Fancy Living in an Eco-Tourism Resort In the Jungle?

At the foot of the Rinjani National Park, in Lantan, Batukliang Utara, there lies an abandoned coffee processing site. It's a unique place, as it lies right in the jungle in a small dip of land. The ruins of the place which is said to have included the landlord's residence, a swimming-pool fed by natural spring water, some ponds for aquaculture, and who knows what other highlights, was destroyed following unrest and discord with the local population some 15 years ago.



The place is now overgrown with moss and plants. As you walk around you hear lizzards dart between the granite blocks. Adjacent to the site, spanning a couple hundred hectares of forest is a polyculture with shade-grown coffee trees.

Shade-grown coffee is a particular form of coffee culture. It's actually the old form, since coffee trees were originally never sun tolerant (they burn under too much sun exposure) and were thus grown under canopy. However, in the last few decades sun tolerant coffee trees have been developed, and because they produce higher yields, have taken over as the dominant form of coffee culture.


Shade-grown coffee trees are planted under the canopy of existing trees, which make them an ecologically friendly alternative to sun-grown coffee plantations. Under sun-grown coffee monoculture, for example, indigenous bird populations decline by over 70%. With shade-grown coffee cultivation, some natural forest may be removed but it still allows for a rich mix of various types of trees and other plants to co-exist, which could all produce fruits, vegetables, nuts, and medicines; shade-grown coffee is typically less input-intensive (pesticides, fertilizer etc.) and thus better for maintaining a healthy biodiversity of a place.

At the same time, shade-grown coffee trees, as here in Lantang, are a source of income for local residents. They offer villagers viable alternative to cutting trees for wood and income. That said, of course yields per hectare for shade-grown coffee are much lower than for sun-grown coffee.

A foreign agri-investor company is in discussion with the local government of Central Lombok to resume management of the coffee site under a HGU license agreement. The HGU (Hak Guna Usaha) license agreement gives the license holder the right to use the land for cultivation purposes, such as for coffee. It does not include the right to harvest timber products.

Ultimately, it is expected that the agri-investor will turn the site into an agro-tourism destination, where visitors will find first-class lodging on a coffee estate, be able to do some wandering around such as to a nearby waterfall - or even trek up the Rinjani Mountain - and be in nature. In my mind, the forest trails that I have seen would also make for great mountain-biking.

Although the license hasn't been issued yet, we have already seen workers on the site beginning with cleaning up, cutting underbrush, and other works, before full construction can begin. In total, some 260 workers are already said to be employed, working away in the forest or on the main site under supervision of different team-leaders. So this is obviously a pretty big project. I wouldn't be surprised if the lodges are up and running in less than 18 months.


Coffee pot belonging to the workers

Tourism in Lombok is really taking off, I told ya!

Rumput Laut in Lombok

Yesterday I was standing on the bright blue shores of Gerupuk Bay in South Lombok, watching seaweed farmers carry their harvest from sea to land. I was meeting with their foreman, a nice chap who allowed me to take some pictures of Lombok seaweed for our forthcoming agri-catalogue. The seaweed was about to be trucked to Sumbawa, so I caught them at a nice moment.



The farmers were a happy bunch, all smiley and talkative with me. I guess the seaweed harvest was looking good and the market is right.



In Bahasa Indonesia seaweed means “rumput laut” (seagrass; rumput=grass, laut=sea) which in English translates to seagrass. Technically speaking that's the wrong word. Because seaweed is an algae form, they are NOT plants.

In English there is seagrass and seaweed. Seagrass denotes the species of marine organisms that ARE plants and, like plants, have different sexes, produce flowers, fruits and seeds. They enhance the ecosystems they live in by providing food and shelter to many animals and organisms.

One of the animals heavily dependent on seagrass for food is the dugong (also known as sea cow), the only strictly-marine herbivorous mammal.



