Wednesday 31 October 2012

Day tripping, temples, photo opportunities and tourist prices!

So again another blog entry to first be written out on WordPad as the internets aren't quite working at XL Shisha Lounge - I can log on with my Iphone and Blackberry, but not the Netbook - weird!

So today I didn't nap - hooray!  Probably a good idea too as I couldn't sleep until 2.30 am last night and ended up watching Horrible Bosses which was...erm...horrible really.  It lacked any particularly interesting twists, and likable characters and probably the only redeeming feature was realising that Colin Farrell had been playing a particularly despicable character and looked nothing like his normal attractive self.


Breakfast was a Jaffle - basically a banana and honey toasted sandwich with fruit salad again.  Rachel, Made and Kiran came and picked me up at 9 am and Made was our driver for the day.  We went up towards Kintamani and found that a lot of tourist viewpoint places are now charging tourists just to drive past!  We first of all took the opportunity to take pictures of the lovely rice terraces which really are beautiful.


We then stopped so Rachel could grab some breakfast whilst we enjoyed the view over Mount Batur  What I particularly enjoyed was that you could see a piece of green forest surrounded by black ash from when the last eruption had occurred and wiped out the vegetation around it.  



Tourist prices are very different - we paid nearly £2 each for a very basic coffee and Rachel had a banana pancake for about £2.50 - in Ubud this would cost around half this.  Made however as our "driver" went into a special room and got buffet breakfast for free for bringing us there!

We stopped off on the way to buy some fruit from a really pretty fruit stall.  Rachel let Made do the negotiation to get a better price and bought some mangosteens - which look like tiny aubergines, but when peeled reveal something that looks almost like a peeled bulb of garlic and tastes a bit like Mango.  I really like them.  I also got to try something that looked a bit like a date on the outside, but almost like a passion fruit on the inside and tasted like plum.  Neither Made or Rachel knew what it was called!  A very sweet little girl was also trying to sell us a basket in between hiding behind the fruit.



Made then drove us to the Holy Water temple - Tirta Empul - Tampak Siring Temple and I put on the sarong that I'd brought with me from home that I'd worn to Rachel's wedding in 2009 and Rachel lent me a sash.  The temple was really beautiful and the water comes from a volcanic spring and you can see the water bubbling up through the bottom of one of the very clear pools.   There are several springs which you get into and pray at each spring before moving onto the next.  You can get right in, but even though I had a change of clothes it did seem like it would be a bit of a hassle, so I opted for dipping my hand in and splashing water on my face.  We got accosted around the temple by some excitable Malaysian ladies who were desperate to have their photo taken with us...or rather Kiran!  On the way out it was quite sad as you have to walk through an area of shops and there are loads!  Rachel could hear that they were shouting out prices to the Indonesian tourists in front of us of 5000 rupiah (c35p) and then "one dollar" to us!  Rachel bought a nice hat for Maya to make up for her staying at home.  I felt almost guilty for not buying anything as everyone was trying very hard and they had obviously spent time in building up their wares for sale.




We then to grab some lunch at a place that one of Made's friends had recommended and said did some Thai food.  It didn't do Thai food and whilst I had a good set meal with a soup starter, Nasi Campur main and banana fritters with ice cream and gorgeous caramel sauce, it was pretty expensive - 165000 rupiah and Rachel was very disappointed with her soup that was tiny and 35000.  Madea again went to the "drivers" area and probably had a much better feed than we did!  I did like my main course and my dessert was particularly tasty!


We then went back to the house and I got to see Rachel's office and the new kitchen.   I didn't get to meet her cat Queenie though which was sad as she's been missing for a few days - but she did come back tonight hooray!  Rachel then dug out the wedding video which I'd not seen and was interesting.  It brought back lots of memories from the first time that I visited including Coddy's awful Abe Lincoln style beard and me before contact lenses!   


Rachel put Kiran in the Halloween pumpkin sleepsuit that I'd bought for him and we took some lovely posed photos of him next to a pumpkin that she'd picked up earlier on our trip.


Made then dropped me off at my hotel and I got a well needed shower before working out that I can Skype Coddy from an app on my IPhone - he showed me the cats and I showed him around my hotel room and I decided on my next venue for dinner - XL Shisha Lounge A trip adviser review complimented it on having "lots of Pillows" what more could I want!

I have also planned out a bit more what I'm doing for the next 5 days I'm here (can't believe that it's going so fast!  Tomorrow I'm going to do a Yoga class at The Yoga Barn - I'm going for the beginners class as I don't trust myself to know what I'm doing otherwise even though I've been doing yoga for about 6 years!  The class will be 110000 rupiah - about £6/7.  I'm then going to have a massage somewhere good.  

