I slept in a little today and I have all morning to pack things up.
Graham recommends having dinner at the Happy Banana in Labuan Bajo. I am going to check it out! It looks like it is open until 11pm.
I hugged everyone goodbye on the pier.
I left the resort at 11am and was at the airport before the counter even opened. Once it did, I could tell something was wrong, but they weren’t telling me anything. Both of the agents behind the counter were involved and it had been like 20 minutes. At one point one of the agents powdered her face. Really? So I asked but they didn’t speak any English. So the agent, God love her, brought up the Google translator app and we communicated that way.
My flight to Labuan Bajo had been canceled. But the airline was going to put me up in a hotel in Kupang. OK, then I typed in when the airplane was scheduled to leave/arrive. The details were fuzzy but it did sound like it would be in the morning.
I was supposed to check in with the ticketing office when I arrived in Kupang. OK
Then after all that, they still tried to charge me for the overweight baggage. Through Google translator, I tried to explain that this was SCUBA gear and it doesn’t apply to the overweight baggage rule… and in fact on my previous flights on this same airline, they didn’t charge me. These meek little Indonesian girls would not budge. I then asked to talk to their manager and of course, he was in a meeting. Ha. Then I realized that the bags were already gone and probably on the plane, so just waive the fee. Then my bags magically appeared back in the checkin area.
I was playing chicken with these agents. And now the time was getting close to boarding. Ugh. So I realized that they had never told me the actual cost. It was around $35 USD. So really that’s not so bad. But after not having to pay on the last flights and now my other flight getting canceled I really felt they should waive this.
So I handed them my credit card.
And they said “Sorry, we don’t take.”
C’mon, really? This is an airline for crying out loud!
So then I told them I really didn’t carry cash… and we waited longer…
I did have some Rupiah but possibly just barely enough to cover this, so I didn’t want to use it all here.
Finally I got them to agree to take $30 USD and $5 worth of Rupiah.
I guess I really am an ugly American.
Once I got to Kupang and collected my luggage (thank God it arrived – I did cross my mind that they might mess with the baggage now), I found the ticketing office. I waited some more and when it was my turn the woman seemed to know what to do and was able to tell me that the hotel was going to come pick me up and bring me back in the morning.
She left the office to go get that driver. And didn’t come back for over half an hour. When I finally saw her back at the counter, she said the driver was almost there… and moments later this little man was in front of me with a brown Indonesian style shirt and these blue rimmed eyes. He actually spoke decent English. Hooray!
He drove me to the hotel which was neither of the two names that the agent gave me. It was called Chrysant Home Stay.
As we pulled up it looked like the hotel in that movie “The Best Exotic Marigold Hotel” (or whatever it’s called). This thing was big and I guess had potential but it was falling down everywhere and was under construction but looked like it had been for the last twenty years.
The owner had the bellboy take my luggage up to the room and sat with me at a table on the patio. He went on and on about how lucky it would be for an Indonesian man to marry such a clean pretty white woman. Then he wanted to friend me on Facebook. Not!
He offered me tea and coffee but I did see that there were soft drinks so I asked for a coke instead and he got one for me.
We sat there for what seemed like forever (I was even reading my kindle by that time) and I finally asked if the room was ready. He said: “Yes, it’s been ready for a while now.”
Ugh. I don’t get it. Grrrrrr…
So we made a plan that at 6pm he would drop me off at a local restaurant.
The room was small but had air conditioning and a working shower. The bed seemed fine. However, later I found there were ants in the room. Marching across the floor. Ew.
The driver took me to a seafood restaurant and said he would come back to get me in an hour.
There was an open courtyard with lots of crazy lighting and a running fountain next to a statue of the Virgin Mary.
I got a seat and looked at the menu. It was all in Indonesian. Crap.
Then I remembered Google Translator. And I noticed that the restaurant had WiFi. So I asked for the password and she gave it to me. OK, now we are in business! I ordered a strawberry Fanta and sent her away while I studied the menu. I figured it out and ordered a Crab for dinner. It was good but I forgot what hard work it is to get the crab meat out. I then asked for napkins and they said no, just wash your hands. Oh man… I got so messy.
After washing my hands, I wandered over to the freezer where I saw they had ice cream. I got one that looked pretty normal: vanilla ice cream and chocolate outside. I was super interested in another one with green on the inside. I thought maybe it was pistachio.
After I ate the first one, I went ahead and got the second one. I did google translator on this thing called Dung Dung and it turns out that this is green bean ice cream. It wasn’t half bad actually. I guess this means you can tell your mom you are eating your vegetables.
I noticed that they had two huge tables set up in the middle of the restaurant and some helium balloons spelling out Happy Birthday. It was a baby’s birthday party. I’m sure it was really for the family, not the baby.
While I had WiFi, I caught a message from Graham. He saw on Facebook that I got stuck overnight and he asked me what he could do to help. I told him where I was staying and that I was having a nice meal, so I told him I was fine. He said it was really fun diving with me. I told him I’d go diving with him anytime, just say when and where.
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