We're back in Malaysia now, after spending a few days in North Sumatra, Indonesia. From Penang (Malaysia) we flew into the airport in Medan, which is the capital city of the Indonesian province of North Sumatra (which, as you may have guessed, comprises the northern part of the island of Sumatra). From there we traveled overland to a village called Bukit Lawang. It's a small town that is situated on the edge of the Gunung Leuser National Park, and supports itself through tourism.
Tourists go to Bukit Lawang (\there too, the orangutans, but as it turned out, the village itself was interesting too.
Below: a table selling durians, the \Osur to Indonesian food goes, it wasn't very hard to find vegetarian stuff. There Was a lot of tofu and tempeh dishes, Among Other Things. But everything was incredibly spicy! On our way out of the country (flying from Medan to Kuala Lumpur) Our flight WAS delayed three hours (it Was Only a one-hour flight, and It Was Already Going To Be a midnight arrival, so the WAS MOST unwelcome delay, we Got Into Our hotel in KL around 4:30 am). Anyway, since it's so late and the WAS Entire Seem To Be airport shut down and the Passengers Were Already on the Other Side of security and we where so long delayed, the airport (or the airline) Actually Provided everyone with free food, a whole boxed meal. And like I Said, It Was Mostly vegetarian, But Was It ever man spicy, WAS Which Consistent with my previous experience with Indonesian food, But It Was That this meal Surprising That They Gave everybody - Grandmothers and grandbabies alike - Was That Hot. I guess that's just the way everybody eats it There. (Picture Below another one from Bukit Lawang ... unrelated to food.)
So anyway, like I Said, people go to BL to see the orangutans and monkeys and stuff, and we did see Them. We Saw Them On Our Official Guide Through the rainforest hike, But We Also Saw Them When We just walk around on our own, Both in the forest and in the village. One morning, Some Were Even monkeys clambering all over and around Our guesthouse (first picture below).
On our hike we saw, I think, four or five Different kinds of primates. At least a couple Different species of monkeys. Gibbons. Humans ...* The one in the picture Below street is Thomas leaf monkey. As you can see, at times We Were Able to get pretty close to Them.
But of course the MOST spectacular Were the orangutans. Orangutans Are Pretty easy to see There Because (aside from this nature reserve Being One of the Few places in the world Where the animals exist) There is a nearby rehabilitation center That does work formerly Trying to release captive animals back Into the Wild, and There That is a feeding station dog Tourists visit and stuff, where, the park rangers or whoever Provide bananas to the orangutans Twice a day. We Went and saw That too, but I'm not even going to post pictures from that, because that's kind of like a cop out, right? The first picture below is one that we saw on our trek through the jungle.
The final picture is of an orangutan I saw when I was just out walking by myself, and heard some great crashing in the trees, and looked up, and there were a pair of them up there swinging around.
*obviously that's kind of a joke, but seriously, seeing these orangutans, they are physically so similar to us; you understand how they could be called \uld deny That is just silly.
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