Life goes on in Bagan Batu: Mr Chris is going to teach you past participles

April 15, 2015

For a couple of days after the altercation with my criminally-insane arch nemesis I was on edge. I felt like running away, naturally, no one likes a stalker, but a life on the run was not for me, and so I instead prepared for the potential return of Mr Muchsin by making friends with the guys that sat at the hotel each night drinking and shooting the sh!t. I thought it better to have some muscle at the ready should he come back. One of these, Lohot, was particularly awesome, because he could speak English, laughed at everything, and never stopped smiling. In hindsight, smiling and laughing may not have been the most useful weapons against an evil mastermind, but not to worry, my diplomatic e-mail must have worked, for there was no further sign of Mr Muchsin.

And my protection at the school, the female teachers

I also wanted to stay because I thought it a good idea to wait for Tom, the Belgian cyclist who was going to join me on my cruise to Australia. I knew that he was somewhere in Malaysia doing a ten-day-long meditation retreat in complete silence. As he was not allowed any contact with the outside world during this enforced silence he was proving difficult to get in touch with, but during our last communication he’d mentioned that at the conclusion of the retreat he’d take the boat from Malacca to Dumai and then come and catch me up. So I thought it might be polite to wait for him before straying any further from that town and I also thought that having a companion would lessen the stress of cycling in this intense country, not to mention the usefulness he could provide should I ever be tracked down by any psychopaths again.

I wasn’t sure what to expect from Tom. We’d only spent a few days together at the same guesthouse in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, the previous summer. From what I could remember he had dreadlocks, watched South Park all day and farted an awful lot. Come to think of it, I was starting to wonder if he wouldn’t look a bit out of place on a cruise.

As I waited for Tom I continued with my simple Bagan Batu life, helping out at the school each day, with the exception of Sunday, when there was that two hour church service of course. That wasn’t as bad as I might have feared, perhaps being preached to in a language you can’t understand is better than one that you can. Mr Daniel was one amongst several speakers and there were a fair few lively songs too, with Lohot belting out the tunes with the best of them. After the service I posed for another few hundred photos out in the sunshine, everyone wanting to get a shot next to me in their Sunday best.

I found being in a Christian church in Indonesia particularly confusing because the Indonesian word for 'God' is 'Allah'

I feel I must clarify that the point of this photo was that all of these girls *wanted* to have their photo with me. I did not sneak up behind a group of girls and photobomb them

After that Mr Daniel invited me to leave the hotel and come and sleep at the school for the rest of my time in Bagan Batu. I was a little apprehensive about doing that at first, because I liked having my own space and I didn’t want to feel obligated. But Mr Daniel was a very kind man and he didn’t expect too much of me in terms of hours of class time or work load. At least he didn’t after he tried putting me in a more direct teaching position for the first time. “Mr Chris is going to teach you past participles today” he’d announced to the class of eager faces as we walked into the classroom, handing me a workbook and pointing at the board. “I’ve already started off with a few examples. Go ahead Mr Chris.”

“Mr Daniel, wait” I said, looking flushed, “I’m sorry, what the hell is a past participle?”

Rate this entry's writing	Heart	6
Comment on this entry	Comment	0