(This post was written by Ryan and I. We constantly talked over each other about how awesome Bali was during our writing process.)
MJ: I think the month in Bali went by pretty fast. It felt faster than our time in Fiji. Bali was one of the most inspirational places I've been so far. I was really looking forward to New Zealand because I read a lot about it and the country is so beautiful and we were fortunate enough to have the time to spend walking around staring at it. I found the island of Bali to be just as beautiful as New Zealand but in very different ways.
View of the night sky during Nyepi, Balinese New Year. The use of fires and lights are prohibited, making the city extremely dark that night. Happy 1938 everyone!
Just one of MANY examples of beautiful sculpture living in Ubud Bali.
RD: Bali is our first stop that I felt we were moving into truly unknown territory. New Zealand and Australia were very familiar due to their similarities with America. Fiji was remote but it wasn't a total cultural immersion the way that Bali was. We arrived in Denpasar and quickly made taxi arrangements to get to Ubud, which is north of the city, closer to the heart of Bali. I was absolutely sure we were going to die on our way there.
If you like traffic, you'll love Ubud. Especially if you like motorbikes flying around at high speeds. Someone directing traffic is very rarely seen here.
Motorbikes swerve in and out and around cars. Cars pass buses and motorbikes by moving completely into the other narrow lane and dodge back, just missing the oncoming traffic. I kind of knew it would be like this but it's something entirely different when you are in a speeding vehicle experiencing it first hand. I thought maybe our driver was just a bit nuts but after a few more rides I realized everyone drives like this. I'm really shocked that I did not see a single accident in the whole month we were there although we did see several people (tourists) wrapped in bandages that looked like the fallout from a bike crash.
Image from a shadow puppet play (called Wayang Kulit) about Anoman, the Divine Messenger, from the Ramayana Epic. This was hilarious and amazing! The Puppet Master (Yes, that's his title), uses over 160 puppets made of leather to tell a one-hour portion of a four-hour tale.
Handmade puppets from Java. We did not see a puppet show with these but they are still very beautiful.
MJ: Bali was inspiring for many reasons. Ubud oozes with culture, more then any place I've been, even though it's changed a lot recently and some people feel areas are over run with tourists. It seems to me that most places highly sought after for tourism have been, and will continue to be, affected by the Information Age we're all living in. Most places in the world are probably vastly different then they were 20 years ago. Look at Seattle for example.
This archer greets you at the main turn onto Ubud Road, which shoots arrows straight through the heart of Ubud.
RD: The thing that is really amazing about Bali is the detailed sculpture that is everywhere. You can barely go a few meters down the street without seeing a beautifully carved gateway or a statue colorfully painted. A couple people I know talked to me about Bali before I left but none mentioned the amazing, giant statues around Bali.
Every town and village has at least one in the main traffic circle. They rival famed statuary from Italy in both complexity and detail. Smaller statues are in every nook and cranny in Ubud. Carvings of Ganesh, Garoda, Himalya and many more characters from their vast religious history adorn pathways, shopfronts, and, of course, temples. It was one thing that really separated Bali from any other place I had been in my life.
A decorated Ganesh sits in front of an art gallery near Ubud center.
Just one of many highly-detailed sculptures hidden down alleys, often in family temples near Ubud center.
A finely carved figure of Garuda perches above a doorway,
Beji Temple on the North Coast of Bali was fantastic. Carvings covered just about every surface of the place. We had the temple to ourselves as it is a little off the beaten path. Our driver, Messi, had never even been there even though he was from a village not far away.
MJ: Arriving in Bali during the shoulder rainy season, we did end up getting caught in a downpour a few times. And Bali's rainy season is real serious rain. The kind that pours down in sheets, turns the streets into trash water super-highways while simultaneously making the island overall very beautiful and green.
We mostly avoided the rains by ducking into a restaurant for lunch or a drink, or got soaked and then dried off and later went to the pool. Being in Bali during rainy season allowed us to experience some pretty amazing thunderstorms. Including one time I was talking to Ryan on the patio when a giant flash of lightening, followed immediately by an explosive thunder crack, made me jump and run away.
Ryan stood there laughing.
A rainy view of a decorated shrine near Gitgit Waterfall. We got SOAKED on the walk to visit the falls but who cares? Rains make for good waterfalls!
Children get a chance to run around with giant monsters on their shoulders during the parade for Nyepi. This one caught Ryan taking his picture.
Nyepi celebrations continue into the evening with a parade and dance / fight parties at the soccer field near Ubud center. We sat amongst the locals with our front row seats for about an hour until some tall, adult tourists showed up and sat right in front of us, but more so right in front of local children who were eager to watch the events. I thought Ryan was going to punch a guy in the back of the head.
RD: The people in Bali are very nice and welcoming. I find, when traveling to a place that does not have English as a first language, knowing just a few words and shrugging and smiling when you don't understand each other will get you through just about any situation. It is worth is to be a bit more learned in local language and culture if you want to really bargain for items or find a hidden gem that you wouldn't be able to find otherwise.
The staff at Kinaara really took to us as we tried out our feeble grasp of Indonesian with them. They started to teach us new words and phrases and we even learned a few of their nicknames. This gave us the opportunity to joke with them more and laugh at our use of their language. As it turns out, one of the staff, Putu, is a pretty avid photographer. He invited is to join him on a sunset walk to a temple on a hill behind the resort. The next night, we were able to share some Photoshop tips and tricks with him and he shared Fast and Furious 7 with Indonesian subtitles.
Photo fun on the hilltop walk behind Kinaara.
One night, he invited us to view a Keris knife dance at a local funeral. Unfortunately, the plans fell through but I don't think we would have even been given the opportunity if we hadn't tried to embrace some Balinese culture to begin with. Again, the people here are just very welcoming and nice and I'm glad to have gotten to know them.
Surana is a Physics Professor and traditional balinese painter whose work is displayed in galleries around the world. We met him on the ridge walk in Ubud and were fortunate to be able to purchase two of his paintings.
MJ: We sought out unique experiences in Ubud by staying in a small garden guest house, taking a crash course in bahasa Indonesia and walking through rice fields on several occasions to go back and visit the artists who live and work among the fields. The language class gave us a few conversational phases that allowed us to hack through sentences for ordering food, bargaining for items or saying "good morning, how are you?" (Salamat Pagi. Apa kabur? if you were wondering).
I was surprised how much a brief language class really changed our ability to connect with the locals. Especially during our stay at Kinaara Resort in Pemuteran. Part of that could be the type of place we were staying in since there were a lot of people working there and not a whole lot of guests. They really seemed to take an interest in us and enjoy teaching us how to correctly say what we thought we were saying in Indonesian.
Another view from our hilltop walk with the staff and new friends from Kinaara.
We sought out Bali as a destination due to its rich artistic and cultural opportunities. Spending a month on the island in three very different locations presented varied experience across a small-ish geography. Each location had slightly different ways of saying things but overall we were fortunate to have the time and opportunity to immerse ourselves in their ways. Also we continued our duty as representatives of the United States by apologizing for Trump to everyone. Even our yoga instructor from a small village in a rural part of northwest Bali asked us about him. Again, we're sorry. Despite its crushing heat and humidity we found Bali to be an inspiring and beautiful place we hope to visit again for an extended time, soon.
Sunrise from Mount Batur, in the distance you can see Java.