Canadian Thanksgiving, Balinese Heat

Canadian Thanksgiving, Oct. 13, has definitely been a highlight of my time here in Bali. I went early in the afternoon to Barry and Geri's place to help set up, and then we went for a nice, perfect relaxing swim. Yes, swimming on Thanksgiving. Why? Two reasons: #1. Because I can. #2. Because its a zillion degrees with 157% humidity!

The meal was perfect. The turkey was done on the barbeque and was so great, there was purple sweet potatoes, stuffing, pickles (I brought them), pumpkin pie, apple pie... practically every Thanksgiving thing you can think of, even cranberry sauce! I ate sooo much I could hardly move. If it had been in Canada I think I could have eaten alot more, but with adjusting to regular smaller portioned meals here,and the heat I ate less than I would have at home.

The company was great as well. There was myself, Barry and Geri and their son Quinn, and another family with 3 kids from Alberta, and a woman who lived in Calgary with her two sons who are Indonesian-Canadian. It was alot of fun, definitely alot of "ehs".

My New Favourite Thing

Last Saturday, Oct. 4, Lindsay, Melissa, and myself, decided to go to Pedang Bai where there is a beach called "Bloo Lagoon" on the East Coast of Bali. I found a new favorite thing.
Snorkeling.
Seriously, this is amazing. You put on these funny looking masks and have to breathe through a tube, but you just float and you have a front-row seat to the amazing world under the sea. Incredible. I saw fish that looked like they belonged on Finding Nemo, and they were 3 feet away from me! I had no idea that it was that cool under there and could never understand people who loved snorkeling, but now I have seen the light. I was telling the kids about this the next day and they could not believe that this was my second time ever in the ocean and my first time ever snorkeling. (Kids who have grown up in Bali don't really understand "landlocked Alberta")

So we spent the first part of the day hanging out at the beach, watching the fishing boats, snorkeling and eating. Then we walked into town to catch a tourist shuttle bus that was going to take us back to Sanur. We were at the booth on time and got in the van. They drove us to the other side of town, told us to wait "sebentar" (for a minute) and then left. We waited.. and waited... waited. Two hours later, they come back with a bunch of tourists that had just gotten off the ferry from Lombok, and finally we're off. We were so tired, hungry and angry, but at least we were now on our way.

(what do you do when you're stuck on a bus for 2 hours in Bali? You take pictures of offerings and fishing boats.)


About twenty minutes into the trip back, the driver pulls over, looking concerned. He gets out, looks around the van, walks across the street talks to someone, gets on a motorbike and leaves. He eventually came back. It turns out tat a strut or something had broken. So now we are stranded in the middle of nowhere. We find out that we are 30 km away from Sanur and we determined that this was too far to walk (after converting it into miles for Melissa and Lindsay, the Americans). Then (because we are not tourists and we know people in Bali) we all get our phones out and soon we have friends on the way to come rescue us. They show up-bless their souls-and we get home uneventfully.

I liked the first part of the day better.



It has been getting hotter here. Now even just standing outside breaks you into a sweat. Even at the beach it is becoming more sauna-like. The kid's building is brutally hot when you have 20 kids and 4 adults in there on Sunday mornings, this morning even the kids were sweating (usually I'm the only really sweaty one).
(yes, that is cream to make your skin whiter)

Friday night we had a "Girl's Movie Night". I moved two of the mattresses from my house into the building and we watched the movie "Enchanted". It was a pretty fun night, we had a bunch of great snacks, played charades, laughed and talked. I know if you just read the last couple blogs I have posted you would think all I do here in Bali is go to beautiful rice fields and the beach. But my weeks are pretty full with all sorts of things! I do language class three times a week, which I really enjoy and can see my progress in. I also prepare lessons for Sundays. There's Kid's Club on Thursdays, meetings and getting to know people. Some weeks I'm pretty busy!

This isn't new news, but, sometimes I forget things. Usually, they are just little things that are easy to fix (especially if there is a set of keys other than the ones in my locked house). But sometimes they are things that are not easy to fix. Say like, hypothetically forgetting to take your bank card out of the atm... in Indonesia. This, apparently, is not so easy to fix. I'll spare you all the details but I will tell you this: Never Do This.

