Lake Toba - the Batak people

Day 88 - 25th July 14

From Medan we catch a bus to Parapat. It's crowded full of people and leaving as we arrive, but there are two seats at the back. We try to stop the porter from cramming the wheelchair in the back, saying 'hati hati' (be careful). It's a 5 hour journey and I dose on the bus. Nearing the end of the journey, Lake Toba emerges into view and the high road follows its banks from here to Parapat. Restaurants sit on the road side with views overlooking the water and surrounding mountains. It's the largest volcanic lake in the world. We reach the town late afternoon - a bustling market square is starting to close in front of the harbour. We have an hour before the last ferry leaves for Samosir Island so we eat in a nearby cafe. The staff are cheerful and friendly, telling us to make ourselves at home. I have a salty noodle and vegetable soup and Harry a dry, crispy fried fish, the white meat now almost non existent. The fresh mango juice is smooth and delicious. Here Christianity holds swap, so the restaurants serve

food throughout the day.

It's a 30 minute ferry to the island which is packed full of tourists. On reaching Tuk Tuk, there's a thin steep concrete path which is difficult to navigate with the wheelchair and motorbikes are trying to pass from the opposite direction. I'm worried I'll drop Harry into the water. Bagus Bay has a room for this evening, but is fully booked after tonight. I walk around the corner to Liberta which is fully booked tonight although a space may become available tomorrow, so we take the room at Bagus Bay. It's clean and spacious with a pretty porch overlooking hanging flowers shaped like bell chimes swaying in the wind, their heavy rustling sounding like rain from inside. There's a restaurant here with a terracotta tiled floor, pot plants and wooden furniture and their large grassy lawn leads down to the waterfront. The island is populated with Christians so the rules of Ramadan do not apply. It's nice to be able to order a beer so easily. We go to bed early after such a tiring amount of travel.

Day 89 - 26th July 14

In the morning, we are grateful that they manage to shuffle the room arrangements, so we can stay in our room for one more night. We ask about hiring bikes and a driver to take us around the island. It costs 80,000 for the day, but we have woken late, so they agree we can pay this amount to have the motorbike for this afternoon and tomorrow morning. Roman, a smiley 25 year old who grew up on the island will drive Harry and I will drive myself. We decide to visit the museum and later the hot springs. The roads are ok, but there are lots of potholes, so Roman drives slowly for my benefit, while I carefully follow the lines he takes behind, driving in the centre of the road when necessary. Tall yellowing corn grows in the fields alongside the harvest, but the few rice paddies we pass are completely dry - apparently there has not been enough rainfall this year so the island is more barren than usual. The road passes alongside the lake. The buildings we pass sit on stilts with boat shaped roofs of corrugated iron rusted red, and painted wooden bodies. They're very similar to the Torajan architecture. Apparently the people from Toraja may have originated from the Batak people of Lake Toba. The animal motifs carved on the buildings differ however – geckos, serpents and bulls. We pass churches, the large rectangular building fronted with the same architecture to melt into the original culture - a spire constructed in corrugated metal sits on the building behind, its base a square.

We stop at the museum and Harry asks Roman to join us inside since his English is excellent and as a descendant, he knows a little about the Batak culture. He shows us the carved sticks like totem poles,

faces built on faces, representing each new generation. Pointing at the spears, he says he still hunts wild pigs on foot for sport, using dogs to locate them. Perhaps that is why the dogs on the island are so friendly - they're important, well-looked after pets, not strays. There is an old Batak village as part of the museum, the houses here still with thatched roofs. They entertain with Batak dancing and music daily, but we have already missed the show. The musical instruments sit on the balcony of one of the buildings. We enter this one, up the wooden staircase at the front. It is much larger and more spacious than the houses I visited in Tana Toraja. A trap door in the floor covers the hole that the family would have used as a toilet, additional food for the pigs that were kept in the area below the building.

