Steps

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It seems the block out blinds in our hotel room are quite effective; we thought it was about 6am when we stirred from our slumbers, but a quick check of our devices suggests we were out by a bit, like say about six hours. I suppose that’s jet lag for you. So so much for breakfast; it looks like it’s straight on to lunch. It feels slightly strange to be completely surrounded by Aussies again after three months when they‘ve been a relative rarity.

We head out for a wander down onto the wide grey sand of Seminyak Beach. The surf’s pounding in and signs on the flags recommend against swimming. I think there might be more motorbikes here than people … on the roads that is, not on the beach; the sand on the beach is a bit soft, so I think they might get bogged if anyone tried to ride one of them down here. It seems that if you’re too stingy to fork out for a normal taxi you can use a motorbike taxi instead. And how do we know this; well there’s a constant stream of riders with “Gojek” written on the backs of their shirts offering us lifts. I thought It was fairly obvious we were together, but unless I’m missing something there’s only room for one passenger on the backs of these tiny conveyances. Now that I come to think of it they did seem to be focussing their attention a bit too strongly just on Issy.

If the beautiful and unique Balinese culture ever goes the way of the dodo us Aussies are going to have a lot to answer for. I’m sure the many beach bars offering “ice cold pi**”, and those that have elected to give themselves names like ”The Bullsh** Corner Bar” think they’re going to drag homesick Aussies in in their droves … and we might have been tempted too if only we could stop cringing.

The beach was relatively unoccupied mid-afternoon but it’s a whole different story as sunset approaches. It’s not just tourists now, it looks like sunset watching is something the locals are also very keen on. It’s a hive of physical activity - boxing, jogging, horse riding, kite flying (I’m not 100% sure that one’s a “physical activity”), a full blown soccer match, and beach volleyball. There’s even a group of pairs of ballroom dancers strutting their stuff in front of some portable speakers. And if you’re not into physical activity well you can just plonk yourself down on a colourful bean bag on the sand with several hundred of your closest friends, order a drink, listen to the blaring music, and take in the beautiful vista.

We dine in at one of our bit-too-luxurious-for-us hotel‘s many restaurants. Our table’s next to a small step, and why is that worth mentioning I hear you ask? Well the guy at the table next to us tripped over it on the way in and nearly ended up spreadeagled all over the floor. The staff looked a bit concerned when they came over to check if he was alright. It’s the only step in the floor of the whole restaurant, and we’re still not quite sure why it’s there. There are two steps right across each end of the lobby too. That’s also otherwise all on one level, so we’re not quite sure why they’re there either. At least there are signs, lots of them, in front of these accidents waiting to happen warning people to, what else, “mind the step”, or sometimes a more polite “please mind the step”. And they’re the steps that you can see … as long as you haven’t had one too many Bintangs. I went for a quick dip in the pool this afternoon. There was a giant vertical step right across the middle of that too, and no hope of seeing it until I stumbled down it and nearly drowned … well not really ... but it did make me a bit wary not to stub my toes on the way back. I can’t help but wonder whether more than one architect might have worked on the hotel design and the steps are where their designs met and the levels didn’t quite match up. We haven’t been down to the basement car park yet, but steps in the floor down there might make for an interesting driving experience.

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