TRANSPORTS OF DELIGHT
In our wanderings around south-east Asia we travelled on practically
every form of transport known to human kind, apart from the horse and cart.
Planes, buses, trains, boats of various shapes and sizes, 'songtheaws', 'bemos',
tuk-tuks and bicycle rickshaws - you name it, we rode on it.
Travel in Thailand turned out, on the whole, to be fairly easy. Although we
were sometimes in some doubt about how to reach our destination the Thais are
well used to coping with the tides of tourists which sweep along the by now
well worn channels and they knew where we needed to go, even if we didn't. There
are, however, one or two points that the uninitiated should bear in mind. The
first is that all travel agents in Thailand will tell you that the only buses
and trains to your next destination run at night. This may not make much difference
to the Thais, who fall asleep within minutes of departure whatever the time
of day or night; but we wanted to look at the scenery - and anyway, neither
of us can sleep sitting up. However, if you persist you can usually discover
a daytime bus, though you may have to trek out to the bus station before anyone
will admit to it.
The second thing to remember is that the air conditioning on both buses and
trains will be set to the temperature of the average domestic refrigerator.
There is, however, a difference in policy between the bus companies and the
railways. On the bus they wake you up every hour with a drink, a damp towel
or a 'comfort stop' to make sure that you have not succumbed to hypothermia.
The railway company, on the other hand, is pioneering the science of practical
cryogenics. Their policy is to reduce the passengers to a state of suspended
animation so that they will not notice how often their 'express' train stops
in a siding to allow a 'special express' to overtake it.
Local journeys in Thailand tend to be rather more hazardous. I have already
discussed the drawbacks of travelling by tuk-tuk in Bangkok. Further south the
preferred method of getting around is the 'songtheaw'. This is a small van with
two bench seats in the back and a roof-rack for luggage. You can seat five people
comfortably on each bench, six at a squeeze (seven if they are all Thais - I
have never felt so ungainly as when trying to insert myself into a space where
a Thai bum would fit quite neatly). With two passengers up front with the driver
that makes a full compliment of fourteen to sixteen. But all songtheaws are
private enterprises and no self-respecting driver will willingly set off with
less than twenty on board. Once the benches are full small plastic stools are
set in the space between them on which three or four more can squat and even
then the driver will happily stop to pick up more. I have seen seven people
standing on the tailboard of a songtheaw and clinging on to the roof-rack. In
fact, I have been one of the seven. When we first encountered these overloaded
vehicles we used to wave them away, crying, like the Mad Hatter to Alice, 'No
room! No room!' But we soo learned that if we wanted to travel at all we had
to pile in with everyone else.
Probably our most complicated journey took us from the island of Koh Lanta,
off the extreme south-west coast of Thailand, to the Malaysian island of Penang.
'Can we get to Penang in one day from here?' we asked the manager of the complex
of beach bungalows where we were staying.
'Certainly,' was the reply. 'You take a boat at 8am to Bo Muang, then a mini-bus
will take you to Trang. From there you can get a bus to Hat Yai and from Hat
Yai you go to Penang. No problem!'
'And how do we get to the boat?'
'Be ready at 7.15 and the truck will take you into town. No problem!'
At 7.15 twenty-two people, plus their luggage, were waiting to get to the boat.
Somehow we all crammed onto the open back of the pick-up truck and were bounced
over the unmade roads to Saladin, a fishing village of rickety wooden houses
built on stilts over the water. We struggled up an equally rickety pier to a
waiting boat.
'Krabi?' demanded a man, seizing my bag.
'No! Bo Muang.'
'Ah, Bo Muang!'
He turned and swung my bag to a man behind him.
'Bo Muang ....Bo Muang ...Bo Muang ...'the cry went up, as our luggage was passed
from hand to hand across the deck and overthe rail to a second craft moored
alongside. We scrambled after it.
'Krabi?' enquired another man.
'No, Bo Muang.'
'Ah, Bo Muang!'
The luggage was already on its way to a third, smaller vessel. We reached the
deck of this one and looked around to choose a comfortable seat. 'Bo Muang!'
came the cry and we turned to see our bags disappearing over the rail, this
time apparently into the ocean. We rushed to the side and looked down. Below
us was a long-tail boat - a kind of overgrown rowing boat with a motor that
consisted of a truck engine mounted on gimbals and provided with a long propeller
shaft extending over the stern. Amidships, about twenty people were huddled
on wooden thwarts under a canvas awning. We had no choice but to join them.
In spite of our misgivings, the boat delivered us an hour later to a slipway,
at the top of which stood the promised minibus. By 6pm that evening we were
in Georgetown, Penang.
The Malaysian bus system worked very well, too, once you accepted the fact that
all Malaysian drivers are in training for the Monte Carlo Rally. We took a bus
up to the Cameron Highlands on a road that climbs 4000 feet in an apparently
endless series of hairpin bends. Our driver was obviously more concerned with
clipping a minute or two off his Personal Best than with the comfort of his
passengers. Feet braced, hands gripping any available hold, we clung to our
seats while he flung the bus around the sharpest bends, pulling G-Forces only
normally encountered in space travel.
We treated ourselves to a hire car in New Zealand but it was back on the buses
in Australia. The drivers here were friendly characters who helped with luggage
and often contributed a running commentary on the scenery but they had very
clear ideas of the correct conduct for passengers. A notice onboard a Queensland
bus said it all. 'No Smoking. No Eating or Drinking. No alchohol to be carried
or consumed. Persons under the influence of alcohol will not be carried. Foul
language will not be tolerated. The driver has the authority to refuse carriage
to anyone at his discretion.' And you don't argue with those guys!
