...one thing in common about every place I've visited so far in Indonesia - everyone is pretty convinced you are not where you want to be. Regardless of whether you're strolling along the beach, going on a run, stepping off a shuttle into a new town, walking out of your hotel, even standing still watching the scenery - the question is "where are you going?" It's like they know something I don't.
...there are no dogs on Gili Trawangan. I agree - it's an odd thing to mention. But their absence is strangely magnified by the fact that there are goats, roosters and about a million cats (if not that many yet, there will be soon). No dogs.
...everything that can be fried, is. The strangest fried item I've seen so far is a fried boiled egg. First boiled, then dipped in batter and fried. I'm really not sure why.
Be back!
Monday, July 20, 2009
Friday, July 3, 2009
Bali - some things to write home about
So far, my week in Bali has ranged from encountering the strangest sights to the oddly familiar. Bali is a land of contrasts...for a tiny island that can be covered in one long day, it offers a multitude of experiences that can leave you reeling at the end of each day.
To begin with, there are the temples. 20,000 of them. On one tiny island. There are family temples placed within family courtyards, village temples where the entire village (and just that village) holds festivals (there are three subsets of temples here too), professional temples such as a fishermen temple, an artist temple and so on...and the major public temples that any Balinese person can visit. Outsiders, even Indonesians who are not from Bali, are often not allowed into many temples.
Then there are the volcanoes. Like NZ, Indonesia is built on and around them. Many of them are open to climb, sometimes uncomfortably close to when they last erupted - unlike NZ, where most if not all volcanoes that one can hike up blew up at least a 100 years ago. It is my intention to scale the highest volcano in Bali, Gunung Agung, when I get back from Java next week.
The one word I've heard most often in the last week is "Transport?" with just that ending. Every four people out of five are seemingly ready to push you into the closest available car and drive off into the horizon. Again, for a little island of its size, Bali has an incredible number of cars...and more people willing to arrange them for you.
And then...there is the food. Ah, this is a vegetarian's paradise. Tofu, tempeh, bean sprouts, spinach, cabbage, carrots...you name it, it's all here. Fresh and often covered in peanut sauce. The nut-allergic may suffer - as I found out in my cooking class yesterday, Base Gede, the basic spice mix used in almost every food, contains kemiri or candle nuts. Hard to avoid those even if you lay off the peanut sauce. But what a way to go...!
Highlights this week - a few days of blissful living at the Le Meridien Nirwana Resort in southwest Bali - MUCH appreciated after the last few months of dorm/bunkbed life (it even had a water slide from its top pool level to its bottom pool level!); watching the sunset at Pura Tanah Lot, one of the 9 or so large public temples in Bali; my 80 US cent Indonesian meal of Gado Gado (absolutely the best I've had so far and the price had nothing to do with it); biking through Balinese countryside exchanging high fives with little kiddies on the way, making a pretty neat bracelet in my silversmithing class, wandering through Ubud - Bali's arty town at all hours of the day, lunching at Sari Organik (address to be posted later) in the middle of rice paddy fields and finding some mind blowing chocolate at Casa Luna.
Next week in Java...to be continued.
To begin with, there are the temples. 20,000 of them. On one tiny island. There are family temples placed within family courtyards, village temples where the entire village (and just that village) holds festivals (there are three subsets of temples here too), professional temples such as a fishermen temple, an artist temple and so on...and the major public temples that any Balinese person can visit. Outsiders, even Indonesians who are not from Bali, are often not allowed into many temples.
Then there are the volcanoes. Like NZ, Indonesia is built on and around them. Many of them are open to climb, sometimes uncomfortably close to when they last erupted - unlike NZ, where most if not all volcanoes that one can hike up blew up at least a 100 years ago. It is my intention to scale the highest volcano in Bali, Gunung Agung, when I get back from Java next week.
The one word I've heard most often in the last week is "Transport?" with just that ending. Every four people out of five are seemingly ready to push you into the closest available car and drive off into the horizon. Again, for a little island of its size, Bali has an incredible number of cars...and more people willing to arrange them for you.
And then...there is the food. Ah, this is a vegetarian's paradise. Tofu, tempeh, bean sprouts, spinach, cabbage, carrots...you name it, it's all here. Fresh and often covered in peanut sauce. The nut-allergic may suffer - as I found out in my cooking class yesterday, Base Gede, the basic spice mix used in almost every food, contains kemiri or candle nuts. Hard to avoid those even if you lay off the peanut sauce. But what a way to go...!
Highlights this week - a few days of blissful living at the Le Meridien Nirwana Resort in southwest Bali - MUCH appreciated after the last few months of dorm/bunkbed life (it even had a water slide from its top pool level to its bottom pool level!); watching the sunset at Pura Tanah Lot, one of the 9 or so large public temples in Bali; my 80 US cent Indonesian meal of Gado Gado (absolutely the best I've had so far and the price had nothing to do with it); biking through Balinese countryside exchanging high fives with little kiddies on the way, making a pretty neat bracelet in my silversmithing class, wandering through Ubud - Bali's arty town at all hours of the day, lunching at Sari Organik (address to be posted later) in the middle of rice paddy fields and finding some mind blowing chocolate at Casa Luna.
Next week in Java...to be continued.
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