Tagalalang, Bali, Indonesia
In my last week at Bali, I took a lot of pictures. Around Ubud and in Pemuteran, mostly, but a few around Seminyak again as I did some businessy stuff before my flight out. Rather than provide another long insufferable writing piece, I’m going to offer up some shorter peppier photo essays. I use “photo essays” because it makes what’s about to happen sound fancy.
The first one: my lucky discovery of a Full Moon Festival in the town of Tegalalang just north of Bali. I had decided to go on an extended motorbike ride, cause it’s so much fun, drove past the rice terraces and noticed on my GPS that there was a little road that circled back to town through the country side. Perfect! Lovely drive, plus I happened to do it during a special day called Purnama., or Full Moon Festival. I came across this little village and the place was a’bustling! I parked my “iron horse”, and as I walked into a temple, a very nice man pulled me over and told me I had to change my ways if I wanted to stick around. Namely put on a hat and wear a sarong, which he gave me. So, I did that and wandered around the festivities, talking with people who were very friendly and welcoming. In fact, one guy pulled me over to a beruga (sitting platform) and offered me coffee. I ended up chatting with this group of men, who were taking a break from all the setting up, for about half an hour. All were interested in where I came from, and why I was there. Compared to other white visitors, an American was a relative novelty here, it seems. One guy wanted to talk Elvis. Another Arnold Schwarzegger. Another about the climate in America. I in turn asked them about the festival and about their families. Their English wasn’t great, but leagues better than my Balinese or Indonesian. (Evidently, English is mandatory at schools here until high school, and many take more classes so they can interact with tourists). Anyway, I promised a photo essay, so here it is. My shots taken before the festival (which wasn’t going to start until later that night). The temple is called Pura Sanghyana Alang and is in Tegalalang, Bali, just north of Ubud.
Pura Sanghyana Alang. The big temple in town, getting prepared for that nights festival.
The front of the pura (temple), lots of color!
Puras all over Bali have various statues from both Balinese Hinduism and the older animism. This one was guarding an ancillary temple, where the people were preparing everything for the Pura.
Path leading from staging area temple to main temple.
Women carry nearly everything on their heads. In this case, they are carrying offerings to the temple on their heads, because the head is the most sacred part of the body. So, not only is the head a good place to carry stuff, it’s respectful to their worship.
Inside the temple. Most of this is straw, rice, various paper, and other natural materials.
The ubiquituos offering bowl. Women, mostly, put these out before every meal, at the driveway, in front of businesses, on temples, on the street,….everywhere. Always has these kinds of ingredients plus incense burning. (As with all these photos, click on them to make them bigger)
Women praying before they go into the temple. There isn’t ONE altar, like with Buddhism or Christianity. They have multiple altars, and while I couldn’t figure out why, it seems that they do serve different devotional purposes.
Women carrying offerings into the temple.
Young girls coming from their school to the festival. They came as a group of about 20.
And they were kind enough to pose for this picture for me!
I didn’t take as many pictures of people as I could have, because I don’t have that nosy photojournalist mojo going for me. Plus, I really thought I was being intrusive to take pictures of people while they were going about a sacred endeavor. Maybe not, but…still.
Back on the road, I took a lovely hour long ride through the countryside. And here’s what I saw!
The road beckons south.
Temple stone factory.
North of Ubud there is whole district of small factories, workshops really, that make the stone walls, towers and whatnot that temples need.
Every village has at least three temples. Every village. That’s a lot of temples, not to mention all the big ones and tiny ones, nor all the shrines that most families have in their homes, somewhere. So there’s a thriving business for temple replacement materials.
Since you asked, the three purrs are:
Pura Puseh: A temple dedicated to Lord Vishnu (the preserver). Vishnu can take on different incarnations, and can move freely between the earthly world and the heavenly world. All Pura Pusah are located at the upper end of the village, as the river/stream runs. Vishnu’s ability to settle the outburst of evil powers makes him the right deity for the entrance to the village.