Then I hope to go to the Kecak fire dancing display at 7.30pm.  On Friday I will be doing a bike tour Banyan Tree Bike Tours - which I'm a bit worried about as I sweat so horribly here just walking around that I'm going to be soaking wet by doing any physical exertion!  Hopefully it will be ok - Rachel reckons it should be mostly downhill.  

Then I'm trying to get booked onto a Batik class - from I Nyoman Suradnya - hopefully Rachel will let me pay for her to come too as a thank you for being my personalised tour guide/chaperone. I am then keen to go back to Tjampuan with Rachel for a spa day - maybe we could fit it in on the same day as Batik?  Other than that what else do I want to do?  More shopping, maybe a day at the beach?  So much to fit in and so little time left!  I might just have to come back again very soon!

Tuesday 30 October 2012

2 lazy days

Ok, so I didn't post yesterday and it's largely because a post where the total of the days activities can be summarised as follows:

Woke up + ate breakfast (banana pancakes) + went back to my room to read more of "The Hunger Games" + fell asleep + woken up by Rachel, Maya and Kiran at past 3 pm to go swimming wouldn't be a massively interesting entry!



Swimming was fun though - I was supervising a very adventurous and fearless Maya who was determined to push my five foot three and a half inches stature to the limit when throwing herself into the deep end!  Even when she managed to jump in the shallow end by herself when we weren't looking for a split second and her head went under the water she didn't seem to care! After swimming we got changed and then Made picked up Maya on his scooter and Rach, Kiran and me went to grab some dinner at Devilicious.  Kiran did a bit of sleeping, but then woke up and got very excited again, especially when we went back to the hotel room!  I had a yummy Laksa curry and Rach had a burger!  Western food becomes a novelty when you eat Indonesian food as standard.

After Made had picked up Rach and Kiran I headed out to pick up some Wifi and grab a Bintang at Arts Cafe and look over emails and Facebook.  It was reasonably busy and friendly and there was a live band who were ok at playing covers, my only grip was that they played "Imagine" when they had a request to play The Beatles!

This morning I got up again and had breakfast (vegetarian omelette) and then headed back to  my room to finish "The Hunger Games" which I did, eventually, but my mistake was reading whilst lying down and so I ended up having another nap until about 2pm (let's blame the jet lag finally catching up on me perhaps?)  I was planning on a massage, but Rach had messaged to say they'd pick me up about 4.30pm, and I had left it too late and there is nothing worse than trying to rush relaxation!  So I wandered along the lower end of Monkey Forest Road and had my first successful attempt at haggling and bought a much needed fan for 40000 rupiah, down from 55000 (only saving about £1, but at least I felt I was doing the right thing!)  


I then bought a red vest top for 75000 which was already on sale (about £4.50) as I've realised that whilst I have bought lots of clothes with me,there is a distinct lack of tops!  Grabbed some lunch (only 32000 rupiah for iced tea, Nasi Goreng and fruit plate - about £1.92!) and then Made, Rachel, Maya and Kiran picked me up outside the hotel at 4.30pm to meet up with their friend Stephanie and be able to take some photos in the sunset light for THE SLING DIARIES.  The blog entry is here if you would like to take a look Sling Diaries.  

It was a bit of an ordeal to get there as one of the roads we wanted to take was closed, so we doubled back on ourselves back into Ubud, and then got to the other side of where it was closed and realised it wasn't the road we wanted it!  It was a race to get the photos before the light went!  At least we didn't end up like this truck that fell into the rice field (it did get out again)!



Fortunately we managed to pick up Stephanie in time, get to a pretty rice field and take some lovely pictures of Rachel with Kiran in the sling.



We then went for a lovely chilled meal at a Warung and I had very tasty (and quite spicy!) fish.  Maya and Kiran used the opportunity to dance with their Dad.



Then we went back to transfer the photos from Stephanie's camera to Rachel's Macbook.  After a few technical hitches we managed, but it gave us a good opportunity to meet her MASSIVE pet rabbit who was lovely.  Kiran and Maya thought so too.



Stephanie has a very useful website for anyone thinking about travelling to Asia here which covers places beyond Bali.

Made then drove us back to Ubud and dropped me off and I'm currently at Bar Luna catching up on Facebook and drinking a Bintang listening to a very good live band called Papyafil .  The leaflet on my table has this to say about them:

Mike (strings/voice), Enti (bass) and Defris (drums and percussion) are Papayafil, a band, like papaya which is easy to digest and a symbol of the tropics bearing an exotic flavour that can be heard in their music.  After several incarnations, one as Cozy Republic and several musiciam changes, Papayafil was recently launched with their current line up of musicians in 2009.  

The band includes the musical influences of each band member: reggae, folk, blues, funk, soul, rock and some spice from traditional and world music.

