Nothin’s shaking in Bandung

So, I heard there were a couple of quakes in Indonesia yesterday. Just thought I’d let everyone know that they were both very far away from us, and we didn’t feel a thing. Ahhh, the excitement of living in the “ring of fire”.

I am thankful

So, yesterday morning here was Thanksgiving evening back in Seattle, and I spoke with most of my family. My Dad had told me a few weeks ago that he and his girlfriend had a Thanksgiving surprise, and he’d call me around 9am my time to share it. He called from home and had his girlfriend Judy’s family there. They’d just finished their big Thanksgiving dinner… and I was still lying in bed. He put me on speaker phone, then told everyone that the Thanksgiving surprise was that he and Judy were getting married… in a few minutes! WOW! I figured that they were going to announce their engagement to the family, I mean they’ve been together for 8 years… but I didn’t expect that it would be a same-day wedding announcement. I was on speaker phone for the ceremony, and it sounded beautiful. I just wish I could’ve been there. It’s difficult missing huge things like that.

After talking to my Dad for a while I called my Grandmother and spoke to everyone there: My Mom, my aunts, my Grandmother, and one of my cousins. It was really nice to talk with everyone.

Being Thanksgiving, it all made me reflect on my life and my blessings. So, I’m feeling thankful for so many things (in no particular order)…

• My fantastic husband – He’s my fellow adventurer, and I can’t imagine moving around the world with anyone else.

• My supportive friends and family – When Billy and I decided to move to Indonesia to teach English I think we shocked a lot of people. Everyone was quite supportive of our decision though, and it’s nice to be able to keep in touch with the people I love back home… as well as continuing to make new friends here.

• My Mom coming to visit – She’ll be here in a month! I look forward to sharing our new world with her.

• My job – It has helped me to grow in so many ways in just 6 months time. I feel quite comfortable teaching, and enjoy building relationships with my co-workers and students. It’s also great that it allows me to live comfortably in a tropical country!

• Butterflies – I love the abundance and diversity of the butterflies around our home here. I can see a dozen different sizes, colors, and shapes of butterflies when I’m sitting out on our balcony.

• Thunderstorms on a really hot day – Some days it feels so hot and stuffy, and you can see the rainclouds slowly drifting by. When they finally open up and release the rain it cools everything down and makes the air feel so fresh and clean.

• Our Pembantu (maid) – She’s such a sweet, honest woman. We never have to tell her what we want her to do. She sees dishes in the sink, and she washes them for us. She hand-washes all of our clothes, and irons them. She even brings us fresh fruit from her yard… bananas and whatever kinds of mangoes are in season. And she always has sparkling eyes and a wonderful smile.

I hope everyone had a nice Thanksgiving!

Making Jewelry with what’s available…

When we were in Bali I collected some shells from Dreamland Beach. I made a few pendants out of the shells and some silver wire I’d brought with me from Seattle. Here are the results…

And finally, on to Dreamland…

We ended our Bali vacation in a place called Dreamland Beach. It was about a 40 minute drive from the busy streets of Kuta, and my students had told me that it was a beautiful place. What no one told me was that most people tend to just day-trip in to Dreamland.

We arrived at Dreamland late in the morning on Billy’s birthday. The first thing we did was find a place for the night. The accommodations there are uhh… rustic. There was only one place listed in the Lonely Planet for Dreamland, and it was a Warung (food stall) that also had rooms above it. As Billy mentioned in his blog, it was a surfer’s dive more than a hotel. The walls were made out of woven bamboo, the window was just somewhat decorative wooden bars set in a rectangular opening (no glass), with tattered old pink curtains. There wasn’t a ceiling above our room, it was just open to the huge thatched roof that was above all the rooms. It kinda reminded me of a Girl Scout camp I went to when I was a little girl… except that this place did have a western toilet (even though it was shared between 5 rooms), instead of outhouses. There was also a shower in the bathroom, but it didn’t have hot water. In the morning the water was pretty cold, but in the afternoon and evening it was pleasantly warm. It felt like we were camping… especially because nothing really felt clean. There was always sand and salty mist on everything.

