It’s a strange and amazing experience—planning a shotgun weekend away to a country you’ve never been to before, buying a plane ticket to an island you probably couldn’t point to on an unlabelled map, packing your backpack with little more than your swimsuit, magazines and a toothbrush, hitching a drunken ride to the airport Friday after work and nearly missing your flight, arriving at your destination without a visa, hoping to find some guy named ‘Ketuk’ waiting outside the airport with your name on a placard and a smile on his face, cruising away from the hustle and bustle at a snail’s pace into a suburb that has even Ketuk turned around, breathing in and trying to freeze-frame the unfamiliar sounds and smells and sights, suddenly seeing a familiar figure on the side of the main street with his arms outstretched, jumping out of the cab into the warm embrace of your friends—and feeling like you’ve come home.
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