Dugongs also live in Indonesia. There were probably populations of dugongs in Lombok not too long ago, but I haven’t heard of any now. They do still live not too far east of Lombok actually, for example near the island of Flores. They are listed as a “vulnerable to extinction” species by the IUCN, due to hunting, habitat degradation, and fishing-related fatalities (such as mutilations on their bodies from being hit by ships).

Anyways. Back to seaweed. Seaweed, unlike seagrass, reproduces via spores (not seeds) and serves fewer bio-functions in its environment. In an evolutionary sense, seaweed is less developed and more primitive than seagrass.

Seagrass and algae beds together form an important ecosystem, and both should be maintained. But the balance has been tipped in favor of algae of late. Seaweed and seagrass in fact have a non-symbiotic relationship; in areas where seagrass dies and decays - often through human disturbances like eutrophication, mechanical destruction of habitat, and overfishing – algal blooms occur. These are free-floating micro and macro algae, which obscure the water, weakening the sunlight infiltration and making photosynthesis for watergrass difficult. As this happens, the algal blooms accelerate and have a positive feedback effect on seagrass loss, and a complete regime shift from seagrass to algal dominance may occur.

Lombok has both seaweed and seagrass areas, but the areas of seagrass I’ve seen weren’t real meadows but just patches of seagrass. In the shallow areas of Tanjung’an Bay I’ve directly swum over many of these. But they are very limited. I am guessing the seagrass areas have been shrinking more and more in Lombok, just as elsewhere.



But for the marine farmers of Gerupuk Bay, seaweed is an important commodity. Seaweed is highly prized for the extraction of its gelatinous substances, like carrageenan, which is used in the food and pharma-industry. Most seaweed from Indonesia, which this year has surpassed the Philippines as the largest seaweed producer in the world, is shipped to Hong Kong and Taiwan to my knowledge.

Seaweed in Gerupuk, Lombok, grows on long lines. Typically, seaweed does not grow a real root system like seagrass (plants), but has “holdfasts” to attach itself to hard substrates like rocks and shells. But the farmers here attach short seaweed sections by rope to the long lines, so they just float at sea anyways. I’ve seen two types of seaweed harvested here yesterday: one is a large, thick and brown-green variety called “Maumere” (because it stems from said area in East Indonesia) and another is a variety from the Philippines called Tambalang, which occurs both in red and green color.



When the individual sections have grown to about 100 grams the transplanting begins.
Seaweed in Lombok is actually “transplanted” to waters in Sumbawa, where it is allowed to mature fully. An individual seaweed section there may grow to about 1.5kg. One long line with its multiple nodes will carry a total of about 25kg of seaweed for its final harvest before sale.

And that concludes my seaweed post for today. Apologies if this was a little technical. This stuff is more interesting to see in person. If you rent a boat to take you out to one of the surf breaks in Gerupuk Bay you will actually drive right past the floating structures in the water there. There are many more out at sea; I was windsurfing zig-zag through a field of them once. Or they were lobster farms. I forget. I was paying attention to other things, like how to get back to shore.

Being Beaten Over The Head With A Rainbow

Another Lombok beach with not a soul on it. This one in Ekas on the south-east coast.

You’re wondering, “well, wasn’t there at least a photographer there?” Nope.

How this picture came about: I had to run up the hill, set the camera to auto-picture mode, which gave me 10 seconds to jump off the point of the cliff, swim a short distance, and climb out of the water looking as casual as I can. True story told by a liar.

I’m tired of the blue lagoons. The lonely coves. The palm trees. The white sand beaches all to myself. Too much beauty. It’s like the Englishman Russell Brand said about his short stint in Hawaii shooting a movie there, “yes it was beautiful for a week or two, but after that it just felt like being beaten over the head with a rainbow.” Painstakingly beautiful.

I need a change. I want to be a sardine in a box on an overcrowded Italian beach and fight with other beachgoers over the corner of my towel they are sitting on. Or tell them that they just threw sand on my bags. That they're standing in my sun. And curse at the Mojito inebriated drunkards who stumble over my legs. Not to mention the exorbitant entrance fee I want to pay to set foot on the beach in the first place.