There was, of course, no A/C. There was just a rusty old fan on the wall that I think used to have an oscillate function, but now just hung to one side. The side it pointed to was away from the bed, so Billy ended up wedging an empty water bottle behind it to get it to aim at the bed. The sheets didn’t feel very clean, due to all the salty ocean spray and sand, so I slept in shorts and a t-shirt on the sheets, and was reluctant to pull up the comforter when I started feeling cold in the night.

After we checked in to the room, we changed in to our swimsuits and went to play in the water. The waves in Dreamland were a lot more powerful than those at Kuta Beach. Dreamland beach was much steeper, and the waves crashed much closer to the shore. The sand also gave a lot more under your feet, so walking at the water’s edge you’d sink into the sand a good inch or two, and if a wave washed over your feet they’d be completely under the sand. The soft sand, combined with the riptide, made it pretty difficult to keep your footing when you were in the water. The waves would crash, and you’d brace yourself against the current to the shore, but the soft sand didn’t allow any traction to really “dig in”, the as the waves withdrew again, they try to wash you away from the shore, and you had to fight against the opposite direction.

I’d started feeling pretty confident in the water when we were at Kuta Beach. Even though the waves were bigger at Dreamland, I thought it wouldn’t be that different. The waves seemed a lot heavier though at Dreamland, and would knock you right down. Even just walking along the shore, sometimes a wave would crash and knock your feet out from under you. I have to admit it was pretty funny watching unsuspecting people strolling along the sand and suddenly wiping out. After playing in the waves for a little while Billy and I went to a beach cafe to have some lunch and beer and laugh at the people that didn’t know what was in store as the approached the water.

Dreamland was also far different from Kuta in the sense that it just wasn’t very developed. There was a parking lot pretty high above the beach, and you had to walk down a bunch of steps to get to the beach. This meant that there weren’t any cars or motorcycles on the beach. Aside from the waves and the stray dogs barking, it was pretty quiet. There weren’t any ATMs, so we were glad that we’d hit an ATM in Kuta before we left. I think there were only a few places offering lodging, and they all seemed like they’d be similar to where we stayed. The hawkers on the beach were also far less aggressive than the ones in Kuta. Kuta is known for it’s nightlife, but Dreamland practically shuts down at 7 pm. Maybe half of the restaurants weren’t open when we were trying to find dinner, and we ended up walking the whole length of the beach to the very last place to have a Birthday dinner for Billy. We were the only patrons, and the bar was blasting music by Phil Collins. It was quite different from the dinner we had a year ago for his 30th birthday in Ballard surrounded by family and friends.

I don’t think I mentioned that Dewi’s Warung (where we stayed) was right on the beach. I think during the night the tide came in, and the waves were washing up just under the balcony in front of our room. The waves were extremely powerful at Dreamland. Billy and I both had a hard time sleeping. As soon as you started to drift off there’d be a huge BOOM, then CRASH of the waves to jolt you awake. When I finally did fall asleep, I had a dream that the water kept rising, and we had to run to higher ground. We weren’t at Dreamland anymore in my dream, we were in some kind of big hillside village instead, and it didn’t make any sense how the water could be flowing up the steep hillside. It wasn’t a very pleasant nights sleep, but it made us really appreciate the fact that we’d spend the next night at home in our own clean bed.

The next day we got up and sought out a big American breakfast. Many of the restaurants in Bali offer western-style breakfasts. We haven’t found any place in Bandung that offers this. After breakfast we rented a couple of chairs and an umbrella on the beach. The guy renting them tried to charge us Rp. 100,000 (almost $11) to sit there. Billy talked him down to Rp, 70,000, but we still though that was pretty expensive. At Kuta the chair and umbrella rental was no more than Rp. 20,000.

