Flores, Indonesia

July 7, 2009

I thought I would give you all a little briefing on our travels but first to explain a bit how we travel.

Antonio and I decide on our destination and then buy our RT tickets. We don't book tours, hotels, guides etc. We have somewhat of an idea of where we want to go and what we want to see but we are always open to suggestions from other travellers. When I said that we had a guide in Sumba, I meant for only one day. We took one of the guys from the guest house because we were going to go to some small villages where we obviously don't speak the language and we would like to understand what we are seeing and be able to communicate with the locals. Plus I think it is very rude to poke my camera in people’s faces, houses etc without asking permission and also showing interest for them and their cultures.

Since my last email we have been to a little village up in the mountains. We rented a motorbike in Ende and drove to Moni, where the volcano Kelimutu is located. It is a volcano with three craters which have lakes of distinct colour in each one. The lakes change colour every few years do to the mineral and sulphur levels and also the weather. Now the lakes are turquoise, dark green and black. We also visited a few traditional villages which are known for there weavings of ikats. They are nice and some take weeks while others up to 4 months. The people here are very nice and instead of the typical "hello mista" we get "hello, where are you going". In our bungalows "mama" the owner made home cooked meals for us every night and we were even offered to try dog, but declined.
Here in Ende there is a nice market and they sell some pretty big fish here. We have seen shark, Manta Sting Rays, large tuna and other smaller fishes. We will be going tomorrow to a small town called Boawe to the west of Ende.

I thought I'd include some funny things that people have said or yelled to us....
"hello mista. I love you and your woman"
" hello foreign"
"bule" which literally means white person