Sama Sama (or You Are Welcome II)

I have the entire row to myself, in the double-decker jet. After a chicken and rice dinner served by green pin-striped waitresses, I don EVA Air’s bright green travel slippers and curl up in the 4 pillows and 4 blankets left to my row with a book of a woman’s solo travels around the world, including 8 years in Indonesia (Travels of a Female Nomad, recommended by my immunization nurse after rounds of typhoid, hepatitis, tetnus, and polio shots in preparation for the trip). The stewardesses swing by with platters of lemon and Chinese tea. They fill up my bright green tea cup and minutes later I’m asleep as we fly up to Alaska, around the Bering Strait, down through China finally landing in Taipei, Taiwan (where the toys come from! I try not to think…)

Pink and gold sunrise warms rough, unpainted concrete square buildings and tin shanty-style shelters that huddle on the edges of green fields and deserted roads. From the plane, it looks like the same patched work quilt of half-finished community that I recognize from other parts of the world. I’ll remember Taiwan for its airport. Hello Kitty Stores and cardboard cut outs, strange symbols-that must be telling me something important -accompanied by stranger cartoon characters, giant orchid displays, enormous “green rooms for relaxing” with zen gardens lined by plastic plants and giant greenscape photo backdrops replace empty terminals. I sit for dim sum style bean curd pastries and spicy beef noodle soup, with one horrible latte (in an attempt to ward off simultaneous caffeine headache and jet lag).

He asks me the time. Joey from Los Angeles – Brentwood, rather – California. His story comes out quickly: wildly successful but disillusioned real estate agent, he found life in Los Angeles lacking something essential, something real, he’s not sure, but he just was ready for a different life, something more meaningful. It’s a refrain I’m hearing more often in my own thoughts…and as I show this side of me to others around me, instead of laughter, I hear agreement from more and more people in my life too. Tired of the game, and the show, and things that seemed unreal, he spent the last 8 months traveling through Asia only to fall in love with Indonesia. He returned to the states to sell everything he owned and move there permanently.

My story comes out more slowly. Like everyone else these days, I can see he’s impressed that I have my own little business, and that I’m taking the time to make the most of it. He tells me where to go, what cell phone to use, what to watch out for, to be careful as a woman traveling alone in Indonesia (it’s just that it’s different here). It’s not the first time I’ll hear this. We trade emails when he goes spear fishing often now and tells me his friend has a yacht going to the Gilly Islands, not the touristy one but the others. I ask him to stall the tour until after I leave Ubud, maybe I can still talk Christine, Jeannette or someone into joining me—I get the feeling that this is all going to be incredible and I’m not even there yet! Whether it actually works out or not, it feels good to now have a friend.

When I say teri mi kasih, Joey responds in Balinese with sama sama. (Indonesian was made the official language in the 1930's, while island specific lanuages - often with caste specific nuances - are still spoken throughout.) I've been learning (non-caste) Indonesian. I've just learned the Balinese way to say you're welcome.