Pura Desa: A temple dedicated to Lord Brahma (the creator). Pura Desa are located in the middle of the village, and people gather there to pray as well as hold community meetings. Lord Brahma is the god of creation, so he’s a good one to have on your side.
Pura Dalem: A temple of Lord Siva (Deva Siva), the destroyer. Pura Dalem guard the downstream exit / end of a village. Believers believe that Siva purifies ones ancestors and converts them into deities. He judges the good and evil deeds of a person and decides the punishment/reward. So, again, good to have on your side.
I talked with a Spanish hotel manager, who has lived in Bali for 2 years, and he told me that Balinese spend up to 1/3 of their annual income on donations to support their religion, including temple maintenance and the ceremonies that happen at their pure. That seems like a lot for a relatively poor population.
Rice Field!
Close up of young rice growing in rice field.
Woman farming in Rice Field.
House set back behind Rice Fields.
Closer up of same house. I could live there, could you?
Roosters under basket arrest. I couldn’t figure out exactly why they do this. I know they keep roosters for the hens, they sell roosters to other farmers, and they also – long tradition here – sell roosters for cockfights.
Toward the end of the drive, I came across these guys. They seemed to be intent with their march, but I had no idea where they were going. Didn’t mind me motoring by.
And that was it. Soon thereafter I entered Ubud, and bought a Coke Zero. 🙂
(Click to embiggen)
Fleeing the Madness.
After about a week in Seminyak / Kuta, I had had enough. I LOVED my lush digs with Marlen, but I had been completely denied in my desire to have a “Bali beach” experience. I was reading up on where to go next, and got curious about doing some scuba dives. (Aside: I’ve been saying that 1/3 of this trip is being a tourist, 1/3 is doing pro bono consulting for nonprofits, and 1/3 just going with whim. This one goes in the “whim” category. I had no plans to do this before I saw the brochure.) Getting PADI Certified has been on my bucket list (ever growing, it seems) and for a reason I can’t remember I settled on Bali Hai Diving Adventures. It was a whole package (resort stay and certification course), and it was on an island far away from Kuta. So I signed up, got picked up at Marlen’s by their driver, dropped off at the dock, boarded, and the adventure began!
The ferry ride was a bit odd. Nice boat, as far as ferry boats go. But this one had a 4 piece band on deck playing Beatle’s covers. For a 40 minute ride. They even had time to take a short break in the middle of their set. Hmmm…
All Aboard!
Bali Hai Diving Adventures. We arrived at Nusa Lembongan (Nusa = Island), and before we even made it to land, we docked at a big platform, donned wetsuits and took a dive! Our first of 4 required dives. Really really cool! Rosie, our dive instructor, from England, was superb in every way. Smart, friendly, funny, skilled, and talented! So over the side we went! (my TripAdvisor review is here).
Dive platform over a reef in the background.
For those of you who have been PADI certified, you know how it goes. For the rest of us, it’s just not that hard. You learn how the reasonably simple equipment works. You learn how to not kill yourself. You learn how to not kill your buddy. You learn how to not kill the aquatic life. And you learn how to put on extremely tight neoprene tights. And look good in them. There’s other good stuff, like buoyancy control, gas contamination, O-ring inspection, damn dive tables (still!), and knowing when a trigger fish is angry and when it’s merely grumpy. And, thanks to Rosie, it was all easy, fun and occasionally hilarious. I was 120 feet under the surface, and it was amazing.
Bali Hai Diving Adventures HQ
Bali Hai Beach Resort. During the course, I stayed at the Bali Hai Beach Resort, at about $147 / night (way out of my price range on this trip, but I think I got a deal for doing the scuba package). You get your own bungalow with A/C, with two pools, beach front, nice lagoon view outdoor bar/restaurant. And very friendly staff. Nothing bad about this place, but it is pricey for this part of the world.