Folks, time’s running out. I’m telling you, y’all come visit me while you still can. The resorts are planned. Development is coming. Hurry before this landscape has changed.

I'm trying to break your heart

When they see a "bule" (foreigner), most kids in Praya will just call out "Hello Mister", regardless of whether you are a man or woman, incidentally. The "mister" part is often exclaimed in somewhat truculent manner, and though it is not meant as such, it can get quite annoying. These are not the sweet kids.

But there are many sweet kids. In fact, once you get to know them, they're all sweet. In my old neighboorhood, i helped the kids with their math or English homework sometimes. They were incredibly sweet kids, i even loved the kid of my old landlord, who was a bit of a fallout character himself. i don't know if it's school or the "bule" they liked, but they were always really enthusiastic about doing homework with me. They even knocked on my door on the 1st of January at 7 a.m. in the morning to get help with their homework. I was rolling around in bed trying to pretend i wasn't home, but they persisted until i opened the door.What incredible resolve and resolution for the new year!

In my current neighboorhood I haven't made friends with the kids yet. I haven't told them my name either or helped them with homework. i want to sleep in on the 1st of January. i figure if i don't get to know them, it'll be easier to say no. So til now anyways, to the kids, i'm still "Hello Mister", yes, in that truculent speech. (Note to all Praya teachers: don't teach the kids to say "Hello Mister" to bules, it's annoying.)
I do like to play pranks, and one of these days amybe, i'm gonna stop while i drive past them and tell them my real name is Sauron. Imagine, all tourists were henceforth greeted with "Hello Sauron". And i started the trend!

Some messed up sh*t

If you've ever had a sea urchin stuck in your finger, you too will become more careful in planning your swims according to tide charts. The spines of a seaurchin lodge themselves deeply in your flesh, even if you've just brushed them slightly. They are pretty hard to get out. I rubbed red onion juice over my pinkie because I couldn't surgically remove them without making a mess of my finger. The red onion eased the swelling.

I've seen many seaurchins before but this one happened a while back and I was a newbie so to speak. It was afternoon and I was swimming into shore with some waves and surf pushing me in, when I noticed with some consternation that I was swimming right over a bed of seaurchins. And just then it was too late already.

If you're in Kuta, don't follow the tourist guidebooks' advice on swimming schedules. A lot of tourist guidebooks will tell you that the best times to swim in Kuta bay, Tanjuan or Mawun are the morning hours til noon. They say that's when the water-level is up. Now that is non-sense. There can be low tides at any time of the day. It depends on the moon phase, the position of the sun and rotation of the earth, and the shape of the ocean floor. Most places around the world experience 2 high tides and 2 low tides a day (semidiurnal) or 1 high tide and 1 low tide a day (diurnal). These tides follow a schedule of about 6 hour shifts. But not exactly 6 hours.

See, the moon orbits the Earth at the same times as the Earth rotates on its axis, so it takes slightly more than a day—about 24 hours and 50 minutes—for the Moon to return to the same position in the sky. This is why semidiurnal and diurnal tides come in with a bit of delay, like 6 hours and some squeezed minutes or 12 hours and some minutes. During the course of a year, high and low tide will pass through every hour of the day. Saying that there is always low-tide in one place before noon all year round is rubbish.

That's the clue, especially in Kuta Lombok, it's really messed up here, but I can't tell you why. Magicseaweed, the trusted surfer website that most people here consult, also doesn't think there are static tides. However, they suggest that Kuta Lombok, unlike Kuta Bali or other places, goes through irregular tide shifts which are neither diurnal nor semidiurnal tides but "mixed tides", with sometimes 10 hour shifts and more! Based on my experience of swimming in Kuta, the tide predictions on Magicseaweed aren't spot-on for Kuta-Lombok exactly, so I look at tide charts for Bali too and concoct my own ideas of tides down here.