A Visit to a Village

Friday, Lindsay, a couple that Lindsay works with, and me headed out to a village past Tabanan to visit a friend of theirs. It was about a two hour drive. Their friend, 'Pak', grew up in this village, and has an amazing story:

Pak's older brother had gone to school on Sumatra, another Indonesian island, and hadd become a Chr'stian there. When he came back he shared about his beliefs to his family, and his brothers also became C's. (I guess to understand this story you have to know that cnverting like that is a really big deal, especially in a village. The other families believe that it will displease the gods and that bad things will happen from the village, and other things like that, so its not exactly an accepted change.) This was about the time of the attempted Communist coup in Indonesia, and anyone who was suspected of being a Communist was killed. Apparently about 100,000 people on Bali were killed. Some leaders in Pak's village (Pak was away at school) used this as an opportunity to get rid of Pak's two C brothers, and they were murdered.

Pak went to school in New Zealand after High School, and did some other things, lived in other places in Indonesia, and then got a job with World Vision because he has incredibly innovative ways of pumping water to remote villages and stuff like that.

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Eventually, with full knowledge of who murdered his brothers and what was awaiting him, Pak returned to his village, and was told that if there was an opportunity, he would also be killed. But, Pak stayed and has transformed this village- paved roads, helped give opportunities to the kids, built water pumps and invented easier ways to thresh rice and other things like those that have greatly aided this and surrounding villages. Now, after maybe 10-15 years Pak is a respected member of the community. He travels all over the world (has been to Winnipeg and he couldn't believe how cold it was there) and aids alot of villages in getting access to clean water. Its such a beautiful story of forgiveness and mercy, and I feel privelged for being able to meet him.

We spent the night there, and got the chance to eat some amazing village food, meet some beautiful people (who work harder than I ever will for $4 a day- seriously, women carrying buckets of dirt and also rocks on their heads) and look around at the absolutely stunning landscape. My pictures do not do justice to this place and the things I saw there.



The afternoon we got there, there was a flash flood in the river:




This is the next morning, after the flood was done:

A Day In Ubud

On Saturday the 20th me and Lindsay decided to go to Ubud for a day trip. It was about a 45 minute Taksi ride. When we first got there we went to the Monkey Forest. There are gajillions of monkeys there and they are wild! You can get really close to them, and buy bananas to feed them, even though this is not recommended.

You can soon see why feeding the monkeys is not recommended- they can smell them on you and will climb all over and basically attack you if you don't give the food to them! We almost had as much fun watching the ridiculous tourists as we did watching monkeys!



We rented a motorbike too. Lindsay drove, and I was on the look out for any obstacles. It was alot of fun to be able to get around on our own, and we didn't die! We went to the Ubud Pasar (Market), which is crazy packed and like a maze. Also, we explored around Ubud a little, taking some dirt roads and meeting some local rice farmers. We went to a huge, old, Pura (Temple) as well. Ubud is the art center of Bali, and there is alot of historical preservation there.


One other funny thing we saw was a flock of ducks thinking they were a car and causing a traffic jam! We were on the bike, wondering why traffic was so backed up, but then we saw a bunch of ducks and ducklings waddling along in the middle of the road- not even caring about all the honking or anything. It was a fun trip!


Below are some baby grasshoppers I saw in the middle of a flower,
and a giant one on the leg of my table!



I also got a package from home this week, from my mom (Love you mom!). Inside were magazines, gum, chocolate bars and my one true vice- Lay's Salt and Vinegar chips!!! This is what they looked like after their trek all the way from Canada:

Sudah Dua Bulan

I have been here for 2 months now. Hard to believe.

Things are good, really enjoying it here. It's starting to get hotter which sucks, but the bright side of that is... ummm... well at least I have AC. That's a positive thing.

The kid's stuff is going pretty good, its sometimes frustrating because there are huge differences in the amount of kid's that come from week to week. Sunday before last we did a 'camp day' which was alot of fun, and 28 kids came out! We roasted marshmallows over votive candles on sate sticks! I would like to point out that in the picture below about 7 nationalities (American, Indonesian, British, Indian, and Australian) are represented.


I still enjoy going to the beach, generally on Saturday's if I don't have anything else planned I go to the beach and read and enjoy the sun and waves. It's fun to go to the non-touristy side of the beach and watch the local kids play in the sun, and sit next to the really, colorful neat fishing boats.



I love the architecture here. It's weird that its September but its still green!


So far here I've seen 5 or 6 parades, depending on when you count one ending and one beginning. They love parades here... especially the kids!

One day as I went to wash out my coffee pot, I discovered a gecko in the pot!

Just Wait Till October...

