Bali in your Face

You wake up one morning and the calendar says it is time to move. Am I ready to leave this place. Sure I've been here for almost 3 weeks, but was that enough. I just started to really feel like I know this neighborhood, city, region, country.... and now you want me to go? It happens like that. There is excitement attached to a touch of sadness. You are going to a new place, but you are leaving what is now familiar. If you stayed you would without a doubt dive deeper, drop to further depths of culture and knowledge. You may even meet that special somebody today that changes your life. At the same time all that could be waiting for you when you get to your next location. This is how it happened for me on May 15th of 2008. I woke up in Vientiane Laos. Three weeks had passed since I crossed the border from Thailand. What a distant memory Thailand is now. Laos has been my home and land of discovery. The itinerary says the flight leaves at 1pm. I only have 4 hours. It is really over. But Bali Indonesia is waiting for me on the other end of the flight. With a quick stopover in Malaysia to change planes, I should be in Kuta Bali by the evening. The rush of moving on to a new Country.... it far surpasses any change of town, city, or even province.


The cool evening air whips across my face as I speed down Jelan Legian. My cloths are drenched in sweat from the vigorous workout I just had at Ade Rai’s Hammerhead Gym. The breeze against my wet clothes gently cools my whole body. As I swerve around the slower traffic and avoid the oncoming cars with expert precision I find myself driving through a thick cloud of smoke. That smoke which bellows out into the street from the restaurant on the corner is filled with the sweet smell of chicken sate. A long bed of burning hot wood chips with chicken skewers spread over them. The fan, directed at the BBQ to keep the coals hot, doubles as an advertisement for the restaurant. The aroma for sweet marinated chicken almost makes me subconsciously pull my motorcycle off the road for dinner. That’s right, my motorcycle. All 100cc of pure asian power between my legs propels me swiftly through the crowded and crazy streets of Bali. I just finished my evening workout at the gym and now I’m making the 15 minute drive through a maze of one way roads to the night market. A quick left, then right, and now I’m on a back alleyway that weaves past countless small eateries that are packed with locals. Another right turn and back left and I find myself back on Jelan Legian right in the heart of Kuta tourism. Surf shop after surf shop, with clubs, restaurants, bars, and retail stores mixed throughout. Hundreds of people walking up and down the street, window-shopping, answering to the local touts who offer their transport services. I hear a loud whistle and turn to see a parking attendant that is flagging down traffic to allow a parked car an opportunity to back out and enter the flow of traffic. The other cars on the road obey the waving command of the parking attendant while the rest of us on motorbikes maneuver around the obstruction. Thump, thump, thump… the club music has already started at Bounty, the very popular night spot in Kuta. Down the road a bit I hear an Indonesian cover band belt out the lyrics to a Gun’s and Roses tune. Kuta is a frenzy of activity this time of night and will continue to pump out energy until the wee hours of the morning. Another left and one more right turn and I’m just down the road from the night market. I kill the engine and hop off my bike. I walk up to the familiar face of the woman working the Nasi Campur food stand I have made my nightly eatery since I discovered it on my second night in Kuta. She smiles when she sees me, happy to have my continuing business and friendship. I walk behind the counter as she spoons a mound of rice onto my plate. She begins to spoon various different meats and vegetables onto my plate after I prompt her to do so. Chicken curry, jackfruit chicken curry, meet curry, bamboo shoots, spinach, eggplant, minced beef, swordfish, egg…. The plate piles higher and higher until I am certain I’ll be full. I sit down with my spoon in my right hand and fork in the left (a typical way to eat in my southeast asian countries… don’t ask for chopsticks dude… you’re not in china). She serves me up a hot glass of tea which may sound strange but a hot glass of tea really does compliment a spicy meal on a warm evening (if you’re going to sweat anyways, might as well make it a good one). A little rice, some meat, veggies, a little chili sauce… each perfect bite gets washed down with some delicious tea. Eventually the plate is empty and I sit for a few moments and take in the atmosphere. Since I sat down a family of 4, mom, dad, brother and sister, arrived on their one motorbike. They all sat down and ordered dinner and drinks. The baby girl and I have been making faces at each other and smiling for the last 5 minutes or so. They have just come from worshipping. The young boy looks just like his father and mirrors his movements almost identically. They stand up to leave and pay all of 5 dollars for the four of them. Back on their motorbike and out of my life. I stand up and pay the $1.50, get on my bike, hand the parking attendant 5 cents, make a left and I’m back in the crazy flow of traffic in Kuta. Within minutes I arrive back at Segara Sadhu Inn, my room for the last week. I shower off the sweat from my workout and dress myself for the night. About 5 minutes out from the front door to my room I find myself on the beach. Nighttime on the beach in Kuta is perhaps the most enjoyable of anytime. While there are hundreds of people around, most of them are not there to bother you, and I can walk the beach and enjoy some peace. I do this almost every night. Head down to the beach after dinner, or with my dinner, sit down and enjoy the cool ocean breeze. Then I walk. The beach goes on for miles and miles. You could walk all night. Tonight my feet take me a few miles up the beach. I turn up a road and begin the journey back to my room. Through crowded streets and quiet ones, past big shopping areas and past small family compounds, the scenery changes at every corner, and if you pay attention you are bound to find so many unique shops and homes. It’s almost midnight by now. I’ve been walking for a couple hours and after a long morning of surfing, and afternoon of laying in the sun and playing cards on the beach with my Indonesian friends, an evening of working out at the gym, and a night of walking, I’m spent. The fan in my room spins overhead and the gentle thump thump of the ocean beach club down the road is all that I hear as I drift off to sleep.


