Gili Air

Just off the coast of Lombok lie the Gili Islands - Gili Trawangan, Gili Meno, and Gili Air. These 3 tiny islands are a popular destination for travelers and backpackers who end up on Lombok. Just a 30-45 minute boat ride away, they offer quiet beaches, scuba diving, a wide variety of chill bars and restaurants, and spectacular views of Mt. Rinjani, the 3700 meter mountain on Lombok. Gili Trawangan is known as being the party island, Gili Meno is the super quiet island, while Gili Air is somewhere inbetween. We all opted to head to Gili Air, as we didn't need a huge party island but did want the option to have a few Bintang beers on the beach while socializing with other backpackers. We took a long, extremely indirect local bus from our hotel on Lombok to the port where we could catch the boat to Gili Air - had we taken the logical road the bus ride would have been 30 minutes, but instead we had to go all through the center of town to make other stops so the bus ride ended up taking almost 2 hours. After finally arriving at the port, we found our boat and quickly realized that this boat would be insanely crowded - the boat itself was quite small, in reality it probably had room to seat 30 people comfortably, but we would end up cramming 60 people plus baskets full of food on this little boat. Since the Gili Islands are so small and secluded, almost everything has to be imported from Lombok, hence everyday the boats that go to and from the Gilis are filled with fresh fruits and veggies, bread, eggs, meat, you name it. Thankfully the boat ride was only about 30 minutes, so despite being crammed onto the boat, we didn't have to endure discomfort for too long.

We arrived on Gili Air to quickly see that there are NO cars or motorbikes on the islands, the only mode of transportation is horse-drawn carriage, bicycle, or foot. It was so nice to be surrounded only by the sound of the ocean and the click-clacking of horses hooves on the dirt road. Sarah, Hari, and I found some cute beach-front bungalos complete with hammocks on the porches and decided that we would easily be able to park there for several days. After dropping off our stuff, we walked along the narrow white sand beaches and explored the island. Gili Air is so small that you can walk along the entire beach front perimeter of the island in about 1.5 hours. I immediately loved this island, it was so peaceful and while there were other people around, I still felt completely secluded and not at all like I was on a tourist island.

Another reason we chose to spend our time on Gili Air was because Hari´s has a family friend, Kelly, who insisted we stop by there - Kelly is married to a Sasak man who was born and raised on Gili Air and now owns a bar/restaurant on the island. Kelly and her husband currently reside in the US but her husband´s brother and friends are in charge of Zipp Bar. Kelly told us that if we made it to the island to go to Zipp and ask for Didi, who she promised would take good care of us. Since the island is so small we found Zipp Bar very quickly and as Hari approached the bar, Didi was there waiting for us. He could not be nicer - Hari had contacted Kelly a few days earlier to tell her that we would be going to Gili Air and she told Didi to expect us. Didi immediately made us a drink introduced us to ¨The Boys¨, the rest of the crew who help out around the bar. Zipp Bar had a first-class location on the island, it was on the nicest part of the beach and had awesome views of Lombok.

We spent a lot of time at Zipp hanging out with Didi and The Boys. The food at Zipp was delicious, I ate the chicken and pineapple salad almost daily and they had a wide variety of fresh, Indonesian specialties. We spent most of our time on Gili Air relaxing on the beach, walking around exploring the island, and snorkeling. During that time Hari and I both had a lot on our minds - at this point in our journey not only had we become extremely close, but we were now a couple. Based on our general travel plans we would have to separate after Gili Air, as Sarah and I were on schedule to head to Australia for about 3 weeks, while Hari was going to spend more time in Indonesia and make only a brief stop in Sydney. After that we would all head to South America, but Sarah and I had a completely different path in mind than Hari so we did not think that meeting up in South America was really a possibility. Neither of us were really sure about what was going to happen when we separated but we did know that we were not ready to be apart...

Sarah headed back to Lombok a few days ahead of us because she wanted to spend a few days in Singapore before we flew to Australia. I had gone to Singapore with Hari before Indonesia so Sarah and I decided to meet at the airport in Singapore in a few days time and fly to Melbourne together. Hari and I thought that these would be our last few days together, so we spent every second together. We managed to get in a few scuba dives off the coast of Gili Air, but aside from that we relaxed on the beach and had a few romantic dinners. On our last night, we went to Zipp Bar to have one last dinner and hang out with Didi and The Boys.

We arrived at Zipp just before sunset. After a drink and a few rounds of Hold Em with The Boys, Hari and I looked at the sky and saw pink, orange, and yellow as we had never seen it before. It was, by definition, the perfect sunset. Hari asked me if I wanted to go for a walk on the beach and of course I said yes. We walked along the edge of the water and watched in awe of the brilliant colors illuminating Mt. Rinjani on Lombok. Along our walk we found a perfectly situated log on the beach and sat down to take it all in. We started chit-chatting, nothing out of the ordinary at all. Hari was a bit quiet but I didn´t think much of it. After spouting out some random thoughts about missing friends at home and blah blah blah, Hari took a deep breath and started talking - he told me how happy he was that we were able to meet in Vietnam a few months earlier, and that we were able to continue our travels through Cambodia, Laos, Thailand, and Indonesia. We were both very concerned about what was going to happen when we separated, especially since he was supposed to be moving to Africa for 2 years to join the Peace Corps. Somewhere along the way when we realized that our relationship was much more than a fling, I asked Hari if he would be willing to stay with me even through his journey in Africa. In his ¨speech¨, he told me that he had given it a lot of thought and that he wanted to commit to me even when he was in Peace Corps. At this point I wasn´t really sure what to think, I could tell this was not just any regular conversation...but the next thing I knew, Hari said that he had gotten me something on the island and pulled the most beautiful coconut wood ring out of his pocket. Before I could even realize what was happening, he asked me to marry him. I was shocked, thrilled, ecstatic, so many things at once that I could do was give a little giggle. Poor Hari thought that I was laughing at his speech and rejecting him, but that could not have been further from what I was really thinking. Without an ounce of hesitation I said yes and with that neither of our lives would ever be the same...

After embracing and realizing that we were ENGAGED, we headed back to Zipp Bar as future husband and wife. We enjoyed a quiet dinner and found ourselves just sitting and smiling at each other through the whole dinner. It was nothing short of magical, I couldn´t have asked for anything else in the world. To be honest, the rest of Gili Air and Lombok is kind of a blur to me...we did head back to Lombok for a night, and then had to sadly split for an undetermined amount of time. We were sad to be leaving each other, but given that we had just committed to each other for life we knew that we would figure out a plan for the rest of our travels to work for us. And so I headed to the Singapore airport to meet Sarah and tell her the news - she screamed, jumped out of her chair, hugged me, and even cried a little, it was so sweet. Sarah is the one person who watched my relationship with Hari unfold from the very beginning - we met in Vietnam as friends from work who hadn´t seen each other in several months, and ended up falling in love and agreeing to spend our lives together. Sarah and I hopped a flight to Melbourne and were both excited to start the next leg of our journey...Down Under.