Harry is wearing black jeans, a black top with a beautiful white geometric pattern and 2 thin red lines, a brown leather satchel and sandals. It’s as if she dressed this morning to match the brown

wooden buildings decorated in black white and red patterns and motifs. An old lady lives in the last house at the end. We visit her, knocking three times by saying 'tuk tuk tuk', awaiting the welcoming 'horas' in reply to allow entry. Harry bonds with the old lady, who has trouble walking and empathises greatly with her condition. The old lady asks Roman to translate so they can converse. She tells Harry a little about herself and her children. Harry buys a wooden carved figure of a woman in a squatting position, her legs together - a sign of respect. Roman tells me the doors in the houses are as small as they are, as it is polite to crouch when greeting someone. The low door frames enforce this salute.

We drive onto the hot springs, passing an old large cone-shaped tomb. Men are carving out a canoe from a tree trunk on the road side. It's in its early stages but the shape is already recognisable. When we reach the hot springs, Roman laughs when we ask what rock is being mined here. It is of course volcanic ash which we can see covering the immediate hillside. The egg-like smell of sulphur pervades the air. There are two separate baths for men and women. We inadvertently begin to follow Roman into the wrong one. A man exiting laughs at us and points us to the correct door. It's late enough that the air is now cool and the heat of the water enjoyable to bathe in. We sit here for a while - Harry's hip is aching a little and she's hoping it will ease the pain.

I'm worried about driving the return

journey in the dark. We drive a little faster to try and catch up with the setting sun, but darkness soon ravels the landscape. It is difficult to see the potholes but the vehicles are visible sooner around the corners due to their headlights. We are halfway back and the tyre on Roman's bike has become flat. We wait by the roadside while Roman disappears with my bike to find a mechanics. A family comes out of their house to sit with us in silence.

The mechanic has requested an extortionate price for a wheel to be fixed. Apparently this man is known as being a mafia figure in the area so Roman didn't want to argue with him. Instead, he risks driving the bike to the mechanics not much further up the road where a friend works. Fortunately, they are still open repairing a truck. We wait sitting on tyres on the ground in the dark. It's cold and I'm hungry since I ate no lunch.

When we eventually arrive back, the woman from the shop next door who we unknowingly borrowed the bikes from is angry. She tells us we are 3 hours late returning the bikes and she will charge us the full day’s fare, not to include the following morning as previously agreed. Her sister appears and shouts at us in English. They're incredibly unfriendly woman – a mean expression mars a potential beauty in the younger woman. It is clearly futile to argue. Unfortunately I have

already brought my laundry here so I don't look forward to a similar debacle when I pick it up the following day.

Bagus Bay is packed full tonight, as there is traditional Batak dancing and singing on show. I see the three German guys who I met in Sentani and we join them for food. We order a fried fish fillet with chips and a beer. It's nice to catch up with some friendly faces. They spent a few weeks in the Philippines and have come to Sumatra for the end of their trip. They join us on our balcony for some more beers before bed

Day 90 - 27th July 14

Sue is the Australian lady who runs and owns Bagus Bay with her husband who grew up on this island. They also have a business in Australia where they spend the majority of their time as their two teenage children go to school there. She is probably in her late fifties. She has ginger hair, with a slightly podgy, kindly face. She's incredibly helpful and although there are no rooms available here or at Liberta, she sends Roman around the island to help our search. When I see her in the morning, she asks about the scooter fiasco. I relay the story. 'That woman! She's such a bitch', she says in her strong Australian accent. I ask if she knows her well since she works in the shop over the road. 'I'm ashamed to say, she's my sister in law!' I am then faced with the embarrassment of her husband forced to apologise to me on behalf of his sister. 'She's crazy' he says. Sue explains that she has known her since she was 15 and even then she had a spiteful streak. She relays a story from a few years back, when her mother in law, with whom she was very close and has since died, was in need of an operation to prevent her from going completely blind. Sue paid the extortionate fee for this operation, but they could not stay for long to look after her throughout the recovery period, as they had to return to Australia. Her sister in law was furious that she was expected to care for her mother. She asked Sue: 'Why would you spend all that money on an old woman close to dying? You should have bought me a motorbike instead!' Sue has never quite forgiven her for this.