I talked to a dive operator and they didn't know why it was all so weird either. Don't trust the guidebooks. Don't trust anyone.

Which came first?

"Let's think of eggs. They have no legs.

Chicken come from eggs. Well, but they have legs.

Now eggs also come from chicken, here the plot thickens.

But eggs with legs, whence do they come from?

Oh what a conundrum!"

The other day I was sitting around with some kids. I asked the kids some elementary questions, like the one on the origin of the chicken. They went round in circles with their responses. First it was the egg. I asked them what laid the egg? Then they said it was the chicken, and so on. I wasn't trying to pull anyone's chain, but they got all irritated and stirred up. They did not think it was funny. I forbade myself to ever bring up again the chicken egg topic. It's a cultural thing.

Na zdraví!

My Czech friend Ales told me this Christmas that whenever he's in India he drinks a shot of hard liquor in the morning when he wakes up, and in the evening before he goes to bed. He says he's never had any gastric problems when in India, even eating the food at street kiosks. I've taken to heart his good suggestion and will gulp down a shot of Gin before and after my swims at Praya's murky swimming pool. My swimming sessions are now probably harder training for my liver than my arms.

Oh and Na zdraví! to my Czech friend Anna who got married this week.

There I was...

There I was... parading with my BAPPEDA office friends and thousands of Sasak at Nyale Festival this Wednesday in Kuta. Nyale takes place every year in February in commemoration of the Princess Mandalika who, a long time ago, when faced with a cohort of enamoured princes who all wanted to marry her, threw herself into the ocean off the rocks at Pantai Seger.

She thereby forestalled the possibility of war between the rivaling and potentially discontented parties, and ensured that she would be there for everyone and always... in the form of the waves that roll in and out of the beaches bringing in swarms of Nyale worms once a year. The Nyale worms are the corpses of little spaghetti-like oceanic creatures that, after spawning out at sea, get washed onto shore on 1 or 2 days a year. If you think about it, geo-biologically speaking, Nyale is really quite a remarkable event. A good Nyale harvest (the Sasak like to wade into the water at dusk and collect the worms) is also said to herald good agricultural harvests for the coming year.

Note the mascara on me.

We were all lined up and ready to stroll in procession But we had to wait two hours in the sun until the Vice-Buppati arrived. The costumes were very hot. When I saw the masquerade of small kids strolling through the finish-line some 3 hours later, I felt so sorry for them, they were so tired. Although we were all pretty tired due to the heat and long wait, the parade was actually really fun. There were even parashooters falling from the sky.

I grew up in the Rhineland, and the Nyale parade yesterday and the vibrant energy on the street reminded me a little bit of the "Karnevalszug". But yesterday, I couldn't help noticing comically, how we were more people in the parade than we had spectators.

Feisty ants

In that photo you see ants climbing around on an electric cord . The photo was taken minutes before they died. But I am manifestly still a vegetarian.

I am perfectly tolerant of the ant populations in my house, I regularly leave scraps of foods or dead cockroaches for them to feast on. And they are mostly tolerant of me. But this red worker ant population in the photo, they are feisty.

Basically these ants forgather on my extension cords. I don't know what's so special about the cords. The extension cords weren't sugar-coated by the manufacturer, not to my knowledge at least. Maybe they like live wires. Anyways, when I need to move the cord I nudge the ants gently away, but they won't have any of it and go all berserk on me.

Let me tell you about the time huge male ant populations invaded my bed. It happened weekly. Unfortunately I don't have a picture of it but you must believe me that it really happened. The sheer number of them was maddening. They were all male ones, and they were peaceful which was good. But they decided that my pillow was their front yard and a good place to loiter. They were climbing all over my naked back and shoulders.

