Wow!! I suck.

The title of this post really sums it up, eh? No posts since August, shame on you Kate, shame!! Well it's really hard sometimes when you do the same thing every day and you don't have the internet at home. I guess I could write them then upload them later on. ......GENIUS!!


Umm so a brief update what has been happening since August-

working,
no more accidents
went on an awesome trip to the Gili Islands
fell out of love with Bali
decided to move to Australia when my contract is up

1) Working.
Alright, since this takes up most of my time lately, I will start here. Work is going okay. This job is nothing spectacular but it's better than some of them that I have had. I mean how can you get really excited over coming to work and sitting on a computer every day and teach English over the internet?
Most of the classes are spent sorting out technical problems or sorting out people who are not in the correct level for their speaking ability. The most heard phrases in my day are "Teacher, you listen me" and "I don't know, teacher".

I mean sometimes you can get a good student or have a good class but if someone asked me, "Hey Kate! You want to teach English online again?" I am going to run away. BUT on the otherhand, I do have a lot of free time to play on the internet (so I really don't have ANY excuse for not writing this blog more).


2) I haven't had any more accidents, which makes me think, I don't think that I have written about my accident actually.
Short version: I got hit by a truck :)
Long Version: I was riding my motorbike with my friend on the back, a guy tried to pass me in too small of a space, hit my handlebars and sent me flying into an oncoming truck.

We were okay...in that we didn't die but I had to have surgery on my leg. Nothing major but I had about a litre of fluid in my leg that needed to be drained as a result of the skin and muscle separating from each other.

So I didn't ride a motor bike and could barely walk for about a month but I'm okay now with a big scar and a rad story to tell.


3) Awesome trip to Gili
On November 15th, I turned 29 (eeeeekkk). And me and some friends decided to take have a birthday extravaganza as it was my birthday on the 15th and my friend Sara's on the 17th.
If you are not familiar with the Gilis, they are a group of 3 islands off of the east coast of Bali. And they are what I imagine Bali would have been like about 20 years ago before all the crazy Aussies (love you guys) started using it as their breeding ground.

So we went over on the 15th and spent about 2 hours wandering around in the blisteringly hot sun to look for a hotel because 'there are better deals if you don't book somewhere before you go". finally we found somewhere but they didn't have any good rooms until the next day so there were 4 of us squished into one kind of small room for the day. We all got really comfortable with each other.

Other than the obvious tropical paradise fact, one of the main draws is that there are no police on Gili and in a country where drug possession is punishable by death, no police to look out for means party time! Now, fair reader, I am not saying that we partook in any illegal activities, you can make up your own minds about that.  The other thing about Gili T is that there is only 1 party spot a night and only on alternate nights. Apparently the 15th was an off night, so I had a bit of a bummer birthday but the 16th was awesome and then the 17th was another off day but we managed to make it work somehow.

On the boat trip home I got ridiculously sick. This is the first time EVER that  I have been motion sick on a boat and I do not wish to repeat it. I spent and hour and a half in a tiny little bathroom puking my guts up and getting looks ranging from sympathy from people who have been in a similar situation to "Oh God, you aren't going to puke again are you? Why can't you just swim back?"


4) Falling out of love with Bali

A few months ago I fell out of love with Bali....hard! Bali is a cruel mistress and unless you are here on a two week holiday quite a hard place to be. When you live here and live really close to the tourist centres there is never a break from the constant hassling. Whether it is people trying to get you to have a massage or a Bali boy telling you that he loves you as you walk past, I am going to be so happy when I never have to hear, "Oh hello honey", "I love you, honey" ever again. This has made me feel even more cynical about love and relationships than I did before.
 
As my wise stepfather said. "Someone has to hate paradise and apparently that's you". Thanks M ;)

I don't always hate it sometimes I have AMAZING experiences here and I now have some of the most amusing stories about random shit that I have seen- eg teenaged boy riding on the back of his friends motorbike with a meat clever in his hand.
But I don't think that this is the place for me...I might be wrong and I might decide to come back but for now my plan is #5.

5) Going to Australia

After falling out of love with Bali, I needed to make a new plan. I know that I am not ready to go back to Canada (sorry Vic). It doesn't make sense to fly all the way back to Canada when I am already out on this side of the world and I have so much more to see. I have a couple of friends that I made here who were moved back to Sydney in October and we came up with a genius plan of moving in together in Sydney. Who knows how that will work out but if you never try you will never know.

I am getting a working holiday visa so I can work in Australia for a year- the only stipulations are that you have to be under 30 and not work at a job for longer than 6 months. You are only supposed to be funding your travelling not setting up a life for yourself. And as I am sadly almost 30, I had to do it now. I love that I am totally doing it backwards. Most people do this working holiday visa when they are 18 on a gap year before university and I am pushing it to the age limit. What can I say, I love living on the edge. hahahaha.


