Goodbye Bagus Bay with all the lovely long haired Batak boys, smiling and laughing, playing their guitars and singing in harmony in the bar.
Goodbye Lake Toba with its cool, clear water.
I caught a shared taxi from the Lake to the airport at Medan for three times the cost of the local bus .i.e. five pounds, rather than one pound fifty. The taxi business assured me that it was a non-smoking taxi, so I was understandably upset when the driver lit up. Probably thinking that I was threatening to jump out, the other passengers remonstrated with the driver, who threw the cigarette out of the window. It was a boring journey, but a smoke-free one.
The plane was full of Thai people, who laughed and joked all the way to Bangkok. But as we approached the airport, the pilot announced that we would be circling for a while, waiting for a slot to land. When we did eventually land the queues at immigration were enormous. Why is everyone coming to Bangkok on the 31st January? It’s hot, it’s humid and it’s full of tourists. Anyway, by the time I got through immigration, caught a train into town and got a taxi the rest of the way, it was ten o’clock. In Apple guesthouse Mama was distraught. No rooms, she said. Carl, who had arrived the day before, having hitched all the way from Penang, had written my name on the board (Mama’s booking system) for the 31st, but someone (her son, maybe) had rubbed it out and put someone in the last room. I ended up spending the night on the hard wooden bench in Mama’s sitting room. Mama tried to make it more comfortable by giving me a pillow and a sheet. It was still a hard wooden bench
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