I know ant colonies must reproduce. But do they have to do it so often? Do they have to do it in the evenings, behind my back, while I am reading a book or watching Lord of the Rings? Ants aren't nocturnal, couldn't they fornicate during the day while I'm at the office? Most of all, couldn't they do it some place else?

I don't know what Queen Ant actually looks like. But I know this tribe lives under my pillow, in the bamboo bed structure. She and the rest of her kin.

I have seen unusually big black clumsy ants around the house as well. They had wings but prefered to wander around. In fact, they were caravaning out one ant-hole in through another. They looked lost. An ant colony may have several queens or reproductives. I think that was them reproductives doing a random ant migration.

Gaddafi, Berlusconi, Mubarak and the BBC

I'm a big fan of the BBC. I catch the BBC broadcasts on short-wave radio as much as I can. It's my antenna into the world.

The BBC does serious and thorough news reporting.

But when it comes to sensationalism, the BBC has had its guilty share. Yes, the BBC just loves a good racy anecdote.

Year after year, the BBC reports on Colonel Gaddafi's official visit to Italy. The visits are only newsworthy because Gaddafi holds en-mass Islam conversion parties, to which flocks of Italian glamor models are bussed.

In November 2009, for example, while attending a UN food summit 200 Italian lovelies were invited. In July 2010, 500 models (!) were rounded up by an Italian model agency. He also invites said models on all-paid-for trips to Libya. Nobody knows how much success he actually has with the Islam conversion, but it obviously makes the headlines. And the BBC thinks it's a story the world can't get enough of.

I don't know if you knew, but Gaddafi will trust only a cohort of female soldiers to be his close bodyguards. In the picture above you see Berlusconi admiring one such. (And the old pope in the background waiting just next in line.)

There's no question that Gaddafi's counterpart, Berlusconi, is a buffoon too. The BBC is currently reporting on his sexual larks involving a 17 year old prostitute called “Ruby” and whether the evidence for the case amounts to enough to bring him to court.

Berlusconi's antics are many, and you wonder if and when the Italian public (the other half; not those who don't already) will have enough. But apparently for the BBC, Italy's political system is in such utter hopeless chaos, it doesn't see it fit to report on the screws that need to be set right for the economy or state. Instead, it's all about Ruby.

Ruby was arrested for theft once and held in a police department in Milan. When Berlusconi heard about it, he made a couple of phone-calls to important people and the police set Ruby free again. Berlusconi maintains his innocence and that he thought the girl was actually the daughter of Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak.

Which brings us to Mubarak and the protests in Egypt. At last, we have the news.

Times when I hang my head in shame

Sometimes you admire a public figure that goes off and does something stupid that isn't admirable. At all.

Tony Blair could be one such public figure. I think we all liked him. Until, of course, he lied at the British people and the rest of us about the wrong reasons to invade Iraq. And, you know, everything else thereafter. But women were fond of him, I hear.

Or Naomi Campbell and her “No Furs” agenda, while it lasted. And what was she doing opening her hotel door at 3 a.m. to accept blood diamonds from an aide of Charles Taylor?

James Brown with 8 arrests and 3 convictions.

Michael Jackson. Nuff' said.

Songwriter Neil Young, who first defended President Bush and gave him credit for “sticking to his vision of how to lead America.” Then, some years later, rescinding his support with the unambiguously titled song "Let's Impeach the President."

Billy Bob Thornton, who besides being a great actor may also be a great singer/performer, but while on tour in Canada, gave a stampede of ill-mannerism in a live interview on CBC radio. Among other discourteous things he said was that Canadian audiences were like “mashed potatoes without the gravy."

For me it's Janine Turner. She is one of those stars that for a glimpse of a moment I might have fallen in love with. Janine Turner starred in the television series “Northern Exposure” which aired in the early 90s. It's a great series in which she plays an Alaskan bush pilot and ex-girlfriend of various oddly deceased lovers (one died during a picnic, another was hit by a satellite plunging out of orbit), mostly irritated by her love-hate relationship for the protagonist, Joel Fleischman. I'm quite addicted to the series at the moment, I must confess.