Home
Upstairs bedroom
Downstairs living room
Rama Garden Bungalows. After the course was over, I decided to check out the north end of the island, and booked a lumbung (traditional Balinese hut) through airbnb at Rama Zen Garden Bungalows, for about $30/night. Very clean and modern. Some have no A/C but mosquito netting around the bed, which I loved. And the outdoor shower and bathroom (underneath the bedroom) was well designed, modern and fun! Made me feel Bali that much more. There was something …connecting…about sweating at night under a ceiling fan, open windows, yet safely within the netting. And the lizard, that I’m saying is a big gecko. When you hear a loud croaking sound, directly above your bed, it’s just the friendly neighborhood gecko . He is harmless. And he is lonely. Imagine it’s like a frog in the summer time.
The Nocturnal Croaker
I really liked the host Trinity and her staff at Rama Gardens. She’s partly from Houston, so English clearly wasn’t an issue. And I loved that she was off surfing when I showed up! Her staff very capable of my check in, and was happy to make me anything I liked from their kitchen but excelled in tasty and healthy smoothies and fruit shakes. Meals were all healthy too. The special breakfast for guests was $4, two eggs, fruit, toast and coffee. As with most other restaurants anywhere I’ve traveled, if you order local dishes they are ½ – 2/3 the cost of “Western” dishes. Nasi campur costs $4. Pizza cost $10.
Nice place in my lumbong for a tasty beverage.
Rama Gardens has few amenities other than the restaurant, like a pool, but a mere 1 min walk down a funky path you’re at the beach and you can swim in the ocean. MUCH nicer beach than Kuta or Seminyak. On Friday nights, the local mostly ex pats, many dive instructors, show up from around the island to party at the Blue Corner Bar, which is a 3 min sandy walk from Rama Gardens. Nothing fancy here, just cold beer, an eclectic and simple but tasty menu, and lots of happy people who never again have to work in a grey cubicle.
Blue Corner Bar
This is how dive instructors celebrate.
Rama Gardens is kind of tricky to get find, but just trust your guts and your smartphone GPS, look for the signs, and you’ll make it. I rented a motorbike near Bali Hai Tides Hotel (south end of the island) and found my way. The trick – just keep driving until you think you’re on the wrong road, check your GPS, get back on track, and you’ll find it. Pretty good signage from the main road at the path to the place. You can also rent a “pick up”, but I was impatient waiting for the trucks to show up. (more on Lembongan taxi/pickups here). Full time local staff is very friendly and speaks English well enough.
If you REALLY want a Bali hut on the beach, I’d say look at Yoga Beach Villas. Same area as Rama Garden and Blue Corners Bar, but fancier (ie, a pool) and it’s on the beach (well, not sand under your bungalow, on the beach, but 10 short steps to it.
Nusa Ceningan. On my last full day in the island, I took my motorbike across the “Yellow Bridge” to Nusa Ceningan. Trucks/cars can’t go on this island because there are no roads for them. Just paths with some old pavement over rocks that largely has decomposed to roughness. But my rental motorbike handled it just fine. Key word: rental. As in Not Mine. It’s a very small island, so you take the circular path up a decent incline and have lunch at the Ceningan Cliff Rest Area (aka restaurant). Great view of the channel between Nusa Penida and of Nusa Penida as well. It was a sedate lunch for me, with the only other people being a German couple that didn’t want to talk with me (or couldn’t, who knows). Then a gaggle of Japanese students showed up and I was surrounded by bantering photographers. I was sitting at just ONE of the chairs along the table facing the channel, and I had, at one point, 3 such intrepids pointing cameras at me, and past me, from very close quarters. Like less than a foot. I remember fondly my time in Japan last summer, but I don’t remember that sort of frenzied descent on an otherwise serene viewpoint. Ah well, they seemed to be having fun, so what’s the harm? Anyway, a nice little tour of a different island.
