Day 4 we woke up late and wandered over to an extremely local warang for lunch, located next to a nearby mosque in town. The warang was so local that we received weird looks upon arrival and a woman cook rolled her eyes at us when we ordered nasi goreng... Despite the confusion that went through the locals heads when we showed up to eat an authentic Indonesian meal in Indonesia, we ended up chatting with a young local guy for some time, while enjoying a delicious meal. We even tried a puff of his Indonesian cigarette, only because it smelled like incense!! It was very mild and sweet tasting.
Chicken soup:
Nasi goreng (fried rice):
Before going to the night market that evening, we witnessed a very weird occurrence in the hotel restaurant area.
We walked into the restaurant and saw a bunch of the boys (7 of them) holding down their friend who was laying on the ground speaking in tongues and trying his hardest to fight back. Meanwhile, one of the boys was doing some type of blessing or ritual thing on him. We later found out that one of the boys' friends was playing some type of game in the staff room telling a "geenie" or spirit to show himself and come out of hiding,
which essentially lead to getting processed by a very angry geenie.
Apparently geenies are very common in Indonesia and extremely prevalent in Lombok. All of the boys claim that they have seen multiple geenies in certain whereabouts of the hotel, but most frequently in the staff room. After the pocession occurred at the hotel, the boys would literally only go into the staff room in pairs and just avoid it whenever possible (Google geenies in Indonesia for more info).
After the night market and weird experience we hung out at the hotel with some of the boys and their friends and listened to them sing and play guitar. We also bought them a round of beer and enjoyed it together, which is rare for them to drink since they are all Muslim.
Day 5 we again took our leisurely time waking up, drinking tea and coffee and eating our usual banana pancakes for breakfast (the daily breakfast that is included with the stay). We found out that the friend who had been possessed the night before was taken to Lombok because the geenie came back a second time that night and he needed a proper blessing from a doctor in order to get rid of it.
When we finally left the hotel we headed to "Green Cafe" for lunch and dined on gado gado and chicken soup,
Best gado gado we have had yet! The local dishes truly differ from one another depending on the warung or restaurant that we order at, making it again an adventure everytime we eat. After lunch we walked around town and watched the locals all working together to carry concrete blocks from a boat onto the land and then into the horse carts to be carried to some building site on the island. Since no motorized vehicles are permitted on Gili island, the building process and day to day life is overwhelmingly slow and almost takes you back in time. The women carry EVERYTHING on their heads around the island, from concrete blocks to pounds and pounds of local produce.
Chicken soup:
Gado gado:
A woman carrying cinder blocks on her head:
After we cooked each of the meals, we sat down and ate at much as we could
That afternoon we sat around and decided our next plan of action for the trip. Did we want to leave the following day? What about a cooking class? How long did we want to spend on Flores Island? So we headed back to the hotel, chatted with the boys, watched them cook their lunches and did some research about Flores Island. That day mum arranged for the building process of the new septic tank for sink water to begin in the restaurant area so we also watched the workers start dig through the sand and break the tile underneath by hand. Very labor intensive to say the least.
Agus preparing sambal (hot chili):
The construction:
For the rest of the afternoon we sat at the beach, snorkeled around, attempted to stand up pattle board and ate french fries. For dinner we went to the night market with Egan or Ijen (one of the boys) and treated him to a yummy dinner that he didn't have to cook. In return, he gave me a lovely tiger balm calf massage when we got back to the hotel.
The beautiful, clear water:
My massage:
Day 6 it rained all afternoon so naturally we booked the cooking class "Gili Cooking Classes" that we had been contemplating over the past few days. The class was later in the afternoon so everyone drank beer and wine together while cooking and preparing: a coconut dessert, peanut sauce with fried tempe, chicken taliwang, fried rice, and chicken curry. It was a cooking party! Our instructor was named Echo, he's only 21 and has been cooking for quite some time and has been running (doesn't own) the cooking school for almost two years. He was a really great and enthusiastic teacher!
The crew:
Aidan and Echo:
The first thing we made was the coconut desert. We mixed rice flour with a coconut cream water mixture until it had the consistency of a dumpling dough. Then we rolled the dough into little balls (there were many ball jokes) and then stuffed them with brown sugar. Next we boiled the balls until they floated on the surface, then rolled them in fresh coconut flakes. Oh and we got to choose if we wanted to dye the balls red or green, so I chose both colors and our balls turned a purple, brown color...the first ever in the history of Echo's cooking classes!
Coconut balls:
After crafting the balls to perfection we moved onto the peanut sauce and tempe dish. We mixed peanuts with chilie, garlic, soy sauce and water then grinded the ingredients with a mordar and pestle until the sauce became a smooth consistency. We deep fried the thinly sliced tempe for us to dip in the peanut sauce.
Peanut sauce:
Next up, chicken taliwang! We chopped the ingredients, cooked the chicken, then added the ingredients into the pan with a bit of coconut cream until the sauce became a thick paste. And walaaaw, done!
Chicken Taliwang:
Last up was the yellow chicken curry dish. The paste consists of scallion, garlic, white pepper, chilie, coriander, turmeric, brown sugar, ginger and coconut cream. Yellow curry paste is commly made in Indonesia and can usually be stored in the refrigerator for an entire week, so locals frequently use curry paste to make their delicious meals.
Chicken curry:
stomach. It was incredible, however we had to ask for take away for almost every dish since we were so full! We took the boys at the hotel little boxes of left over coconut balls for dessert.
Day 7 we didn't feel so hot...The beginning of another session of food poisoning we believe, so we ate a banana pancake, then Aidan went back to the room for a nap. Meanwhile, there was construction going on in the room above us, so while Aidan slept through the noise, I stood around tidying the room and sweeping all the sand out. For a minute I stood there in awe of my ability to clean our room to a literal sparkle on the tile floor, but all of a sudden the roof over our heads burst through!
Aidan awakened by the loud noise, bolted from the room when he felt mounds of dust/dirt fall on his head and heard a loud bang. I can't really remeber, but I somehow ended up outside just before the ceiling came through.
"Are you f***ing kidding me," I screamed while dying of laughter. Then one of the boys rushed down the stairs cracking up and in awe of the disaster he had caused in our entire room. But within seconds Sol managed to hammer our ceiling back in place and Egan quickly changed our sheets and cleaned the room that was perfectly clean before all hell broke loose. We couldn't stop laughing for the entire day and days after the incident, a very memorable one indeed.
Day 8 we finally decided to head out of Gili and move onto Kuta, Lombok and Flores Island the following day. We said our good byes to all of the hotel staff then walked to the harbor to waited for the Bangsal, Lombok bound boat to depart. While we waited an hour for 30 people to show up for the boat (the boat won't leave until it is completely filled with people- very efficient, yet inefficient,) three ladies approached us and started taking tons of pictures with us. An Australian 'local' told us that it is because we have such white and are sooo much taller than them. It was pretty funny.
We will miss mum!:
Aidan and the Indonesians:
The boat, over crowded as always:
Bye bye Gili Trawangan:
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