[brightbluesky]

Originally Posted by nitecrawllerr

Upz u 18++ for ur effort/fr.

super thanks for the pump.

my next series...

where i usually go and eat?

1. what's the 1st thing i do (of course, this is not set in stone. it's just a series of recommendations that I abide to, so that it factors in safety first.)

I usually walk into the town from the jetty.
You will be hustled by the drivers / ojeks to take their ride.
if you choose to, I usually pay sg$1 to sg$1.50 in rupiah. I kid you not.
but I rarely do that, cause maxi is just hmmm 15 mins walk away?
do not make eye contact with the drivers/ojeks and be assertive when you reject. The balai folks are ok, they will not pester you when you are assertive.
but do not be violent, rude cause we are visitors/guests afterall.

the 1st thing I do after I change money is to buy a pre-paid sim.
it's only sg$3.5 to $5?
you will need it for google-translate, google maps and internet surfing when you are outside of your hotel and when you are back at the jetty, waiting for your ferry. this is money v well spent. don't skip this.

the 2nd thing I do after I change money is to buy 2x 1.5L bottled water for each day of stay. I usually buy 3-4, so that I do not run out of portable water. That 3rd bottle is for the farm girl.

There's a "7/11" just beside Maxi. I recommend that you guys go there. The prices there aren't varying. I realised all my years of patronage to this chinese provision store, he varies his prices. So ya, if u are cigarette/beer consumers, buy from their unofficial 7/11s'.

If you choose other hotels, there will be some shops near you for your provisions. but I highly recommend maxi, why? if u are super unadventurous, you can spend your entire day in maxi. it has a restaurant inside and you can have your meals there. Don't expect real western grill, ok? They are not going to be using some charcoal oven to cook your meats. But if u are lazy to travel and values utmost safety, you can nest at Maxi the entire day.

of course, you can also choose to boil water but that's too much of a hassle for me and seriously, I think bottled water is abit safer. You can always boil the bottled water if u want extra safety.

2. I usually eat at the bak ku teh just outside the jetty, bearing the channel U logo. because I don't speak bahasa and seeing the food, the nasi padang, placed outside in the open/cold signals to me germs build-up, I usually skip it. I am not saying that it is bad but I don't want to have the runs when I am overseas. I am probably in SG for too long to have a strong immune system when I taste street food from indonesia.

*If u have the runs/diarrhoea, there's a 24 hours pharmacy just diagonal of the police post. the police post is somewhat diagonal of Maxi. Yes, it's truly 24 hours, the pharmacy. I checked it out at 11pm before. & yes, 11pm is considered super late and scary to be loitering around alone or in a pair. Try not to do that, esp if u are new to the place.

3. my dinners are quite standard. I highly recommend an ojek ride to Silver River. It will costs u sg$1.50 to sg$2 max. I mean the scooter ride will costs u sg$1.50, not the seafood dinner*

Silver River is just another typical Chinese seafood restaurant but it does not serve pork in it's menu. They cater to the muslim majority, being halal.

When you order, the common sense thing to do is to ask how much is it for what you order before you consume the food. otherwise, you would be in a world of pain if u wrecked up a rolex bill for the price of a dinner.

I would also tell the boss that there's no accompanying driver/ojek, so there's no commissions payable. Remember in my part 1, drivers/ojeks hook onto you like a leech. And they will collect commission wherever you go with them. So your farm girl becomes more expensive, etc.

I have eaten meals at Dolphin, Long Beach, etc.... and found Silver River to be the best in food quality and lower pricing. Or rather, I observed most locals seem to go Silver River... so my other rule of the thumb is to go where the local chinese goes.

What if u are hunting on a budget? Go to Food Court 22. Again, pay the ojek a dollar and wait for the industrious one who will fetch you there.

Food Court 22, if I didn't remember the name wrongly, is like our open-air hawker centre. Sells beers. BBQ Fish which wasn't v cheap. And other items, like Zi Char and other dishes. The indonesian malay locals go there too. It is somewhat near to silver river too.

It's in the fruits region of the town. There's a few mega-stalls selling fruits. It has the chinatown feel/balestier feel/geylang shophouse feel.

otherwise, if u are on super budget... you can always go for the ramlee burger at an affordable sg$2.50 for their burger special on double rats' patty and cheese, etc. Yes, I don't think that's beef though they claim it is. This ramlee burger standalone operated by 1 pax joint is just outside another fake 7/11, on the left side of Maxi, across the road. It is opened from hmm, 8pm onwards?

This fake 7/11 sells slurpees and it has 1 or 2 tables with seats for it's customers outside the shop. But 1 table is permanently occupied by the ramlee burger vendor... so do not be in his way unless u are his customer.

That's about all.

My solo trips to balai are usually v simple. It's just a mainly sex-buffet affair in the past. But after I get hit by absconding girls, it is no longer in my list as a nice and cheap short-break destination.

I hope that any other budget solo travelers would benefit my write-up, if they like a guide of what I usually do as a routine there. essentially, i hope all these benefits the new to-be solo traveller @ balai.

TO DO
1. I usually pay in full for the projected number of stays for my hotel after I changed my sgd to monopoly money in rupiah.
2. Keep sg$6 or 60k rupiah in exact notes. This is their current ferry tax which is payable upon exit.
3. DO NOT, I repeat DO NOT hoard rupiah. It's only dumbos who will keep rupiah and bring it back to SG or Msia, regardless. Change what you need to their monopoly money and then change it back to your local currency on your day of departure.

I met this uncle who hoarded rupiah, thinking it's treasure. That was from the suharto went down days. Their currencies got changed in printing style and it becomes japanese ww2 banana monies.

So no, do not change more than what you need. Or when I have excess, I always convert it back to local currency that I use, be it RM or SGD.

how do I get my sg$1 ojek rides?
well, the context is their normal hardworking everyday folks get a salary of sg$80-150 a month.
sg$1 for a scooter ride where the scooter's speedometer is faulty, probably with only 1 or no rear view mirror sounds like a fair bargain, if at all as it comprises safety.

Initially, they (the ojeks) may mock u, but that's just them trying to pressure you to their game.
Just stand around and approach another who is willing to go for it.

The point here is this, per meal, we spend sg$5 to sg$25 per pax?
Their natives' per meal is at a fraction of what we spend.
sg$1.50 or thereabouts region. Yes, I ate what the locals ate at a v local coffeeshop, it's mainly carbo with soy sauce as condiments and lots of msg.
My point is this is their ecosystem, let's try spoil it for them.

It's like how we spoil out market for domestic helpers in SG.
Are they worth that $600 a month they draw as a salary?
hell no, cause I don't see the maid working 4 times as hard.
in fact, she works way harder when she's a hotel staff back in batam, etc, drawing 1/4 the min salary we pay them.
You get the point.