We’ve spent past week in Northern Indonesia going around Padang and Bukittinggi. Now we are super nervous if we are able to fly tomorrow towards Bali or will our flights be canceled because of the volcano that’s erupting there. Going to Bali has been a dream to me for so long, I hope everything ends up going smoothly.
In Padang we’ve been staying in this great homestay pretty close to everything, but outside of the city center. Our homestay host is super sweet local lady who speaks amazing English and tries to help us with absolutely everything. We always travel with air mattress that our daughter sleeps on (in case we can’t find a place with enough beds for suitable cost) and we were positively surprised when we arrived to this homestay and the owner had made a mattress for our daughter too (in Asia hotel staff doesn’t usually care if there’s enough beds or not). Then for 3 nights we went up to Bukittinggi to couchsurf and then came back to Padang and to the same homestay - and the owner bought a whole new bed for the room we were staying! How nice is that! I can’t even tell how much that meant for us (not to mention all the other nice things she does for us, making breakfast and arranging day trips and figuring out how we can get to airport at 4 am). If you are coming to Padang and are looking for amazing and affordable place to stay then Musa Enda B&B is for you!
Our stay at the Bukittinggi was the absolute opposite. As I mentioned we were supposed to couchsurf up there on the mountains and we thought we found amazing host through couchcurfing.org. So we took the Uber from Padang to Bukittinggi and met our host in some gas station, and from there he took us to his sister’s restaurant. We were tired and hungry and just hoped to go eat and relax. Now somebody reading this must wonder why we just didn’t eat a the restaurant, right? Oh we wish, but it was one of the filthiest places I’ve seen in my travels. Gross. Mold everywhere, food buffet open without anything to cover them, all the meat and fish dried up in the sunshine, not to talk about the tables and their conditions. And the toilet... Feast everywhere and no water or soap, so everybody just went there and then went to eat with their fingers (no forks, spoons or knifes in Indonesia). Just.. OMG, terrible place. So we didn’t eat. Next thing we know is that our host leaves somewhere to “quickly pick up his son”. Goes one hour, he’s not back. The his sister leaves the restaurant too and we are left there on our own. Three bule’s who doesn’t speak Indonesian (and no one speaks English). Some customers tries to come to eat, waits for a while and leaves. Then after another hour our host comes back with his sister and family and still insists to stay at the restaurant. At this point we are exhausted, hungry and pissed off. So then after staying at the filthy restaurant for hours our host finally decided to take us to his place and it is CATASTROPHE! I have never in my life seen a place that dirty. Toys everywhere, food everywhere, dust everywhere, flies and cockroaches, no running water, toilet again full of shit... Just terrible. And this guy wants us to sleep on the floor. I don’t expect much when traveling and I sure don’t need much, but this was just too much. We ended up going to hotel. We still didn’t want to hurt his feelings and gave him a reason that we have a bad back that we really need a good bed to sleep in.. So we met this guy every day and he took us around - all the time asking money. It was absolutely horrible and awkward. We are there to couchsurf, o make friends and bond and then there’s this guy who speaks super bad English and just wants money. We felt used and somehow like we were the bad guys here when we told him no to money requests (after buying all the foods and drinks and already giving him 300 000 for the gas - which by the way cost him less than 100 000, but he tried to hide it from us). Absolutely terrible couchsurffing experience that I hope no one else ever has to go through. We got rid off this guy couple of hours ago and we all feel exhausted like after a hard break up or something.
Oh, also as a side note I did not get into the school. So more bad news there. Now we hope the volcano doesn’t erupt or the ash won’t cancel our flight to Bali tomorrow. Pleasepleaseplease let us go to Bali. After these few hard days I just want everything to go smoothly.