86. UBUD

See: Post 35 Bali Hi!

Time to touch base with Bali, this time round to spend more time in Ubud. Kuta is like the commercial beachfront city, Ubud is rural with wide expanse of ricefields, mountains in the distance, creeks where the locals bath in - men and women, young and old, sans clothes with just their sarongs to dry themselves with, drape around them when they've finished and walk home.

The Balinese are open about nudity, it's part of their culture. It's perhaps this openness towards nudity and free love which irks their Muslims so much that they're moving into Bali, slowly but surely encroaching, colonising this Hindu majority island in order to dilute the Balinese population.

This is my sense of the place after spending a few days exploring and 'feeling' the streets and surrounds. It dosen't help that large numbers of white settlers have chosen Ubud to be their playground. Many have homes and small businesses here. Many gather at the same watering holes day and night. Many call one another by first names, hug and mua each other.































Meals on wheels - it's nice to be spontaneous and live in the moment. Just like these locals stopping by for a quick bite. I tried the food, found it too salty, couldn't hold a hot bowl so parked myself at a drink store nearby to make use of their table. City slicker!













 

















Monkey Forest. It's late in the afternoon so the zillions of monkeys are cooling off in the shade otherwise they'll be all over me. They scare me as one had previously grabbed my shades from my face and returned it in exchange for a packet of nuts offered by a vendor who knew exactly how to handle them. I think monkey and vendor work together - you scratch my back, I scratch yours! These guys are smart crooks, just like their cousins, the human mammal. The macaques confine themselves to certain areas and do not invade the towns but in Nth India, they've moved into the towns in very large numbers. They look too much like Haruman, so the need to spare them. The Chinese too have a Monkey God - gotta be a connection somewhere.....

Elephant Cave (right) - Pura Goa Gajah. Not much info on this place. Probably old temple or meditation hole, made 'holy' by the tourism people to bring in the crowds to offer prayers or whatever.....

 











 


Under that greenery there's a homo sapien

 














Their women work, their men relax in the town pavilion. Above, this lady under that pile of greenery piled on her head, walks in the rain. Below, their men catch 40 winks, catch up on the gossip and TV news, on this community pavilion smack in the middle of this intersection.

 







They love their dogs, the Muslims don't, another thorn on their side - that these infidels are living in the largest Muslim nation in the world

Pretty In Pink, decked with pearls. I showed her this pix I took she said 'thank you.'

























 

The ritual here is to stop at each spout, wash with a prayer - to clean, purify

A prayerful, peaceful people, quiet in their speech and manners. What's wrong with that? It's not about 'saving' other human beings or love of 'Allah', 'God' whatever - it's all about political Islam and political Christianity, about personalities and their egos.

 





 




 



 

















Me and old trees - there's something about them. The Balinese feel the same way. They will have an altar to offer flowers and one may stop to offer prayers. It used to be the Malay Muslims did the same with a keramat or shrine at the foot of old trees. The Chinese would do likewise with a bodhi tree, offering incense and such but unfortunately, they would place a donation box as well. Old trees don't need maintenance, what's their excuse for the box - ah! the corruption of charities

 

Stonewalled! - this gorgeous wall has pebbles covering it forming a floral design - I love the idea, it's brilliant. Simple, cheap, creative. Now why can't people with their degrees come up with something like this on their computers? A brilliant computer exists in our heads, we don't tap it enough. Sometime perhaps that time will come when mankind's ready, meanwhile, we can create the software to help us along.

 

The Balinese versions of well-known Hindu gods.
Without a strong cultural ballast a society can produce brutes.
Such artistic, creative souls. Such fine detailed workmanship. Such proportion. Such form and function. I don't think the creators of these pieces learned this in uni, it comes from the very depths of the artist, the Creator - Us, You, I. I Am That...





























 

I like to bum through bazaars and market stalls. It's getting to the grassroots level to see and 'feel' its people and the place...
Sure a bomb can go off but heck. I've been to the Taj hotel in Bombay twice before, had tea there, browsed its excellent book shop and than, it got attacked in '08. I've been to that German bakery in Pune, had breakfast there, and it was attacked last week!

 

Candi Tebing Gunung Kawi

This place is in the bowels of the earth, it was a lot of steps down and back up. Supposedly constructed in the 11th Century by a Balinese king as a memoriam to himself and his lineage. Little is known about it. It's used now as a place for ceremonies and quiet reflection.

Makes me wonder, how many ancient places are there in the world in which little is known about its erection and the tourism people or local governments cook up some stories about it just to create some publicity and buzz to draw in the crowds and collect some entry fees and donations at the same time. So, we have a temple exhibiting a huge tooth claiming it to belong to Buddha, we have a Ganesha statue pouring forth milk and a Virgin Mary statue crying blood and .....and.......and....... ??

I spent a few days at this family-run guesthouse. The pavilion is a common feature of Balinese life. It's where family, friends and guests interact, eat and nap....
The owner of this place is a spry old man who works in his padi field in the mornings and in the evenings, as a healer. The massages are done on this pavilion with oils he makes himself.

My room was rustic and homely with just the basics. It was surrounded by lush vegetation with lots of insect and bird and gecko noises. The geckos must be large ones judging from the power of its calls - it actually says 'gecko'! That's how it got its name.

 










Rooms with a view - a pond in front of it and frogs in the night. It might be hard for city slickers to sleep in such a 'noisy' environment but nature noises never bother me, it's city noises like car horns, loud talking, loud music that makes me murderous. I'm ready to be a hermit.

The family has their own pavilion outside their bedrooms where they do their own thing.