From one of the poorest islands in Indonesia to its glittering capital. Two flights yesterday brought me here, to Jakarta, a city of high rises, including this hotel.
Have I ever slept 55 floors up before? I don’t think so.
The noise that reaches this high is indistinct, muffled traffic, a low roar, snippets of faraway music. I look out the window but forgo the balcony. It’s nice to have a thick pane of glass between me and the view.
After days of flying and layovers I’m on the other side of the world, in Waingapu on the island of Sumba, Indonesia.
It’s a lovely, arid place, filled with beeping motorbikes, bleating goats, crowing rosters and an air perfumed with something I can’t quite put my finger on that seems vaguely familiar.
I took a walk this morning before breakfast (which, like every other meal, consists of friend rice … luckily I like fried rice) and saw clusters of uniformed school kids sauntering along shaded lanes.
The older children (who have studied English) shyly greeted me. “Good morning,” they said, and looked down.
I was struck by how universal are morning routines. I could hear the sounds of water splashing, of mothers calling. Yes, the pigs and chickens are not exactly suburban Virginia, but in so many ways, the rhythms of life are the same. They are a window on the world, a world that for me right now is completely and wonderfully alive.
Just a sliver of time this morning, enough to squeeze in a run in the park. Not just any park, though. But this one.
And it felt like so many of the years that have passed did not really pass, and the me that was running, creaky-kneed, through the brisk November morning was just a breath away from the me that lived here so many years ago.
There are morning glories still blooming on the fence that borders the sheep meadow. There are the same gaggle of runners and bikers and baby carriages.
New York City is a well that never goes dry.
A long time ago, I lived to travel. I saved my teacher’s or assistant editor’s salary so I could use it on trips to Europe, Greece and what was then called Yugoslavia. I’d plan these trips for months, find cheap charter flights (one of which almost stranded me in Athens), stay in minimal hotels — and have the time of my life.
The travel bug has never really gone away. It’s just taken a back seat to raising a family and earning a living.
I’m hoping it will make a big comeback next week when I travel to New York, Jakarta, Burma and an Indonesian island called Sumba. Right now I’m racing around getting shots, finishing assignments, arranging a complicated schedule with scores of moving parts — and imagining how my suitcase will fit everything I need, plus the three moisture meters I’m ferrying over to Burmese coffee farmers.
It’s tempting to wonder whether it’s worth all the bother. But it hans’t been so long that I’ve forgotten how it feels. i’m keeping in mind what travel does for the soul. It feeds it — and fills it.
It’s the City that Never Sleeps — and I’m a person who doesn’t sleep much. Not the best combination. Which is why I find myself typing these words at this hour in this city.
Alistair Macleod’s No Great Mischief is a great-hearted tale of family and place. Set on Cape Breton Island and elsewhere in Canada, it makes me remember a trip there more than two decades ago.
What a rugged, misty place it is, the sort of place that would never leave a person. And it never left Macleod. I read this morning that he returned to his ancestral home most every summer to write exquisite short stories and this one fine novel. His writer’s cabin was perched on a cliff where he could look out across the sea to Prince Edward Island.
Some writers prefer to ply their craft in a closeted space, physically confining but mentally liberating. I prefer (though unfortunately do not practice) Macleod’s method — drawn back year after year to the place that created and nurtured me, with a simple desk and a view that captivates and frees.
(Photo: Wikipedia)
Heading to New York aboard the Acela Express, three hours to the Big Apple. It’s work that takes me there this time, but I’ve built in a few hours to walk.
It will be the perfect way to calm down after a frenetic morning of packing, texting — and learning about last night’s Chelsea bombing. I can already imagine the relief of moving quickly down an avenue, the creative chaos of Manhattan setting the pace.
For now, there is the slightly bumpy ride of a fast-moving train, the only sounds those of keys clicking and newspapers turning. (I’m in the quiet car.)
It’s a rocking motion, and would, if I gave it half a chance, lull me to sleep.
It’s the first beach day I’ve woken up to rain, so instead of rushing off on an early morning jaunt I’m taking a lazier approach to the day. I’m thinking about the walks I’ve taken here this year and the lusciousness of the sand on this beach.
The afternoon was too warm for a walk, but I pressed on anyway. By the time I’d finished, thunder was rumbling in the distance.
The weather here follows its own tropical rhythm. Bright blue mornings and dark blue afternoons. It’s the perfect excuse for indolence.
There’s only so much you can do when it’s this hot. And there’s only so much you can do when rain is pounding the beach and wind is bending the palms.
And so, you do very little. Or try to.
It works pretty well most of the time.
(This lazy canal says it all.)
It’s not a compliment, and Chicago has seldom taken it as one. Sure, the name has come to mean the comedy troupe not a comedic trope, but still … the City of Big Shoulders doesn’t like to come in second in any way.
I learned on last Monday’s boat tour, though, that Chicago was first called the “Second City” in 1890, when it came in second to Philadelphia in U.S. population.
That the metropolis had grown so quickly after the devastating fire of 1871 — which killed 300 people, scorched 2,000 acres and left a third of the city’s population homeless — made it a good kind of “second city.” But subsequent references have left a lot to be desired.
Today I travel to New York for an overnight stay. It will be my second city of the week. So there you go, Chicago. For me, for this week (and this week only), you’re the First City. And New York, sorry, you’re the Second.