They really are pretty good.  Here is their Facebook page

Monday 29 October 2012

Bali Belly and Blanco

So rather annoyingly I'm writing this blog entry first of all on wordpad as I first of all tried the WIFI at the hotel and it wasn't working, so I've then come into 3 Monkeys where I used WIFI a couple of days ago and it doesn't seem to be working - grr tedious!  Especially since I just paid 50000 rupiah for a beer!

So today was a bit different, I got up at a similar time, had breakfast, but my stomach felt a bit odd.  Rach messaged me to say that she had a bit too much work on and so I said that I was fine to amuse myself for the day whilst she got her work done.  Rach suggested the Antonio Blanco museum and gallery which I had regretted not visiting last time we were here, especially as we had to walk past it at least twice a day on the way to and from our hotel Tjampuhan which really was *miles* away! 

So I got back to the room and started to get ready to go out, but stomach just wasn't right, I didn't have painful cramps, but (and I'll spare you the details) the next 4 hours meant that it was very useful to have an en-suite toilet!  I read a load more of "The Hunger Games"  and snuck out to buy some Pocari Sweat (isotonic drink) and coconut milk both of which I know to be good at replacing fluids and salts etc when you are dehydrated.  I also made an educated guess at what a version of Imodium was over here and emailed the photo to Rach to translate (fortunately I was right, although I've not actually needed to take any of them yet thankfully!).  I napped for a bit and then woke up at 2pm and decided that I'd wasted enough of the day and so got up and walked down to the Antonio Blanco museum. 



It's probably only about 15 - 20 minutes walk, but I was just so hot that I was really hot, sweaty and horrible by the time I arrived there.  I paid my entrance fee of 50000 rupiah and then was directed to the restaurant for my complimentary welcome drink which was ice cool and much appreciated.  What I appreciated a whole lot more was the lovely cool towel that the waiter gave me.



I walked around the Blanco museum and he's clearly very odd, very close/friendly to Michael Jackson and obsessed with erotica, but I really enjoyed his art.  Here is one of his Jacko pictures (not my photo as obviously in a gallery photography is not allowed!)



The building in which the gallery was based was beautiful   Lots of very dark colours and gold, it should have looked horrendously tacky, but it was actually really intriguing and appealing.  His artwork was a lot of very detailed oil paintings, but also lots of collage work interspersed with writings and poetry that he had written.   The style (although definitely not the content) reminded me of some of the work that my friend Hayley has done - scrap book style with writing and text mixed with different collages of different media.  I really enjoyed looking at it and hopefully I'll be able to use it to inspire me to do some more creative embroidery.  He also had loads of really ostentatious frames for all the pictures which formed part of the overall impact of each of the pieces.

One of the descriptions attached to one of his paintings that I found both intriguing and deeply disturbing was when he was asked his opinion on the meaning of life and he said that it was the idea of fondling the buttocks of an 18 year old in one hand and a ripe mango in the next - or something like that.**  

**Edit - just found the actual description now that I'm back online and here it is:

Probably, because of the Erotic feeling in his painting, I am compelled to tell a true story that relates to this Mystic-Erotica.I received a letter from an enthusiastic Art collector from London in which he asks: "Antonio, you are rather Philosophic; what have you found to be the meaning of life?" My Answer: "When I am bitting into a ripe succulent Mango in my right hand, and at the same time fondling (with my left hand) the firm buttocks of an 18 year girl…..er…..Model, THAT I have found to be the closest THING to a MEANING FOR LIFE" Frame of red and gold exotic Blanco - design.

I wasn't sure when I went up to the second floor of the gallery whether I should go up onto the roof using the slightly rickety spiral staircase, but I did anyway and the view was fantastic - jungle and rice fields.  



The gardens in which the museum and gallery is set is pretty spectacular too, there are loads of vividly coloured parrots on perches which if you like you can have put on your shoulder.  I didn't really fancy this, but I did take a couple of pictures.  I then ventured into the gift shop via a place where they had a DVD playing depicting a dodgy acting out of Blanco courting his Balinese dancer wife and bought the "Fabulous Blanco" book getting a bit confused by the conversion price again.



 Needless to say that things are generally very cheap in Ubud, but I spent more on this book than probably any other book that I've ever bought before!  It looks good though so hopefully it will be worth it!  The lady in the shop complimented my perfume, but then tried to sell me lots of jewelry designed by Blanco's daughter, she was certainly persistent.  **

**Edit, I'm a bit happier with my purchase as I've just seen this as a description on Amazon: 

Currently unavailable.

We don't know when or if this item will be back in stock.

I then had buyers remorse for about an hour, walked back towards my hotel noticing for the first time a very well disguised Starbucks and then stopped off at Kenko for a pedicure.  It was the first place I ever had a manicure at the age of 29 so I thought that it was appropriate that I should visit the same place for my first ever proper pedicure.  I do think that they were laughing at me as so much dead skin was filed away from my hardworking and runners feet.



