2018
Whiling away the Bali days before the Festival
25 October 2018
I don’t know if it will work, but I have been deliberately lying low this afternoon and evening, holed up at Puri Saraswati with a novel, a can of Bintang and a packet of crisps, storing up energy that will be needed for the coming four days. The wafting music from the gamelan /dance performance on the Lotus stage next door has kept me entertained and is blessedly over by bedtime. Wafting is not the right word - it is actually booming! Or clanging! The Opening Ceremony will have taken place at the Palace just up the road (we translators are not on the VIP list for that this year!) Anyway I have been to several over the years - very formal with way too many speeches and dances, but fun to spot the celebrity authors. Usually a huge military presence (to protect us from terrorists?) but once the opening is over they leave us to protect ourselves!
Have been spending my days catching up with more friends and eating so well at breakfast and lunches with them that no dinner is necessary!
When I ventured out for an ice cream last night I captured Ubud’s main street by night - Ubud is a city these days, but the tourist brochures still insist it is a village! At least the traffic had calmed down at this time of day.
Have been spending my days catching up with more friends and eating so well at breakfast and lunches with them that no dinner is necessary!
When I ventured out for an ice cream last night I captured Ubud’s main street by night - Ubud is a city these days, but the tourist brochures still insist it is a village! At least the traffic had calmed down at this time of day.
And the Lotus stage is lit up waiting for the show to begin. It is one of Ubud’s most magical settings.
Brekky with Pam Allen and Roger who arrived last night from Tasmania. At Casa Luna – at the very table that was Josh’s morning coffee hang over all those years. The staff were eager for news of him when I first went there a couple of days back. Pam and I are in constant touch, playing “Words with Friends” every day and making good use of the message bubbles that go with it, as well as email and FB, that it did not feel like a year had gone by since we last saw each other. Fellow translators, she and I love swapping our experiences of the profession. Tomorrow night we are invited to the media event and dinner of the National Book Committee that is handling Indonesia’s role as market focus country at London’s 2019 Book Fair. Nice that we translators are getting recognition with a formal invitation.
A swim in between, where I noticed the temple-style gate into the next property has now become totally organic. Looks like the gardeners at Puri Saraswati have given up trimming the growth.
A swim in between, where I noticed the temple-style gate into the next property has now become totally organic. Looks like the gardeners at Puri Saraswati have given up trimming the growth.
Then lunch with Jeffrey and Anna, just back from Jeffrey leading the latest Ombak Putih Spice Islands sailing trip. Anita from Ganesha Bookshop and her sister Harmy also joined us at Savannah Moon (a lovely but odd name for a little local eatery - no savannah in this part of the world!) for several hours of catching up. Three of my friends were on this Ombak Putih trip, so it was wonderful to hear the stories - already two years since I last had the pleasure of sailing in those remote waters of eastern Indonesia and six years since my first life-changing Spice Islands adventure.
Yesterday was much the same - the morning spent with Janma, Josh’s best mate here whom I have known as long as he has, first over coffee then continuing the talking as we did endless laps of the little hotel pool here. A brand new grandchild in her life - 2 days old! Janma misses Josh terribly.
Later in the morning I set out by taxi with Barbara to locate an art exhibition promoted by the festival, but we failed to find the gallery in the maze of streets in Penestanan in the heights above Ubud. (The map in the festival program was far too sketchy). We were not at all put out - were perfectly happy to go on to Pulau Kelapa which readers of this blog know is my favourite place to eat in Ubud - Javanese food in a spectacular setting. Their soto ayam (chicken soup - but actually so much more) and saté have flavours that can transport me instantly back to many a simple street stall meal on my earlier travels in Java.
These social /culinary activities barely suffice as a full timetable of Bali holiday experiences, (or indeed the stuff of a gripping email) but this is exactly how I wanted to spend my time leading up to the festival. It will be very different, starting at 9 am tomorrow! Not sure how I will survive without my afternoon naps, but am hoping the festival adrenalin will kick in.
Ubud is lined with these wonderful tasteful posters. I love the combination of the old Dutch costume and the Balinese woman’s multiple heads. This year’s theme, a Sanskrit word Jagadhita, means “The world we create”.
Yesterday was much the same - the morning spent with Janma, Josh’s best mate here whom I have known as long as he has, first over coffee then continuing the talking as we did endless laps of the little hotel pool here. A brand new grandchild in her life - 2 days old! Janma misses Josh terribly.
Later in the morning I set out by taxi with Barbara to locate an art exhibition promoted by the festival, but we failed to find the gallery in the maze of streets in Penestanan in the heights above Ubud. (The map in the festival program was far too sketchy). We were not at all put out - were perfectly happy to go on to Pulau Kelapa which readers of this blog know is my favourite place to eat in Ubud - Javanese food in a spectacular setting. Their soto ayam (chicken soup - but actually so much more) and saté have flavours that can transport me instantly back to many a simple street stall meal on my earlier travels in Java.
These social /culinary activities barely suffice as a full timetable of Bali holiday experiences, (or indeed the stuff of a gripping email) but this is exactly how I wanted to spend my time leading up to the festival. It will be very different, starting at 9 am tomorrow! Not sure how I will survive without my afternoon naps, but am hoping the festival adrenalin will kick in.
Ubud is lined with these wonderful tasteful posters. I love the combination of the old Dutch costume and the Balinese woman’s multiple heads. This year’s theme, a Sanskrit word Jagadhita, means “The world we create”.