I hope everyone is doing well as the summer is winding down. I chose "Just wait till October" as the title of this update because I have heard it alot lately, in reference to the weather. It's hot here. It was a pretty nice week though, the mornings and evenings are cooler (I even wore my jeans a couple times which is a special treat) but the afternoons can be brutal. So, whenever I comment on the weather to someone who has been here for a while, I always get the same response: "Just wait till October". Because, October is when the "rainy season" starts. And by rainy I mean oppressively humid hot daily monsoon rains, apparently. Sounds like fun eh? I know I'm excited...

Not so much.

Anyways! Things are really, really good here. My temporary house-mate Lindsay from the states arrived on Wednesday. I have really enjoyed getting to know her and showing her around. She is alot of fun, laughs at my jokes, wants to do things, has traveled alot and is really interesting. It's nice to have someone around.

Language is fun!

Oh my goodness, I am so excited about this. This coming Sunday I am 'canceling' the children's program and we are having a Camp Day! I haven't come up a name for the camp yet. So, I'm going to decorate the kid's building like a camp- make a fort, have some tents, a fake fire (I really want to have a real fire, but I also want to pass my internship and I think burning down the church would constitute an 'F'), fake trees, nature crafts, "cabins", campfire songs, crazy games, a dramatic "scary" story, and (if we can find marshmallows) a marshmallow roast!!! Doesn't that sound fun?! I hope the kids like it, I think it will be good to change it up for the kids (and me), and will be a good community-builder as well.

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Random Bali fact: Just because there is a sign for a "Wendy's" restaurant does not necessarily mean there is one.

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So, I'm sure you can kind of tell so far in this newsletter that I'm really enjoying it here, but a couple days last week were really hard. I really had to deal with understanding the culture and not taking some things personally and I was pretty lonely. It was not very fun and locking myself in my house all day was a very tempting option. I get approached a lot for numerous reasons, and I got really impatient with that; just tired of having to deal with people and the language barrier and I wanted to just put in my i-pod to block out the world. But those days didn't last long, with a lot of thinking, good friends and good sleeps. I'm glad it only lasted a few days.

Did I tell you we have been sort of fund-raising here for a tv for the kid's building? Well, we have. This week we took a special offering in the community for it and then after the service a woman I have gotten to know a bit approached me and said she would like to donate her tv to us! That was pretty cool. The generosity of people (here and at home) continually blows me away.

Galungan was last week, it was a very quiet day as everything was shut down and people were with their families. I did not specifically notice a change in the atmosphere, but it was a difficult time for some people as far as anger and things go, and I guess it was for me too. The only place (so far) I really notice an atmosphere difference or the "darkness" or "heaviness" that some people speak about when they talk about Bali is actually in Kuda, which is like tourist central with alot of partying and all the things that go along with that, alongside the Balinese traditions. Its a strange place.


Itu saja, thats all. Thanks everyone for your support, thoughts and encouragement.

Culture and Cockroaches

I don't really know about this blog thing! Sometimes I just forget about it or procrastinate posting, so my apologies to those of you who have been checking but there hasn't been an update for a while. My original idea was to just copy and paste my weekly email updates (which have also been a little late lately... whoops) but I know there are a couple people who check my blog and also get the updates, so sometimes they will be the same but I will try to add a bit more here for the people who would like to know more about whats up with me! So I guess here I have two weeks of things to catch up on! This counts as two... it's long!

One of the biggest new-things that I have been doing is starting language. Last week I had it four days, but now we are just doing 3 days a week, two 1.5 hr lesson and one 2 hr lesson. I am really enjoying it, its not too difficult of a language but remembering new words for everything is sometimes hard! And so is learning different grammar. I'm glad I'm a native English speaker though, because the more I learn Indonesian the harder I think English is! One of the reasons why I enjoy Indo lessons so much is because my teacher is alot of fun. Other than language, she also teaches some cultural things, and I really enjoy learning about those. We usually hang out after a lesson too, she'll take me to some really good restaurants!

Oh the food. Some of it is so good, and I eat out a lot! I honestly have not cooked in my house (besides toast) since...I don't even remember, maybe Tuesday! Food is incredibly cheap. I try to eat whatever is put in front of me, and I like trying strange things. Alot of food here is really spicy, which is getting tiresome because I can't handle spicy food very well. Another reason why I haven't cooked very much this week is because it's the Sanur Village Festival here! It started on Wednesday. There are lots of food booths with all sorts of really good food, music, sports, exhibitions, shopping... lots to do and see! There is a limit on how much the food can cost so the locals can enjoy the food as well, so the most expensive food will be is Rp. 30,000 which is about $3. Yeah! Like I said, the food is so cheap here, especially at places for the locals. I'll pay about Rp. 9000-10,000 (about a canadian dollar) for Nasi Campur (Chawm-poor), which is like rice, meat, vegetables, just a campur (mix) of whatever they have!

