Sunday, December 21, 2008

Small time Celebrity

Day 285
I had wanted to wake up early but I spent a bit too much time reading and overslept a bit. After breakfast and packing it was time to head back to Padang.




Conveniently outside of my hotel was a guy with a horse and buggy. This was one form of transportation that I had yet to utilize. He told me that the price was 4 and I agreed. In my guidebook it says that rides should cost around 5,000 and I figured he meant 4,000 by saying 4. When we got to the bus stop he told me that he wanted 40,000, not 4,000! I was about to just tell him too bad, he had said 4 and that was what he was going to get but I went ahead and gave him 10,000 anyway. It was something that I wanted to try and that was less than a dollar.

The minibus I jumped into left in about 15 minutes. I was stuck all the way in the back corner though and no amount of pleading could get the people in the middle seat to open the windows any further for me. It was a rather hot and uncomfortable ride. When we got into Pedang I was the last person on the bus. The driver asked if I would pay him extra to drive me to my hotel. The price he gave was fair and I quickly agreed. It might have been a few cents cheaper to get a local mini bus but the hassle of bargaining wasn't real ly worth it.

I had decided to go back to the first hotel I had stayed at here. It had a great location for seeing20the rest of the town. Luckily they had room for me. I also arranged airport transfer through them for the morning.

After some lunch I went to check out the sites. It was blazing hot and I kinda needed a break from the constant attention though. After walking around for about an hour I just went back to my hotel for a shower.

For dinner I went to a seaside restaurant, I had just missed the sunset though. A nearby family asked if their daughter could take a picture with me. I doubt that she was 2 and after I said yes she was in my lap before I knew it. Right away she started to howl. I didn't really blame her though, I'm not that child friendly and I think that kids can smell fear.

When I went to pay my bill the waiter mixed up 14 and 40 but we got it all figured out in the end. I grabbed a beer and wrote in my journal for a bit at a place right next to my hotel. I was a bit tired though and wanted to go to sleep early anyway, I had an early morning to look forward to.

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