16/12/2013 to 18/12/2013–Kuta, simply don’t come here!

 

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Ahh, Kuta, a highly acclaimed tourist destination in the south portion of Bali. Filled to the brim with Australian holiday makers and wet surfers strolling the streets with their surfboards in hand. People come here for the surf, the beach and the nightlife with new clubs opening every weekend to rinse every dollar from the tourists.
Walking the streets and beach I had to fend off many people from selling me items that I would never have use for or offering surf lessons and the one thing that really annoyed me was that many of these locals would have incredibly rough Australian accents and would get my attention by yelling in such a way it would make me cringe, this is obviously due to the overflow of Australians who would flock to this location.
This place to me has no soul with few tourists having intent to see the culture, the friendly local people or even the delicious authentic Balinese food that seemed only available on the outskirts of town that were hidden from view unless of course your are willing to pay the overpriced menu in the fancier restaurants. Although having just said this I am a victim of going to an all-you-can-eat western food buffet for $5 and inevitably crippling myself from eating way too much.
Unfortunately for me I had to stick around Kuta as I was waiting for my passport to be extended which took a couple of days. I could have gone to the immigration office at the airport myself however I was told that this takes up to a week to process so Luckily I met a guy in the street who did the whole procedure for me; it did seem sketchy at first but all worked out and now I have another month before I have to leave the country.
Speaking of which, over these last few days I have been debating with myself on where to head to next, it took quite a lot of googling but my best bet is to continue east across the archipelago through Komodo and into Timor where I can cross into East Timor and back to Indonesia for another month where I will boat it to Sulawesi and Borneo.