Main road on Nusa Ceningan
As you’re riding around, on the coast, you’ll see the local industry out in full force. Seaweed cultivation! Seems every house along the way had long sheets of seaweed drying in the sun, sometimes near their house, sometimes in the road, sometimes…wherever there was relatively flat land. I didn’t figure out what they do with this seaweed, since none of the local dishes had it. Maybe export?
New seaweed on left, dried seaweed on right.
Seaweed “farming” boats.
Seaweed farmer
Motorscooter rental. Aim for about 50-70,000 per day ($4-6). If you run out of gas, don’t expect to find a filling station on Nusa Lembongan. Instead, look for the roadside Petrol businesses that will sell you a a liter or two of petrol from an old water or juice bottle. You buy it ($2) they pour it in your tank, and they refill the bottle later. If no one is at the stand, just leave 20,000, pour your own, and leave the bottle.
Gas by the bottle!
ATM. Since there is but ONE ATM on the island, with a location known only to locals, I advise you stock up on cash before you go to the island. If you must get to it, it’s on the road that runs to the beach just south of …well…never mind. Ask a local!
Bugs. There are mosquitos and flies. But not oppressively so. Still, prepare.
Laundry. The folks at Rama Garden did mine very nicely for $2/kg. It was more expensive at Bali Hai Beach Resort. Give them 24 hours.
Electricity. Same plugs as in the rest of SE Asia, the round two prong jobbies. You can buy a converter plug at any hardware store for $1. Again, since all of my electronics are made for the global market, I don’t need a power conditioner. My MacAir, Samsung Galaxy, Kindle, and even Canon camera battery charger all handle the dual voltage nicely.
Okay, that’s it for the first half of my Bali trip. Next few days are in Ubud and Permuteran. With a dive at Nusa Menjongan. Stay tuned….
Here are some random shots from Nusa Lembongan…
Kids with a day off school playing.
Beach in front of Blue Corner Bar.
Seaweed farmer homes
Main town on Nusa Lembongan
Flower by the side of the path near my bungalow.
First off, for those who have faint memories of this song. Bali Hai means “Helloooooo Bali!”. (Hai in Balinese means hello. ☺ ) Might want to play it while you’re reading this post.
I’ve had some requests to reconnoiter Bali, for future visitors, and so what follows is more of a TripAdvisor sort of thing, than usual. Maybe you too will come to Bali!!! (I promise I’m trying to ween myself off exclamation marks.) You will land at Denpasar Airport (DPS), which is the main international airport on Bali Island. Officially known as Ngurah Rai International Airport, named after the leader of the Puputan (“fight to the death”) where locals rebelled against Dutch colonial rule. Every single one of the Balinese fighters died in this 1946 battle (story here and here). You will have to choose where to go first, and…well…I went to Seminyak (just north of the airport).
Accommodations. On the solid advice of friend Mark, I aimed at Seminyak rather than Kuta, and found a place on airbnb.com with Marlen, a friendly innkeeper. However, after a couple days at her first property, I moved to her second one because it was loads nicer. (My review is here.) If you can afford $50/night, definitely go to her nicer place. If you want to pay $25/night, for much less comfort but still safe, go for the modest place. Marlen manages both, and both are in the same neighborhood, about 5-10 minutes to a beach, depending on if you get lost or not. If you don’t like these, or they are not available, you should have no trouble finding accomodations. Unless you’re willing to pay top dollar, don’t expect to be ON the beach in Seminyak. If you can, try the W Hotel, which looks very nice indeed and good views of the ocean.
Marley’s Place. View from just outside room.
Transportation. When flying to a new country, I like to get met at the airport by a friendly local smile. So before I flew to Bali, I asked Marlen to arrange for an airport pick up, and she sent Ketut, an English speaking local who came with the desired smile. He has a nice Toyota miniSUV, with A/C, and I am happy to recommend him for your taxi needs. I hired him for 5 rides. Just text or call him at 0813-3844-5438. He charged 150,000 Rp / $11, no tip, for the 30 minute trip from the airport to Marlen’s; and later he charged 300,000 Rp / $24 for the 1 hour trip from Sanur to Ubed, to give you an idea. (While we’re at it, the one way taxi ride from Ubud to relatively far off the beaten trail Permuteran on the north shore was 600,000 Rp / $48. Buses….not so practical.) Marlen also arranged to have a motorbike rental delivered to my place, which I bargained down to 320,000 / $25 / week, no tax. A nice little 125cc Honda job (Bali Jaya Tours, 0819-3304-2826 or info@balijayatours.com. In Seminyak.)