Until I found out Janine Turner was a tea-partyist and fervent supporter of Sarah Palin. Helllo!??!?! My first reaction was denial of course, it isn't true. But it's true. She is. That woman is absolutely nutty. What happened to her? I thought she and I were of kindred spirits.

How can anybody support Sarah Palin? Sarah Palin believes the world is 6000 years old and that dinosaurs were around then. And let's not mention the macabre gun crosshairs on her website.

My assorted tropical fruitbasket. And a misunderstanding involving banana gluttony and the death thereof of a person in a single person household.

I was born in Thailand and we lived there until I was 2 years old. My mom sometimes goes down memory lane and reminisces what our Bangkok lives were like in the early eighties. Mostly she talks about the culinaric delights, the lush variety of tropical fruits one could buy there for next to nothing: papaya, litchis, mangoes, longan etc.

I was too young then to remember what our fruit dishes looked like. I grew up on apples and pears in Germany. Though I've always been fond of coconut milk.

But I've finally made it to the tropics now. And maybe it's my turn to brag. My motley fruit collection comprises: papayas, rambutan, mangoes, various types of bananas, young coconuts, mangosteens (which were a REAL discovery), snake fruits, dragon fruits, durian and many more, some of which I don't even know the names of.

I sometimes ask Ibu Nunik to go down to the local market and buy fruits for me, like bananas. Bananas grow in bunches or “hands”. They can only be bought in “hands” too. You can't buy single bananas in Praya. I tried it, and everyone looked at me bewildered. Then they laughed (as they always do about us “bules”, foreigners).

Anyways, a bananas “hand” counts about a dozen bananas. That's quite a lot of bananas to eat, even in a small banana world. I ate up the first bunch of bananas very quickly so that they wouldn't start rotting.

Enter Ibu Nunik again. She figured that I was so fond of bananas she would buy me more. The next time she bought me 25. Again, I hurried to eat them before they spoiled. So then Ibu Nunik figured 25 wasn't enough and she scaled up. We're now at 45 bananas, to be eaten in under a week, which comes to over six bananas a day. I hope we put a tap on this gluttony soon, or it's death by banana for me. And no more bragging.

That's just not right

Yes, the cover image is fine but the image on the back of the package? That garlic bread photo, it just doesn't look right. I don't know. Did they have nothing else in NZ to choose from? Like more cows and pastures? The first time I was looking at that butter package, it fell out of my fridge door, I picked it up and... it made me homesick. I like our German butter packaging so much better.

Doing the boogie BYOT.

My private disco nights in Praya are back on. I missed them while in Berlin. Berlin, contrary to its perhaps well-deserved reputation as Europe's best clubbing capital, has never elicited my own disco fever. I've always harbored feelings of dislike for the oh-I-am-so-cool-hanging-out-at-an-illegal-party-in-an-industrial-complex-loft-this-club-has-no-permanent-address-keeps-moving-venue-and-my-name-was-on-the-guestlist disco crowds. I have been dragged along to a handful of such parties in Berlin, and I've never left them feeling beguiled.

Over Christmas, boy, did I miss my disco nights in Praya. Firstuval, in Praya the air humidity and heat are so high, it only takes looking around the room and you've worked up a little sweat already. Maybe you snap your fingers a couple measures long, bend your knees a little, go hi-lo, you're really breaking into a full sweat now. You follow this routine along, skid across the room a couple of times, solemnly hoof along in Limbo style, mix in Shakira's signature shotgun hip-flick and you're sweating from every pore of your body. In profusion. It will feel like waterfalls run down your spine. This party is BYOT, bring your own towel, you will really need it.

