Indecision and Amusement

I’m supposed to leave Kuta today and go to Ubud, but I’m not feeling rushed. I actually find myself with enough time to do what I want to do and to do it slowly. It’s miraculous. And to top it all off, I still have options. I could go to diving at Lombok and Gili or take a motorbike around Northern Bali. The wierd thing is, though, that there’s part of me that wants to chuck it all in and go back to Singapore. I miss my friends and my own place, not to mention I am seriously tired of mosquito bites. However, I have absolutely zero desire to go back to work. Jesus, I would give anything to work as a relief teacher. I'm just so tired of feeling so stressed out all the time.

This morning I woke up early, owing to the fact that I just couldn’t work up the hutzpah to go out last night. It’s difficult to go out to a club solo and pull off an ‘I’m dancing alone and I’m okay with it’ facade that is never really true. I was feeling a bit restless, so at 7:45 I headed out the door for a walk to find some breakfast or coffee near the beach. After a pricey buffet, the only thing open besides the food carts, I took one last walk along Kuta Beach. The waves really are beautiful and the mellow soundtrack of Beck, Andrew Bird and John Mayer was just perfect—I could have walked forever.  Oh, and there was apparently a dance competition for little girls going on at one of the temples; it was hilarious to see them with giant fake sideburns drawn on, wearing such heavy costumes and headpieces, and doing that side-to-side look with their eyes!  So cute!

It’s still hard for me to believe that I didn’t really meet or talk to anyone here, since it’s crawling with foreigners and Kuta is where most of the backpackers are. But I didn’t really meet anyone on the beach and my hotel doesn’t have a good central spot to have dinner and meet other guests. At the restaurants most people are in groups and I just don’t seem to fit with the trendy vibe that Kuta and Seminyak have developed over the years. I’m not here to shop at all, so my whole time here just feels like an expensive trip to a decent beach. I didn’t feel that sad to leave.

So now I’m in Ubud, for better or for worse. Again, I feel like I’ve missed out on seeing Bali before it became conglomerized into what could pass as an up-and-coming hipster neighborhood of Chicago. Boutique stores, organic restaurants, art gallery after art gallery, breezy linen clothes in neutral colors, and a New Age crystal shop (???). To remind you you’re in Asia, though, there’s a recessed door every 500 meters or so that leads to an open space with a garden and some altars. If you’re really paying attention, you’ll also notice the narrow lanes that lead behind the buildings to the few rice paddies that still exist in town and provide an expensive view for the pricey bungalows.

Unfortunately, prices aren’t much better than Kuta. My Lonely Planet is only two years old and rates have already nearly doubled at the hotels they feature. I end up walking and carrying my ridiculously heavy packs (one of these days I will learn to travel lightly) a couple of kilometers before I can bargain my way into a nice room at Shana Bungalows. Oh, and it’s a good deal. I get a huge room--a triple--with breakfast every morning, a western bathroom, cold water shower (unfortunately), and veranda with a breakfast table and lounge chair. The only thing I can see from the veranda is the garden, because it’s everywhere! A narrow concrete path is the only way in and out of the place and when you walk down it you’re completely engulfed.

 

As I walked through the town, hoping to find some enclave that hadn’t been taken over by rich French, Germans, and Japanese, I grew more and more disappointed, even though I could tell that it must have been a beautiful, simple city even a decade ago. It boggles my mind that people can come here, buy a few silver bracelets and a wood carving, see a traditional dance, eat an overpriced plated of vegan nasi goreng, and go home to brag about how they saw the “real Bali” by leaving the beach. I’m sorry, people, but if you’ve ever rented a Land Rover to avoid public transport, you can’t say you’ve experienced “the real side” of that country. Tomorrow I’m going to rent a motorbike and get the heck out of here. I’ve stopped caring if the police will be after me for bakshish, I just want the last memories I make in Bali to be of unspoiled Balinese countryside and the regular Balinese people.

Now this is where I sheepishly admit that I did play the tourist a bit at the end of the day by going to one of the traditional dances I just bemoaned. It was expensive, Rp75,000, but it was quite impressive. It featured a chorus of about 50 men and 30 women, two child dancers, six adult dancers, six actors and plenty of fire. The men came out chanting a rhythm that they maintained for most of the night, but which unfortunately didn’t really get any easier to follow. As someone who loves a good beat, I was going crazy trying to figure out how they were keeping time in their heads! Someone would call out randomly, the dancers’ movements didn’t match the singing, there was a drum seemingly playing a different song, it was equally annoying and impressive because there’s no way I could have kept up with that!

It turns out that this style of dance is actually a bit of a bastardization of the original; they needed to spice it up or something for a movie made about Bali in 1930, but that didn’t ruin the beauty of it at all. It seems the key to being a successful Balinese dancer is to move slowly, keep everything bent from your fingers to your toes, wiggle your head, pull at your scarf from time to time, and open your eyes verrry wide. The young girls were especially fascinating to watch, although without any fire the light was too poor for me to take pictures.

 

One of my favorite moments was when an actor came out wearing a red costume and large moustache; I’m pretty sure he was saying in Indonesian, “It’s-a me! Raja Mario!!” He went on to fight some kind of monster which looked a bit like Bowser if you squinted, and I got a few odd looks for laughing through the whole thing. After that I wandered the town a bit more before I had another pricey dinner at a place that at least had large portions and free Wi-Fi, then went home to my bungalow to gain a few more mosquito bites while I slept. I need to learn how to hang a mosquito net before I travel in December...

Memorable moment of the day: A moped goes by with dad in front, toddler in the middle, mom in back. In her left hand, held above her shoulder with the wheels in the air, mom is carrying a bicycle. Amusingly dangerous or dangerously amusing? Maybe just dangerous.