Vrrroooommmm!
I like Marlen! She’s a good resource for getting settled in (taxis, motorbikes, SIM cards, clubs, restaurants, etc.), and a delight to hang out with.
Communications. If you have an unlocked smartphone, buy a SIM Card (or, if not, arrange for international coverage from your carrier). With Marlen’s help, I bought a Telkomsel SIM card for about $8, topped it another $8 for a “mostly data” plan and it lasted my whole 3 weeks here. Guy at store (well, roadside hut) popped it in for me, worked his magic fingers on my phone and handed me a card with my working Indonesian phone number on it. I found that I need cell network coverage because wifi hotspots are spottier and much less available than ubiquitous cell coverage. And GPS works better too. I did lots of texting, some photo uploads to FB, and that was all I needed. Coverage worked all over the island, and even on Lembongan island. I also found that internet in Indonesia is not that great. S L O W, and cuts out regularly. Especially in rooms or bungalows. So I’ve relied on cell coverage for most of my internet access needs when the internet wasn’t working. (Curiously, wifi signals that I could find within a hotel or restaurant were uniformly strong, it’s just the internet connection that sucked.)
I’m not a big “go outer”, especially because night clubs are awkward alone and I like to eat cheaply on this trip. However, I did get out to a few places.
Potato Head Beach Club. If you’re in Seminyak, or even Kuta, and want a Western style beach experience that’s not over the top tourist/drunken, then I highly recommend the Potato Head Beach Club. It’s free to get in, and opens at 11am. If you want one of the seaside 2-4 person “beds” with umbrellas, get their close to that. Otherwise, it’s never more than a short wait for a nice table, and there are plenty of other places to sit. For merely the cost of a beer, you will receive a fabulous view of the ocean, a big clean pool, hot tub, cool green grass, tasty cuisine, music (popular not “island”, although a reggae mix does sneak in periodically), and access to a well kept beach. The staff are extraordinarily friendly and perky. Potato Head caters to English speaking tourists, lots of Aussies, but some East Asians too. Not many Americans.
The staff was surprisingly surprised that I was American. As proof of the staff’s coolness….The manager stopped by my table for a chat, and I told her what I was up to. We talked for maybe 15 minutes. Then, after dinner, this showed up unannounced:
Awwwww..
I like Potato Head!
Ku De Ta This is another beach club in Seminyak, but I just didn’t like it. No pool, small outside compare to Potato Head. On the other hand Ku De Ta has a much bigger indoor dining area, so maybe that’s the draw. I preferred Potato Head. Newer, shiner, and more outdoors!
La Plancha!
La Plancha Marlen recommended La Plancha for sunset dinner, so off I motored, searching for La Plancha. Eventually, with the help of my GPS and a few questions asked of folks along the way that resulted in lots of arm waving in the direction of “back thattaway”, I found it. Turns out you need to drive to the very west end of Jl. Camplung Tanduk (that’s a street). In front of you, westward ho, you’ll see the Indian Ocean. To the left, you’ll see a nice looking restaurant called Chez Gado Gado (more on this in a moment). Between Chez Gado Gado and the ocean, you’ll see a path. This is not a path. This is a road. Turn left (south) and keep driving (cars not so much recommended, motorbike is best). Keep looking on the right and about 300 meters down and you’ll find La Plancha. As you park your bike, some guy with a big grin will approach you as you park along the wall in the evening, and if you don’t want to cause an incident, you’ll hand him the 2,000 Rp / 18 cents) he requests, for parking. Feel good that you’re supporting the local economy, I have no idea if he’s official or not.