I have ranted to a couple of people about my semi-legendary Praya disco nights already. They've apparently gained some recognition, and the stories have inspired my friend Janine to present me with a small disco bowl over Christmas. I've brought it back from Germany and during day-light, the disco bowl dangles demurely in the room. But when night falls, and the lamp shades dance on the terrace, the pack of dogs outside howl like wolves, she, the disco bowl, is cajoled into a light swaying of her equatorial hips, and when the wild colored lights come on I give her a spin to the wild side.

One of these days I'm gonna ride Kylie Minogue's locomotion right into the streets of my kampung.

Young professionals.

My friends Sophie, Katharina and I have started a swimming group. A very informal one. I am very excited about it. The downside is: we don't train together. That's because we live in different cities. I thought about our swimming group and how it's not working out and then it dawned on me: incidentally, and just by the way, the three of us have become so-called "young professionals". Who would have thought? Not me. 2 years ago we were all happily and idly (well, sometimes) living the student life in Berlin, wondering what we'd do with our lives. And now we are all three young professionals, with different jobs in different cities, and our personal lives to balance. But we can still swim together. If we all enter the water in Berlin, Hamburg and Lombok, respectively, at the same time, well, that would constitute a swimming group I think.

I don't know if our trainings are synced exactly like clockwork yet. When I swim here in the afternoons, Sophie and Katharina would have to swim in the early mornings for us to be swimming “together”. Morning swims are not for the light-hearted. Sophie and I both missed our new year's morning swim, which was due to start around 10 am on a Sunday of this new year I think. The upside about training apart is that no-one has to wait for the other at the street-corner and wonder “will they show up?”

When I swam my 10k last weekend I kept having to think about the rotation of the Earth, and there I was, the first of our swimming group in the water that day (which was a beautiful and warm day in Lombok), depositing the first laps into the bank. In the middle of my swim, some time in the afternoon, I was wondering if Sophie and Katharina were finally in the water too.

My life in Pink

I bought myself some bedsheets a long time ago. The choice wasn't big, so I settled for “Strawberry”, perhaps reminded of the Beatles song “Strawberry fields”. And wouldn't it be beautiful to fall asleep every night in strawberry fields? After buying myself these pink strawberry-motifed bed sheets (the alternatives were Barbie and Manchester United), Ibu Nunik has ventured out on her own accord to buy more pink things for me. She must have decided that I was fond of pink. I now call myself also proud owner of a pink plastic book shelf and a pink plastic etagere in the kitchen which at the moment makes me happy because it is weighed down by some Christmas-special Guiness pack that, because it's past Christmas, makes me feel like I got it at a bargain price. Ibu Nunik also prefers to write messages to me in pink. I kid you not. I've added to my pink collection a set of guitar strings and a key fob which I go swimming with. And a pink bathroom door which I insisted must be installed after long negotiation with my new landlord.

Changing sides

I live in an imaginary world sometimes. A world in which I am a “bloke” or “fella”. That world also includes watching ball-games like Rugby or NFL football, the rules of which, I dare admit, I'm not entirely acquainted with. But I just love to pop open a can of beer, lean back, and enjoy an evening of “Monday Night Football”. There are also “Thursday Night Football” and “Sunday Night Football”, and probably many more. Maybe there is NFL football every day of the week?

Because I don't entirely understand the rules and strategies in rugby and American football, I do get distracted and sometimes begin cooking vegetables while a game is on. But the game carries on in the background and I'm still tuned in to the TV commentators exclaiming things like “now we'll have a scrummage”, or “2nd and 9” or “1st down”. What does that mean? I'll understand it eventually I'm sure.

A common criticism of the game of American football is that it lacks fluidity. And it does. But I've got used to it, it's a strategic game, and it's physical. I prefer the rawness and nakedness of Rugby over American football though. I do wonder how the Rugby players manage without the helmets and pads they use im American football?

But they're all equally tough I'm sure. In rugby and NFL, the players don't throw themselves to the ground and fake injuries like the phony Italian soccer players. If they get tackled hard, they just get up and play on. The players' individuality is made up less of vanity, good looks and standing out alone in the team than manliness and sportsmanship. One is spared many of the antics in these sports that have become so famous in soccer. Neither do Rugby players, for instance, cuss at the referee. They say that rugby is a game for barbarians played by gentlemen. Football is a game for gentlemen played by barbarians.

