This is an account of all the mistakes i have made, am making and will make while travelling in Indonesia. In essence i hope to learn from the error of my ways and stop wasting time and money in what could very well be a paradise if you know how to make the most of it. I hope that by relaying the accounts of my misfortune i will be able to learn from it and perhaps have more fun in the future. I have made some stupid mistakes but i have also made some great discoveries and i hope i can share all my knowledge here with everyone so others can enjoy the stories.
I am probably one of the few people on this planet (real or fictional) who can honestly say they "get" George Castanza. I make bad decisions and then look back and wonder why i made those decisions. Well if i knew the answer i wouldn't be asking the question in the first place! Should i have ended that last sentence with an exclamation mark? Probably not, i'll just add that to the list. I am also blessed or cursed (depending on how you look at it) with the worst good bad luck ever known. I say "good bad" luck because although i always seem to have misfortune it is never devastating, it's just like someone is constantly throwing a spanner in the works and i have to keep removing it, even just getting to the point where i can type these words in this blog has taken a few spanner removals. Sometimes i feel like i have a malevolent pixie sitting on my shoulder with a little magical boomerang spanner but he gets more satisfaction from seeing me struggle so he never leaves me completely beaten but just hangs a little evil carrot in front of me to keep me trying to get back up.
For those of you who don't know I have visited Indonesia and Bali many times over the past 12 years. My very first time was in 2001 on a stop over on the way to Japan to work as an English teacher. I spent one day in Bali, so this place has the honour of being my very first overseas destination. I had a good friend in Bali at the time and wanted to go surfing that day if i could but i had no idea about the place and was hoping my friend would pick me up and take me surfing.
Rule number 1
If you want to go surfing and there is swell, go surfing.
He was going to meet me at my hotel, The Ramada and we could have gone surfing (unfortunately those kuta girls got the better of him). As i said i had no idea, i was there for one day in transit, i had no boards and no gear, i thought it was too difficult to go surfing without someone to help me. Enter hindsight... WRONG. I spent the day relaxing by the pool and spending money on overpriced drinks in my 4 star hotel. Little did i know that 100 meters from my hotel was one of the best left hand reef breaks in Bali, Kuta Reef, and apparently it was breaking nicely that day. I could have walked to the beach, rented a board, hired an outrigger canoe to take me out to the break and caught some nice waves. But yeah i decided it was "too difficult" basically if you know where the waves break in Bali and you have money you can surf. So my first day here and i wasted it, sipping avocado smoothies by the pool and walking along the foreshore to Kuta square. The one good thing about that day was i discovered how awesome avocado ice cream and chocolate sauce go together in combination. Amazing!
The lesson of the day is know where the nearest surf break is and know the weather conditions, all else doesn't matter and can be solved with money. Tip: if you haven't tried an avocado juice yet you don't know what your missing!
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