I had arrived in Bali on May 15th and wanted nothing more than to find a place to stay for a week or more. I felt like I had been on the move for the better part of two months. Even in some of the places I visited where I stayed more than 4 or 5 days, it was never planned and I always felt like I was moving. It can wear on you after a while. Unpacking and repacking your backpack every couple days, getting on busses and boats, taking flights… I really wanted to just set up shop somewhere and remove all the thoughts of moving for a little bit. So in Kuta, my first stop in Bali, I rented a room for 8 days, a motor bike for the duration of my stay, a surfboard for a week, and purchases a week long membership to the local gym. I was determined to find some routine in my days here while still remaining open to whatever opportunities presented them to me. I was going to surf everyday, as many hours as I could handle. I was going to go to the gym and work out with weights, a luxury I have not had for the vast majority of my trip. I was going to eat terrific Indonesian food everyday on the beach and at the markets. Hopefully along the way I’d meet some good people and get a taste of what Bali is all about. Turns out I met terrific people, both backpackers and locals. As far as getting a taste of what Bali is all about, I would say that Kuta is not the place to do that. You can get a taste of Kuta is all about, but to say that Kuta is a great representation of Bali is a flat out lie. Kuta has become the tourism hub of Bali and if you don’t pay attention closely you can completely miss any remaining elements of Balinese culture that are around.

Despite the complete transformation that Kuta has undergone in the past 20 years, one thing remains the same. The Balinese people are incredibly kind. First you have to understand that this entire place is surviving because of tourism. The dollars are getting pumped through Kuta and the surrounding areas and everyone wants to get their hands on some of those dollars. If they don’t then their families suffer. It doesn’t take a trained eye to see that the tourism dollars are not being evenly distributed amongst the Balinese people. In many cases that money never sees the bottom of a Balinese pocket, as many western entrepreneurs have come to Bali and built big hotels, clubs, and restaurants that suck many tourism dollars right out of the local economy. With that said it is no wonder that lots of Balinese small business owner, street touts, and beach vendors are aggressive. They are trying to get you business before someone else does. You can expect a constant barrage of locals trying to sell you things, get you to come look in their shops, use their motorbike for transport, take their taxi, rent their surfboard, get a massage at their shop… the list goes on. You go through stages with it. At first you might be overwhelmed. Then you may just find it all humorous. There is going to be some eventual irritation and frustration. Then perhaps you’ll be angry. And once again you may transition back to humor. But behind all of that are genuinely great people. Whether you decide to give them business or not you can more than likely be assured that if you stop to talk to them they will be might friendly and may perhaps become your friend. When you decide to do business with them I found in general they are pretty honest and won’t try to rip you off, and if they do not too bad. This of course was my experience with the young guys that I rented my surfboard from. For just about 5 dollars a day I had myself a surfboard for an entire week. No questions asked, no passport exchange, no “where do you stay”, just money in their pocket and a surfboard in my hand. Plus, everyday I came down to the beach I was able to keep all my belongings at their surf board rack, I never felt like my valuables were in jeopardy of being stolen, they played cards with me for hours everyday, talked with me, laughed with me, did magic tricks with me, and we just genuinely great company. Sure I had to bargain with them on that first day on the beach. But in the end I felt like I knew them pretty well. Gede introduced me to his son, I showed Thomas some of my magic trick secrets, and when my Mom finally came to Bali to meet me they insisted that I bring her by to meet them and sure enough I did.

Then there was Ketut. Ketut is Balinese for fourth child. This may not be news to many of you. In fact if you read the score “Eat Pray Love” then you know that Ketut is the name given to most fourth born children in most families in Bali. Names like Wayan are given to the first born, Made the second, and Nyoman the third. A fifth gets the name Wayan and the order starts all over again. Their like nicknames only they stick. So walk out into the street in Bali and yell Ketut and you’re likely to get several heads turning. As for my Ketut, the one I met my first day in Bali, he was another example of a charming guy who was trying to sell me something but turned out to be a great contact and friend. He rented me my motorbike for the week. Once I had agreed to rent from him he was constantly trying to help me out in any way he could, finding me better deals on accommodation, the cheapest surf boards, easy transportation, and if I needed anything he worked for Kodak and could probably get me a good price. He spent an entire hour one afternoon just driving me around to find a better deal on accommodation. Ultimately I stayed at the place I had been at since night one but it was quite a nice gesture. He too got a chance to meet my Mom when she arrived and he was kind enough to arrange some transportation for she and I to Ubud through his friend K.K.