La Plancha is just one of many beach side shacks, but this one offers a special whimsy and bit of fun. Bean bag chairs! Just find one among the many strewn across the beach, and plop down. Servers bring you drinks and food and you watch the sunset or surf while on BEAN BAG CHAIRS. Pretty cool. (I ate the Slider Sampler, and the ubiquitous Balinese beer, Bitnang. Yum!) Only downside – loud popular music (why don’t they like island music here???).
If you want the same view and are in the same place, but want real tables and chairs up off the beach, then Chez Gado Gado is a good choice. Very nice.
And then I stopped at some random places that just looked good at the moment: “Bestest Café” (Greek), Chat Café (Italian, but mostly a 24 hour coffee shop), Capil Beach Bar & Grill (on the beach near La Plancha, simple Indonesian fare), and a few more. If you want more info about these, ask! Although, you’ll be just as well off discovering eateries on your own. Just wander, sniff, and enter.
Security Soldiers: Because of the terrorist attack in 2002, I think, every beach club or place frequented by tourists has a private security detail watching closely. I’m glad they were there, but did seem a bit overkill. For their part, the guards were all fun happy chill people, and did not add any sense of foreboding to the days activities at all.
One word. Ugh. If you like Waikiki or Ft. Lauderdale, then you’ll like Kuta. If you don’t, just….don’t go there. It’s just NOT the Bali of my dreams. More dystopian, sadly. There is no reason to go there at all. Just. Don’t. Go. I did, because I couldn’t believe that Bali wasn’t uniformly romantic and mythical. Crowded with tourists and hundreds of businesses trying to make money off tourists, international chains like Hard Rock Hotel try to recreate within their walls what Bali should be outside the walls, traffic cops looking to shake down foreigners, beaches that had black water and plastic crap strewn about the surf and beach, endless vendors (albeit friendly and earnest, they have to earn a living somehow) approaching you insisting you buy something…. Just don’t. If you insist on going to Kuta, look elsewhere for tips. I fled.
So NOT my image of Bali, sadly.
The Shake Down. I fled, but not before getting nailed by the aforementioned traffic cop. As I’m leaving Kuta, The Heat struck. He drove up along side me, leaned into me a bit, and pointed to the side. Clear sign to pulls over.
He smiles as he takes your money.
Being a newbie, I did as I was told. Traffic Cop saunters up to me, asks for my International Drivers Permit, which of course I do not have. He makes me pull out the motorbike contract and sure enough, the first thing on the contract is “You must have an International Drivers Permit”. Fine. I don’t have it. I plead ignorance, which is my default play, and works disturbingly often, but he’s having none of it. “You need to go to the police station and pay 600,000 rupiah fine.” (pause) “Or do you want to take care of it here, for 400,000?” So I paid the $32 “convenience fee” and was on my way. Not being one to take such effrontery lying down, I whined about it to the locals I met, with indignation. They schooled me on several ways to do it better next time.
It probably doesn’t matter if you have an International Drivers Permit or not anyway. You’ve probably broken a dozen laws you don’t know about, just by being there, so they can pull any idea out (such as “people over 6 feet tall have to slow down when they drive past a Mini Mart”, or something). They just want an easy way to supplement their meager income, which is hard to find fault with.
Still, motorscooters. Rent one, they’re fun! And really they’re the only way to get around, by any measure, unless you have a family or are hauling luggage. With a good motorscooter and a good smartphone GPS, there’s no where you can’t go in Bali. Oh, and drive on the left side of the road.
Quick note: Cash is king for everything. Some restaurants and most hotels will take your credit card, but this will make them grumpy. And they will add 2-3% to your bill to pass on the credit card service fee. On the plus side, they don’t expect a tip, and tax is buried in the published price, so you’re still ahead. But…take cash. Don’t bring it, just use your ATM card.
So long, Seminyak..