Roman returns. He has found a room and asks if I would I like to see it. I have already walked some way along the road searching to no avail, so I'm very grateful. It's called Zoe's guesthouse and is located a little further around the island. It's a small place. The rooms are in huts with the typical Batak front. Two of the Batak houses here look original. They all face onto the lawn, which runs straight down to the lake, where a miniature rocky island sits a few metres beyond the shore. It's a picturesque spot and will be perfect for a morning swim.

We've run out of money, so I take the ferry back to the mainland so

we can pay our tab. I have an interesting chat with a French lady who I had noticed at our previous guesthouse - it’s a shame we didn’t meet earlier. I have to catch a minibus up the hill to the ATM. It's the bus' last stop so it takes me back down to the port, but there’s an hour wait for the ferry. When I return, Harry has been on a trip with Roman to visit the stone chairs - she shows me her photos. It is here that the council of the village would have met to decide an enemy’s fate. Apparently the victim, if sentenced to death, would have been eaten by the villagers. The Batak people have a history of ritual cannibalism.

We stay at Bagus Bay to have dinner and then Sue kindly drives us in her car to Zoe's, as it's too far to push the wheelchair.

Day 91 - 28th July 14

In the morning, I am half woken by what sounds like an argument between my sister and a man, but I don’t wake fully until later. Mike, the owner of the guesthouse is bitterly complaining. He keeps on repeating angrily 'Roman said you were here for many nights. But only one night! But it doesn't matter' although clearly it matters to him very much. The island's very busy so it will be easy for him to fill the room today. We can only assume he can't be bothered with the hassle of changing the sheets and cleaning the room again.

Despite this upset, we still have a pleasant morning. Harry keeps smiling and chatting to him until he softens a little. His wife, a lady from Switzerland, is actually very sweet. She seems shy and we wonder if she's a little suppressed by him. We head to the shore's edge for a swim in the lake. We swim around the pretty little rocky outcrop, admiring the distant mountains surrounding the lake, in the morning’s hazy light. The water sparkles in the sunlight like jewels. A couple of jet skis speed past, disturbing the peace. Their daughter Zoe is playing with 2 friends in the shallow waters. Ella keeps dropping a stainless steel spoon onto the silty bottom, but Zoe cannot dive deep enough to fetch it. She keeps asking 'where is the spoon?' And when Ella has retrieved it 'give me the spoon' only for Ella to drop it back into the lake. 'Watch' shouts Zoe ' I go more deeper'. Her English has a slight Swiss twang. She's pretty and confident.

We eat lunch in a restaurant that the Swiss lady has recommended, choosing pork rendang and pork curry. The food is nice enough but it is the view that is special here - high up overlooking the lake. We fit in a final swim prior to the 4 pm ferry. The ferry's a little late - we're worried we will miss the bus. At the harbour on the mainland, a taxi man offers a price of 75,000 each instead to take us straight to our hotel. Knowing the expense of the taxis in Medan, this actually seems

like a reasonable price, so we accept. There is confusion at first as it transpires we are sharing a taxi with an older Australian couple and an Indonesian tour guide, yet the Australian couple had understood they had booked a private taxi. The Australian couple have travelled extensively and we listen to some of their stories throughout the journey.

We arrive in town late, after stopping off for some food, dropping the Australian couple at the airport and the Indonesian at his home. He promises to book me a room in Bukit Lawang tomorrow as he says the town will be very full, since everyone will be on holiday celebrating the end of Ramadan.

Harry has booked us into a 5* hotel. We sleep in luxury for the night and wish we were staying in this hotel longer!

Day 92 - 29th July 14

When we wake the following morning, we take a swim in the hotel swimming pool. It's on the 9th floor outside and some of the Indonesian guests are doing the same. We are relieved when we see one other girl also wearing a bikini as everyone else is swimming in t-shirts.

We make the most of the buffet and the freshly baked bread and take a taxi to the train station. It's literally just around the corner, but the taxi has a minimum fare of 25,000 IDR. We've left late and I run through the train station pushing the wheelchair and just managing to board the train in time. Harry's heading to Bali but I've decided to stay to visit the Orangutans. I say goodbye, half tempted to see if there is a spare seat on the plane to join her instead as I'm always a little nervous of travelling alone.