I headed back to the hotel for a well earned shower and started to watch The Hangover 2 on my netbook before Rachel came over to head out for dinner.  We went to a Cuban restaurant - Cafe Havana (Rachel, Coddy and I had a fab holiday back in 2007 to Cuba so it was nice to reminisce)  Kiran very helpfully fell asleep and so Rachel managed to eat tapas and drink sangria with one hand.  The tapas was really tasty and it was one of the very few restaurants in Ubud that seems to cater for children as they were able to provide Rachel with a baby chair which was useful until Kiran fell asleep.  I managed to get timings wrong and ordered another jug of Sangria before realising that Made was coming to get Rachel back from my hotel in less than 20 minutes!  I had to drink it pretty quickly which wasn't hard as I was thirsty and it was tasty, but it did feel a bit wrong!  I went back to my room, failed to pick up wifi as I mentioned, I tried again in the breakfast room opposite the pool and again failed, but I was also persuaded to move on as there was swimming in the pool in the dark which was a bit odd and worrying! 

Anyway, photos to follow when the connection speed is better...

Saturday 27 October 2012

Shopping and coffee drinking Ubud style

It's easy to forget sometimes as you are walking around Ubud just how pretty everything is as there is so much beauty everywhere.  A simple shop will have a beautiful floral decoration outside or a pile of offerings carefully crafted with many coloured flowers displayed.  Even the shops have their wares presented beautifully - all brightly coloured items either clashing in a very attractive way, or clothes arranged as per the colours of the rainbow.  I feel very fortunate to be able to enjoy this as I've yet to come across another British tourist - Dutch, German, Australian and American yes, but no Brits at all - where are they all?


Rachel came by after breakfast and we went out for a wander looking in some of the funky shops and also stopping off for a few coffees and drinks along the way.  First of all we went to Tutmak Coffee Shop where Rach had breakfast and I had a couple of iced coffees and a lemongrass and ginger drink and Kiran had....a very long nap on the comfy cushions.  



We then wandered past Hibiscus Bar which isn't a bar anymore and is actually a cushion shop

If your image of Ubud streets is purely based on Eat Pray Love, you'll be amazed at how much more chaotic everything is - there are *loads* of motorbikes everywhere, loads of offerings all over the place including the floor, random dogs and lots of people offering Taxis and in a way that makes it sound dirty "Nice massage very good price".  Here is a typical picture of the street
I like the chaos and the noise and the random blend of smells - rubbish and litter, incense, spicy cooking, a different blend of incense, and the general smell of tropical vegetation.  

There is loads of art everywhere in Ubud which is really interesting to look at - here is Rachel outside an art shop along with some slightly more random examples!  She's also wearing a slightly different baby carrier - Kiran seemed very comfortable and did quite a lot of sleeping whilst we were walking around.



We walked around a few more shops including a very plush shop with awesome, but very expensive children's clothes - it had some bird boxes outside.

Then it was off to Bar Luna for lunch which had some comfy cushions which helpfully were transformed into a soft baby prison for Kiran to stop him crawling off and falling onto the floor!



And of course we needed dessert so we stopped for some very reasonable sorbet at an icecream shop about £1 per scoop.  Rachel (and Kiran!) had passionfruit sorbet and I had lime sorbet.


We walked back in a circuit and past BAWA which is a sort of RSPCA equivalent.  Rachel adopted her cat Queenie from them, but she told me a rather worrying story where she reported a dog that had lots of puppies, and then another litter and they came to take photos of it and then instead of taking it away, came back and dropped off some more puppies for it to be a surrogate mother to!





We then walked past Monkey Forest and saw a couple that had "escaped" (Rachel is a bit immune to them as she sees them a lot - they probably seem a bit like squirrels to her!)



After all the walking around we were all hot and bothered so decided to go back to the hotel to cool off with a dip in the pool.  It was also a chance to give Kiran his first swimming lesson!  Maya apparently howled the first time she was in a swimming pool, but Kiran loved it!  He splashed around, smiling and laughing and even splashed other people in the pool!


So here is what I managed to spend some money on in the course of our shopping trip:  A lovely dress/long top and some aromatherapy spray - very refreshing in such a hot climate.



So Rachel then was picked up about 4.30pm and I went for a nap and then headed back to Bar Luna for dinner - apparently it's supposed to be a fairly social place for travelers  but at the moment, I'm the only one here and have been since the 4 people telling stories of getting drunk in Bankok and dropped off at a police station by a taxi driver left about 30 mins ago...I have to say though, I am enjoying my own company for a change and it's nice to be able to slow down and enjoy just doing very simple things like eating and drinking - slowly....  Bar Luna is famous for "literary" stuff and they do readings etc and so their menu is peppered with references to literature and so it's only right that for my dinner I had a "Graham Greene Salad" (I didn't even eat the bread - I'd be a rake if I lived here permanently!