We played in the waves a lot more during the day, and got a little sunburnt, but not too bad for being in Bali for 7 days. We left for the airport at 8pm, and back to our house at almost 3am! Ugh. It was great to get home, but we had a fantastic first vacation in Indonesia!

Then on to Kuta Beach, Bali

Okay… I promise this post won’t be as long as the last one.

At the beginning of our trip to Bali we were constantly in a state of amazement at just how many white people we saw in Bali. We’re used to being a bit of a novelty in Bandung, as there just aren’t many white people there. It was also strange to us that the majority of Balinese people we met knew a good amount of English. Again, quite different from Bandung.

We left Ubud at noon on Monday, taking a bus to Kuta Beach. This is probably the most touristy part of Bali. We stayed in a place called Sinar Bali that one of Billy’s coworkers recommended. It was a small hotel in Legian (pron. leg-ee-on), just North of Kuta. The room was reasonable, with AC, a private balcony overlooking the pool, and a pretty good buffet breakfast.

I hardly took photos in Legian and Kuta because we spent a lot of time at the beach and I didn’t want to leave my camera when I went swimming. Billy and I played a lot in the water, and I snorted a fair amount of water when the waves crashed on me. Eventually I figured out (with Billy’s help) how to handle the huge waves. Riding over the top of them, diving through them if they were too big, or turning my back to smaller ones and leaning back into them with my legs churning like I was running in place. I was also very careful to apply copious amounts of SPF 30 waterproof sunblock. The sun is so much harsher in Bali than it is in Bandung, since it doesn’t have all the air pollution to filter out some of the sunlight.

There are a lot of restaurants in Bali offering international cuisine. All of the food we ate was great. I think every restaurant we went to served alcohol, and there were tons of pubs around the Kuta area. This is another contrast with Bandung. Since Bandung, and most of Indonesia, is mostly Muslim it’s really difficult to get alcohol. The Muslim faith forbids alcohol consumption. In Bali, most of the people are Hindu, and their faith doesn’t have the same restrictions.

We stayed at Legian/Kuta for 3 nights. We enjoyed our time there, but at the end of 3 days we were tired of the aggressive hawkers that shouted “excuse me” at you whenever you walked by their stall, or they saw you on the beach. Street vendors in Bandung are usually very laid back, and if you tell them you’re not interested they just move on. In Bali, a lot of the vendors just ignore it if you say you aren’t interested. They continue to show you things and say “very cheap price”. If we spoke in Indonesian we seemed to get a little more respect, but they were still just as insistent that we buy their wares.

The prices in Bali were really soft. Again, that’s something that’s a bit different from Bandung. The vendors all seemed really desperate for sales in Bali. In Bandung, if you’re haggling and decide that the price is still too high, you walk away, and that’s that. In Bali, if you walk away during the bargaining process the people will follow you and continue to drop their price until you come to an agreement. It can get a bit overwhelming sometimes. Speaking in Indonesian helped a lot to bring down the price on goods we wanted.

We started in Ubud, Bali

We got about two hours of sleep the night before we left for Bali. Our flight wasn’t until 11 am, but it’s 2-3 hours from Bandung to the airport in Jakarta. It’s really expensive to have private transportation (around $85), so we decided to take a bus. The bus was only about $16 for both of us, and they leave every hour, starting at 4 am. Weekend traffic gets really bad between Bandung and Jakarta, so we decided to catch the first bus. We got up at 2am, walked about 10 minutes to the end of our street and caught a taxi to the bus station. We’re pretty sure the taxi driver was either drunk or crazy, but he got us to the station alright. We got to the airport at about 7am… 4 hours early for our flight! We were both really tired, and somewhat cranky, but happy to be heading out for an adventure.