Okay folks. I hope that satisfies you for now....if anyone is still reading this. I hope I can keep it up more regularly.

Kxx

Okay!! Okay!!

I promise that I will write soon!! I have so much to write about!! hahahahaahahahahahahah

I am still alive...don't worry.

Okay, so again I am crap and have been lagging on the blogging but I am saving up exciting things for you. Well I left the city and moved back to the beach. It's amazing. I literally live across the street from the beach, I fall asleep to the sound of the waves now instead of whistles and horns. Okay, so the waves aren't the only thing that I hear, I also fall asleep to the sound of the wind blowing through the trees in front of my house. Life is tough.
I have my own little 2 room house - well a bedroom and a kitchen. But it's big enough for me. I live beside two friends and it's nice that we have our own little community down here. We usually spend evenings drinking beer out of one of our porches. 
Did I mention that I totally lucked out and got this beauty for $150 a month? Most places this close to the beach are about $150 a night. It pays to know people in Bali.


I am not living in my new house completely alone but before you start getting excited, I found a puppy in a garbage pile and brought him home with me. I called him The Kraken, mostly so I can yell, "Release the Kraken" on the beach and let him run free. He's super cute and a little bit of a shit but he's mine now. He's also got an AWESOME case of mange and has no fur on his belly or butt. I am taking him to the vet soon to get a shot, plus other essential puppy vaccines. He is so freaking cute. Yesterday I went for a walk to get dinner and realized about 5 mins into the walk he was following me so I let him come with me and it was great until he got scared by a crowd of people and refused to walk anymore so I had to carry him to the food place. I got some interesting looks. Apparently people in Bali don't carry dogs places. 
Oh and right now he is defending the porch from Spotty the slightly retarded Dalmatian/mutt cross. I think he's winning too even though Spotty is 3 times the size of him. Go Kraken :D 


Some not so good news- I got stopped by the cops and didn't have enough $$ to pay a bribe so I got a ticket and might have to go to court. Eek! I am trying to find a way out of this. Apparently I need to call the lady I rented the bike from. I should get on that soon. 




Work is going good. Made some friends- Go Team Kate! Classes are okay. They aren't great but it means that I get to live in Bali so I can't complain too much. It's work so you know how it goes.

Okay so I suck....

I know! I know!! It's be forever. I don't call, I don't write and so on and so forth.

But to be perfectly honest I really haven't done anything that exciting lately. I'm am just getting into a routine and getting on with life.

Yesterday was my one month Bali-versary. Yep, I have been here for a month. Shit, time flies, eh? Started work, it's going good. Is it the greatest job in the world - no, not really. Is it okay enough to keep me in money and living in Bali -yes.

I've made some friends too. On Sunday or Monday I am moving next door to a girl from Vancouver and another girl from Australia. I am so stoked to move down to the beach. The place that I am moving to is AMAZING. It's a little 2 room house literally across the street from the beach. But the end of the beach that is a little bit too far for the annoying tourists to come down but not too far to walk into town along the beach path. It's the same price as my place in the city but 232352564256 times nicer.

Oh did I mention that it comes with a dog? Yes, I got a dog. Her name is Shorty due to her tiny stumpy legs on her almost average sized body. But she is very cute and kind of came with the house. I feel like we were meant to be as kate (ka-TAY) is Indonesian for dwarf/midget.

On that note - ka-TAY apparently is the new pronunciation of my name so let the hilarity ensue. Some of the Balinese/Indonesian people think it's really funny that my name is Kate because I am so much taller than about most people here.

Ok...I'm going to go to the beach. Maybe something interesting will happen there?\

Gotta pressie for ya....

So some people (there was more than one of you) who will remain nameless were complaining that there weren't enough pictures on the blog....

Sooo.......here ya go....

To scoot or not to scoot that is the question

Okay to begin with can I ask, how many bastardizations of "To be or not to be" have there been....how many have I made?? Hahaha

Aaaaaannnnyyywaayyyy.....scooters.

Walking to work every day for a week I have realized that the sidewalks in Bali (or at least Denpasar) might be more dangerous than the roads. Walking even 15 minutes can feel like you are playing a game with the Reaper. Firstly, there aren't always sidewalks. The sidewalk placement is sporadic at best; one side of the street can have sidewalks and the other can have nothing or a sidewalk can abruptly end leaving the walker suspended in a state of where now. Secondly, if you do find a sidewalk there are no guarantees that it will be intact. Walking to work is sometimes the most exciting part of my day, I look at it like a memory game of sorts. You have to remember what slabs are okay to walk on, which ones felt a little wobbly yesterday and which ones have just plain vanished or cracked in half. The missing ones are my favourite because you actually know what you are getting with them. The ones that seem fine and the ones that are a little wobbly are where you have problems because if I have learned anything from my 2 weeks in Bali, its is not to trust anything. That sounds worse than I meant it to, I don't mean that people in Bali aren't trustworthy, I guess I mean is that there are always surprising little extras. Every step I am waiting for the last step before a slab goes and I fall into the open drain below it. I have seen into these drains. Believe me, you DO NOT want to fall into them. Not that I can think of any reason that any drain would be pleasurable to fall into. 

