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Published: February 16th 2008
Me (Ubud, Bali)
We stop the car to capture the breath-taking views... of me.Dalton and I left Houston with bellies full of buffalo burgers on Sunday, Feb 10, 2008. Flying through Phoenix, we arrived without incident at LAX, where I ran into a friend from Brazil, Guilherme. I couldn't believe he recognized me from across the airport after 7 years. Guilherme was on his way to Australia and we promised to catch up via email.
We arrived in Taipei to bad news and not even the free custard steam buns could lift my spirits. While we were flying, the President of East Timor, Jose Ramos-Horta, had been shot and was in critical condition. As I was to fly to Timor on Friday, this posed a bit of a problem.
But we soldiered on, and were upgraded to Business Class on our Taipei-Bali flight. Dalton took to it and declared he could never go back to coach.
We arrived in Bali and went straight to Ubud, checked into a hotel and went looking for massages. We ended up at Salon Milano and had fantastic hour-long massages for 80,000 Rp. (about US$8).
The next day we rented a driver and drove up to one of the volcanoes, stopping
Palm-reading (Ubud, Bali)
Dalton, Me and Ketut Liyer seek answers to my fate. at a temple and having a pleasant lunch of chicken sate and fish by the crater lake. Dalton continued his avid wooing of Balinese cats by jumping up with child-like wonder usually reserved for small children on Christmas morning every time he saw or heard a cat.
As we headed back to Ubud, I asked the driver to make a small detour and visit Ketut Liyer, a healer, painter, palm reader featured in the book,
Eat, Pray, Love, which Oprah and I both highly recommend.
What my palm reading lacked in depth, it made up for in novelty and entertainment value. The overall theme was that I was "very good girl" (to which Dalton had to stifle a laugh) with good luck and 74%!g(MISSING)ood karma. After feeling my shin, he announced I was a good driver (to which Dalton openly laughed) having had one minor accident (which is true, close only counts in horseshoes and hand grenades). He said I was in my third life but would surely go to heaven and not hell. It seemed he was playing a bit fast and loose with his religious paradigms, but who am I to judge? He
Dalton (Ubud, Bali)
Dalton reclines in the very same bale at Bumbu Bali that my mom and stepdad reclined in 3 years earlier. said I would marry at 34 and have 2 children, but that I must take care not to have sex 3 times on my wedding night, only 2. And it was very important that I wait an hour between or my baby would be born tired. Hmmm, okay.
The next day we came down to Kuta Beach. We had high hopes for Dalton's last night in Bali, but alas, a torrential downpour interfered and we spent the evening in the hotel room drinking Bintang beer, playing gin rummy and praying Dalton's pants would dry in time for his flight to Bangkok the next day.
He left on Friday, Feb 15 and I set out to explore just how far I could make a few dollars go. I ran into Mike and Maggie, Kansas natives, at the hotel and we met up later that night to check out the bars. We ended up at a reggae bar that had a great band, whose Balinese lead singer spoke with a Jamaican accent between songs.
That's it for now and for the time being, I am a beach bum in Bali waiting for news from East Timor.
Tomlin, Cash (Kuta, Bali)
Dalton and the Man in Black tell it like it is.
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fran ruddick
non-member comment
East Timor
I suppose you know that Netty's husband, Alfredo Reinado, was also killed. What a sad story. He certainly flamed out in the end, and in such a self-destructive way. Who knows what Netty will do next, she's in Australia with four kids, and the government there has denied her the right to stay. She's making a final appeal. If you want her email address, I'll send it to you. Fran