Tip: Getting Around

In Indonesia, Malaysia, and Singapore, instead of Uber or Lyft, we use Grab. It works just like Uber and Lyft. It's an app on your phone where you designate a pick up spot, a destination, and it tells you how much it costs. We've never had a bad experience, and the prices are very cheap when you're converting it to USD.
It's everywhere, in high traffic places like the airport, there can be a designated spot like this.

Or, you can just be driving on the street and you'll see a fleet of people in neon green driving by.

Indonesia Trip 2019: Day Two in Penang! (July 31st)

Since the reason behind the trip to Penang was for my grandfather to get a check up, that's what we did. It took us nearly the whole day to go through the whole process.

For dinner, we went to the Chulia Street Food Stalls. It was quite hectic, the moment we sat down there were probably three people talking to us in hokkien about how we needed to get drinks. It was quite hectic, even though I couldn't understand it.

Indonesia Trip 2019: Off to Penang! (July 30th)

My grandfather doesn't trust the doctors in Medan, so to get a doctor's visit, he goes to Penang, Malaysia. It's a couple hour flight, and all of us went together.

My friend happened to be in Penang on that day, and we really wanted to meet. The two of us met a few years ago over the internet, and through that time, we have worked on many collaborations together. It started with us singing a cover together, then she introduced me to more collaborations, and our friendship grew from there. We'd stay up all night chatting with each other about life, making jokes, and working on YouTube videos. She is the closest friend I've made on the internet, and since I happened to be flying across the world and would be in the same country, I told her about it. From there, we planned to meet in Penang. Time would be short, since she'd have to leave later the day I arrived, but a few hours was better than nothing.

Amazingly enough though, her parents were able to find a room in the hotel we were staying at, and booked a room to stay in. It was crazy, because then we were able to spend the whole afternoon and evening together. What was even crazier was I said "let's meet in the lobby," thinking that it was a public space and that there would be other people in the area (as a safety precaution). We ended up meeting in the elevator as we both went down to meet in the lobby. The stars must've aligned for us that day, because so many things went so well.

Since we hadn't eaten lunch yet, that was our next step. We (meaning my dad) decided to walk to a nearby Nasi Kandar with thousands of reviews on Google. It was sweltering hot, sunny, and humid. So it wasn't a great time. It would've been easier to use Grab. The line was extremely long, and we waited nearly half an hour in the sun before we could eat.

After that, we spent the rest of the day filming videos and singing together.

Tip: Norit

Now, if you are a foreigner (like me) coming into Indonesia, your stomach might not be able to handle the food very well. According to my cousin, street food and ice are especially dangerous. Ice because you don't know where they got that water from, so you can get food poisoned. So, what do you do when your stomach is causing a storm? Norit.

Image credit: https://www.ebay.com/itm/NORIT-ACTIVATED-CARBON-CHARCOAL-FLAUTULENCE-INDIGESTION-GASTRO-DISORDER-TOXIN-/233155712806

It is the only medication that I know in Indonesia. You may have seen things like this floating around the internet when the "black foods" craze was happening. It basically helps when you have diarrhea, so, if you're one of those poor people who are suffering from that while you're in Indonesia, search for this.

Indonesia Trip 2019: To Medan! (July 29th)

It was time to say goodbye to our family in Jakarta as we headed off to the next leg of our trip. One side of my family is from Jakarta, while the other side is from Medan.

We met my grandfather and more old friends of my parent's. We ate kwetiau, a dish with wide noodles with vegetables, eggs, and chinese sausage.

Indonesia Trip 2019: Back to Jakarta (July 26th-July 28th)

We returned to Jakarta in the morning, and for the rest of the day my sister and I took a nap...well, it's more of we went to sleep. I woke up for dinner, but my sister didn't wake up until around 15 hours later. For the whole trip we had been getting up early and going to sleep late, so naturally, we needed some time to catch up on our sleep.

The first thing we did on the next day was eat mie alip, which is some really good bakmi, noodles with chicken, some vegetables, and some wonton as well. I'm salivating just thinking about it! In the picture below, we're in the upstairs of the building, so if you go and there's a lot of people downstairs, considering going upstairs. It was empty up here while it was packed downstairs.

Then, me, my mom, and sister, went to Bogor, the place where my grandmother grew up. We visited the Botanical Gardens there, and happened to be there when the President of Indonesia was there. There are a lot of plants and very tall trees.

We ate some ngohiang, which is some vegetables, potatoes, and meat in a sort of gravy. It's very good.

Then, for dinner, we joined up again to eat Bebek Begil, or duck. This is more food that I'm just salivating while thinking about it. The tea with lychee is really yummy too! To get there, since there were a lot of us and we didn't want to battle the traffic, we used the MRT system.

The next day was also a quiet day. We went shopping, and also ate some martabak. There is martabak manis and martabak telur. Martabak manis is like a thick pancake with chocolate and nuts inside. Normal martabak is more savory and uses egg. Both of which are delicious, so if you have the chance, definitely try some!

Indonesia Trip 2019: Labuan Bajo (July 25th)

This was one of the most exciting days of the trip. We got up early and got on a little motor boat to begin island hopping.

Our first step was a gorgeous panoramic point. We had to walk up a bunch of steps to get to the top of the island, but I don't think it was as bad as the waterfall.

From there we went to Komodo Island to see the Komodo dragons! There are a few islands that have dragons, the ones I remember are Komodo Island as well as Rinca Island. We only went to Komodo Island. There are a couple guides on the island, and we trekked through the forest to find some dragons.

The first dragon we went after involved us speed walking off the path in an attempt to see it. It was well hidden in the bushes and the only way we could see it was when it was walking. This was a treat because they are cold-blooded creatures, so they will most likely be basking in the sun instead of walking, so that was very cool.

The next thing we saw was a dragon laying down close to the middle of the path. We were disheartened to hear that it was dying, and as soon as it died, other Komodo dragons would come in and eat it. These creatures are quite scary. Even from birth they start eating each other. Also, the small dragons are able to climb up trees, they can run up to 12 mph (20 km/h), and our tour guide has seen them swimming from island to island.

We were lucky enough to see a couple more dragons within the shrubs in the forest. It was very neat! They're huge.

We thought we were done with seeing dragons and took a stop at the cafe on the island, but then our nature guide pointed out a dragon that was sitting under the stairs. We were able to get some really cool pictures with it!

After that, we went to the pink beach to do some snorkeling. It's honestly not that pink, near the water you can see it's more pink, but it's not a vibrant pink. It's mostly sand with some flecks of pink.

Here's an FYI for those who want to come here, there isn't a bathroom at the pink beach. So, you may want to wear your swimsuit underneath your normal clothes, so you don't need to try and figure out how to change under a towel.

From there we went to find manta rays. Our tour guide hadn't seen a manta ray since around spring time, so it was amazing to get to see them. They are huge, majestic creatures that fly around in the water. Honestly, this was one of the coolest moments in the entire trip. We were somewhat in the middle of the ocean, so there were a lot of waves that were a little frightening.

After we saw the manta rays, we hopped back into the boat to try and find some sea turtles. Most of them were sitting on the ocean floor, so if you're like me and can't see without glasses, it's hard to see them. We were able to see a couple swimming up to the surface, so that was really cool as well.

And with that, we headed back to Labuan Bajo. Here's a note from me, make sure you dry off and put on some clothes, because later that evening I caught a cold which plagued me for the rest of the trip. We finished the day by watching the sunset on the water. It was also very pretty.