Billy and I didn’t have any accommodations planned out ahead of time for our trip to Bali. In fact, we didn’t even know what city we wanted to start in. We only knew that we were flying into the airport in Denpassar, and it wasn’t until we were on the plane that we decided to spend the first couple of days in Ubud. It’s known as the center of Art in Bali. After we narrowed that down, we thumbed through the Lonely Planet Indonesia book to figure out where to stay there. We just started by telling the taxi driver that we wanted to go to Central Ubud. I think it was about a 30 minute drive from the airport, and as we got closer we chose the place where we’d stay, and gave the driver the address. Yeah, Billy and I have gotten pretty spontaneous with our travels in recent years.

We decided on a place called Sri Bungalows which is located on Monkey Forest Road. The Lonely Planet description was pretty basic, but mentioned that it had 16 bright bungalow-style rooms with hot water, and that it was off the busy road. The price it listed was fairly high, Rp. 350,000 (just under $39). It sounded nice enough. We got there, and found a very nice man working there that showed us a cute little room with bamboo furniture, a ceiling fan (no AC), and a private bathroom with hot shower and western toilet… for only Rp. 200,000! That’s about $22/night. It was surrounded by beautiful gardens with many birds. Each room had a little veranda, and the front doors were all awesome carved wood. Here are a couple of pics of the place:

It ended up being a great place to stay. The man from the front desk brought us a nice pot of tea with sugar and fresh limes as we were getting settled in. It was a very relaxing place, and had a nice breakfast included as well. It’s location was also pretty central, so we could get around Ubud on foot easily from there.

Our first day in Bali was pretty laid back. Within a few hours of arriving in Bali we went for a stroll through Ubud, and I found a bead store. YAY! Of course I had to buy some beads. After that we went to a little cafe nearby that was also listed in the Lonely Planet, and had cheese and wine right at the edge of a community soccer field where a bunch of kids were just running around playing. We didn’t really have any plan for the day, so we just wandered around and looked at some of the local art in all the stores and street stalls. We also stumbled across a big outdoor market and had many hawkers fighting for our attention and purchases. We had dinner close to the Bungalows, then decided to go to a Balinese dance performance. We hadn’t realized that we forgot to set our clocks to Bali time (an hour ahead of Bandung), so we missed most of the performance. The few dances we did see were great, and accompanied by an orchestra playing traditional Balinese instruments. After the dance performance ended we went back to the bungalow to get some more sleep, as we were planning to get up early in the morning.

The next morning we got up at 7am to have breakfast and head out for a morning walk through the Sacred Monkey Forest and Ubud’s rice paddies. Again, the Lonely Planet gave us this idea. It listed directions for a nice walk through Ubud. It was 7 km, and we figure that we probably walked at least 8 km (5 miles) that day. It started sprinkling a little as soon as we set off, so we stopped to buy an umbrella at a corner store, then on to the Monkey Forest!

The entrance to the Monkey Forest was about a quarter mile from where we were staying. It sprinkled off and on until we got there. I think we started our walk at about 8:30 am, and there weren’t many people out. We knew we were close to the Monkey Forest when we saw a few monkeys hanging off the power lines. We got there and paid, and were greeted by a few monkeys at the front gate. There was a woman selling bananas for people to feed to the monkeys, but I was afraid we’d get jumped by a bunch of monkeys if we were the only ones walking through the park with food… so, no bananas for us. Here are some of the monkeys that we saw:

Shortly after entering the Sacred Monkey Forest there was a tropical downpour! Billy and I huddled under the small umbrella we’d bought, and just stood still in the thunderous rain. Then we found some shelter under a tree with huge roots that came down over the path, creating a natural archway. We stood there for a few minutes, then as the rain got a little less monsoon-like I decided to run off and explore. I left Billy under the tree with the umbrella, and I ran down by a stream, and followed a path along it to part of the Bathing Temple called Nista Mandala. I was already pretty wet, and the rain was warm. Everything was so lush and green and we had the place to ourselves. There was a real Indiana Jones feel to the park.

