Chatting With the Fam..

So I'm realizing that with cultural adjustment comes a seeming lack of things to journal about. It's not that we've stopped experiencing so much; it's just that the things that used to seem so noteworthy are commonplace now. Wehn the shift from feeling like a hesitant observer to an everday participant begins, I guess that's bound to happen. I'm having to remind myself more and more to try to soak in everything that's going on around me, before I get home and suddenly realize again everything about Bali that I wouldn't have once called "normal". Because then it will be too late!

I think it's more of the little stuff I'm learning from now. I have a steadily improving ability as far as listening to/participating in conversations goes, so since looking around at the offering-laden sidewalks and north-south, east-west oriented compounds doesn't incite as much curiosity as it used to, I've been trying to take advantage of all the opportunities I have to bercakap-cakap (chat) with my family.

I'm even starting to be able to understand my littlest brother, Errlanga, more and more. He's the biggest goofball of the kids (they always refer to him as "nakal", or naughty), and he loves to try to talk to me in Indonesian. I think he knew before that I would never understand him, but now that my language is getting a little better, he's trying his best to tell me things. Yesterday, I understood two story/joke things he told me! One about a man who went to a restaurant and was accidentally served a stronger man's grilled chicken and had part of his butt bitten off as a result, and one about three Draculas in a blood-collecting competition. The winner was the one who ran into a phone pole, busted his head open, and collected his own blood. As un-funny as they actually were, I enjoyed them just because the meaning eventually got across..

It's amazing what simple things can pass the time with people who are so curious about American culture. Today we spent quite a while comparing rupiahs and dollars. I got out some dimes and quarters and a dolalr bill and tried (unsuccessfullly) to tell them what all the pictures were. Errlanga thought it was so funny that the border around the dollar is as thick as it is--something I've definitely never thought to consider. He's right, though. It kinda looks like a frame that could just be cut off. Maybe that's only cause I'm used to looking at rupiahs now..
It's like getting a new pair of eyes, or maybe just some different color contact lenses, myself--being the vessel through which my family sees things for the first time. I've incited similar reactions of wonder with things like my mechanical pencil, which they thought was so high-tech (although I'm sure there must be mechanical pencils somewhere on this island), and with my Target men's underwear section, white, V-neck t-shirts that my Ibu so intently admires. I feel like I know the simplicity of the things in a new way now-- my pencils etching with a little extra novelty, my t-shirts begging a little more of a luxurious feel. I think maybe this little embellishment-through-sharing technique could be more enlightening if applied to something more significant than a pencil or a t-shirt, but, then again, maybe it's those things I never think about that could use the reevaulating the most.

I also have to say the experience I'm having is definitely family-specific. I've learned that there's a large financial disparity between mine and some of the other students' homestays. I think I hear at least once a day, "tidak punya uang" (we don't have money), and the fact that my Bapak is still (going on 4 years now) jobless is a constant topic of conversation. I wouldn't trade my family for anything because our personalities, somehow, seem to match really well, but the situation does make it harder at times to separate which of their opinions are formed by culture and which are formed by their personal situation.

My Bapak loves to ask these questions that leave me without an answer-- things that are either irrelevant, unexpected, or in need of clarification beyond my Indonesian skills. I tried to explain the concept of babysitting and all he wants to know is, "Where do the kids' parents work?" Well..it just depends. I tried to explain the concept of believing that someone can be born gay and all he wants to know is, "How can the 'homos' go back to being 'normal'?" Well...I don't think that's really an option. I tried to explain eating a sandwich and all he wants to know is, "Do you put the meat in a blender before you put it on the sandwich?" Hmmm no. That would be disgusting. I tried to explain that some students might never live at home again after they go to college, while others might live with thier parents during the summers and/or after they graduate, and all he wants to know is, "Who pays?" Well...that's not really what I was talking about. I tried to explain Halloween and all he wants to know is, "Why trouble when for devil?" First of all, we're missing some key words there. Second of all, the devil isn't actually involved..

It's a constant struggle to find answers satisfying enough for his curiosity. I'm glad he keeps asking though...because it's giving me quite an entertaining insight into some of the disparities between the Balinese and American mindsets. It's also a continual vocab lesson, which I could always use more of.

