Jakarta

12/23 (uploaded later)

I’m stranded in Jakarta, well that wouldn’t be that bad, but more precisely I’m stranded in the domestic terminal of the Jakarta airport. I’ve checked in my luggage and cannot leave the terminal, and my plane is… not there. We were supposed to take off four hours ago. And they just keep announcing next delays. Of course they do so in bahasa Indonesia, I’m the only tourist so why bother… It sounds like: 5 minutes of announcement in bahasa and then in English – quote - “plane delayed”. Luckily there is one helpful English-speaking guy here who translates it for me, but come on. They give no reason for the delay, when I asked (via my interpreter ;) whether we will go at all, they didn’t want to tell me. And this is my 30th hour of travel, the flight do Makassar takes about 3 hours. 

Honestly, I think that as soon as I get a hotel room I will fall asleep and not wake up for the next 24hrs. If I had my luggage with me, I would have left the airport. I just want to take a shower and go to sleep. I can’t really sleep here – first of all, the airport staff is far from being friendly and I don’t think they would wake me up for the flight, and second – there are cockroaches here, running around on the floor and on the seats in the waiting room. Thus, I prefer to stay awake. 

I think once I get (to Makassar and) some sleep I will head to Jayapura and if I have time then on my way back I will see the death village in Tana Toraja (which is in Sulawesi, and is famous for rather bizarre funeral rites with cadavers ‘displayed’ in the villages). Or maybe not… For now I just wanna get out from this airport-prison ;)