Last week I went with Melissa to Echo Beach in Canggu, about a 40 minutes taxi ride, it was so nice! Some great resturaunts and some hotels, but it is basically undeveloped and alot of locals hang out there. It was nice just to sit wherever we wanted and relax without having to deal with throngs of tourists and people trying to sell you stuff. The waves there are too big to swim in, but apparently its good for surfing! (I wouldn't know though, haven't tried surfing yet!). The taxi ride was an adventure though, definitely thought I was going to die (thats an over-exaggeration). These pictures are from Echo Beach.

Yesterday I went for a little tour of south Bali with my teacher and a friend of hers from Java. We rented a car and hired a driver (which was really cheap in my perspective- only like Rp. 100,000 each so $10- but for them it was a splurge, so I really had to watch what I said) We went to Nusa Dua and looked at some of the really nice resort hotels, and to the Bukit (hills) to a cultural park thing with some huge statues of Bali's "protector" it was pretty neat. I ended up in a group picture with all these other tourists from Java, it was really funny- they wanted me in there! We also went to Dreamland beach where there were lots of tourists and surfers, its beautiful, but just lots of people and people trying to sell you things. We drove through Jimbaran, where there is really good seafood apparently. Finally we went to Kuta beach (I had been here before), played in the water a bit, people tried to sell us stuff, watched the sunset, and once again I was approached by a bunch of people from Java who wanted pictures with me (I think cause I'm white and blonde and was dressed pretty conservatively). Then we went out for supper and I had a sirloin steak (not Albertan quality of course but it was still pretty good!) and spaghetti for like $2. When I get back home I'm not going to be able to handle paying $20 for a restaurant meal! The experience at this resturaunt brings me to another Bali discovery that I have made this past week and highly regret.

Cockroaches.

Oh my goodness. Seriously. There was one in my house, I did not deal with it well. Luckily it was not moving so I just left my bedroom and waited for like 2 hours until Barry got to the building. Then I went and got him to kill it while I stood on a chair absolutely disgusted. SO GROSS. So that was that, apparently they're pretty common but that was the first one I had seen. And apparently they fly, which makes me want to flip out just thinking about it. Then yesterday, at this restaurants I see something scurry on the floor under our table, but when i looked there was nothing so I forgot about it. THEN I feel something like tickling my foot... then my ankle... then my calf, I look and bat at it with my other foot, and it was a cockroach! It was ON ME. Needless to say I kinda freaked, it took alot for me to not completely make a scene, and the people I were with (all Indonesians) were looking at me like I was insane (its just a cockroach, of course) but I could not believe there were cockroaches in this fairly nice restaurant and no one cared! Then (yes, this story is not done) I see another crawling across the floor, then another! I was like, uh... what? But apparently thats just a normal thing and its not a big deal to local restaurants, so i tried to just brush it off. I still shudder when I think about it crawling on me though (like now). So sick. Definitely the thing I have the biggest issue with here so far. They fly!!! I like the geckos better.
Okay, enough about cockroaches. Think positive... I'm getting a great tan! These pictures are from the South Bali tour yesterday. On the first one you can see both the east and west coasts. If you look at a map this is the skinny little part near the bottom of Bali. The second is me and my language teacher, the third is a statue of the Bali "Protector".

Getting into somewhat of a routine has been nice. I've started going to a Study with some of the expatriates, and I meet with my mentor weekly. Also, last week the after-school kid's club kicked off last Thursday. Five boys came (we're expecting more in the coming weeks). It was interesting haha. Two of the boys are from Australia, one from France, and two from Holland. They had a blast doing a craft, playing games, swimming in a pool, and chasing the baby chickens.

Children's stuff is going good, we are starting our volunteer rotation and such as of today, and we had a really good meeting with the volunteers, and I'm excited about some of the things we are going to try to make happen. My supervisor is all about getting the children's program "up front" in the community- making it an important part of the community and having the community involved and supporting it, which is so great and encouraging! And there are some other amazing people that are a part of this community who are behind it and helping it, that I'm learning a lot from. I'm really enjoying working here.

I don't really know what else to write about... Next week is independence day here and also one of the major Balinese celebrations, so that should be interesting, loud, and colorful!

This picture is me being a space cadet in my new helmet!
The picture at the very top is one from the Sanur Village Parade that I
just got back from about an hour ago.