Vacation in Karimun Jawa: Abridged Version

Last week, I found out at nearly-the-last-minute that there would be no school in the upcoming week due to mid-year testing. (It isn't even close to mid-year yet, but, you know, whatever). So what was I to do for twelve days of zero responsibility? Travel to a nearly-deserted island, naturally! On somewhat of a whim I packed up and with three of my girl friends traveled to Jepara (central Java), embarking for the island of Karimun from there. (Karimun means “stone’s throw,” so the name of the island literally means ‘a stone’s throw from Java’). We imagined a smaller, less developed, less populated Bali. A tourism site advertised abundant snorkeling and scuba diving, fishing, “sunbathing” and a few western-style resort hotels. We couldn’t have been more wrong.

There’re a million things I could talk about here, but I’m going to keep it to bullet-points, mostly due to my own laziness.

--For a “tourist resort” island, there were only two places to eat—both somewhat unappetizing warungs—and no actual restaurants.
--The “western” resort that we had planned to stay in for at least one night was closed, apparently because they were renovating it. We had only three other choices of hotel: two of these were completely empty (read: no guests), and the third had just one guest, a white woman who paid no attention to us.
--The first hotel we tried staying at kicked us out after the first night because, (and I’m hardly kidding here), the owner wanted to go to Semarang (city on the mainland) and didn’t want to keep the hotel open. I should mention that after telling us they could not provide us with the free breakfast the booking usually includes, the hotel staff member said if we paid 25,000 rupiah they could magically make some nasi goreng (fried rice, often eaten at breakfast) appear for us; it almost sounded like bribery!
--The second hotel was fine, but the only food it had was rice, eggs, chicken, and a few vegetables. There was no possible way for our hotel to even acquire more food until the next ship came in from Jepara, and we ate them out of bread and veggies after only one meal!
--After mentioning to our hotel manager that we’d like some beer (the hotel was freshly out of it, of course), virtually every person we came across on the island asked us if we wanted beer. In the morning, at night, whenever.
--After going snorkeling for a few hours one day (one of about three activities for tourists, aside from the shark pool and fishing), more or less everyone we spoke with mentioned that they saw us snorkeling and that we were good swimmers.
--We decided to rent motorbikes to take a driving tour of the island, and after asking our hotel manager for helmets, he responded with a glint in his eye “Oh, don’t worry, there aren’t any police on this island!” As if this would be the only reason to wear a helmet!
--After having dinner at said sketchy warung, we were invited into the home of the family across the street, which owned the one and only souvenir shop (it sold flip flops and sunglasses). We were fed just about every kind of drink and snack they had in their modest house, and got to play with kids and watch Muslim soap operas! Living in a relatively big city in a somewhat wealthy, private neighborhood, I rarely if ever experience the Indonesian phenomenon that is “come into my house and I will feed you a million different things.” I loved it, of course. I found out that most people who live on the island migrated over from Jepara or Semarang once the island started being developed for tourists. I had guessed this was the situation. The only resources on the island are fish and coconuts, so it would have doubfully had a “native population” in the past.
--Apparently the only thing on the island designed specifically for tourists was the “shark island.” During our snorkeling trip, we were taken to a tiny island near the main one that could only be reached if one stepped on a dock made from trash and old barrels, and which hardly looked equipped to support the weight of some healthy American girls! Once we braved the dock we were shown a human-made “pool” that contained maybe ten nurse sharks. If you paid the 20,000 rupiah docking fee, you could climb into the pool and swim with sharks! What fun! I declined participating in this riveting activity because I was feeling a little cold and clammy from snorkeling. That, and I wanted to take some photos as evidence of this bizarre island attraction.

So, yes, our trip to “mini Bali” wasn’t quite what we expected, but if it had been typical, I’d never be able to tell this ridiculous bullet-point story! Well that, and the stars at night were to die for. Truly.