Plus walking you are at the mercy to everyone that you walk past and it might seem a little mean but I am really sick of saying Hello to every person I walk past in a day. Wow, I am a dick. These people are saying "Hello" to me and all I can think is "Crap, I have to say hello to someone else".

All this taken into consideration with the fact that it will soon be about 40 degrees everyday, I decided to get a scooter. I can hear the gasps from everyone who knows me quite well and has seen the bruises that I can get from falling over while standing completely still. I am not taking this decision lightly and I am practicing before I go out and play in traffic.

I rented the bike off a "friend" of Darmi's (she is a lady who's restaurant I go to almost every night and she is helpfully teaching me Indonesian). I say "friend" because I am pretty sure everybody in Bali is a "friend" to everyone else. This friend had to ask Darmi her name so I am guessing that they are pretty tight. But whatever it worked out useful for me. So this lady who's name I totally forget drove me the 2 minutes back to my place and showed me how to work the bike. I'm not sure if it is just me that found this problem but it is very hard to maneuver a scooter or bike in tight spaces and at slow speeds. This attempt at riding my scooter in my driveway while really not knowing what I was doing had the rental lady and her son (?) in stitches. But they thankfully tried to hide it from me, which I thought was kind of them.
Left in the possession of her "very best" bike, I decided that the thing to do was to drink away the nerves and wait til the next morning and practice on the streets.

I woke up at 5am and tentatively started the bike and tried to get it out of the driveway. A helpful little frog hopping in front of my scooter helped me practice stopping suddenly. What a guy!! Out of the driveway and on the open road, I was free....going about 10 miles an hour and my feet sticking out to the sides like a small child whose training wheels have just been taken off. I made it to the bottom of the street with out much difficulty and then remembered that I needed to go back to get home. Zooming up the street at my earth shattering , record breaking 10 miles an hour I was passed in no particular order: a man pulling a garbage can, a teenager on a bike and a 2 legged puppy who was walking on its front paws....Okay I might have made that last one up.  BUT I made it home and didn't fall off, that's the main thing.

The next day I did the same thing and woke up at 5am when the roads were still relatively quiet, so I decided to venture off my street and on to the more busy road that crosses with it. Oh yes on Tuesday I was learning how to turn corners!! I know! Turning the wide corner on to the main road I felt on top of the world. I had made it around a corner with out putting my feet on  the road to guide me or to keep me from pummeling the 2 feet to my inevitable death on the road below. My new sense of adventure lead my down the road, but I wasn't feeling THAT adventurous so I turned on to a road that I know fairly well from my daytime jaunts around the hood....What I didn't know is that this street is where they have the night market. Now in Bali the night market runs from about 10pm to whenever they feel like closing in the morning (so after 5am). So now not only do I have to try and make sense of this new bike, I have to look out for people, carts and other bikes. I firmly put my feet down about this situation....no really. I kiddy-pushbiked it through the market. Feeling exhilarated at my brush with a crowded marketplace, I went home to get ready for work.

This morning was day 3 of my learning experience and I know knew to miss out the market street so I went a little bit further and went up the next main street. Yeah, that wasn't the next main street...It was what they call a "gang" in Bali. So basically a narrow street or alley off a main street with houses on either side. But what the heck, I like an adventure until you ride a bit to far and disturb two sleeping dogs who jump up and start growling at you. My mind was racing at how if I had to, I could pick up the bike and throw it at the dogs. But I managed to turn the bike around in time and race home. I was going to try riding my bike to school today but I got home and noticed my gas gauge was almost on empty. Maybe tomorrow.....hahahaha

The past few days walking to work I have been observing and trying (unsuccessfully) to learn the rules of the road in Bali. The only thing that I have understood so far is, there are no rules. There is a sense of "this is my space and this is yours. If you are going to slowly in front of me I will beep once and go around of you". It is an organized chaos. I can deal with organized chaos, my life is organized chaos. It is a state that I understand well. Plus I really have no prior driving knowledge to get in the way so I figure that I will go back to Canada and be the best driver there......

xx



  

It's a shorty today....

I really want a fucking tuna melt.....I miss tuna. I love that the only thing that I really miss from Canada is canned tuna. Also maybe hummus.
Waaaaah!! I want a tuna melt with hummus and veggies now......