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started 2022 with a trip to Bajawa. Such a breath of fresh air from the city. Funny story, a friend from Bajawa went to Jakarta and since they are used to Bajawa’s quiet and spacious road, they choose the most crowded and jammed street in Jakarta. “Why did you choose the jammed road? You could have chosen a more relaxed way,” asked a friend of mine, “No, I am doing this on purpose, I need a new environment, I need congestion,”. Well, I found that interesting and funny that we, city people, crave peacefulness yet they want congestion. Bajawa and its cold weather, transportation such as cars with their super loud music, become its characteristics.
Everybody knows everyone, locals are super friendly, that is why I miss Bajawa. The day I arrived in Flores, I did not directly arrive at Bajawa, Ende was the first destination. We first visited Soekarno’s seclusion house during his time in exile. Then we had to go through 4 hours trip with a car to Bajawa, though the 4 hours trip felt so long because it was nighttime, thankfully we have Mama Asri with her interesting fun experience and knowledge about Flores’ tradition and culture. We stopped a little bit and ate grilled fish with the beach as our view, exchanging stories about Flores and Javanese culture, thus we are not only full of foods but our brains were also full of knowledge. After a couple of more hours, we arrived at Edelweiss Hotel. Edelweiss hotel’s people greeted us at midnight with their typical warm yellow cozy lights and we went to sleep right away.
Edelweiss hotel made me feel welcomed and after days at the hotel, I felt the bond between us and the hotel staff. We even shared moke (Bajawa’s traditional alcohol drink) at night in front of the hotel’s dining room. Speaking of the hotel’s dining room, it was my favorite spot and the view in front of the hotel’s dining room was my favorite view. You can see Inerie mountain clearly from the hotel dining room in the morning and that was our view for 13 days straight.
The day after, we went to Nage Village attending Bajawa’s new year tradition, the Reba ceremony. It was very ritualistic and festive, I ate so much food and drank a few mokes (Bajawa’s traditional alcohol drink), since every Sa’o (traditional house) I visited, served food, I had to eat every food that was offered. First, when we went to Mama Rosa’s Sa’o she lent us Bajawa’s traditional cloth for the ceremony, then, we had Uta wona for the opening, Uta Wona has a thick porridge texture and is made from moringa leaves. You can eat Uta wona alone or it can be eaten with rice but clearly, Moke is still compulsory for the drink. One of my favorite traditional food there is Rarete, Rarete is a mixture of chicken, chicken’s blood and coconut grating steamed together making a tasteful dish that is served in many houses in Flores. I prefer Flores’ traditional and home foods rather than the city’s restaurant food honestly.
As I said before in Bajawa, everybody knows everyone, no matter how far you go, the chance you’ll meet your blood sister, sister you didn’t even know exist, your mother’s cousin is big. If you happen to see two cars stopped on the side of the road, it is not because their machine broke, they are just casually smoking and chatting because they are somehow related. It is amusing for me, whereas at home, I don’t even know who my neighbors are.
I went to Wolobobo hill, from there you can see Inerie very closely, if you ever wonder what it was like, it was like looking at a live desktop wallpaper. Mama Asri told us the story of Inerie mountain when we first arrived at Bajawa. In the story, Wolobobo is actually the most loyal guard of Inerie. Ine in Ngada language means mother, thus Inerie is associated with woman. That was one of the reasons why my mother liked Inerie so much. She even made a song dedicated to the mountain. Unfortunately, the Wolobobo hills are now filled with installations for tourist interest.
One of my friends met a cop when we were at Manulalu. In our country, paying cops for making driver’s licenses is normalized. The police said that here, in Bajawa, making a driver’s license is way cheaper and easy because of the low population. My friend got so excited because he had to renew his driver’s license and seeing this opportunity made him want to make a new one. Without making further ado, two days later, he and I went to the police station. I waited for less than an hour, he just had to fill in his data, took a picture, and wait. It was that easy. He paid Rp 500.000 for two licenses (sim a dan c), he was so excited about this, because in Java, we could only get one license for Rp. 500.000 and we have to wait a few days for it to be done. Making the driver’s license needs less than an hour but we hung out in front of the police station for two hours because we had too much fun chatting with the cops in Bajawa. Bajawa has a low population as well as the crime rate. They share their personal experience being a cop in Bajawa, a lot of free time because of how small the city is, especially for traffic police, traffic accidents did not happen often but if there is one, death usually follows after. The most common problem that the police have to deal with is land disputes. Police raids rarely happen, if they happen to see underage kids drinking alcohol either they would just tell their parents directly since they knew who their parents are or they join them drinking the Moke. The same applies when there is a group protest (which rarely happens too), they would just tell them to go home.
There is only one café in town or at least that we know of, Lekosoro. It is one of the town’s hot spots for youngsters. I made many new friends there. I’m amazed by their spirit of making art in whatever form it is, though there are few people who are aware of these things there. But at least, the friends I met there wanted to do many things, individually or collectively. Lots of poets and musicians like to hang out at the café. Every few days there is live music, whoever wants to sing can sing. Their café felt homey because of how cozy and friendly the environment was. When in Bajawa, we spent our time there, until 1 AM just jamming songs to songs because everybody could sing and play guitar, I was surprised that everyone has such a good voice.
My experience in Bajawa was bitter-sweet, I learned a lot of things from each person I’ve met and gone with. I’ve seen beautiful things, learned new things, experienced a new culture, but overall, this trip is very insightful and it is going to be a memorable trip for me. Bajawa was by far the coziest town I’ve ever gone to. That was just a little part of my trip, I hope I could go back there someday.