faraway

Our second vacation on the Island of Lombok was a welcome relief from the hustle and bustle of Jakarta city-life. No cars, no bajajs, no motorcycles who’s stupid owners have taken off their mufflers. I left my handphone in the hotelroom safe and didn’t check email all week (except for one aborted attempt in Bali). We were removed from our busy lives for a blissful week in an isolated but comfortable corner of Lombok.

Once again the Novotel Lombok did not disappoint and served as the perfect venue for our summer vacation. The architecture of the hotel is charming and adventurous. Ten metre-high thatch cylinders reminiscent of the Sasak “lumbung” (a rice storage towers) rise above the peach and salmon coloured hotel complex. The restaurants are open pavilions with grand views of the sea. The beach location is beautiful and stunning. Novotel is situated in a little cove flanked on either side by dry, barren hills. The location is very representative of the arid conditions of West Nusa Tenggara province.

I have been away from home a lot for the past three months so it was great to spend so much time with Galuh and Zach. We splurged on a villa close to the beach. The villa built using Lombok materials such as a grass roof and hewn coconut wood fashioned into a simple but stylish pavilion with two sides made of wall-length windows. The bathroom is a huge space with a long slab of coconut wood serving as the bathroom counter. Water comes down into the bathroom sink via a wooden tube straight from the ceiling. The rustic feeling is completed by the faucet knobs which are clunky pieces of wood on the wall.

We spent the next five days eating, swimming, playing in the sand, sleeping and more eating.




Each day I borrowed a sea kayak and cruised around in the cove. I tired flying a kite but it crashed into the sea.

I wrote in my journal about Zach and life. We took a lot of photos. Zachary spent the first couple of days running wildly on the beach with two boys he met on the first night. The older boy, Sonny was six years old. I liked him. He seems very mature. The other boy, Anthony, was about four, blond and seemed jealous that Zachary was getting some of Sonny’s attention. Anthony shouted at Zach several times and Zach came crying to us “he is angry of me”. After that Zach didn’t want to play with Anthony. But on that first night they had great fun running along the beach and zipping between tables at the barbeque that Novotel organized.




The next morning Zach’s toes had blisters. He swam and jumped in and out of the wading pool. Eventually some of his blisters burst and blood came out. He began to cry and pleaded with me to take him home. I carried him back to the villa and then said that I would put a “band-aid” on his toe. He has never had a band-aid put on a cut. He was afraid and sobbed, “no, no, no. No bandage, no bandage.” I tried to apply a small bandage to the bleeding toe but he started squirming and screaming. I had to hold him down to put it on. But because he was moving so much, it fell off. Finally Galuh came to help me. She said to him, “Zachary be a brave boy. Make Mommy happy.” It worked. Despite more whining he held still while I put a bandage on his toe. Galuh instructed me to put bandages on the other toes which had blisters. Eventually three toes on each foot were wrapped up in bandages.

Since then, he gets upset if his bandage falls off and whines, “Mommy, put a bandage on, put a bandage on…” He’s addicted to bandages now. He asks for them all the time.




Zach really loved the sand. On his first visit to Bali when he was les than one years old, he really didn’t like the sand. We could leave him on a towel on the beach and he wouldn’t crawl anywhere because he hated touching sand. This time, he headed straight for the sand and started playing. Zach looked for dinosaur bones and dinosaur eggs in the sand. We made sand castles although I did most of the building and Zach did most of the destroying.




One late afternoon we walked over to the hill east of the hotel. There’s a small paved path that leads to a washed out bridge at a river just before the hill. All that is left of the bridge is a row of concrete supports staggered like broken teeth. But in late afternoon, the water in the river drains away with the low tide in the cove and we were able to cross. Grazing on the hill was a herd of goats. Zach was drawn to these goats and insisted on climbing up the hill. When he is intent on something, he talks incessantly like he is reading a narration. The goat herd was a weathered old woman accompanied by her two children. I chatted with her about Zach, her children and her herd. She has 50 goats! A wealthy woman.




After that, we continued east. Four teenaged girls who sold coconuts on the beach followed us. A dirt path continued east behind the hill. Past the hill we discovered a beautiful white sand beach. The girls called it Segar Beach. Apparently, surfers use it but since the bridge is broken, Novotel guests don’t go there and it was empty when we arrived. Zach was determined to climb the hill at the far end of the beach to find dinosaur bones. I walked with him to the base of the hill and we found a big white stick. Zach carried this stick back to the hotel.




We rented a car and drove to a beach close by called Tanjung Aan. The sand is finer there and it is undeveloped and very beautiful. Zach was fascinated by all the animals that we passed and wanted to see them. We first stopped by a small group of cows grazing by a small village. Zachary and Galuh got out and walked across the road to see the cows. I stayed in the car. Many villagers nearby were curious why some child would want to see a cow and came over to talk to Galuh. Women and children gathered around Zach. Zach is so huge and white compared to the thin, short and dark village kids. The cow owner came over too. Then Zach picked up a stick and tried to hit a cow. The cow lurched away in fright dragging its tether. The tether caught up Zach’s legs and sent him spinning to the ground. He was crying but unhurt.

When we arrived at the beach we were disappointed. The pristine white sand was covered in dried seaweed and trash. There were a few people trying to sell things on the beach. These people sell pathetic trinkets and coconuts. If you say no, they start to beg for money. It is irritating. So Galuh became quickly annoyed and went back to the car. Zach wanted to play in the sand so I went with him and started building a sand castle. A half dozen kids came over to sell stuff to us. After, I said no several dozen times, they started to play with Zach. They certainly liked his toys and seemed to have a good time. This lasted for about an hour until a man came over and struck up a conversation. For a while the conservation was pleasant but eventually he started trying to sell me coconut hair pins. Most of the kids were very well behaved and said thank you for playing with Zach’s toys. Some even washed Zach’s toys. One or two asked for money or asked for a toy. It was hard to say no. But I didn’t want to turn this experience into something commercial. Even as we got ready to go, all these people mobbed the car and begged. A woman asked Galuh to exchange a US dollar.

Jerome, 9 July 2005 at Bali Hyatt Hotel