Another thing I've been reminded of through all of Bapak's questioning is how I hope my homestay family is learning as much from me as I am from them. It's really easy to focus on what I'm getting out out of each day, and each conversation, since I am, after all, the one being "culturally immersed". But, I've realized that where I come from is just as, if not more so, unkown to my family as their ways were to me on the day I moved in. Since then I've been flooded with information about Balinese beliefs in regards to everything from religion to arts to child-rearing from more informants than I could count...but it's my own responsibility to make this a beneficial opportunity for the people that have somehow managed to make me feel welcome-- in this compound where the structures' names and layout are so full of meaning I couldn't have even dreamed them up 6 weeks ago (and I still couldn't really tell you everything..)

I love seeing that my Ibu is picking up little bits of English. Last night she said, out of the blue, "Soapy go to Ubud. Right?" I said, "yay! that's right," choosing not to get into the difference between go and goes, and she got such a satisfied look on her face, congratulating herself with "Ibu pintar (smart)!" We can actually sit and have a conversation now, just the two of us. Sometimes it doesn't go far, but it never lacks a feeling of understanding somewhere beneath the repetitions and squinting our brows and looking up and to the right. We have to leave for our ISPs in less than 2 weeks, and I can already tell it's going to be really sad. In the mean time though, I'm just trying to focus on being right here. I'm also crossing my fingers that the rainy season doesn't actually come..

I keep finding my mind drifting off before sleep to imagine my first day at home, when I wake up and attempt to go eat my breakfast outside only to find that A) there's nowhere to sit and nothing to look at, and B) it's way too cold. C) There's none of this coffee that I think I'm getting addicted to (depsite the fact that I have to pick out the ants). and D) There's no Bapak to say "pagi" and try to confuse me by asking me who I'm eating. I really can think of positives too...those are the thoughts that come first though, so I just try to go to sleep without thinking about it. I guess I don't have to deal with that too, too soon.

When I can do that-- be focused, that is, I sometimes find that there are new things to find fascinating beneath the outer layers of some of those once-unfamiliar-but-now-everyday things. A simple example is mangosteen, this delicious, sweet fruit. It's all over Bali but not, to my knowledge, anywhere in the US. It's round and purple-ish with a cute green stem that looks like a ruffled top hat. The hat pops off and the outer layer cracks open when you squeeze it between your palms. Then you suck the flavor off of the white, crescent-shaped segments tucked inside. The novelty of the taste was experience enough at first, and I've gotten my fair share already...but, Errlanga taught me a whole new secret about mangosteens yesterday. There's a star on the bottom that actually tells how many segments are inside-- a 5-pronged star means 5 segments, a 7-pronged star means 7. Who knew that a fruit's skin could be so telling? Or that there was more to know about a mangosteen than what I'd already discovered about the look and taste?

Saturday was a big day as far as rituals go. It was Kuningan, which marks the end of the 10 days of Galungan, AND the odalan (bday) for Pura Samuan Tiga, the big temple here in Bedulu. I went to the temple with my sister and Ibu (and most of the town) to pray in the afternoon, and then Bapak took us all back later to watch the Topeng dancers perform. I think the temple odalans are like a sacred excuse for the town to hang out at the temple all day. It's as much a social event as it is religious. After giving your offering (some of which are super tall pyramids of fruits and cakes that the women carry on their heads) and being belssed with holy water (meaning you get to walk around the rest of the time with rice on your face), you can just hang out with friends and familly. It was a little socializing opportunity even for some of us...because even though we're only a group of 13, it takes about 20 seconds to look around the rows of kneeling, pakaian-adat clad locals and find what other Americans are there, tagging along with their keluargas.

The act of praying at the festivals doesn't even seem that strange anyomore. Granted, I don't know what I'm supposed to be thinking when I'm carrying out the motions, but we've done it enough times to get the hang of the cleanse your hands over the incese and pray, pray with a red flower between your fingers, then a white flower, then a little blue and a little white, then a final empty-handed prayer succession. The the priest comes with rice and water. Let the water fall on you. Sip from your right palms three times. Splash it over your head. Take some wet rice for your neck, your hair, and your forehead, then wipe the rest of it off. I always feel like I'm walking out of a little hailstorm after that part. It's a good thing pakaian adat can handle getting wet.

