Being Good Representatives of Our Beloved Country, Indonesia

Well well, the title sounds so awesome right? Good representative ofIndonesia :D But it’s really the fact! Atin and I went to Sun Moon Lake in Taichung and we ended up feeling that we’ve become good representatives of our beloved country, Indonesia.

Okay, to start the story in Sun Moon Lake, I’d like to tell you that this place was actually the second destination of AISC field trip. However,Atin and I could not join the trip because the seats were fully booked. Since the place (on pictures) looks so beautiful, we decided to go there by ourselves by Sun Moon Lake bus. Yap, the two of us. Taking this two-hour journey by bus.When we were in Taichung bus station, we opened our map and saw the picture of Sun Moon Lake bus. And then, a taxi driver came to us and seemed to ask where we were going. Since he spoke Mandarin, we couldn’t really grab what he was saying. So we only showed him the map and pointed Sun Moon Lake. He told us about the bus (as long as I understood him). Well well, we talked in body language after that :D We really appreciated his kind intention in helping us though he couldn’t speak English.

In fact after that, there was this old man who walked here and there while seeing us talking with the taxi driver. He seemed to talk to the taxi driver and then greeted us “Where are you from?”
Atin and me (relieved because of meeting someone speaking English) “Indonesia” :)
Him “Ah! Genius. Many genius are from Indonesia.”
Me “Thank you?” (Turning toAtin and whispering) “Atin, ini bapaknya nyindir, berpragmatik, apaseriusan muji ya?”
Atin “nggak tau mbak” (Laughing together)

Shortly speaking, the bus came and we got on the bus. After two hours, we got off of the bus in Sun Moon Lake station. We paid as much as 200NTto get there. We then walked to see the route map of this lake and decided torent bikes. Unfortunately, the rental owner also didn’t speak English so we didn’t have any idea what he was saying. All we could grab was that the rent fee was 100NT/hour. We rented two bikes. Blue for Atin and pink for me (I wish there were a purple one!). So we rode the bike and took the route based on a map that we brought. The scenerywas soooooooooooo beautiful that we decided to enjoy it without bothering about the time. The blue water, the mountainous background, the hotels in the middle,the green trees, and the romance of many couples (young and old), the ancient temples. They were simply indescribable and unspeakable! Definitely wanna go there again if I have another chance. I hope the next time would be with my husband :) Aamiin.

Anyway, we already rode for (like) two hours that we seemed to be going into forest. There were stairs in front of us. We actually decided to turnaround because we were kinda scared to get into the forest-like situation.However, we saw these three Americans and a Chinese girl riding their bikes and went into the forest. We were then motivated and we felt challenged to get into it too. We kept on riding up up up that we felt tired! We took a break and saw two (Chinese?) men stopping. We asked them if they knew our current position in the map. They pointed a spot and we spontaneously yelled “Whaaaaaaatttttt????”It wasn’t even half of the journey although we already rode for 2.5 hours! We were kinda confused whether to go on with the next route or to turn around. In fact, we decided to go on (which I kinda regret!).

Yap, Atin and I felt like fainted because the route was so tiring.It was uphill, well the slope was low but it was soooo loongggg,, we didn’t even ride our bike but pushed it while walking. Our water ran out, we didn’t bring any food. :( poor us! We decided to take taxi actually, but the taxi which passed by us already had passengers. So we kept on walking while waiting for a miracle.

After an hour, alhamdullillah, we didn’t get fainted :D we even found a food stall! We bought two bottles of cold water and its shop keeper was Indonesian! She came from Malang. We told her about the journey and she said“Ah, yang menuju kesini memang naik terus. Capek. Tapi habis ini turun terus.Paling 30 menit uda sampai ke pangkalan sepeda. Ya ga sampai 1 jam lah.” Well then, we kinda felt so relieved after hearing what she said. She then suggested us to go into a temple in front of the shop because the lake view from there was very very awesome. We did as suggested and it was real awesome, I swear! Trust me!

After that, we left the food stall and she was right: what came before us was downhill route. We were so happy that we didn’t have to use our remaining energy to move forward. We could even feel the fresh breeze of air in our faces and bodies. But then, an uphill route came before us again and it wasn’t short! We thought “Ah, mbaknya PHP!!!!!!” And the remaining route to take was uphill, downhill, uphill, downhill, and we rode, we walked, we sat, we lied down, we complained, we kept silent, we looked up, we looked down, we looked back, we wiped our sweat, etc.

After 1.5 hours, we finally reached the bike rental. We were welcomed by the owner with his unbelieving expression. Though we didn’t understand what he said, he was kinda shocked that we, two girls, could really ride the whole spot of Sun Moon Lake which was soooooo broad! Moreover, we rode sepeda mini instead of sepeda gunung! He then allowed us to rest and he gave us discount for the five-hour rental. We only paid for 4 hourrental. Besides, he also bought two boiled-in-tea chicken eggs and gave them tous for free! And last, when we were about to leave after paying, he asked for our photograph and said something which we couldn’t understand. However, I didhear he mentioned Facebook. Thus we assumed that he wanted our pictures with the sepeda mini(s) to be uploaded inhis FB and he would write “Believe it or not: Two tough Indonesian girls traveled the whole places of Sun Moon Lake in 5 hours with sepeda mini!” hahahahahaha Atin and Iwere happy and so proud of ourselves :p Atin said "Mbak, kita mengharumkan nama bangsa!" wkakakkakakkakakaka

Well, that was it actually. But I have this ironical situation after that. When Atin and I were walking down the street in the souvenir centre, we met the three Americans and the Chinese woman. They greeted us and I told them we just arrived there because we traveled the whole places and it took us 5 hours. They looked shocked and said “WOW! We didn’t even continue our journey and decided to turn around.” And I was like“Whhhhaaaaaaaaatttttttt????”  I mean,they were the ones who made us decide to go on with the route when we already decided to turn around. And then we knew that they actually turned around when we went on. What an irony!!! Hahahahuuuhuhuhuh.. So awesome though.. I kinda feel regret but also proud of myself :D

I definitely want some more exciting experience like this!!!!!

Me and One Beautiful Spot at Sun Moon Lake