Shortly after the Equator passage I passed a little village with a big assembly on a public ground. Although the ride was already consuming a lot of energy, and the final climb to Bukit Tinggi was still to come, I couldn’t resist to drop my bicycle and step into the crowd to watch the spectacle. ‘Rachma’ with her little one ‘Colby’, explained to me that they are celebrating a Christian holiday and at the end of festival they do the pole climbing. Aim of the participating teams is to reach to the top first and pick the attached gifts for their team.

It was great fun to watch them building / failing to build  the pyramids – it didn’t look very organized or efficient – but everyone seemed to enjoy it. After a while the focus deviated from the climbers onto me and I eventually became the main attraction again – as so many times in the past, when I stopped to take photos or interact with the locals. Obviously this area is rarely visited by tourists.