FLYING TANDEM GONE TERRIBLY WRONG

“What will you do if your tandem partner is weighted you down and there are no safety parachute left to safe both of you?! ... Free falling together or cut her lines and safe yourself instead?”

In my 10 years of flying tandem or solo -- traveling with partners or buddies or by myself, ALMOST never EVER I had terrible experiences until recently when I was traveling in Myanmar.

I always called myself as responsible budget traveler with a lot of attitude and style, which means even though I travel with specific amount of budget to spend, however ... in the same time I keep maintaining my certain standard of style and conveniences, as well as ... being responsible by do not give a burden to the other fellow travelers and do not leaving a foot print to the places that I visited besides a tons of great pictures, good times and little souvenir for beloved people back home.

Just like my travel motto that I quoted from my close friend: “you can be cheap but not easy or you can be easy but never be both”

So when Vero (my friend who is working in Yangon at the moment) informed me about Myanmar’s situation and condition, from visa regulation until the country restriction likes; there’s no ATM machine, we can’t use credit card or western union and avoided talking politics to local peoples because you will never know whom you will be encounter along the way. There are so many undercover government secret agents among society.

Consequently I did my home work by prepared myself to act like ordinary traveler who just want to have a great time and counted how much budget that I will be need to spend. Based on my past experiences traveled around South East Asia for 10 -15 days, we only need around 5 million IDR excluded flight ticket of course.

The original plan was traveling with Vero for a week after that I will continued the trip by myself for another week.

We decided to start our journey from Mandalay (because of Thaung Byone Festival “The biggest gay festival in South East Asia” .... Ehm, sounds great huh? a bunch of gay guy, party, and booze).... Then Bagan (the city of thousand temples and pagoda’s), Inle Lake (the romantic getaway over the lake view) after that I will continued by myself to Kalaw (famous for tracking destination) and Ngapali (simply the bitch areas ... Upsh I mean beach area).

Somehow along the way, my other friend here in Jakarta is interested to join the trip, which is fine by us (Vero and I) ... given the fact that we thought, we “knew“ this girl and again “the more the merrier!!!”

Unfortunately WE WERE TOTALLY WRONG!!! … First of all: we absolutely don’t have any ideas how this girl will behaved outside her comfort zone, secondly: the more can be crowded and suffocated, especially when the person that we were travelling with dumped all of her financial and emotional baggage on us without prior notice, it just felt likes, we’ve been “ambushed” that leaves us breathless and speechless.

Although before the trip I did brief her rule of Mika’s 101 famous back packing travels (To whom that might interested to have the manual … it’s available now in GRAMEDIA!!! Hahahhaha….) -- things that we will dealing with, all the reading material concerning the places that we’re going to visit as well as the list of the things that she needs to pack basically I look alike travel agent that make sure that everything are set and done before the trip.

Again unfortunately she didn’t even bother to read all the things that I sent her because she thinks she can always rely on us (Vero and I ... Well, I love you but I love me even more ... so think again!!!)

All of a sudden Vero and I trapped in situation like we were traveling with a “big baby” where we had to take cake and constantly reminded her things that she needs to do since she can’t think for herself.

Seriously if I could choose -- I feel much better traveling with actual baby because somehow in the back of my mind I’m fully aware that baby was meant to be annoying and craving for a lot of attention so at least I will well prepared myself for it (read and watch nanny 101, I guess) but “big baby". OMG, I don’t think so!!! Unless, I got paid… Honey, please read the first manual of Mika’s 101 famous back packing travels –“you can be cheap but not easy or you can be easy but never be both”.

Anyway here are the best parts… She did not only corrupt our mental with her lack of inability to act and think in the same time but she also messed up with our traveling budget, because of her unorganized plan to change her flight ticket back to Indonesia earlier in the last minute that costs her the price of a new flight ticket plus she even didn’t bother to check her financial situation and again rely on us (borrow our money which we only brought just enough for ourselves).

I guess some people are just meant to be as social gathering friend but it’s not as the traveling mate, because finding travel mate is like finding a good sport shoes, it has to be comfortable, affordable and you can rely on in any situation.

Thanks god,Vero and I shared the same habit of travel and dark sense of humor, so we could passed the days with laughter to ease our burden. I remembered one night in Bagan, during our last dinner (meanwhile the other” friend of mine” was sick and stayed at the hotel room) we joked around that this would be our last supper since in the days to come we have to really squeeze our budget, BADLY!!! and it did.

For the first time in my life I had to counted every penny of my money make sure that I had enough money for accommodation, transportation and the food. I never feel so poor, like I felt that day… Not because I don’t have money but because I lead my money in the name of responsibility and good conscious that ended up messing up with my traveling budget.

Back to the first question in my article: “What will you do if your tandem partner is weighted you down and there are no safety parachute left to safe both of you?! Free falling together or cut her lines and safe yourself instead?”

I’m definitely not going to free falling together, I might just send her back to Yangon earlier by 15 hours bumpy, dusty, bus ride with 40,000 IDR in her hand (just enough for taxi cost for bus station to Vero’s apartment) then ask her to refund her flight ticket from Inle Lake to Yangon so she can use that money to survive in Yangon before she is heading back to Jakarta.

Do I traumatize with flying tandem? Absolutely NOT!!! One bad experience can’t justify my future flying tandem. So far I had a great tandem partners -- they are not only well equipped with emotional and financial stability but also performed as my personal GPS, porter (umbrella boy), bodyguard and private donor or even sponsor =)

However thanks to her, I learned a lot from this trip, such as:

Lesson number 1: RESPONSIBILITY and GOOD CONSCIOUS are not meant to be together =)

Lesson number 2: How to get a grip of a person that you don’t like without losing your sanity. OMG, you don’t know how many ideas that I had…. Plenty!!! I even think to create a blog called www.get-a-grip-of-her.com

Lesson number 3: How to survive traveling with very tight budget without flashing “my two big assets”!!!! (Gee, that could be my next book title I guess! hahahahaha....)

Will I be traveling with her again? HELLO PEOPLE, didn’t I learn my lesson?!!! =)

Honestly with all the things that I’d been going through, deep down inside I still believed and think, she’s a nice person with a lot of potential to over! It just I don’t need to be the one who discovered =) I really hope she learns her lesson to be more responsible to herself and the people around her. Moreover I wish all the best for her in the future.

As for the other friends who might interested to join me in my next back packing adventure; (I was thinking next year will be Philippine, New Zealand or Nepal) ... Don’t be afraid, I don’t bite but I might ditch you in the middle of nowhere if you act like that! HEHEHEHEHE ....

Of course, you are most welcome to join me however bear in mind PLEASE be a responsible traveler by not leaving your footprint, emotional, and financial baggage behind because I can’t be your travel mate, babysitter, parents, or sugar mama in the same time!!!...