I wish I could say I haven’t been keeping up with my blog because I’ve just been too busy, living life, out of wifi connection. In reality, I lost my phone and broke my computer in one day on the journey from Lombok, Indonesia back to Australia. Yes, one day. My most important technologies exterminated. If you don’t want to be incredibly inconvenienced, distraught and, frustrated in a foreign country… my expert suggestion would be to not, do this. So, to my dismay this post is another “I fucked up but I’m learning stuff along the way,” edition to Dana The Explorer.
I woke up early morning the day I was scheduled to leave Lombok. Elli and I were parting ways. She was about to embark on a three day hike up a volcano and I was scheduled to start another workaway on a cattle farm north of Sydney. Before I said goodbye to Elli, I started throwing up. My first experience of “Bali belly” after almost a month in Indonesia, just a few short hours before I was to begin what would be a 36 hour journey back to the Land Down Under.
It was the Bali Belly that would temporarily destroy my connection to the 21st century. I decided to pack my computer away in my backpack. I assumed it would be safe, after all, there’s a computer pocket. WHAT COULD GO WRONG? ( Hold that thought.)
After a cup of tea to sooth my stomach, I laid down on a beanbag in my hostel, half a asleep waiting for my transportation to the ferry. Eventually I heard my name called. At this point, what I think happened was that I put my phone down on a table, strapped on my backpack and took off. Leaving my iPhone and lifeline on the table. Still feeling like complete crap and knowing I had scheduled transportation at every step of the trip from Lombok back to Bali and to the airport, I didn’t even look for my phone.
I didn’t look for it in the shuttle, not in the cafe they dropped us off at to wait before I hopped on the back of the Shuttle Company Owner’s motorbike with my 50L backpack. I was so sick I didn’t care to look for my phone while I was waiting in the office at the port for an hour. I didn’t care to look for it in the hour and a half ferry from Lombok to Bali. I found my airport transfer after looking for a half hour, I finally decided that I should check the time.
After it definitely wasn’t in my purse. I started to panic. Because I’m traveling light, that’s the point. I know I’d never stick my phone in my backpack because I wouldn’t have access to it. Once I confirmed it wasn’t in my purse or backpack I knew it was gone, I literally have no other belongings. I was angry at myself, still felt sick and, even managed to get with the middle seat for the two hour traffic-riddled trip to the airport. I was pissed. The silver lining was that I was just going to be slightly unconvinced, I could get to the airport, log on to my computer and figure everything out. Or so I thought.
I found the airport waiting area before I passed security and pulled out my laptop. The screen was black. Hmm bummer, I thought I’d charged it. I moved my stuff over to a charging station. There was even a converter already in the plug, lucky me, I thought . I plugged in and tried again. Screen still black, except this time I heard the apple start up noise. Why is the screen black? Why is this happening? I was scheduled to arrive on a farm soon, the only information I knew was that after I got to Australia, there was a 6pm bus from somewhere that would lead me to the farm. Now the reality set it in, I was phone less and computer less in an airport in Indonesia, completely alone. Cue the tears.
After several deep breaths and thoughts along the lines of “what the expletive is happening” and “it’s just you here, you need to figure this out” I scoped out a couple that looked like they spoke English and I pulled it together enough to explain that I lost my phone and my computer wasn’t working, could I please use yours to try to figure out my life?
My only objective at this point was to figure out information about the farm I was going to. By some miracle, I remembered my Workaway password and username on the first try. The second miracle was that my host, Kevin, provided me with his phone number in our correspondence . I shot him a message that I’d be calling on random number and wouldn’t be able to be in contact until then.
At this point it wasn’t a priority to check in at home. I didn’t want to spend any extra time on this stranger’s laptop and honestly, I still felt like complete crap. I thanked the couple, who I never got the names of, and set off to find a place in the airport to wait out the time I had until my flight. About 5 hours… I found the most chocolatey looking brownie I could find and sat and waited, trying not to dwell in the shit day I’d been having.
I’ll spare you the incredibly boring details about how I eventually managed to find my way to the farm. It involved a bus to a train, another five hour wait on a park bench and a two hour bus ride. When I made it to the farm, there was a 14 week old puppy and a room just for me.
The moral of the story is, sometimes life sucks and you have to cry to strangers. Other than the last hours I spent in Indonesia, the things I saw and did there will stay with me forever. I’m once again incredibly lucky that nothing was stolen from me, it was my own mistakes I have to live with. I even managed to find my phone, It’s currently in Malaysia with Eli. I’ve got an amazing support system, a new computer, and a google phone that sort of works. Yesterday I became 1/3 of the proud owner’s of a car and I’ll be one the road again soon. More adventures to come.