Sep/090
Motherfucking Medan
"I have a mission to accomplish in this world for which I must sacrifice everyday pleasures my home my personal security and maybe my own life this is my commitment and i can not be free of it as long as I live." - Che
"Don't Follow the green follow the dream." - Puffy
“In order to be irreplaceable one must always be different.” - Coco Chanel
Being on the road I'm watching a lot of flicks. In Indonesia dollar bootlegs of tons of movies are everywhere. The suprising thing is that its not just the recent action flick. They have really good indies, docs, and tv specials... I recently picked up Steven Soderbergh's 2 part Che series, The Notorious movie, and the Coco Chanel movie. Very cool to watch three stories who changed the world in very different ways, but in common they all had an amazing dedication to do something completely unique and always had their eyes on the prize and didn't let the immediate and overwhelming difficulties keep them from their dreams.
So in continuing with my little dream of circling the globe I left Bali about a week ago on Air Asia to a 5 hr stop over in Jakarta, to an overnight in Medan to a bus to take me to Lake Toba.
Arriving in Medan I first got a vibe kind of like mexico city, with streets bustling and car mechanics and hustlers everywhere. Th ehotel the taxi driver took me too was only 6 bucks, but is easily the most fucked up looking place ive ever slept with holes in the walls, electrical sockets with wires exposed, a padlock on teh door because the door lock was destroyed (and was not fixed, there is still a hole there).
As the sun want down I realized my hotel was literally in the middle of a parade for the first night in Ramadan, and my waiter at the restaurant warned me to keep my hands on my wallet and to watch my bag. I got that lost and drunk in bedstuy at 3 am in august kind of vibe, where EVERYONE was noticing me and it seemed like if they tried to mug me nothing too bad would happen. People calling "Mister! Mister" little kids, dudes in the street... I feel like a space alien. As someone who usually likes to chill in the background it was def a little uncomforatbale. On a footbridge some teenagers took out their money and gestured for me to take out mine. Didnt know what that was about but I didnt stick around to find out. I'm back in the hotel room with Islamic prayer music blasting from across the street. Look forward to being on the island tomorrow.