I ran back to find Billy, and we went on exploring the park in the now drizzly rain. It rained to some degree for the majority of time we were in the park, and most of the monkeys were huddled together in trees or under shelters. We made the mistake of trying to take shelter in a covered area that apparently belonged to the monkeys, and one of them bared its teeth at Billy and stood its ground. We retreated quickly back into the rain, then saw that monkey run and retrieve her little baby that she’d stashed nearby. She held her baby in front of her and pushed herself up against a column of the shelter, so all we could see of the baby was a little foot poking out from the momma’s side. She was the most protective monkey we encountered. The rest of them were pretty mild-mannered, and would walk up pretty close to us, in a non-threatening way. Many of them just ignored us and played games with each other. There was a peek-a-boo game going on with a few monkeys and a woven mat they’d found in one of the shelters. They cracked me up just how much they acted like children sometimes.

There are 3 temples in the Monkey Forest. The Bathing Temple, the Main Temple, and the Temple of the Dead. These temples are used by the Balinese for religious ceremonies, and tourists aren’t allowed entrance to them. I appreciate it that the Balinese don’t feel obliged to allow tourists access to their sacred temples. We’re still allowed to see the temples, but there are small gates to keep us outside the grounds. This is the Main Temple, and there were monkeys hanging and climbing all over it.

There is a lot of fantastic information about the Monkey Forest on their website. The site also explains a lot about Balinese culture and religion.

After we left the park, we walked down a small road and the rain started coming down pretty hard again. We took shelter under a large tree for a while and saw people walking by holding giant banana leaves over their heads, as natural umbrellas. I wish I had my camera out to catch a shot. I think there were 5 or 6 people doing this. Well, the rain continued to come down and eventually it saturated the tree we were under, so it wasn’t keeping us dry any longer. We ventured out again with our cheap little umbrella, taking shelter under eaves on occasion, and laughing a lot about the experience. We crossed over a bridge, and maybe midway across the bridge the rain became a torrential downpour! We screamed and huddled together, then our cheap umbrella started to leak! HUGE puddles quickly formed in the road on the bridge, and we hurried across the bridge, trying to find a dry place. We found what looked like an old carport with a thatched roof, and a really old car that said it was a “courtesy car” for a nearby run-down hotel. The thatched roof had a few holes in it, and gradually more leaks formed in it. We also watched as the tiny stream on the other side of the street swelled and covered about 1/4 of the road, rushing down the hill with water about the color of chocolate milk.

We stood under the shelter for maybe 1/2 hour, waiting for the rain to let up. Puddles had now formed on the ground under the shelter, so there was only a small area of dry land. The wind picked up, and started blowing the rain at us under the shelter. During the time we were in the dilapidated carport, we’d seen a lot of cars go by, and the cars were slowing down more and more before they crossed the bridge. We couldn’t see the bridge from the carport, but assumed there was a fair amount of water over the roadway.

We noticed on the other side of the road, up a hill there was some sort of hotel or resort. There were people there, and it looked dry and inviting. We waited for the rain to let up enough that we could make a mad dash across the road, through the growing stream, and up the hill to the building. Once we got across the road we could see the bridge, and sure enough it was flooded. The water was high enough that motorcycles were stalling in it.

When we got to the new shelter we discovered that it was a Villa with a few little bungalows and a restaurant (which was closed at the time), and an additional open-air, roofed area for seating for the restaurant. All of this was surrounded with beautiful tropical gardens. We were soaked to the bone, but still smiled as we were greeted by the staff there. One of them brought us to the seating area and let us sit down. Then he asked if we’d like something to drink. He brought us hot tea, and left us to just sit and enjoy the beautiful scenery. After the rain stopped we went to pay for the tea, and the man that gave it to us refused to make us pay. He just gave us a big smile, and said it was free. It was just what we needed.

The rest of the day was somewhat overcast, but very pleasant. We strolled along through some rice paddies and past countless little temples and offerings.

