Christmas Adventures

Bali, Indonesia is my new favorite spot on earth.  I can't even say why exactly.  The Balinese people are genuinely nice and engaging and Bali has everything one could want in a travel destination from beautiful beaches to an active volcano to tropical forests to mountainous regions as well as areas of nightlife, shopping, relaxation and exploration.  But I nearly cried when it was time to leave Bali.  8 days was not enough and I hope to make it back here some day so I can spend far more time meeting people and exploring.

Any of you who are friends with my husband on Facebook know that it rained for our first three days.  The rain, while disappointing, was not nearly as troublesome to me as it was to Kyle.  The kids still played in the ocean and I still sat in my cabana reading a book.  And Michael, in true kid fashion, played in the puddles!

Mikey playing in the puddles

By Christmas Eve we were worried that it might rain the entire week (full disclosure, it is rainy season in Bali so even though it was highly unusual for this amount of rain, it wasn't entirely unheard of.)  We managed to have a very nice evening with an outdoor dinner and managed to get the kids to sleep so Santa could come - and he made it to Bali even though the majority religions are Hindu and Muslim.

Pre Christmas Eve dinner

Whoever said, "Santa is white, kids, he just is." obviously has never seen Santa in Southeast Asia.  This Santa visited our hotel on Christmas morning to participate in a celebration with cool Balinese dancing, music and gift giving!

We got the best Christmas present when we woke up on Christmas morning.  SUN!  Which meant Kyle could stop complaining about the rain!  But, it didn't stop him from talking about the trash.  On certain days the beach was perfect, but the next day it would be covered with trash.  Mostly wood and other organic materials, but there was also a lot of general trash mixed in.  I'm not sure if the beaches are just that polluted in the area or if the recent massive storms contributed to the influx of trash, but it was very sad that such a beautiful location was overrun with litter.  On the mornings when the trash was bad we would see locals cleaning the beach.

Local Balinese woman cleaning the beach

Needless to say, we had a lovely Christmas day that ended with a nice dinner on the beach:

For one day we explored the area with a tour guide and I learned so much about Bali during this tour.  We started by driving about 2 hours into the city of Ubud and stopped at a traditional Balinese house.  The houses are set up very differently from how houses are constructed in the US.  There is a wall around the property and inside are a series of unprotected areas.  In the southwest corner is the kitchen (southwest symbolizes Hell in the local religion which is why the kitchen is located there.)  Then there is a platform with a cabana like roof covering and curtains surrounding it acting as walls which is the gathering area.  There are bedrooms which are essentially platform beds constructed like the gathering area.  The only bedroom with a door and traditional walls is the room of the newly married couple.  In the northeast corner of the property is the family temple.

Traditional Balinese kitchen.  The mother/female in the family spends all day in the kitchen preparing food for the family over the fire oven.  It is hot and backbreaking work.  

After visiting the house we ventured to Mikey's favorite location of the trip - the Monkey forest.  And it is aptly named because there are monkeys EVERYWHERE!  They were fun to watch as they played with each other, tormented the humans who were unlucky enough to carry food into the forest, and took care of each other.  We spent over an hour exploring the forest much to Mike and Jameson's delight.  Mine too because it was significantly cooler in the forest than the hot temperatures everywhere else.

A mom protecting her baby

From there we traveled up to the active volcano for lunch.  We passed a rice field on the way so we stopped to take a look.  In Bali the rice fields are completely harvested by hand without any machinery at all. Rice fields are surprisingly beautiful to look at.

When we arrived at the volcano we were able to each lunch in an open restaurant overlooking the impressive sights.  The restaurant was a bit scary because there was only a half wall, and by half wall I mean it was about as high as my thigh and the drop over the wall was deadly.  I was nervous anytime a family came in and took a picture with their kids sitting on the wall.  Luckily my boys were afraid to get too close.

The boys admiring the lava fields of the volcano

I think the favorite part of the day for everyone was the trip to the coffee fields on the way back to our hotel.  One of the famous coffees of Bali is the Luwak coffee.  You may have heard of it from the movie the Bucket List.  But for those who haven't, it is made from a coffee bean that is eaten by the wild cats of Bali (the Luwaks).  The cats only eat and digest the outer portion of the bean so the coffee kernel is passed through their system and deposited onto the ground.  it is then collected and processed into the coffee that our family was affectionately calling the Cat Crap Coffee all day.  While I was drinking said coffee, Jameson's clever little mind came up with our new name for the coffee, Defecation Caffeination.  So, for anyone who may drink coffee at my house, you never know when I will serve up a cup of Defecation Caffeination for your drinking pleasure.

