HarvardIV wrote:
Hi Brad:
Quote:
That being said, I've been to Indonesia and a couple of other places around that part of the world. Make sure your insurance is paid up! Personally, I wouldn't go there looking for anything!
Where've you been exactly? Let me guess Banda Acha? Tsunami relief? What was going on, that made you say the above? Did you run into a bunch of wild jungle bunnies with machetes or what? I'm sure I'm not the only one who'd like to hear about it.
Chris,
No, I've not been to Banda Aceh and haven't had anything to do with the tsunami stuff yet. I've been in Iraq and Afghanistan pretty much since the tsunami. Although, that may be changeing. At least that's what my scheduler tells me. (Australia, are you listening??)
I've been to Medan, Palembang, Linga, Tanjungpandan, Cirebon, Surakarta, Pasuruan and three or four other places when I was still on C-130s. (I might add that we didn't always land at the actual airport in these towns, sometimes we landed at other locations nearby) In this last year, I went to Jakarta a few times with a C-17. Never in my career have I had such a feeling of being unsafe as I did in Indonesia. I can't put my finger on exactly what was wrong, but I got the distinct feeling that if I ever got caught alone somewhere, I might not make it back alive. I've thought that a few times in various places in Africa and South America. And once in the red light district of Frankfurt, Germany. But it really bothered me in Indonesia.
When I was five or six years old, my Aunt and Uncle back in Texas had a foreign exchange student from there. I think she was from around Jakarta, but I'm not 100% sure. Anyhow, she told my Aunt that her family wasn't happy at all that she was going to live in America for a year. Her older brothers basically disowned her for coming over here. It was all over that "Islam is a religion of peace and America is full of infidels" thing. That was back in 1978 or so. I can't imagine that we are thought of much better now.
One last thing. I've been to over 100 countries and territories in my career. It's been my experience that State Department travel advisories are generally pretty accurate! I'm scared of very little, ex-wives, midgets, muslim extreamists, polar bears, panthers, people that drink tequila straight from the bottle, NASCAR fans, soccer hooligans and the occasional circus clown. But I tend to follow the travel advisories just to be safe.
Good luck to ya!