When we awake all we want to know is: have our colds magically been cured and is the A/C in the main room working. No and no. Whaaa.
We get sufficiently presentable for breakfast and head over. From where we sit we can see the water (the Indian Ocean?) and walking along the cement boardwalk along the edge of the sand are lots of soldiers with big guns all hoofing it towards the airport. A coup? A military exercise? Just plain old exercise? We decide to go with this last option.
Breakfast is good. They had all kinds of breakfasty (and not breakfasty) things, including bacon and sausage. It is chicken bacon and beef sausage. No pork, we guess. Indonesia is a mostly hindu nation. Is pork a no-no? They do have two guys playing two small zylaphones (each with 12 notes) made from halved bamboo of different sizes. They’re so loud I thought my Apple Watch was going to warn me of danger to my hearing.
Back in the room Karen crashes on the couch, where she stays, asleep, most of the day. At 10am a young man from maintenance shows up asking about our A/C. I explain what’s working and not working. He tells me a bunch of stuff of which I understood exactly none, so I invite him in, and point him towards the non-working A/C. Twenty minutes later he’s replaced the fan, the capacitor, and some other part, and it’s working like a dream. I love this country.
While Karen tries to sleep off her cold, I decide to go grocery shopping. I’d previously scoped things out and there’s a mini-mart not too far away. I saunter down the cement walkway, bordering the sand, now with no heavily armed military soldiers. I pass women who want to give me a massage. There’s all kind of people out enjoying the day, working, or just hanging out. At the store I stick to just the essentials: gin, vodka, tonic water (I think), water water (I’m sure), and tortilla chips.
Back home I do the daily diary and Karen stirs. We have the makings for gin and tonics (mostly, maybe) but no ice. The “tonic” I bought doesn’t have that word anywhere on the can, but does say “Schwepps” and “Botanical seltzer” or some such thing. From the bar I request ice and two cans of tonic. When it arrives the cans look just like what I bought. Yay! We have no limes, but from our welcome fruit basket I grab a mandarine orange, or clementine, or some such smallish orange citrus. The G&Ts taste divine. We gingerly carry them out to the sitting area by the pool and sip away.
I’d scoped out a likely place for dinner: Envy, which is in the Holiday Inn a ways down the path. We clean up and dress up and head out. Envy is outdoors, much of it at tables on a beautifully green lawn. Karen’s beverage is just water (after the tall gin and tonic earlier). I opt for a cocktail made with Arak, a strong local spirit made from palm juice. The waiter says we just made happy hour, so I’ll be getting two of them. He’ll deliver one now and make the other when we want. We get a “long pizza” with half margarita and half tandoori chicken. It was at least adequate. The drink was good and Karen definitely helped.
Post dinner we saunter home, take some NyQuil, and fall into bed, hoping to be fully cured in the coming daylight hours.
Photos
[Having technical difficulties today. Abadee, abadee, abadee, that's all folks]
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