Mikey roasting the coffee beans

All in all a good day!

We spent the first 6 days of vacation at a very quiet and relaxing hotel on Jimbaran Beach.  The final two nights were spent at the louder Hark Rock Hotel on Kata Beach.  I definitely realize that I am in a quiet and relaxing hotel stage in my life.  But we had fun at the Hard Rock.  On our last full day we spent most of the day at the pool where the kids were invited to participate in a "Walk on Water" competition.  The competition involves a long ladder-like contraption with floating steps set up in the water. The steps are similar to floatation devices but they get very heavy when wet and will drop pretty far into the water when stepped on so it is extremely difficult to manage to walk over the 15 steps.  In a moment that truly defines the strengths of both of our children - Michael managed to complete the ladder walk three times (the only child to do that!).  Jameson, who is not blessed with the balance of Michael, managed to fall after five steps on his first try - which was very similar to what most of the children accomplished.  On his final attempt he fell again around step 6 or 7, but instead of swimming back to the start, he crawled the rest of the way to the finish.  He was going to get there one way or the other and if he could make a pool full of people laugh while doing it all the better.  In another proud mom moment, Michael quite clearly won the event but the person keeping score mixed up the results and he was not included in the award ceremonies.  He was at first confused because everyone knew he had won, but as soon as he realized that his name was not going to be called he jumped in the water, swam back to where Kyle was sitting, and apologized for not winning him a free beer -  Yup, a free beer was the prize for winning a kids competition!  He couldn't have cared less that he didn't get a prize or recognition, he was just happy to compete and was ok that a mistake was made in a silly competition that has no bearing on anything.

All in all is was a fantastic vacation and a much needed get away from the craziness that is Bangalore!  But I was happy to get back home - and I realize that home now is Bangalore.  And even with the frustrations of traffic and people in my house ALL. THE. TIME! I am happy to be here and especially happy that I get to visit so many places that I would never get to under any other circumstances.

One of the reasons I like to travel is that I love to meet people and learn about how other people live.  And, as much as I would love to retire to a place like Bali, I also realize that I won the birth lottery in the USA.  I could have been born in a place like India or Indonesia and never have even imagined the opportunities I was missing.  America has many faults and the polarizing discussions of politics and religion drive me insane, but at least I am able to have those discussions or choose not to have them as is more often the case.  Equality of opportunity is a truly amazing thing that I didn't even think about until I moved away.  I agree that we, as americans, have not mastered the application of equality of opportunity.  The rich are always going to have more opportunity than the poor and unfortunately it is still legal to discriminate against people for their sexual orientation, but in my limited experience, America is better at this than almost anyone else.

In Bali I noticed a muslim woman's bathing suit for the first time.  Traditionally, I understand that muslim women are not allowed to show any body part other than their face.  I see many muslim women walking around covered but I had never seen one on a beach before.  They wear head to toe beach wear, including a head covering, even though the men they are with are wearing only shorts.  It just seems wrong to me, although I do not pretend to be an expert in the religion nor do I know any Muslims who are this traditional so I certainly am not judging the behavior.  I am just glad that even though there are days that I would like to cover myself completely in a snuggie, I am glad that I also have the choice to wear a bathing suit and feel the sun on my skin if I want to.

a muslim woman at the pool in Bali

In many countries, like in India, it is accepted that since one is born into a certain group they are unable to attain any job outside of that station in life - maybe a street sweeper or housekeeper.  Many of the housekeepers I've met work extremely hard every day only to go home and start a fire under a large pot of water so they can cook rice and beans for dinner or wash laundry by hand.  They spend their entire weekends cooking and cleaning without any chance to have any fun.  They spend 40 hours a week in our homes using tools and appliances that must seem so luxurious to them but seem like torture devices to me at home - vacuum cleaners and washing machines.  They go to school until the age of 14 or 15 and simply learn enough to go into people's houses to clean or, for the men, to drive people around.  I spend more money on groceries in a week then most of the street sweepers or housekeepers will make in a month.  And I am a little embarrassed about it until I realize that this is acceptable to them and they don't seem at all upset by it.  In many cases the people believe in a religion that states if they live the best life they can in this life they will come back to better things in the next life.  And they truly believe this in the same way that Christians believe in God without question or kids believe in magic.

I have a choice in my religion and my beliefs - and more often than not I choose to be undecided because there is just so much I am still trying to learn about different beliefs that I don't feel I am educated enough to make a choice.  I try not to blindly believe in anything and I am thankful that I am able to educate myself and make these kinds of choices. I am also thankful that I can change my mind.  

But, I do believe in magic.

Happy New Year everyone!  May 2014 be even better than 2013.