We spent Wednesday through Saturday in Denpasar, the capital, and Sanur, a more touristy, beachside town. We had class at Udayana University and got to spend more time with the local students who came to the village with us. Denpasar is probably the most western-like city in Bali-- not in the touristy sense, but in the sense that there are shopping malls and fast food restaurants and adolescents all into their emo-pop fashion trend that do the same things for fun as any college student. It was a weird environment to be in-- too much like home to feel like I was really still in Bali, but too different from home to make me able to enjoy the "home-like" comforts it offered. We had cable tv AND a hot (though not separate from the toilet area) shower. I was beginning to think I'd come to a point where hot showers with water pressure had lost their seeming appeal and necessity, but I was quickly reminded when I got under that showerhead of how clean it's actually possible to feel. I guess I'll just forget again until I get home. We also watched enough MTV to see the same commercials about 15 times over. As enjoyable as it was, I think I decided that if I'm not going to be actively experiencing American pop-culture for one semester, I'd rather be completely cut off than watch it paraded repetitively across a screen in front of me.

I think that's all for now. Our "school" part is wrapping up next week, and then we're off on our own! It should be interesting. Some of us will be in the same place for at least some of the time so it won't be lonely-- just a big change of schedule and focus. I'll elaborate on what I'm trying to do once I figure it out more. I'm at least starting back in the little village, Munduk Pakel.

This week, I'm just concentrating on finishing my batik. Almost done...but I really wish I could just keep going..

:)

Galungan and Going North

We got up at 3:30 this morning to climb a volcano and watch the sunrise from the top.  My brain isn’t functioning, but I have to start writing things down cause my journal has gotten so far behind my life and I’m going to have a really bad headache if I don’t start remembering the past week soon.

Someone thought it would be a good idea for us to take herbal sleeping supplements before trying to sleep, but I think they had the reverse effect on me cause I just laid there in our squeaky cradle of a bed, rolled against Marissa because of the inward slant, atop the nasty exposed mattress that the sheet didn’t fit, thinking for hours.  Maybe I slept one hour…I don’t even know.  We had quite a time trying to get anyone to sleep anyway because the wall was flaking off on my head, Becca had some sort of hysterical laughing attack on the toilet, there was mysterious “blood” on the sheets, this awful Indonesian radio was blaring from another room, and we might as well have been trying to sleep in the middle of a dog pound. 

I was so glad when the hiking guide finally banged on our door to take us up Mt. Batur, but somewhere between 3:30 and 8 the grumpiness and exhaustion started to kick in.  The view was incredible.  We could see the island’s biggest volcano across a glittering lake, and Lombok off in the distance from the top.  And when we got started, there were so many stars in the sky that it looked like a big black tray of sprinkled salt.  I don’t think I’ve ever seen so many so close together before.  Our guides (they’re mandatory) were obnoxious and trying way too hard to force conversation about girlfriends and relationships at 4 a.m. though, so they put a little damper on the trip.  They also really enjoyed holding your hand and literally leading you up for minutes at a time.  I think if hiking guides are going to be mandatory they should come with an on/off switch.

I had a little nap, but now we’re back in Bedulu, and it’s my little brother’s Balinese birthday (different from the day he was actually born), so we just made fish satay and fresh fish on this make-shift, outdoor grill.  I was hoping I would finally get to see the kitchen, but no such luck.  It was fun to help with though.  Birthdays mean a grilled feast instead of just rice and tempeh or something…and the real treat for the kids is just getting to help cook.  We even had Coke at dinner!  I think that was the sugar substitute for cake. 

I’ve gotten to spend more festivity time with my fam lately, not only because of the bday but because of Galungan.  I finally spent one entire day around the compound, which I realized that with school and stuff, I hadn’t yet done.  I felt more like a real Balinese and a real part of the family than I have yet… feelings that have come in little spurts but haven’t stuck (and probably never will, especially with the language). You can see pictures that my Bapak started taking here:

http://galuhprabaningrum.blogspot.com/

Bahaha.  Oh Bapak.  I think his new blog is his outlet for the journalism he once did but can’t do now due to his lack of computer.  I only wish I could tell you all just what it says..

