Ringing in the New Year with a … Crash

You’re supposed to ring in the New Year with a bang, but we did it with a crash.

New Year’s Eve was lovely and low key. We went out for a couple of champagne cocktails (French 75’s), then to Naughty Nuri’s for ribs. The plate of Balinese-spiced ribs was large and excellent. The atmosphere was a bit like Hooters for ribs. Very amusing. Upon request, the DJ would play a part of “Shake it Off” by Taylor Swift and the waitresses would gather and perform a line dance for the requesting (and paying) table. They’d scream out “Shake, Shake, Shake” during the chorus and the chorus climax of “Shake it Off!” Because, of course they would.

The decor included pigs.

We headed home early and enjoyed some wine with our host while watching the Sydney celebration (three hours ahead). I turned in a bit after 10.

For New Year’s Day, we took a day trip to Nusa Lembongan, an island southeast of Bali. It was an easy half hour boat ride. We grabbed some juices in town when we arrived, then rented a motor bike for the day for about $7.50. We had lunch at Dream Beach which really was pretty dreamy.

We then headed to Sunset Beach which was even better. It has an out-of-the-way (i.e. not too crowded) beach club with an infinity pool overlooking the ocean.

We needed to be back to town at 4 for the 4:30 ferry home, so we left around 3:30. The motor bike had gone pretty well all day. A bit unsteady at times, and some trouble turning, but no accidents.

Well, that changed quickly. We’d stopped at a small intersection to wait for traffic to clear. It was uphill, and as I accelerated into the right turn (note that you drive on the left here), things got a bit wobbly. Not a big problem; I figured I would just stop, get us settled, then continue. Well, you pull back on the right grip to hit the throttle and accelerate, and you also pull back to brake. I managed to turn the throttle full blast as I went for the brake. The throttle won and we crashed hard into a knee-high wall on the left side of the road.

Ouch, ouch ouch. No good. We both scraped up our left legs from the knee down pretty good. The wall was a rock wall with a very rough and uneven cement finish. The kind of wall that will scrape you pretty good! I also got a deep gash on the front of my knee, and Leena badly bruised (at least) her foot.

We picked up the bike and managed to drive it very slowly back to town. While neither of us was bleeding much initially, we were pretty messy by the time we got to town. I paid the rental place the ~$60 they asked for damages to the bike. We cleaned up as best we could by washing up in the ocean, then found some gauze wraps in the ferry office’s first aid kit. We were quite the sight with our bloody bandages on the ferry ride home.

It was pretty clear I’d need stitches, so we looked up a clinic that was just a couple of kilometers from where we’re staying, called to confirm they were open, and I hopped in a cab. I walked in to a nice receptionist who was behind a desk and couldn’t see below my waist. So she asked what’s wrong. I said I was in a motorbike accident and pointed to my leg. She came around the desk and, well, sprang into action. I was immediately taken to a room with a bed, and while I filled out a consent form they started cleaning the wound and explaining that they’d be giving me stitches. They were stitching me up about 10 minutes after I walked through the door. I also got a tetanus booster for good measure.

The cost? About $200 for stitches, tetanus booster, pain medication, and antibiotic pills and ointment. And this is the first day on traveler’s insurance; my Nike insurance ran through the end of December. We’ll see how the claim goes.

Leena will go for an X-ray on her foot tomorrow since it’s very painful at this point.

WARNING: I’m going to post a couple of nasty injury photos below, so stop scrolling if you don’t want to see those.

It’s a deep gash below my knee.

To fill some space, I’ll tell you about my experience the last time I got stitches in the US. I banged heads with a guy playing hoops, and had a cut on the line of my cheek bone. I entered the ER a bit after 8p (because all the urgent cares had closed) and was stitched up almost six hours later (just before 2a). And the bill was a bit over $1100.

I might have been lucky this wasn’t directly on the knee cap or shin but just in between.

The doctor and nurse were amused that I took some pictures.

OK, here’s my knee before and after four stitches.