It was in Indonesia that travelling became exciting again. To get from Cilacap
to Kalipucang on the south coast of Java we took a dilapidated wooden riverboat,
crowded with women with baskets of produce and smartly dressed men carrying
briefcases and schoolboys on their way home. Soon the riverbank gave way to
mangrove swamps and from time to time the boat put in at landing stages alongside
tiny fishing villages, where the huts consisted of little more than woven bamboo
screens perched a few inches above high water level.
I became aware of a young man sitting a few feet away. He was looking at the
airline labels on my rucksack. Then he looked at me.
'English?'
'Yes,' I said, doubtfully. 'English.'
He said diffidently, 'May I talk to you? For three years I learn English at
college, but always from books. I never get a chance to speak.'
I asked what he wanted to talk about. He had been reading an English novel.
'Please, what does the expression 'by hook or by crook' mean?'
I knew what it meant all right, but explaining it was a different matter.
He told me that in his country it was considered good manners to ask a stranger
where he is from, where he is going and other personal questions and that the
Javanese found English reticence very puzzling.
'Let me ask you something,' he said, frowning. 'Last week I was in the railway
station at Yogyakarta. There was a couple asking about the times of trains but
I could see they were having difficulties understanding the answers. I went
over to them and said, I speak English. Can I help? But they said no, it is
all right. We do not need help. But I could see that they did. Why did they
refuse my offer?'
I looked at the river and struggled for an answer. I remembered the importunate
street vendors, the taxi driver who had ripped us off, the video camera which
had vanished from beneath my seat during a long bus ride. How could I explain
to this polite, diffident young man about the armour of suspicion which the
average tourist dons for protection?
The boat turned up a tributary. The water was the colour of cafe au lait and
the banks were lined with plantations of banana and coconut and bamboo. My companion
rose.
'I get off at the next village.'
'Is this your home?' I asked.
He shook his head. 'No. Before they graduate all college students must spend
two months helping the people in one of the villages. I have been sent here.'
The village was as poverty stricken as any we had passed. As the boat drew into
the landing stage I noticed a chequered board under his arm.
'Chess?'
He sighed and nodded. 'For the long evenings. I think I shall need it.'
It was on the way from Bandung to Bogor that we experienced the real flavour
of travel in Java. As soon as we reached the bus station a porter seized our
luggage.
'Where you go?'
'Bogor.'
'Ah, Bogor!' and he set off through the crowd at a pace which made nothing of
our two heavy bags. When we caught him up he was stowing one of them in the
hold of a bus, while another man made off with the second.
'Hey!' we shouted. 'Come back. We're going to Bogor!'
A lengthy and acrimonious argument in Indonesian ensued about which bus we should
be on. We opted to stay with the one which already contained our bag and only
realised too late that we were on the cheaper, non air-conditioned bus which
the locals take, rather than the 'executive' bus intended for tourists. It was
already packed but we were squeezed onto the back seat with four high-school
boys.
As soon as we were settled the usual catechism began.
'Where you from? Where you going? How long have you been in Bandung?' (Indonesians
never miss the chance of a free lesson in English conversation.) Then the boys
produced cameras and took turns to be photographed sitting next to us. To have
a picture of yourself with a European is a great status symbol.
All this time the bus was besieged by peddlers selling sweets, cigarettes, tangerines,
bottled water - even second hand magazines. As we prepared to leave they were
replaced by a young man with a guitar who sang, his voice drowned by the noise
of the engine. When he had come round with his hat, his place was taken by a
boy in a purple shirt and a black fez who recited a lengthy prayer (so our new
friends explained) for the safety of the bus. His collection was probably the
most profitable!
The conductor, meanwhile, was busy with his own financial transactions. So much
to the men who brought passengers to his bus (which explains the heated argument
earlier), so much to the men who ran the bus station, rather more, for reasons
no doubt connected with the over-crowded condition of the bus, to the police
watching the entrance to the motorway. These completed, he took up his station
in the well by the rear door, just in front of me. Indonesians have absolutely
no inhibitions about physical contact and he found my knees very convenient
to lean against. By the end of the ride my shins recognised every vertebra in
his spine and my foot had a more intimate acquaintance with his buttocks than
I found comfortable.
Having been sung at, prayed over and offered everything we might conceivably
require in the way of sustenance, we hoped we might be left in peace for the
rest of the journey. Not a bit of it! If ever there was an economy based on
free enterprise and the exchange of small sums of money, it is the Indonesian.
At every village fresh hordes of eager salesmen swept on board, squeezing their
way from one end of the bus to the other past the passengers standing in the
aisles. Toffee, peanuts, fruit salad in plastic bags, little portions of savoury
rice parcelled up in banana leaf ... Many of them were selling the same thing
but each was spurred on by the conviction that people who had refused a dozen
times would suddenly be smitten with an overwhelming desire for just what he
had to offer. Sometimes they got lucky - not very often. It was a relief to
reach Bogor.
Bogor was almost the end of the journey for us. A short train ride, another
bus and we were safe in the arms of Quantas for the flight home. Was it worth
it? Sweating and freezing, struggling with far too much luggage, trying to distinguish
the advances of the genuinely well-intentioned from those of the con men? Definitely,
yes! Would I do it again? I'm not so sure.