I had a dream last night: There was a big explosion of the Muslim population in Moose Jaw, and they built a HUGE mosque directly south of St. Joseph's Church, it dwarfed the church. The mosque as HUGE, and very impressive to behold.
Up about 8:30, showered, had breakfast. Ojek driver came about 9:20, as I was finishing packing. I checked out, and ojek buddy drove me to Senggigi. We almost got in an accident, almost hit a BIG truck head on. That would have hurt. I saved us by pointing the truck out to buddy, because he got distracted with something else.
He dropped me off at Lombok Coconut Hotel, and waited while I checked it out. Nice, swimming pool, big room for 45000 rupiah, I got them down to 40,000 rupiah, and decided to stay. No breakfast included, though. I paid the ojek driver and moved in. They were very happy to see me here. I'm around the point from the main town strip.
Walked down to the beach, black sand beach at my bay. Walked past the point to the main town area. It is DEAD!!! Hotels, bungalows and resorts shut down, lay overgrown, in disrepair. Most of the shops downtown are all boarded up, for sale or rent signs on them. Most of the hawker stalls are shut down. Very few tourists and only a few hawkers. It's really hard to so "No thanks" to the children trying to sell little toy boats. The whole town is quite sad, actually, considering this was THE tourist destination on Lombok before the Bali bombings. Tourists are starting to go back to Bali, but not Lombok.
Stopped at the Berry Cafe for lunch. Started chatting with Berry, the owner. He's quite talkative, and introduces me to his son, a half-breed, half Indonesian, half Canadian. His ex is Canadian. He asks me where I'm staying, I tell him, and he says that's a fair distance from town, and he takes me to the bungalows next to his cafe and shows them to me. If I want to move there, it's a lot closer to town. He also remarked that I can stay at his home with him and his maid (a teenage boy), for free, if I want. We got back to his restaurant, he invites me upstairs in his restaurant to show me the work he's doing, renovating to make an additional open-ari loft for his restaurant. We sat upstairs for a while, talking. He told me about his family, all nurses and police officers, we talked about sex and diseases, and lots of other things. He's also very touchy-feely, keeps touching me on the leg or arm or whatever. So, I'm just thinking he's friendly, that's all. No big deal. His son comes upstairs with two of his friends, he introduces me to him, he'd be, maybe 6 years old, then his maid comes up and introduces me to him, then he offers to show me his home, so I can decide if I want to stay at his plac. He takes me there, he lives in an upscale area, where lots of expats live, three bedroom house, he sleeps in one, the maid in another, the third is presently vacant, which I could use. He's Catholic, and has various Catholic symbols about his home. He's fairly well off, owns 75% of his business, he plans on paying off the rest by end of the year, he owns a nice home. On the bike ride to his house, and back to the cafe, he occassionally touched me on the leg as he talked. He then takes me to an internet cafe, so I can use the internet, and I thank him, and think to myself he's a little strange, but I'm done with him now. NOPE! Five minutes later, he's back, saying he has to check his e-mail or something. I finished using the internet and said bye, and started to walk back to my hotel, and he stops me, "No, don't go back, come back to my restaurant, my sister dropped off a jelly cake last night, you should have a piece, it's so good." Not wanting to be rude, I oblige, and off we go back to his restaurant, and we have jelly cake (wasn't that good) and a mixed fruit shake (free).
He then offered to take me back to my hotel, it's a fair walk, so I said sure, and on the way there, he's drove real slow, and he kept touching my leg and and my hand. He starts telling me how much he likes my white skin (as all Asians do), and how hairy my legs are, and he kept trying to rub his hand up my inner thigh, and I kept pushing it away, but he kept trying. He then grabbed my hand and tried to rub my hand against his inner thigh, so I could feel how little hair Asian men have. I pulled my hand away, and it slipped through his hand. He then proceeded to keep touching my legs. At one point, he made a remark that he's heard that Canadian and American men are "huge". I remember thinking that he's driving slow enough, if I needed to, I could jump off the back of the bike without too much damage.
We got to my hotel, and I thanked him, and walked up towards reception. I had a big grin on my face about the whole, stupid experience. The hotel staff were all sitting around the reception area, including the owner, an older Norwegian lady, and one of the staff sees the smirk on my face and asks me what I'm smiling about. I told them I was at Berry's Cafe and met Berry. They all started laughing hysterically at that point! One of them blurted out, amongst his guffaws, "Ladyboy, ladyboy!" Amongst their laughing, I told them that what had happened, the whole, dumb story, and one of them made another remark, in between his laughs, that I'm going to have a knock on my door tonight. I told them he didn't know what room I was in, and laughed, then added that I expected none of them to tell him if he showed up! AFter the laughter died down a little, one of them asks if he kept touching my leg and thigh, I said ya, all the time, and they all erupted in a new fit of laughter.
The owner lady said that he's a nice guy, just a little different. I don't have to be afraid of him.
They also remarked to me not to tell the two Danish couples how much I was paying for my room, apparently they were paying a lot more than I.
Back to my room, and wrote in journal, listened to music, read.
About 6:00, got a motorbike ride to town with one of the hotel guys who was going to town to "market" the hotel. He suggested a restaurant and dropped me off there, I ate, bought a bookmark from a hawker, felt bad about not buying anything from the kids, the needy looks on their faces, then walked around a bit, ran into the guy who took me to town, then the free shuttle back to the hotel came along, and I got a ride back to the hotel, about 7:00.
Virtually no tourists here. It's crazy.
Sat at the bar counter and chatted with one of the hotel guys. He know a guy who does treks up the mountain and he could do one for me for 350,000, 3 days/2 nights. Other tours are $100US.
About 9:00, back to the room, then read and went to bed.
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