Anyway, for Galungan, we all got up early and had coffee before changing into our pakaian adat.  My little sister and I matched in our newly made, sheer, purple, flowery kebayas complete with glitter dots.  It’s funny—I would think that shirt is hanusly ugly in America, but our traditional clothing taste must have come with the cultural adaptation.  I’ve been wanting a sheer kebaya because it’s kind of risque and beautiful when you can see the strapless through it.  (The Balinese aren’t as conservative as I thought..)

I spent almost all day in my sarong without getting that uncomfortable!  And I actually ate the same thing for all 3 meals.  It’s supposed to be a big pig slaughtering and feasting day, but luckily (for me) my family doesn’t have enough money for all of that, so we got some special ordered chicken instead.  That didn’t keep me from having to hear the little piggies all over town squealing at about 4 a.m. though!  That’s what time the slaughterers get to work. 

Most of the food has to be given as an offering before you can enjoy it.  It’s kind of like Easter for the kids in a strange way.  We spent a long time praying in the family temple, and I watched Ibu scatter trays of fruits and flowers and little cakes all about.  Then, once mealtime came, she would tell the kids which offerings we could eat, and off they’d run to bring the trays back and quickly scope out which treats they want.  My family actually did most of the rituals the day before Galungan, which I didn’t really understand, but apparently it works out somehow.

The pervasive family traditions here make me want to hold on so tightly to what un-commercialized and home-focused holiday moments we still have.  Like Thanksgiving dinner…I’m upset I’m missing that one this year :(  The fact that it’s really just a span of days for preparing and then one for indulging and being with family makes it such a treat.  Mom, I feel like when I get home, I want us to cook every meal…you think we can do that??

Sometimes it’s the down-time I spend with my siblings that can be the most enlightening.  They’re so easily entertained, and they get along SO well.  It would be interesting to do a study on Balinese child-rearing.  Somehow the kids rarely, rarely seem to need discipline.  I don’t think I’ve seen my siblings fight one time, and day in and day out they’re playing games with each other for hours and hours.  They all love taking naps with Ibu and Bapak on the open pavilion, and Ibu just patiently strokes their hair for as long as they want to sleep.  One thing our teachers told us was that the Balinese don’t tend to comfort children when they get upset.  I haven’t witnessed it with my family here (because they haven’t gotten upset), but there was a time during my stay in the village when the little girl was sobbing and sobbing after hitting her head on the floor, and Ibu just looked at her and tried to stifle laughter while the little girl crawled on her lap in an attempt to cling on.  Ibu was almost void of movement, letting the little girl to look to her for comfort but offering no sign of comfort in return.  Maybe the kids aren’t dramatic because they know it won’t bring attention?  I just don’t know..

 On our excursion this week, we spent a lot of time learning about religion.  We were in the north of Bali, which is the area where the island’s small population of religious minorities is located.  I think Bali is like 95% Hindu, but there are Muslims, Buddhists, Confucians, and even a few Christians as well.  We met with a group of Indonesian students at a University in Singaraja and spent the day visiting different places of worship and talking about faith.

The people here are incredibly open to minority religions, which was a little surprising to me given what an incredibly religious people the Hindus of Bali are.  Their religion, though, seems more like a well-practiced spirituality.  In North Bali, the different beliefs seem never to be a topic of tension—rarely even a topic of discussion, for that matter.  A few complications come into play when marriage between faiths is considered, but I think the only people for whom love can’t always be the determinant are Hindus in the highest caste. The non-Hindus attend the cremation ceremonies for those they are close to, and on Hindu holidays like Galungan, the Hindus stop by both their Hindu and non-Hindu neighbors houses to offer little gifts of coffee and fruit. 

The only concepts you can’t seem to find any sign of here are atheism, agnosticism, or even just a time of indecision.  This is where I wish a language barrier didn’t exist.  It’s so interesting to me—these beliefs play into daily life from the time a child is born, so wouldn’t you think, at some point in the endless span of rituals, the youth might wake up and think, “Wait…is all this stuff I’m spending so much time on really serving a purpose??”  It’s was an interesting conversation given our SIT group compared to the group of Indonesians, because I think over half of us would say that, even if we can identify with a religion, we don’t currently practice anything too specific.  For the Indonesians though, there’s never a question of “hmmm what am I?”

