Well, that brings back memories of a trip to Singapore and running out of things to do while I there on business for a few weeks. Singapore has a fairly limited set of attractions for the tourist visitor and some are quite Disneyfied. However, it was easy to take a ferry over to Indonesia, Batam Island. So I went with my girlfriend to see what it was like. We went on a day trip that turned into a bit of an adventure.
There are several ferries that cross the Straits. We took a catameran service, which took less than an hour. Arriving at Batam ferry terminal, it seemed quite a poor place. The map I found didn’t offer many clues for what a couple of tourists could do on day trip. We took a taxi and pointed to what looked like a town on the not very good map I brought with me. The driver did not speak a word of English. When I spotted a modern looking hotel, I reasoned that there might be an English speaker who could give us some advice. I was wrong. We walked along a busy, polluted road and there seemed to be on the edge of a shanty town, with open drainage, quite flyblown. My girlfriend had high expectations of having a nice Indonesian lunch in a restaurant but we saw meat covered in flies and quickly lost our appetite. I decided to take another taxi who could take us to somewhere to safe to eat and then we go lucky. The driver spoke very little English but seemed to understand what I wanted and took us to an indoor food court, where everything seemed quite organised and we had some nice Indonesian dishes.
What to do next? I looked at the map and there seemed to be some resorts along the coast, so I pointed at one of these and our driver took us there. The resort was quiet, but we had some tea and I guessed it was for Singaporeans. There were some groups of guys doing what looked like team building activities. They looked like office workers from Singapore.
Our driver looked at the map and pointed to nearby spot which he said was ‘verry good tea’ . It turned out, he lived nearby and invited us to visit his home. This was a simple building and we sat with his wife and child and then his brother who was visiting from Singapore. His brother spoke perfect English and worked in the fish market in Singapore, he was visiting his brother and also to buy seafood from a local tribe of ‘sea people’ who were fishermen who wandered along the coast. He explained a lot about Batam island. Apparently, it is a ‘development area’ and attracts migrants from other parts of Indonesia. There is a certain amount of lawlessness and crime and it is quite a contrast to Singapore, which is tightly controlled. He told us that people were quite superstitious and believed in spells and omens in this little village. He pointed to a building surrounded by what looked like circular millstones and said it belonged to the local shamen priest. He said it was important to get his support in case anything went wrong doing business with the Sea people, who had powerful magic themselves.
We spent a pleasant afternoon like this and finally, they took us back to the ferry terminal. I got the impression that here was an older brother looking after his younger brother, had set him up with a car to do business as a taxi driver. With this in mind, I took his brother aside and discretly settled the bill for the tour with nice tip.
We returned to Singapore a great deal wiser and my tale brought some wry smiles from my colleagues. They advised me to try a flight up to Penang in Malaysia next time.
So there you go. We were two innocents abroad, but it worked out well. It is quite easy to get lulled into a sense of security in a place like Singapore because it is so modern. When you travel to the other countries in the region, different rules apply.
Indonesia is a huge country and this was one very small part of it. Next time, I would take a cheap flight to explore some of the more spectacular parts of the country.