“Get the hell out of Kuta!” These words were playing themselves over and over in my head when I arrived in Bali. Someone I had met on the backpacker circuit had told me that Kuta was not the place to stay. Granted, he had a magnificent time in Indonesia, and the best times he spent were not in Bali but on Java, the island to the West of Bali. So it makes sense that he would tell me to get out of Kuta and head somewhere else, that is where he found peace and joy. But time and again on this trip I have found peace when others found chaos, I have experienced fun where others met lack of stimulus, and I have discovered culture where all you see on the surface is buckets of booze and repeats of Friends playing on TV. Perhaps I was eager to do just the opposite of getting the HELL OUT OF KUTA. In a place that is so filled with tourists you may think that making friends with locals and getting to know Balinese or Indonesian people would be absent from the experience. But aside from the surfing and great food, my time in Kuta will be memorable to me because of the terrific Indonesian people I met and the relationships I made. There are countless people that I am certain I could return to in a years time, walk up and say hello, and without hesitation they would remember me and we would share a great laugh and conversation. I already told you about Ketut, Gede and Thomas, the night market Nasi Campur lady, but there were plenty more.

On the beach each day I had two food stops that were mandatory. First off the food was terrific and demanded a daily indulgence. Secondly, when you are surfing for that many hours the calories never seem to get replenished and you are just hungry. Thirdly, the two women running these adjacent food stalls were so nice and warm that I got happy each time I saw them. The first lady servee me sweet hot tea and fried tempeh. Each morning she would fry up a big batch of tempeh, tofu, battered bananas and potatos. They would sit in a giant plastic crate just waiting for folks to come up and grab them. I would also get about 5 or 6 pieces of tempeh, cover them in chili sauce and a drizzle of sweet soy sauce. That along with my tea would run me about a dollar. I would grab a small plastic stool and have a seat, chatting away with this woman who loved that I loved her tempeh. She always asked me if I had a girlfriend and when I came by one day with a girl I had just met on the beach to have tea she was so excited to see I had a female companion. She asked me about her each day after that.

The other lady on the beach that I got to know was serving up Gado Gado. This dish is a mix of steamed vegetables and peanut sauce. Other ingredients get tossed in depending on who is making it and where they are from. She liked to put in small bits of tofu and rice. But the key to a great Gado Gado is in the peanut sauce, and having tried many Gado Gado’s while in Indonesia I can say that this woman made the best by far. It all started one day when I was walking past her stand and I started to stare at a dish that some guy was eating. It of course was the aforementioned Gado Gado, but I didn’t know that at the time. He pointed and said, “you want to try, very cheap.” Those 6 words are about all that need to be said to me to get me to try something. So he order me one. I watched the process closely. The magic all happens with a mortar and pestle. One chili, some palm sugar, salt, fermented prawn paste, slivers of young banana, and whole peanuts. She grinds away and slowly the ingredients become one. A little water gives the paste a sauce like consistency. In a short while there is no evidence of separate ingredients, just one smooth sauce, all mashed by hand. Then steamed green beans, bean sprouts, cucumber, tofu, and slices of rice that has been steamed in a banana leaf and formed into logs. The sauce and veggies are all tossed together and served up. I took so much interest in her preparation every day. She really appreciated my attention to detail. She would let me come behind the cart and look through the ingredients. The smile she would get every time I walked up to order another was priceless. All that love and deliciousness for a mere 50 cents.

The last group of friends I made that I will mention here in this blog were the men who came from Sumatra. Sumatra isn’t just a blend of Starbucks coffee. It is actually an island in the Indonesian Archipelago. This is the most Westerly island of the 5 major ones and these gentlemen came from a village at the far west reaches of Sumatra. They were Westerners… so to speak. They had come from their humble village, all the way to Bali, in hopes of learning valuable lessons about tropical fish farming. Since the tsunami that his this part of the world several years back they have been working hard to rebuild their lives. Their geographical location made their island and village one of the most effected by the tsunami. In the last two years they have made tremendous accomplishments in improving the infrastructure of their home. Now they want to learn how to profit from their waters. They were in Bali to learn how to successfully turn their fishing business into a surplus that they could export to countries like America. After saving money for 2 years this group of 12 men had organized and taken their first flight ever, and first trip off their island, to Bali via Jakarta. They stayed at my Guesthouse in Kuta and early one morning met me over a cup of coffee. We talked for a long time, almost 2, about everything I have already mentioned. They were happy to hear about my travels and home. We shared many stories in those 2 hours and exchanged contact information. They were very excited to have learned so much on their visit to Bali and were eager to get home and put their new tools to work in their village.

I managed to find a couple afternoons to get out of Kuta and explore the surroundings coastline. I even made it across to the east coast of Bali one day. But when it came down to it everything I wanted and needed was all within a short walk or motorbike ride from my room at Segara Sadhu. A great beach, wonderful people, incredible food, and an energy that was unlike any other place I have experienced in my life.

We made it… all the way to Bali.
I love you all for coming this long way with me.
Marcus

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