Flying Water!

A great little side trip on our Ambon trip was an impromptu hike to the Waka Waterfall...

We had just stopped along the side of the road to admire some spices (more about this in another post)...  As is my style, I ended up chatting with the locals who were standing around... asking about the area, the spices, their gardens and farms... chit-chat.  Of course, my obvious interest led to an invitation to go see some of their lush forest gardens, with promises of not only all these spices on the trees in their natural state, but almost all the fruits I have ever heard of in Indonesia, plus a few I never had!

Pala, or nutmeg... one of the main export commodities of the spice Islands.  The fruit is actually quite tasty, and the under-ripe fruit (above) is extremely sour, but supposed to be very good for cleansing the palate, or curing halitosis.

Oh and that wasn't all... our elderly gentleman tour guide was eager to show us the villages 'flying water' (air terbang).  Huh?  Yes, you heard it right... When I first heard him say this, it took me a few seconds, then a smile of recognition played on my lips as I realized he was talking about a waterfall (usually, air terjun)!  Only here in Waka, the water doesn't just fall as it does in other part of Indonesia and the world, it FLIES!  YES!  Sign me up, that was the clincher... flying water... let's go!

Well, the flying water was no longer flying in all the glory of its more formidable days when it was given the moniker, but we enjoyed the walk through the forest freshness anyway!  It seems agricultural activities up-stream have stemmed the flow of water and reduced it to a mere quarter of its original size.

Waka "Flying Water" Waterfall

Of course, it started to POUR just as we were heading back down, and after taking shelter for half an hour it was apparent the rain wasn't letting up, so we fashioned ourselves some local umbrellas and continued on our way!

Ambon Manise

Retro-posting!

I was in Ambon to help with a ten day Sustainable Fisheries Management Planning Training... the training was excellent, but draining, as it always is when I'm functioning morning 'til night in multiple-languages.  It also meant I was in an area of Indonesia that I had never been before... and with the long Easter weekend on the horizon, I decided there was no better time to extend my ticket and explore a bit!  Luckily I wasn't going to have to do that alone, either... ii came and joined me and we had a fabulous weekend!

We explored the underwater Ambon diving for two days and then explored the terrestrial portion of the island as well!  We literally covered almost every square inch of the island!  There are a few stories about it I wanted to share... but as they say, 'a picture is worth a thousand words'... so...

Hukurila

Hukurila Cave

Laha Piers

"Dad, what's a toad face..."? 

Better keep that eel in your trousers!?

Coy eel

Posing mandarin fish

Tube anemone

Lionfish dead ahead

shoefish

Bottle sponge

Lightbulb eel

Squat lobster catching a ride on a fire urchin 

Stylin' underwater Ambon

Dive log

The diving at Laha was the most utterly surreal experience of diving I've ever had... I can understand why they have named this area 'the Twilight Zone'... because it is!  You're diving in a black sand slope FULL of garbage under the constant drone of the active fishing vessels at the jetty, which throw all their waste directly overboard...  at one point the only exposed skin on me was so itchy... it was disgusting to think of the cause... but then on the other hand, everywhere you looked there was another unique an interesting critter... The types of creatures that choose to make this place their habitat are seriously special!

Our overland exploring consisted of a two-day road trip around the entire island!

Best umbrellas ever!

View of Seram from Fort Amsterdam

1642... still standing after all these years (with a new roof) - good ole Dutch construction!

So many eels at Larike!

Seaside mosque near Larike

Gardaria... the Ambon specialty... size and texture of a plum, tastes like Mango!

Standing on "Pintu Kota", the Gates to Ambon City

Pintu Kota

Downtown Ambon city

A lone rooster with his pink wall

Gimme five!

Hug an eel today...

quite content

I really don't know exactly what it was about this place... the people, the place, music, food...  Ah, Ambon, Sweet Ambon (Ambon Manise)!

Survivor in Raja Ampat!?

I remember watching the first season of Survivor back when I was in university. I didn't realize it was still going... or that there were French, Serbian or Israli versions either!?  And certainly when I was watching it then, I didn't think much about the area in which the 'teams' were living, other than to think it was beautiful scenery and backdrop for the game.

Now, however, that there is a French television team shooting a Survivor Series in Raja Ampat, I am seeing things in a different light.  I am seeing how oblivious foreigners are when they come to an area with a single aim.

Obviously they are here because this is such a beautiful area, rich in culture and nature.  But is their presence here going to do more harm than good in the long run?

Apparently a substantial amount of money has gone into this project... fair enough... but that money was paid directly to the central government and to the government of Raja Ampat... I would wager a very very small percentage of it ever reaches any of the communities of Raja Ampat... its impact will not be felt where it could do some real good and is needed.  As far as I'm concerned it is a complete lack of respect for the traditional village systems which exist in Papua.

This is Indonesia, but Papua is a special case... things don't work here exactly the way they do in the rest of Indonesia... I mean, the level of corruption is still there, or perhaps worse even, but there are two systems of law/government here that should be abided by...  The 'hak wilayat' (traditional tenural system) has been in place in Papua for generations, and has worked to maintain peace as well as protect resources throughout local history.  This traditional governance is the system that the local people live by, abide, and should be respected by the any visiting foreigner as well.  The dualism created when the Indonesian government moved in to Papua is hard to reconcile... but possible.  Papua has special autonomy, and legal respect for their traditional systems... but when foreigners come in without knowing about this, it is easy to step on toes... and the people who lose inevitably are the locals.  I could write many posts on this problem, but don't want to make this blog political and get black-listed from Papua... so I won't.

On one hand, the French TV folk can't be blamed for being utterly oblivious to the appropriate manner of doing things here... they expect that things work as they do in their own country and no doubt no one from the Indonesian government told them any different... But on the other hand, if they're planning such a big and impactful investment in an area, shouldn't they do a little background research and find out the way to do things best???

Anyway, a funny story from the villages since Survivor has come to the area... the villagers in one nearby village were utterly appalled that these poor people had been left to fend for themselves without food, water or fire... so they snuck them over food!  These are the Papuan hearts that I love!