Jason Lunn.com/ Portfolio of a life…..

10th September 2009
Surfed this morning and decided to walk around the piece of land I am buying to get some inspiration and work out a route for a small road to the top where the view is.

Problem 1..Electrical pylons about to be erected through my land..

Due to Lombok’s rapidly developing infrastructure, Only now is electricity about to be supplied from an electricity provider. There is a huge network of pylons and cables appearing on hillsides every day to enable this. Unfortunately whilst walking my land today I have seen electrical cables have been laid on the floor through my land top to bottom and are awaiting pylons to supply electricity in a straight line to the top of the hill,… Aghhh these will be running right across where I envisage my dream house to be. No consent here gained or granted by the electricity board. No instead just send a group of lads in a pickup truck to roll electrical cables down the hill and cement huge posts up wherever they feel fit for them to do this regardless of who owns the land (this really is Indostyle or the Indo factor as my friend Eugene Tollemache puts it, No process just do it and deal with it later).

Ok this is also why I love the place, this is the reason I can ride around on a motorbike all day without a helmet and pay a policemen £3 even if I do get stopped. In this journey this is apparently the first hurdle to overcome. I cannot speak very good Indonesian due to the fact most people in Bali speak English and as a result I have had no need to really learn. Lombok however is very different the locals speak a combination of Sasak their native tongue and Bahassa Indonesia (the united language of Indonesia). So I need to work out here how to communicate the fact I need the persons involved to reroute some pylons hopefully before they are concreted through my land,..

This is Indonesia and this could only happen here never in the UK,  So time for a deep breath I am sure it will be cool..watch this space..

11th September 2009 Land Department Measure land,
A whole crew from the land department turned up on the land I am buying today with tape measures, theodolites, measuring poles and accurately measured the land I am buying. This is great it feels quite legit and official which is reassuring at this stage. They will be returning to insert concrete posts during the week to officially mark the boundaries.

12th September 2009 Grupuk Bay,
I have been surfing a break called Grupuk the last two days, its is a protected bay with an assortment of waves coming in at various sizes and angles. It is in a quaint little bay surrounded buy stunning mountains. The wave is about 1km off shore so  you need to negotiate a boat ride out from all the local hustlers on the beach, that see anyone with white skin as a bank on a legs. If you ever come here you will understand this. The wave; Fun wave easy take off with long rides left and right. I managed to spend some time working on my turns during these two days. Quite a crowded wave but more than enough to go around. My back went into spasm on my first wave yesterday and is still sore. I have to continually remind myself to drink lots of water. I crave black coffee during the day and I am pretty sure it has dried out all my vertebrae joints as I know I have not been drinking anywhere enough water during the day. I am feeling like a creaky old rocking chair at the moment so I am cutiing back as of now and getting on the hot lemon and ginger!

13th September 2009 Land Update
I received a map and plan of the land today from the Land Department, which is great. I also managed to have a few words with the crew of guys from the electrical company working on all the pylons in the area and it seems for a moment the work on the land I am buying has come to a halt. The pylons seem to be a problem in the whole of the Kuta Lombok area and the Kapala Desa (Village Head) apparently has told them to stop for a while and negotiate the electrical routes with the land owners. Well we will see…

14th September 2009 River Villa, Helped do some work on River’s villa today planed the bottoms of a door and sanded and oiled some hardwood flooring. Slowly in between surfing we are aiming to get the finishing touches done on his villa so it is suitable and ready for renting out…

15th September Back still sore so no surfing today.