Ubud

So I left Sanur for Ubud to begin my trip around the island, and even the taxi journey up there was more fascinating than Sanur. The major thing that stood out to me was the election campaign posters lining the roads. They were just like the ones in HK, except there were about 50 different candidates. My favourite was a guy in an army-style, roofless jeep, grinning, with his arms up in the air as if to say "Whatever". My second favourite was a guy with a yellow mohawk. I have to point out this was for the Indonesian general election!



Ubud itself is lovely. Much more upmarket and chilled out than Sanur, where there is so much hassle that I felt uncomfortable going out in the street, making it a chore to leave the hotel. The place I was staying in here was set in tranquil, tropical gardens, where you feel totally alone. It creates the impression that you are in your own, giant Balinese palace. If you take the time to sit and look around you, you begin to notice the intricate stone carvings of nonsensical animals. It was the calmest view imaginable, yet it was a jungle of sound - hundreds of insects chirping away, the hidden gardener chopping at the hedges, a girl singing nearby, a cockrel crowing(!), some kids making tarzan noises, people manually building something, laughter..... It was nice to just sit for a while and listen.



Later in the day I met with the group that I was due to go on my trip with, there were only six of us in total. Two of the people were American diplomats - there lives sounded fascinating. They work as politcal officers to improve human rights and have been stationed in countries such as Afhganistan, Bangladesh, Thailand.... from everything they were telling me it sounding exactly like my perfect job! Maybe a possible result of my intended International Relations/Peace Studies masters in Japan...?



Another person on the trip was Chloe, a girl the same age as me who I shared a room with. She had just been travelling in Australia as well, and turns out we both knew some of the same people in Byron Bay! Such a small world! Also, she happens to be in Bangkok on the same dates as me, so we are meeting up again there.



That night we all went to a night market. It was kind of funny - the drive there was the first sense I really had of being in Asia, it felt like I had come home. The market itself was a bit like a Hong Kong market, except no where near as packed and so much more chilled out. It was all locals apart from us. Here was the first place I realised my love of Asian food - I had an excellent meal of these veggie tempura type things. No idea what was in them other than that the were vegetarian, but they were delicious! And all for about 30 US cents. The market's speciality was suckling pig.

The next day we walked through the nearby countryside, surrounded by rice fields. It was so beautiful, like a picturebook. A kind of bizarre thing was though, that the small path was dotted with art galleries, but there were no tourists to buy the art. Perhaps the send it to Ubud to be sold.

At the beginning of the walk we saw a traditional (rich person) Balinese house. Each room in the house had a different function and needed to be facing a different direction according to its function; but the great thing was that every room could also be used for sleeping. The house was beautiful, with such detailed carving everywhere in wood and gold. The most striking feature, I thought, was the two statues of what appeared to the Western eye to be demons guarding the door from evil. There was also a pet dog that sang.

Througout the day our local guide would tell us all the relevent traditions of Hinduism to what we were seeing. There are several major ceremonies throughout life, one being tooth filing, and they all seem quite focused on purity. We were appropriately standing under a great Banyan tree while the guide was giving is longest talk on the ceremonies - this tree is holy to Hindus - and the guide, who was lovely, made what at the time was a rather amusing joke (though I think it was more amusing for him to be telling it as he couldn't speak much English, so it was rather sweet, whereas if i told it, it would have been quite cheesy). The joke was that in Hinduism they have a holy tree - the Banyan tree, in America they have a Holy-wood. The guide also, much to my entertainment, frenquently used the phrase: "Take a chill pill, man."

One thing I started to learn in Ubud - all chips in Bali are so tasty!!!

So after that tasty chip lunch, we went shopping in the market. They were shouting out that though shoes were 1000IDR...thats 10 US cents... which of course was incredibly cheap and worth getting some. However when I actually went to buy a pair, they changed their price to 100,000, so it was just a trick to reel people in. However I did get a good bargain on a pair of light trousers which I needed for more conservative areas, but the woman didn't seem to happy about selling them for such a low price, so I felt a bit bad afterwards! Thinking about it now though, I reckon it was all an act.

I should really talk about the people in Ubud, as they were absolutely lovely. I ended up spending a while talking to the hotel staff, and just random people on street corners! They were all really curious about us, loving to ask questions about where we were from, what we did for a living, our family. They were so sweet and unlike other places where you never really talk to hotel staff, these guys would just come and socialise with you.

In the evening we went to see a traditional dance, which was in three parts. The first dance had a dramatic chorus of about 60 men, chanting noises throughout, such as a very fast "tukka tukka tukka" and something sounding a bit like "ketchup". At first it was a bit confusing as the two main, male characters were played by girls, but we soon figured this out! The costumes were a show in themselves. They were so extravagent with lots of gold - very beautiful. The bad guys were all played by older men in masks. It was a typical story of a princess being kidnapped and her rescue - all very lively and dramatic.

The second dance was done by two very long girls in a trance, dancing with their eyes closed. Every so often they would collapse and have to be picked up by the nearest female background-chanters. They were perfectly in time with each other, but apparently they aren't taught the dance at all - the spirit of the goddess goes within them and dances using their bodies. At the end a priest revives them using incense and holy water.

The final dance was somewhat disturbing! It started with a big fire being made out of coconut shells and the all traditional petrol! Then a guy came along riding a toy horse and ran straight through the middle of the fire! He carried on like this for about fifteen minutes, kicking the fire about and running across the burning coals barefoot! All the time he is in a trance with his eyes closed. With the little girls I didn't believe the trance, however this was so....incredible I'm not so sure anymore. He was in a total frenzy. In the end two people had to catch him and hold him down while the priest revived him in the same manner as the little girls. That was the end of the show....but I noticed the guy who had been running through the fire just sat in the same place where he had been revived, not moving and looking like he was going to be sick for about half an hour afterwards. He was really not in a good state at all, it was quite worrying!

After that intense start of the evening we headed to a local Balinese lady's house for dinner - a friend of our group leader. She had cooked a big buffet for us and it was delicious! There was lots of coconut involved. I was very pleasantly surprised, the fussy eater that I am, that on trying everything vegetarian I loved it all and ate until I couldn't move!