”
I’m thinking in my mind, I would’ve probably died at Sumbawa, especially after I’ve heard it pumped up by every surfer here. Next time.
The drive back is significant. It’s the last time that I’ll be on this machine, salt encrusted, plastered by Vertra, wedgied by my wet boardshorts, and feeling the Bali wind in my face. Sky said something to me that really stuck, it was from the first day I met him. I told him about how driving here scares the shit out of me.
He replied, “All my friends that I talk to back home, when they talk about Bali, this is what they miss. Driving around here, being on the bike, heading out for an early morning surf, the trails, the roads.”
Yeah . . . I can see that.
I check out at the motel, stop by BK, say goodbye to Wulan and Citri, and I take a couple pics with them. Wulan apologizes that her husband Kadek can’t take me to the airport, but I tell her that she’s apologizing for nothing. She thanks me for the clothes and donations that I brought for them. I tell her that I’ll have a better Michael Jackson dance when I return.
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| Wulan, Citri, and their family have treated me like their own blood. Until next time. |
I’m riding with my board, suitcase, and backpack so stuffed that the zippers are bulging. I’m worried for that one accident to put the rotten cherry on top of the trip, but I make it to Randy’s without incident.
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| Jaya will be big the next time I see him. |
I unload the bike, shower, play with Jaya for a little bit, and then Randy and I head out for two hour massages, again, only for $10. This was planned. After all, what better way to prepare for a long international flight?
Randy tells the people at the counter, “I want someone strong!”
I’m worried at hearing this. HE wants someone strong. I just want a “massage.” When we enter the hallway there are two chicks. One has a pleasant smile, greeting me with a hand gesture to sit down. The second one is older, who’s face tells tales of war. She has an involuntary grimace. She’s not heavy, but her cheeks weigh down, and her expression has a grim quality. Fuck that, I’m thinking. I sit down with the first chick.
I know what to expect now. She cleans off my feet, leads me upstairs, and it’s G-string time again. I learn that my upper back and calves are tight. She goes over them, feels the knots, sees that I’m squirming, and dedicates herself to indulging in my pain. Not only does she go over the knots, but she digs her fingers into them; they feel more like pressure points. And when I think that the worst is over, she’ll dig her finger above the painful spots, run it down slowly, and work out the knots again with each stroke. It’s like she’s ironing out wrinkles over my body.
When I turn over I fall asleep as soon as she starts caressing my chest. She doesn’t put me in the “huckle buck” like the last person, but my body feels so loose and relaxed that I’m ready for a nap.
We stop at the Javanese warung on the way home. It’s my official last splurge in Bali, so I get a big plate with dessert again. Back at the house, Randy asks me if I did everything that I wanted to do. I tell him that I didn’t get the barrel, but I accept that I don’t have the wave knowledge yet, and that I’ll just have to work on that.
“Does Huntington barrel at all?” I ask. It was his favorite spot since moving from Oceanside.
He lowers his eyebrows and nods his head. “Yeah, there’s barrels there. It’s a high performance wave.”
He tells me that I should surf there if I want to improve and train for the next trip, and HB has the current and good combo swells when the conditions are right.
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| Last banana split shot, I pomise. |
There’s a little downtime before I fly. I’m already packed, I’m still full from dinner, so I go to Chat Café one last time to post the Uluwatu blog. It takes longer than I expect, and by the time I get back, Jessica and Jaya are in bed. Randy’s up, he coordinates a cab for me, and I’m a little rushed to shower and put my bags outside. I regret not having a chance to shoot the shit with my brother a little bit more, but we come from an unemotional family, and we’ve spent the whole day together anyway. There are no cabs available because of the holiday, so he has to ride around town on the bike to flag one down.
It’s dark, there are no street lights, and mosquitoes buzz about. I feel the loose dirt and gravel under my slippers, and the light from the blue Yaris taxi brightens the road. I tell Randy I love him, thank him, and that we’ll surf again. I give him a big hug, he hugs me back, but I barely feel it. I say, “Squeeze me, God dammit!” He does. My big, shreddah, brother in Bali, my role model. I will truly miss him.
Denpasar:
The cab driver’s a nice guy. I tell him how much I love Bali, and he tells me how much I look Japanese. My brother said to only tip 2,000 rupiah, but my western senses make that really hard. He’s grateful for the two thousand, but I give him another two Gs. It makes me happy to make this guy’s night.
International airports. I think Cairo was the worst one that I’ve traveled through. There are no signs for China Air, and I have one big suitcase and Klaude’s boardbag that I’m lugging around. After walking back and forth, someone tells me where to stand; the counter’s not open yet. Once it does open, I check my bags in, and I hand the guy my credit card. He swipes it, pauses, and a concerned look overcomes his face.
“Is this the only card you have?” He says.
“It’s not working?”
“No. This card no work.”
Fuck . . . I grab my Visa debit card and hand it to him.
He looks at it, flips it around, and asks, “Is this debit?”
“Yes.”
“Debit no work, need credit.”
Fuck my life. I’m feeling pretty damn vulnerable right now. “How much in rupiah?” I ask.
“Five-hundred-fifty-thousand.”
I pull out my dwindling wad of rupiah. I’m over two-hundred-thousand short. “Is there ATM here?” I ask.
“Yes.” He points outside and gives me my baggage claim tickets. “Show them this at the door the come back inside.”
Damn . . . I’m thinking about the worst case scenario. I picture myself frantically contacting my brother, asking him for some money to borrow. And then again, how the fuck would I get a hold of him? Also, what the fuck is wrong with my fucking credit card? I’m cursing Bank of America and their Hawaiian miles. Assholes.
When I get to the exit, there’s an airport security guy sitting by the door. I tell him that I need to use the ATM. He points to a sign stating that once passengers check-in they can’t leave. I tell him I need to pay for my luggage.
He says, “Okay, I help you.” He opens the door, but just as we’re stepping outside, an Asian tourist starts running up to the door, yelling his goodbyes to a family member inside the terminal. It catches the both of us off guard. I wait, the guard is looking at me, then he has to stop the Asian guy, and THEN the guard just gets overwhelmed. He grabs me by the arm, points to where the ATM is and says, “I help you, you help me,” then he turns and deals with the other guy.
The whole situation is weird. Does he want a bribe, am I going to have to pay this guy just to get back in? Thank goodness, my debit card works at the ATM, but I can only withdraw rupiah. To avoid this from happening again, I take out more than I need. I go through security again and take a wide route back to China Air, avoiding the guard. I pay my rupiah, go upstairs, pay another 150,000 exit fee, and then I have one more counter to go through.
I whip out my camera, take a pic, and the guy at the counter yells, “Hey, no photo!”
“Oops, I’m sorry.” I shove my camera back in my pocket and approach.
“You delete picture!” he says.
“Ummmm,” I have to think fast. I barely use my flash. “No flash, I didn’t take picture.”
He puts a sticker on my boarding pass and I head towards my gate. It’s midnight. Day 29 is over.