I might spend some time with that during my ISP…trying to get people to tell me what they really feel is being fulfilled by these pervasive religious practices.  Was there ever a time they doubted?  Do the rituals ever seem to lose a sense of purpose?  What’s really going through your mind each morning when you wake up knowing you need to give an offering?  I just need help with language!  And people who want to open up!

Openness as far as actions are considered hasn’t been hard to find at all.  Even in the only Hindu communities, they are always willing to let outsiders observe or participate, and always (at least so far) without any attempts at proselytizing.  If you have questions, they answer gladly, but I don’t think my family has once asked me what I believe.  It’s nice.  It makes their pervasive rituals seem not so much a special, “you must study this to benefit from it” kind of thing, but much more of  “this is what we choose to do to contribute our little share to the contentment of the world”.  It’s like simply opening yourself to it opens it to you…and “it” isn’t necessarily identified as Hindu or non-Hindu.  “It” is just a special way of showing gratitude, and asking for health, security, fulfillment…and they seem to recognize that the need for all of that must exist within every creature (even the plants!) in this world.  

One night in Lovina we spent some time in a Buddhist monastery up on a hilltop.  With the views of the mountains from every side and countless little coves and outdoor inlets within which to pray, I don’t know that one could find a single spot that didn’t feel peaceful. It was like the atmosphere enveloped you.  I was surprised just walking around by how easy it seemed to imagine how one could just retreat there and give everything up.  I know I don’t have the mindset to do that, but I swear the place could have made anyone think for at least a minute that being a monk might be a good idea..   

Ahh what else did we do? I’m having trouble remembering.

Oh! We went out on those little wooden boats that look like water-walking bugs at 5:30 morning to look at dolphins.  It was a weird mix of enjoying ourselves but also feeling guilty and invasive because we (and all the other tourists) were like an army that turned and chased every time a dolphin fin popped up.  We wanted to see them, but we wanted to leave them alone too.  The boat I was in sort of separated from the rest of the pack near the end and we were lucky enough to see a little dolphin jump up and twirl around…twice!  It was like he was just discovering he could do it..and only willing to try because most of the tourists had moved away.

We also visited a little Muslim fishing village on the edge of town.  We danced with all the kids there while the local musicians played some instruments I don’t know the names for.  The kids were so happy! And they got attached to us so quickly.  If only we hadn’t already been exhausted when we got there and dripping in sweat after one song of dancing, I think we all would have been content to hang out with the kids all day. 

What else…we got into a discussion about gays and lesbians in Bali, and we sang more American music with the students, and I’ve got some more funny stories, but I don’t think I can write anything else right now.

It’s gotten really hot here for some reason.  And my hair has adapted this weird straw-y texture.  It’s had some rough times because I stopped trying to use conditioner when I got here, but I don’t know where this new texture is coming from.  I’ve decided that one of the strangest things when I get home will be to step into a shower.  Even places with a showerhead here never, ever separate the area from the rest of the bathroom.  That’s why all the bathrooms feel so damp and sticky and hairy and start to smell bad..

K it’s Monday now and I have to go finish my batik!  We’re going to Denpasar (the capital) for 3 days on Wednesday.  I’ll update again sometime next week! 

 :)

From the Village to the Expats...

I feel like I’ve become the ball in a game of culture shock ping-pong.  In the past couple of days we’ve gone from a rural village to work at the Ubud Readers and Writers Festival, and I don’t feel like I have the time or mindset to figure out how best to adjust.  Somehow the humility and simple joys that made us all love the village so much (probably my favorite part of the semester so far!) don’t align with the “mind-opening and intellectual” experience I’m supposed to be having at this well-intentioned, yet undeniably self-praising and culturally obtrusive, expat-run literary fest. 

We were already a little down after having to leave the village at all.  It’s not that I don’t love my family in Bedulu, but somehow the “town”, with its multiple banjars and real marketplace, no longer seems as communal and small.  It’s so hard trying to keep things in perspective. 

 

Of course family and tradition, simplicity and continuity, are just as pervasive in Bedulu as they were in Munduk Pakel, but there was something so heartwarming about that rice-field framed, single village street.  Almost so heartwarming that it made me forget what I like about Bedulu.  Not quite though!  I just have to readjust. 