We had a late lunch at a place called Murni’s Warung. It was a great place (also mentioned in Lonely Planet). The food was really tasty. I had a traditional Balinese dish of spiced chicken, called Ayam Betutu. It was so tender and the flavor was like a really good curry. Yum! Murni’s was positioned on a steep hillside, and looked out across a deep river valley. The view was beautiful, and we lingered there for quite a while.

After eating, we had a couple of drinks, then headed back to the bungalow for a nap. We were pretty exhausted from all the walking and excitement of the day. We woke up around 8 pm and went to grab some dinner at a cafe nearby.

The Three Monkeys Cafe sits right next to rice paddies, and we sat outside and had a chorus of frogs from the paddies serenading us while we ate. Some of the frogs were really loud, and occasionally one would make a sound that was reminiscent of a goat, then the paddies would erupt with this goat-like call from numerous frogs. Billy and I couldn’t help but laugh. In the rice paddies I also saw the only firefly I’ve seen in Indonesia. Poor little lonely thing.

Flowers from Bali

We returned from Bali early this morning. I didn’t take as many pictures as I’d planned, but here are some I took of the flowers there.

We’re going to BALI!!!

This Saturday we’re heading to the airport bright and early to catch a flight to Bali! Woohoo! I can’t believe we’ve been here for 6 months, and we’re finally going to go to Bali. Billy’s birthday is next Thursday, and it’ll be nice to spend so much time with him. We don’t have any hotel reservations, just plane tickets. Since it’s not a peak tourist time we shouldn’t have a hard time finding a place to stay, and this way we get a chance to check the places out before we commit to anything. We’ll be there for 6 nights, and we’re both really looking forward to it.

I plan to take lots of pictures to share here. If you’ve been to Bali before, and have any suggestions for things we should see or do, please let me know.

Saturday – Kawah Putih

Saturday morning we got up early to go with our friend Sisca and her family to Kawah Putih (White Crater). We were up at about 6:00, and from our balcony we could see the mountains. Usually it’s pretty hazy out, and you can’t see them. Here’s the view I had while I sipped my coffee…

We met Sisca, her husband, Mom and Dad at 7:30 am. In addition to Billy and I, there was another teacher, Pat. I think it probably took about an hour to get to Kawah Putih from Dago (our neighborhood in Bandung). It’s only about 40 km away, but the roads are really congested, even at that time on a Saturday morning.

Kawah Putih means White Crater, and it’s a crater lake. It’s rich in sulfur, and the water glows a vibrant blue-green. It looks electric, like it’s lit from beneath. There are some sulfur vents around the edge of the lake that send out plumes of steam, and cover the lake in a fog. Most of the landscape around the lake is barren, and it looks like you’re on the surface of another planet. Like this:

Unfortunately with the fog it was difficult to get really good pictures. My camera just couldn’t seem to pick up the unbelievable color of the water.

We had fun just walking around the lake, but Billy got a little too close to the water’s edge and almost lost a flip flop in the sulfurous muck.

It started raining a bit as we were leaving Kawah Putih, and we stopped to grab a bite to eat in one of the sheltered food stalls that surround the parking lot. We had fresh roasted corn on the cob, fried tofu and fried tempe (soybean cake), along with some nice hot tea.

After we left Kawah Putih, we tried to go to another lake nearby. It was so rainy and foggy by now that you could barely even see the lake. We’d originally planned to take a boat out on the lake, but we changed our mind, and trudged back to Sisca’s parents’ car.

Then we went to lunch at a really nice Sundanese (from West Java) restaurant. We had grilled chicken, shredded beef, fish, tofu, tempe, and karedok (a vegetable salad with spicy peanut sauce). It was delicious, and the seating area was on stilts over a big fish pond. It had a thatched roof and was open on all the sides. Beyond the fish pond, there were lush green paddy fields. The rain started coming down pretty hard while we were eating, and the air was nice and cool.

It was a fantastic day!