Arriving in Raja Ampat

After a three hour flight on a small airplane (but far from being the smallest one we’ve been on), we arrived at the Sorong airport, a room that was empty except for a baggage claim, bathrooms, an immigration office, and, of course, people. On the east side there were warnings about Ebola and MERS. In the middle of the Ebola sign, it told people not to eat bats or “bush meat.” Then we got a taxi across the city to a ferry. Like in Bali, many people in Sorong rode motorbikes, but, unlike in Bali, some people walked, and many of them used umbrellas to protect themselves from the sun. There were far fewer people than you’d expect in a city.

Then we boarded the ferry.     It wasn’t too different from most other ferries we’ve been on. In the row in front of us, there was a Belgian man who owned a traditional homestay with his Papuan wife, and a German couple who worked for the government but got a year off to travel every three years. Mommy joined them in a vibrant conversation about Papua. Then the Belgian man got out his computer and showed us pictures of his homestay. When we got off the ferry, every man was smoking. The woman didn’t smoke, at least not in public. Papua had a much worse smoking problem than Bali did.

We had to check into the tourist information center, which was, oddly, much bigger than the airport. It had two large rooms, both of which were mostly empty. At the back there were stands with snacks. We brought Oreos and some peanut crackers. Several employees stood around with nothing to do. Two of them were playing a game of chess.

We proceeded to a motorboat that would take us to our first homestay. The German couple from the ferry joined us. Our first stop was a traditional Papuan market, were the owners of the homestays got their food. The market consisted of a couple of tables with food on them. We came in the afternoon, so there wasn’t that much food left, but there still were bananas, cassava, and several other things. People from the surrounding areas also came to buy things. Many had dogs, which were not leashed, but stayed, in the general vicinity of them. We were told that dogs are native to Papua. We did not buy anything because you had to get the entire portion of food, and we only needed so many bananas. However, the people steering our boat got some food from the market.

After dropping the Germans off and watching an amazing sunset, we got to our first homestay after dark. It had dogs, two of which where very nice and slept in our rooms. The first three homestays we stayed at weren’t actually homestays, but rooms made out of coconut trees (indeed, everything was made out of coconut trees) that were for sleeping, plus a place for eating. The other homestays were built on or near the water, had fewer rooms, and were more like actual homestays, being shared with the owners. All of them had mosquito nets, although we saw few mosquitoes. We bought a hammock with us and set it up when we could. The food was mostly fish and starches, with very few fruits or vegetables. Eggs (omelets, boiled, fried) were common, but, oddly, chicken was rare. Every meal had rice.

We were renting the kayaks from kayaks4conservation, an NGO (non governmental organization, of which Papua has many) that made kayaks and made them accessible to visitors. It was located on the island we were staying on, Kri, and so, on our first day, we set out on foot to get our kayaks. One of the dogs from the homestay followed us. Unfortunately, it was Saturday, their day off (we had assumed their day off would be Sunday, because most Papuans are Protestant Christians). So we had to wait until the next day to get our kayaks. In the meantime we met a nice French man who had been living in Germany. He showed us a documentary on conservation in Raja Ampat. The next day only Mommy and Daddy went to get the kayaks, and on their way they saw a giant lizard. The kayaks were very good quality. Later that day, we headed off to our next homestay. The waves were unusually choppy, but we were in our bathing suits and had spray skirts, so it wasn’t too much of a problem. Our plan was to kayak around the island of Gam (not to be confused with Guam, the U.S. territory) and then return to the Kri homestay.

-Isaiah