I do still enjoy watching soccer/European football too, but I don't follow any league in particular. And in spite of the splendid World Cup performance by the German team, I don't feel so attached to soccer anymore.

Because of the BBC broadcasts and their endless tirades in sports hour about what Rooney said, and Sir Alex Ferguson replied, and what have you, I'm still familiar with the current items in Premier League football. When I did my short stint in Ethiopia, that was strongly recommended. I found, it was a good way to start a conversation there. Everyone in Ethiopia seemed really tuned into Premier League football and followed one of the top 4 English teams closely. The Premier League has really successfully marketed themselves around the world. But not so much here in Indonesia, at least not in Lombok. There's no craze for it here. I find that Indonesians are moderate in most things in life, so too in their appreciation of soccer.

Bought Nick Hornby's “Fever Pitch” - hear it's a good read and am looking forward to it, even in a year without a major summer football event..

PS I occasionally watch NHL icehockey games, when I want to be a Canadian chap, but NHL is harder to catch down here. And somehow I've had my chance at being a Canadian chap, and I didn't fare well in the rink.

Wuhu!

Somebody said that if we're 70% water then only 30% of us is going to have to swim.

A good three months after I'd hoped for, and a series of bouts of ear infection later, I've finally completed my 10k swim. It took me 3:20 h on last Sunday. That's not a very good time, but that doesn't matter too much at the moment. I committed to it when I entered the water that day, I felt healthy and mildly enthusiastic about the swim. I still felt good for most of the swim. I had a short slump around 8 or 9k but it wasn't too bad. I had my waterproof mp3 player with me and got through the whole playlist from Neko Case, David Bowie to Coeur de pirate.

My longest swim up to then had been 2 hours. That had got me up to around the 7k mark. I had done that swim multiple times, but have usually had get out of the water because my tummy hurt and I'd felt sick. To get further than 7k this time, I planned my swimming session out a little different. On the swimming technique side, I emphasized my hip roll a lot more to ease the effort my arms and shoulders put into the stroke. I swallowed a lot less water that way, which was good, because there was a bit of surf and spray going around, so not perfect conditions. Not swallowing sea water meant my tummy didn't get upset.

I refueled with some water, juice and a Granola bar after 4k and again after 8k. I think that's what did the trick for me this time. I've never refueled during my swims before. I don't think the Granola bar helped much because it takes the body longer than 2 hours to break something solid down into energy but the water and juice were good.

Last Sunday's swim was a surprising result, in some ways at least. I haven't really been training much over the past weeks. Over Christmas and New Year's break, I only swam twice in the Berlin Velodrom pool. It was nice, but very crowded compared to my ocean swims here. Kept bumping into people in my lane there. Some guy doing a sloppy English backstroke even slapped my face.

One positive change in my life is better eating. I finally bought myself a stove, and so I've begun cooking for myself and been buying some more expensive foods. Enough cheap Nasi Gorengs.

I remember swimming around the little island of "Gilli Air" for the first time many months ago. It was a shorter swim, maybe 5k. But I wasn't ready for it then, and I really pushed myself hard to complete it. I didn't enjoy the experience. I didn't feel elated or have a sense of accomplishment afterwards. The 10k swim was so different. Most of all, my swim was enjoyable, it's really true. And afterwards I felt good, not exhilirated but not knackered either. I didn't have muscle ache, nor head ache, nor fatigue, just some sunburn.

I don't know what's next. I know I can still improve a lot but I don't know if i want to put the time and energy into it. We'll see. I'm taking some time off from swimming right now.

Many thoughts

It's been a while since I blogged. There are reasons for that.
Don't think anybody really noticed. So, I have new stories from Lombok. Coming soon.