Munduk Pakel just felt so right to everyone…even the Indonesian students from Denpasar who came with us.  One day and we had already discovered how many English songs we all know and can sing along to together with a guitar.  Two days and I felt like all the Ibus and Bapaks in town recognized us.  Three days and we’d figured out how to use rocks as a sort of exfoliating “sponge” for our river baths.  Four days and my Ibu was serving every meal in the coconut bowl I carved myself! And then we had to say bye :(

It’s not quite the same in Bedulu because we don’t all live in the same banjar.  Everything’s close, don’t get me wrong, but I can’t just yell over the wall to Becca eating breakfast next door, or watch my Ibu step outside the compound and likely be within several feet of some sort of relative and/or best friend.  I guess you don’t realize how “big” Bedulu seems to the Balinese until you spend some time in a real village. 

I guess I should talk more about what we did there…

We each had a new homestay family.  Some students were in the same compound as each other because several of the compounds house more than one family.  I was on my own with an adorable, adorable Ibu who’s 35 and giggles a lot and has hair that goes down to her waist.  She’s actually our teacher who’s wife’s died wife’s sister (meaning her sister died), which made it all the more adorable to see how nice she is.  My Bapak was on the quieter side.  He, like most of the village men, is a farmer in the rice field.  Then I had two little siblings, Putu and Kadek…not surprising given that those are the names for kids #1 and #2 here.  Ooh also we had a 2-week-old puppy. SO cute.  And probably the closest thing I’ve seen to an American puppy since I’ve been here.  They let us pick it up and play with it, although they warned us to be careful because it couldn’t bathe.  It mostly just slept in a little ball beside the wood-burning stove in the kitchen.  And, of course, it ate a little puppy serving of rice three times a day.

Things were much more traditional at my compound in the village.  There was the single mandi room with a squatting toilet and a murky green water filled bucket bath tub.  Somehow it felt really clean though…it hadn’t adopted the same damp smell that my bathroom in Bedulu is starting to have.  And I’d never used a squatter before, but it’s an incredibly convenient invention if you ask me.  That’s the position people got in to use the bathroom before there ever was a bathroom…so doesn’t it kinda make sense?  There’s no touching anything involved, no nothing…you just kinda hang out on the two treaded footpads beside a perfectly positioned plastic hole.  We did all act like Westerners and bring a roll of toilet paper, but, other than that, I was surprisingly pleased with the squatter.

Every day we bathed in the river.  That’s not really what the locals usually do—it was just more fun for us, and a pleasant reminder of the joys of water pressure.  I kind of felt like a little animal all weekend, between the squatting and the river bathing and the carving coconut bowls and eating with my hands.  One morning I actually bathed 3 times.  I took a bucket bath at home, then we walked across the river to visit a balian’s house and another girl and I both fell in, and then I took a real bath in the river after that.  It’s the most clean I’ve felt the whole trip!

On our first morning in the village, we hoe’d the rice fields.  Stack upon stack of endless, curving green, framing reflective pools of rice sprouts, with mountains and palm trees in the distance on every side.  We worked (very ineffectively..) then had races and mud fights.  But we got in trouble for our attempted army attack on the level above us cause we were apparently mixing up the seedbeds…oops!  After the races, our teacher’s dad (who lives in the village) carried baskets of fresh young coconuts up on his back for us to eat and drink while the mud dried.  It all washed off wonderfully with our dip in the river!  I’m having to readjust now to my wall-pipe, quasi shower thing..

We spent the days doing a variety of “traditional village” things.  We ate cooked dirt that tasted (surprisingly..) like smokey clay, we spent hours carving those dang bowls, we went on an herb walk and chopped veggies to make sambal, we hung out in front of the warung (food stall), and we interviewed locals.  In our down time, the Indonesian students got out the guitar and we just sat and sang together…from Blink 182 to Backstreet Boys to some covered version of Allison Krauss’ “When You Say Nothing At All”, it’s amazing how many English songs they know.  Most of them fall into the “emo-pop” category, which is fitting because they way the students carry themselves, you might thing they were an Asian sensation pop band.  Some of them actually are in a band called “Dysentery Gary”.  And they throw up the double peace signs in almost every posed picture.  They were such goofballs. 

It was refreshing being with students our age.  They go to school in the capital city, so they weren’t accustomed to this traditional medicine using, family camp style, farming life either.  Some of it was just as much of an adjustment for them, so it was nice for us to all get used to it together. 

