Feature | Nemanja Glumac
SULAWESI
I was sitting on a mattress on a
floor in an empty storage room
which had been my home in Bali
for the last couple of months. I
was bored, depressed and slowly
running out of money. Wasting
countless nights online led to nothing productive
though it had provided the perfect opportunities to
meet locals from different parts of Indonesia. Among
many shallow and superficial conversations, one
stood out in particular: a girl from South Sulawesi.
Something just clicked with her. She knew almost
nothing about me except that I was a vagabonding
photographer and I knew absolutely nothing about
her and her island, her culture or her family. In
spite of this, she invited me to stay and live with
her family and to explore her area. I was already
searching for cheap flights as she was still typing. Just
like that, I bought a one-way ticket which left me
with no more than USD $30-40 in my pocket.
IT’S USUALLY DURING THE FLIGHT
that people reflect on their memories or ponder
about the future. I had the weirdest rush of
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The Travellist | Issue 4, 2016
conflicting thoughts as I suddenly realised
what I had done. Honestly, I had absolutely no
idea where I was going. All these conflicting
thoughts bubbled to the surface of my mind
- I had exchanged too few sentences with
my future host nor had I spent enough time
to get to know her better; I didn’t know the
language, and I wasn’t sure at all if anyone was
going to show up at the Sultan Hasanuddin
International Airport which was my
destination (and not the final one, I hoped.)
I guess that’s what separates ‘normal’ people
from adventurers. Unknown is magnetic.
Uncertainty is seductive and if it sounds crazy
enough it has to be done. As the airplane was
landing, all I could see were dry and dark
yellow fields stretching endlessly before my eyes
and the dusty streets of Makassar, the biggest
city in the South Sulawesi region, home to
around 1400,000 people. It seemed as if the
whole area had suffered from a long period of
drought from which it had never recovered.
To my immense relief, I was soon welcomed
by a wonderful, traditional Muslim family