Trains, Planes & Rice on Wheels

The use of Transport in Flores, Indonesia

Not without a hint of apprehension, I stepped onto the rickety, well-loved bus to undertake the long and sickeningly winding journey from Labuanbajo to Bajawa. I was about to see Flores in all its glory, from the dramatic, lush landscapes to the charm of local commuters. Seven or eight hours of travel lay ahead of me, though I had learned to take such estimates with a veritable handful of salt.

The bus smelled a little dank, musty with the scent of livestock, but the atmosphere was welcoming, and smiles ubiquitous. A twig-thin girl wearing a sequined jilbab could not hide her curiosity in me, a bule, and periodically swivelled on her mother’s lap to steal glances at me from between the seats. I was confident I was on the right bus, but was nonetheless concerned when the bus boarded a ferry. Concern was quickly replaced with a combination of relief and amusement as sun-beaten, shirtless men heaved sack upon sack of nuts and rice into the bowels of the vehicle, before piling the sacks onto the roof like the blocks of the Egyptian pyramids thousands of miles away. Once every nook had been occupied, every cranny stuffed full, the driver guided the reluctant bus around the town in search of further passengers to fill the spaceless places in a vehicle that was starting to resemble a stuffed sack itself.

Eventually we set off, the bounce of the road exaggerated by the hard rice-bag on which I was sitting. The flood of green flowing past the window was mesmeric, and I had soon tuned out the claustrophobia of it all. With nothing to do, I employed my time as an instrument of reflection, marvelling at the pragmatism of transport in this beautiful country. There is never a wasted journey in Indonesia.

A blur of serrated, knife-edge peaks bit into the sky outside like an oscillating, emerald carving knife and they drew me in for what felt like hours. I was absorbed by thoughts of previous similar experiences; the Uzbek trucks loaded with tree trunks and local men, Serbian horses pulling carts of goods and squabbling chickens, and Ladas in Kazakhstan harbouring piles of plants, people and electronics.

Cramped Uzbek man in a shared taxi in Denov

My daydreams were interrupted as we ground to a halt in Ruteng with the dusty engine’s lyric splutter. I was sitting next to an open window and could smell the scent of hot nasi goreng emanating from nearby food carts. A passing young man cheekily tugged on my leg hair through the window, smiling in my direction in order to share the joke. I laughed and pretended to threaten him out of the window. Yet more people piled into the bus at the stop, and began using the laps of existing passengers as extra seats.

Our journey resumed, along with my daydream. I cast my mind’s eye back over one almost very ugly, illustration of resourceful transport. In Java, near Bojonegoro, a driver, a female student and I made our way along a good quality road that bobbed and weaved its way through mountains and banana trees.  We were travelling in a people-carrier, and were greeted by a small intersection where all four corners were peppered with colourful bamboo market stalls selling fruit, fish and beautiful textiles. Taking the stop sign as an unhelpful suggestion rather than an instruction, our driver accelerated into the junction. A four-way pile-up very nearly ensued , and would have included three jilbab-clad women wearing Air Max equivalents riding a motorbike, a becak (a three-wheeled bicycle rickshaw) carrying an entire 4-person family plus luggage, and a horse pulling a hay-loaded cart guided by a weathered Javanese farmer nonchalantly chewing grass. Extreme road and vehicle use is not uncommon in many places around the world, but the more I had thought about this surreal episode, the less sure I had become that stretching every available resource in a transportation infrastructure was entirely a good thing.

Another sack of rice was passed through the rear window and dumped on my lap, crushing the air out of me, and just like that, I was certain it was not always a good thing.

Funnily enough, weeks later and I would be rolling down the glossy tarmac of an Australian carpool lane, allowing a smile to creep over my face at the sheer irony of it all. Australia, and many other more wealthy nations, is now so resource rich that people are actually rewarded for not underusing an available commodity.

I sensed the need for some compromise.

WORDS BY DANNY GORDON