I sure got my dosage of traditional medicine while I was there.  That added to my feeling like a little animal.  I interviewed one of the old women in the village about some of the different local medicines, like creams used for cold feet and juices used for fevers and heartburn.  Then we got to help make them and test them out.  It was tough work…lots of grinding and pounding…and I don’t actually know if it worked cause I didn’t have heartburn to begin with, but it was fun to try!  The locals said that no one there gets serious illnesses, like cancer, diabetes, heart disease, etc.  “We’re happy and active and eat well.  Why would we get sick?” is what they said.  I think maybe they just don’t identify those serious illnesses for what they are.  Everything happens for a reason…so someone dying is just someone dying and it’s not what they died of but why they died that seems to take precedence.

At night we would walk up to the rice fields and sit and look at the moon.  One night it was after the village-wide flirtation dance, where we all had to dance in front of everyone to try and “woo” this traditionally dressed girl (NOT my idea of fun..).  Two nights it was after some ear-drum-bruising rounds of gamelan.  They wanted us to try to play it, and it was a really nice gesture…but when you have 20+ people trying to bang 8 repetitive notes on drums and symbols and xylophones over and over for a span of 2 hours, everyone starts to get a little cranky and headache-y.  Good thing we had the full moon and eastern constellations to help distract us from the ringing sound afterwards..

Another theme of the animal (more specifically monkey) like weekend was weird shit on my skin.  I guess my scalp got burned in Uluwatu, but due to my lack of mirror in the village, I had no idea until someone told me that there were large flakes in my hair.  Sick.  After our baths in the river, one of my friends picked them out for me baha.  Then I put some of the traditional medicine stuff on my feet and it created a nice orange crust that fell off gradually throughout the day.  And apparently when I fell in the river I hit a rock cause I had a nice big knot/bruise on my calf.  When I showed it to my Ibu, she brought out a red onion and crushed it and stuck it on there!  She said I wasn’t allowed to peel it off myself, it had to fall on it’s own time, so I’m sure I smelled really nice by the time I got to the wayang (traditional shadow puppet) show the last night. 

Our last morning, we got up at 5 to watch the sunrise from the rice fields.  It was so beautiful—Mt. Agung and Mt. Batur off in the distance, the moon still way up in the sky, opposite the rising pink and orange.  I wonder if there’s a point where the natural beauty of the view atop a rice field ever becomes too commonplace?  I really hope not.  I think I could have stayed there forever!

I actually might go back to a small village for my ISP period, assuming I can find something to research.  I don’t know that it would be the same though without other students there though.  Maybe if I just keep practicing my Indonesian! 

So now we’re back in Bedulu.  I hope I don’t sound too upset about it!  It’s just this dang festival that I was so excited about before I came here but is proving to be a really strange adjustment now. It’s a real effort not to abuse the proximity of Ubud when we’re in Bedulu…because even though checking my email here has a tendency to stress me out, it’s so easy just to whip out 30 cents for a bemo ride and come into town when we have free time.  After returning from the village though, I don’t have that much desire to be here.  It’s not even an option for the next few days though because I have to work as an MC at this festival.  I feel so bizarre—dressed in traditional garb, telling the audience to silence their cell phones, shuffling around with the microphone in Q&A sessions.  What on earth qualified me to do this??? I have absolutely no idea.

There really are some fascinating writers here, so I’m trying to focus my attention on appreciating them rather than pondering the strangeness of the expat culture.  Like yesterday…I was at a session with Fatima Bhutto (who I think is one of the most naturally beautiful people I’ve ever seen).  And I know the people running the show are just some international, down-to-earth, literature lovers, but I don’t know how to come home from a day interacting with them in their “serene” and “exotic” venues to my fam’s feast of finger-food veggies and rice.  And what’s worse is I don’t even know if I’m justified to feel like this…cause it’s not like I’m a local either…and I have only been here for 5 weeks..

Alright, I have to go because I’ve been sitting here for way too long.  No MC-ing today, but I’m going to listen to some of the sessions.  Hopefully they’ll be enjoyable.  Next week we’re going to Lovina…I don’t really know what’s there, but I guess I’ll find out!  And then after that is the big big festival in Bedulu.  That will be my Balinese replacement for Halloween.

:)