Medan New Year
Better not be in a hurry on New Year's Eve in downtown Medan. Located in the northern half of Sumatra, Medan is the third largest city in Indonesia. The exuberance and dynamism of its people seem to exceed the capacity of its social and physical infrastructure. In other words, traffic is terrible. We had just returned to Medan after spending several enjoyable days at Lake Toba, including Samosir Island. Sitting at a comfortable 900 meters elevation, Toba is considered the Asia's largest lake filling an ancient volcanic crater. Samosir sits in the middle. It is larger than Singapore, and can only be reached by ferry. More on that in the next blog. Since we were to return to Singapore on New Year's Day, we returned to Medan on December 31. Thinking to have a New Year's Eve dinner with our hosts, we decided to go to the mall, after which the rental car was to be returned. When we emerged from the mall, all the roads were clogged with cars, pedestrians and cars, mov