When we had reached the ferry station, there
were many people but luckily the queue for the boat we were taking was short.
My brother kept whining about how scared he was about falling into the water when
we had reached the dock. The boat was floating beside it, and there was a
wooden slab that was used to get onto the boat. It looked very unstable. The
ferry ride was way too long and we had nothing to entertain ourselves with. The
boat just kept floating idly there for several minutes. Although, we had tons
of snacks and we finished the BBQ-flavored Pringles and Chocolate-flavored
Lucky Stix before the ride ended. We were given water too, and my brother and I
kept playing with the containers using the straws. Yes, that was how bored we
were.
We had arrived at Indonesia, and the
queue there was also long. It took up about thirty to forty-five minutes. When
we had gotten out, my brother had to go to the restroom. He said that the
restrooms were really dirty and that they smelled bad. When we got out onto the
bridge that connected the dock to the mainland, we were greeted by one of the
tour guides. My parents told me that we were going to take a massage, something
that I was not very fond of.
We waited a few minutes for the other
people who our tour guide was guiding, and we got onto the bus. It was smaller
compared to the tour buses in Singapore. My mother had finally allowed me to
use the DS-Lite, and I could continue playing my Pokémon Emerald. When the bus
arrived, we entered the building and we had to take off our footwear and put on
slippers. The employees who did the massages washed our feet, and led us to the
massaging rooms. The rooms were separated by curtains, and the room I was in
was beside my brother’s. The massage was weird for me, but my joints felt a
little better after it. My dad told me and my brother that we didn’t know how
to enjoy massages properly.
We got back into the bus, and we went
to where we were going to have lunch. To be honest, the food there wasn’t all
that great. The chicken tasted bland, and the iced tea tasted like actual tea,
which I really don’t like.
After lunch, we went into a nearby
shop. I bought a keychain with my name and Zodiac on it. The person who sold
them used a pen that was tipped with a heater instead of ink, the designs he
put on my keychain were really cool. We also bought come ice cream, but I
wasn’t able to finish mine in time and I had to throw it away.
Instead of a
bus, we rode a car to the hotel. I played Pokémon Emerald the entire ride, and
when we got to the hotel, the first thing we saw was a small swimming pool a
few meters away from the counter. We had to wait in the lobby as my father
checked us in. I was playing a hand-game with my brother, and he kept losing. I
was about to win another round and I told my brother that he could never beat
me, but I lost that specific round. My brother started laughing at me so hard.
Once we got checked in, we got back
into the car and drove to our room. Yeah, the blocks are far apart so you have
to use a car to get from one place to another. Since there were 4 of us, we had
to use two separate rooms that were right beside each other. After we got settled
into our rooms, my mother told us to go change into our swimming attire.
We drove to beach to swim there, but it
was really dirty, so we decided to just swim in the swimming pool. Although, we
did take a few pictures there. There was a house on stilts and a bridge that
connected to it. I tried walking on the bridge to get to the house. It was
really scary walking on something so unstable, and it would wobble slightly
from time to time. There was also this ‘sinking in’ feeling when you look down
off a ledge from a high place. I felt like I was going to fall!
After that, we
drove back to the lobby, and went to the swimming pool near it. I put on my
goggles and cannonball dived into the pool, making a big splash. We played
around in the pool, but at one point, I got a muscle cramp. It was really
painful, and I had to rest my leg for about at least thirty minutes. My brother
started to mock me, I wanted to hit him so badly. After I was able to move
around, I asked my brother to go into the Jacuzzi. We would toss his goggles
back and forth. Sometimes, he wouldn’t know where his goggles were, and I had
to help him find it. We would also play either Water Tag; basically Tag in
water, or Splash Tag; we tag each other by splashing water at each other.
When we were done, we got dressed back into
our normal clothes and we headed to the restaurant for dinner. I only ate 3
bowls of corn soup, 2 plates of spicy beef and rice and 2 and a half glasses of
soda. It wasn’t very filling and after dinner we headed back to our rooms using
another car.
My brother started to whine again about how scary the room was, so
I played some calming music, and that seemed to do the trick. I started to eat
the remaining snacks we had left, mainly dark chocolate-flavored cookies. Our
parents went into the room for a ‘Family Bonding Session’, which was the first
we ever had since, like, 2005. My dad was telling jokes, and most of them were
pretty funny, especially the one with Judas and Jesus. Heheh… After about an
hour, they went back to their own rooms, leaving me and my little brother
alone. My brother started whining again, but I just ignored him and he calmed
down soon after. Soon, we fell asleep.
The next day, we woke up early for
breakfast. All I had was some cereal, fried rice and sausages.
There was
another swimming pool near the breakfast area, but it was really dirty and was
surrounded by dragonflies. We drove to the lobby, and went swimming again. I
swear, it was the only fun thing we did during our 2-day stay in Bintan. We did
some of the games I mentioned earlier, and sometimes, our mother would join us.
Fast forward a few hours, and we were back at our rooms, packing up to go back
to Singapore. We made sure that our phones were fully charged and that nothing
was left behind. We then drove back to the lobby to check out of the hotel. We
waited a few minutes for Dad to finish, and then we ate at the restaurant
upstairs. The food wasn’t very filling, and I was getting bored. I went
downstairs to play my Pokémon
Emerald. I played it until we reached the ferry station, and we got up onto the
boat using the same unstable wooden slab. I played again for the entire boat
ride, and I had beaten the game already before we even arrived back at
Singapore. The ride felt shorter since I had something to pass the time. For
the most part, I was glad to be back in Singapore. Bintan’s cool and all, but
the food there tasted bad and there was no Wifi Signals.
