Five days in Bali

I had practically no knowledge of Bali, when I boarded the plane to the same. I was excited by an invitation to Bali, Indonesia, by my husband, what with the hospital duty back at Kochi and an ailing mother. I thought it would be nice to get a respite from the busy schedule.

As I was in the hospital the last couple of weeks, I could not do some homework on Bali before travelling as I used to do usually. But, Swati, my husband’s nephew, who accompanied us, who had done quite a bit of groundwork, educated us on facts about Bali.

Bali, it seems was the region, ruled by Bali, Sugriva’s brother of Ramayana. The region was inhabited by 85 % Hindus.

My son, our nephew and myself were to travel to Bali via Kuala lumpur on 18^th August 2017. My husband would meet us at Bali airport.

We arrived at around 8.00 pm at Nedumbassery Airport. I was seeing the new airport for the first time. The counters were all decorated with plastic flowers of different colours and the display of elephants was thrilling. The various details like the height of the elephants etc were accurate. CIAL could be proud of being the first solar operated airport.

We boarded the Malasian, Malindo Airlines. There were lot of Tamilians on the KL sector. The KL airport was very cold. A group of around 25 personnel belonging to the sweet and namkeen, Delhi-based company, called, Babaji Namkeen boarded for Bali, all wearing navy blue T shirts, with names of their company printed on them.

While waiting for the Bali flight, Swati said, Bali was one among the 17000 islands of Indonesia and the language of the place was Balinese. Navaneeth, my son, quipped that Indonesia was the world’s largest archipelago.

After the vegetarian meal, settling in my seat, I watched the Roger Hammerstein Classic, Sound of Music. Once again, I was mesmerized by the adventures of the Von Trapp family and the acting of Julie Andrews. It was indeed a treat.

Reaching Bali, there was not much immigration formalities. We had just to fill a form. But the officials opened my box. Once they realised we were harmless, they let us go.

My husband was there at the Bali airport with his newly acquainted driver, Mr. Nyoman, a smart young man. He shook hands with all of us. We had fish fillet, sea food, vegetable curry, rice and orange juice at a restaurant on our way to our hotel, Sheraton.

After taking a little rest, we went to Uluwatu, a temple by the side of the beach. There are a lot of temples in Bali. According to our guide, Nyoman, each house has one temple. The bigger the house, the bigger will be the temple. In this temple by the side of the beach, there was pooja by couples. On our way back, we went to an Indian restaurant. The owner was a Malayali, hailing from Pala. On the walls of the restaurant, there were pictures of the maps of India and Kerala and also the family photo of the owner. There was a sweet looking girl, who waited upon us. She was Balinese and her name was Devi. I had lamb stew and Kerala parotta.

Earlier, in the day, we went to a place where Luwak coffee or the world-famous Civet coffee is made. The Asian palm civet is fed on coffee cherries and the defecated, partly digested, coffee seeds are made into the coffee powder. The Luwak coffee is the most expensive coffee in the world. We also tasted several other varieties of coffee and tea.

In Bali, people worshipped all the Hindu gods we worship in India like, Vishnu, Siva, Lakshmi, Parvathy, Saraswathy, Ganapathy etc. In Nyoman’s car, a picture of Siva and Saraswathy hung in front. And daily, remains of the offerings to the gods, like incense, candy, flowers etc were kept in a small basket in the front of the car. One day we were surprised to find an egg inside the basket.

The second day, we went to a place where Batik painting was done. Beautiful T-shirts and the like were painted on the spot by artists skilled in the same.

Later, we went to some sort of a monument, where a photo session of a bride and groom were taking place. Inside the monument, there were a lot of dioramas meaning small models of the natives fighting the British.

We proceeded to the hot springs near Batur volcano. The place was a beautiful resort with the volcano as a backdrop. My husband enjoyed a bath in the hot spring while I had a Toya salad and a mango juice by the pool side. The soil all around Batur was rich with lava from the volcano and everywhere there were cultivations of plants like onion etc. In our short stay at Bali, we came across a lot of terrace-farming at various places.

On our way back, we went to a restaurant by the hill side. Sitting on the terrace of the restaurant, we could see the volcano towering behind us. It was a thrilling experience. We had fried rice, noodles, chicken, tofu etc. We had a desert made of fried banana, black rice and honey which was very tasty. We took photos with the waitress, Marianee.

Coming back, we went to Tirta Empul, a temple. As is common in all temples in Bali, we tied the cloth, Sarong around our waist and entered the place. We were surprised to find a lot of people immersed, waist deep in water, in a queue as an offering to God.

The third day, we went to Baisakhi temple, beside the volcano, Agung. The last stretch to the temple, could be covered only by walking or on motor bikes. I clumsily got on a bike, with my husband’s help. The temple consisted of several flights of steps. While waiting for my family, I happened to meet a pleasant Indonesian lady, named Nandi, who presented me with a pack of post cards of Bali. She had come there along with some Greek visitors.

A small Balinese girl, who came to sell post cards, asked me for my bindi. As I had only one with me, I refused to part with it.

About a month after our tour to Bali, while I am writing this article, I came to hear the news that the volcano, Agung, is about to erupt and around 70000 people were evacuated from its premises.

Later the day, we went to the Elephant cave, where we saw idols of Ganesa and Siva linga.

In the evening, we went to watch the Fire dance. It was a dance drama with the story of Ramayana. There was a pretty Sita, agile Hanuman and ugly Ravana. A group of about 30 men served the purpose of the chorus.

The next day, we went to the beach in the morning. My husband and the children, indulged in water sports like, para-sailing, jet-ski and sea-walk.

By noon, we went to an Indian restaurant. I had chole batura and mango lassi. Our Balinese waitress’s name was Okta. Later on, we went to Krishna super market and bought some souvenirs.

The last day before going to the airport, we went to watch the Barong dance. The dance symbolises the fight between barong and rangda, the good and evil forces. There are many comic interludes in-between.

We proceeded from Bali to Kuala Lumpur around 1.00 pm or so. The Kuala Lumpur airport is huge with all sorts of amenities. I had a fruit smoothie from an Irish restaurant named, OBriens. There were lot of other eateries offering veg, non- veg and even vegan food.

The rest of the journey was uneventful. We will always treasure this brief episode in Bali, as a beautiful chapter in our lives.