8.20-8.30 AM, at an anonymous travel agency, Singkil

After the discomfort of arriving to Medan (and after all the previous overnight trips in a bus or minivan on this journey) we did everything we could to avoid travelling to Singkil overnight – except paying the hefty price for a private car and driver. Thus we had no other choice than to hang about at the Medan guest house until late evening, when a car would come to pick us up and take us to Singkil on the opposite, South-Western coast of Sumatra.

We did not quite know what kind of a vehicle to expect - a bus, perhaps (how would it fit these alleys of suburban Medan?) or the usual Toyota Hiace, modified to fit a dozen passengers. When the ride ultimately arrived, we were pleased to see it was a “Kijang”, a Jeep-style Toyota with room for eight passengers, but as we started off, there were only five of us inside. Little did we know.

The first stop was at the main Mosque of Medan. The driver pulled aside, we sat and waited, the engine running, the two men on the front seats making phone calls and smoking away, the depressing heat streaming in from the open windows and packing the heavy tobacco smoke to the rear end of the car where we sat, and where the windows could not be pulled down. Another few phone calls, and off we went. We drove around the mosque, to a poorly lit back alley, where the driver stopped in front of what looked like a one-star hotel. Ah, more passengers? No. Instead, our travelling companions started rummaging around the luggage stuffed on the middle seat row, and lifted out a color printer – or something that was packed inside a cardboard box that once contained a color printer.

We got out of the car as well, to stretch our legs, and to ask the other passengers what was going on – but they were too busy with their arends, and we didn't have a common language, anyway. Some fifteen minutes passed: cats and little boys scanned the dim alley, back and forth, but nobody entered the car. Ultimately, the same three people – two men and one lady – returned (without the printer), got in the car, and we set off.

We had not seen much of the city, and it was dark outside, so we had no way of telling our whereabouts. All we could register through the shaded windows was that we stuck to the bigger roads: an endlessly hectic traffic, an almost inseparable mass of scooters, minivans and a few odd cars, moving at a constant speed as if all glued together, along roads where lanes either did not exist or matter.

And that's probably why it happened. We slowed down to busy intersection, grouped on the right side of the driveway (Indonesia has left side traffic), where mopeds and cars in front of us were waiting to take a turn to the right. Seizing a short pause in the on-coming traffic, they bursted off, and us with them. But instead of turning, we were about to continue straight. Whether we were allowed to go straight from where we had been waiting, I have no idea, but indeed the moped driver on our left side, building up speed, was anticipating us to turn. He cut sharply to the left, straight in front of us, and before our driver had any chance to react, the impact had already taken place, and the poor woman seated on the back seat of the moped (no helmet, of course), was half-way in the air, landing just far enough in front of us for the driver to stop the car in time.

It seemed as the entire traffic in the intersection had stopped, all eyes on us. The woman was swiftly carried away from the road, and we slowly crept on and pulled up on the roadside. A great number of people gathered around; there was a lot of hassling and severe faces, but nobody got violent. And in a few minutes, we were on our way again. Perplexed of that the accident could have been dealt with so lightly, we could only hope that the poor woman had not lost her life. After half an hour of driving around – still inside the city area – we got confirmation of the situation as we pulled over at what looked like a clinic, and on the yard, the injured woman leaning on the damaged moped, looking dreadfu,l but nevertheless alive. Hands were shaken, and we set off again.

With the weight off our hearts, we expected us to be finally on our way out of the city. But as we took a turn away from the main road, to a residential area, our hopes melted away. After asking around for directions, our driver found the right house, from where two youngsters emerged, carrying something big and noticeably heavy: a vault? As the car was equipped with three rows of seats, there was no way of fitting a vault in the luggage compartment, so it was placed on the back seat next to us, taking up the space of one passenger. With the car now full, the journey continued.

We could not believe our eyes as we pulled over to yet another residential house, where two elderly women were already waiting, with a pile of bags of variable sizes. But there were no places left in the car! The driver and the man on the front seat – some kind of a master of ceremony, it seemed – got out and had a quick negotiation with the women. In no time, a wide plastic protective sheet and a roll of string were dug up from the luggage compartment, and a process of rolling, wrapping and tying up took place. In the meantime, we took the chance of using the toilet inside the house – it was more like a mansion from some bollywood movie – and when we got back, the men were busy tying the wrapped-up items on the roof of the car; even though it had no rack.

So, the luggage was successfully stored, but still there were no passenger seats left! One of the ladies went back inside (she apparently had not even intended to leave with us), and the other one hopped on the front seat, aligning herself as close as possible to the driver, and the master of ceremony sat down next to her, with barely one butt cheek on the seat. And what's more, there was no room for the front door to close, so we started off with the MC hanging halfway out of the window, holding the semi-closed door under his arm. And the ride to Singkil was going to take roughly eight hours, on a winding mountain road, scattered with potholes.

We were quite relieved to notice that the MC only drove with us until the end of the street (a distance he could have easily walked in two minutes), then stood up, closed the door and waved us goodbye. Finally, at around midnight, we were on our way.

In Singkil, we helped the driver to unload the luggage from the roof, and he took us to a travel agency where nothing indicated it to be a travel agency other than a faded map of the Banyak archipelago, to which our destination (Pulau Palambak) belongs. Relieved by the sight of this map, we sat down to eat the breakfast we had saved up from yesterday's dinner.

• two boiled potatoes
• two bars of chocolate

Shortly after the breakfast we were guided to a nearby pier, from where a speed boat took us to Palambak.