Probolinggo to Surabaya (5 hours)

So we get into the bus station and the bus drivers were all yelling "Surabaya?" "Bali?" "Jakarta?" "Malang?"  I really appreciate the Japanese style of minding your own business unless someone asks you ... then you yell the truth.  So I asked the Surabaya guy how much it was to get there and apparently, he was about to say something, but I blurted out "$2.00?" and he agreed.  Our guidebook said $2.20 so I thought it was okay.  Josie said we should shop around because we had time, so we left.  When we walked back, he told us $1.50, so we took it.  Before I got on the bus, he grabbed my arm and asked me, "Where are come from?" so I answered "Japan" and he had a look that looked like relief.  When he came to collect the money later, he only charged $1.40.  I know I didn't make a mistake because when he told me $1.50, he kept saying "FIVE-TEEN, FIVE-TEEN, not FIVE-TEE."  (15,000 rupiah is roughly $1.50).  Maybe I got the "Not American" discount.  (Thank you immigration officer).

This bus is definitely the most interesting one I've been on.  The usual touts were there, of course, but this time, we also had the battle of the bands (Something that Elly had told us about in the morning).  

Performance #1: a trio of singing 8-year-old boys with ukeleles.  They were cute and not too bad, so for karma's sake, we gave them 100 rupiah each (about a penny).

Performance #2: a trio of teenage boys with a guitar.  Not so good.

Performance #3: an old man with a guitar.  I was expecting some out of this world finger shredding, but it was some mumbling senile old man hamming away on an out of tune guitar.

Performer #4: a lady in her 40s with a mic and speaker.  She sang Indonesian karaoke folk music.  Not too bad actually. 

We're sitting in the back so we have more roomfor our packs (or because we're foreigners), but there is a dirty bucket full of water (I hoe its water) sloshing around behind me and sometimes the back door flies open and the brakes are giving off that loveley odor.  By far, the best public transportation in Indonesia so far.

We got off at Surabaya station a little after sunset and it just looks so shady, but again we're bombarded with swarms of taxi drivers lying to us.  Before we got off the bus, other bus drivers were tring to get us to get into theirs.  We had three options
1. Stay near the station, but that seemed like a bad idea
2. Stay near or at the airport, but we weren't sure if it closed or not so maybe we couldn't sleep in it
3. Stay in the city, which was the opposite direction of the airport and our Indonesian money was running out, so that was a bad idea.  

We walked around the station for a while, but no one spoke English and there were no other foreigners.  We tried so hard to find out if the airport closes, when it closed, and if we can sleep there, but all we got was 1 hour.  Everyone was trying to get us to take their taxi or motorbike to the airport.  

Eventually, we took a break and wentto go buy some chips.  The guy told us "five," but we weren't sure if it was 5 cents or 50 cents, so I asked in Indonesian "Lima nul nul?" (500?) and the guy laughed and said "No, 5000."  Then someone said "go-jyu en.  go sen." A few Indonesians spoke a little bit of Japanese, but this guy was completely fluent so he helped is out a lot.  I was soooo relieved to meet him and to speak bit Of Japanese too.  He told me that he's been to Nagano and that the airport closes, but we CAN sleep there. He finished with trying to get us to take his bike to the airport, but we kindly refused and took the bus.

The bus was no problem at all and when we got to the airport, we saw a lot of outdoor seats so we thought, no problem, but we still had 24 hours before our flight.  We walked around and found a tourist information center.  He told us of a nearby hotel that was $13 for an economy room and $25 for a superior room.  I was almost 100% sure that he would tell us that there were no more economy rooms, which he did, but then later called the hotel again and said one opened up.  

The hotel picked us up, and when we were signing in, the staff was very friendly, until I showed my American passport.  They started saying stuff in Indonesian and they seemed really upset, but we got our room and we don't have to check out until 1PM tomorrow.  Only a few more hours in this country and I think I'm never coming back.