Bagless in Bali

So, having left Dublin slightly late in the gently falling snow, made it through Heathrow just in he nick of time to catch my flight to Doha, changed planes with no time at all to spare in Doha and stopped off in Kuala Lumpur for an hour, I arrived in Denpasar, Bali at about 1800 hrs local time on Monday (1000 Irish time). Unfortunately, my bags did not. I suspect that they never made the tight connection and the switch from T1 to T3 in Heathrow. However, on a positive note, I was paged as soon as we disembarked and was told that my luggage was delayed by 48 hours which is a lot better for the confidence (if not the hygiene) than finding out the hard way as you are the last passenger watching an empty carousel going around and around.

In London I met Peter, a fellow VSO volunteer who is going to the same placement as me in Maumere and, by a strange coincidence, worked with my brother-in-law in Stranraer many years ago. On arrival in Bali we were met by an existing volunteer and a VSO staff member who brought us to our small hotel, which will be our home for the next four nights. Our first full day (Tuesday) was a relaxing one, occupied by buying SIM cards, finding local shops, etc. and on Wednesday we were taken to the VSO office for the first day of our induction. That night we all went to the home of Anne, VSO’s country director in Indonesia, for a welcome party where we met the hosts in whose homes we will be staying for six weeks from the end of this week. My host has good English and a huge sense of humour and I think will make this a very interesting experience. He told me that his wife speaks no English so I will starve unless I learn Bahasa Indonesia very quickly ! I’ve promised to teach him a few words of Irish while I’m there.

Thursday & Friday will also be taken up by various induction programmes – introductions to the VSO staff and to VSO’s programmes in Indonesia, etc. On Friday we move in with our homestay families and on Monday next we start our six week language course so there’s a busy time ahead. Some photos shortly, I promise - I realise that word only posts are very boring !

STOP PRESS : 9am THURSDAY : I have been reunited with my luggage !